Burke's Gamble

by William F. Brown

  Finally, Donatello Carbonari knew he could sink no lower. He rose to his feet, extended himself to his full height, and straightened his jacket and tie before he turned toward the penthouse door. They could kill him if they wanted but, he decided, he would go out with some measure of dignity. Unfortunately, as he took the first long, confident stride he stumbled over his briefcase and almost fell again. The briefcase skittered halfway to the pool, but he no longer cared about any of that. The sniper was still out there too, but Carbonari no longer cared about him either. If the man was going to shoot him, at least he would be properly dressed for the newspaper photographs. He left the briefcase where it fell, straightened his jacket again, and continued walking toward the penthouse. Sure enough, standing in the center of the doorway was that bastard Burke with a pistol in his hand. Carbonari didn’t look at him. He raised his chin and strode past Burke as if he were not even there.

  “Ghost, Ace. Fish in a barrel, you want me to put him down?”

  “Negative. Don’t worry, he has worse problems than us.”

  Ace sighed into the open mic and said, “If you insist.”

  Linda Burke knew that the almost humorous distraction that Carbonari had just provided might be her last chance. Theo still had his arm around her neck and his pistol pressed against the back of her head, but his attention was everywhere except on her. Remembering bits and pieces of a half-assed Women Against Violence self-defense course her girlfriends talked her into taking one night after too much to drink, she suddenly leaned forward, dropped down, and tried to twist away from him. Her plan was to catch Theo in the groin with her elbow or forearm and break free of his grip. Unfortunately, Theo Van Gries was not a five-foot-eight, 130-pound female Recreation Department instructor. As she dropped and twisted, he did the same. The best she could do was to hit him in the hip with her elbow.

  For a brief instant, Ace had a clear shot at Theo from his waist up. Unfortunately, Ace too had been as distracted by Carbonari as everyone else had been. By the time he pulled the trigger, the Dutchman had ducked, his head and shoulders were no longer in the crosshairs, and the bullet missed high by at least six inches.

  Fully understanding what just happened, Theo stooped even lower, got a firmer, five-finger grip on Linda’s hair, and pulled back sharply until she screamed. Slowly, he got back up, carefully keeping his head directly behind hers as he forced her to stand in front of him again.

  “I am not amused, Mrs. Burke,” Theo growled at her. “I swear, if you try anything like that again, I really will kill you.”

  With an expert sniper to his front and an even more angry Bob Burke to his rear, Theo Van Gries knew his position was hopeless. He was a realist and could see there was only one solution.

  “Major Burke,” he called out. “I propose a temporary cease-fire, if you will, sir. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt up up here, not your wife, and certainly not me. Agreed?”

  “All right. Agreed,” Bob answered as he stepped out onto the roof and walked toward Van Gries.

  “Ghost, if I get another shot…?”

  “No, stand down, everyone, until I hear what he has to say. Copy?”

  “Copy,” Ace answered, if reluctantly.

  As Bob approached, Theo Van Gries straightened up and gave him the slightest nod of the head. No one else saw it, but Bob had, and understood its meaning.

  “Well played, Major,” Theo said as he glanced toward the Tuscany Towers building. “Master Sergeant Randall is a superior shot. May I assume you told him not to kill me?”

  “May I assume the pistol you’re holding to my wife’s head is empty?”

  “Touché.” Theo smiled as he released his grip on Linda’s hair and lowered his Glock. “I sincerely apologize for my rudeness, Mrs. Burke. My mother would not be pleased with me, but such are the fortunes of war these days.” With that, he bowed to her and handed her his pistol. “I am your prisoner, madame.”

  She took the heavy pistol in her hands, looking down at it for a second, obviously debating whether to use it on him herself. In the end, she drew her leg back and kicked him in the groin as hard as she could. “Take your apology and shove it!” she told him.

  Fortunately for Van Gries he saw it coming, turned slightly, and caught the kick in his thigh. That was painful enough, he thought as he limped around for a moment, but it could have been much worse. The woman knew how to kick. Finally, he looked up at Burke. “No doubt I deserved that, but you and I still need to talk.”

  “About what? Desperate men in hopeless positions?”

  “No, about how much you and I have in common at the moment.”

  “You and I have nothing in common.”

  “You could not be more wrong. What we have in common is our sometime, mutual comrade-in-arms, Captain Randy Benson.” Van Gries turned and pointed a long finger at Gramps, who was still hiding behind Patsy, perhaps hoping they’d forget he was there. “He is the only reason you and your men, or I and mine, came here to begin with.”

  “Benson? I don’t think so. I came here because your brother and his mob friends killed one of my sergeants, and then you decided to get in the way.”

  “No, Benson killed him. Then he sucked us both in, hoping we would kill each other off before we figured it out.”

  Bob stared at him and then at Benson. “And why would he do that?”

  “The oldest reason in the world, Major, for ‘the stuff that dreams are made of,’ I think Bogey called it, for the gold.” Theo reached in his pocket, pulled out the ancient lion medallion, and held it up. Even at night in the harsh glow of the floodlights, it hung there like liquid sunshine. “Beautiful, is it not? But do you know what it is?”

  Bob turned and looked at Benson, and then at Patsy. “Not entirely, but the last time I saw it, I think it was hanging around Patsy’s neck.”

  “She got it from your Sergeant Pastorini but it has been through many hands over the years. It originally came from the royal Assyrian tombs, which were excavated in Nimrud and Ur over a century ago. The last time I saw it was in Baghdad. It was one of fifty-five pieces that my CIA-sponsored burglary ring were told to take into protective custody from the Iraqi Museum of Art before they disappeared in 'the chaos of war,' or so we were led to believe.” Bob frowned and Theo laughed. “Major, I am an infantry officer, not a cat burglar or an art thief. How else do you think we pulled that assignment off? It was a CIA operation, an inside job, from Day One, or that was how it started, anyway.

  “You know how things were in Iraq — how they still are — greed and corruption everywhere. Well, someone in Baghdad convinced someone in Langley that this cache of items was a 'national treasure' which needed to disappear before the really bad people in the Iraqi government got their hands on it. They teamed us up with some Iraqi military intelligence and museum people who turned out to be only slightly less corrupt than the people we were supposedly saving these items from. It was supposed to be a simple in-and-out, but no sooner did we get in the door than things went very wrong. The Iraqi Intelligence people tried a double-cross. Shots were fired, they came out on the short end, and we ended up with the gold. Once that happened, Iraqi politics took over. They turned on us and the CIA was quick to follow. We became that ‘rogue operation up in Mosul’ and everyone suddenly disavowed any knowledge of the operation, as they say in the movies.”

  “You’re too tall for the Tom Cruise part,” Bob told him.

  Theo smiled. “You are right. Cruise is more your size. We were able to hide the gold temporarily where the authorities couldn't find it, but the CIA, the Iraqis, and the CID were all over us. We became everyone’s easy target, but they needed the gold to arrest us.”

  “Why didn’t you just give it all back?”

  “We couldn’t. No one would ever believe us, and handing them the proof would simply put a noose around all of our necks. The simple solution would have been to melt the pieces down, or throw them in the river, but I refused to do that. They truly were a cultural h
eritage. So our only choice was to get the gold out of the country before they caught us with it. Fortunately or unfortunately, that was when your Sergeant Pastorini entered our desperate little drama. He agreed to smuggle the pieces out for us in return for some gambling debt forgiveness, but then we could not get him to give them back.”

  “Who else knew the CIA was behind this? Anyone?” Bob asked.

  “No, only me, a few people in Baghdad, the wrong ones, and supposedly their handlers back at Langley. None of my men knew. Not even Benson. They all thought we really were stealing the pieces. Like I said, you were there, you know how things worked, and down deep, you know what I am saying is the truth.”

  “Ghost, Ace,” Bob heard in his ear. “You aren’t buying this, are you?”

  Van Gries saw the thin smile on Burke’s face and asked, “That little bird in your ear doesn’t believe me, does he?”

  “You might say that.”

  “I’m not sure I would either, but it was your Sergeant Pastorini who double-crossed us, and it was your Captain Benson who killed him, not my brother’s people. What does that make it? A triple-cross?” Theo said as he turned and glared at Benson.

  Patsy had been listening to every word Theo Van Gries said. Finally, she turned and tried to push Benson away. “You bastard!” she called him but he still had a handful of her hair and a knife at her throat.

  Bob finally turned toward Benson. One look in his eyes told Bob all he needed to know, and who was telling the truth. “Let her go,” he told him.

  “I don’t think so,” Benson said as he tightened his grip.

  “Ace has his Barrett lined up on your head, Ernie Travers has an H & K P1 pointed at you from the penthouse door,” Bob told him as he nodded toward Ernie, “and I have my Beretta.”

  “And none of you will dare shoot as long as I have this blade at her throat.”

  At that point, Theo Van Gries stepped forward. “Pardon me for interrupting, Major, but since it appears you may be tied up here for a while, if you have no objections, I believe I shall leave.” Theo handed Bob the gold medallion. “You can add it to the rest of the pieces in Pastorini’s garage in Fayetteville, and perhaps I can go visit them someday in Baghdad.”

  Burke looked at the medallion for a moment, and then back up at Theo.

  The Dutchman shrugged and said, “Whatever grievances and honor violations you and I had between us have been resolved now. We no longer owe each other anything.”

  “There are six bodies inside that penthouse,” Bob told him. “Who answers for them?”

  “And three more out here. Smit, DeVries, and Bakker were good soldiers with at least a shred of honor before your CIA came along, but they are on your side of the ledger. I shot MacGregor and Reimer, but they were mercenaries, hard cases the world will not miss. The boy is between my brother and Carbonari. And as for the three New York gunmen lying near the bed, well, they got what they deserved and neither you nor I are the police.”

  “What about your brother? I’m not finished with him.”

  Theo smiled. “Martijn? He has always been able to weasel his way out of most problems on his own, so he is your problem now, not mine. Besides,” Theo said as he looked around the roof, “he appears to have disappeared. Carbonari was neither of our concerns to begin with, and Benson is all yours. Can you think of anything else?”

  Bob stared at him for a moment. “Dorothy. Someone needs to answer for Dorothy.”

  “Ah, the young woman on the boat who was shot. I sincerely regret that happening, but I was not there. I was told that was Benson’s doing, he and Reimer. Reimer is dead and you have Benson. That should be a sufficient ‘mea culpa’ to satisfy anyone.”

  Bob turned toward Linda, whom he had not spoken to since he left her on The Enchantress with the others earlier in the evening. “Is that true?” he asked her.

  Linda frowned for a moment, thinking, and then she nodded. “It all happened so fast, but yes, it was Benson who shot her.”

  “As I said,” Theo shrugged, “perhaps we shall meet again, under more pleasant circumstances, Major. Until then, if I can ever be of assistance, most evenings you can find me at the bar in the JW Marriott in Kuwait City.” When Burke made no reply, the Dutchman gave him another polite nod, turned, and began walking toward the penthouse door.

  “Ghost, Ace.” Bob heard that voice in his ear again. “You aren’t going to let him go?”

  “Yeah, think I am” was all Bob could think to say as he turned and watched Theo Van Gries walk through the doors, cross the family room, and exit out the large penthouse’s front door before he turned back and looked at Benson.

  “Surely you don’t believe that preposterous story about the gold and how I threw Vinnie out a window, do you? It never happened.”

  Burke looked at him. “Really? Theo never said you threw Vinnie out a window, he just said you killed him. So, if you want me to believe you, let the girl go.”

  “There’s three of you, with guns, what chance would I have?” Benson asked.

  Burke looked at him and tossed his Beretta on the deck, and then turned to Ernie Travers. “Stand down, I’ve got this. You hear that, Ace?”

  “You drive me crazy when you pull this crap, you know,” Ace said in his earpiece.

  “Stand down, Ace… You too, Koz. That’s an order.”

  “Roger that,” Ace replied. “Just make him suffer before you kill him.”

  “Wilco.”

  “What did Randall just say?” Benson asked, skeptical. “I don’t care what you say. He’s always hated me, and I know he’s going to shoot me anyway.”

  “Nope.” Bob keyed the mic and said loud and clear, so all the others would hear, “He won’t interfere and neither will the others. Everybody hear that? Good. So it’s just you and me." Bob began to walk around as he continued to talk to Benson, feeling the old juices coming back. "That’s what you always wanted, isn’t it, Randy? A shot at the champ?”

  “I remember when I joined the Unit,” Bob went on. “Richards, the old CO, had rotated out and you’d been there for what? A year? You were a big guy, every bit as big and muscular as Ace and Koz. When they put you three together, people thought you were triplets, didn’t they? Three big, old, gnarly Deltas out to kick the world’s ass. You were a very senior captain and the job and the promotion were supposed to be yours. It was in the bag! But then the Big Green Machine decided to screw you over and send in a new guy to take your job in your group. They passed you over for a little shrimp of a newly minted gold-leaf major. I didn’t even look like a Delta, did I? I couldn’t be what? 150 pounds sopping wet? And there you were, stuck saluting me and taking my orders. I’ll bet that really pissed you off, didn’t it, Gramps?”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Benson’s eyes narrowed, as they darted back and forth between Burke and the others. God, he hated that guy, but he was stuck. He had dug himself a very deep hole with the gold, but it almost worked. Almost! And for a chance at ten million Euro, more than twelve million dollars split with no one, he would do it all over again. Benson watched Burke closely as he walked around him, watching his hands and how he moved. It had been three years since they last served together. Burke spent them behind a desk, and that was a long, long time for a soldier. Did he appear older, fatter, and out of shape? Maybe. He did look stockier than he used to, even a bit jowly? Maybe, but the little weasel had always been quick and lithe, and the only way to find out for sure was to accept the challenge and take him on. It was also the only ticket out of here, he knew.

  Gramps! That was what the enlisted men started calling him as soon as Burke arrived, because Benson was a year and a half older, and therefore the oldest man in the Unit. Gramps! It still rankled. He was the ROTC guy, the world’s oldest captain, who ended up in second place to a goddamned West Point “ring knocker” who needed what they called “command time,” which was a polite way of passing over Benson and saying he was second class. What did Burke do with this opportunity?
He turned in his papers, resigned his commission, pissed it all away, so two careers went down the toilet. Gramps! For the executive officer, the "Number Two," to be called “Gramps” was the kiss of death and everyone in the Unit knew it.

  Despite the risks of taking on Burke hand to hand, Benson knew there were two certainties. If he did nothing or tried to run, Ace Randall would gun him down, despite any assurances Burke had given. On the other hand, if he took Burke on and beat him, the Ghost would do exactly what he promised. He would let him walk out even if it killed him.

  “Come on... Gramps,” Bob called him out with a slight voice inflection to needle him. “Back then, you were hard-scrabble tough. I remember you were that big nasty bastard, who could have kicked my ass any day of the week, couldn’t you? Oh, I took up some martial arts stuff and even got pretty good at it myself. So, who knows? I’m a sneaky little bastard, but after three years sitting behind a desk this is your big chance to prove you are the better man and always were. It’s just the two of us now, mano a mano.” Burke continued to circle. “Here I am, all of your frustrations wrapped up in one little package. What’s it going to be? Put up or shut up. Let the girl go, beat me, and you can walk away. You can even keep the knife... Gramps!”

  “All right, you bastard!” Benson finally had enough. He took the knife away from Patsy’s throat and shoved her across the roof into Linda. “Put up or shut up, you said? I guess we’ll see,” he said as he dropped into a perfectly balanced defensive fighting position, knees bent, his hands out in front of him, blade at the ready, moving counter to wherever Burke went.

  Bob smiled. Given the size difference between them, his natural advantage was being lower, lighter, and quicker. The textbook approach was for him to bob, weave, and make the occasional quick thrust, staying on the perimeter just beyond his larger opponent''s reach. The goal was to tire him out and wait for him to make a mistake. That was what the text book said, but Benson knew that too; that was why he would hold the center, wait, and cut Burke to pieces with the knife every time he came in and tried to strike. The knife was the key. Leaving Benson with it was Burke’s big mistake. Since the major left the Unit, Benson had spent countless hours working with the knife until it became one of his specialties, but Burke wouldn’t know that.