Assassin's Express

by Jerry Ahern

  “Mister—I’ll buy you lunch.” She smiled.

  Frost shrugged. “I’m not proud.” He felt relaxed, that even if the KGB people were moving they wouldn’t be moving yet, would still be back behind the ponderously slow-moving trucks traveling in convoy down the highway. Frost spotted two seats at the counter—together—and said, “Over there—come on. I’ll order something expensive.”

  The waitress told Frost where he could find a towing service and while the food was being readied, Frost left the diner and found the garage, leaving them keys to the car and getting a promise it would be towed out within the next forty-eight hours. Deciding this was the best he could do for the moment, Frost started back toward the diner, feeling uncomfortably warm with the jacket over the heavy sweater but unable to ditch the jacket because of the gun he carried in the shoulder holster underneath it. He’d had to pay the tow-truck driver in advance—he wondered if that had been wise as he pushed through the restaurant door. Jessica was still sitting where he’d left her—he’d half-expected her to take off. She was that kind of a girl, he’d thought. She saw him, waved for him to hurry, and he started across toward her. The people in the restaurant had thinned out some and as he sat beside her, he realized they were the only two people at the counter.

  “A lot of brave people leaving here,” Frost cracked.

  “Well—it’s melting still, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah—unless we can rent a car, we’ll be stuck here for two days until the car and trailer get towed out. Where’s my food?”

  “The girl was keeping it hot,” she told him, signaling the waitress.

  Frost wolfed down the first quarter-pound-sized cheeseburger and worked on the French fries—it was called a Texas something and he’d ordered two. As the waitress came back and took the first plate and refilled his coffee cup, Frost turned around, hearing someone coming in through the door. Five men—dressed casually with sour faces—walked in. A sour face after the previous night was something Frost could well understand.

  “It’s Chevasnik and Gorn.”

  “Is that bad?” Frost cracked.

  “KGB—dummy,” the girl rasped under her breath. “Five of them.”

  Frost’s right hand was already under his coat, the hamburger in his left hand—he was still hungry and he saw no sense in a shoot-out on an empty stomach.

  “Chevasnik and Gorn, huh? I got one of their albums at home—a little on the heavy-metal side, maybe but—”

  “This isn’t any time for jokes,” the girl whispered, her lips sipping at the coffee held between her hands.

  “It isn’t any time to keep both your hands occupied either,” Frost told her flatly. He liked everything about the girl really—except her mouth.

  The door opened again; Frost turned on the stool, staring at the face there in the doorway. It brought back memories of Bess. Frost’s eye met the eyes at the door; then the face moved out of his line of sight. “You look like you just saw a ghost,” Frost heard Jessica Pace whispering.

  “No—just somebody who reminded me of one.” Frost turned back and faced the counter—the person who’d reminded him of Bess was sitting at the far end of the counter, the five KGB people at a table. The face that had reminded Frost of Bess had been someone they’d both known—FBI Special Agent Michael J. O’Hara.

  Chapter Ten

  “Who is he?”

  Frost looked at Jessica across the French fry in his left hand. ’Michael J. O’Hara—met him on a job awhile back up in Canada. He’s with the FBI.”

  “Great. We’ve got five KGB men and a fed—all of ’em out to—”

  “Wait up a minute,” Frost rasped. “O’Hara’s not in on this.”

  “Then why’s he here?”

  “I don’t know—he’s straight, though, like you wouldn’t believe straight.”

  “Bullshit!”

  Frost glanced down to the end of the counter—the waitress was bringing O’Hara a cup of coffee and O’Hara was looking straight ahead.

  “No one moves!”

  Frost wheeled in the stool, starting to push Jessica Pace away; five guns aimed at him and the girl, one of the guns a small, Czech Skorpion machine pistol.

  Frost kept his right hand under his coat, the Browning half-out of the leather, but not out of the coat.

  The girl’s hands were near her handbag—he didn’t think she’d be able to draw fast enough.

  Frost slowly moved his head; the KGB men started toward him. O’Hara wasn’t moving—yet.

  Frost started to move his right hand, slowly. “No one moves!” the same voice shouted.

  Then there was another voice. “FBI—freeze, you Commie bastards!”

  Snaking the Browning out in his right hand, Frost pushed Jessica down to the slushy floor, then his ears rang from a booming sound—O’Hara’s Smith & Wesson Model-29 .44 Magnun. Before Frost could fire, the Skorpion was spraying the counter. Frost, on the floor now, was pulling a table down for a shield; the big .44 was firing again as Frost pumped his first two shots out of the Browning High Power.

  There was a coughing sound beside him—it had to be Jessica with the silenced Walther. Frost glanced toward her as he wheeled toward one of the KGB gunmen—he wondered if it was Chevasnik or Gorn. Her purse was still closed, but the front of her sweater was pulled up over her jeans and her blouse was half-pulled-out as well—she’d had it in her waistband, he decided. He pumped the trigger of the High Power twice, then twice more, nailing the man with the Czech Skorpion machine pistol—twice in the chest and once in the head. The pistol fired wildly into the ceiling; fluorescent lights exploded and showered the floor with shards of white glass. Frost pushed the table ahead of him—toward two of the KGB men; the table slammed into one of the gunmen, kicking a Walther P-38 out of his hand. Frost fired point-blank into the second man, two rounds into the neck; the standard blued High Power fell from the gunman’s limp finger as he crumbled toward the muddy wet floor. There was a booming sound again and Frost wheeled left—the man who’d dropped the P-38 was on his feet almost as if running backward, the gun in his right hand, a grapefruit-sized hole in his back between the shoulder blades.

  There was one man still shooting, his left arm a bloody pulp at his side as he knelt on the floor beside a second man, already dead. O’Hara was bringing the .44 Magnun down out of recoil, swinging the muzzle on line; Frost punched the High Power straight ahead of him, his finger twitching the trigger. The gun in the KGB man’s hands—it looked like a Commander-sized Colt—was firing. The man wheeled left, spinning almost like a ballet dancer, then sprawled back across the table behind him, sliding off the table onto his face on the floor.

  Frost, the Browning still in his right fist, glanced behind him. Jessica Pace had the silenced PPK/S in both her fists, the slide in battery, but the hammer at full stand. “You got him?”

  “Yeah,” she grunted, starting to walk forward. She stopped to kick one of the dead men—from the way she did it Frost couldn’t determine why she was doing it—to check if the man was actually dead or just because it felt good.

  “How ya’ doin, Ace?”

  “Wonderful, O’Hara—now that you’re here, just wonderful.” Frost smiled.

  “What d’ya say we get out o’ here and talk a little, huh—you and the lady?”

  Frost looked over his shoulder for Jessica—she had the Walther leveled at O’Hara. As he turned back to look at O’Hara he saw the white face of the waitress—tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  O’Hara was staring with his icy eyes at Jessica Pace. “Frost—tell the little lady to put away the peashooter or I’ll nail her—and this thing nails ’em good.” He moved the muzzle of the 29, but not so much as to get it off line with Jessica.

  “Hey—let’s talk—good idea,” Frost said brightly.

  He looked at Jessica. She shrugged, then slipped the Walther back under her sweater.

  Frost dropped the hammer on the Browning and stuffed it into his belt. “You got whee
ls, O’Hara?”

  “Have I got wheels? Of course, I’ve got wheels. It’s the United States Government I work for—not some el cheapo government.” Then O’Hara turned to the woman behind the counter, smiling broadly at her as he slipped the 29 under his coat, but still held it. “They were all bad guys anyway, ma’am—you know, Commies. Don’t cry. Contact your nearest FBI office and you can file a claim for damages—ask for a form—”

  “Cut it out, will ya?” Frost almost shouted. “Let’s get out of here, O’Hara!”

  “Right.” O’Hara started for the door, wheeling around once and scanning over the bodies. Jessica was running toward the door, the purse over her shoulder. Frost stood in the middle of the room a moment—bodies were everywhere; broken glass and table settings littered the already muddy floor. He shrugged and snatched up his pack.

  The for-official-use-only Interagency Motorpool, gray two-door sedan O’Hara drove definitely had wheels, Frost decided as they stopped on the far side of the small town, but it didn’t have a radio, didn’t even have a dashboard light—somebody had apparently stolen that.

  The ground was dryer here and Frost guessed the snow had not fallen nearly so heavily on the eastern side of the town. “How the heck did you get here?”

  “Followin’ them—the KGB fellas, Chevasnik and Gorn and the rest of those turkeys.”

  “Which one,” Frost asked, “was Chevasnik?”

  “The guy with the P-38—the one I creamed.”

  “How about Gorn—?”

  “Won’t you guys cut it out?” Jessica Pace interrupted, leaning over from the back seat and pushing between them.

  “Gorn was the one—” O’Hara began.

  “The one with the machine pistol,” Jessica Pace said, sounding bored.

  “Right—you knew them too, huh?” O’Hara cracked. “Which leads me to why I wanted to talk to you guys—let’s get out and chat, huh?”

  O’Hara was already sliding out from behind the wheel, the big Model 29 in his right hand. “I got two rounds in here yet—just enough for you guys if I need ’em—now out!”

  “I told you,” Jessica Pace snapped.

  Frost just shook his head, then as he slid out O’Hara rasped, “Hands where I can see ’em, boys and girls.”

  “You arresting us?”

  “That’s the general idea—never would have figured you’d be into somethin’ like this. Can’t understand that deal with Chevasnik and Gorn, though.”

  “What are you talkin’ about?” Frost asked him.

  “Assassination—that’s what I’m talking about. Now maybe she suckered you with some other story, Frost—make a clean breast of it and—”

  Frost looked down at his sweater; it was caked with mud and he could feel it had soaked through to the skin. “I couldn’t make a clean breast of anything.”

  “Very funny—ha-ha! See how you laugh in the Federal University System for the rest of your life, Frost—now let’s have the gun!”

  “Nope.” Frost smiled.

  “What do you mean, nope? I could—”

  “You won’t—at least not until you’re sure. Right?’

  O’Hara ran the fingers of his left hand through his graying hair, his jaw muscles flexing. “You talkin’ truce?”

  “Just while we talk—we can take it from there.”

  O’Hara nodded, then swung open the cylinder on his gun, starting to pick out the empties. Frost’s left hand flashed out, catching Jessica Pace’s right hand as she started the PPK/S out of her trouser band.

  O’Hara’s eyes were locked on Jessica Pace, then flickered toward Frost; Frost nodded. O’Hara continued picking the empties out of his gun, then loading single rounds into the emptied charge holes of the cylinder.

  Jessica Pace looked at Frost, her eyes cold, the muscles around them tight. “Why the hell didn’t you—”

  “He’s on our side—relax. He’s a good guy.”

  “You’d better believe it, sweetheart,” O’Hara muttered, then closed the cylinder on his Metalifed Model 29 and slid the gun into the Lawman leather holster under his coat, covering the gun and the shoulder rig again.

  “So—tell me the story, the big picture so to speak—then I’ll arrest you.”

  “I’m gonna load my gun while we talk—O.K.?” Frost smiled.

  O’Hara shrugged. “Whatever burns your shorts—loaded or empty, I’m takin’ you in, Frost.”

  “Super—now,” and Frost began the story. Knowing no better place, he decided to start with Andy Deacon’s urgent request for him, Frost, to fly to the West Coast, ready for work—meaning armed. O’Hara had heard about the fight at the hospital; that had confirmed to O’Hara that Frost had gone bad. Only a bad guy, O’Hara had interjected, would mistreat an FBI agent. Then Frost got to the part about Jessica Pace and the list she’d memorized, the list of highly placed officials in the CIA and FBI who were double agents for the Communists.

  “I can’t buy that crap—so just hold it right there. I mean, yeah—every once in a while the Reds slip us a bad apple, but we get ’em. There’s no big list of baddies who work for the Reds, got the FBI and the CIA after her hide. She ever tell ya the one about her being a Red herself, an assassin sent here to get the commander in chief?”

  “The what?” Frost mumbled.

  “The President—the President, dummy. You know—used to pay your salary too, years back before you turned mercenary. I guess you guys’ll work for anybody if the price is right—never thought you’d go bad—”

  Frost pushed himself away from the fender of the FOUO car, his face inches from O’Hara’s face. “You dork—why do you think they put out that assassination story? Just to make honest guys like you hunt her down, too Can’t you see it?”

  “Hey—I know where my head’s at—I wish I could say the same thing about you, Ace.” O’Hara grimaced, turned around, walked a few feet away, and stopped.

  “O’Hara—she is working for Calvin Plummer, dummy!”

  “Calvin Plummer—the superspook?”

  Frost breathed a sigh of relief. “Yes—call him on your radio, maybe.”

  “You can’t just call Calvin Plummer on your car radio—where the hell have you been? He’s so super-secret he has to open a safe each morning just to find his socks, and I’m supposed to call him on the radio?”

  Frost sighed heavily, lighting a cigarette. “Can you go to a gas station and call him on the telephone?”

  “Yeah—maybe I can get his number from directory assistance—wait—”

  “What?” It was Jessica Pace.

  “I got this buddy—maybe. But then what do I do with you two clowns?”

  Frost shook his head, inhaling hard on the cigarette. “You leave us here—we can stay over in those trees.” Frost pointed to the far end of the roadside clearing. “I can use the shut-eye. Come back, we got it all straightened out—maybe you can help me get Jessica to the President—not to assassinate him, but to recite the list.”

  O’Hara said nothing—seemingly lost in thought. “How do I know you guys—?”

  “Won’t go, run out?”

  “Yeah—won’t run out.”

  “I’ll give you my word,” Frost said, not able to keep himself from laughing.

  “Yeah—I know. That’s just terrific—and then when I let you two escape and you get her to Washington to knock off the President, when someone complains, I can just say you gave me your word and you fibbed—right?”

  “Would I lie to you?” Frost asked, laughing.

  “Yes—as a matter of fact I’m sure you would. But I guess not this time.” O’Hara stuck out his right hand. “Got your hand on it?”

  “Yeah—got my hand on it,” Frost told the tall Irishman.

  “O.K.—I’ll be back in a flash—”

  As O’Hara started for the car, Frost shouted after him, “Hey—tell ’em I want extra pickles on mine.”

  O’Hara froze in his tracks, started to turn, then started walking again, climbed int
o the car, gunned the engine—too fast, Frost thought—and rolled down his window. He looked out at Frost and the girl, then sneered, “I’ll get ya extra pickles!”

  Chapter Eleven

  Jessica had wanted to leave as soon as O’Hara’s car had gotten out of sight, but Frost instead had taken her by the hand and started toward the trees with her, explaining he trusted O’Hara, that O’Hara was smart despite the crazy talk, and that O’Hara was one of the best men with a gun Frost had seen. All three attributes, with O’Hara on their side, could make getting her to Washington a lot easier—Texas was at best halfway there.

  The day was becoming progressively warmer, despite the fact that it was late afternoon by the time O’Hara’s car turned off the road and came into the clearing. Jessica had slept—Frost hadn’t, not trusting the girl to stay, thinking she might bolt and run assuming O’Hara would be coming back with reinforcements and bent on killing her. As Frost saw O’Hara’s car now, he shook the girl by her shoulders; she’d been dreaming—talking in her sleep, half in Russian, half in English. Frost spoke no Russian, but the English words had chilled him. The dream she’d been having apparently had dealt with changing back to her own identity, as if two women—one who spoke Russian and one who spoke English—were fighting inside her. Frost shook her again to awaken her, feeling at least mildly sorry for her and also feeling mildly terrified. He was coming to the conclusion that the girl might be mentally disturbed—there’ d been ample reason for it, he realized. But if she were, getting her safely across the country would become even more difficult. As he watched O’Hara climbing out of his car, Frost shook her once again. She was starting to wake up. A chill ran up Frost’s spine; his whole body shook with it. What if O’Hara were right, what if Deacon had been suckered, what if the girl were an assassin and Frost was just bringing her to the President’s doorstep?

  “What—ohh, Frost.” She smiled, looking up at him.