by Brad Taylor
I held up the tablet and said, “That’s them. Let’s roll.”
We gave Brett and Nick time to circle the block, then Knuckles put the sedan in drive, inching forward, Jennifer behind us. My radio crackled, “Pike, Pike, this is Veep. We’re entering now.”
Knuckles took a ticket, and our drop bar opened. We stayed on the pressure pad, waiting. Nick called again. “Pike, we’re in, and I can see the vehicle. Range Rover sitting in the middle, three heads inside.”
We rolled forward, sliding into the darkness. We reached the bottom of the ramp, and the headlights of the motorcycles illuminated a late-model green Range Rover, three heads in silhouette. I recognized Billings in the driver’s seat.
“All elements, all elements, Billings is driving. Hostiles are in passenger seats. Blood, Veep, lock down the front. We’ll take the rear.”
We’re going to get the jump on them. I saw the bikes coming forward, still about fifty meters away, and I climbed into the back of the sedan, cracking open the left-side door, getting ready to leap out when Knuckles came abreast. Then the enemy decided to vote.
While we were still thirty meters away, the rear passenger door of the Rover opened, the window already down. A man crouched behind and began spraying rounds toward my men. I saw one of the bikes go down, the other goosing the throttle into the parked cars, the rider diving off into cover.
I leapt out, seeing the Range Rover jerk forward, spinning one motorcycle out of the way and racing up the exit ramp, shattering the drop bar at the top.
What the hell is Billings doing?
I rolled and swung up my weapon. The Arab dove into our row of cars, and I recognized him. It was the one I’d fought in the park, now on the loose with a weapon.
Knuckles dove out the passenger side of our car, into the parallel row across the garage. I said on the radio, “Target is on my side, my side.”
I heard “This is Blood. Veep’s hit.”
I heard the Arab shuffling forward one car over, trying to escape. I leapt up on the hood and scanned the other side, expecting to see him crouched low. He was right in front of me, so close our barrels clanged together as he whirled to fire. I squeezed off two rounds just as he slapped my weapon aside, the bullets slicing into the car behind. I dove on top of him, ripping his MP7 out of his hands. We both rolled upright with only one of us holding a weapon. Me.
He leapt to his feet and I rose as well, barrel on his chest. I was a millisecond from squeezing the trigger when I heard Knuckles shout, “No! We now need his intel.”
I realized he’d had him in his sights when I’d jumped onto the hood.
The Arab was standing with his arms raised, waiting on the bullet. I kept my weapon on him and said, “Get on your fucking knees.” He just snarled at me.
I said, “You want a shot at the title, little man?”
And he charged right at me, spitting in rage. By all rights, I should have pulled the trigger, but I didn’t. I dropped my weapon on its sling and he began throwing punches. I blocked every one, batting them away like he was a child, letting him get close and wrap his arms around me for a takedown. He tried locking his leg behind me, just like he’d done in the park, but there was an enormous difference between me being surprised and me being ready.
I sidestepped it, grabbed his hair, and head-butted him, slamming my forehead like a pile driver right above the nose. His arms turned to rubber, the fight completely gone. I kicked his legs out from under him and dropped him on his back, looking for Knuckles.
The entire episode, from the time the door of the Range Rover opened until I’d dropped him, had taken maybe forty-five seconds.
Knuckles reached me and said, “I can’t believe you didn’t pull the trigger.”
“What? You just said we needed the intel, and you were right behind me. I was in no danger.”
He shook his head, zip-tying the Arab’s arms and legs, muttering, “. . . just embarrassed about that fight in the park.”
Which was true.
I said, “Brett, give me a status.”
“Veep’s got an in-and-out of his right thigh and a nick in his bicep. Nothing life-threatening.”
Knuckles finished searching the Arab, holding up a cell phone. On it was a map with a blinking blue marble. I recognized the site. The Fredrikstad Museum in Old Town.
Where the peace talks were being held.
88
Billings felt the bile rise in his throat, as if he’d had too much to drink and wouldn’t be able to hold it in. But he kept driving, mainly because of the barrel in his gut. After all that had occurred, he was on autopilot.
The man to his right seemed to have no fear whatsoever, and Billings had no idea what he intended to do once he arrived at the peace talks. Run inside with a pistol, shooting like he was a madman in Paris? Shout obscenities at the moon? The guy was crazy. One thing was sure: He was absolutely calm. Almost serene. Whatever he had planned, it wasn’t spur-of-the-moment.
Even though the old town and the museum were right on the banks of the Glomma, a stone’s throw away from the parking garage, they’d had to retrace their steps, going back up the 110 to the large traffic circle miles away, then turn right, basically making a box to get into the ancient fort, as there was only one road that a vehicle could traverse.
The town was literally a defensive encampment from ages ago, with an actual moat that slashed out in a zigzag pattern around the village, which, due to restoration and upkeep, looked much like it had eons ago. And it was the reason the location had been chosen. A single choke point to defend against threats.
Throughout the drive, Billings had thought about his options, telling himself to fight. Wrestle for the pistol, or jump out, letting the man shoot at him as he ran away. In the end, he simply couldn’t bring himself to do so. His rational mind said there were better options. There were armed men at the talks. Security guards even on the main road. There was no way the Arab would be able to penetrate anywhere dangerous. As soon as Billings got the chance, he’d raise the alarm and they’d take the man down.
In retrospect, his biggest mistake had been flooring the accelerator in the garage. He had no idea what had happened there. One minute, they were discussing moving to the peace talks, the next minute, Khalid was blazing away at two motorcycles to his front. It was insane. When the man in the passenger seat had screamed at him to go, he’d reacted out of instinct, wanting to get away from the gunfire, but he now wondered if they hadn’t been police trying to help him.
Did he now look like he was complicit in whatever these evildoers had planned?
The Arab said, “Slow down. Checkpoint ahead.”
In the words, Billings realized how much he had been duped. Haider had said the man spoke no English, but that too was a lie.
He looked forward and saw the spit of land that stretched over the moat, lined with trees. In front was a chicane of three concrete blocks, and two men standing near a warming barrel, bundled up in the cold, weapons slung.
He thought, This is it. This is when it ends.
Sabour said, “If you get us through this, you will live.”
Billings felt the sweat break out on his head. He pulled forward and rolled down his window. The first guard began running a mirror under the frame of the truck and the next one said, “May I see your registration, please?”
Billings looked shocked at the question. He had no idea what to say. No idea who the vehicle was registered to. Sabour dug through the glove box with his left hand, his right hidden. He held out the registration.
The security guard said, “Sir, are you all right?”
Billings wiped his upper lip and said, “I’m fine. Just fine.”
Reading the registration, he asked, “What is your name?”
Billings started to answer, when the pistol went off right in front of his face, the bullet snapping the g
uard’s head back and the sound exploding in Billings’s ears. Billings screamed, and the Arab rotated, shooting the second guard through the passenger window. The guard whirled, then fell to the ground and started crawling away, scrambling for his rifle on his back, clearly not mortally wounded. Sabour leapt out, stalked over to him, put the barrel against the back of his head, and pulled the trigger.
Even with the events of the last few hours, the act of violence shocked Billings.
Sabour returned to the vehicle and said, “Get in the passenger seat.”
Billings obeyed, and Sabour came around, entering the driver’s seat. He locked the doors, then switched on the parental controls, preventing Billings from opening his side.
He reached underneath his seat, pulling out a metal case the size of a cigarette package. He flipped up a cover, and flicked a switch from off to on.
Billings said, “What is that thing?”
“Your ticket to paradise.”
The Arab put the vehicle in drive and crossed the moat.
89
I handed the phone back to Knuckles, saying, “Check those bikes out. See if they still run.” I clicked my radio and said, “Blood, Blood, this is Pike. You’ve got exfil. Get the hostile and Veep out of here. Koko, you copy?”
She said, “Coming down.”
Brett said, “No issues. I got Veep stabilized one row over. Where’s the hostile?”
“Right next to the sedan. I can’t stay here with him. We need to move.”
“Roger all. What’ll I tell Showboat? Where are you headed?”
“To find a Range Rover.”
I called Blaine on the phone, waiting for it to encrypt. I told him what had transpired, and that I’d need a cleanup crew at my location. I gave him the data in clinical terms, but then ended with what I thought was happening.
“I believe that vehicle is a VBIED. I think they intend to drive it right into the peace talks and set it off.”
“You sure about that? I think this is something to do with Billings. A hostage thing. Why on earth would they set off a car bomb at the peace talks? They’re from Qatar.”
“I don’t know. Middle East agendas are impossible to sort out. Why does ISIS behead members of al Qaida? Why does the Taliban fight ISIS? It’s not worth finding a motive. That’s what I think’s happening.”
“Do you have any proof?”
“No. No smoking gun, but we got a guy here you can put the screws to.”
“That’ll take too long. If you’re right, we need to get moving. We called, but they wouldn’t shut down the talks based on the actions at the cottage. All they did was put up a checkpoint outside the moat. You can still get through without any special identification—they aren’t stopping tourist traffic—but they’ll flag anyone strange.”
“Get the word out about the vehicle. Tell ’em it’s a Range Rover.”
“I will, but it won’t happen quickly. Especially if they’re inbound.”
“I’ve looked at the map and I can beat them there. They’ll have to go far out of their way to get to the village in that vehicle. Thank God Norway actually chose a fortified one for the talks. I’ve got a couple of bikes that will probably make it on the footpaths. I get across the bridge, and we’re cutting straight through the fields. There’s a single path on the river. If we can use that, we’ll go straight to the museum, giving them our intel personally.”
“What about Billings?”
“Sir, he was driving the damn vehicle. If he’d have sat here in the garage, he’d be free and we’d be looking at victory. He’s the one who hauled ass out of here. My concern now is the peace talks and the innocents there. Once I get them onboard, I’ll look at pulling his ass out of the fire.”
I heard nothing. I said, “Sir?”
“Okay. Okay, that makes sense. Just stick with the ‘saving innocents’ and drop the ‘he’s a jackass’ if this goes bad.”
I saw Nick being loaded and said, “I’ll call when I can.”
Jennifer came over to me and said, “We’re ready to go. You need a hand?”
“No. Brett’s not taking a hostile and a WIA by himself. He’s going to need some help. This is just a Paul Revere ride to warn the locals that the bad guys are coming.”
She squinted her eyes at me, sensing there was more. I said, “Get out of here before someone wants to know what the loud noises were down here.”
She pecked me on the lips and said, “Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Do I ever?”
She got in the van and pulled away. Knuckles said, “Both bikes will function. One’s banged up pretty good, but all he did was ding the engine cage and gas tank.”
“Let’s go.”
He propped his bike up and said, “We doing something stupid?”
“More than likely.”
We crossed the bridge across the Glomma and I immediately began looking for our own create-on-the-fly off ramp. I found it a quarter mile in, when I saw a makeshift footpath snaking down through the snow, the chain-link fencing cut away by pedestrians looking for a way to get to the river without walking two miles and turning around. I pointed and Knuckles flicked his head, telling me to go.
I stopped the bike and threaded it through the chain link, pushing with my feet, seeing the drop down the slope. It was a little hairy, especially in the snow. People in cars were staring at me like I was about to perform a stunt, which I suppose I was. I didn’t look like a touring rider, that’s for sure. I had the bike, but no jacket, boots, or helmet. One man honked the horn, and Knuckles waved, waiting on me.
I said, “Maybe we should look a little farther on, where it’s not as steep.”
Knuckles grinned and said, “Maybe you should do a little more mobility training.” I saw his head swivel, and I followed his gaze. From our height we could see the entire town and the moat surrounding it. Out in the distance, there was a single vehicle coming down the small ribbon of road that led to the tourist town.
It was our Range Rover.
If I’d had a helmet, I would have slammed the visor down with authority, then skidded down the slope in wild abandon. I opted just for the skidding, riding the back brake and letting gravity take its toll. I hit the bottom and waited for Knuckles to catch up. When he did, I said, “We need to hit it. They’ll be inside the perimeter of the town in seconds. We get in, you cut north. I’ll head to the museum. You track him, let me know how much time I have.”
“Got it. Let’s go.”
The town was really nothing more than a simple grid, with about as many buildings as would be expected from a fifteenth-century construction. It wasn’t large at all, and standing on any one road, a person would be able to clearly see the far perimeter. Which meant, once he was inside, we had very little time.
I hit the gas, throwing out the snowy mud before hitting the pavement, then went as fast as I dared on the asphalt. We raced to the river, hitting a dock and a small footpath. I went left, now restricted from gunning the engine. The footpath widened and I opened the throttle. We were past the moat.
Ahead of me, I saw a small cluster of people selling wares in what looked like an artists’ colony. A bunch of painters and pottery builders. I couldn’t get through them on the bike. I slowed and dismounted, saying, “Please let me through.”
They gave me a startled look, since this definitely wasn’t a motorcycle track. One man stood up and waved his hands, an older hippie-looking guy speaking Norwegian. I pushed the bike forward and reached a parallel street that dead-ended against a small picket fence. I glanced up and saw the Range Rover pass a street. A brief glimpse, but I saw it. The VBIED was on the island.
I threw myself over the saddle, saying on the radio, “They’re in.” Then goosed the engine, shouting, “Get the fuck out of the way!”
I let the clutch out and went ripping through the tables
and stalls, not really caring what I hit. I saw plaster and canvas flying left and right, people screaming and diving, and then I was through. The footpath turned to asphalt and I increased speed. I passed the sally port on the river side of the town and flicked a hand out, telling Knuckles to take it.
I heard his bike’s whine disappear. I continued on. The museum was the farthest building on the south end of the town, and I’d seen the Range Rover entering from the center. They were going to beat me.
I shifted gears, the bike now almost out of control. The end of the town appeared, the asphalt turning to dirt again. I hammered the brakes, twisted the wheel, and slid into the turn. Ahead of me, at the east end of the road, was the Range Rover, the old garrison wall of the museum the only protection for the men inside. Between us was the cul-de-sac entrance to the courtyard of the museum.
I saw a large group of people milling around a bunch of town cars and SUVs, a platoon of earpiece-wearing security interspersed among them, completely oblivious to the threat bearing down.
This is it. I thought through my options. Reach the men? Shout at them to run? Drive forward, guns blazing like a movie?
Or just sit. Because I was too late.
I saw Knuckles turn the corner behind the Range Rover, still going strong.
Shit.
I gunned the engine and popped the clutch, racing straight at the grille in an insane game of chicken. I caught only a snippet when I passed the open cul-de-sac, a brief glimpse of men scrambling and reaching for weapons, then I was past. We closed together until I could see Billings’s horrified face and the steely eyes of the Arab driving, and I laid the bike down, sending it straight into the front of the Rover.
I bounced on the ground, skipping on the asphalt, and the Arab jerked the wheel, avoiding the bike and careening up onto the old grass fortifications on the other side of the road. The Range Rover fought for traction on the grade, eventually failing.
