The Night Charter

by Sam Hawken

  Camaro looked to the gunmen. They were ready. One balanced his rifle on the lip of a compacted window and raised his free hand. The others steadied.

  She brought up the Colt and took aim across the span of street and yard. Her thumb edged the safety off. In the red-dot sight on the rifle, she had the first gunman zeroed in. She pulled the trigger.

  A .308 round crashed into the side of the gunman’s head, and he went down. For a long moment there was nothing but the echo of the rifle’s report, and everyone was frozen. Then they moved, and the gunfire began in earnest.

  Matt and Jackson and Soto drew weapons, as did the Cubans in suits. Matt shot the man closest to him before a burst of rounds from the gunmen drove him back and into cover. Jackson was caught out in the open, and his chest burst apart before he could lose a single bullet.

  The second Cuban dropped the briefcase and it burst open. Scraps of plain white paper exploded from within, scattering like heavy snowflakes in the dirt. He sought refuge around the back of his Mercedes, but he was exposed to Camaro on his flank. She shot him twice in the back, then shifted her aim to the gunmen, who laced the Charger with gunfire from their impregnable position.

  Matt and Soto were still shooting, but Camaro could not see Parker. Pops and rips split the night. Camaro poured fire into the gunmen’s position until the magazine went dry. She dropped the empty and swapped it out for the second.

  She was firing again as Matt made it behind the wheel of the Charger and started the engine. The wheels spun as he geared into reverse and stomped the accelerator, then bit down. Matt shifted again and peeled out, swinging the car around in a rough circle, back tires burning in the dirt and kicking up a cloud of choking dust. Camaro could barely see as Soto hustled Chapado back into the car and boarded himself.

  The Charger leaped forward, catching fire as it went. The two remaining gunmen moved out of hiding to pursue, shooting at the Charger as it fishtailed in the street. Its rear window turned white with holes and cracks. Camaro ignored the car and concentrated on the men, dropping one with three rounds to the chest and head and putting the other on the ground with a pair of bullets that ripped his shoulder.

  Now she could see. The two suited Cubans were dead by their car. The gunmen were all dead or dying. Parker lay still on the ground.

  Camaro gathered up the spent magazine, ran to the ladder, and descended fast. She dashed from between the buildings and across the street, into the yard where Parker remained.

  His shirt was deeply stained from the wounds in his chest and stomach. He breathed only shallowly. Camaro ripped his outer shirt open and lifted the undershirt beneath. He’d taken one in the right lung, the hole sucking air, and another in the liver. The third entry point was two inches below his heart. He should have been dead.

  She cradled his head. “Parker,” Camaro said.

  He could not focus his eyes, and when he tried to reach for her, his blood-sticky hand missed her face completely. More red was on his lips, bubbling up with every breath. The hideous sucking noise of the lung wound continued.

  “I can’t save you,” Camaro told him. “You’re going to die.”

  Parker found the energy to nod once. He closed his eyes. His body stopped.

  Chapter Thirty

  THERE WAS A Texaco station not far from where it all happened, and Camaro stopped to use their restroom. Blood on her hands and arms swirled away into the dirty sink, though she thought she could still feel the stains. It was always the same.

  When she was done, she filled up her truck’s tank, the routine of the activity distracting her not at all from the thoughts whirling in her head. Police sirens called out in the night, overlapping and synchronizing with one another until it sounded like an army of cars was out there. And perhaps there were. Camaro would not go back to see for herself.

  The rifle was hidden on the floor behind the front seats of her truck, a blanket over it, but she still had the Glock and her karambit on her. Once she was away from here completely, she would not have to worry so much about being stopped. And if she were stopped, she would claim that she had spent the evening at her boyfriend’s in Hialeah. Close enough to Liberty City to make it possible she had been, but not so close that they’d want to take a look at her.

  A part of her cursed and spat at the other part of her that had brought her to this place. It had been none of her concern, and she had not had to be there when it happened. But she had gone there, and she had done it anyway for reasons she could barely articulate to herself. She had not owed Parker. She had not loved him. He was almost a stranger. But he had been in need, and he asked her for her help.

  She did not have to think long on the next step. The next thing to do was to leave this place and go to Parker’s home, where a woman Lauren Story did not know would have to tell her that her father was dead. And Camaro would take her from there, along with the money Parker had hid, and she would make certain Lauren was safe until she could be sent far, far away and clear from all of this.

  The gas nozzle’s handle clicked, and Camaro put it back on the pump. She went to the cashier’s window to get change from the two fifties she’d given the attendant. He barely paid her any mind, shoving the coins and bills into the little metal trough beneath the bulletproof glass without meeting her gaze or saying a word.

  As Camaro walked back to her truck, another police unit came screaming down the street with its lights flashing and its siren alive. Camaro watched it go until it vanished from sight, then climbed into the truck and drove away.

  While she went, she thought again about what she had done this night. The men she’d killed had not been the first. That honor went to an insurgent in Iraq just two weeks after her first deployment began in 2003. That man had rushed a position being guarded by her unit, his body laden with explosives, and she had been the first to fire. Afterward, they had told her she could have left it to the men, but she had said that it was her life in danger as much as theirs, so she did it herself because it had to be done. There had been looks after that and comments, but she ignored them all. Twice more during that tour she’d been involved in combat situations in the Sandbox. That’s how she had killed her second man. A boy, really. Only eighteen.

  There were others. People back in the world did not understand that a combat medic lived true to her title, and combat was where she went. One minute she could be fetching water for soldiers in her unit that needed it to stave off dehydration, and the next minute she could be taking fire. She saved lives, and she took lives. One may have been better than the other, but she was not afraid of either.

  She drove south, out of Liberty City and away from Parker. In her mind she had an image of Lauren Story taken from the photograph in Parker’s wallet, but that would not be the reality of it. Lauren was older now, and she would have to be shaken from sleep. When she heard the news, she would fall apart, and it would be up to Camaro to hold her together long enough to clear out of the little rented house. There was no time. Once the police identified Parker’s body, they would come for Lauren. But they were not Camaro’s first concern. Matt knew Parker, and perhaps the Cubans knew Parker, too. Either outcome was not a good one.

  After New York she had promised herself no more, that she wouldn’t stray. Tonight the promise was broken. Perhaps it had been broken all along.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  WHEN THE PHONE first started ringing, Ignacio thought he was dreaming it and did nothing. It was only when the call went to voice mail, only to start ringing anew a few seconds later, that he stirred from sleep. He felt for the phone on the nightstand, found it, and put it to his ear. “Did somebody die?” he asked.

  Pool was on the other end. “Somebody did die. A whole bunch of somebodies.”

  Ignacio sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes. It was dark and cool in his bedroom with the ceiling fan turning away above him to stir the air. “Who?”

  “Right at this very moment I’m looking at Jackson Dewey.”

  “Jacks
on Dewey? Where? What happened?”

  “I think you ought to come out here and see for yourself. It’s a regular party in Liberty City tonight.”

  “Tell me where you are,” Ignacio said. He turned on the bedside light.

  Pool gave him the address and Ignacio memorized it. “I’ll be there in…thirty minutes?”

  “I’ll keep everything fresh for you.”

  “Thanks. I’m moving now.”

  Ignacio tossed his phone on the bed and raided his closet for work clothes. He had the next two days off and was going to take his good outfits to the dry cleaner, so all that was left were things that were too small or not in fashion. In the end he dressed as if he were going out dancing and not to work, but at least everything fit.

  He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel while he drove. A coffee would have been good, given the hour, but there was no time for that. Simple adrenaline would have to suffice to keep him going until sunrise. After that the sun would have to suffice.

  Pool had not been wrong about the chaos at the scene. Police units blocked both ends of the street, and there were ambulances and more police beyond them. Colors were flashing everywhere, turning the dark into a stroboscopic nightmare. The CSIs had set up portable lamps in the auto yard, the plain white of their high-powered bulbs beating back the light bars. Every last grain of dirt in the yard was flushed in illumination.

  The Mercedes drew his eye immediately, and the bodies next to it moments later. He saw the CSIs were working on the far side of the yard, behind some destroyed cars, so there must have been more that had happened there. Ignacio spotted Pool standing in an open space, and near him two more bodies. One of them was clearly Jackson Dewey. Ignacio knew him instantly.

  “Welcome to the O.K. Corral,” Pool said when Ignacio came close.

  “What the hell happened here?” Ignacio asked.

  “First guess: these fellows in the suits had a disagreement with Jackson and this other guy, and there were some heated words exchanged. Plus some bullets. We’ve got three corpses in nighttime camouflage, plus there’s a dead man over there behind those crushed cars who looks like he might also have been backup. Took a rifle shot to the head. Those three in the military getups were also taken out with a rifle.”

  Ignacio looked, but only the dead men in black seemed armed. Jackson was the only one of the others brandishing a gun. A second man in a beach bum’s uniform lay dead, with his outer shirt laid open and his undershirt pulled up to expose the bloody wounds beneath. The night picked out the reflective circles of the outer shirt’s buttons in the dirt.

  “We have a nice set of skid marks in the dirt here that shows there was a second vehicle, but it’s long gone,” Pool said.

  “Who was shooting with the rifle? Jackson has a pistol. The dead guys all have assault weapons, but they didn’t shoot each other.”

  Pool pointed across the street at the buildings opposite. There was a metalworking shop immediately facing them. The roofs of all the buildings were flat. “I’m thinking a sniper up there. I haven’t sent anyone to look, though. Figured you’d want to give the order once you got here.”

  Ignacio went to the dead man with his shirt pulled up. A CSI took the corpse’s picture. “What’s this guy’s story?”

  “Story,” Pool said, and he grunted a laugh. “That’s his name. Parker Story. I don’t know him by sight, but I’m willing to bet the database has his name in it. I’ve already asked them to run him. Looks like someone tried to do first aid on him, or at least they saw he couldn’t be saved.”

  “This is all about Matt Clifford,” Ignacio said. “I know it.”

  “We still have that BOLO out on his car, but no luck. You’d think it wouldn’t be a problem spotting a car like his. I guess he’s better at hiding than we thought.”

  Now Ignacio went to the Mercedes and crouched next to one of the dead men in suits. He looked over the scattering of plain white papers that spilled from an expensive leather briefcase. A case like that might have cost two hundred dollars easily. The Mercedes itself would run close to a hundred grand. The suits looked like they were top quality, perhaps even tailored and not off the rack. “What were you two doing out there with Matt Clifford?” Ignacio asked out loud.

  “You figure all these other guys for Cubans?” Pool asked.

  Ignacio went from body to body. One man in battle dress had clearly bled out from a pair of agonizing shoulder wounds. He wondered how long it would take for that to happen. “They could be,” Ignacio said. “But they might not be. We can’t just assume they are. Have we run the car’s plates?”

  “Stolen off a Hyundai. The VIN’s still intact, though, so we’ll be able to check that in the morning.”

  “Good. I know Jackson, and we’ll figure out who this Story guy is, but these are the important ones. They’re the reason everyone’s here.”

  “What do you want to do next?” Pool asked.

  “Check those buildings like you said. Have the CSIs take this whole scene apart. After that we’ll see about pulling traffic camera footage, anything we can use.”

  “It’s going to get crazy once the word gets out.”

  “I know it,” Ignacio said. “I know it.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  “MOTHERFUCKER!” MATT SCREAMED at the high ceiling of the old warehouse. “Motherfucker! Motherfucker! Motherfucker!”

  Soto dragged Chapado to the straight-backed chair and taped him to the armrests again. Soto had been quiet the whole way back from the killing fields in Liberty City. He was quiet now. Matt was glad of his silence, because if Soto had opened his mouth to say the wrong thing, Matt might have put a bullet in it.

  Matt turned to Chapado and drew his gun. He pressed the muzzle against the man’s head. “I should kill you right now,” he said. “I should end you!”

  “Please don’t,” Chapado whispered.

  “Huh? What?”

  “I said, please don’t,” Chapado repeated more loudly.

  “They don’t care if you’re alive,” Matt said. “If they wanted you alive, they would have paid the money and you’d be on your way. But, no, they want to play games! They want to try and off me and Sandro and everybody else. You heard them shooting. Do you think they were worried about hitting you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know. I know. I know what’s up. Sandro knows what’s up. You’re the only one who thinks this is going to have a happy ending. Goddamn it, I hate liars.”

  Matt wheeled around with the pistol in his hand and stalked the open space in the center of the warehouse, moving in and out of the light, a thin shadow one moment and real the next. He muttered to himself and cursed out loud, but he did not go after Chapado again.

  Soto finally spoke. “What do we do?”

  “I need to sit. There’s some folding chairs in a closet in the office. Bring out a couple.”

  He waited while Soto obeyed and regarded Chapado with blackness settled over his heart like a pall. His ears were still slightly stunned from the gunshots in Liberty City, though they no longer rang. The smell of gunpowder was on his clothes. He had a hole in the loose cloth of his shirt beneath his left armpit, where a bullet had passed between arm and body without striking either. Just a little more to the right and he would have been like Jackson, dead on the ground in a second.

  Soto returned with the chairs and set them up. Matt dropped into one and let his gun rest on his knee. He glared at Chapado again until the man lowered his gaze to his lap and kept it there. Matt thought maybe Chapado would piss himself again. The odor of it had been strong in the Charger.

  “What do we do?” Soto asked again.

  “I have to think.”

  He thought and the broken pieces of the evening assembled themselves into something that might be considered a shape. The conclusion rose up slowly, rearing like a sea beast out of the ocean of his mind, as dark as his mood. “It was Parker,” he said at last.

  “Parker? How?�
��

  “He must have cut a backdoor deal with them. That’s why he didn’t bring the forty grand to the meeting, because they told him he could keep it after they took us out. And I know exactly who put the idea in his head: it was that bitch.”

  “What bitch?”

  “What do you mean, ‘what bitch?’ The bitch. The one with the boat. I knew something was going on between them. I’ll bet you every nickel those assholes have that it was her on that roof across the way.”

  “But that means she was shooting them,” Soto said.

  “Huh?”

  “If it was her up on that roof and she was working with Parker trying to take us out, why was she shooting the Cubans instead of shooting us? It doesn’t make any sense, bro.”

  Matt muddled through this, and then he had it. “It was a double double cross,” he said. “Brilliant.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  He could not sit. He stood up with nervous energy and paced again. The shape that had formed before took on a new texture as the details accreted. The image of Camaro was the most vivid. Whatever else she might have been, she was a good shot, because she dropped the Cubans like they were nothing. If Matt had not been so quick, she would have gotten him, too. Or maybe it was not chance. “Here’s the double cross,” Matt explained to Soto. “First, Parker goes to the Cubans and tells them he wants to get out of my pocket and into business on his own. He cuts a deal to keep the $40,000 we got at the start, in exchange for Chapado and the rest of the money. But then he gets greedy. He puts his head together with the bitch, and they decide that if they shoot everybody at the meeting they can get the money Parker was holding, the money we got at the first exchange, and the money they brought for the final payoff. And here’s the best part: if they leave me alive, the Cubans think I’m the one who cheated them again. It’s why she didn’t shoot me! Goddamn it, it all makes sense now.”

  Soto stared at him for a long time. “You were supposed to make it?” he asked.