by Jack Du Brul
Lauren threw herself to the ground, rolling across the stiff grass as a pair of shots split the air above her. She spun back to her feet and continued charging. The sergeant held his aim for a second—why, Lauren would never know—but it gave her the time she needed to dive again and throw off his aim once more.
Maybe he was letting her go, or at least giving her a chance, in order to make up for his own feelings of distaste about the torturer. Whatever the reason, Lauren reached the corner of the garage before he could fire again. The other Chinese troops running from the house couldn’t target her either. She blew off the garage’s side-door lock with the Colt. The SUV was a green Ford Explorer and, blessing of blessings, Liu trusted his security staff enough to leave the keys in the ignition.
She had the engine running before the first of the Chinese led by the sergeant were a quarter of the way to the garage. The troops carried type-87 assault rifles. The automatic weapons crackled the instant she pulled from the garage. Glass exploded around her and no matter how low she ducked in the seat she felt she presented a huge target. Flooring the big truck so the V-8 growled, she tore across the lawn away from the advancing soldiers, the 4x4 giving excellent traction despite the dew covering the grass.
More rounds hit the back of the truck, shattering the rear windshield, but each second increased the range and decreased the accuracy. Lauren dared sit straighter. She twisted the wheel to get back on the driveway and floored the gas.
She had no idea what kind of force Liu had at the end of the meandering drive, but she was sure they’d been alerted by radio that she was coming. She was also sure that in a few minutes guards would give chase in the sedans.
With the speedometer reading eighty miles per hour, she drove with single-minded purpose, keeping her focus on what was coming up, not what was already behind.
Every few seconds she had to wipe her sweaty hands on the front of her uniform. She saw the car phone clipped to the center console when she reached down to engage the air conditioner. Now wasn’t the time, but having the phone gave her spirits an added lift. She had to tell Mercer that Liu planned to destroy the canal the next day using a ship called Gemini.
After ten miles, she spotted the end of the driveway. A guardhouse constructed of wood sat at the juncture of a main highway and Liu’s access road. A chain-link fence topped with razor wire stretched parallel to the highway and a heavy gate had been closed across the drive. The trio of guards had also maneuvered a pair of matching SUVs to bolster the gate.
Lauren hesitated for a second then mashed the accelerator again. As she approached the gate she fired off her Colt’s magazine, keeping the guards down for the seconds she needed. Ten yards from the barricade, she eased off the gas and gently turned the wheel, mindful that the sport utility wasn’t known to be nimble.
She ducked an instant before the front of the truck smashed into the guardhouse. Wood and cheap furniture exploded around the hurtling vehicle like they had been tossed aside by an enraged bull. The truck barely slowed and continued through the far wall with so much momentum that Lauren had to slam the brakes to make the turn onto the highway. The black marks in the asphalt indicated that the traffic entering or leaving Liu’s compound came from the right, leaving Lauren to believe that was the way to Panama City. A minute later she saw her assumption was correct. A road sign said she was thirty miles from the capital. As soon as she reached a long straightaway she pressed the button on the steering wheel that activated the car phone’s voice-recognition program and she asked it to dial her cell phone number.
She couldn’t wait to hear Mercer’s voice.
The difficulty in snatching Maria Barber began with her anger at being woken for a second time when Mercer and Bruneseau hammered on her fourth-floor apartment door.
Lieutenant Foch and two Legionnaires waited in a van outside the nondescript apartment house.
She came to the door after five minutes of pounding. She was yelling at them in Spanish even before swinging open the door. She wore a tattered housecoat, her hair was awry, and her breath was sour with stale alcohol. Her eyes were red-rimmed and puffy. Whatever beauty she’d once possessed was being washed away by the booze.
Seeing her, Mercer felt a hot stab of anger surge through his body. Maria was partially responsible for Lauren’s death and had callously told Liu about her husband’s discovery, knowing that Gary and everyone else living with him on the banks of the River of Ruin would be murdered. That a quirk of geology had killed them first didn’t absolve her in his mind.
She continued her tirade, not bothering to identify who had disturbed her. Mercer stood rooted, his lips compressed in a white line and his eyes narrowed to angry slits. He let her go on for a few more seconds then slapped her across the face. The blow was just enough to stun her into silence.
“Mercer!” she cried when she finally recognized him.
Rene and he pushed her into the dingy apartment and closed the door.
“What are you doing here?” Maria clutched at her robe.
Two empty wine bottles sat on a coffee table next to a dinner plate overflowing with cigarette butts. Wads of tissue like the bodies of dead birds littered the floor next to the sofa. Maria had been crying the night before as she tried to drink away some pain. Mercer felt no sympathy. Gauzy curtains diffused the light streaming through the window and cigarette smoke still swirled in the stuffy room.
Lapsing into a wary silence, Maria watched as Mercer made a slow circuit of the living room, peering at the cheap curios she displayed. There were open spaces on the walls where photographs, probably of her and Gary, had until recently hung.
Mercer’s body vibrated with the effort it took to put up a calm front. “He was right, you know,” he said when he could finally look her in the eye. “Gary, I mean. There was a clue in that book I brought from Paris. The Twice-Stolen Treasure is at the lake very close to where he was working.”
Maria blanched. She staggered back and dropped onto the sofa. Keeping her face to Mercer, her hands searched out, then lit, a cigarette. “I always knew he would find it.” She couldn’t muster enough conviction to cover the lie.
“Don’t bother, Maria. We know everything. About you and the Chinese. How you gave up your husband for whatever Liu promised you. I assume it was money, but I don’t really care. I also know you called Liu yesterday when you found out I was still in Panama and had gone out on Lake Gatun.”
To her credit, Maria didn’t continue the charade. Instead her voice turned furious. “And that son of a bitch tossed me aside last night like I was a whore.”
Rene stepped closer to her. “You are a whore, Madam Barber.”
She threw him a halfhearted curse in Spanish.
“Get dressed,” Mercer ordered. “You’re coming with us.”
“Like hell I am.”
Mercer’s urgency to get away from the apartment suddenly grew. Liu Yousheng wouldn’t be satisfied with just breaking up with Maria. She had information he needed protected and only her death would ensure silence. He was somewhat surprised that she was still alive now. “I can’t promise to keep you out of jail, but I can save your life. Liu is going to have you killed the same as he’s killed a lot of other people involved in his plot.”
“I don’t care.” Plucking a fresh tissue from a box she dabbed her eyes and blew her nose.
Mercer yanked her off the couch and shoved her toward the back bedroom, pushing her through the door into the dim room. The bed was unmade and mounds of clothes threatened to topple from chairs and dressers. A mirror, razor blade, and a rolled dollar bill sat on the nightstand. Mercer’s expression twisted with disgust. “I’m giving you one minute to get some clothes on or so help me God I’ll drag you out of this building naked.”
“That’s all men want from me anyway,” she sobbed.
“Keep your self-pity and get dressed!”
With eyes a mix of contempt and fear, Maria shucked off the robe. If she was looking for Mercer to react to he
r nudity, she didn’t get it. She snorted and threw on panties, jeans, and a T-shirt that strained against her chest. He handed her a pair of sneakers. Back in the living room, they found Rene on his cell phone.
“We have trouble,” the agent said to Mercer.
“What’s up?”
“Foch said a car just pulled up outside. There are three Chinese men in it. They’re talking right now as if finalizing a plan. Also an army patrol is just down the block. Ten men at least.”
“Shit!” Mercer and Rene drew their weapons. He gave Maria a look as if to say I told you so. “Is there a fire escape?”
Her bravado evaporated. “No, the elevator and stairs are the only way up.”
“What do you think, Rene?”
“Three men? One will come up the stairs, two in the elevator. One of them will remain in it so he can hold the car while the second comes to the apartment to kill her.” He put the phone back to his ear. “Foch, wait until they enter the building then send in one of the men. As soon as two of the Chinese get in the elevator tell him to take out the man coming up the stairs. That’s how we’ll be coming down.” He turned his attention back to Mercer. “We’ll be gone before the Chinese in the elevator know we have Maria or that army patrol hears anything.”
Rene opened the apartment door and checked the hallway, which was clear. With Maria between the two men, they moved toward the enclosed stairway. Like the rest of the building it was cement and they clearly heard a door opening four floors below. That would be the first of the Chinese. A moment later the door swung open a second time and someone whistling the opening bars of “La Marseillaise” entered. The Legionnaire.
Mercer glanced at Maria, trying to judge how she was handling the situation. He had just an instant to recognize the defiance before she screamed. “Help! Help me, please.”
With a startled grunt, the Chinese soldier climbing the stairs began racing upward. Bruneseau unceremoniously punched Maria in the stomach to choke off her shouts. Mercer readied himself in case the Legionnaire couldn’t stop the assassin in time.
Before the soldier came into view, everyone in the echoing stairwell heard the racking slide of his weapon being cocked. Mercer used his knee to buckle Rene and Maria just as an eruption of automatic fire burst up from below, sparking off the cement in a maddened swarm of ricochets and cement shrapnel. The soldier then turned because the next fusillade sounded like it was fired down the stairs.
Amid the deafening roar, Mercer heard Lauren’s cell phone ringing in his pocket.
He also heard a keening wail of a mortally wounded man down below. The French soldier had been hit.
“Merde!” Bruneseau looked ready to kill Maria for giving them away.
Mercer chanced opening the stairwell door and spied a Chinese assassin armed with a silenced automatic running down the hall. His partner, who’d been waiting in the open elevator car, raced after him, pulling one of the compact type 87s from under a coat.
Lieutenant Foch must have heard the gunfire outside, but Mercer didn’t know how close the Panamanian patrol was to the building. He didn’t know if Foch and his partner could storm the place. He had no choice but to go on the assumption that he and Rene were on their own.
He fired through the partially opened door, startled that the snap shot actually hit the lead gunman. He fell awkwardly, clearing a lane of fire for the other assassin. Mercer slammed the door as bullets from the assault rifle pounded the metal. Another burst exploded from below.
The phone chimed again. Bruneseau laid down suppressing fire and peered around the corner of the scissor stairs. The Chinese commando had ducked out of view. The gunfire against the closed door abated, probably because the gunman was checking his wounded comrade.
Maria had regained her breath, but wisely realized her only chance of surviving the next few seconds lay with Mercer and the heavyset Frenchman. Bruneseau fired down the stairwell again and slithered forward. The gunman had retreated at least one flight, maybe hoping to lure them down or to wait for his partners to break through the steel door. The air swam with acrid clouds from the spent ordnance.
Then came a sound more incongruous than the ringing cell phone. A single shot from a silenced pistol. And then a wet voice. “Monsieur Bruneseau, tout clair.”
The Legionnaire gunned down in the first seconds of the exchange had survived and had either climbed up behind the Chinese assassin or had lain in wait for him to come down. Mercer grabbed on the door handle to keep it closed while Rene led Maria down the stairs. He gave them a few-seconds lead then took off after them, leaping from landing to landing as he spiraled toward the first floor. Fear and adrenaline buzzed in his veins like champagne. He was halfway down when the door above opened and the Chinese gave chase. They were too far back to stop him now.
He leapt to another landing and would have fallen down the remaining stairs had he not clutched for the railing. Like a horrible Rorschach blot, the floor was painted in blood. The Chinese soldier had been hit in the side of the neck and much of the blood in his body had pumped from the grisly wound. Through the red pool, Rene and Maria’s footprints continued past the gruesome scene.
Lieutenant Foch stood at the bottom landing, his wounded man thrown over his shoulder. He had an automatic in his free hand and waved Mercer toward the small lobby. The third Legion trooper had pulled the van to the front of the building. Rene was already bustling Maria inside.
Mercer gave the street a perfunctory scan. Uniformed soldiers of Panama’s National Police were at least a hundred feet away and showing no interest in the apartment house. The only thing that had gone in their favor all morning. He waited for Foch and helped him gently lay the bleeding soldier across the van’s middle bench. The two clambered in and the driver pulled from the curb.
Mercer looked out the rear window in time to see the uninjured Chinese gunman rush from the apartment building. He quickly pulled the type 87 from view and plucked a phone from his jacket pocket.
Mercer threw him the finger. “How’s your man?” he asked Foch.
“Three hits, two in the stomach, one in the thigh.” Foch tore off his shirt and used it to stanch the blood. The wounded Legionnaire moaned as pressure was applied to the oozing holes. “He needs a hospital.”
Mercer addressed the driver, “Head toward Avenue Balboa on the waterfront. That’ll take us to the Paitilla Hospital.”
Although they were far from safe, Bruneseau didn’t protest the detour. In the past weeks he’d learned that no matter what, the Foreign Legion always took care of their own. He nodded to the young soldier behind the wheel. “You’ll have to stay with him.”
“I understand.” Because these were gunshot wounds, it was likely the driver would be detained by the police. He was the logical choice to remain behind.
Mercer was well aware that including Foch, only five Legionnaires were in fighting condition. If Lauren’s father couldn’t come through for him, Liu would likely succeed through sheer attrition. Thinking of General Vanik reminded him of the cell phone. He turned it on and hit the automatic call-back button. Rather than a long international exchange, it dialed a seven-digit local number.
“Hold on,” a female voice answered after four rings. For a moment Mercer thought it was Lauren.
The next sound he heard was tires squealing on asphalt and the concussive blast from a handgun.
What the hell?
“One more second,” the woman said.
It sounded so much like her that Mercer’s heart flopped in his chest. He couldn’t help himself. “Lauren?” His voice quivered.
“Hi, Mercer. Give me a sec.” The gun exploded again and Mercer could hear the rising snarl of a vehicle under heavy acceleration. Foch and Bruneseau had looked at Mercer when he called Lauren’s name. He gave them an enthusiastic thumbs-up.
His hand tightened on the phone as the past fifteen hours of misery lifted from his shoulders. He had no idea how or why, but Lauren was alive. Alive! So overcome with emotion
, he couldn’t speak as he listened to what sounded like a running battle over the cellular connection.
He heard the Doppler wail of a tractor-trailer truck’s air horn and the sharper bark of a smaller vehicle’s tires losing grip. Lauren gave a little moan as if her voice could control the events around her.
“Yessss!”
“What happened?”
She sighed, relieved. “Some of Liu’s goons were following me. I just played chicken with an eighteen-wheeler and got him to jackknife across the road behind me. I think I’m in the clear. I’m about ten miles from the city.”
Mercer laughed along with her breezy description, loving the melodious sound of her voice. “Are you going to tell me how you pulled off the greatest Lazarus impersonation since the Bible?”
“It can wait.” She became almost frantic with the need to tell him what she knew. “Liu’s going to take out the canal tomorrow! Sun told me because he thought I wasn’t getting out of his horror chamber. The ship carrying the explosives is called Gemini.”
“Jesus. Are you sure?”
“His exact words were that Gemini is going to be detonated in the canal tomorrow.”
“Anything else?”
“Isn’t that enough?” she cried.
“I’m just making sure, that’s all. I, ah . . .” Mercer didn’t know how to broach the next subject so he just plowed in. “I spoke with your father this morning. I told him you were dead.”
“Thank you.” Lauren was serious. “I wouldn’t want him hearing about it from anyone else. I’ll call him in a minute.”
“Anyway, I brought him up to speed and told him some stuff even you don’t know. Like how there are eight missile launchers in the Hatcherly warehouse we broke into.”
“I never saw them,” she protested.
“I think we both did, but you made the same assumption I did, that they were cranes of some sort. They were on the other side of the building from the gravel pile, painted yellow. Rene Bruneseau is the one who recognized them when I drew a picture of one.”
