The Rogue Agent

by Daniel Judson

  She waited, did her best to control her breathing, but adrenaline was in her blood now.

  Surging through her, it caused her heart to pound as if she had just run miles.

  But she was used to that.

  She was used to pushing herself.

  The steps she heard were slow and deliberate but getting closer.

  She had no idea how many rounds Ballentine’s pistol held or how many she had already fired, but since the slide hadn’t locked open on an empty mag, she knew at least one remained.

  She scanned the floor, looking for her .357, just in case.

  After spotting it on the other side of the room, she put her eyes back on the doorway.

  And as she did, someone appeared in it.

  Forty-Four

  It wasn’t the Algerian who crossed the threshold first.

  It was Sandy.

  Her shock had worn off and tears were streaming down her face now.

  Fear and grief gripped her.

  She was followed by Grunn, and behind her was the Algerian, his weapon against the base of Grunn’s neck.

  Stella held her ground, the subcompact Beretta raised and aimed.

  The Algerian was squarely behind Grunn, so all that Stella could see of him was one eye as he peered around Grunn’s head.

  She held the front sight on that eye.

  The Algerian told her to drop her weapon.

  Stella shook her head.

  “I will kill her, and I will kill the other,” the Algerian said. “And then I will kill you.”

  From the corner of her eye, Stella detected motion. Valena had been standing outside the kitchen door, but now she was gone.

  The direction she had run—toward the front of the house—told Stella what the girl intended to do.

  Just as the Algerian and Ballentine had, she was making her way around to the front entrance.

  A short walk down the hallway to the living room, and she’d have a clear view of the Algerian’s back across that open room.

  But the girl needed time.

  “Go fuck yourself,” Stella said.

  The Algerian was at first confused by this—by her defiance—but then he smiled. “That is what he said to me. Your man. Tom. You two are meant for each other.”

  “He’s on his way,” Stella said.

  “Good. I hope he arrives soon. In the meantime, I will enjoy causing you agony. And humiliation. I can cause all kinds of both. The sounds of your cries will bring him right to me.”

  Stella ignored that—or at least wanted it to appear to him that she did.

  In reality, fear was like a fist in her gut. “You need the girl,” she said. “The phone she has, that Ballentine tracked her with, you need that. Why?”

  The Algerian’s answer was to lower his PPK and aim it at the middle of Grunn’s back.

  Stella remembered the feel of the muzzle of Ballentine’s Beretta pressed against her spine, the instant and unbearable thought of a bullet severing it, paralyzing her.

  “You shoot, she goes down, I shoot you,” Stella explained. “Go out the way you came in, and no one’s going to chase after you. Get in your car and drive. If you don’t, you die.”

  “Arrogant American woman.”

  “Like I said, go fuck yourself.”

  “I’m going to count to three,” the Algerian said.

  “This is your last chance.”

  “One.”

  “Turn around and leave.”

  “Two.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Before the Algerian could speak, a voice came from behind.

  A woman’s voice.

  A girl’s voice.

  It was Valena, and she was just a few feet away. “Three,” she said.

  Startled, the Algerian turned, bringing around his PPK, but it was too late.

  Valena’s first shot was a center-mass hit at point-blank range.

  He was a strong man, though, and the .380 round fired by the Bodyguard lacked the power to knock him down.

  Grunn quickly grabbed Sandy and pulled her clear of the line of fire, shielding the woman with her body, just as she had been trained to do.

  The Algerian was bringing his weapon to bear on Valena, but Stella had more than just one eye to target now.

  She put a nine-mil into the Algerian’s right rib.

  But that shot emptied the Beretta, and he was still standing.

  Stella ditched the empty pistol and scrambled across the floor for the .357.

  She heard two more shots from Valena’s .380, which emptied that weapon as well.

  The Algerian was still standing, determined to return the young Syrian’s fire—determined to kill every one of these women.

  Spoiled American women who dared to oppose him, talk back to him, think they could bring him down.

  He had his target in his sights and was placing his finger inside the trigger guard when someone tackled him.

  It was Grunn, throwing herself into him and slamming all her weight into his freshly wounded rib, driving him backward. He stayed up for a few steps, but then he came down hard.

  Quickly mounting him, Grunn landed several vicious elbow blows to his head, bouncing his skull off the wide planks and stunning him.

  Then she went for the weapon in his hand, prying the Walther free with little resistance.

  Her right hand closed around the Bakelite grips and her finger covered the trigger as she brought the PPK to his head, pressing the muzzle against his temple.

  The hammer was already drawn back, so only a slight amount of pressure would be required.

  Leaning close, she looked the Algerian in his eyes and said through gritting teeth, “Moi encore.”

  Me again.

  Then she pulled the trigger, killing him instantly.

  Stella had grabbed her .357 when she heard the shot.

  Getting to her feet, she rushed to the doorway, reaching it as Grunn was rising to her feet, the dead Algerian beneath her.

  Both she and Valena were staring down at the man, their chests heaving, their faces blank.

  Stella turned to Sandy. “Are you okay?”

  Her only reply was to say her husband’s name. “Kevin.”

  She moved past Stella and into the kitchen, but she had taken only a single step before stopping short and gasping.

  Stella turned and followed her line of sight to the puddle of blood by the pantry door.

  The masked man was gone.

  She grabbed Sandy and pulled her back into the living room.

  Grunn had ditched the Walther and was already at the gun cabinet, the shotgun she’d been forced to drop once again in her hands.

  She loaded two shells, closed the breach, and handed the weapon to Valena, who took it and stepped aside.

  Stella joined Grunn at the cabinet, as did Sandy.

  They each grabbed a rifle and began loading them as quickly as they could.

  After that, they took positions around the room, covering every door and window.

  And there they waited, ready.

  Though the man was wounded, he was still armed, could be outside right now planning to ambush anyone who exited.

  Or he could be looking for another way in.

  Whatever the case, he was an active shooter, and setting a perimeter and guarding it was the right thing to do.

  It was, Stella knew, what Tom would do.

  Minutes passed—long minutes—before they heard any sound.

  What they heard wasn’t an indication of the masked man returning for them.

  It was the steady thumping of an approaching chopper.

  Coming from the south and moving fast.

  Forty-Five

  Tom could finally see the farmhouse below.

  Krista banked to circle, maintaining an altitude that would keep them out of the range of small arms.

  But Tom spotted a vehicle parked in front of the barn.

  Three of the vehicle’s four doors were open.

 
Next to it was a body, facedown.

  The body was to the left of the vehicle, between it and the farmhouse.

  Then Tom saw something else.

  Another prone figure, but this one was in motion, crawling from the farmhouse toward the vehicle.

  Then the figure got up, staggered for a few steps, only to fall again.

  After that, the crawling stopped.

  Tom ordered Krista to land.

  She banked around again and brought the copter down in the open field to the right of the barn.

  The vehicle was a good three hundred feet away.

  Tom exited, his Glock drawn, and began to close the distance.

  Krista paused only to kill the engine, then was right behind him. Running, she drew back the charging handle of her AR-10, chambering the .308 round.

  As they neared the vehicle, she said, “Going left.”

  She veered in that direction and took cover behind the rear right bumper. Tom veered right and quickly cleared the vehicle’s interior before taking position by the front right fender.

  Krista scanned the farmhouse and announced, “All clear.”

  She and Tom rose to their feet, moved in sync around the vehicle to the man lying facedown next to the rear passenger door, and knelt beside him.

  His head had turned sideways, and Tom looked down at the lifeless face of Kevin Montrose.

  He muttered, “Shit.”

  But that was all he had time for. He rose again, Krista with him, and together they ran toward the man Tom had seen crawling across the grass.

  They were steps away from him when Tom knew exactly who he was looking at.

  Reaching the masked man, he knelt, rolling him onto one shoulder, while Krista covered him with her AR.

  Tom looked into the eyes he had seen the night before.

  The eyes he had seen a decade ago.

  He pulled off the mask and looked at the face of Frank Ballentine.

  Gasping for air, he was looking up at Tom.

  Tom glanced toward the farmhouse, saw Stella standing in the kitchen doorway. Relief surged in his chest.

  With her in the doorway were Grunn and Valena and Sandy, every one of them holding a rifle.

  Tom said to Krista, “Go. Secure the house, find the phone, and shut it down. Then get everybody ready.”

  “We are we going?”

  “Shelter Island.”

  She started toward the house as Stella stepped out on the porch, Sandy close behind her.

  Ballentine was still conscious, so Tom held up his hand palm out, indicating Stella and Sandy should stay put.

  Looking down at the fallen man, he remembered that night in Afghanistan, Ballentine’s face appearing above him, eclipsing the stormy night sky.

  I got you, Seabee, Frank had said.

  Tom wondered whether his own face was obscuring the clear night sky above them.

  He wondered, too, if Frank had lain bleeding in the dark, waiting and hoping as he felt the life draining out of him.

  Felt the world and everything in it slipping away.

  Ballentine struggled to speak. Finally, he said, “It wasn’t personal.”

  Frank looked at the Glock in Tom’s hand.

  Nodding toward it, he said, “Finish the job, Seabee.”

  Tom shook his head. “The Colonel will want to talk to you.”

  “I have nothing to say to him.”

  “Raveis won’t care.”

  “I saved your life. You owe me.”

  Tom rose to his feet.

  “I’ll make it easier for you,” Frank said.

  He rolled onto his back and reached for the 1911 in his waistband.

  Tom’s 1911.

  Despite his wounds, Frank Ballentine moved fast, with deadly intent.

  He was drawing the Colt and releasing the slide safety with his thumb when Tom pointed the Glock at his head and pulled the trigger.

  Ballentine dropped the pistol onto the grass.

  Tom stared at the dead man’s face, then tossed the Glock next to the 1911 and turned away.

  Sandy broke into a run, hurrying toward Kevin.

  Tom fixed his eyes on Stella as they started toward each other.

  Meeting halfway, they embraced.

  When he opened his eyes again, he saw Krista, Grunn, and Valena exiting the farmhouse.

  Krista held up a cell phone and nodded as she led the other two toward the EC155.

  All that remained was Sandy.

  Kneeling, she was leaning over her husband’s body.

  The only sound that could be heard now was her weeping.

  PART SIX

  Forty-Six

  Tom slept in a white room.

  Whitewashed walls and plank floors, white wicker furniture, white bedding, white clapboard ceiling.

  He and Stella had been in this room before.

  This time, Tom slept for days, pulled deep into the plush mattress by his own weight, which seemed almost unconquerable.

  He’d never before known such complete exhaustion, the cause of which, more than physical activity or sleeplessness or violence, was the elation he’d felt upon seeing Stella again.

  Returning for her—for all of them—and bringing them, with Krista’s help, to this safe place.

  It was as the Cahill compound on Shelter Island had come into view below them that Tom finally felt the full force of his profound exhaustion.

  And once he and Stella had been brought to their old room, it was as though a trapdoor had opened beneath his feet, dropping him suddenly into an unconsciousness that felt like succumbing to death.

  He saw faces as he slept—his mother and sister, his father.

  But he did not revisit his childhood home and see again those things he had not witnessed.

  Those four men breaching the front door.

  Nor did he see his father, driven mad by grief, fighting to the death in some New York City hotel room with those same men.

  He saw only what he had actually seen—his mother and sister happy, his father proud.

  He saw himself, too, as a young man, one-fourth of a family of four, with his entire life ahead of him.

  For the three days he’d slept, this was what Tom had dreamed.

  Even when he had recovered from his exhaustion he still forced himself to seek more sleep, if only so he could spend as much time as possible with these memories.

  Finally, when he’d had enough and it was time to again face the world, he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror and saw a man who was ready for whatever was to come.

  They ate meals family style, at a long table.

  Tom and Stella; Krista, Valena, and Grunn; Cahill and his parents, who were the kind and gracious people Tom remembered them to be.

  People who took genuine pleasure in caring for their guests.

  The majority of their efforts were at first directed toward Sandy, who spent a great deal of time in her room.

  Cahill visited her frequently, sometimes got her to come out and go for walks with him, and every time Tom saw them together, he considered the terrible bond they now shared.

  Both had lost what Tom could not imagine losing.

  If anyone could guide Sandy through her grief, it was Charlie Cahill, a man she had known since they were teenagers—he a student at Taft, she the daughter of the boxing coach and school physician whose friendship had turned the onetime troubled rich boy around, setting him on the path that would both prepare him for and ultimately lead him to his life’s purpose.

  Over the course of a few days, Tom watched the forming of a new family.

  Stella and Valena spent much of their mornings together, often taking walks down to the water, while Tom and Cahill and Cahill’s father sat on a porch and talked history over coffee.

  Afternoons were private time, during which Tom and Stella took to their room and a calming silence fell upon the entire house.

  Where the others were, Tom didn’t know or care.

  He had Stella in
his arms, and that was all that mattered.

  At five o’clock every day, he secretly turned on the phone Carrington had given him, sent the prearranged coded text of 1835, then kept the phone in his pocket till six, when he powered it down as secretly as he had powered it up and put it away in the drawer of his bedside table.

  He’d yet to receive any reply from the man.

  There was no way of knowing whether this meant something had happened to Carrington, but all Tom could do was power up the phone at the appropriate time, send the coded message, and wait and hope.

  If something had happened, Tom was certain news of that would eventually reach him.

  But if Carrington thought it was best to maintain silence for now—to ignore Tom’s daily attempts at opening communication—then there had to be a good reason for that.

  One day, Tom would receive a reply, and until then, he would continue to follow protocol.

  Dinners were spent together, as were the evenings.

  Tom would watch everyone as they drank a little too much, let down their guards.

  There wasn’t a person in that room who hadn’t faced death or been forced to become it.

  They would forever be bonded because of this, and yet it was their laughter that lingered in his mind when bedtime came.

  He and Stella retired to their room at ten every night, slept beside each other in that white room, and woke together to mornings that smelled of sea air and cooking breakfast.

  It was during one of those mornings that Tom awoke to find Stella already in the shower.

  Leaving their room to use the bathroom down the hallway, he saw Krista quietly exiting Grunn’s bedroom and closing the door carefully.

  She turned and saw Tom.

  They looked at each other for a moment before she nodded once, then crossed the hall and entered her bedroom.

  Later, when Tom mentioned to Stella what he had seen, she simply smiled and said, “Good for them.”

  A week had passed, the weather getting warmer, when visitors came to the island.

  Tom watched from the bedroom window as a Mercedes SUV turned into the compound and headed up the long gravel drive.

  It stopped at the gatehouse, where the driver showed his ID to one of a pair of armed guards before continuing on to the main house.