Off Guard: A clean action adventure book

by Glen Robins

  That thought brought a shark-like grin to his face. Soon would be the day.

  Penh’s grand master plan was nearing completion. With his team of hackers from around the globe gathering in Mexico City, poised for their attack on the world’s largest, most corrupt financial institutions and their top executives, Phase II was well underway. A few more manipulations of global currencies, combined with another series of precisely-timed hack-attacks on the exchanges, which would likely be followed closely by a prepared press release from the Chinese Minister of Commerce suspending all credit to foreign banks and calling in all loans due to their cash shortfall, and mass panic would ensue. It was only a matter of time before their ultimate goal was accomplished.

  Once the clamoring started, it would be nearly impossible to stop. And with the right people, each with his hand-selected skill set in place in Mexico City, a coup there would add momentum to the collapse of the United States. One of the first moves of the new Mexican regime would be to stop trading their oil via the US dollar and move, instead, to the new currency China, Russia, and several OPEC nations had proposed. Moving oil trading away from the US dollar would cause the dollar’s value to plummet even further and, consequently, compound the staggering foreign debts of the US government, preventing them from being able to print enough money to bail themselves out of this one.

  The only thing they needed now to light the fuse for this devious chain of events was a fresh infusion of cash to pay his cohorts in crime. And Penh knew exactly where to go to get it. By getting back the $30 Million that was his, he would accomplish two goals with one stroke: put the down payment on the services to be rendered by the Mexican military and reverse the disgraces heaped upon him by Collin Cook. Once this transaction was finalized, Penh’s end of the bargain would be complete, and the fall of Western capitalism would commence.

  But first things had to come first. Embarrassment and shame must precede the calamities which were to follow. To start things off, Penh and his syndicate had already begun to unveil via online leaks a trove of stolen emails from the accounts of senior officers in some of the most respected banks, corporations, and government agencies in the United States. They would continue to be leaked in succession and would clearly outline the backhanded secret deals that had been cut at the expense of investor returns and corporate profits. Soon, the whole world would have proof of how the executives had lined their pockets and hidden their vast fortunes.

  Thousands of documents and several hundred recorded conversations were making their way to cyberspace. News agencies, social media hawks, and political bloggers of every stripe were starting to pounce. Investors would react. Self-proclaimed experts had already begun to clamor for airtime to say, essentially, “I warned you.” All the while, politicians would sling mud and insults aimed at discrediting the information, the sources, and the veracity of these scandalous-yet-true revelations, knowing full-well their cozy relationships and legislative influence aided these monsters. Indeed, many politicians, like the business executives they coddled and clung to, had much to lose. More than just the millions they garnered over the years of influence-peddling, their reputations and their very futures were beginning to crumble under the weight of this heretofore buried information, which Penh and his hackers were bringing to light—today. Yes, it would be a glorious day for truth and justice. It would be a horrible day for the greedy, pompous, and corrupt Westerners.

  These stirring machinations increased Penh’s heartrate and breathing. A wry grin spread across his tightly creased lips. He tilted his head up, pulled in a deep breath, and savored the moment.

  Penh’s satisfaction, however, was interrupted when the car began to slow. They were exiting the highway near the Sepang Circuit, the international raceway, using the side streets to get to the airport’s private entrance where Penh’s jet sat waiting.

  His phone rang as the car pulled past the security gate. Penh answered, then listened with rapt attention, nodding his head periodically. The grin left momentarily, but returned as the man on the other end concluded his narrative. “All the pieces are in place, then? I will be there in approximately twenty-four hours. Schedule the meeting.”

  Penh listened for a moment, then added, “Assure the aides to the good senators of Mexico that their cooperation will be rewarded and their bosses will be the new conquistadores of the world after the United States implodes. Mexico will be redeemed, as will every other nation that has lived out their existence as subservient dwarves to the corrupt economic superpower for generations.” Penh’s voice exuded the supreme calm and confidence of a man who held all the cards in a high-stakes poker game. His royal flush was about to open the flood gates of opportunity for the oppressed of the world.

  He listened again. “The power void is for them to figure out. I’m not concerned. Your interests will be covered—generously, I’m sure—when the dust settles and a true new world order takes shape.”

  The elegant black Mercedes rolled to a stop next to the private air strip on the far end of the airport, where all the high-powered business executives and government officials boarded their private jets. Penh had, with his fortunes and promises, secured himself a privileged place among the elites of the region.

  He smiled broadly at the sight of the Gulfstream 650 that awaited his arrival. It was a beautiful jet and a symbol of his power and elevated profile. Soon enough, he thought, it would be upgraded. Lights flashed, windows glowed, and an entourage of support staff stood at attention at the bottom of the open stairway. A food service truck pulled away as the Mercedes approached.

  Within minutes of Penh’s arrival, the plane was in the air and on its way to Mexico City.

  ****

  Villahermosa, Mexico

  June 17, 2:30 p.m. Local Time; 12:30 p.m. Pacific Time

  With the pilot responding well to treatments and Collin’s head beginning to feel normal again after rehydrating and taking a cool shower, Collin began to think through the events of the past twenty-four hours. It had been an eventful day, as they all had lately. Something in the back of his mind was banging around, begging for attention. What was it? Something forgotten. A nugget of usefulness that he tucked away in his mind and meant to remember later. But what was it? There was this something and it had gotten pushed to the background in the expediency of the moment—whichever urgent moment it was. He retraced his memories, his emotions, his reactions. Nothing jumped out at first, but that banging continued, like a kidnapee in the closet of some dark basement in one of those TV cop shows.

  Collin remembered starting a conversation with Lukas while he was in the plane, on the first leg of the day’s journey. It was early in the morning, and he was tired and cranky. That much he remembered clearly. His emotions were all tangled as he prepared to leave the hut on the beach—still were—being riddled with guilt and angst over the violence he had perpetrated on those who wanted to kill him. He started to confess to Lukas about killing Stinky and harpooning that diver, but Lukas had brushed him off. There was something else that lingered in his mind, something he felt like Lukas needed to know.

  Then it hit him. As he paced the floor of the underground safe house, something in his pocket triggered a sensory stimulus and the light switched on. The weight of Stinky’s satellite phone tapping against his thigh as the pockets of his cargo shorts swung with each step reminded him. He pulled out the yellow-and-black device and the sight of it rekindled those anxious moments in the boat when Penh breathed out his ominous threats against his mom and Emily through that very phone. He remembered the helplessness and anguish he felt knowing they were under the control of Penh’s goons, sequestered in a dingy, abandoned warehouse in the middle of nowhere. Collin also recalled bumping into Stinky’s bloated body in the submerged wreckage of the Admiral Risty, then pulling it back so he could fish the phone from the corpse’s trousers. Reliving the scene brought back the squishy sensation of the grayish and plump flesh, causing him to fight back a wave of nausea.

&n
bsp; The phone, Collin had surmised, could help them locate Penh. He had to get a hold of Lukas and remind him of this salient fact.

  Lukas sounded out of breath when he answered, but jumped right into the meat of the conversation. “I’m so glad you’re safe, buddy. I thought Miriam was pretty amazing, but I think you’re an absolute champ for landing a shot-up plane while you were fighting heat exhaustion and a sick pilot on your first ever solo flight. Amazing, man. Just amazing.”

  “It didn’t feel so amazing at the time, I’ll tell you that. It hurt—a lot.”

  “Probably something like your waterskiing crashes back in the day, if I’m picturing it right,” Lukas quipped.

  Collin shook his head and realized how good it was to have a friend on the other end of the phone, bringing him back to ground, keeping him attached to who he was. At the same time, it seemed strange to him that he had been on the ground for almost an hour, yet this was his first conversation with Lukas. “Thanks for that. And thanks for getting Miriam to help me out. I couldn’t have done it alone. That was clutch.”

  “You’ve had a pretty wild ride lately. I wish I could offer you a long, relaxing vacation, but—”

  “Hold that thought, Lukas. I have to share something with you before I forget. I think it’s pertinent and I don’t want to let it slip my mind again.”

  “OK, what’ve you got?”

  “Remember how I started to tell you about the phone I pulled off the dead guy? You remember, that one in the boat? Penh’s main guy there?”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Well, don’t you want to pull whatever information you and your brainiac crew can from this thing? I mean, I’ve got it right here.”

  “Definitely. I couldn’t have done much with it while you were in the air, but now that you’re on the ground, we can certainly process whatever information is on it. Take it to the head IT guy there, he goes by the handle Mongoose. He’ll know what to do. Tell him to upload it to Billy Bob’s FTP site.”

  “You got it. Do you think it will be useful?”

  “We’ll know more when he’s done, but I would imagine that it would give us the IP address of the phone Penh was using, if it was a smart phone like I suspect it was. That would be huge unless he switches phones frequently. If it’s a landline, which I doubt, we’d know that location. I can’t imagine he would stay in one place for very long, but it might prove helpful nonetheless.”

  “OK. I just wanted you to so something useful with it, since I can’t.”

  “Thanks. You know, you just might make a great agent someday.”

  Collin forced a laugh, then hung up.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Scripps Cancer Research Patient Clinic, La Jolla, California

  June 17, 1:15 p.m. Pacific Time

  With the curtains drawn, the room was dark, empty, and quiet except for Sarah and Emily, who lay resting peacefully after an eventful morning. The walk had been invigorating for them both, as had the conversations and stories and laughter. By the time lunch was over, all were tired and ready for a nap. Megan asked to borrow Emily’s car to take Henry back to Emily’s condo for a rest. Henry, who was still feeling the effects of the concussion he had sustained at the hands of Sarah’s abductors, became fatigued more easily than before. Headaches had become a daily occurrence in the afternoons. Richard had taken the rental car shortly after returning from their walk to drive up to Huntington Beach, at Emily’s insistence, to make sure Rob was all right. He insisted on going because, he said, he feared Emily would sneak out and go herself if no one else did.

  The gentle knock on the closed door was barely audible. The second knock was louder and more forceful. The door opened and a deep voice called out, “Hello, Mrs. Cook, Ms. Burns. May we come in?”

  Emily sat up with a jolt, alarmed by the sound of a male voice. Her whole body was instantly tense and her senses tingled. To her right, Sarah stirred and muttered, “Who’s there?”

  “Ma’am, it’s Agent Crabtree and Agent McCoy. Can we bother you for just a few minutes?”

  “Agent Crabtree? What are you doing here? Yes, you can come in. Emily, is that OK with you?”

  Emily hesitated. She shot Sarah an alarmed look and shook her head as the overhead light flicked on, but it was too late. The two agents were already in the room.

  “Good afternoon, ladies. Pardon the intrusion, but we were in the area and decided to stop in for a short visit. Hope you don’t mind.”

  Emily, still tense, stared in disbelief. Had Sarah not been there, she may have laid into them about how they had no right and no manners, but she held her tongue and let Sarah take the lead since she was obviously more comfortable with them.

  “What brings you here, Agent Crabtree? Do you have some good news for us regarding my son?”

  “Well, ma’am, more like questions, really.”

  “What kind of questions? I thought you still believed Collin was dead.” Sarah shot Emily a look of exaggerated innocence.

  This made Emily smile, but she tried to contain it.

  “Mrs. Cook, we have no proof that he is, but until we have some evidence of that fact, we’re still investigating his whereabouts.”

  “I see. And you’re wondering if he has shown up here, are you?”

  Reggie blinked and paused. “That thought had crossed my mind, but I’m sure you would have called me to tell me something as important as that, right? What I was wondering, however, is if you have spoken to him recently. Has he attempted to make contact of any kind?”

  “Agent Crabtree, I appreciate your concern for our son and I’m glad you’re still on the case. That confirms to me that you don’t really think he’s dead. It does, however, also confirm to me that you still think he’s a criminal worth chasing after. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have driven all the way down here to ask me these questions.”

  Another set of noises came from the hall. As someone pushed the door open, the voices from the hallway grew louder. When the door clicked shut, the room was quiet again. Henry and Megan stepped into view.

  “Agent Crabtree, Agent McCoy, what can I do for you?” asked Henry as he moved to the space between the two beds. He reached for his wife’s hand and squeezed it. Then he placed the other hand on the rail of Emily’s bed. She placed her hand on top of Henry’s and felt a certain sense of reassurance.

  Megan moved to the other side of her mother’s bed and held the other hand between the two of hers.

  Surprised to see him, Sarah asked why he had come back so soon.

  “Megan left her bag here; thought she might like to fire up her laptop while I slept.”

  “Mr. Cook, I was just asking your wife and Ms. Burns if they had had any recent contact with Collin. Perhaps you might know something they don’t,” said Reggie.

  “I wish I did, Agent Crabtree. I really wish I did. But, the truth is, we haven’t heard a thing. We’re going solely on faith that our son lives and is all right. We have nothing else to go on.” He paused and shifted his gaze from one agent to the other, then back. “I suppose you don’t either.”

  “We need any information you might have in regards to his location or his plans in order to ensure he does not either risk harm or injury to himself or to this country,” said Reggie.

  “To this country?” blurted Henry with incredulity. “You still think somehow that he has it in for this country? You haven’t listened to a thing we’ve told you in the past, have you?”

  “At this point, we are trying to protect both the individual and the nation as a whole.”

  “Is that right? It seems to me to be more of a witch hunt,” said Henry.

  The door burst open again. “I found out why Rob’s not answering his phone,” announced Richard as he marched into the room. He held a smartphone in a star-spangled waterproof case, waving it in the air. It was unmistakably Rob’s. “This was resting on top of the—” Richard stopped cold in his tracks. “Oh.”

  “Hello. Richard, isn’t it?” said Spinner
McCoy, the one standing closest to the door, recalling their meeting a few days earlier, after Sarah’s abduction. His hand was held out. “May I see that?” Before Richard could pull his hand back, McCoy snatched the phone away. “And who is Rob?”

  “Rob is a friend,” Richard stammered, glancing at his parents for approval. They both frowned, but didn’t say anything.

  “I see. Who would like to tell us more about this ‘friend’ and why Richard has his cell phone?” asked Reggie, his eyes darting from person to person as he scanned the room.

  Finally, Emily cleared her throat and responded. She knew the FBI agents would find out one way or another, so it would be most beneficial to not withhold information. “Rob Howell is Collin’s best friend. They are very close—always have been. Rob and I have been friends ever since I met Collin our sophomore year of high school. When Rob found out that Collin was missing at sea, he came home to comfort the Cook’s and me, knowing it would be hard on us. I expected him to be here this morning. We were supposed to talk. But he never showed up and never answered his phone, so Richard went up to the house in Huntington Beach to see what was going on since Rob was going to pick up the mail this morning before he came here to visit us.”

  “Thank you, Ms. Burns. If I remember correctly, this is the same friend who showed up shortly after Collin’s disappearance and dealt with the media as the family spokesman, am I right?” asked Reggie, looking at Sarah and Henry.

  “Yes, that’s right. He was wonderful,” said Sarah. “He took all the pressure off us and did such a nice job of helping us get more support from the community.”

  Looking back at Emily, Reggie continued his questioning. “And how long has he been in town?”

  “A few days, I guess. All I know is that he said he had come by my office the day I was . . . I was . . .”

  “Abducted?” interjected Reggie, with a delicate inflection.