by Mel Odom
A moment later, Fat Mike pulled the trailer’s back door down. Bright sunlight cut into the gloom.
“All right,” Victor said over the headset that connected him to the rest of his men. “Let’s ride.” He twisted the accelerator and let the clutch out.
Victor took the lead and roared down the inclined ramp leading out of the trailer. When he reached bottom, he brought the motorcycle around and headed into the gravel parking lot. The other motorcycles trailed only a short distance behind him and flared out in a phalanx of thundering metal.
Shel McHenry, the other man, and the dog were caught out in the open. Victor grinned as he saw the Marine look in his direction. With one quick grab, Victor yanked the shotgun from the shoulder scabbard and pointed it at the Marine. As cut-down as it was, the shotgun was more pistol than anything else.
He squeezed the trigger. Double-ought buckshot exploded from the shotgun’s throat and sped toward Shel McHenry. The abbreviated weapon jumped erratically in Victor’s grasp, but the semiautomatic function fed a new shell into place.
36
›› Mooney’s Tavern
›› Jacksonville, North Carolina
›› 1417 Hours
“Max!” Shel roared as he slapped his thigh to bring the dog in close to him. By then Shel was already in motion. The Purple Royals’ colors stood out and identified them at once.
Remy broke for cover at the same time but in a separate direction to split the attention of their attackers. That was how they’d been trained for urban area action. Split, but not far, and regroup as needed. It made them harder to hit, more difficult to cover, and gave them overlapping fields of fire.
A cloud of double-ought buckshot punched through the windshield of a parked Ford pickup. The loud report almost drowned out the noise of the breaking windshield, barely audible anyway over the rumbling Harley engines. Cube-shaped glass crunched under Shel’s feet as he beat a hasty retreat. He drew the SOCOM. 45 from his hip and took a two-handed grip as he crouched behind an SUV.
Bullets peppered the vehicle.
Shel felt Max braced at his knees, ready to take action. The SUV sagged suddenly as the front tire blew. A quick step put Shel at the rear of the SUV. Pistol held high, he peered around the vehicle, then singled one of the bikers out of the pack. He aimed for the man’s center mass and fired twice.
The first bullet took the mirror off the motorcycle’s left grip. The mirror had slid over in front of the biker’s chest. The second bullet hit the biker in the chest. He lost control of the motorcycle but didn’t let go of the handlebars.
Before he could recover, the motorcycle ran into a parked car. The bike flipped onto its side and threw the rider to the ground. The biker pushed up on his hands and tried to get to his feet.
Body armor, Shel realized. Their attackers had come loaded for bear, as his daddy would say.
Remy wheeled from cover and took deliberate aim. One of his bullets struck the man’s helmet. The 9 mm round ricocheted off the helmet’s hard surface. The next two struck the biker in the neck. He struggled for a moment, then slumped to the ground.
As he watched the man die, Shel hardened his heart. The way they were outnumbered, he knew they couldn’t afford to leave their enemies able to fight.
Another biker brought his Harley around and planted his feet. He lowered an Uzi and unleashed a torrent of rounds in Remy’s direction. Remy ducked back immediately. Bullet holes chased him.
Shel shifted and fired two shots into the man’s back without hesitation. This wasn’t one of the Louis L’Amour stories where two men faced each other and slapped leather like the books Shel had grown up on as a kid. This was war. In war, a warrior didn’t always call another man out and take him on face-to-face.
The biker jerked and fell sideways. The fact that there was no blood reinforced to Shel that the men wore body armor.
A Harley engine blasted to Shel’s left and raced closer. He turned and watched as the biker lifted a machine pistol in one big, hamlike hand. Shel stood his ground and fired instinctively. Running was only going to get him killed a heartbeat later, and by then the biker could have taken cover.
Bullets cut the air only inches from Shel’s head and face. He didn’t hear them passing, but he felt the heated wind tug at his hair and pulse against his jaw. Two of his bullets caught the biker in his helmet. One of the rounds glanced from the rounded surface of the helmet, but the other crashed through the faceplate.
The biker, suddenly slack, toppled. The motorcycle dropped with him, momentarily engaged gears, and spun out. The rear tire threw gravel like shrapnel. Then the engine sputtered and died.
Down to five rounds in his pistol’s magazine, Shel took the opportunity to reload. He shoved the partially spent magazine into his back pocket so he could find it if he needed it. Then he ducked and ran around the SUV in order to change his position.
Three attackers were down. Shel pulled up a mental image of the bikers. There had been ten of them when the shooting started.
Shel stayed hunkered down behind the pickup while two motorcycles zipped by. The bikers sprayed the truck.
Shiny chain links draped over the side of the pickup’s bed grabbed Shel’s attention. Judging from the mud caking the vehicle, the driver spent considerable time off-road. Moving quickly, Shel yanked the chain down with his free hand, then underhanded it at the next motorcycle.
The chain struck the motorcycle’s side and wrapped up in the rear wheel. Before the biker knew what was happening, the motorcycle’s rear tire locked up. The rider flew over the handlebars and managed an inelegant face-plant.
Conscious of everything around him, Shel watched as the downed biker forced himself up to his knees and halted there for a moment. Before he could move again, Shel took aim at the man’s neck and fired. The man rolled over and was still.
In less than a minute, the parking area was riddled with bullets and spent brass. And nearly half of Victor Gant’s would-be murderers were down.
Victor himself sat almost seventy yards away calmly reloading his cut-down shotgun. Shel took a bead and fired. The round slapped against Victor’s helmet and rocked his head back. Then he engaged the clutch and the accelerator and shot forward. He raised the shotgun before him and fired.
Shel ducked the blast and felt the vehicle behind him shiver with the impacts. Victor Gant roared past him, followed quickly by the other survivors of the attack. When the last of the five went past, Shel stepped out and took aim at the last motorcycle’s rear tire.
The tire exploded. Rubber came loose and flapped against the wheel housing. Out of control, the biker slammed into a twentysomething-year-old Trans Am. He didn’t get back up.
Gun in hand, forcing himself to move, Shel crept toward the last man they’d downed. As Shel kept watch, Victor Gant’s bikers roared out onto the street. Shel reached into his pocket and took out his cell phone.
Remy maintained his cover with his pistol extended and ready to use.
Shel called NCIS headquarters and got Will on the phone. Briefly he outlined what had just taken place. Beneath his fingertips, the biker’s pulse was fast and weak.
“Stay there,” Will advised. “Secure the site. Estrella’s already notifying Jacksonville PD and the sheriff’s department. They can get out roadblocks. We’ll be there in a minute.”
“Copy that,” Shel said. Then he broke the phone connection and walked back to his Jeep to get a pair of disposable cuffs. He knew Victor Gant wasn’t going to let this go.
›› 1423 Hours
As he tightened the cuffs on the unconscious biker’s hands, Shel’s cell phone rang. He answered without checking caller ID, figuring it was Will or one of the team.
Instead, it was Victor Gant.
“You got more lives than a cat, jarhead,” Gant snarled. “Thought I had you cold.”
Calmly Shel stood and signaled to Remy, who was already getting portable barricades from the local PD who were just then starting to arrive. Remy
looked at him. Shel pointed at his phone and mouthed, Gant.
Understanding, Remy used his own phone to call NCIS headquarters and initiate a GPS lock on Gant’s phone.
“Well,” Shel drawled, “you got high marks for effort. And it only cost you five of your guys to find out that you weren’t good enough.”
Victor cursed.
Shel dragged the handcuffed biker to shelter under a 4x4 pickup. He checked the surroundings. It wouldn’t have surprised him to learn that Victor had another team in waiting or had doubled back.
“I’m still here,” Shel said. “Still standing. If you decide you want to take another run at me, I’ll be here waiting.”
Remy had taken up a support position too. But he’d switched his pistol out for the M4 assault rifle he carried as part of his traveling equipment. The commands he’d yelled earlier hadn’t kept the locals back, but they were staying back now that the rifle had come out into the open.
“I think I’m going to pass on that,” Victor said. “I’ve got things to do.”
“There’s a big score between you and me,” Shel said. “You didn’t strike me as the type of man to leave something like that standing.”
“I’m not,” Victor promised. “I’m purely an Old Testament kind of guy. If you know anything about me, you know that.”
“Your son shot me,” Shel said. “He took me on while looking me in the eyes. Takes a real man to do that.”
Victor laughed bitterly. “You sure like to push buttons, don’t you, boy?”
“If we went at it one-on-one, I’m just saying this thing might end up differently. You want me. I’m willing to meet you. Just name the time and place.” Shel glanced at Remy.
Remy spoke into his cell phone, waited a moment, then shook his head.
“How do I know you’d show up there?” Victor asked.
“I’ll give you my word,” Shel replied. But he knew he wouldn’t do that. There was no way Victor would meet him under such circumstances. Not willingly.
“Your word.” Victor snorted. “Your father teach you to stand by your word, jarhead?”
Shel felt a pit open up beneath him, and he knew he was playing with fire. His daddy’s life-especially what had gone on in Vietnam-was never spoken of.
“I knew your father,” Victor said. “Back in the jungle. Back when the government gave us an even harder war we couldn’t win.”
Shel steeled himself to make no rebuttal. The most onerous thing about this conversation was that Victor Gant knew things about Tyrel McHenry that Shel didn’t.
“Cat got your tongue, jarhead?” Victor taunted.
“I’ve been listening,” Shel said. “And I’ve decided that you ain’t fit to breathe my daddy’s name.”
“Is that right?” Victor laughed. “You got a mighty high opinion of your father.”
“He’s a good man.” Shel knew that was so, even though he couldn’t explain why his daddy had kept his sons-and the rest of the world-shoved away.
“Did he ever mention me?” Victor asked.
“No.”
“Probably not. He had plenty of reason not to.”
Shel wanted to shout the man down, and it took everything in him not to do that. If he angered Victor too much, the biker leader might break the phone connection. Instead, Shel glanced at Remy again.
After a brief conversation, Remy shook his head. He took his phone away from his ear and made a circular motion, mouthing, Keep going.
Shel knew the fact that Victor was in motion, running through overlapping cell-phone towers, was making the trace more difficult. Breathing out, Shel held on to his focus and tried his best to push all the anger away from him.
“Did your father ever tell you about the man he murdered?” Victor asked.
37
›› Mooney’s Tavern
›› Jacksonville, North Carolina
›› 1432 Hours
Shel exploded as the biker leader’s words slammed into him. “You’re a lying sack of-”
“Your father has a lot of secrets, jarhead,” Victor interrupted. He spoke slowly, calmly, mockingly. “I helped him bury the soldier he killed that night in Qui Nhon. And when we finished covering him over, your father prayed over that dead man and gave up on God in his next breath.”
Fear and anger throttled Shel. He tried to speak and couldn’t. His throat felt like it had swelled nearly shut. He forced himself to breathe, and even that was difficult.
“When you see your father again, maybe you ought to ask him about that,” Victor suggested. “Remind him that there ain’t no statute of limitations for murder. And that the Army still hangs war criminals.”
Get me a twenty, Shel thought desperately, looking again at Remy. He knew Estrella would be the one running the phone search. Find this jerk for me.
Remy shook his head.
“I’ll tell you something else,” Victor said, “if you people find me again, I’m going to tell everything I know to the newspapers. Maybe catch one of those guys at 60 Minutes or something. They like stories that have a history. Maybe you’ll get to see your father swing from a gallows.”
Cold anger replaced the heat inside Shel. When he spoke, his words were calm and measured. “You’ll never live to see that happen.”
Victor laughed. “Touched a nerve, did I? What is it, jarhead? You got some kind of hero worship about your old man? When I saw you, I figured you for the type. I hate to be the one to bring it up, but he didn’t come see you in the hospital, did he? Just stayed down there at that ranch in Texas. Is he too old to travel these days?”
Shel didn’t say anything.
“I’ll be seeing you, jarhead,” Victor said. “I ain’t gonna forget about this little dance we got going on between us. I ain’t the forgetting kind. I’m just gonna put it on a back burner for a while. Catch you on the flip-flop.”
Before Shel could say anything, the phone connection ended. He turned to Remy. “Tell me Estrella found him.”
Remy talked for a moment, then shook his head. “He was moving too fast. She got a general location. Jacksonville PD’s already covering it.”
“Where?”
Remy hesitated.
“Where?” Shel demanded. He didn’t know what he’d do if he caught up with Victor Gant. He knew he wasn’t truly in control of himself. But he couldn’t sit back and do nothing.
“South side,” Remy said. “When she lost the signal, Estrella said Gant was rolling south.”
Shel closed his phone and started for his Jeep.
“Shel,” Remy called.
Shel ignored him. Anger pooled inside him like bubbling lava.
“The PD’s not going to let you leave,” Remy said. “They want us to stay here.”
Shel stepped into the Jeep and slid behind the steering wheel. Max vaulted through the passenger window and settled into the seat. The Labrador was alert and pensive.
“You’re making a mistake,” Remy said.
Without answering, Shel put the Jeep in gear and backed out into the parking lot. He threaded through the wrecked motorcycles and bodies toward the street exit. One of the policemen started for him.
“Sir,” the officer said as he held up a hand and kept the other on his gun butt, “I’m afraid you’re going to have to stay with the scene.”
Shel ignored the man and rolled on by. He knew the policemen weren’t going to fire on him. They might not like the fact that he had disobeyed them, but they weren’t going to shoot him.
One of the police cars pulled out of the parking lot and followed Shel with his lights on.
Shel didn’t care. Victor Gant was headed south, so south was where Shel was going to head. He just hoped he found the man, but he didn’t know what he was going to do with him when he caught up with him.
Shel was so focused on the idea of finding Victor Gant that he didn’t see the police car swing out in front of him until it was almost too late. He jammed on the brakes and managed to bring the Jeep to a stop mom
ents before it would have slammed into the squad car. Before he even had a chance to put the Jeep in reverse, the cop was out of the car, gun drawn.
“Stand down, Gunnery Sergeant,” the cop yelled. “I am placing you under arrest.”
Fuming, Shel realized he had no choice. He put the vehicle in park and resigned himself to the fact that Victor Gant was most likely going to escape-again.
›› NCIS Offices
›› Camp Lejeune, north carolina
›› 1843 Hours
When Will entered his office, he found Shel waiting for him.
The big Marine stood impassively at the window and stared out at the camp. His sunglasses covered his eyes. Max lay at his feet. After being remanded to NCIS custody by the Jacksonville PD, Shel had returned to camp. He now wore Marine cammies, complete with the uniform hat. Evidently he’d taken time to shower, shave, and get his kit together. A duffel bag sat beside one of the chairs in front of Will’s desk.
Like an automaton, Shel spun expertly and saluted Will. He held the salute until Will returned it.
“At ease,” Will said.
Effortlessly Shel relaxed into parade rest.
Will pointed at the chairs in front of his desk. “Take a load off.”
“Thank you, sir,” Shel said. “But I’d prefer to stand.”
“I’d like to sit,” Will said, feeling a little irritable, “and I’d like not to have to twist my head off to look at you.”
Shel moved to the front of the desk and stood silently.
“That’s not a whole lot better,” Will said.
“I was thinking we could make this a short conversation,” Shel said.
Will studied Shel. They’d been friends through their work at the NCIS for years. Will had trained Shel in a lot of the crime scene investigation techniques. Shel had helped Will work on his fighting skills and pistol marksmanship, neither of which was imperative aboard an aircraft carrier.
“You left a crime scene today.” Will flipped open a yellow legal pad to the notes he’d taken earlier.
