China Strike

by Matt Rees

  Verrazzano saw what might be at the root of Cruz’s agitation. “What do they know how to do?”

  “We are from the Brigada de Investigación Tecnológica. How do you say it in English?”

  “The cybercrimes unit?”

  “Is correct.”

  Kinsella slapped her hand against her hip. “Harrison messed up. I told him all the details, and he sent us a bunch of computer geeks.”

  “Comisario Cruz, we don’t have a lot of time,” Verrazzano said. “We’re going to move right now, before the people on that boat realize we’re here. And you’re moving with us.”

  “I will go to explain to my men.”

  “Do it quickly.”

  Cruz hurried to the edge of the quay and hid himself behind a palm tree, speaking to his officers through a microphone on his lapel. Kinsella handed Verrazzano an earpiece, a receiver, and a mic. He reached up to fit the earpiece and grimaced. He switched it to his other hand and plugged it in.

  “You’re hurt?” Kinsella pulled the lapel of his jacket to get a look at his wounded shoulder.

  “Not as bad as my dad was hurt when the Islanders moved to Brooklyn.” Over the earpiece, the comisario’s voice came through in impatient Spanish.

  “How’re we going to do it, Dom?” Kinsella said.

  A taxi pulled up at the bus stop in front of the restaurant. Two of the Spanish cops approached it, gesturing for it to move on. But the rear door opened and Jahn stepped out. She brushed off the Spaniards and hurried toward the ICE agents.

  “Before everything kicks off, you’d better look at this, Dom.” Todd pulled a FedEx waybill from his pocket. “It’s from the packet the Irish banker had in his attaché case. Inside was a scalp. The waybill was sent from a FedEx office in Cologne, so I’d guess the scalp belonged to the fourth engineer.”

  Verrazzano took the paper. The Irishman’s Luxembourg address was written in a shaky hand. Printed beside it, the location of a FedEx office on Klarastrasse. He remembered the street. It was where he had found Turbo dead, with Jahn standing in the middle of the road looking hopeless.

  Jahn reached them. She grabbed the paper. “The hell is this?”

  “It’s nice to see you too,” Kinsella said.

  Jahn read the waybill and stuffed it in her pocket. “What’s the situation?”

  “We have the three suspects on the yacht at the end of the quay. Support is from a local cybercrime unit.”

  “Cybercrime?” Jahn glared at Kinsella accusingly.

  “We have to board the yacht right now. Bill, wrangle these Spanish cops to keep the perimeter. See that Agent Jahn is issued with intercom hardware. Let’s go, Dom.”

  “I’m going to do it,” Verrazzano said, “with Gina.”

  Kinsella stared from Verrazzano to Jahn. “Dom, what the hell?”

  “There’s another suspect at large. The guy who’s actually been doing the killings.”

  “The one with the rotten skin?” Todd said.

  “The Krokodil. If we, all four of us, go to board the yacht, we’ll have no one but the computer nerds between our backs and a very deadly assassin.”

  “We don’t know that he’s even in Palma,” Kinsella said.

  “I won’t take the risk. Noelle, I need you and Bill to secure the end of the quay and make sure that the Krokodil doesn’t slip past the Spanish cops. Whatever happens over there”—he pointed toward the yacht—“I want you to maintain the perimeter back here. Things blow up over there, you do not, repeat do not, come running in. It could be a distraction intended to draw us all toward the yacht.”

  Todd shrugged his acceptance. Kinsella clicked her tongue.

  “Go tell Comisario Cruz how it’s going to be, Bill.” Verrazzano took Kinsella a few yards away from Jahn.

  “What the hell’s going on here, Dom?”

  “You have to let me play something out, Noelle.”

  “I should be going with you.”

  “There’s no one I’d rather have with me boarding that boat than you. But it isn’t going to be that way.” She opened her mouth to question him. He turned away and spoke to Jahn. “Gina, let’s move.”

  Kinsella moved closer and spoke quietly. “There’s something you’re not telling me, Dom, and that’s okay. I’m going to do this your way. But when it’s done, I don’t care what you write for the files—you’re going to tell me the real story. All of it.”

  “No secrets. It’s a promise, Noelle.”

  “In that case, take care. Get on now.”

  “Gina, come with me.”

  Jahn ran her finger down the scar on her face, her nerves telling in her movements. For her, this was more than just an arrest they were about to make.

  It was for Verrazzano too.

  They walked side by side onto the quay, measuring their pace in case someone was watching them from inside the yacht. If they were very lucky, the people on the boat would still be sleeping. But Verrazzano had never once seen Wyatt asleep, and he didn’t expect to catch him napping now.

  Jahn went into a slow jog. “Let’s move, Dom. We’ve got to get on that boat.”

  Verrazzano caught her arm. His eyes were hard. “It’s a dangerous operation, boarding the boat.”

  “Okay, so it’s a risk. Let’s go.”

  “You’re mighty keen to get on board. Are you expecting to meet someone?”

  “Meet? What the hell are you talking about?”

  “You sent the scalp to the banker in Luxembourg.”

  “That’s nuts.”

  “I found you on the street outside the FedEx office. With Turbo dead. There’s no way the Krokodil had gotten there before you. I was tracking him. He couldn’t have done it.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Tell me the truth, Gina. Or I’ll bring Kinsella over here and board the boat with her, instead.”

  “No.” Jahn strangled her shout. She glanced at the boat, anxious that she may have alerted the people on board. “For God’s sake, I have to do this.”

  “How did Wyatt get to you?”

  Her shock seemed to double. Her eyes searched him, terrified, wondering how he knew.

  “Who does Wyatt have on that boat?”

  She spoke in a murmur. “My husband.”

  The Special Forces soldier she had thought was dead. Wyatt had found him and made him a hostage—and made Jahn work for him to save her husband. Verrazzano watched the first glimmer of the rising sun on Jahn’s scarred face. The scars her husband had tended and soothed until an operation in the Middle East took him away from her. Now Wyatt had given her the chance to get her man back, one sacrifice from her to repay the many sacrifices he had made in the military. All she’d had to do was kill one Chinese computer engineer. Verrazzano saw the force that had overcome Jahn’s sense of duty. It was love that made her betray her mission.

  “I’m going to stop Wyatt right now.” He put his hand on Jahn’s shoulder. “And we’re going to go get your husband.”

  She stared at him in surprise. Her eyes teared up.

  “Doing right isn’t really important until you’ve felt what it is to do wrong,” he said. “Let’s go make this right.”

  She wiped the back of her hand across her eyes. “How’re we going to handle it?”

  “It’s a big boat, but not so big that we have to split up. We’ll go up on the aft deck and into the master cabin. Then we flush right on through until we find whoever’s in there.”

  “They could come out of a hatch farther up toward the prow.”

  “Once they’re out in the open, we don’t have to worry about them. Inside the yacht they’ve got Wi-Fi and, maybe, the codes they need to activate the big crash.”

  “Wait, they don’t have the codes. You got the tattoo on the head of the engineer in Prague. Without that, they can’t activate the crash. They also don’t have Turbo’s scalp. Agent Todd intercepted it. They needed five scalps. They’ve got three.”

  He put his hand again
st her shoulder blade with a gentle pressure, and they moved off. “Gina, we’re going in. Focus on that.”

  They passed two of the Spanish cops on the quay. One of them perched on a bollard set up to prevent vehicles driving into the water. The other kicked aimlessly at a cleat, his toe poking the knot that tied off a thirty-six-foot sailboat. They glanced at Verrazzano with all the confidence of naked middle managers addressing the board of directors.

  The chugging of a heavy diesel engine at low speed sounded beyond the next dock. Through the earpiece Verrazzano heard Comisario Cruz demand to know its source. The cop on the bollard squinted between the boats. A forty-foot power boat with shiny gold bodywork rumbled toward the sea.

  “The Spanish cops are going to screw it up,” Jahn said. “If we do force our suspects off the boat, these guys will either let them get away or they’ll shoot them dead.”

  They were fifteen yards from the motor yacht when the noise of the diesel swung suddenly toward them. The high prow of the power boat emerged from beyond the row of docked yachts, lifting from the water, the engine thundering. Behind the windshield, the Krokodil spun the helm.

  Loud voices in Spanish yelled through Verrazzano’s earpiece. He called into his microphone, “Noelle, keep those guys cool back there. Mantened donde estáis. Everyone stay where you are.”

  The cops at his side drew their weapons and made for the yacht. Verrazzano shoved them backward. “It’s a diversion. Ved el barco, no mirad la lancha. Everyone watch the boat, not the motor launch.”

  The powerboat’s engines caught and started to drive past the big yacht. The Krokodil left the helm. He jumped onto the prow and leapt for the yacht. He scrambled through a hatch beyond the forward mast.

  “What’s he doing?” Jahn said.

  The powerboat kept going, its engine at full strength even with no one at the helm. It bellowed and stamped over the water toward the rear of the seafood restaurant on the quay.

  “Noelle, get those people out of the restaurant,” Verrazzano shouted.

  Kinsella rushed toward the seafood joint, waving her arms and yelling. A few of the sunburned Germans pointed toward her. One or two even stood up. But they were still there when the powerboat nosed through the plate glass windows and smashed its hull into the quay. The Germans screamed, and the ones that could still move got up and ran. Through the chaos of the panicked tourists, the bawling of the Spanish cops on the earpiece, and the impotent clamor of the powerboat straining against the quay, Verrazzano heard the purring of the motor yacht’s engine. “Move, Gina. They’re running.” He sprinted for the boat.

  The Krokodil was back on deck, ducking along the gunwales, slashing a K-bar through the ropes, cutting the motor yacht loose from the quay.

  Verrazzano leveled his H&K. He squeezed off four rounds. The Krokodil sliced the final rope and rolled under the bullets, into the wheelhouse and out of sight. The motor yacht moved off.

  Throwing himself from the quay, Verrazzano caught the stern and hauled himself aboard. Jahn made the leap. Her legs slipped toward the churn of the engines. He grabbed her wrists and lifted her. She came onto the poop deck as the boat powered forward. She stumbled into him. He felt the force of her heartbeat against his chest. The boat moved out into the marina. The quay behind them was in chaos. Over the earpiece, he heard Kinsella calling out. “Dom, Bill and me are coming to back you up.”

  He bellowed into his microphone. “Noelle, remain in position. I want the quayside cleared. The Spanish cops will have to handle the evacuation of those tourists. You and Bill are all I have between me and the Krokodil. I believe he’s somewhere on the quayside to your rear.”

  Jahn flashed a surprised look at him, shocked at his lie. The Krokodil was on the boat with them.

  “Hold your position, Noelle. I repeat, hold your position.” He pulled the mic off his jacket and tugged the earpiece away. He tossed them into the water. No one, not even Kinsella, would hear what he and Wyatt talked about. He could count on Jahn’s own secrets to keep her quiet about anything she learned on the boat. She tugged the communications rig off her jacket and threw it aside too. “It’s just you and me,” she said.

  “And a couple of very dangerous guys.”

  They entered the luxurious salon and went through to the dining room and the galley. The engines rumbled them farther from the quay toward the marina’s entrance and the open sea. The shouts and screams and sirens receded behind them. Then they heard a slap, and a man cried out ahead. They picked up the pace.

  They passed the open doors of the yacht’s four bedrooms. Each of the cabins was empty. At the entrance to the owner’s quarters, Verrazzano signaled for Jahn to throw the door open. She gripped the handle and stared at it. Verrazzano whispered, “It’s time, Gina.”

  She yanked the door open. Verrazzano spun inside. He held his weapon high.

  In the center of the room, Feng Yi was tied to a chair by his wrists and ankles. He was shirtless and shoeless. Blood streaked his fleshy torso and pooled around his feet. His nipples had been peeled away. His detached toenails lay on the boards of the deck. The scent of his urine and his soiled pants was strong in the enclosed space. Wyatt stood over him in a black T-shirt, his feet a yard apart, a hunting knife in one hand and a set of pliers in the other. His hands glistened with gore. Behind him on a rolltop desk, a MacBook flashed a connection to a page running computer code down the left side of the screen, waiting for the missing inputs from the dead engineers’ scalps. The Krokodil wasn’t in the room. Jahn entered behind Verrazzano. She covered every corner with her pistol, but Verrazzano locked onto Wyatt.

  “Where’s my husband?” Jahn shouted.

  The Chinese man wailed in pain. Wyatt jammed his pliers into the back pocket of his jeans and laid his big hand over Feng’s mouth. “Hush now,” he whispered. “General Feng, the cavalry has arrived.”

  Feng struggled to free his head from Wyatt’s grip. He turned his myopic eyes toward Jahn and Verrazzano. His voice was shattered and torn. “Please.”

  “I figured it wouldn’t take long to get what I needed out of this guy,” Wyatt said. “I was wrong. Turns out, he isn’t just a nasty little Chinaman. He’s also an awful tough little Chinaman.”

  “You’re wasting your time.” Verrazzano gestured toward the laptop. “Even if Feng talks, you won’t make any money from instigating a massive car crash.”

  “You figured out my short play on the stock market?” Wyatt’s smile lingered. He slapped Feng’s cheek gently. The man winced.

  “Your stock play is blocked.”

  “You’re sure that’s the only trade I put on?”

  “It doesn’t matter. You won’t be able to activate the crash codes. It’s too late.”

  “It’s never too late, son. You sure as hell know the truth of that.”

  Jahn stepped to Verrazzano’s side and spoke in a strangled rush. “We’ve got the scalps of the last two engineers, Turbo from Cologne and Jin from Prague. You can’t do this thing now. You’re missing two parts of the code.”

  Wyatt glanced at her tenderly. “Honey, I know how to make a guy talk. I’m just getting started on fat boy here.”

  “You’re done torturing him,” she said.

  “Your husband is in the prow of the boat with five kilos of plastic explosive strapped to his skinny neck.” Wyatt lifted his hand and showed a remote detonator in his palm. “If you want to see your husband alive, you’d best take care of Agent Verrazzano here. Meanwhile, I’m going to work on the honorable General Feng.”

  Jahn turned her weapon toward the ICE agent.

  Wyatt took the pliers from his pocket. “Go ahead and disarm him, Special Agent Jahn?” He waved the detonator.

  Verrazzano didn’t look at Jahn or the gun that was pointed at him. “Do what you have to do, Gina.”

  Wyatt wiggled his fingers over the button on the detonator. “Maybe you want poor old Chris blown up, Agent Jahn, so you and Verrazzano can be together. He’s a free agent, after all. H
is wife kicked him out when he told her all the bad stuff he’d done working for me. Right, hoss? You confessed to sweet little Melanie because you didn’t want any secrets between you, but instead she decided you’re a murderer and she hates your guts. That’s the price you paid for all the sacrifices you made for your country. At least it means you can be with Gina. You’d be an awful nice couple.”

  Verrazzano spoke quietly. “I said do what you have to do, Gina.”

  She hesitated, then she spun away from him toward Wyatt. “You can push that detonator. You can blow up the boat, and me with it. But you don’t get to torture this man, and you don’t get to kill thousands of people.”

  Wyatt shrugged. “Makes no difference. After all, Dominic’s going to join me. Ain’t that right, son?”

  Verrazzano understood why the Krokodil hadn’t intervened yet. Wyatt wanted to have him alone with Jahn. To bring him back onto his team. It was no risk, after all. If Verrazzano didn’t accept, the Krokodil would come in and kill him.

  Feng Yi coughed and spat. He lifted his head and craned his neck toward Verrazzano. “I have five million dollars. You can have it all. Please help me.”

  Verrazzano had a deal to strike that morning. But it wasn’t going to be with Feng. He moved forward and laid his hand on Feng’s head. He yanked the man’s toupee away. Feng bawled as the pins tugged against the hair around his ears and at the nape of his neck.

  “Well, damn me.” Wyatt stared at the bound man’s bald head. It was tattooed with lines of code—the commands that would activate the huge malfunction in the onboard computers of every new car. The characters spread from an inch above Feng’s brow back toward the crown of his head. Turbo had remembered what Feng told his engineers: It’s all in your heads. But if you screw it up, it’ll be on your heads anyway. The code was split between all the engineers, a few lines tattooed to each of their heads. But if one of his computer engineers was lost or decided to revolt against the operation, Feng’s fail-safe had been written under his own hairpiece.

  “No, you idiot,” Feng said. “You have given him the codes.”