The Prisoner's Gold (The Hunters 3)

by Chris Kuzneski

  ‘Don’t worry,’ he assured the women, ‘there are no listening devices active in this room. I hacked the feed and put it on a silent loop so we could speak in private.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Sarah asked with a straight face.

  ‘Come on, Sarah. Don’t play dumb. I know you know about the bugs. And I know that Papi is the one who put them there. It doesn’t take a genius like me to figure that out.’

  ‘Genius?’ Sarah said with a laugh as she secretly pulled the bug detector from her pocket and activated it under the table. A quick glance down at its darkened LED confirmed that the listening devices that were normally present in the room were not recording, just as Garcia had said. ‘Aren’t you the same guy who mistook our translator for the maid?’

  Garcia blushed but didn’t take the bait. ‘I want in on the search for Papi’s employer.’

  ‘What search?’ she demanded.

  ‘Come on, Sarah. I know you and Jack are trying to figure out why this house is bugged and why Papi’s keeping us in the dark about his funding. I want to help.’

  ‘Help?’ Sarah blurted. ‘If I remember correctly, you were involved with spying once before – but you were doing it for Papi and against us.’

  Garcia groaned. He knew she was going to bring up the incident on the train. ‘How many times do I have to tell you: I didn’t betray anyone. He was paying me. Back then you were total strangers, and I was merely doing my job. Things are different now, and you know it.’

  ‘Maybe so,’ she said, reluctantly acknowledging the loyalty Garcia had shown ever since. ‘But there’s nothing to tell you. Maggie and I were just talking about history.’

  ‘Relax,’ Garcia said, ‘I looped the bugs in the next room, too. Even if you shout, no one will hear you.’

  ‘Why do I get the feeling that you’ve said that to women before?’ Sarah teased.

  Maggie put her hand over her mouth and tried to stifle her laugh. She had been completely quiet up to this point in the discussion, but the line was just too funny to ignore. ‘Sorry.’

  Garcia remained focused on Sarah. ‘Tease me all you want, but the truth is I watch your backs all the time – even when you don’t know I’m doing it.’

  Sarah leaped to her feet. ‘So you are a perv, just like Josh said!’

  ‘What?’ Garcia blurted.

  ‘I swear to God, if I find out that you’ve been watching me in the shower—’

  ‘No!’ he shouted as he stood to defend his honor. ‘Nothing like that! I swear! All I do is make sure you’re safe. That’s it. That’s all I do. I make sure the team is safe.’

  ‘Safe, how?’ Sarah demanded.

  ‘For instance, I ran a thorough check on Maggie as soon as I knew she was joining the team – even before you and Jack asked me to.’

  Maggie stopped laughing and stared at Garcia. She knew that they were going to check up on her, but she was surprised that they were going to reveal the results with her in the room.

  ‘And?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘She is who she says she is: a high-end travel guide based in China. I thoroughly checked her credentials, and there’s nothing weird in her history. And she’s not reporting to Papi, either. As far as I can tell, the two of them first spoke earlier this month. No prior connection.’

  Sarah stared at Maggie. ‘And since then?’

  Garcia answered. ‘One phone call, two emails, and three texts; all before she was introduced to the team. Nothing since.’

  Maggie simply nodded.

  Garcia took a deep breath. ‘Seriously, Sarah. I’m here to help. Just tell me what to do.’

  Sarah reluctantly sat down again and signaled for him to do the same. Thanks to a rocky childhood and many years of undercover work with the CIA, she found it difficult to trust people – especially those who had wronged her in the past. Even so, she realized that sometimes a second chance was warranted, and she sensed this was one of those times.

  Of course, she wasn’t going to make it easy on him.

  That wasn’t Sarah’s way.

  ‘Look,’ Maggie said to break the icy silence, ‘I came to this party a little late, but if it’s okay with you, I’d like to speak on the matter.’

  ‘Go ahead,’ Sarah said.

  ‘As I understand it, we were hired by Jean-Marc to find a treasure. We were selected for our abilities and our willingness to step outside the law to accomplish that goal. I don’t find it the least bit surprising that he might have some skeletons in his closet. And considering the amount of money that he’s paying the team, I understand his desire to keep tabs on us.’

  Sarah and Garcia nodded grudgingly.

  Maggie continued. ‘I can see where Jack might want to have more information about Jean-Marc’s motivation, but how exactly does that help us accomplish our goal? I mean, all that matters right now is that Jean-Marc does want us to succeed on this mission, right?’

  Sarah sighed. ‘Yes, but the thing is, we were hired on the understanding that Papi was in charge. It was all presented as a scenario where we were working for him and spending his money, but we sense that isn’t the case. And that makes us very uncomfortable.’

  ‘Why?’ Maggie wondered.

  ‘Why?’ Sarah echoed. ‘Because I’d prefer not to be working for the Russian mob. Or a Mexican cartel. Or any of the million or so criminal organizations in the world.’

  Maggie conceded the point.

  ‘Plus,’ Sarah continued, ‘why is Papi – or our real employer – spending millions of dollars to find these ancient treasures if they just give them away?’

  Garcia nodded. ‘That’s been bugging me, too.’

  Sarah glanced at him. ‘Hector, I’m going to ask you an important question, and I need you to be upfront with me. No bragging. No exaggerations. Only the honest truth.’

  ‘Go ahead. Ask me anything.’

  She stared at him. ‘How good a hacker are you?’

  ‘I’m very good. Why?’

  She shook her head. ‘I mean, if you were to rank yourself compared to all the other hackers in the world, where would you fall?’

  Garcia gave the question some consideration. ‘Probably near the top ten, if not in it. It’s hard to say. There are a lot of us out there who don’t exactly advertise.’

  ‘You’re that good?’ Maggie asked.

  Garcia tapped briefly on the small tablet he’d brought into the room. In less than a minute, he had the information he was searching for. ‘You have precisely $107,123.11 in your numbered account in Liechtenstein.’ He smiled at Maggie. ‘You shouldn’t have set that up online.’

  Maggie grimaced. ‘Hector, if I forgive you for calling me the cleaning lady and for snooping on me, will you show me how to hide those funds better?’

  Garcia nodded. Then he turned back to Sarah, who was waiting patiently. ‘Why did you ask about my ranking?’

  ‘Two reasons,’ she answered. ‘The first is obvious: if we’re going to get more information on Papi and what he’s really up to, we’ll need your help. The truth is Jack was always going to bring you in, but I asked him to hold off until you and I had a chance to talk. Now that we’ve cleared the air, I think it’s time to prove your worth.’

  ‘Just tell me how.’

  ‘We know that Papi has access to millions of dollars to pay for us, this compound, his yacht, and everything that we need on our missions, and yet we’ve gotten absolutely nowhere on his background and business holdings. So we have to assume that he’s got some incredible cyber power on his side.’

  Garcia was surprised. ‘You think he’s hired someone better than me?’

  Sarah nodded. ‘I think he thinks he has. Now it’s up to you to find a way past his defenses and prove him wrong.’

  Garcia grimaced. All this time he had been thinking that the reason he couldn’t find anything on Papi was because he was clean. He had honestly never considered that someone better than he was responsible for hiding the Frenchman’s dirt.

  ‘
It’ll be easier said than done,’ Garcia replied. ‘Don’t get me wrong, I can do it. I’ll just need some time.’

  ‘How much?’ Sarah asked.

  ‘A few days. Maybe a few weeks.’

  ‘Weeks?’ Sarah groaned. ‘Why so long?’

  ‘If someone else is protecting Papineau’s digital footprint, then I can’t just bombard his accounts with everything in my arsenal – they’ll pick up on that and know we’re up to something. I’ll have to come at this from another direction, something they’ll never see coming.’

  ‘But you’ve got something in mind?’ Maggie asked.

  Garcia nodded. ‘Yeah, I think I have something that’ll work.’

  ‘Good,’ Sarah said. ‘Get to it.’ She didn’t need to know the specifics of his plan; she just needed it to do what he said it could.

  ‘Will do,’ Garcia said as he grabbed his tablet and stood.

  ‘Wait,’ Sarah said. ‘We’re not done.’

  ‘Right. You said there were two reasons you wanted to know my worldwide ranking as a hacker, and you only named one. What was the second?’

  ‘You have to double-check all your protocols.’

  Garcia flashed a look of confusion. ‘I’m not following.’

  Sarah stood and walked around the table to place her hand on Garcia’s shoulder. Though he had the highest IQ on the team, his lack of street smarts was sometimes disconcerting. ‘Think about it, Hector. If Papi hired a hacker who is better than you, what do you think his first assignment was? Here’s a hint: I guarantee it wasn’t me.’

  Garcia’s face went pale when he realized her point. Everything he had established might already be compromised. Until he had rechecked his system, he had to assume that all of his work was unsecure. The thought sickened him.

  The team was vulnerable, and it was all his fault.

  Garcia nodded. ‘I’ll start right now.’

  22

  Cobb dragged McNutt the last few yards back to the ravaged Land Cruiser, then laid his unconscious form on the ground. Steam was still hissing from the engine when Cobb climbed over the gore-splattered back seat and accessed the cargo area of the vehicle. He quickly found the first aid kit that he’d brought along and tore it open.

  The bullet had ripped through McNutt’s leg and come out the other side, leaving two external wounds to close and a multitude of blood vessels to plug internally. Unfortunately, the kit was designed with superficial lacerations in mind; McNutt’s injuries were simply too severe for gauze and tape. Even with the military-issue, quick-hardening bandages and next-generation spray-on skin, there wasn’t much Cobb could do.

  Then he had an idea.

  Cobb threw the first aid kit aside and scrambled for the backpack that contained his laptop. Rummaging through the case, he quickly laid his hands on the cylinder he was seeking then returned to his fallen friend.

  He dropped to McNutt’s side and slid a folding serrated knife out of his pocket. He used the blade to cut off McNutt’s T-shirt, some of which he’d already used as a makeshift tourniquet. Next he ran a long slit up the leg of McNutt’s trousers to expose the wound.

  The hole was to the side of McNutt’s thigh and just larger than an American quarter. Blood formed a perfect half-sphere as it bubbled up out of the puncture before seeping down the Marine’s leg. Cobb used McNutt’s sliced shirt to swab away at the bulk of the fluid and then brought up the cylinder that he’d retrieved from his computer case.

  He pointed the aerosol can at the wound and began to spray. A thick, black, gelatinous substance squirted out of the can and into the hole. Cobb laid it on heavy, then he pulled back and watched. In just a few seconds he could see the dark gel hardening. A moment later, the blood around the edges of the wound stopped flowing entirely.

  Miraculously, the spray had saved McNutt’s life.

  But Cobb had no way of knowing if the substance would eventually kill him.

  The thick gel was filled with colloidal quantum dots: microscopic semiconductor particles designed to function like solar cells. The US military was constantly field-testing stuff like this. A soldier could spray it on a rock and shove in the plug of a power cord – or even just the frayed wires where the plug used to be. The black ooze would harden in seconds and collect enough solar energy to power an electronic device in a pinch.

  In this case, Cobb simply used it for its quick-hardening property and hoped like hell that none of the small particles would be swept through McNutt’s system and cause an embolism. He also had no idea if the material was toxic; the military wasn’t big on warning labels.

  At least it did the job for the time being.

  Cobb rolled the sniper onto his stomach and applied more spray to the exit wound. Once the bleeding stopped, Cobb wrapped the leg with the quick-hardening bandages from the first aid kit, then moved the unconscious man to the front passenger seat to get him out of the sun. He would have laid him down in the back seat, but there was so much blood and gore back there he was concerned about infections.

  Next Cobb went to take a look at the engine. He didn’t have any spare parts, but he hoped there was something he could do to fix it. Instead, just as he rounded the front of the vehicle, he caught a glimpse of something down the road. Way past the remains of the burning helicopter, far off in the distance, a trail of dust was rising.

  Someone was coming.

  Cobb cursed loudly as he retrieved the telescope that McNutt had used earlier and then climbed to the roof’s luggage rack for a better view. As he focused on the billowing stream of dust in the distance, he slowly breathed a sigh of relief.

  It wasn’t reinforcements.

  It was a commercial truck.

  With massive wooden boards surrounding the bed, the Pakistani rig was painted in brilliant reds, greens, and blues. The front of the cab was decorated with more superfluous crap than Cobb had ever seen on a vehicle that wasn’t in a parade: lights, fringe, beads, fluttering fabrics, and carvings in the shape of peacocks. He could also see that the bed was crowded with Muslim men – their beards and taqiyah skullcaps announcing their faith. He reasoned the truck was most likely headed for Kashgar, and then probably on to Gilgit, and maybe even Peshawar.

  As far as he was concerned, any of those cities was better than here.

  Cobb climbed down and grabbed the M60 from the rear of the Land Cruiser. He stepped onto the asphalt and hoisted the barrel of the machine gun skyward with a single arm, allowing the weight of the weapon to pin his elbow to his side. The pose was meant as a display, not as a threat, and it freed his left arm to flag down the approaching visitors.

  Cobb stopped in the middle of the road and waited.

  He could clearly see the vehicle speeding toward the ruins of the helicopter. Moments later the truck slowly picked its way around the wreckage and approached the human blockade.

  Cobb didn’t move.

  He simply stood there and stared.

  The driver stopped the truck a hundred feet away. From this distance, the Pakistani was the only man that Cobb could see. All the others were hunkered down in the back, completely out of sight. Were they praying? Getting weapons? Planning an attack?

  Cobb didn’t know, but he kept his cool.

  He slowly moved his finger to the trigger, just in case.

  The driver, who didn’t know what to make of the scary man with the M60, started to whisper to his brothers behind him. At their urging, he called out in his Uyghur dialect.

  Cobb countered with a single word. ‘English?’

  ‘Ah! I can speak!’ a different voice yelled out.

  A man’s head popped up in the rear of the truck. He wore a white and blue skullcap over black hair, and his face sported a short beard. Cobb put him at no more than twenty-five.

  ‘I speak the English good! What you are needing?’

  ‘I need transport to Kashgar. My friend is hurt.’

  The young man’s face darkened as his eyes darted lower, toward where McNutt sat slumped in the inter
ior of the SUV. Cobb could hear the others mumbling to the man in Uyghur and Urdu, but not loudly enough for Cobb to make out any words.

  ‘Okay,’ the young man said. ‘One moment.’

  Then he ducked his head back down behind the headboard of the truck. A heated discussion arose, and occasionally a loud voice would bark something out for the driver’s attention. He routinely answered in monosyllabic grunts or with the word ‘acha’, which Cobb knew to mean ‘good’ in both Hindi and Urdu.

  Finally the man popped his head up above the board again. He looked a little sheepish when he spoke, as if bargaining hadn’t been his idea. ‘How much?’

  Cobb had been prepared for this. Haggling was a way of life in western Asia, and it stretched well into the interior of China too. ‘I have two hundred American. It’s yours if you get us to Kashgar – but no police or army … Two hundred. That’s all I have.’

  Of course, that wasn’t true. Cobb had a few thousand in hundred-dollar bills stashed in watertight bags on his body and a few thousand more in the SUV, but he knew he’d need most of that for a back-alley doctor who wouldn’t ask questions and the rest to cross the border back into Kyrgyzstan.

  The negotiator ducked his head down and informed the others of the deal. There was some thoughtful bickering, but no more outright arguing. Cobb took that to mean they would accept the deal. One lone voice still sounded like it wanted more.

  There was always a greedy one.

  Then he raised his head above the barrier with a sad look. ‘Two hundred? Is all you have? Nothing else? They are wanting baksheesh.’

  Cobb knew the word meant ‘gift’, but in practice it was more like a bribe.

  He slapped his free hand on the M60. ‘You get the machine gun, too – after you get us to where we need to go.’

  The young man’s face erupted into a wide grin, full of genuine joy. He only had a few teeth left, but the smile was the best thing Cobb had seen all day.