Mystery: The Sam Prichard Series - Books 1-4

by David Archer

  “Trust me, babe, I'm not out to win any medals. I just need to check this guy out, and if I can get anything that says he's our guy, the feds'll take it from there. My job is just to give Harry enough evidence to get Washington to listen.”

  “Then, he's right? The whole plot was cooked up right there?”

  Sam shrugged, even though she couldn't see him. “That I don't know, yet, but if we've got a real local cell, then it's possible. Let's face it, Denver isn't known for being too high on the feds' watch list, so realistically, it's an ideal place for them to sit and plan. My goal is to make sure it doesn't work out for them.”

  Indie sighed. “Just be careful. Kenzie and I need you, baby.”

  “And I need both of you. I'll be careful, don't worry.”

  “Yeah, right,” she said. “I think you might as well lose those words from your vocabulary—I married the wrong guy not to worry. I love you, and I wish you were here doing all those wonderful things to me again!”

  Sam smiled. “Me, too, but just hold that thought. We'll be back on our honeymoon before you know it!”

  “Right now, I'd settle for just having you here with me. I know I say this a lot, but, God, Sam, be careful. Please?”

  “Careful is my new middle name, babe. I'll see you soon.” He ended the call before he could talk himself into telling Harry he was quitting.

  The house at Teller and Twentieth was not what Sam would call 'colonial,' but it had some big white columns and was rather large. He parked down the street in the lot of a medical clinic and walked back toward it with the glasses on. Heat blobs in several houses showed what appeared to be people sleeping, and one who must have been watching TV; a second heat signature was probably a television, from its shape and placement. He scanned the mansion itself, and saw only four blobs, all of which seemed to be lying down. There was a small one moving around, however, and he watched for a moment before concluding that it was probably a cat.

  He walked into the yard and slipped quietly around the side of the house before he remembered to turn on the watch's audio function, so he stopped and did so. He waited a second to let it warm up if it needed to, then whispered, “I'm at Fareesh's place. No sign of guards, no dogs. I don't see any obvious alarm system, no motion detectors or anything. I'm going to check out the exterior, and then think about what to do next.”

  He moved toward the back of the house and came to a fence. He scanned along it with the glasses but saw nothing that indicated anyone, man or animal, so he followed it to a gate and looked it over carefully. Luckily, the moon was fairly bright, so he didn't need a flashlight; there were no signs of sensors on the gate, so he opened it gently and slipped into the back yard.

  There was a large pool, a beautiful patio and a child's playset, the kind made of wood with swings and slides and a playhouse on the top. He cursed himself for not finding out if Fareesh had children, but he'd come too far to back off, so he went through the yard to the back door, which seemed to lead into the garage.

  Suddenly he heard a noise and froze, but it was coming from his shirt. He glanced down and realized that it was the earpiece from the Geiger phone in his pants pocket, and took it out to listen to it. The clicking was steady and fairly rapid.

  Radiation? He took out the Geiger phone and waved it around the door, and the clicking intensified slightly. He lifted his wrist to his mouth and whispered, “I've got definite radiation here, coming from the garage. I'm gonna try to get in and see how much.”

  He felt the doorknob and tested it, but it was locked. He used his own phone as a light and looked at it, seeing that it was a simple single lock, set into the doorknob. A moment later, a credit card slipped the latch, and he pushed it open slowly. He heard nothing that indicated he'd set off any alarms, and entered slowly.

  The clicking got louder, and he waved the Geiger around to determine where the radiation was strongest, but it was steady. He walked carefully around the one car that was inside, a big Cadillac Escalade, but the clicking remained as it was. It hit him that he wasn't picking up radioactive material; he was getting the radiation that had collected in the garage while some radioactive material was stored there. Odds were, he thought, he'd discovered where the bombs had been stored, or maybe even assembled, though that was doubtful. What was far more likely was that they had been hidden in this garage for some time, possibly even weeks, before they were sent to their final destinations a few days earlier.

  “Okay, guys, you better be listening. I'm in the garage, and there is a lot of stray radiation all over the place. My guess is this is where they kept the bombs for a while, maybe while they were figuring out how to get them spread out around the country. I'm thinking this is enough evidence to back your suspicions, Harry. I'm gonna back on out of here and let you big boys play a while.”

  He turned and looked toward the house, and saw a large red blob moving in what seemed to be his direction. He whispered, “I may be caught,” and snatched the silenced automatic from his belt as he watched the blob come closer and closer.

  The blob was fairly good sized, so he figured it was a man, and likely Fareesh. He ducked down behind the Escalade and waited, watching the blob moving behind the wall that divided the garage from the house, and it came to the door between them and paused. There was a long moment of stillness, and then the door opened slowly.

  12

  Sam saw the hand with the gun in it, surrounded by the red glow of the infrared, as it came ahead of the man through the doorway. Sam stayed still and watched, and a moment later the whole man appeared. He stood in the doorway for a long moment, and then stepped softly into the garage and closed the door behind him.

  “I know someone is here,” he said. “Do not be foolish; show yourself, now. If I have to come and find you, I will not be as lenient as I may if you come out.”

  Sam kept quiet, waiting and wondering what to do. He was there to get information, not confront the terrorist, and yet, a part of him wanted to be the one to take this guy down.

  The man took another step into the garage, and Sam could tell he was looking at the car. There was no way out, he knew, but he also knew that if he showed himself while the other guy was armed, he was probably going to die. He made a decision, and aimed the automatic, suddenly wishing he'd had a chance to try it out on a firing range.

  Shoulda thought of that sooner, he thought as he squeezed the trigger. His aim was good; the little gun made a loud phweet! sound, and the man's gun flew out of his hand as the bullet struck its barrel. Sam rose and showed his weapon as the man let out a yelp and grabbed his injured hand with the other.

  “Don't move,” Sam said, “or I'll kill you. Come closer; are you Fareesh?”

  “I am Dawid Fareesh. You are a dead man,” he said. “When I heard the door open, I called for people, and they will be here any moment. You cannot hope to escape.”

  Sam shrugged. “I've heard that line before,” he said, “in bad movies, usually. Let's just say I'm a cocky bastard, and skip all that stuff. How many bombs were kept in this garage, Fareesh? I mean, this place is so full of radiation, you and your family are probably dying already from radiation poisoning, so I know you had some of them here. How many?”

  Fareesh's face was red with anger and pain, but he seemed to react when Sam mentioned his family. “I will not tell you anything, Dead Man,” he said. “You are nothing to me.”

  Sam walked toward him. “I'm nothing to you?” he asked. “Maybe you want to think about that again, Fareesh, because at the moment, I'm the man who's got a gun on you and can end your life.”

  Fareesh shrugged his shoulders, and then winced. “If I die, I die for the glory of Allah. You will still not escape when my people come for you.”

  “So dying doesn't scare you? What about your family? I could just as easily kill you, now, and then go into your house and kill all of them. If I’m going to die anyway, what have I got to lose?”

  Fareesh watched him, but said nothing. Sam looked around, le
tting his glasses tell him that there were no other figures moving around him at the moment, then looked back at his captive.

  “Let's try this one more time,” he said, “but if I don't like your answer, then I'll just shoot you in the head and then go and do the same for your wife and children. How many bombs were here?”

  Fareesh glared at him, and for a moment Sam thought he would refuse to speak, but finally he spat out, “All of them! Allah gave them to me, and instructed me on how to use them, and they will destroy your people with the fear and panic that they cause!”

  Sam laughed. “What, those little things? They might blow up a building or two, but you warned us, so I really doubt anyone is going to get hurt; everybody got out of town wherever you put one, so who do you think you're going to scare? Nah, you blew it with this one. I don't think Allah's gonna be happy with you, things might not go well when you get to paradise.”

  Sam heard a noise outside, and a moment later he saw a red blob at one of the garage doors. The figure held something in one hand, and Sam didn't need a degree to know it would be a gun. The blob shifted, and someone knocked gently.

  “Dawid? Is that you in there?”

  Fareesh suddenly screamed, “There is a man here with a gun, he has shot me! Come in, come in!”

  The blob moved suddenly, and Sam turned his gun toward it and fired twice, the silencer muting the noise into a pair of sharp whistling sounds, and the figure outside the door grunted loudly and then fell. Sam had aimed for the head, and hoped his shots had been fatal.

  “Well, he's dead,” Sam said, controlling the shaking he felt trying to get into his voice. “Got any more of them coming? I can do this all day, if you want. Now, tell me this: who's the real brains behind this operation? Cause I know you're not smart enough for it.”

  Fareesh had gone quiet when Sam had fired, and the sound of his man grunting told him that Sam had hit his target. Fareesh couldn't understand how Sam had known where to aim, and he was shaken. “More are coming,” he said. “I will tell you nothing more.”

  Sam shrugged and aimed the gun at his head. “Okay. Hey, just out of curiosity, your kids—boys? Girls? One of each? I'll be killing them, next, so I'm just wondering.”

  Fareesh stared at him with pure hate. “My children are innocent. Kill me if you wish, and then go, and you may escape before the others arrive.”

  “No, no, that wasn't our deal. It was, if I get answers, your wife and kids don't get killed; but you're not talking, so I guess you want them to die. Boys or girls?”

  Fareesh slumped. “The operation was ordered by a contact in Syria, I don't know his name. He sends me messages through the internet, and the bombs were delivered to me a few weeks ago in furniture cartons. We had to arrange ways to ship them out, and then we had to put the batteries in them, and then they were gone. That is all I can tell you.”

  “No, you can tell me a lot more than that,” Sam said. “How many in your cell, and who are they? Tell me now, and I will leave you and your family alive; if you don't, you all die, it's that simple.”

  Fareesh seemed to think about it for a few seconds, but Sam knew he was trying to buy time for his help to arrive. After a moment, he said, “There are only seven of us. Myself, Assam Al Razi, Ibrahim Al Khalid, Hisham Hasin, Imran Mahmoud, Mohsin Al Mayim and Noori Bina. Those are all of us. Now go, and leave us be, as you promised!”

  Sam's phone rang, and he jumped, but recovered and took it out to answer it.

  “Yeah? Kinda busy, here!” he said.

  Harry chuckled. “Just a busy little bee, aren't you, Sam, boy! Thought you'd like to know that you're about to be visited by some police officers. We've got the list you just got, and we'll be rounding them up as fast as we can, but we thought we'd give you a break and get you out of there. The cavalry should arrive any second now. Take the whole family into custody, and we'll figure out what to do with them later.”

  “You got it,” Sam said, and hung up as flashing lights hit the thin garage doors. He looked around and saw the remote door opener on the visor of the Escalade, reached in and pushed the button. As the door went up, he lowered his gun and held out his ID to the two officers who came rushing in with weapons in their hands.

  “Sam Prichard, Homeland Security,” he said, and one of the officers stopped and stared at him.

  “Sam?” he asked, incredulous. “Man, I heard you were disabled and retired! I'm Jack Simmons, we went to the academy together!”

  “Long story, Jack,” Sam said. “This is Mr. Dawid Fareesh, and he's being arrested for international terrorism. HS will give you all the details. There are four family members inside the house, and you're to take them into custody, as well. Once again, HS will be in touch about what to do with them all.”

  The two cops took Fareesh, and two more that arrived went into the house, returning a few minutes later with Mrs. Fareesh and two teenaged girls. While they were being loaded into a car, a truck pulled up and four men climbed out. Two of them carried Geiger counters, and began scanning the garage.

  “We're gonna need everyone out of here,” one of them said to Sam after seeing his ID. “This place is moderately hot; it's not particularly dangerous unless you live in it for a few months, but it's gonna require a hazmat cleanup.”

  Sam shook his head. “How do you clean up something like this?” he asked.

  The man smiled. “Demolish the house and haul it off somewhere safe, dig up about ten feet of the ground under it and replace it with new fill. Won't be anything left of this place in a week.”

  Sam left the men to their work, and went to his truck. He called Harry when he'd gotten inside and shut the door.

  “Harry,” he said, “I'm tired.”

  “I know you are,” the old man said. “Sam, boy, you done good! You identified the cell, and got evidence that the whole bomb plot was cooked up right here, which means we'll get some new funding and a better HS station. I can't thank you enough, son.”

  “No problem, Harry. Just glad I could help, but now I'm gonna go back to the cabin and get some rest with my beautiful wife.”

  Harry laughed. “You do that, Sam. We'll take it from here.”

  “Okay,” Sam said. “Hey, what about the bomb downtown? I left my old partner watching it.”

  “We've got a bomb team coming in on a special flight from White Sands in a few hours, so they'll take charge of it. Your guy can watch over it till then, can't he?”

  Sam chuckled. “Yeah, but we'll let him stew over it till they get here. If I call him now, he'll want to know why someone else can't come and babysit it. I'll buy him a steak tomorrow night and apologize.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Harry said. “And I'll figure out a way to say thanks for this, too. For both of you! Incidentally, once again thanks to you, I just heard that all of the bombs have been located and are being picked up and disarmed.”

  “Talk to you tomorrow, Harry,” Sam said, and ended the call.

  He started the truck and put it into gear, heading for I-70 and the two hour drive back to the cabin. He called Indie, knowing she'd be awake and waiting.

  “Sam? Is everything okay?”

  “What's that music they use in the movies, when the mission is accomplished? I want to hum that tune, but I can't remember it at the moment.”

  Indie giggled. “I don't know, but does that mean you're done?”

  “It does, it does! I found the cell, got the leader, and identified the rest of its members! Their tenure as Denver's Terrorist Cell is officially ended, and I'm on the way back to you as we speak!”

  “Baby,” Indie said, “that's the best news I've heard all night! Hey, was Beauregard right? Did you meet up with the man with the red eye?”

  “Nope. Nobody fit that description, so we can mark him wrong on that one! I'm sure it's not the first time he's been wrong, is it?”

  Indie was quiet for a moment. “Well, actually, I can't think of another time when he was. But who cares? Gotta be a first time for eve
rything, right?”

  Sam laughed. “Right. I'm on the road, and about to get on the Interstate, babe. I should be there in a couple of hours, but I might push it a bit, since there's almost no traffic. See you as soon as I can!”

  “I'll go keep the bed warm for you. I love you, Sam!”

  “I love you, Indie,” Sam said with a smile, and hung up.

  The road was as deserted as he'd expected it to be, so Sam was pushing the Ridgeline up to ninety miles an hour. He saw one State Trooper, but the cop had a truck pulled over on the other side, so he didn't even slow down. When he got to Breckenridge, he was almost on empty, so he pulled into a gas station and used his credit card to fill up. He was almost thirty minutes ahead of schedule, and even after stopping for gas, he made it to the cabin faster than he'd ever done before.

  He parked the truck next to the limo and got out, but he hadn’t even gotten the door closed when Indie came running out to throw her arms around him. She kissed him deeply and happily, and Sam laughed as she finally let him catch a breath.

  “Hey,” he said, “I thought you were planning to keep the bed warm for me?”

  “I couldn't sleep, and just laying there without you wasn't any fun. Kenzie is in with our moms, so we've got the whole loft to ourselves. Come on, let's go get cuddly!”

  Sam laughed again as she dragged him inside, but by the time they got up the ladder into the loft, which took Sam a minute thanks to his bad hip, he was past laughing. They closed the curtain across the front of the loft and Indie dropped her nightgown where she stood, leaving Sam just staring at her naked beauty.

  “Are you gonna stand there all night, or get undressed?” Indie asked, and Sam needed no more prompting. Shoes, shirt and pants went flying, and they fell into the big bed together. A moment later, Indie was gasping as he showed her once again just how much she turned him on!

  Afterward, they slept, and Sam kept Indie in his arms all through the night.