Tanner turned his head and saw that six rifles were pointed his way. If he so much as hinted he was going to raise his own weapon, he would be shot numerous times.
“What’s going on?”
Cal Vernon came into the room, and he was not alone. Bidder Number Three was at his side.
“I knew you were a bad ass, Ryan, but I had no idea you were really the assassin named Tanner.”
The young guard moved closer and aimed his gun at Tanner’s head, then he told him to pass over the rifle. Tanner did so, slowly, while asking a question of Bidder Number Three.
“Who are you?”
The white mask rose and revealed the grinning and handsome face of a Mexican man in his early-fifties. He was Damián Sandoval, leader of the Sandoval Cartel.
Tanner had dealt with him three years earlier while on his quest to kill Alonso Alvarado. Sandoval had helped Tanner while never believing Tanner would do more than cause Alvarado a little grief. After Alvarado’s death, one of Sandoval’s own men, Dante Cardoso, took over the Alvarado cartel.
Tanner had heard Sandoval wasn’t pleased by that outcome. Tanner hadn’t given a damn how Sandoval felt about it… but perhaps he should have.
Due to a twist of fate, Sandoval was repaying Tanner for a perceived injustice.
“Hello, Tanner, and thank you. Because of you I’ll be given an advantage of a million euros over the other bidders.”
“The U.S. government sent you, didn’t they?” Vernon asked Tanner. “You were sent here to kill Bishop and get the drive.”
When Tanner said nothing in response, Vernon smiled.
“It doesn’t matter.” He looked at Sandoval. “Would you like to kill him?”
Sandoval looked amused by the offer.
“There would be poetic justice in that. Our friend here gained much fame by killing a cartel leader. If I, another cartel leader were to be the man to kill him, it would be ironic. However, Tanner has capable friends who might seek revenge. I would be most happy not to be publicly associated with his death.”
Vernon took out a 2-way radio. “Karl, come in.” After his call was answered, a guttural and sibilant voice came from the speaker. It was Vernon’s bodyguard, Karl, a man who hated Tanner.
“Yesss, Cal?”
Vernon spoke while smiling at Tanner.
“Karl, I need you back at the chateau.”
“Now? But I wasss making preparationsss for the ga—”
Vernon cut the transmission to keep Karl from finishing his sentence, then he spoke again.
“I have a present for you.”
“A presssent?”
“Yes, I’m going to let you do whatever you want to Steve Ryan.”
After a moment of silence, Karl came on again.
“I have to finish here, but I’ll be back soon… with a pair of pliersss. Before I gut him with a knife, I’m going to yank every tooth out of Ryan’sss head.”
Vernon ended the call while laughing, then he asked Tanner a question.
“Were you planning to kill me?”
“I was sent to kill Bishop and bring back the drive. As long as you didn’t get in my way, I had no reason to kill you.”
“And now?”
“And now you’ve gotten in my way.”
“Forgive me if I don’t shake with fear, but you do realize you’ll be dead soon?”
“Maybe Karl will turn the other cheek.”
Vernon laughed. “It’s more likely he’ll want a tooth for a tooth, Ryan—excuse me, I mean, Tanner. It’s too bad you have to die; I liked you once we were on the same team.”
“I’ve seen how you treat your teammates,” Tanner said, referencing Owen Bishop.
Vernon stole a glance at Sandoval, then spoke to a guard. “Gag him and take him downstairs. We have an auction to get going and Mr. Bishop wants things to run on schedule.”
As Tanner was taken away with a hand over his mouth, he glanced at Sandoval. He had expected to see a look of smug satisfaction, instead, he glimpsed an expressionless face. Sandoval had told Vernon about his true identity to gain an advantage along with a measure of revenge, but there seemed to be no hate in his eyes.
Tanner’s thoughts about Sandoval ended as his arms were wrenched back and handcuffs were applied to his wrists. Then he was dragged away to be tortured in the bowels of the chateau.
27
Wheels Within Wheels
At the airfield on the grounds of the chateau, the pilots and bodyguards of the guests were being treated well. A tent had been erected, tables and chairs set up, and food provided.
As could be expected, the bodyguards sat with the other bodyguards at three folding tables, while the pilots congregated together at other tables. There were also members of the staff present, along with several of the chateau’s guards.
Most of the planes were small and Owen Bishop’s Gulfstream 550 dominated the landscape. It was thought that the jet was unoccupied, but such was not the case. Three teams of assassins slipped off the plane one by one. Each team had four men, for a total of twelve, and they had been trained by Boldizsár Magyar. Cal Vernon had hired the men with a plan in mind, and that plan was nothing short of wholesale slaughter.
Magyar’s assassins were equipped with night-vision monocles. They kept to the shadows as they grew closer to the pilots and the bodyguards. At a prearranged time, the lights went out at the airfield, plunging it into darkness.
The blackness was interrupted by numerous muzzle flashes as Magyar’s men killed without mercy.
At the chateau, one of the guards was staring in the direction of the airfield with growing concern. Although Magyar’s assassins were using weapons with sound suppressors and the trees obscured the muzzle flashes, the sharp retort of the muffled gunfire could still be heard.
The man took out his radio and called the head guard.
“What is it, Papetti?”
“I hear gunfire coming from the airfield and all the lights are out over there too. Do you think the different guards of the bidders have started fighting each other?”
“Shit. I’ll call over there and see what our men say.”
Inside the chateau and below ground in a wine cellar, Tanner was struggling to free himself. He was confined to a round stone pillar with his arms stretched behind him and his wrists cuffed together. At the moment, the hidden handcuff key he had attached to his shoelace was doing him no good. The guards had taped his ankles together and the tape covered the tops of his boots.
There was also a bruise forming on Tanner’s chin, below another strip of tape that acted as a gag. The young guard had hit him after he was handcuffed. The kid couldn’t help himself. It was retaliation at Tanner for having knocked him down and grabbing his rifle.
Tanner bent his knees as far as he could, given that his bound ankles restricted his movements. When his thighs were at a forty-five-degree angle he leapt up. The impact of landing sent pain through his shoulders, which were being pulled back so far by the cuffs that they’d begun aching from the stress. There was a positive outcome as well, as the duct tape around his ankles had grown looser after being stressed.
By the time he’d made his fourth leap he was able to lower himself until his thighs were parallel with the stone floor. Upon landing, Tanner looked down and saw that the weakened tape had torn. Two more leaps caused the tape to rip open. After lowering himself to the floor, Tanner bent his leg backwards until his hand could touch his shoelaces.
The stone pillar at his back was wide and his wrists were behind him and cuffed together at the center of it. If he had not spent decades keeping himself in optimum condition, or had lacked flexibility, his efforts thus far would have been useless.
After he had the key, it took only moments to get the handcuffs off and free his arms from the pillar. Both shoulders were aching, while his left forearm was scraped bloody. The skin there had rubbed against a burr on the rough stone while he was jumping up and down to put stress on the duct tape. He was also ch
illed, as the room was kept at a lower temperature to help preserve the wine.
Although free of his bonds, Tanner was still locked in. He had noted upon entering that the wooden door was inches thick and secured from the outside.
Thankfully, that same door would be opened at any moment by Karl, who was anxious to torture him. Unfortunately for Karl, things wouldn’t work out the way the man would like.
A wooden ladder was leaning against a row of shelves where the wine was stack to the ceiling. The ladder was about six feet high and its rungs looked well-worn. Tanner moved it away from the shelves, gripped it at one end, and lifted it. It was heavy, but not so heavy that he couldn’t swing it at chest height.
While carrying the ladder, Tanner moved to the door, which opened outward, and stood to the left of it. While waiting for Karl to appear, he decided his original plan was still viable if the auction hadn’t ended by the time he returned upstairs.
He still had the element of surprise on his side and nothing had changed as far as his goals were concerned. He needed the data drive and he still had to get to a plane. If while going about achieving those goals an opportunity arose to kill Cal Vernon and Damián Sandoval, well then, so much the better.
After he was unable to contact the men he’d left at the airfield, the main guard of the chateau’s security team went to speak to Cal Vernon. He understood that the man was in the midst of running the auction, but he needed to know how rough Vernon wanted him to get if the guests’ bodyguards had taken over the airfield.
He was also puzzled that the lights had gone dark out there. That area was on a different system than the chateau and had a propane generator as a backup system. Even if they’d lost normal power the lights should have come back on in seconds.
When the tickle in the guard’s throat turned into a cough the man thought nothing of it. However, when his eyes began watering and he collapsed to the floor, he knew that something was horribly wrong.
Three doors down the corridor Cal Vernon stepped out of a room. Through watery eyes the guard saw that Vernon was wearing a black gas mask. He was also carrying a distinctive backpack that the guard recognized. It was red and had tartan pouches. The backpack contained the money, gold, and jewelry the guard had pilfered from Bishop’s safe.
Vernon strode over to the man and spoke as he stared down at him. His words were muffled by the mask, yet clear enough to understand.
“About the contents of Bishop’s safe. I’ve changed my mind; I’ll be keeping that.”
The guard opened his mouth to answer and a wheeze escaped. When he tried to stand, he found he lacked the strength.
Vernon patted him on the shoulder and walked past him, while knowing the guard had just minutes to live.
In the library, Damián Sandoval crawled over to the prone body of one of the guards and grasped the man’s rifle. The rest of the people in the room had already succumbed to whatever was in the air and they lay on the floor coughing and wheezing.
When he attempted to lift the guard’s rifle, Sandoval found he could only tilt it upward. He did so in a jerking motion and squeezed the trigger.
The weapon had been set to deliver a three-round burst. The upper pane of glass shattered but the lower section remained intact. Still, the opening allowed fresh air in while letting the poisonous gas seep out.
A convulsive spasm of coughing racked Sandoval until all strength left him. He looked up at the window until his watery eyes could no longer see it.
When Tanner heard Karl unlatched the door to the wine cellar, he hefted the ladder up. As the door opened, Tanner twisted to the side so that the ladder would gain momentum before striking its target. The impact was devastating, and Tanner got two for one as the chauffeur, Tremblay, entered the room beside Karl.
A pair of rusty pliers and a blow torch fell from Karl’s grasp as he grunted from the impact of the ladder to his chest. Karl tumbled backwards into the hall, fell onto his ass, and struck his head against the wall. Tremblay had fared better and had only fallen to one knee.
Tanner dropped the ladder and kicked Tremblay in the throat. The act was made more difficult than it should have been because Tremblay, like Karl, was wearing a gas mask that extended out from his face. Tanner puzzled over that development while at the same time noting its significance.
He removed the mask from Tremblay as the man made gagging sounds from the pain and discomfort the blow to his throat had caused. When Tremblay attempted to keep him from taking his mask off, Tanner dislocated one of his fingers, and kicked him hard in the balls three times.
That gave Tanner the opportunity he needed to strip off the gas mask, but before he could put it on, Karl stirred and reached for his weapon, which he wore in a shoulder holster. Tanner dropped the mask onto Karl’s lap then gripped his wrist with one hand while the other grasped a handful of Karl’s hair. Karl’s struggle to free his gun from its holster ended after Tanner slammed his head repeatedly against the stone wall of the chateau’s basement.
With Tremblay’s mask on and secured, Tanner stripped Karl of his gun, then he removed the gas mask Karl wore. Tremblay had recovered enough from the trauma to his testicles to worry about whatever was in the air.
“The mask! Let me have Karl’s mask!”
“Why? What’s in the air?”
“Poison.”
“It doesn’t seem to be affecting you.”
“It’ll take longer to get down here, but Vernon is poisoning everyone.”
“Everyone?”
Tremblay’s eyes filled with tears as his hands fluttered in the air. His chest was heaving as if he had been running hard, and desperation was etched on his features.
“The guards, the guests, everyone. Give me the mask, Ryan, please? For the love of God, please, Ryan.”
Tanner brought up Karl’s gun.
“The name is Tanner.”
He shot Tremblay in the heart and the gunfire roused Karl. He gazed up at Tanner with eyes large with terror. Tanner shot him in the mouth twice, obliterating any of Karl’s teeth he had previously missed with his assault with the pipe. A search of Karl’s pockets yielded a cell phone and a spare magazine for the gun.
With a weapon in his hand and the pretense of playing Steve Ryan behind him, Tanner felt better than he had in days. He was done living like an undercover agent. He was a Tanner goddamnit, and he would bring death to anyone who got in his way.
28
Square One
Cal Vernon stood outside Owen Bishop’s Gulfstream 550 and spoke to Bishop’s pilots. The men had been kept unaware of Bishop’s death until earlier in the day, then were held captive on their jet by Magyar’s assassins.
Both pilot and co-pilot were true believers of the late Owen Bishop’s anti-government philosophy and had considered the man to be a friend. Their hatred for Vernon was evident in their gaze. They had only learned earlier in the day that Bishop was dead, and they blamed Vernon for his demise. The pilot was an Englishman while the co-pilot was a Spaniard. Both were family men with five children between them.
Power had been restored to the airfield moments before Vernon’s arrival. Nearby, beyond the jet, were the dozens of bodies of the charter pilots and guards who had arrived with the auction bidders. When the wind shifted, the stench of their vacated bowels was detectable, and Vernon wished he had kept his gas mask on.
Vernon took out his phone and read off the names of the pilots’ wives and children. The defiant and angry expressions on the pilots’ faces changed to looks of concern.
“I’ll send these men to kill your families if you don’t cooperate. Is that understood?”
The pilots nodded, then were prodded by two of the assassins and told to speak.
“Yes, sir. We’ll do whatever you say,” said the senior pilot. His educated British accent sounded haughty despite the tremor in his voice.
“Chart a course for Belgium. The men guarding you will tell you which private airfield we’ll be going to.”
&
nbsp; As the pilots were herded back onto the plane, Vernon made a call to Karl. The cell tower had been powered up and was working again. Vernon had told Karl not to take too long with Tanner, but it seemed Karl was making his fun last. Still, the man should be answering his phone.
As he was beginning to wonder if something had gone wrong, Vernon remembered that Karl and Tremblay were underground in the chateau’s wine cellar. Perhaps the cell service below the surface wasn’t good.
After looking at the time on his phone, Vernon was certain Tanner must be dead in any event. If Karl hadn’t killed the man, the poisonous gas would. A broad smile filled Vernon’s face as he thought about how well everything had gone.
The fourteen bidders had suspected nothing while that fool Sandoval had helped him by betraying Tanner. Sandoval’s reward had been to die as the winner of the auction after he had deposited eleven million euros into the secured account Vernon had set up months earlier. In fact, all of the bidders had been told that they’d won, and every one of them had sent payment for the data drives.
In all, Vernon had received one-hundred and fifty-one million euros from the bidders. He had feared that some of them might catch on to the con before they transferred their payments, however, everyone had paid. If they were wearing smiles of glee due to their belief that they had won the auction, their happiness had been hidden behind the masks they wore.
Meanwhile, every witness against Vernon was dead, as the pilots would soon be after their usefulness ended. Boldizsár Magyar and his assassins were professionals who Vernon didn’t have to fear would talk to the police. If that assessment proved wrong, it still wouldn’t matter. He had a brand-new life planned out and would be living it with an altered appearance and a new identity.
Owen Bishop would be blamed for the slaughterhouse the chateau had become and the United States and other countries would focus on him.
The Spy Game Page 14
