Barratt looked around quickly. There was a team out there somewhere.
"Yes, there's a team out there,” Dornan said, as if reading his thoughts. "But you tell me what we need to know, you won't have to meet them."
Barratt had no choice. He could see no other way out. His mind rehearsed the quickly formulated plan before he acted on it. He would lunge for Dornan, use his body as a shield from the sniper, dive into the fountain and, protected by the concrete edge, swim under the water to the rear of the statue, then behind its massive size, run for the trees. He still had his gun. Any agents on the ground would be exposed if they tried to apprehend him.
It was a poor plan. One where he wouldn't survive, he was sure. But it was all he had. His grip tightened on the gun behind his back, he shifted his weight slightly, and prepared to move.
The burner phone in his pocket buzzed loudly in his pocket. The sensation snapped him free of his thoughts, catching him on the precipice of action. One second later, and it would have been too late; he would have been in mid-air flying toward Dornan.
"I would get that if I were you, Barratt. It could be important,” Dornan said with an arrogant smile.
With his free hand, Barratt slowly reached into his pocket and retrieved the phone. It was still buzzing.
"That's her, isn't it,” Dornan said, smiling. "Invite her to join us."
Barratt stared at the phone a moment longer, not sure he should answer it. If he was going to die, he didn't want her to know about it until after the fact. He canceled the call.
Before he could throw the phone into the water, it rang again.
Dornan said nothing. He just watched him. Curious. Like a cat toying with a mouse before it pounced.
Barratt's thumb went for the "end" button, then slowly moved to the side and answered the call.
"Yes?" he said flatly.
"Give the phone to Dornan," Shirin said calmly.
"Don't do this, Shirin!"
"I know what I'm doing. Give it to him."
Barratt pulled the phone from his ear. Looked at it as though it could answer all the questions in his mind, as though it were a crystal ball about to divulge his future. And then, slowly, he handed the phone to Dornan.
"Are you ready to come in, Shirin? If you come in now, quietly, we'll let your friend here walk off into the sunset, and he'll never hear from us again."
"I don't think so, Dornan," she said without emotion.
"Shirin, we have a sniper with his sight leveled at your friend as we speak. If he moves, he dies. We also have an EMR team fifteen seconds away. If you don't come in, we will have to take Barratt. He will tell us everything we need. Then we'll come after you anyway. Why not save us all that time and unpleasantness?"
"Dornan…" Shirin said softly, "I'm going to enjoy killing you. But first, I think I'll put a bullet through your gut."
Dornan laughed. It was a laugh more for show than anything else. But it choked quickly at the back of his throat when he watched the red laser dot move from Barratt's heart.
The red dot moved evenly away from Barratt, across the space between them, and then rested, steady, over Dornan's stomach. His eyes went wide with shock. Understanding flushed the color from his face.
14:57:42
A few feet to Shirin's left, the incapacitated sniper lay awkwardly on the ground, shackled, unconscious, but alive. She would have questions for him when this was over.
Leaning into the supported gun, she felt at one with the rifle nestled against her in a tight cheek weld. The grip was comfortable, the scope powerful. She could see the whites of Dornan's eyes. She could see his temporal arteries pounding erratically. She could see intimately the fear oozing from every pore.
"Dornan, put the phone on speaker," she said into her hands-free earpiece.
His hands trembled. Clumsily he managed to press the speaker button.
Shirin knew now that this man was involved in Harry's death. There was no doubt. For that, she would kill him, of that there was no doubt. But first she had to find out who else was involved and, most importantly, who was behind it.
"Barratt. Can you hear me?"
Barratt nodded in reply.
"Good. You're all clear. If Dornan tries anything, snap his spine. I see two agents positioned either side of the walkway ahead. Walk straight past them to the south side entrance. One block to your right, there's a Ford Sierra. The back door is unlocked. Secure Dornan. I'll meet you there."
Without speaking, Barratt stood, pulled Dornan to his feet, and marched him forward.
14:58:51
Barratt heard the loud noise in the distance, an engine screaming closer and closer. He turned his head to see a large dark van barreling through the park, approaching the fountain at high speed, headed straight toward them.
"Keep going!" Shirin yelled over the speakerphone.
He pulled Dornan roughly behind him, almost dragging him along. With his free hand, he held the Glock concealed by his side, ready to fire.
The van was closing the gap quickly. They were still in the open, nowhere to hide. He just needed ten more seconds. He could use the trees for cover.
He was turning his back again to gauge their distance when he saw a hole burst through the front windscreen. He saw the driver slump forward. A second hole snapped through the front screen on the passenger side. The second figure slumped. Wet red smattered the inside cabin.
The van careened to the side and collided with the concrete edge of the fountain. The front end dug into the barrier with force. The back of the van kicked up and over, until the whole van tipped into the pond, its rear doors jammed against the base of the large statue.
Without missing a step, Barratt kept pulling Dornan faster along the pathway. They were out of the clearing, into the perimeter of trees. The two agents Shirin had identified sprinted toward him, guns drawn.
Barratt fired the first shot, his silenced weapon barely audible over Dornan's panting breath. Barratt's bullet missed its mark. The two men were out of range, but closing fast. He didn't need to hit them, he just wanted to slow them down.
The two men returned fire, taking turns, advancing on Barratt and Dornan. Their bullets zipped past, wide, but getting closer. Barratt shoved Dornan ahead of him, using his as a human shield.
Without warning, the closest agent's shoulder seemed to explode. He spun and fell. A moment later, the sound of Shirin's silenced rifle fire reached past his dead body to Barratt's ears.
He ran past the fallen body, raised his gun and continued to fire at the second agent, now concealed behind the bulk of a large tree trunk.
Barratt felt the waves of the loud thud before he heard it, as Shirin delivered another precision bullet, smashing through the agent and embedding itself into the trunk.
Barratt and Dornan kept moving. The entrance of the park was seconds away. Curious bystanders stood gawking, crouching and hiding, as they reached the pavement, turned right and headed for the parked Ford.
Barratt pulled at Dornan again. They didn't have much time. Police sirens wailed in the background, heading straight for them.
A gunshot smacked the air. He couldn't tell where it came from but felt it was close. He turned to look at Dornan and saw a gaping hole appear center mass, the wound in Dornan's chest wide enough to shove a fist through. His face registered shock, then another deafening gunshot and Dornan's head exploded like a watermelon assaulted with a bat.
Blood, hair, and brain splattered across Barratt's face, blinding him. He felt disoriented and shaken but managed to dive to the pavement and roll under a nearby car for cover while desperately trying to wipe the debris of Dornan's head and face from his eyes.
15:04:12
Shirin heard the two gunshots as she was packing away the sniper rifle. She dropped the weapon instantly and ran to the edge of the parapet. Five floors below, she saw what was left of Dornan's body flop to the pavement, and Barratt drop and roll under a large 4WD. She searched desperately for the shoot
er, but her vision was obscured by outcroppings of the building's architecture and store verandas below.
Barratt was still under the 4WD vehicle. He hadn't come out the other side. He was trapped with nowhere to go. She had to get down there.
Leaving the rifle and the unconscious agent behind, she ran across the open space to the stairwell, flung open the door, and bounded down the stairs five or six at a time.
She reached the ground floor, sprinted the narrow corridor to the entrance, and drew the silenced weapon from the small of her back.
The bright sunlight blinded her for a moment as she sped out of the building. Confronted with the cacophony of police sirens, screaming witnesses, and policemen yelling, Shirin froze and quickly reversed herself back under the threshold of the entrance.
Two patrol cars had pulled up on either side of the large 4WD. The four officers were yelling at Barratt to roll over and put his hands over his head. Their guns were drawn. If he tried anything, they would kill him. They had that look in their eyes.
15:08:15
Smith rounded the corner. Two blocks behind him, the chaos grew less objectionable to his senses.
Using a handgun without a silencer in public was not something he felt comfortable with. However, it provided the shock value and distraction he needed to slip away unnoticed. The clumsy arrival of the police made disappearing easier.
One more block and he would be in the food district. He could slip into a quiet restaurant, enjoy a peaceful afternoon coffee and melt into anonymity.
Killing Dornan was not ideal, but allowing Shirin and Barratt to question him presented too many risks. Dornan had known too much.
chapter 4
"GETTING IN is easier than getting out."
the book of seekay
15:08:49
Barratt lay prone, face first on the hard road, his head pinned against the rough bitumen. His vision was still blurred from Dornan's blood and the weight of the police officer's knee pressing heavily against the side of his face.
Another officer placed his knee and full weight at the center of his back while his hands were painfully secured behind his back with hard plastic flexi-cuffs.
He felt the officers place small plastic bags over his hands and tape them in place, secured for forensic analysis. He was searched quickly and thoroughly.
Before releasing him from their heavy grip, police officers cleared the immediate site, his gun collected from under the large 4WD. A police van pulled up close to the scene.
It was standard procedure. He was considered a suspect in a multiple homicide. One man's brains were plastered across his face, two more men shot dead in the park, and unknown casualties in the wrecked van crumpled into Kitchener Fountain. They would consider him dangerous.
Barratt had been on both sides of this exchange before. He gave no resistance.
15:10:36
Shirin watched at a distance as the four policemen roughly lifted Barratt from the road and placed him in the waiting van.
More sirens could be heard in the distance. Media vans littered the perimeter with hungry reporters while pedestrians and patrons of nearby buildings flocked to the park, trying to see the violence that had unfolded in their city. Police battled the growing crowds, trying to put barricades in place. The scene was a circus of activity.
Dornan's dead body had been cordoned off. A makeshift tent was pitched over his corpse and surrounding pavement to preserve the scene for the forensic team.
The fire department was at work on the van wrapped around the statue of Kitchener Fountain, trying to free the injured and dead agents.
Stepping back into the shadows, Shirin knew it would only be a matter of time before news of Barratt's arrest reached the desk of Director Zelig. She didn't have much time if she were going to free him.
15:11:17
Gerald Maier's office was plain, without adornment. It functioned as a place where he could focus on the intricacies and often-circuitous financial stratagems of the rich, corrupt, and immoral.
The challenge of unraveling the twisted spider webs of financial fraudsters kept his mind sharp and his heart happy. He loved the chase.
Sitting behind his desk, the USB he'd reluctantly accepted from the beautiful woman hours earlier sat beside his monitor taunting him. He didn't want to get involved until terms of contract had been established. But there it sat, willing him to have a quick look.
Giving into his curiosity, Maier snatched the USB from the desktop, slipped it into the port of his PC, and geared himself up for another chase.
15:12:57
Smith sat with his back to the wall, facing the entrance of the quaint restaurant. A young waitress returned from outside, talking with animated shock about what she had seen at the park.
The news of a shooting had reached most of the businesses in the district quickly. Smith wasn't concerned.
He looked down with indifference at the cutlery symmetrically placed in front of him and wondered how long it would take before his meal was served.
The cell phone in his front pocket vibrated silently. It was the emergency burner phone issued by the old man.
"Yes?" he answered quietly.
"Secure?" the old man asked.
"Yes."
"How did the meeting go?"
"As expected."
"And our friends?"
"Left separately."
"Did they get what they wanted?"
"No."
"Very good. For the moment, they are more useful to me together. Help them, then get back to me," the old man hung up without waiting for a response.
Smith placed the cell on the table. Without looking at it, he removed the back cover, took the battery out, slid the SIM card from its slot, and reassembled the casing. He rose from the table, and walked out of the restaurant mechanically.
A replacement phone would be waiting for him at the usual dead-drop location. Again, the old man's air for caution inspired in him an admiration he rarely felt for anyone in his line of work.
15:13:14
Shirin curled the throttle of the Kawasaki Ninja motorbike backward and felt the 750cc engine reply instantly. She had very little time if she was to keep Barratt alive.
Her office was twenty minutes away. To get Barratt out of police custody before Zelig's team got to him, she would need supplies.
The scream of the stolen bike's motor fell behind her as she gunned the engine and weaved in and out of traffic. She would make it back in time. She had to.
15:18:27
Barratt sat on the molded stainless steel chair fixed to the concrete floor. His hands were no longer bound. They didn't need to be.
He was somewhere down in the bowels of the police station. Locked in a solitary confinement cell. The walls were made of thick Perspex, unbreakable, supported at regular intervals by metal posts. The two guards sitting outside his cell could see his every move.
They had asked him nothing during transit. Nothing while they transferred him to the holding cell. Nothing while a preliminary forensic team took his fingerprints, collected DNA and GSR samples. They had stripped him of his blood-soaked clothes and scraped underneath his fingernails. After a cursory medical exam, a bright orange jumpsuit was thrust at him, and he was escorted back to the holding cell.
Rubbing at the bruises forming on his wrists, he knew what they were doing. They were making him wait. Building anticipation, building anxiety.
He felt the temperature in the cell rising. They had increased the heat. He laughed loudly. It was almost comical. They were using every old trick in the book.
They had no idea who he was. No idea the interrogations he had endured in the field. No idea the bloody interrogations he had himself delivered on others…
With that thought, Barratt grew sober. Zelig would surely send his own team to either silence him or collect him. Either way, he knew he would survive neither.
He had to find a way out.
15:23:02
; Director Zelig sat tensely behind his large desk. News of the events at Kitchener Park had been trickling back to his office in vague reports. Regardless of the details, it was clear Shirin had escaped. It was still uncertain if one of the corpses on the scene was Barratt. Either way, the trap had failed miserably.
His famously short tolerance of failure exploded in a blast of profanities. If the mission leader was still alive, his life was about to become a hell.
A sharp knock on his door brought his eyes off the latest report. Agent Lipski, his over-zealous executive assistant, charged into his office. His face was flushed red, his spectacles pushed hard against the bridge of his nose.
"It's him!"He shook a piece of paper in his hand excitedly.
"It's who?"Zelig asked testily.
"It's Barratt! They have him at Belmont Police Station. They just submitted his fingerprints for a match with the federal database! It's him!"
15:31:06
Belmont Police Station was a buzz of activity and tension. Investigating violent homicides was not uncommon, but the events at Kitchener Park screamed of something above Detective Fairley's pay grade.
Returning to his cluttered desk, he knew something about this man in the holding cell didn't sit right. The man was caught at the scene, covered in another man's blood, a recently fired gun within arm's reach, and a faceless corpse meters away, and still, he remained calm, unflappable.
The man was a killer. Fairley had no illusions about that. His steely eyes, scarred body, and impenetrable focus spoke volumes. He was no stranger to violence.
Since his incarceration and processing, he hadn't spoken; not to declare his innocence, not to ask for a lawyer.
Fairley had a bad feeling building up inside him. The beginnings of a headache started niggling at the front of his brain. He didn't like where this case was leading.
15:32:10
Zelig dialed Smith's number on his cell. It rang several times before Smith answered.
Against the Clock Page 8
