The Black Bullet (Sean O'Brien mystery/thriller)

by Tom Lowe

  “Enough! Incompetents!”

  “GPS says they are near Speedway Boulevard. They have come to a halt in the nine-hundred block. We should be there as soon as the police allow traffic to move.”

  “The younger one they show often on television, Jason Canfield. Was he with them?”

  “No.”

  “Keep us informed. The Russians are probably close, too. You know what to do if you see them.” Hakim disconnected and told Sharif what had transpired.

  “To me,” Sharif said as he stood, “this indicates that O’Brien and the Greek are very anxious. Few people can discover our men following them when a tracking device is used. O’Brien is more than a fishing guide. He was a detective, a man who left, according to the news, after he was investigated by his own department.”

  “He may prove to be a formidable adversary. Allah will guide us. Inshallad … he will guide the knife when I cut the infidel’s throat.”

  ***

  O’BRIEN KNEW THE MAN was dead. He could tell the man had been shot after he’d been forced to unlock the storage unit door, giving access to the building. The body was sprawled face down, eyes open, a single bullet hole in the temple. A yellow fly crawled across the man’s blood-splattered wedding ring. A dark stain fanned out from the victim’s head like feathers.

  “Holy mother of Jesus—” Nick stopped when O’Brien held his hand up.

  O’Brien whispered, “They may still be in there. This guy’s been dead a few minutes. Ten, tops. Walk around the side of the building toward the street. Take cover. Call Dave. Tell him what happened. Tell him to get some officers here.”

  “What are you gonna do?”

  “I’m going inside.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  “Dave, you gotta get here quick!” Nick said into the cell phone.

  “What happened?”

  “Dude’s shot. Dead.”

  “Where’s Sean?”

  “Inside the storage place.”

  “By himself?”

  “I don’t have a fuckin’ gun!”

  “Are the hostiles there?”

  “I don’t know who the hell’s here!”

  “Any cars in the lot?”

  “Two.”

  “Stay out of the way, Nick. We’ll be there in five minutes.”

  “Sean said for you to call the cops.”

  “Done.”

  ***

  O’BRIEN REMOVED HIS SHOES inside the air-conditioned storage warehouse. The floor was concrete. He didn’t want the sound of his soles to give him away. Locked doors lined both sides of a thirty-foot hallway. O’Brien crept down the passage. He stopped before it opened into a T-corridor going left and right. He listened, trying to detect the slightest hint of human presence. He could hear the hum of the air-conditioners, the creak of the sun’s heat against the corrugated rooftop, and the buzz of a fly that had followed him inside.

  As he walked by one of the units, he smelled old furniture and rat poison. Then he smelled gunpowder the same time he stepped on a large sliver of glass. O’Brien looked up at a security camera he remembered seeing the last time he was here. It had been hit with a single bullet in the lens. Glass on the floor. He stepped around the glass and a broken piece of mirror that had fallen from the shattered lens. He picked up part of the mirror.

  O’Brien knew Dave’s storage unit was to the left about fifty feet down the hall. But what if the hostiles stood silently in the right side corridor? They’d blow the back of his head off before he could turn to face them. He wedged the section of broken mirror into the end of the Glock’s barrel. Then he slowly extended the pistol until he could see a reflection from the hallway off the mirror’s surface. No one. He reversed the angle and saw no one down the other corridor. The door to Dave’s unit was ajar.

  O’Brien stepped to unit 236 knowing what he’d see before he opened the door. The padlock had been hit with a bullet shattering the lock. He opened the door and saw a half dozen cardboard boxes and Dave’s outboard motor. The U-235 canisters were gone.

  O’Brien felt something wet on the bottom of his sock. He lifted his right foot and saw a blood stain on the concrete, dripping from the cut caused by the piece of glass from the shattered camera lens. O’Brien could hear the sound of sirens approaching. His thoughts were rapid, pulling at fragments, trying to grasp the enormity of the theft.

  What would they do with the U-235? Who took it? How many could die? What else did they get out of Jason? What had Jason told Nicole? What if Jason told the hostiles the story about the other canisters buried somewhere on a beach? Are Abby and Glenda Lawson’s lives at stake?

  “Sean!” Dave Collins yelled outside the storage unit.

  “In here! Clear!”

  Dave ran in with Lauren Miles, Ron Bridges, Paul Thompson, Nick, two sheriff’s deputies, and two men O’Brien assumed were government agents. Dave looked at O’Brien’s face and didn’t even ask the question.

  “Gone,” O’Brien said.

  “Shit!” shouted Thompson.

  Dave said, “The vic outside probably was the manager.”

  Lauren said, “We’ve got two choppers in the air! Flying the perimeter of this place in an expanding three-sixty.” She asked the officers, “Are roadblocks in place?”

  “Should be in place now,” one officer said. Police radios crackled with orders.

  “Should be isn’t good enough!” yelled Thompson.

  One officer held his hand up for silence, trying to hear the police radio. He said, “We have a ten-sixty-nine. They found a body. White male. About twenty. Wearing a gone fishin’ T-shirt. Found his body behind some bushes near the South Davison Wal-Mart.”

  “Jesus, no.” Nick said, making the sign of the cross. “Tell me it’s not Jason.”

  O’Brien felt his stomach in his throat. The air in the storage unit was like a crypt, the taste of mold and the odor of rat urine coming from the concrete floor. O’Brien put his arm around Nick’s shoulder for a moment. “Can you ride back with Dave? I need to take care of some business.”

  “No problem,” Nick said.

  O’Brien walked back down the corridor, picked up his shoes, pushed open the door, stepped around the blood from the body, and limped in his socks to the Jeep. An oak tree was full of movement, black starlings, their chortles like canned sitcom noise, mixed with the sirens in the distance and the whirr of an FBI helicopter nearby. Beyond the glut of flashing blue lights and the blur of yellow crime tape, O’Brien could see the media circling like a pack of wolves.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  O’Brien ignored the mob of reporters, the click of cameras and the microphones shoved in his face as he approached his Jeep. Susan Schulman stepped in front of him with her cameraman behind her left shoulder. She extended her Channel Nine microphone. “We understand there has been another murder, the first being the death of one of our interns, Nicole Bradley, and the kidnapping of Jason Canfield, whose body might have just been found. This is connected to you finding the U-boat, correct Mr. O’Brien?”

  O’Brien disregarded Schulman, walking around her and the cameraman. She shouted, “Are these deaths tied to the uranium?”

  O’Brien stopped, his eyes narrowed. “Have you made sure family has been notified before you identify a body, or is this how far you’ll go for a fucking soundbite?”

  “We’re reporting live, Mr. O’Brien.”

  “You may be live, but any semblance of civility with you is dead. Now move the hell out of my way.”

  As O’Brien got in his Jeep, his cell rang. He recognized the number again, Eric Hunter. “So now the news media know Jason was kidnapped,” Hunter said.

  “You watching Channel Nine in some bar?”

  “Matter fact, I am.”

  “What do you want?”

  “To talk. Where are you going to be in fifteen minutes?”

  “Chapman’s Fish House. I want to find that homeless man you told me about.”

  “I’ll meet you there
.”

  ***

  AS O’BRIEN PULLED INTO Chapman’s parking lot, he looked across the street to Saint Paul’s Church. There was a bus stop bench in front of the church but no one was sitting on it. He parked and got out. The smell of fresh-caught fish came from a truck as the driver unloaded the order. O’Brien’s cell rang. It was Maggie Canfield. “Sean! Is Jason okay?” Her voice was ragged, desperate.

  “Maggie … we’re doing all we can to find him—”

  “Is he alive … is my son alive?”

  “I believe so. We’re going to find him and—”

  “Please, Sean, find him. Every minute he's gone could mean … .” Her voice cracked. “I'm coming to wherever you and the police are—”

  “No, Maggie. Stay home. Stay off your phone in case he calls.”

  “I can’t take another loss … not after his father … .” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Please keep him alive … .” She disconnected.

  O’Brien looked at his phone for a second, started to place it in his pocket as it rang again. Dave Collins was on the line. He said, “We met with Daytona PD and Volusia SO detectives. The body we thought might be Jason’s, turned out not to be. They found the guy in an alley behind an abandoned pool hall. Place is littered with syringes, smells like a sewer. It’s a communal commode. Detectives know the dead guy, gang-banger and user. It’s not Jason. Where are you?”

  “Looking for a homeless man in the vicinity of Chapman’s.”

  “Better luck there. I think the homeless people gave this place up.”

  “The feds still with you?”

  “Yes. Paul, Ron and Lauren. All present and counted.”

  O’Brien said nothing.

  “We’ll be there in twenty minutes, Sean.” Dave disconnected as Eric Hunter got out of a pick-up truck and walked toward O’Brien.

  Hunter said, “Jason’s mother is almost catatonic over this. Woman’s lost her husband—”

  “So let’s make sure she doesn’t lose her son.”

  Hunter pursed his lips and blew out like he was cold, looked across at the church, then at O’Brien. “If we’d started on it earlier together maybe Jason would be going on that next charter trip with you.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I told you, I’m a friend of Jason’s family. Knew his dad for a long time.”

  O’Brien made sure his face reflected nothing. He nodded. “So what does a friend of the family do for a living?”

  “Day job is working with Homeland Security. I can build a motorcycle or take one apart. Pretty good with my hands.”

  O’Brien was quiet a long beat. Then he looked closely in Hunter’s eyes as he spoke. “The day Nick, Jason, and I found that U-boat, the day we dove down and found the U-235 canisters, Jason had called you. Probably coming back from sea. I saw your number on his phone that day. It was one of two calls. The other one was to his girlfriend. She’s dead. Who do you work for?”

  “Right now I’m working for Jason. Trying to save his life—”

  “That’s not good enough!”

  “It has to be, okay?”

  “It’s not okay! Too much is at stake. You tell me you got an eyewitness description of the hostiles from some homeless guy. An anonymous witness.”

  “What are you getting at?”

  “You were one of two people who knew about the sub and the cargo. Nicole, the girlfriend, didn’t know until she got Jason drunk and seduced it from him. But you, his surrogate father figure, he probably told you. And then who did you tell? Somebody in the mob? American? Russian? Some Islamic radicals who’ll stop at nothing to acquire enriched uranium? Who’s paying you?”

  “You have quite an overactive imagination, O’Brien.”

  “How did that reporter, Susan Schulman, know our boat was going to be stopped by the Coast Guard? Did you call her? Did you want this out in the public for some asinine bureaucratic or covert reason?”

  “He’s returned,” Hunter said, looking over O’Brien’s shoulder.

  O’Brien was hesitant to turn around for a moment. He stepped back from Hunter and looked at the bus stop. A man sat there staring straight at him.

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  Eric Hunter shook his head, glanced down at the parking lot and then looked at O’Brien. “You’re wrong about me, but let’s see what he has to say.”

  The homeless man watched them approaching. He grinned, wiped his nose with the back of his hand, and asked, “Anybody got a quarter or two?”

  “Sure,” said Hunter, peeling off a couple of one-dollar bills.

  “Much obliged,” said the man. He was in his mid-fifties, matted dark hair, swimming pool blue eyes through slits of black dirt, new dirt on top of old dirt. He had a sour smell of old sweat and cheap wine.

  “Now,” said Hunter, “you know, Robert, the church folk won’t let you have dinner in there if you’ve been drinking.”

  The man sighed like the last ounce of breath just left his body. “Only had a swallow or two around noon.”

  “And you haven’t eaten, right?”

  “That’s why I’m here. You can get supper in there two nights a week.” He nodded toward the church, his eyes suddenly filled with buried thoughts.

  “Robert Ingham this is Sean O’Brien. Tell Sean exactly what you saw when they kidnapped the young man.”

  “I saw the young fella put some boxes in his truck, ‘bout the time he opened his door, this blue van, a Ford, pulled up and these two men jumped out. One of them stuck a gun in the dude’s ribs while the other pushed him into the van. I stood up to yell about the time two semi-trucks blew by. When the trucks were gone, so was the van.”

  “Can you describe the men who took Jason?” O’Brien asked.

  “Jason … that’s his name?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s a fine name.” His eyes faded a moment and then returned. “One was tall, shoulders like a football player, bald. Other one was blondish. I’d say medium size.”

  “Was there anyone else in the van?” O’Brien asked. “A driver, maybe?”

  “Not that I could see. One of ‘em dudes who jerked him into the van was the driver.”

  “Thank you,” O’Brien said. “If there’s something else, how do I find you?”

  “I’m usually here Monday and Friday’s ‘bout this time. I had me a bicycle ‘till somebody stole it from my camp.”

  “Camp?”

  “Yeah, I used to sleep under the I-95 bridge downtown. But it’s got so damn crazy, teenage kids comin’ in and beating up people like me. Three of ‘em like to beat me to death last winter. I stay in the woods, west side of town off Wilson Avenue. I got me a little tent and a sleepin’ bag. I don’t bother nobody.”

  O’Brien handed the man a twenty dollar bill.

  ***

  “NOW DO YOU BELIEVE ME?” asked Hunter as he and O’Brien walked across Chapman’s parking lot.

  “I questioned whether we could find him again. We did. End of that story, but it’s the beginning of the rest of the story. I want to know where you fit into all of this.”

  “Jason was kidnapped, we hope not killed. It shouldn’t have happened. His girlfriend is dead. Others may die if they’re in the way of whoever’s doing this. You need my help. I can dive down there with you and pull up the U-235.”

  O’Brien was silent for a long beat, studying Hunter. “We brought it up.”

  “You did? When?”

  “Two nights ago. Nick and I dove back down. We off-loaded it in a storage unit, stored where only three people knew the location. Jason wasn’t one of them.”

  “So they kidnapped him for information he didn’t have?”

  “He initially didn’t know. Nick got boozed up, and while ranting to me, Jason overheard him. The HEU was just stolen. Storage manager was shot through the head. This tells me they got the information out of Jason. His immediate value to them may be gone.”

  Hunter grunted. “How much uranium did they get?”


  “Two canisters, probably enough to make a dirty bomb if they wanted.”

  ***

  DAVE COLLINS PULLED his Land Rover into the parking lot. Dave, Lauren Miles, Ron Bridges, and Paul Thompson all hit the ground almost running. Nick walked behind them. O’Brien saw something in Hunter’s eyes, the subliminal recognition, the discovery and concealment coming in the blink of an eye. But it was all the time O’Brien needed. Hunter knew one of the four people.

  Lauren said, “We have a multi-agency task force setting up near the U.S. Attorney’s office on the second floor of the federal building. Secretary of State and Homeland Security want hourly reports. Volusia detectives said that, when they were here earlier, the manager told them Jason bought twenty pounds of bait fish and left the store. He said no one in the store saw the abduction.”

  “Guy across the street,” Hunter began, “a homeless man, said he saw two men push Jason into a blue Ford van. He said they put a pistol in his ribs and kidnapped him.”

  “I’m sorry, who you are?” asked Paul Thompson.

  O’Brien studied Thompson’s eyes, his body movement for a hint of deceit.

  “Eric Hunter. I’m a family friend, also working with Homeland.”

  O’Brien introduced Hunter to the others and looked in each person’s eyes as they greeted Hunter. Nothing. O’Brien said, “There’s a camera on the left corner of the building, pointed toward the parking lot. Did the SO look at the hard drives?”

  Thompson said, “They’re doing that now at our headquarters.”

  “Tape or drives?” O’Brien asked.

  “Drives,” said Agent Bridges. “They downloaded the data. Drives are still in there.”

  O’Brien said, “Maybe the one glass eye of the camera will give us a better picture than what a homeless man saw from across the street. Let’s go have a look.”

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  They lay hidden under a green army blanket on a wooden table in a small warehouse. Yuri Volkow entered the room, nodded at Andrei Keltzin and Zakhar Sorokin. He looked at Jason tied in the chair and said, “You have proved most valuable. Let us see what we have recovered from that storage room.” Volkow slowly removed the blanket from the canisters as if he was trying not to awake what slept inside.