by L. J. Martin
“And why is he being counseled?” I ask.
“It seems the Iman doesn’t approve of his politics.”
“And who does Mohammad hang with?”
Gilbert shrugs. “I only have one other name so far. Amar Jamil Mehrzad, a Yemeni who lives with his mother on Hudson Bay Avenue.”
“And are we into a cell phone on either of them?”
“I tracked Al-Hafiz from the Iman’s phone. Al-Hafiz had a throw-away and I presume he’s changed it again as it’s gone dead. I was able to track Mehrzad from Al-Hafiz’s phone before it left the world, but now that number, Mehrzad’s, has gone dead as well. It seems very strange they’d both ditch their phones if they had nothing to hide.”
Pax steps in. “A good assumption.”
“A damn good assumption,” I add, then turn to Pax. “Have we heard anything from Detective Bollinger or Merrick?”
Pax gives me a tight smile. “Merrick called this afternoon,” he glances at his watch and sees it’s after midnight, “…yesterday afternoon, and I let it go to answering. He wants you front and center. Nothing from Bollinger, but I’m not surprised if we don’t hear from either of them for days. They’re both a little busy at the moment.”
“Anything on what kind of explosive was used at the party?” I ask.
“Too soon.”
I turn to Vanessa, who speaks both Arabic and Farsi. “How about you going with me to Mehrzad’s place? I want to plant some GPS and listening devices and generally recon the place.”
“Why me?” Vanessa asks, a little wide-eyed.
“You speak Arabic and I presume that’s the language of the abode. And I don’t want to waste time communicating anything I pick up and can’t understand.” Then I turn to Pax. “Stay on Bollinger, and keep checking with Sol. I’m worried as hell about him. As smart as he is, he’s no field guy. I wish Skip was here.” I turn to Gilbert. “Please note the address for me and go dig out a couple of voice activated transmitters, a receiver, and a half dozen GPS trackers.” He nods, and hustles out.
Skip Allen is another recon Marine from my old outfit, a total badass who’s helped us out more than once. He hangs in Reno doing private security, body-guarding, and a little bounty hunting for bail bondsmen in northern Nevada and into northern California. He’s big, blond, burly, and fearsome. And no one loves a good fight, fists or firearms, more than Skip. Saying he’s a little crazy is like saying Mt. Whitney is a little hill.
Pax smiles. “I’m ahead of you, as usual. I called and he punted his current job at Harrah’s and is on his way.”
“Did he sound straight?” I ask.
“Sounded fine. I woke him up, but other than sleepy, he sounded good.”
Skip’s been known to try any drug waved at him and has been to rehab more that once. That said, no one’s better at your back. If he’s sober.
“Keep me posted,” I say to Pax, and wave to Vanessa to follow. She looks a little unsure, but a little excited as well.
Gilbert meets us at the bottom of the stairway up to Pax’s office and hands me a small box full of electronics. I turn to Vanessa. “You got wheels?”
“My Fiat.”
“Good. Follow me to my ministorage and we’ll park yours there and take the van.”
“We can go in my Fiat. It's pretty innocuous.”
“That's right, but it doesn't have a dozen firearms and other occasionally necessary toys.”
35
Hudson Bay Avenue is on the north side of Vegas in a lower-lower-end neighborhood, some homes nicely maintained, some run down. Most are three bedrooms with a bath and three-quarters built in the sixties. Many have only covered parking and a few single-car garages. Only four bedroom ones have two-car garages. The yards are mostly crushed rock, gravel, and cactus, with the occasional mesquite; an attempt to replicate the desert. A few have green artificial turf, but very few.
The Mehrzad house is one of the single-car garage models. But this one has a garage that’s been converted into some kind of room. We cruise by and I note it looks like there’s been a party and everyone has passed out. There are two cars, nose to tail, in the narrow driveway and three parked directly in front, one blocking the driveway…and no lights on in the house, other than one low glow from a window centered in a recessed wall where a single-car garage door once stood.
We park a half block away and I give Vanessa a quick lesson in using the receiver and its recording feature. The mate to the small transmitting devices I carry. And a handheld Motorola radio. I take its mate, a pair of transmitters, and a half-dozen tiny magnetic GPS locators with me.
My S&W .380 is tucked in the small of my back under the loose t-shirt I wear, and I've pocketed a couple of extra magazines.
As I leave the van I instruct her, “The keys are in the ignition. Should you hear gunfire, get at least two blocks away. Call Pax, and clue him in, but under no circumstances, unless I call you on radio or cell, do you return here. The code word is…” I think a moment, then remembering her favorite milkshake flavor, offer, “Caramel.” She smiles.
“Even if I yell at you to return, or anyone else does, don’t return without the code word. Got it?”
She salutes, like a dutiful girl scout.
There’s a chest-high property-line hedge running the length of the two cars in the driveway, so I’m able to slip down it and to the window. Gravel crunches underfoot, but not loud enough to be heard over the noise from inside the house. I guess there’s more going on than appears from the street, as I hear laughter and a loud TV. I plant a listening device, using its suction cup, against the window but up against the frame. You’d have to be looking for the three- quarters-of-an-inch, square, flat-black transmitter to notice it, even in the daylight.
I stand for a moment, hearing a TV and reports of the bombing, and the laughter coming from what appears to be three or more occupants. They’re laughing, and talking, but speaking Arabic. I have a smattering of the language, but nowhere near the command needed to interpret the rapid-fire, multi source, chatter coming from inside. But Vanessa does, and I hope she’s listening closely and recording the palaver.
My handheld vibrates and I double click the transmit button and place it to my ear.
“It's them, it's them.” She's a little shrill. “Get back here.”
I whisper. “A little work to do first.”
Before I return to the van, I place another transmitter at what appears to be a living room window, and a GPS device on each of the five cars, noting the device number and the make, model, year—to my best guess—and license number of each vehicle.
There are definite advantages to being a private operative and not having to have a warrant to do exactly what I’ve just done.
Then I go back to the van, which is faithfully waiting; it’s quiet, but its occupant is anything but.
“It’s them,” she says too loudly through the open passenger side window. “It’s them; they’re laughing and congratulating each other, in Arabic, every time some horrid thing comes on the TV.”
“The cocksuckers,” I say, then shake my head. “Sorry Vanessa.”
“The dirty raghead goat fuckers,” she says and smiles tightly.
I nod in agreement.
Calling Pax I report the ID numbers of the GPS devices and their respective vehicles, make, model and license number. He says he'll get Gilbert digging up the ownership. Then I ask the status of Skip and his arrival time.
“Six thirty AM.”
I glance at my watch, but Pax speaks before I can. “That's three and a half hours. What's the plan?”
“You, Skip and I are doing a home invasion. These assholes are the ones who bombed the party. Vanessa has a recording of them laughing and hooting at the TV coverage.”
“So, they're friggin' ragheads. They were dancing in the street over half the world on nine one one. That doesn't mean they're the bombers.”
“Logical. However one of them said, 'I should have moved the payload closer to t
he house’.”
He's silent for a moment, then concedes. “So, when are we going in?”
“They were still partying down when we drove away. I want to be back as soon as we can get here from picking Skip up.”
“It'll be daylight,” Pax cautions. “Well into it, even if his plane's on time.”
“I'm afraid they'll run for it. There are five cars parked outside.”
“You've got them all marked.”
“Yep, but I still don't want to take the chance. We go in masked, tie them up unless we have to send a few to raghead heaven, and call the cops and leave. After we get a few taped confessions.”
Pax laughs. “So, you think they're gonna cough up the truth.”
“They've killed over fifty Americans, if they did the bus bombing which I'm not convinced they did. But just with the party bomb, they've killed nearly forty and wounded a hundred or more others. Even so, over thirty and probably forty with the party bomb. I'll have no problem getting them to talk. I'll take my pliers.”
Pax sighs deeply. “I won't eat first as I'm sure I'll lose my lunch.”
“You can stand outside and guard.”
“Get back here and get a little rest. I'll get equipped and pick up Skip. I got an hour's rest waiting for you to get here from Moapa...since I was, unfortunately, called away from Cindy.”
“Good. I hope your pencil dick falls off.”
“Fuck you. Get here so you can catch an hour or two.”
“I'm wired and want to send some hajis to meet their seventy-two virgins...virgin goats with any luck.”
36
Sol, even having driven much too fast, is a little surprised when he hurries into the giant tent that's the Moapa Casino and sees Vinny Rossi still seated at a slot machine, and not only him but Paul Rudowski at a nearby blackjack table.
Sol is a guy who likes his sleep, a big guy if you consider girth but a little...in fact way...on the soft side with a forty-inch waist. He's damn near as round as he is tall, at only five feet four; but he's very excited and currently running on adrenalin. This is the first time he's had a field assignment from Pax in years and he's not only excited but determined to prove the trust is not misplaced. For eight, ten, sometimes twelve hours a day he's normally glued to a seat in front of two computer monitors, or far worse, at a phone taking service calls from dummies who barely know how to turn their computer on, much less use the many services offered by Weatherwax. So this gig is more than merely exciting, it's invigorating.
In order to blend in with the small crowd, Sol takes a seat at a slot and begins feeding it quarters, then orders from the barmaid who comes by...a Jack rocks, as he'd seen both Pax and Mike Reardon order so many times. If he is now an operative, he will act like one, drink like one, gamble like one.
It is nearly three AM when the two goombas Mike calls Frick and Frack seem to tire of the slots and rise to head out.
Sol yawns widely, and gets up to follow fifty feet behind. He waits as they walk side by side into the parking area, then climb into an older yellow Dodge pickup. As they wheel out of the parking area, Sol runs to his Kia and follows out onto the rutted street leading west, away from the interstate. He doesn't want to be seen, so as soon as he determines their direction, he switches off his headlights—unfortunately, he does not do so completely, leaving on dim parking lights.
After only a half mile, but beyond any structures and with only a few flickering lights in the desert, he sees their brake lights, then their car lights go out altogether.
Sol pulls to the side of the narrow lane and cuts his lights the rest of the way. He waits a few minutes then begins to get nervous. He reaches for his ignition, but before he can start the Kia, bright lights flood his rear view and side mirrors. Someone has slipped up behind him. He looks back over his shoulder but is blinded by the headlights only a yard behind his vehicle.
He turns back and cranks over the Kia's engine, then his face is slammed into the steering wheel as another car...no, the yellow Dodge, backs hard into the front of his car.
He's pinned between.
Run, he thinks, and his wide body is halfway out of the tight little car when a fist smashes the left side of his face, and he goes to his knees. His own door is kicked hard into him and he sprawls to the side, only to be speared by a breath expelling wingtip in the ribs.
Gasping, he's on his back, and a wide face framed by long greasy black hair is leaning over him.
“What the hell are you doing following us, fat boy?”
“Follow...I'm not following anyone.”
He's kicked again, this time knocking the wind out, and he nearly goes unconscious.
He's gasping again, trying to catch a breath, when the face appears again.
“You follow us with no lights on and you think we're too stupid to know you’re following?”
“I wasn't—” he's kicked again, then again, this time in the head, and is knocked unconscious.
Rossi bends over him again.
“Load him in the back of the truck. There's a roll of duct tape behind the passenger seat. Tape the fat fuck up. We'll find out what he's up to when we get him in the barn. I'll get that can of gas...”
As they drive away, with Sol secured in the back, and Butch Flannigan following in a Ford 250 diesel, the Kia is completely engulfed in flames.
Unlike Pax I can seldom sleep on a whim, so I'm surprised when I'm shaken awake and open my eyes to see Skip's wide face and Viking beard over me.
“You gonna sleep your life away, Marine?” Skip asks, then guffaws.
“Hell no, I had my half hour,” I say, and grasp his hand as he pulls me up as if I weigh a hundred twenty rather than two twenty.
“Pax is packing a few things in the van...said you wanted to go visit some fellas by seven. It's six thirty.”
“Then let’s get downrange,” I say.
He hands me a cup of coffee. “This'll get your black heart started.”
“Thanks.”
As we head away from the office, with Pax driving, he informs me, “The house next door to the subjects is vacant, with a for sale sign. It's got a carport and I'm parking there. We can make it through the back yard, over the fence, packing the M4's and have a good chance of nosy neighbors not seeing us.”
“Sounds like a battle plan,” I say.
I've stationed Vanessa a half block away in her Fiat as we may need another driver. I want the van only steps away, but it may be necessary to have it flee the scene. The last thing I want is the law impounding and searching the van.
The last thing I do before waving us on is check the receiver, linked to the listening devices on the front windows. No sounds from the house, not even the TV.
The fence separating the yards is grape stake, and with each of us wearing a ski mask, carrying an M4 with Glock 19s as side arms, Kevlar vests, radios, and battle rattle belts with flash grenades and extra magazines, Skip gives the stakes two kicks and we've got a hole. We charge through and are surprised when an older woman, on her knees in a garden patch, looks up from her egg plants and gasps, covering her mouth with a hand.
“Don't scream,” I say, and help her, slightly against her will, to her feet. She's madly trying to hook a scarf over her face, and I know she must be the lady of the house. “Come on, ma'am,” I say, as soon as her modesty is satisfied.
I lead her into the back door of the house. “You speak English?”
“Of course,” she says, a little haughtily. “I have been expecting you.”
Per the plan we've formulated on the way over, Skip, who can breech damn near any door with a kick, takes up a position at the exit door from the garage room to the back yard. He'll breech when he sees or hears the report from a planned flash grenade.
The three of us wear surgical gloves as it wouldn't do to leave prints. We each carry a half dozen long cable ties to secure hands and ankles, and I lead the woman to a kitchen chair and gently push her down. “Sorry about this,” I say as I run her
arms through the ladder back chair and secure her wrists together, then each of her ankles to a chair leg. “Don't make a sound and we won't have to hurt you,” I lie, as we wouldn't if she was screaming her head off, other than a possible bump on the head.
“Do not hurt my son,” she pleads.
“With luck,” I reply. I duct tape her mouth, so she'll be uncomfortable for only a short time. “We won't be long,” I say, and hope it's true.
Pax has cleared the three bedrooms, finding one boy in bed and controlling him with duct tape and cable ties, and is quickly back to the living room, waiting by the door to what was once a garage.
He has a flash grenade in hand. “You ready?” he asks, and I nod.
37
I try the knob and the door is not locked. I ease it open and and see three young men, two asleep on the floor and one on a sofa. The flash grenade is not necessary. This will be no problem, as none of them are stirring. No weapons appear in reach of any of them—however, I don’t like a corner of the room that’s packed with chemicals and apparatus.
Pax moves between the two on the floor, puts a foot in the middle of one's chest as he picks up a heavy ceramic lamp off an end table and drops it on the other's head. Apparently Skip hears the lamp crash and it signals him into action. The door to the rear yard not only flies open, but flies off its hinges...and into Pax.
My guy awakens and attempts to sit up, but my Glock in the middle of his forehead drives him to his back. He's wide eyed, and screams at the top of his lungs.
Pax is trying to get shed of the door and the guy who was pinned by his boot rolls and, to my surprise, doesn't head for a door and escape, but rather to a corner holding a number of tanks and other equipment.
His intent is obviously evil, and he's a dozen steps from me and I can't reach him before he makes the corner...but suppressed .223 will, and I put two between his shoulder blades. He pitches forward and tangles up with the equipment. Skip is closest and just for insurance grabs the guy by the nape of his neck and seat of the pants and, as if the guy didn't weigh at least two hundred, flings him across the room, away from what appears to be a threat.
