Dead Wrong

by Richard Phillips

  As Jack replaced the tire with the spare, a green pickup truck approached from the north, slowed, and pulled over. Ignoring Jack’s attempt to wave them on, two young men that looked like foreign college students stepped out. Probably a couple of save-the-rain-forest, eco-reengineering majors, he thought.

  “Can we lend a hand?” the taller of the two asked as he walked toward Jack, his Spanish intonation confirming Jack’s guess.

  Jack let go of the tire iron and straightened.

  “No need. Two more lug nuts and I’ll be done.”

  The man’s blond friend glanced into the SUV. “Your companion didn’t get out? Is he ill?”

  Jack shook his head and grinned. “Juan has a bad back, which means I get to bust mine.”

  The other two laughed knowingly.

  “Listen, I better get this finished and hit the road. Thanks for stopping, though.”

  “No problem.”

  As they walked back to their truck, both men glanced at Tupac, seated in the Explorer’s passenger seat, then climbed into their vehicle and drove off. Jack watched the truck disappear around a bend in the road, feeling a seed of worry sprout in his gut.

  Finishing up, he climbed behind the wheel and pulled back onto the worn two-lane highway, wishing there was an alternate route he could take to their destination. But this was Bolivia. Luckily, anybody that might pursue them would have to make the same, slow-ass trip. By the time anybody could get to where they were going, Tupac would be on a river boat into the Amazon, and Jack would be long gone, preparing to inform another satisfied client into which Cayman Island account to transfer his payment.

  He glanced at Tupac, noting the grim look that had settled on the shaman’s face. Despite what Jack had just finished telling himself, Tupac’s look matched Jack’s mood.

  CHAPTER 16

  Janet heard the two helicopters come in low and fast, the whup-whup of their rotors echoing throughout the Altmann compound as they settled onto the broad landing pad. Dolf Gruenberg’s yells carried a note of excitement that lent speed to Janet’s movements.

  Sliding the Glock 19 into the elastic holster-pocket of her utility vest, she saw a grinning Conrad Altmann standing at the floor-to-ceiling living-room windows. He watched as a dozen men gathered around tables in the courtyard, arming themselves with machine guns and ammunition that had been spread out like a breakfast buffet.

  “Tupac Inti?” Her question turned Altmann’s head toward her.

  “He’s been spotted in a black Ford Explorer near San Ramon.”

  “I’m going too.”

  Altmann’s expression darkened. “This is a capture mission. I need Inti alive.”

  Janet smiled. “That’s fine. I’ll kill him after you’re done with him.”

  Seeing the smile return to Altmann’s face, Janet walked back to her room, grabbed a three-foot-long hard-plastic case from her duffel, and laid it on the bed. Clicking open three clip fasteners, she opened the lid to reveal four separate pieces of the sniper rifle resting in separate foam compartments.

  Her hands moved with loving familiarity, snapping and locking the components together, the last being the day-night scope. Slapping a 20 round box magazine in place, she tucked three more into utility vest pockets and then walked out of the room.

  As she crossed the courtyard, Dolf moved to intercept her.

  “You’re not coming.”

  Janet nodded at the house. “Talk to your boss.”

  She watched as the albino looked toward the glass window through which Conrad Altmann observed their preparations. Seeing the muscles in his jaws clench gave Janet her first real moment of pleasure in what promised to be a very long day.

  “Which chopper do you want me on?”

  Dolf turned his icy gaze on her. “You’re with me in that one. Two things.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Don’t do anything unless I tell you to, and stay the hell out of my way.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Screw up and I’ll put you down.”

  Janet smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Turning away, Dolf put two fingers to his lips, blasting out an ear-splitting whistle. As all heads turned toward him, he circled his right hand above his head and yelled.

  “Mount up!”

  Janet climbed into the rear of the lead helicopter, sliding onto the web seat that faced out the pilot’s side. Dolf and another neo-Nazi slid in beside her as three others climbed in on the opposite side.

  As the blades spun up and the two choppers simultaneously lifted from the helipad, Janet watched as Conrad Altmann stepped out onto his pool deck. The walled compound diminished in the distance as the aircraft banked away from the snowcapped Mount Illimani, heading toward a distant rendezvous with Tupac Inti.

  Janet was sure of one thing. If Jack Gregory still accompanied the shaman, Dolf Gruenberg was in for a lot more excitement than he was counting on.

  CHAPTER 17

  Jack spotted the inbound helicopters as the SUV crested a small rise, two rapidly growing specks in the distance.

  “We’ve got trouble. Helicopters.”

  “Where?”

  “Coming in behind us from the southwest. Hang on.”

  Slowing, Jack shifted the vehicle into four-wheel drive and turned off the road, heading toward the tree line a hundred meters to the west, moving as fast as the rough terrain would allow without breaking an axle. Reaching a place where a finger of the rain forest reached out toward them, Jack picked a spot with the least amount of impeding vegetation and plowed forward. Twenty meters in, the trees closed in too tight for the SUV to continue.

  Turning off the engine, Jack opened the door and climbed out, grabbing his kitbag from the back seat and throwing it over his shoulder. Tupac rounded the vehicle and stepped up beside him, his inscrutable face showing no sign of fear.

  Jack plunged into the thick brush, and Tupac followed without having to be told to do so. They needed to get away from the vehicle, and they needed to do it quickly, but not in the same direction they’d driven into these woods. Jack turned south. Fifty meters in, he found what he’d been looking for, a place where a fallen tree provided thick concealment over a shallow stream bed.

  Hearing the choppers for the first time, Jack pointed into the dark space. “Crawl in there and stay down.”

  Again Tupac followed Jack’s directions without objection, wasting no time on argument. That was good, because time was a luxury Jack was quickly running out of. In the distance he could hear the helicopters come in low. They passed directly over the spot where the SUV had been forced to stop and then separated. One went southwest and the other northwest, heading toward the clearings on either side of the woods, intent on cutting off Tupac’s escape route and surrounding them.

  Jack ran south, racing toward the southern clearing as fast as possible through the dense foliage, his H&K P30S having filled his right hand automatically. Adrenaline flooded his blood stream, giving Jack a rush that heightened his senses to an animal level. Though he couldn’t yet see his enemies, he could smell the danger they presented, and that sensation pulled him toward them.

  Ahead he heard the helicopter drop close to the ground and hover, to let the men inside off. Jack dropped his kitbag. It was exactly what he wanted to happen.

  Between tree branches and palm fronds, twenty-five meters away, Jack caught his first glimpse of it, a Chinese H425 capable of carrying a dozen armed men. This one carried six, all of whom leaped out as the three wheels touched the ground. Jack slid through the bushes on his stomach, looked over the gun sight, and squeezed the trigger three times.

  A red mist sprayed the air as two of the men fell to the ground and the third staggered back against the chopper. On the opposite side of the helicopter, the other three men dived into the tall grass as Jack put his fourth bullet through the right lens of the staggering man’s sunglasses. The dead man tumbled to the ground. On the far side of the chopper, wild machine-gun fire from the
man’s prone companions raked the woodline, making it clear that they had no idea where his shots had originated from. The whine of helicopter engines going full throttle accompanied the aircraft into a wheeling climb. Jack sent three shots into the helicopter’s belly before turning his attention back to the spot where three men fired in panic from within the deep grass.

  Holding his own fire, Jack listened as several new bursts of machine-gun fire echoed through the late afternoon. When the firing stopped, Jack let silence hang in the air as he counted down from thirty. In combat, silence was its own special kind of loud, rising in volume until many found it unbearable.

  Seeing a movement in the grass, Jack squeezed off two more shots, heard a gurgling scream, and watched as the two remaining Nazis sprayed lead into the forest until their magazines were empty. In the field, two thin wisps of smoke marked their positions.

  The four shots Jack placed into the grass just below that smoke were followed by silence. Without waiting to confirm the effectiveness of his gunfire, Jack melted back into the woods, slapped a fresh magazine into the H&K, grabbed his kitbag, and turned west.

  The others would have heard the gunfire, and they would be coming in from the northwest. But they would proceed through the dense forest slowly and carefully, trying to keep their companions in sight as they moved. If they were good, they would maintain a ragged wedge formation that provided interlocking fires on three sides. But these guys weren’t military, and Jack doubted they were that good. Inhaling the musty forest smell, Jack felt a fresh surge of adrenaline amp up his senses.

  They were in his world now, and nothing here would save them.

  CHAPTER 18

  Heading directly toward the spot where the black SUV had disappeared into the forest, the helicopters descended to buzz the treetops. Janet caught a brief glimpse of the Ford at the same time that Dolf saw it. Doors open, it had been hurriedly abandoned. Turning her head, she saw the albino speak into the microphone of his radio headset, his instructions sending the accompanying helicopter banking toward the clearing to the southwest while their helicopter turned northwest toward a more distant landing spot.

  Janet replayed the last image in her mind. Three of the SUV’s doors had been left open, two on the driver’s side and one on the passenger’s side. Someone was still escorting Inti, possibly two people, although she doubted it. More likely Jack Gregory had been driving and had opened the back door to retrieve something after getting out. Knowing Jack as intimately as she did, that wasn’t a good sign for his attackers. As they descended toward the landing zone, Janet raised her rifle, scanning the edges of the clearing through the powerful scope.

  Dolf’s plan was to surround Tupac and whoever was helping him, herding them back through the forest until they were trapped against open space or pinned between the twin neo-Nazi pincers. But Jack was a hunter, not the hunted. He wouldn’t hesitate, and he couldn’t be herded.

  As the helicopter’s wheels touched the grass, Janet released the buckle that belted her to the web seat and leaped to the ground. Without hesitation, she raced across the open space and ducked into the forest’s edge, assuming a prone firing position. An angry Dolf Gruenberg crashed into the woods beside her.

  “What the hell are you doing?” he asked.

  “The same thing your people should have done. Clearing the danger area.”

  The sound of distant gunfire cut off his response, sending the other four neo-Nazi foot soldiers running toward the concealment offered by the dense bush. Machine guns from the southern clearing began firing, the sound painting a clear picture for Janet. These weren’t the short, three- to five-round controlled bursts that would indicate the situation was going well. The guns were blazing away as if the gunners were being charged by an enemy rifle brigade.

  Janet rose to a knee, half-turned to face Dolf.

  “If you want to take Inti, we need to move now, before the other action wraps up.”

  “You hear that? The other half of my team has them pinned down.”

  “Does it sound like that to you? Because it sounds like panic to me.”

  To his credit, Dolf showed no hint of his earlier anger, listening carefully to the distant sounds of battle as he weighed her words. The machine-gun fire ceased, followed by four quick shots. When Dolf turned his gaze back on Janet, he nodded.

  “Okay. Your plan. You lead.”

  “Fine.”

  Janet ducked under a branch and began moving rapidly through the undergrowth, angling back toward where she’d seen the black Ford. Behind her she could hear Dolf and his men working hard to keep up. The silence that draped this finger of rain forest was now broken only by the stamp of booted feet, the breaking of branches, and the hard breathing of men who sensed danger all around them.

  Dolf spoke into his radio. “Rudy. What’s your status?”

  As they continued moving, Janet heard the hiss from the radio as Dolf turned up the volume. He repeated the question. “Rudy, do you hear me?”

  Nothing.

  Catching a glimpse of metal ahead, Janet dropped to a knee and raised her rifle to look through the scope. The jungle environment significantly limited the effectiveness of the sniper rifle, but the scope still had its uses, giving her confirmation that she had seen the Ford’s front grille and hood. Janet scanned the surrounding area as best she could and then resumed her forward progress, walking up to peer into the car. Except for some empty snack-food wrappers and water bottles behind the passenger seat, it was empty.

  “We’ve got tracks over here,” Dolf said, bending low on the driver’s side of the vehicle. “Two sets leading west.”

  Janet moved past him, following the tracks over the damp ground, Inti’s large feet making the task easier than it otherwise would have been. In Janet’s head a clock had started ticking, and she didn’t like the feeling. As much as Janet liked having a plan, Jack Gregory lived by following his instincts. It wouldn’t take him long to figure out that the second helicopter’s occupants had acted very differently than their counterparts. Then he would come back for Tupac. Certainly, he would not have allowed the big shaman to follow him on his counterattack.

  Janet hoped Jack wouldn’t kill her, and she hoped she wouldn’t have to kill him. But despite their past history together, it was still only a hope. And if she didn’t want to find out, she needed to hurry.

  A soft shuffling sound ahead brought Janet to a halt. Behind her, Dolf signaled his men, and they froze in their tracks. There it was again, as if something, or someone, was slipping through mud. Turning her head, she saw Dolf unclip a flash-bang grenade from his utility vest. When Janet pointed and nodded, he pulled the pin and tossed it over the bank into what looked like a stream bed.

  Hitting the deck, Janet covered her ears and eyes. Though it kept the blast from incapacitating her, she found herself wobbling when she rose to her feet and rushed forward. On the far bank she saw Tupac Inti lying face up, a trickle of blood running from his left ear. Then Dolf was on top of him, cuffing his hands behind his back.

  Two of Dolf’s men grabbed Inti’s arms and hauled him to his feet. Though the big man staggered, he managed to stand on his own.

  Turning to the two men who weren’t supporting Inti, Dolf pointed to the west.

  “The other one will come back for Inti. When he shows up, kill him. Then meet us back at the chopper.”

  Nodding, the men moved into covered firing positions along the far stream bank. Dolf moved up face-to-face with Tupac Inti. To Janet, they looked like bookends, one dark-skinned and noble of countenance, the other ghostly pale and devoid of human compassion. The sight made Janet’s trigger finger twitch.

  Dolf reached out and grabbed Inti’s throat.

  “Come along, Indian. Someone important wants to meet you.”

  As Janet watched the albino shove the manacled shaman ahead, she stifled a desire to plunge her icepick hairpin through Dolf’s right ear canal, repeating a mantra she’d repeated many times in the past.
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br />   Focus on the mission, Janet. Stay focused on the mission.

  CHAPTER 19

  The distinctive sound of a flash-bang grenade startled Jack. It had come from the east, from where he’d left Tupac. He’d assumed that there would be little difference between the two groups of neo-Nazis, that both lacked the kind of serious special forces training that would give him problems. Apparently, he’d been wrong about that. The leader of the second group had understood the meaning contained within the sounds from his encounter with the first group and had taken decisive action to move on Tupac.

  Changing direction, Jack headed north toward the place where he thought the second helicopter had landed. The neo-Nazis would have to take Tupac there.

  It turned out to be closer than he thought. With the sun a huge orange ball on the western horizon, Jack spotted the clearing. Setting his bag on the ground, Jack unzipped it, grabbed a grenade with his left hand, and then crawled forward to get a view of the entire clearing. The Chinese helicopter sat in the open, a mere thirty-five meters northeast of the spot where Jack lay prone in the bushes.

  The pilot had remained in the chopper, ready to start it up as soon as his passengers entered the clearing. Jack rose to his feet, stepped out into the open, and began calmly walking toward the helicopter, the sinking sun casting a long and slender shadow that matched him stride for stride. Seeing the pilot shade his eyes, Jack waved, a movement that the pilot echoed. Then he reached up and began flipping switches. With a loud whine, the rotors began to spin up until Jack could feel their wash buffet him.

  Keeping his gun hand at his side, Jack watched the pilot’s face carefully as he approached. Five meters out, the man’s expression changed and his hand darted down, almost reaching his gun, when two bullets smashed through the windscreen, one striking him in the forehead and the second, center of mass.

  Jack pulled the pin, tossed the grenade inside the aircraft, and retreated to the tree line. The explosion ignited the fuel and launched the burning aircraft ten feet into the air. The spinning blades struck the ground first and broke free of their moorings, sending shards spinning away into the rain forest, backlit by the fiery glow.