by Brent Towns
Chapter 10
Retribution
“Cara, you and Traynor take the back door, Kane and I’ll go in the front.”
“Do you think they’re expecting trouble?” Kane asked, making a point about the four, armed guards that roved the perimeter.
“Too bad if they are. They’ll get no quarter from us. Shoot to kill anything with a weapon. Ready?”
They all nodded.
“Let’s go. Reaper, you lead. Cara, you follow. Once the guards are down, we split up.”
Kane led out, the silenced HK 416 raised and ready. Behind him, Cara did the same. They walked side by side to keep each other’s line of fire clear.
Kane’s HK fired once, and the guard on the right of the house jerked and then dropped without a sound. “Target down.”
Cara followed suit, and the other guard did the same. “Target two down.”
They kept moving across the dead grass until they reached the house. There were lights on inside, and they could hear noises from within. Kane used hand signals to direct Cara around to the left while he worked his way to the front door. He was almost there when he heard Cara’s voice, “Target four down.”
He and Ferrero paused for a few heartbeats. Kane used more hand signals to direct the DEA agent to watch the corner of the house. He took an M84 stun grenade from his tactical vest and readied himself to breach.
Cara’s voice came to him again. “Team two ready to breach.”
“On my mark. Three, two, …”
Suddenly Ferrero opened fire. “Target three down.”
“Shit. Go, go, go.”
Kane kicked the door open, pulled the pin on the M84, and threw it down a long hallway.
At the far end, a gang member appeared. He was holding what looked to be an AK or something similar. Kane ducked back to shield himself from the blast about to occur.
The M84 exploded, and he heard the man at the end of the hall screech. Without hesitation, he moved through the doorway and shot the gangster in the chest.
Kane started along the hallway until he reached a closed door on the left. Trying the knob, the door sprang free of the latch. He pushed it and moved into the room. It was empty, so he reversed and continued along the passage.
Ahead of him on the right was another door. This one opened, and a redheaded man without a shirt emerged holding a handgun. The HK fired again, and the wall beside the doorway looked as though some bizarre abstract artist had created an overpriced masterpiece from splattered red paint after the NATO round blew the back of his head out.
“Reaper? Cara. You got a Tango headed for the front door.”
“Roger.”
A figure with a handgun appeared in the hallway. The gun was quickly brought up ready to fire at Kane but not fast enough. Another shot from the HK, another kill.
The commotion from the rear of the house carried to him as Cara and Traynor cleared the rooms back there. When Kane reached the door from which the redhead had emerged, he burst through it and found a young woman sitting there naked, terrified, with her hands over her ears.
“Stay there,” he barked.
Backing out of the room Kane kept moving. He turned the corner at the end of the hall where it opened out into a large living area.
Suddenly a gang member appeared with an automatic rifle in his hands. He depressed the trigger, and the weapon burned through a full magazine in zero time.
The slugs ripped through the plaster walls where Kane had been only moments before. Had he not ducked back behind the corner he would have been killed.
The weapon stopped firing, and he heard the gang member curse loudly. Moving forward again, Kane leaned around the corner and shot him in the head.
The dead man fell back across a glass-topped coffee table. It shattered on impact under his weight and sprayed glass across the living room.
“On your right!” Ferrero snapped.
Kane pivoted and saw the woman dressed in jeans and singlet top. She wasn’t armed and seemed terrified of the situation.
“Get on the floor!” Kane shouted. “Do it! Get on the floor! Put your hands behind your head.”
The woman didn’t hesitate. She dropped to her knees and fell to her face. Her hands went behind her head, and she lay there trembling.
Then Buck emerged. Limping, arm in a sling, and a small Steyr TMP in his good hand, he brought the weapon up and pointed it in Kane’s direction.
“Fuck you, you son of a bitch!” he howled and fired.
Kane and Ferrero dived behind the sofa as the weapon roared to life. 9 mm bullets tore ragged holes through the material and with each shot, the barrel rose. Before long, the Steyr had stitched a row of holes up the wall and into the ceiling.
“Asshole,” Ferrero cursed and rose. He fired and put two slugs from his handgun into the crazed gangster’s chest.
Buck staggered back and crashed into the television, knocking it to the floor. The screen shattered, and he fell across it, a load of black glass shards lodged in his back, and never moved.
“You know him?” Ferrero asked.
“Yeah. I shot him.”
“Hell, no wonder he didn’t like you.”
They climbed to their feet and cleared the rooms off the living room. There was no one else left. After moving into the kitchen, they found Cara and Traynor there with four gangsters sitting around the dining table. Three men and a woman. Another male was dead on the floor.
Kane’s eyes settled on Barrett. “We meet again.”
“Fuck you.”
Traynor gave him a solid smack on the back of his head. “Language, asshole. Ladies present.”
“Fucking where?”
Traynor hit him again.
There were two more rooms that ran off the kitchen. Cara and Traynor had cleared those. The DEA agent indicated the second door. “Have a peep in there, Luis. You’ll think it’s Christmas.”
Kane and Ferrero walked through the doorway and found the table stacked with small packets and larger keys of dope.
Ferrero gave it a satisfied nod and turned away. Back in the kitchen, he looked at the group sitting at the table and said, “I’m going to cut a deal with the first one of you who sings. Those who don’t should be looking at a long stay in the big house.”
No one spoke.
“All right, I’ll make this a little easier. I’ll tell you what I want to know, and you can decide. Now, where’s Montoya’s money?”
Barrett chuckled.
“What’s so funny?”
“We ain’t got his money.”
“You sell the stuff for him, so you must have the money. Where is it?”
Barrett looked Ferrero in the eye and smirked. “We don’t have it on account he already took it. You’re too late, Agent Dick.”
“Shit!”
“Yeah, and you’re standing right in it,’ Barrett gloated.
Ferrero’s fist shot forward and smashed the gang leader in the mouth. Barrett’s head snapped back, and then it lolled forward. Blood ran from the unconscious man’s slack mouth and down onto the top of his white singlet.
“There,” Ferrero said, “that’s better.”
“What are we going to do with them?” Cara asked.
“You still have a jail, don’t you?”
“Kind of.”
“Then that’ll do until we work something out.”
Chester saw four men dressed in black suits get out of the SUV, and for some reason, his mind immediately thought of the movie, The Godfather.
He grew nervous as they approached the door, and two of them entered while the others remained outside.
“Ah … something I can do for you gents? A room?” Chester stammered.
The larger of the two men said, “We’re looking for a feller.”
“Plenty of them in town,” Chester said, trying to lighten the mood. When the man didn’t respond, he continued, “Yes, sir, plenty … of them … around … ah, what’s this feller’s name?”
“Kane.”
Chester stared past him and made out he was deep in thought. His gaze came back, and he shook his head. “Nope. Can’t say I recall that name.”
The big man held out his hand. “Register.”
“What?”
“Give me your register.”
“I don’t have one.”
The big man stepped forward and grabbed the closed A4 book on the right of the counter and turned it around.
“Oh, that … register …” his voice trailed away under the stare of the second man.
The big man opened the ledger and flicked through the pages until he found what he wanted. Then he ran a finger down the column. It stopped when it reached Kane’s name and ran across the page until it located the room number.
The big man looked up. “Is he there?”
Chester shook his head.
The big man opened his coat to display a shoulder holster with a gun nestled in it. Chester paled. “He’s not, honest. I ain’t seen him all day. Ever since the shootout and the deputy got killed. And the DEA and a whole heap of others turned up afterward; it’s just been crazy.”
“What other law enforcement?”
“FBI, ATF, State Troopers. But they’ve all gone now. Well, most of them. The DEA and a few State Troopers are still here.”
The big man thought for a moment and then said, “We’re going outside to wait for him to come back. If you warn him, or I even get wind that you tried, I’ll come back here and kill you. Do you understand?”
Chester nodded.
“Good.”
They turned and left.
“Shit,” mumbled Chester. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“Man, I ain’t seen a building with the crap shot out of it like this since I was last in Afghanistan,” said Ferrero as he walked through the sheriff’s office. Every one of his steps brought a crunch to his ears.
“You should have been in here when it was going on,” Kane said. “It wasn’t the most joyous experience.”
“I’d love to get that son of a bitch on U.S. soil,” Ferrero said.
“He’d need a good reason.”
“If we could have got his money, that would’ve done the trick.”
“Maybe we still can,” Traynor put in.
Ferrero frowned. “How?”
“I still have a few contacts south of the border. One of them might know where he keeps it.”
“And then what?” Cara asked. “Steal it?”
Ferrero shook his head. “It’s too risky.”
“Just think about it, Luis,” Traynor said.
“If I let you go, it would be off the books,” Ferrero pointed out. “There would be no backup. It would be a recon mission, nothing else.”
Traynor nodded. “OK.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Good enough.”
“Now, who’s going to sit on the criminals for what’s left of the night?”
Traynor said, “I’ll do it.”
Cara sighed. “Good. I’m out of here. I can hear my bed calling me.”
When Kane awoke, he forgot where he was for a moment. The sound of the ceiling fan brought back memories of countless helicopter rides and insertions.
Half asleep he mumbled, “Check your gear.”
“I said what are you doing here?”
Kane cracked an eyelid at the sound of the strange voice and turned his head. He stared at Jimmy with the same eye and said, “It was too far to walk to the motel.”
Jimmy shrugged. “Could be worse I suppose. You could be in her bed.”
Without thinking, Kane shot back, “Depends if you were me or not.”
The kid gave him a look of disgust and shook his head. “You want coffee?”
“Sure.”
“Black? No sugar? Strong?”
“You’re good.”
“Not really. My mom was a marine too, remember?”
Kane nodded. “Yeah.”
He sat up and looked around the living room. It was small and sparsely furnished. The walls showed cracks and another part had a giant stain of some sort on it.
Cara entered the room. She’d obviously just gotten out of the shower. Gone was the uniform, replaced by jeans and a white T-shirt. Her hair was still damp and combed straight. She stared at him and gave him a wry smile. “Depends if you were me or not?”
Kane turned red. “Oh, crap.”
“Thin walls, Reaper. Old house. Not that it wasn’t flattering to hear that I’ve still got it, but my kid?”
“Yeah, sorry about that. Just kind of slipped out.”
“How did you sleep?”
Kane straightened out another kink. “You need a new sofa.”
“I need a new damned house.”
“I’ve slept in worse places.”
“Thanks a lot. Tonight, you sleep in your motel.”
“That’s one of them.”
They laughed.
Cara asked, “How serious do you think Ferrero was about giving me a job after this is all over?”
“If he says he will, then he will.”
“I hope so. I’d love to get Jimmy out of here.”
“Yeah, I don’t blame you.”
“You want some breakfast?”
“Sure, why not.”
“Pancakes?”
“Sounds better than MREs.”
“Anything’s better than MREs.”
They walked through to the kitchen, and Kane pulled up a stool to the breakfast bar. Jimmy was just finishing with the coffees.
Taking the mug he was offered, Kane took a sip. It was hot and bitter, just the way he liked it.
“This is good.”
The pancakes were even better. Kane was halfway through his meal when there was a knock at the door.
Cara answered it and found Ferrero on the step. “Come on in. You’re just in time for breakfast.”
They came back to the kitchen, and Cara made the agent some breakfast. He started to stuff his face when Kane asked, “What’s up, Luis?”
“Why does something have to be up?”
“You came here for a reason.”
Ferrero glanced at Jimmy. Cara saw the look and said, “Jimmy, give us a moment, can you?”
Once he was gone Ferrero said, “I have news.”
Kane said, “About what?”
“After everything that has gone down here, I made a call to one of the higher-ups. Bottom line, I’ve been given the OK to put together a small team to do whatever it takes to put a stop to Montoya.”
“I thought you guys already had Special Response Teams?”
Ferrero smiled. “Have you ever seen that show on television, Strike something or other?”
“Strike Back?” said Cara.
“That’s it. Well, consider us the DEA’s version of Section-20. Traynor has already left for Nogales. You two will be my strike power.”
Ferrero paused and focused on Cara. “If you say yes, your job here is done. We’ll use Retribution as a base until it’s time to take it across the border. Well?”
Kane could see that she wanted to say yes, but there was one thing that stopped her. “What about Jimmy?”
“Do you have any other family?”
She shook her head.
“I guess we’ll have to work something out.”
“Before you say no, Cara,” Kane said. “I might know of a place that could take him when you’re not around.”
“Good,” Ferrero said before she could speak. “What about you, Reaper?”
Kane hesitated as he remembered what had brought him to Retribution in the first place. “Before you sign me up, I need to tell you something.”
Ferrero smiled at Cara, “Sounds serious.”
“A while back, I worked for a firm called The Gilbert Foundation. We, Hammer and me, were sitting on a couple in West Virginia in a safe house.”
Recognition registered in Ferrero’s eyes. “You were mixed up in that?”
“In w
hat?” Cara asked.
Kane continued. “The people, a husband, and wife were meant to testify against Irish mob boss, Colin O’Brien. The man we worked for betrayed us. Sold us out for money. A team of British mercenaries came in to kill the witnesses and us too. When the dust had settled, I was the only one left.”
“Hammer?” Cara asked.
“Yeah, Hammer.”
Cara gave him a sorrowful look.
“Anyway, I knew it was Gilbert because when I tried to call him right before they hit us, the phone had been disconnected. I went to his house and found out all I needed to. Just as I finished with him, O’Brien’s enforcer showed up. Tidying loose ends.”
“Was it them who shot Gilbert?” Ferrero asked.
Kane stared at Cara. He shook his head. “That was me. He gave O’Brien files on us all. He found out I had a sister.”
“What did you do?”
“I went after him.”
Ferrero snorted. “That’s the Reaper I know.”
“O’Brien had a place in New York. He liked to take his victims down into the basement. When I was there, he had a feller strapped to a chair. He was already dead. I ended up shooting O’Brien, his son, and his enforcer. There were a few others too.”
“It was a pity you didn’t kill the son of a bitch,” Ferrero said.
Kane’s head snapped about. “What?”
Ferrero nodded. “He’s still alive.”
“Shit! That means he’ll be looking for me and Melanie.”
“Where is she?” Cara asked.
“I found a place for her in Maine. I hid her up there before I went after O’Brien. I was going to suggest Jimmy go there when you’re working. The man who runs it is an ex-marine surgeon. I’ll have to call to let him know about O’Brien.”
“You don’t believe in having normal enemies, do you?” Ferrero commented.
“Now that you know, do you still want me on your team?”
“Hell yeah. That ain’t no reason to cut you. After this is all done, you’ll most likely have killed a lot more scumbags.”
Kane stared at Cara. “What about you?”
“I’m good.”
Ferrero wrung his hands. “There you have it. Welcome to Team Reaper.”
Chester looked up from what he was doing and saw them there. The scary part was that they’d made no sound, so he’d never even heard them. They’d been out there for hours, and now it was morning, they didn’t look happy.
