“Is it bad?” She asked, referencing the bullet wound.
Logan grunted. “Got me in the thigh. No exit wound but I didn’t bleed out, so it didn’t get the artery. I’ll be fine.”
Sydney replied, “Or the bullet is plugging the artery, you’ll step funny and bleed to death in seconds.”
Logan shrugged. “Also possible. You have to drive, though.”
With his right leg pulsing with pain, he couldn’t work the pedals.
As she got into the truck, Sydney said, “I sniped everybody outside or by a window.”
Logan nodded. “Anybody inside is getting blown to the pearly gates.”
“That’s not where they’re going,” Sydney responded and pressed the gas.
Logan leaned on a tank of oil for support and kept his other hand on the .50 caliber machine gun. Each bump of the bottomed-out suspension sent a jolt of pain through his leg. He grunted with each one and tested out his knowledge of extensive ways to swear in French and English.
They turned the corner and bumped into the field of poppies. The poppies were in bloom. The flowers dazzled like tiny spots of hot red blood. The field looked like an ocean of blood. They made it to the house where Sydney killed six Spartans who were standing watch outside, and on the roof. The .416 caliber bullets tore ragged, bloody holes through their bulletproof vests. Most of them looked as if they were sleeping in crimson mud puddles.
A single gunshot rang out. It hit Logan in the bulletproof vest. It felt like he’d been kicked in the chest. He didn’t feel the sharp stab of pain from the gunshot. His vest stopped the bullet. It was rated for everything up to an assault rifle. As badly as his chest hurt and how much difficulty he was having breathing he knew that it to be an assault rifle.
He ducked down behind the machine gun, swinging it up towards the window where he thought the shot came from. He sprayed a stream of gunfire at the top floor of the house. The machine gun ran through bullets, spitting empty casings out of the other side.
Sydney swerved the truck and pulled it close to the side of the house. There were only a few windows on this side, and they were too close to the wall for anyone to shoot down at them. With her AK out and up, Sydney crawled from the truck. She pressed her back to the wall so she couldn’t be shot. Logan jumped out of the truck. Landing on the hard ground was a new circle of hell. He pressed his back to the wall.
“Did she get you?” Sydney asked.
“She?”
Sydney replied, “Yeah, there was a woman in a window. White woman.”
The presence of a white woman in Benin was noteworthy. A few worked in European or American embassies but this far out in the country? No, that was worth investigating. Is the new King a Queen?
“Let’s see if she wants to talk.”
Sydney leaned away from the wall and shot one bullet at a window above them. The window shattered and sparkling glass shards fell like rain.
Logan shouted in French, “Can you hear me? We have a bomb. Multiple bombs. Do you want to live?”
The woman shouted back in English. “What’s that? French?”
Sydney and Logan looked at each other in shock. Sydney mouthed “American?” Logan nodded.
That’s weird. The US embassy is in Cotonou, over 400 miles away. An American in an official capacity wouldn’t have shot me in the chest either.
Logan yelled back in English but with a North English accent. She didn’t need to know he was American. “Alright. What’s your name then?”
“You can call me Helen,” she said.
“Helen of Troy? Seriously?”
“Helen of Sparta,” she responded.
“You’re American,” Logan said. She didn’t even bother to dispute it. “There’s enough ANFO in here to level the building. Come out with your hands up, and you get to live.”
“You don’t know who…” The woman started to say.
“Nope,” Sydney shouted. “We’re not negotiating. Stay in the building and die. Surrender and live. Those are your options.”
Logan thought about it for a minute and then added, “Third option! Tell us who betrayed us to Menelaus, and I’ll let you make a run for it.”
“How do I know I can trust you?” She shouted back.
Logan responded, “You don’t, but it’s your best chance to ever be free again.”
Helen responded, “I work for Titus Crow.”
CHAPTER TEN
They buried Juliette Verlay and Park Dae Lun in Benin. Logan memorized the exact coordinates for Park’s grave. He would visit her grave again someday. Flying the North Korean cargo plane felt so lonely and empty.
Sydney slouched in the copilot’s chair. The autopilot did most of the work as she dozed in and out. During some quick field surgery, she decided just to leave the bullet in for now. If it was plugging an artery, removing it would kill him. A doctor could determine what to do with him.
As they cleared Benin airspace, Logan could still see the smoke rising from the blackened crater where Menelaus’s house had been. Park got no tombstone, but she did have a monument. For Juliette Verlay there was no marker, but he left ashes and rubble for a warning to those who killed them. He could come back.
Sydney sat up and said, staring out at the smoke, “I assume we’ll never see Helen again.”
Logan nodded. “A spy who rats on her handler? She’ll probably move to somewhere a white woman can blend in and just disappear. Eastern Europe would be best. Americans are going to be looking for her eventually.”
“What are you going to do to Crow?” Sydney asked.
Logan rubbed his throbbing thigh. “First, I have to know why he did it. Why train me for years just to kill me on my first mission?”
Sydney tore open an MRE. She grimaced as she looked inside. “Chicken chunks.” She dug around for a minute and pulled out a protein bar. “Oh, thank God.”
She ate her protein bar as she talked. “You’re right. He trained both of us. So, think like we were taught. We went in an off-the-books cargo plane and into operation to take out the head of a drug empire.”
Logan snapped his fingers. “What would you need if you wanted to ship drugs all over the world? Cargo planes with unrecognizable transponders.”
Sydney nodded along. “Makes sense. Okay. So, he wants to move Beninese drugs in an unmarked North Korean plane. That still doesn’t explain why he wants to kill you.”
Logan thought about it for a moment, then he said, “He thinks America has too many rules when we fight and when we do counterintelligence. If they kill his star pupil, he’ll get away with some off-the-books retaliation. Kill Menelaus, infiltrate the Korean People’s Aviation Company, maybe even kill the North Korean dictator.”
Sydney filled in the thought. “And in that chaos, he ends up with his drugs and his planes.”
“And Menelaus’s Spartans, at least what’s left. Money, planes, and soldiers. He would be a one-man intelligence agency with no legal limitations.”
They slept in shifts so that someone was always awake just to monitor the autopilot. They flew to Botswana and crossed the South African border on foot. Once they were in South Africa, they became two tourists on their honeymoon.
With a well-rehearsed story of being attacked, robbed, and shot, they were able to see a doctor. The bullet wasn’t near the artery. The doctor sewed him up, applied clean bandages, and gave him a tetanus shot. With a promise to go straight to the police, they thanked the doctor and were on their way.
Logan memorized the location of the experimental cargo plane. He hated to leave it but they didn’t know who they could trust. He could have called Titus to have them refueled in-flight, but a jet might be just as likely to shoot them down. They needed to treat Titus like the enemy he was and plan their steps in a way to make the Agency proud.
They flew out of Johannesburg on Austrian passports.
Logan turned on a trackable cell phone for the first time in months when he landed at the Norfolk, Virginia airport.
<
br /> Titus Crow answered. “Sioux Falls Laundry and Pawn.”
“I’m looking for my car. I lost it last night.”
“I think you have the wrong number,” Titus responded.
“It’s been 24 hours.”
“Sorry.”
Titus hung up.
The code they used was simple. Titus answered with a city. If it was a city east of the Mississippi River, he was unavailable and Logan was to hang up immediately. “Laundry and pawn” meant the line was clean but not secure.
“Looking for my car” meant he was in the United States. “Lost it” meant his movement was restricted though.
“24 hours” was their code for meeting at The Varsity Grill, home of the number 24.
Logan turned to Sydney and said, “Where’s the car rental place? We need to get to West Virginia.”
* * *
The drive was fairly uneventful. They made it in a few hours. Sitting in the car took longer. Logan and Sydney sat in a rented car, a nondescript Honda Accord, in the parking lot of a bank across the street from the Varsity Grill. Logan sipped from a bottle of water, and Sydney chewed gum. They would be sitting in the car for at least six hours. They needed to stay just barely hydrated enough to function but not so hydrated that they needed to pee. Getting out of the car could be stepping off into certain death. Now that they know Titus Crow betrayed them, they didn’t know who they could trust. All of their contacts in the Agency were Titus Crow contacts. How deep did the corruption go? They had no way of knowing, so they must play it safe.
Watching the Varsity Grill, they’d seen dozens of people going in and out, mostly college students. Logan remembered being a student and taking Titus to the Varsity Grill. He was a completely different person back then. He was so young and naïve, and perhaps more so after joining the Agency and working for Titus Crow. He’d been naive in North Korea and Guam. Naïve even in Benin. Something changed when Park Dae Lun died. He’d hardened, he’d been betrayed, his naivete was gone. The world was uglier than he ever imagined. And Titus Crow was one of its ugliest creatures.
If Titus betrayed them so he could take over a Beninese drug empire and use the Beninese troops to kill Americans, he was capable of anything.
After the six hours of stakeout ended, there was still no sign of Titus.
Logan rubbed his sore knees. “Well, I don’t know about you, but my legs are killing me.”
Sydney pressed her knuckles into her back. “Do you think we missed him or he never showed up?”
Logan opened the door. “Only one way to find out.”
He took comfort in the weight of the pistols under his arms in the shoulder holster. He took comfort more in the pair of pistols in Sydney’s shoulder holster. She was a far better shot than he was.
They crossed the street to the Varsity Grill, trying their best to look nonchalant. A bell on the door rang to announce their entry. A hostess leaned out from behind the cash register.
“Well, hello there. How are y’all doing?”
“We’re good,” Sydney replied.
The bubbly hostess replied, “Just seat yourselves, and I’ll bring you some menus.”
Logan eyed the booth where he first met Sydney. A couple of college students sat in the booth now. They were laughing and tossing french fries back and forth. An older couple sat in a corner booth, whispering each other. The handsome white-haired man was showing his wife something on his phone. She clasped her hands over her mouth and gasped, then giggle like a teenager.
A professor sat in a different booth with folders open and papers spread out in front of him. A student sat across from him, he was explaining some concept or other with frustrating results. Any one of them could be a spy. After all, someone would have said the same thing about him not so many years ago. Titus Crow always said the best spies were middle-aged white guys who were balding with a slight beer belly. You would never look twice at a guy like that. By that measure, Logan was too young and handsome. Sydney was too young and pretty. The professor fit the mold, though. Logan kept an eye on him as he moved towards the booth he shared with Titus Crow.
The booth was empty. Logan and Sydney approached it the way one approaches a rattlesnake. A book set on the table in the booth. It was an old and weathered book with a beat-up cover and some tearing down the spine. Logan stared at it with his eyes wide, like a coiled rattlesnake.
Sydney gasped and instinctively slid her hand inside her coat to place a reassuring hand on the butt of one of her pistols.
Logan read the title aloud, just trying to make sure it was real. “The Iliad. The story of the Trojan War. When Menelaus and his Spartans invade Troy.
Sydney reached to pick up the book. Logan grabbed her wrist. “Wait. We’re blown. Crow knows we know.”
Sydney pointed at the book. “So, is this a warning or a threat?”
A red laser dot blossomed on Sydney’s chest. Logan shoved her to the linoleum floor and dove the other direction. A slight tinkling signaled the high-velocity round piercing the window glass. The small hole was nearly invisible in the glare of the afternoon sun. The bullet tore a hole in the back of booth where Sydney was about to sit. The shot came from so far away that Logan didn’t even hear the gunshot. The shooter no doubt used muzzle suppression.
Sydney sat up. Logan pointed at the bullet hole in the seat cushion.
Sydney ground her teeth. “I didn’t even hear the shot. He’s gotta be across the street on the bank roof.”
“Stay low. Let’s go out back.”
They crawled across the checkerboard tile floor. The other customers didn’t hear the shot either. Some turned at the pop of the bullet hitting the cushion. So, they had no idea why these two idiots were crawling like kids playing army. They crawled into the kitchen, where they got to their feet and sprinted out of the back door.
Logan and Sydney emerged from the back door into an alley shared with a couple of other restaurants. The alley smelled like dumpsters and grease traps. It was sickening.
“Okay, the car is blown,” Sydney said.
“You any good on a bike?”
Sydney frowned, “Like a bicycle?”
Logan pointed at a row of motorcycles parked behind a country and western bar.
She pulled a hairpin out of her hair. “Let’s do it.”
Logan mounted a Harley-Davidson Fatboy, a muscular cruiser with a strong engine. Sydney chose a Kawasaki Ninja sport bike, sleek and nimble like her. With some expert lockpicking, they were off. Logan’s Harley rumbled with power, and Sydney’s sport bike purred. Moments later they were flying through the streets. With throttles wide open they turned onto the highway and into the setting sun.
* * *
Somewhere in rural Kentucky, they pulled over as the sun was rising over the trees. They rode all night in an effort to stay ahead of Titus Crow. They didn’t know if they were the hunters or the prey.
They parked their motorcycles at a safe hometown garage and walked the half-mile to a nearby motel. They chose a room with one bed. They were still spies, and the same principles still applied. A man and a woman traveling together attracted less attention if they were a couple.
As they entered their room, they immediately started a standard decontamination and protection protocol that, ironically, Crow taught them. They crawled on their hands and knees, rubbing their hands along the baseboards, under shelves, behind the end table, and anywhere that could hide a listening device. The chances of a random motel in small-town Kentucky being bugged were low but Titus was good. Agents had died due to even lower probabilities.
They yanked the sheets off the bed. Oddly, that was someplace rookie agents often forgot to check. Everything looked clear.
Without saying a word, they both knew what to do. Sydney unplugged the phone from the wall. Sydney pried at the phone for a minute trying to try to pull it apart. They’d left in a hurry, so they didn’t have any tools. Not even a pocketknife screwdriver. After a few unsuccessful minutes, Logan pick
ed up the phone and slammed it against the bathroom floor. The phone sprang open into a mess of shattered plastic and number keys. Internal components spilled out on the tile. Sydney pulled a coil of copper wire out of the phone. She picked the magnet out of the earpiece. She put the phone cord between her teeth and yanked. With her teeth, she stripped the rubber coating off the cord, exposing the wires inside. She connected the wires to the coil, and wrapped the copper wire around the magnet and hung it in the middle of the coil of copper. Connecting a few more phone pieces together, she was ready.
“Okay,” she declared. “EMP is ready. Plug her in.”
Logan plugged in the makeshift EMP. Nothing seemed to happen. Honestly, Logan never saw an EMP go off in real life. He’d seen it in movies, but he didn’t know what he was expecting. He knew he wouldn’t see rapid, invisible bursts of electromagnetic energy. All the same, we expected something.
He unplugged it. “Did it work?”
Sydney replied, “Try the TV.”
Logan pressed the power button on the TV remote. Nothing.
The clock on the end table was dead too.
“Killed all the electronics,” Sydney said. “Hopefully, that includes any listening device we missed.”
Sydney sat on the edge of the bed. She pulled her shoes off and flopped down on the bed. “Okay, so what’s the move?”
Logan stood beside the bed with his arms folded. “Well, I guess that depends on whether or not we’re hunting or being hunted.”
Sydney patted the edge of the bed. “You’re making me nervous.”
Logan just stared at her hand as she patted the bed.
Sydney rolled her eyes, “I’m not going to jump you. We’re only pretending to be sleeping together, remember?”
Logan thought about it for a moment as she lay there with her eyes closed. He’d noticed how attractive she was the first time he’d seen her in Varsity Grill. To pretend he wasn’t attracted to her would be lying to himself. He wasn’t sure of his feelings, but he still felt the death of Park like an infected wound. Was it love? Guilt? No matter, she was dead and buried thousands of miles away.
Clean Cut Kid (A Logan Connor Thriller Book 1) Page 13
