“She is delirious,” Jenny suggested.
“I don’t think so, but I know that we don’t have time for riddles. I think that a hit team is coming in.”
“I agree.” Jenny’s eyes continually probed up and down the hallway.
David rose up to one knee, grimacing with pain from the broken ribs. “I can help.” He checked his gun.
Mitch reappeared in the doorway. “The hotel phone is not working either. I can’t even get a dial tone. ”
Fatima stood in the doorway of the room. “That woman is Maulana Hafsa. She is one of the radicals who works at Sandhaven Software. Every day Maulana had something negative to say about me. Every day she would sit at the lunch table spouting jihadist propaganda to the other radicals. She is their little lion.”
Maulana snarled contemptuously. “Our little traitor appears. The hammer is also descending on you tonight, Fatima.”
“How are they jamming both the cell phones and the land lines?” Charlie asked Maulana.
“Why should I tell you?”
“Primarily because you are likely to bleed to death unless we can call an ambulance to take you to a hospital.”
“Drive me there yourself if you are so worried about me.”
“I’m fairly certain that there is an ambush awaiting us on the parking lot,” Charlie said. “If we step out of this hotel, we will be shot.”
“Stay or leave, it does not matter,” Maulana told him. “You will die either way.”
“Charlie, we are too vulnerable in this hallway,” Jenny said. “Let’s get back into the rooms until we figure out what to do.”
“Okay. First, though I want to check the elevators.” With his gun held ready to fire, Charlie move cautiously down the hallway and approached the elevators.
Then, suddenly, all the lights went off and the hallway was engulfed in almost complete darkness.
“They might be coming now!” Charlie exclaimed. He half-expected armed figures equipped with night-vision goggles to appear at any moment.
“We’d better get back into the rooms,” David said.
“What are we going to do about her?” Charlie asked.
“In spite of what she has done, I don’t feel right about leaving her in the hallway,” Jenny said.
“I have some medical training,” Fatima volunteered. “We can bind her wound with a bed sheet to help stop the bleeding.”
“Good,” Jenny said. “Help me to get her into the room, Fatima.”
“The hammer has begun its descent,” Maulana snarled.
“It’s good to see that you are not ungrateful,” Jenny said sarcastically.
The bright screens of their cell phones provided a small amount of illumination as Jenny and Fatima supported Maulana as she hopped into the room on her good leg.
Charlie helped David back into their room. While Charlie locked and bolted the door, Mitch pulled open the drapes and the room was partially illuminated by the street lights as well as the lights from nearby businesses.
“This should help a little,” Mitch said.
“Close those drapes, Mitch!” Charlie declared, realizing the danger.
At that moment, there was a pinging sound as the bullet punctured the glass balcony door. Mitch lurched backward and then collapsed dead onto the carpet. The bullet had penetrated his forehead.
“Get down!” Charlie commanded Dennis, who promptly complied.
The two men crouched behind a bed, startled by what had just happened.
“Jenny!” Charlie shouted. “Mitch was just killed by a sniper! Stay away from the windows! Take cover!”
“Okay!” Jenny called back. “We’re down behind the beds! We are all right.”
Two more shots smashed into the wall of Charlie’s room, but neither shot came close to either man. Based upon the angle of the shots, Charlie tried to determine from where the sniper was shooting.
“I think that he might be firing from the parking lot,” Charlie said in a very loud voice so that Jenny and Fatima could hear in the other room.
“He does not seem to have a good angle on this room,” Dennis observed. “As long as we stay in this half of the room, I doubt that he can hit us.”
“I agree,” Charlie said. “However, he might be able to move somewhere that will give him a better angle, so we’d better stay down.”
At that moment, someone in the hallway fired a torrent of bullets into the door of Charlie’s room. Startled, Charlie drew his gun and fired back, uncertain whether the bullets would penetrate the fairly-heavy hotel room door.
“We have nowhere to take cover!” Dennis shouted. “We can’t go forward, and we can’t go back!”
Shaukat Khan, standing in the hallway, aimed his Uzi submachine gun at the door handle and blasted the lock away. The door began to swing open, and Shaukat took a cautious step forward. Although he had superior firepower, he knew that the police officers were armed.
While he squeezed the trigger of the Uzi, he kicked the door open, spraying the room with automatic weapon fire.
Then, suddenly, Shaukat heard running footsteps approaching him from behind. He quickly turned to confront the person, but Shaukat was not fast enough. With panther-like speed, Marcus closed in on his prey.
Marcus slammed into Shaukat, grabbing his head, and breaking his neck. As Shaukat collapsed dead onto the carpet, Marcus pulled the Uzi from his hand.
“Valentine! Halloran! Hold your fire! It’s Marcus Augustine! I got him! You’re safe for the moment.”
Charlie, who had barely avoided Shaukat’s final assault, had seen Marcus kill their attacker. Dennis and Charlie stood up and went forward toward the hallway.
“Jenny, it’s okay!” Charlie called to his partner. “Bring Fatima back into the hallway.” Charlie turned back toward Marcus. “There is a sniper down in the parking lot. He killed Mitch, the police officer who was with us here.”
“You don’t need to worry about that sniper,” Marcus said. “Just after I parked my car, I saw him on the lot close to the highway. He was firing up at this room. I jumped out of my car and killed him with a headshot from my pistol.” Marcus pulled out the expensive handgun, which was equipped with a silencer. “I’m sorry that I wasn’t able to get him before he killed your police officer.”
Marcus handed a wallet to Charlie. “I knew that you would want his identification, so I took this wallet of the pocket of his pants.”
Charlie examined the contents of the wallet. “His name was Sharif Saffa. I’ll be interested in finding out his background.”
David came forward and looked intently at Marcus. “Who is this man?”
Charlie made the hurried introductions. “David, this is Marcus Augustine. He is the local private detective who rescued Fatima. Marcus, this is David Hummel, the FBI agent who was Sam Troutman’s partner.”
“You’re lucky to still be alive,” Marcus said.
“You’ve got that right,” David agreed.
Charlie handed David the wallet. “When we are able to reestablish communication, you can give this information to the FBI and Homeland Security.”
While the men spoke, Jenny was keeping a careful watch on the hallway. She glanced over at Marcus. “Can we leave the hotel now?”
“No. Sharif Saffa was covering the side door and north side parking lot to the hotel, but someone else must be covering the front entrance and front parking lot. They might still have two or three operatives out there.”
“The cell phone signal is still being jammed,” Jenny said.
“I’m going to slip out the side door and see if I can spot their operatives that are still active,” Marcus said. “It’s possible that another assault is going to be launched against this room, so you’d better get ready. All of you should lock yourself into this other room whose door is still intact.”
“I have never met a private detective like you,” David said. “You must have been in the military.”
“Yes.” Marcus smiled. “I was with speci
al forces in Afghanistan. I primarily functioned as a sniper.”
“Well, I’m certainly glad that we have your help tonight.”
Chapter 17
Final Jeopardy
Hampton Avenue was normally a very busy street, but it was after midnight, so the traffic was fairly light.
After going out of a side door of the Holiday Inn, Marcus dashed behind a liquor store, then ran north across the entrance ramp to the highway.
He climbed up the embankment, stopping in a flower bed that had been planted along the side of the highway.
Apparently Saud Tariq did not see me or I would be a dead man now, Marcus reasoned. He looked up at the Drury Inn, attempting to find his opponent. Marcus’s eyes scanned the balconies, but he could not see Saud Tariq anywhere.
Perhaps he has run around to the side of the Holiday Inn and is looking at balconies for me, Marcus thought with a grin.
Marcus understood his opponent well enough to know that his opponent had not run away in fear. Like me, he is a proud man, and a man who enjoys the challenge of having a worthy opponent.
Marcus removed his rifle from its case, rested it on his shoulder, and looked through the telescopic scope. He searched the windows of the Drury Inn, looking for gaps in curtains from which Tariq might be watching and perhaps taking aim upon him.
I wish that I had a night-vision scope on this rifle, he reflected. Night vision often came in handy during my days as a military sniper.
Then, suddenly, the moon came sailing out from behind some clouds, and the illumination improved.
As he focused in on the balconies, he spotted Saud Tariq on a balcony on the top floor of the hotel. The man was perfectly silhouetted against the moon. Looking through the telescopic scope of his own rifle, Tariq was scanning the roof and windows of the Holiday Inn.
Marcus felt a rush of adrenalin as he took careful aim at the silhouetted figure. Then, suddenly, as if guided by some survival instinct or sixth sense, Tariq looked sharply left, toward the highway. His eyes immediately found Marcus. Tariq started to take aim at his enemy, but he was much too late.
Marcus squeezed the trigger and fired.
Seconds later, Marcus watched the tall man topple forward over the railing. Tariq’s body somersaulted as it fell toward the parking lot below; it reminded Marcus of an Olympic diver jumping off the high dive. Even at the moment of death, the man was graceful.
After Saud Tariq hit the pavement, Marcus hurried down the embankment and rushed across Hampton Avenue. He knew that a crowd would soon gather near the body, and the police and the television cameras and reporters would soon be there.
Marcus slipped back into the Holiday Inn. Moments after he entered the building, power was restored and the lights came back on. He took the elevator upstairs and went down the hallway.
Having heard the elevator doors open, Jenny and Charlie were on high alert as they peered out of the vending machine alcove where they were guarding Fatima and Dennis.
“Don’t worry,” Marcus called to them. “It’s just me. I got the sniper. His body is on the parking lot of the Drury Inn. I’m fairly sure that he was the last of them.”
“Good.” Charlie holstered his gun as everyone breathed sighs of relief.
They took the elevator down to the lobby, walked across the parking lot, and across Hampton Avenue.
“We’re police! Please move away from the body!” Charlie ordered as he and Jenny held up their badges.
About twenty persons had congregated on the Drury Inn parking lot near where the sniper had fallen. The wail of numerous police sirens gradually was becoming louder.
“It’s Sam Troutman,” David said as he approached the body of his former partner. He stood in silence for several seconds looking down at the man with two names: Sam Troutman and Saud Tariq.
“Well, his opening gambit was quite good, but his endgame needed work,” David stated, concluding his period of reflection.
“That does seem to summarize things,” Charlie said in agreement.
The next day, in the hotel’s conference room, Fatima and Dennis would join forces with the visiting government officials and establish the Internet links that would activate the Intelligent Agency program on dozens of mainframe computers all over the country, giving the United States an invincible defense against biological warfare attacks. Any doomsday virus could easily be defeated by Intelligent Agency.
With backup upon backup, the Intelligent Agency program was now indestructible, and the persons who helped to create it finally felt safe.
Marcus and Fatima both received pleasant surprises. Dennis hired Marcus as the security chief for Sandhaven Software, and Dennis promoted Fatima to the position of director of programming and vice-president of the company.
However, before that day’s final dramatic events, everyone did manage to get a few hours sleep as the waning moon completed its nightly trek through the sky.
Marcus had dreams of restoration, renewal, and resurrection in which he and his family walked in peaceful bliss in an eternal paradise.
With perfect clarity, Marcus saw a golden path before him. He had successfully sailed along the river of time toward this destination that he had so ardently desired to reach: love had indeed led him home.
Jenny dreamt of sitting by a campfire as she looked at the fire’s reflection in the diamond of her engagement ring. Then, her glance moved up from the ring as she saw a cowboy walking over the hill on the horizon.
Charlie, in his own dream, walked through a desert at night. From a hilltop, he saw a beautiful maiden dressed in blue, illuminated by a fire burning bright, silhouetted by the glowing moon.
*****
A great and wondrous sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head.
Revelation 12:1
*****
The Further Adventures of Charlie Valentine and Jenny Halloran
You can read two additional stories featuring Charlie Valentine and Jenny Halloran that are posted on the author’s website at JoeRogers.homestead.com
These two mystery stories are Murder in the Courthouse and The Case of the Missing Professor. Both stories are free.
This website also has other mysteries, plays, family photos, and excerpts from some suspense novels.
Joseph Rogers has other stories, novels, and plays that include:
Novels:
Sentinels at the Gates: A Telepathic Thriller
Realm of Haden: A Space-Age Fantasy
Maiden of Orleans: A Bayou Thriller
The Snow Maiden: A Suspense Thriller
The Powers That Be: A Supernatural Thriller
Stories:
The Magical Truths of Caroline Casey
The Magical Truths of Phoenix Rising
The Magical Truths of Betwixt and Between
The Magical Truths of the Immortal Maiden
Hallowed Eve, Hallowed Day: a supernatural suspense story
A Princess and her Five Suitors: a fairy tale
Plays:
Child of Wonder: a modern Christmas drama
Tobias, a Traveler: a drama in two acts
Garden Sanctuary
My Friend’s Obsession
The Sword of St. Louis: a romantic drama
Who Said It?: a whodunnit in two acts
Moonlight Warriors: A Tale of Two Hit Men Page 11
