Silent Night (Sam Archer 4)

by Barber, Tom

  ‘I want to speak to my son,’ he repeated to Shepherd. ‘Please.’

  ‘Once this is over,’ Shepherd said. Marquez finished adjusting Jacobs’ collar. The mic was invisible. She grabbed a set of headphones and put one of the sides to her ear, pushing her forefinger into her other.

  ‘Please. Just one quick call.’

  Marquez turned to Shepherd. ‘We’re good. Sound is 100 per cent.’

  ‘Once this is done, you can use my cell and talk to him all night,’ Shepherd said. ‘But you give Sway or Rourke one signal, you won’t speak to the kid again until I decide so. Clear?’

  Jacobs looked at him, then nodded. Shepherd checked his watch.

  9:55 pm.

  ‘Showtime. Out you go.’

  Jacobs pushed open his door and stepped out, trying to stay cool and breathe.

  Less than a minute later, Archer saw the lawyer walk in.

  ‘Eyes on Jacobs.’

  The constant jostling of people getting to the bar meant Archer was jammed in, which was good for camouflage but not so good if he had to move in a hurry. In the dim lights, rap music thumping from the sound system, he watched Jacobs closely. He looked nervous as hell. The stairs were straight ahead of him, which he approached and started to climb.

  Switching his attention back to the level, Archer scanned everyone who was walking in and around him.

  Nothing.

  ‘I see Jacobs, but no sign of Rourke or Sway.’

  ‘We’ve got the door covered. Get up to 2 and stay on him.’

  Archer nodded, stepping away from the bar and making his way to the stairs.

  And with all his focus on Jacobs, he didn’t notice a dark-haired woman in a leather jacket watching him from the corner of the bar.

  The second floor was where the dance floor and nightclub were located. People were milling about everywhere, dancing and sitting around drinking as house music pounded out of the speakers, the lights low and flashing.

  When Archer arrived on the second level he saw Jacobs to his left, cutting his way through the dance-floor. He was meant to be on his way to the roof, not staying down here. Josh was here somewhere too but Archer couldn’t see him.

  ‘Jacobs is headed the wrong way. He’s going through the dance-floor on 2.’

  ‘Where the hell is he going?’ Shepherd asked. ‘Follow him.’

  ‘Josh, where are you?’

  ‘To your right.’

  Archer looked over and saw Josh leaning against the wall by a booth, watching the stairs.

  ‘Follow Jacobs,’ he said. ‘I’ll watch for Rourke and Sway.’

  Archer moved into the dance-floor, cutting his way through the crowd, keeping his hand over his Sig protectively. He saw Jacobs turn a corner to the left. Archer quickly followed, but when he got there Jacobs was gone.

  Shit.

  Then he realised that was where the door to the unisex restroom was. Jacobs must have ducked inside.

  ‘Jacobs is in the restroom,’ he said, enunciating clearly so the others could hear him over the pounding dance music.

  He checked his watch.

  9:56 pm.

  They didn’t have time for this. If Jacobs was late, the trade wouldn’t happen. Archer stepped back, casually taking up a position near the wall facing the door. In front of him, the song changed to a pulsing dance track, the lights flashing in time to the music.

  Just as Archer was contemplating breaking open the door and hauling him out, it opened and Jacobs reappeared. His hair had been tidied and it looked as if he’d splashed water on his face. He didn’t notice Archer and headed back down the side of the dance-floor, moving towards the stairs. Archer went to talk into his mic but realised he was beside a speaker. He stepped to his right so the others could hear what he was saying.

  ‘We’re in business. Josh, he’s on his way to you.’

  Watching Jacobs move through the crowd, Archer went to follow.

  But suddenly, his path was blocked.

  Amongst the flashing lights and dancing people, three huge guys seemed to appear out of nowhere. They merged together from through the crowd, a human wall of bulk and intimidation, thick beards on their faces.

  All three of them were staring down at Archer.

  They had their big fists clenched, thick golden rings on their fingers serving as makeshift knuckle-dusters. Each guy was built like a fridge-freezer, way over six feet and two hundred pounds. Comparatively, Archer was around six foot and one eighty five, and there was only one of him.

  Looking up, Archer caught the edge of what looked like a black Swastika tattoo on one of their necks.

  This wasn’t a coincidence.

  THIRTY TWOCornered just off the dance floor, Archer pulled his badge but one of the thugs slapped it out of his hands before he could even flip it open. The only other option was his gun, but he would never pull it in a place that crowded. He glanced at the goon on his left and saw he was holding something in his large fist.

  A knife.

  The middle neo-Nazi pushed him backwards towards the wall, which counted as striking a detective and gave him carte blanche to respond. But he was outnumbered. To his right, a small queue had formed for the restroom, everyone watching as the trio encircled Archer. The song on the speakers beside them changed, David Guetta, Flo Rida and Nicki Minaj thumping out. Where Them Girls At? the lyrics of the song asked, pounding around the room. He looked up at the three skinheads. No girls around here.

  When tackling someone one-on-one or even two-on-one, Archer liked to use jiu-jitsu and chokeholds to disable them. It was quick, bloodless and nullified any size discrepancy. A guy can’t punch you if he can’t breathe and he can’t sue you for assault if he doesn’t have a mark on his body or even clearly remember what had happened. A tough guy could take a punch but no one on the planet could hold out from a choke. But he was outnumbered three to one here and by a hell of a lot of poundage.

  He needed to even the odds to at least two.

  He glanced past the group, over the shoulder of one of them. He had one shot, otherwise it would be like in the movies when someone shouted what’s that? and the bad guys turned to look.

  He did it right.

  Instinctively, the trio glanced behind them, just for a second.

  And backed up against the wall, Archer targeted the guy with the knife.

  His right fist hit the thug’s jaw like a freight train that was running late. He tagged the neo-Nazi just as he turned back, a hundred and eight five pounds of survival behind the punch. The guy hadn’t been braced, the muscles of his neck not ready to absorb the blow and the punch laid him out.

  He dropped to the floor, the blade spilling out of his hand as he fell.

  The others reacted instantly. The middle one didn’t take a swing. He just ducked his head down and drove Archer into the wall, trying to slam him to the ground where he could pin him down and attack him. Archer stiffened his back and legs and looped his right arm quickly around the guy’s neck, grabbing his right hand with his left and locking his grip. The guy was strong and Archer felt himself going for a ride.

  But as the guy slammed him down, he unwittingly worsened his own position. Archer hooked his feet behind the guy’s back and started squeezing his arms as hard as he could, the thug’s head caught in a guillotine headlock. The music was pounding, strobes flashing, people queuing for the restroom shocked as they watched the fight. Archer was now beside the speaker and Nicki Minaj pounded into his ear. His body was pumping with adrenaline, locked onto the neo-Nazi and not letting go. His head caught in the headlock, the thug used his hands to try and prise Archer off his neck but Archer intensified the pressure, using every muscle fibre and sinew in his body, gritting his teeth with fierce aggression, putting a crushing vice on the guy’s neck.

  His back to the ground, every muscle in his body in the choke, Archer saw the second guy coming towards him in distorted staccato images in the strobe lighting. Archer was about to release the goon he had in his
grip to defend himself, but the thug was yanked back as an arm suddenly appeared around his neck.

  Josh’s arm.

  Archer’s guy was trying to pull his head out of the headlock, but he wasn’t going anywhere. He lost consciousness around the same time as Josh’s guy, who Josh lowered to the ground near the corner and out of the way of the dance-floor. Archer let his victim go, the man’s body limp, and scrambled to his feet panting hard. He grabbed his badge from the carpet to his right then pulled his handcuffs and slapped one side over the big skinhead’s wrist, locking the other side to a radiator. Josh did the same with the other two, scooping up the knife and tucking it in his pocket. Without a word or moment’s hesitation, the two detectives cut their way back through the side of the dance-floor, headed for the stairs. Josh took the lead, Archer following, taking deep breaths. He checked his watch.

  9:59 pm.

  One minute until the trade.

  But as he looked up, he met an arcing elbow an inch from his face. It smashed into his nose, taking him by surprise just as his punch had done to the neo-Nazi behind him a few moments before. Stumbling back and falling to the floor, his eyes watering from the pain, he tried to make out who’d struck him as blood started to pour from his nose.

  Seeing double, he could just make out a dark-haired woman walking fast to the stairs, pulling a cell phone from her pocket.

  Drexler.

  Partygoers knelt down to help him to his feet. Archer wiped blood off his face, trying to recover his senses.

  But by the time he looked over at the stairs again the woman was gone.

  Upstairs and unaware of what had been happening immediately below, Jacobs was standing in front of the bar on the roof. Although it was a cold night, the roof top had several burn heaters and walls on three sides acting as windbreaks. There were people standing and sitting everywhere, but none of them paid him any attention.

  Jorgensen was on one of the benches to the right, his left hand in his pocket on the pressel switch, his other resting on the bench within easy reach of his pistol under his jacket. Given that he was dressed in plain clothes, he blended right in with everyone else. He pushed the pressel.

  ‘Jacobs is in place,’ he said quietly.

  Releasing the switch, he glanced to his left, towards the stairs, then scanned the level around him.

  Sway, Rourke or their hit team could be here already, making sure Jacobs had come alone.

  Where are you, assholes?

  Eight yards away, Jacobs suddenly felt his phone purr in his inside breast pocket.

  He reached into his jacket and withdrew it, taking the call.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I told you to come alone. You just made a big mistake.’

  At that moment, Archer arrived on the third floor, joining Josh. Jacobs had his back to them, standing straight ahead facing the west.

  They saw he had his phone to his ear.

  What happened next occurred in a heartbeat. Jacobs was standing perfectly still, then suddenly jolted backwards, like someone had hit him with a strong uppercut. A pink cloud appeared in the air behind his head. There was a thump beside Archer as a young woman chatting with her friends took a bullet in her upper arm. Her body carried the momentum from the round, knocking her over. Jacobs hit the ground at the same time, but he was already dead, shot through the forehead.

  One bullet, two impacts, two casualties.

  Then about thirty screams.

  Outside in the van, Shepherd and Marquez heard the screaming. At the same time, both their earpieces started going off.

  ‘Jacobs is down!’ Jorgensen said. ‘Jacobs is down! Someone took him out with a rifle!’

  ‘Shit!’ Shepherd said, as he and Marquez pulled the door back and jumped out of the van, running around the corner. As they arrived outside the club, they saw people starting to spill out of the doors screaming and shouting in panic. Both detectives had to clamp a finger to their ear to hear what the trio upstairs were saying.

  ‘Is he alive?’ Shepherd shouted.

  ‘He’s gone, sir,’ Jorgensen said. ‘Shot between the eyes.’

  ‘What direction was the shot?’

  ‘From the west.’

  A hundred and thirty one yards from the roof of the nightclub was a newly opened apartment building. It was an ideal location for precision shooting. Many of the apartments inside were yet to be filled or rented and CCTV was yet to be installed.

  The shooter was already on his way down in the lift. He was alone and carried nothing with him save for a rectangular brown box with a stamped address and a cell phone in his pocket.

  It couldn’t have gone better.

  He’d taken a call, learning that the trade was a set-up, then fired from inside a bathroom through a gap in a window that was half open, set up deep inside the room to avoid detection. The rifle was a Winchester 270, a suppressor in place to dampen noise and muzzle flash. He’d also used sub-sonic ammunition so no one heard the shot that killed the lawyer. The bullet had hit the man right through the centre of the forehead. The moment he’d seen Jacobs take the round through the scope, the rifleman had exhaled, then placed the rifle back into its case. The spent cartridge was still inside the weapon which meant he didn’t have to fumble around looking for it. Sealing the case and package he’d scooped it up and promptly left the empty apartment, heading for the stairs.

  He got down to the ground floor in less than twenty seconds. Pushing open the door, he walked into the building lobby. It was empty, no reception desk and more importantly no CCTV. He placed the rectangular parcel by several others by the mail drop-off point so it was instantly camouflaged.

  Pushing open the door to the street he heard sirens and faint screaming in the distance.

  Turning in the opposite direction, the shooter pulled up his collar and disappeared into the night.

  Upstairs at the club, Archer and Josh were with the injured woman, blood pulsing from the wound to her arm. Josh was calling for an ambulance whilst Archer pulled off his hoodie and wrapped it around the woman’s bicep, knotting the sleeves and cinching it tight in a makeshift compression bandage. He clamped his hands either side of the wound. The hoodie was made of thick cotton, but blood slowly started to stain the grey red. She was bleeding badly but the makeshift tourniquet was doing its job.

  ‘Ambulance is on its way,’ Josh said, putting his phone back in his pocket. Archer looked over his shoulder at the city rooftops.

  ‘Son of a bitch,’ he said. ‘It was like target practice. He knew this was a set-up.’

  In the mayhem, Josh looked at his partner and noticed his bleeding nose for the first time.

  ‘What the hell happened to you?’

  THIRTY THREETen minutes later the wounded girl was on her way to Murray Hill Medical. The CSU were up on the third floor, snapping photographs of the crime-scene and Jacobs’ body and trying to establish where exactly the shot had come from. The three neo-Nazis who’d come after Archer had been taken outside and bundled into several police cars. None of them were saying anything. Whilst Jorgensen and Marquez were downstairs talking with backup, Archer and Josh were up on the roof, watching the CSU work. Shepherd moved up the last flight of stairs and walked over to join them.

  ‘How are we doing, sir?’ Josh asked.

  ‘Every cop in Manhattan is looking for Sway and Rourke. We’ll get them.’ Shepherd looked at Archer’s nose. ‘You OK?’

  ‘That bitch Drexler tagged me. Didn’t see it coming.’

  ‘Sure it was her?’

  ‘Positive.’

  ‘She must have got out in the stampede after the shot. We missed her.’

  The three men looked over at Jacob’s body.

  ‘Shit,’ Shepherd said. ‘There goes our lead.’

  ‘And we’re no closer to getting our hands on that virus,’ Josh said.

  Archer grabbed a bottle of water from a table and poured it over his hands, washing off some dried blood, his and the girl’s.

  �
��Any word from Hendricks or the ATF?’ he asked.

  Shepherd shook his head. ‘Not yet. They’re all in place. We’ve got more people watching that camp than a damn soccer game. This virus sample has to show up somewhere tonight.’

  Suddenly, Marquez’s voice came up on each man’s earpiece. ‘Sir?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Good news.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘A man was just picked up and arrested ten blocks from here.’

  She paused.

  ‘It’s Finn Sway.’

  ‘Take these off me, pigs!’ snarled Sway, his hands cuffed in front of him. He’d been dumped in the back of a Bureau Ford Explorer outside the club. Marquez, Archer, Josh and Jorgensen were standing there watching him, a street officer in the car beside Sway to make sure he didn’t try to escape.

  ‘Where’s the rifle?’ Marquez asked.

  ‘What rifle?’

  ‘You’re a bad liar.’

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  ‘Don’t waste our time. Where is it?’

  ‘Shut your mouth, bitch. I don’t deal with your kind.’

  ‘HEY!’ Jorgensen said, pointing at Sway. ‘Cool it.’

  Sway glared back at him. Standing next to Marquez, Archer studied Sway. Although they were yet to confirm that he was the shooter he certainly fit the profile. Peterson had given an accurate description of the guy. He was tall, six-three on the file, and was dressed in blue jeans and a thick cotton coat. He wasn’t wearing a hat, but Archer recognised the distinctive short sides and long-top haircut from his ATF file.

  ‘What the hell is going on?’ Sway asked.

  ‘A man was just shot dead on the roof of this nightclub with a rifle,’ Archer told him. ‘And we know you were coming to meet him.’

  ‘No I wasn’t.’

  ‘Bullshit,’ Marquez said. ‘You’re in the area ten minutes after the shooting.’