Alexander King Thriller Series: Books 1-3

by Bradley Wright

  He would settle for those odds every time. Especially when the guards were sure the situation was under control.

  Without warning, King twisted his hips to the left and fired a right hand directly at the boss guard’s nose. It shattered as he dropped backward to the ground. King turned toward the little guard who’d hit him in the back of his head outside. A look of terror formed on his face as he tried desperately to bring up his rifle, but his shoulder strap was in the wrong place and couldn’t be raised any higher without taking precious seconds to move the strap.

  He didn’t have time for that.

  King reached down and grabbed the barrel of the rifle with his left hand, simultaneously grabbing the shoulder strap around the man’s neck with his right. He ripped the rifle up over his head, then push-kicked him in the stomach, sending him backward a few feet. As the guard regained his balance, he fumbled in his pocket presumably for King’s own Glock. King had watched him put it there as his boss guided King into the SUV earlier. Before the man could produce the gun from his pocket, King happily returned the favor and swung the rifle like a baseball bat, making a solid connection on the side of the guard’s head. The guard subsequently collapsed to the floor. King took his gun back and slid it inside his holster.

  “Xavier, what the hell are you doing, man?” Arnie shouted from behind the desk.

  “Arnie, find something to tie these guys up.”

  “I-I can’t do that. They’ll fire me!”

  “I don’t have time for this. If you don’t tie them up, I’ll just shoot them. Up to you.”

  Arnie could see that King wasn’t kidding, so he raced back to the break room. King grabbed both guards by the back collar of their shirts and dragged them into the break room and told Kuznetsov to follow him.

  “What’s happening? Who are you?” Arnie said as he walked back from the maintenance closet with a couple of extension cords.

  “Just tie them up. I work for the US government and I need your help. Can I count on you?”

  “US government? What the shit, man? You’re just a security guard like me.”

  Arnie’s chubby face was turning red.

  “Arnie, did you see how I just took these guys down?”

  King waited for Arnie to nod.

  “Mere ‘security guards’ don’t normally know how to do that, do they?”

  Arnie shook his head.

  “Arnie, your country needs you. I know you always wanted to be part of the police force. Well, now is your chance to be CIA.”

  Arnie perked up immediately.

  “I hereby deem you a temporary agent,” King went on. “Do you accept, on behalf of the president of the United States?”

  Arnie nodded slowly at first, then more emphatically. “Yes, yes I do.”

  “Good. Now, Agent Arnold Clark.” King was really playing it up. “I need you to tie these men up, gag them, and make sure Roger doesn’t let them out of this room when he gets back from his building check. You understand?”

  “Yes. Yes, sir.” He patted the radio at his hip. “I’ll give you the other radio at the desk.”

  “Good. And just as important, you have to tell me if someone else is coming in. Got it?”

  “I can do it,” Arnie said. Then he knelt down, rolled the boss guard over, and began tying his wrists. “So what’s going on?”

  “If you can do these things I’ve asked, Arnie, I’ll fill you in when this is over. And I’ll make sure the sheriff takes a second look at you for the force.”

  The look on Arnie’s face was like a kid on Christmas morning. “You would do that?”

  “Absolutely. So long as you don’t let me down.”

  “I got this, Xavier . . . wait a second, that ain’t even your real name, is it?” he said with a grin.

  King held up his hands in a surrender pose. “You got me.”

  Arnie smiled and shook his head. “Mary will never believe this.”

  King didn’t have time to give him the “Mary can never know about this” speech. “I’ll be back shortly. Make sure no one comes in without me knowing.”

  “You got it!”

  King turned to Kuznetsov. “Okay. It’s showtime. Let’s make this quick.”

  The two of them walked back out to the secured door. King glanced outside and saw no signs of anyone coming. He removed his coat and laid it on the desk as he grabbed the handheld radio. Kuznetsov swiped his card, and they made their way inside. It was time to see if Kuznetsov was telling the truth about what was going on in Barrow or not. Either way, it would be information that was much needed in the next step of getting to the bottom of who was trying to weaponize a virus on American soil.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  King and Kuznetsov entered the secure door and walked down an empty hallway.

  “Josiah,” King spoke to his earpiece. “You still with me?”

  “We’re here.”

  “What’s it looking like at the gate?”

  “Same as after you all went in. Except the two guards who went with you never came back out.”

  “Yeah,” King said. “They won’t be either.”

  “Nice. Listen, I went ahead and had Cali make her way to the airport. That okay?”

  “Good. I shouldn’t be long. We are heading into the lab now. Let me know if anything changes out there.”

  “Roger that.”

  The two of them approached a door. This was the second one, the last door visible via the security camera system. Beyond it was where King’s knowledge of the facilities ended. Kuznetsov once again swiped his key card and the door unlocked. He pushed through, and the only thing on the other side was a small room with an elevator directly in front of them. That is not what King was hoping to see. He was not thrilled about going below ground, with his only way out being an elevator, which would make it that much harder to escape if something were to go wrong.

  “How far down we going?” King asked as they walked toward the elevator. This was a fingerprint-only elevator, so Kuznetsov pressed his thumb against the small screen. It turned green and the elevator door slid open.

  “Are you claustrophobic?” Kuznetsov said.

  “When people are trying to kill me or you over a super deadly virus and we might be a few floors underground with no way out? Well, yeah. I guess that does make me feel a bit claustrophobic. Otherwise, no. I was a Navy SEAL. Everything we did in training was underwater.”

  King didn’t know why he elaborated with the SEAL comment. Perhaps a little nervous about being trapped down there with a deadly disease.

  “Just three stories down,” Kuznetsov said. “But don’t worry, it’s a big lab.”

  The elevator jolted to life and began moving down. King couldn’t escape the flashing thought that he was being lowered into his grave. Fortunately, it wasn’t the first time he’d had these sorts of feelings and managed to overcome the situation. It was one of the many things his training and experience had taught him over the years. Thoughts only control what happens in reality if you let them. He hadn’t let a negative thought win yet, and he wasn’t about to start now.

  The elevator came to a stop, and as soon as the door opened, the two so-called scientists who Kuznetsov said would be there looked up in surprise. So did the three armed men standing guard around them. As they turned their guns toward him and Kuznetsov, King’s instinct was to reach for his gun, but he stopped himself for fear that it might trigger the guards’ shooting reaction. Instead, King raised his hands at the same time Kuznetsov had.

  “Dr. Semenov?” A dark-haired woman in a lab coat spoke in a Russian accent. “What are you doing here? The guards at the gate radioed that you were coming. They said something about a problem?”

  It was clear the scientists, or whoever they actually were, were there to close up shop.

  “What are you doing here?” Kuznetsov answered, pointing at the stainless steel cases they were loading into boxes. “I didn’t order these to be moved.”

  She stared
at him blankly for a moment. The guards didn’t lower their guns. Whatever was going on, it was clear that Kuznetsov wasn’t in on it. And that part at least made King feel better. The problem was, if they were through with Kuznetsov, there was no reason not to kill him. And King, too, for that matter.

  An Asian man in a lab coat set down what he was packing and stepped toward them. “We’ve been ordered to leave. Haven’t you heard?”

  “Heard what?” Kuznetsov said.

  While they were talking, King scanned the room. It was all open, with tables filled with research and lab equipment such as beakers, microscopes, and safety gear. On the right there was a large metal locker about two feet from the wall, with lab coats and other materials stored inside.

  “There was an attack in Moscow,” the Asian man said. “Two women intercepted a shipment, and management is afraid it will be linked back here.”

  King knew the two women were Zhanna and Sam.

  “Why was I not notified immediately?” Kuznetsov was incensed.

  “We just assumed you were when they called us here and told us to shut it down. They called for Protocol Red. We assumed you knew because Veronika—”

  The Asian man paused. King already knew why. He knew that Veronika was the name of Kuznetsov’s long-time assistant. And he knew the Asian man wasn’t about to offer good news. He also knew now that these two people in lab coats knew Kuznetsov’s true identity. It’s the only way they would know Veronika meant something to him.

  “What? Veronika what? She couldn’t possible have anything to do with this.”

  “She’s . . . she’s dead.”

  Kuznetsov’s knees buckled, and King caught him before he fell. The Asian man pulled a chair over, and King sat him down. Kuznetsov began crying. But King was focused on the guard whose radio just beeped. A man speaking Russian came through its speaker. King didn’t understand the words, but he understood that the men at the gate had probably been trying to reach the two guards who had escorted King inside. When they didn’t respond, the men down here were probably their next checkpoint to see if everything was all right. They were about to find that out that it wasn’t. King reached for his gun before the man on the radio could finish letting the guards know there was a problem.

  He did so in just the nick of time.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The lab was quiet except for the man speaking through the guard’s radio and the mild sobs of grief coming from Kuznetsov. Fortunately for King, the moment he’d reached back for his gun, the two other guards had their attention drawn to whatever the man on the radio was saying. But King knew that wouldn’t last long.

  Before anything changed, he pulled his gun and yanked on the back of the chair Kuznetsov was sitting in. It almost toppled over, but King managed to correct it and slide the chair back toward the metal locker. The woman in the lab coat screamed when she saw King’s weapon. The guard on the right moved so fast that he had a clear shot, except that Kuznetsov was in front of King, which King assumed was why he didn’t shoot.

  Kuznetsov tried to stand up as King pulled the chair around behind the back of the locker, but King pulled him down to the ground by the collar of his coat. By then, the guards were screaming at King in Russian. King pointed to Kuznetsov and mouthed the words “don’t move.” Then he walked over to the other side of the locker and took a peek around. He almost lost his nose. The guard on the right began shooting immediately. Soon the bunkered lab sounded like a war zone as all three of the guards were firing. At first, the female scientist was screaming, but that quickly stopped. Since the scientists were in between King and the guards, they must have been shot.

  King put his back to the metal locker as bullets clanked against it on the other side. King needed to even out the numbers, and fast. If two of the three guards came around both sides of the locker at the same time, he wasn’t going to make it. He looked up above him. The locker was about eight feet tall. There was nothing behind the locker with him, but he did notice the radio that Arnie had given him clipped to his pant pocket. As one of the guards shouted in Russian at them, King took his gun and quietly slid it up on top of the locker. He bent down to Kuznetsov’s level.

  “Tell them we surrender,” King whispered.

  Kuznetsov shot him a look. His eyes were wide. He wasn’t frightened, it didn’t seem, but more surprised. Then he shouted a sentence in Russian. The guards did not immediately respond. This was an intense situation from all angles. But the fact that King could not communicate with the guards, nor could he understand what Kuznetsov was saying to them, only doubled the displeasure. Kuznetsov could have been saying anything to them. There was a little bit of a back and forth; then King heard the squeak of a rubber sole moving on top of the poured concrete.

  They were coming.

  King took the radio in his hand and threw it as far as he could out into the lab. He simultaneously lifted his foot onto the empty chair and boosted himself up the locker. He hooked his left elbow on top of the locker, and just as the radio hit something across the room in a loud crash, he picked up his Glock, found the first guard he could see, and squeezed the trigger three times. He dropped back down out of sight when the guard went down and the other two turned their guns up toward him. He was quick to the far side of the locker, and when he jumped out from behind it, he shot the only remaining visible guard twice in the chest. The guard’s gun had still been firing toward the spot were King had been on top of the locker. King spun back around behind the locker and waited.

  The lone remaining gun stopped firing. Whoever these men were who’d been hired as guards didn’t seem like former military, and probably not even former police officers, because they had no idea what they were doing. King heard the magazine slide from the guard’s rifle. He would have no way to protect himself. King took full advantage and walked around the locker with his gun extended. He had time to watch as the guard fumbled with a fresh magazine, but he would never get it loaded. King squeezed his trigger twice, and the man clutched his chest before he fell to the ground.

  “We’ve gotta move, Kuznetsov. Get out here and gather what you need.”

  Kuznetsov came around the corner and took in the damage. Bodies were spread around—it was a horrible sight. Especially for someone like Kuznetsov who’d never been a part of such violence. King’s ears were ringing from all the gunfire. He knew he was lucky that these men weren’t more skilled. He was always surprised how often men like these were undertrained. With so many fantastic former military in the world, there really was no excuse for it. Except maybe the fact that Barrow, Alaska, didn’t exactly draw skilled volunteers.

  “Let’s go,” King prompted Kuznetsov. “Worry about the lost later. Sorry, but we have to go.” Then he spoke to his earpiece. “Josiah, can you hear me?”

  King watched Kuznetsov shake out of his trance and begin looking for what they needed to take with them. He heard nothing back in his ear. “Josiah, do you read me?” He wasn’t surprised. The radios Josiah gave him were good, but not this far underground. He had no way to speak to Arnie either, with his radio being a casualty of the shootout.

  As Kuznetsov pulled out a few vials and was putting them in the preformed foam inside a briefcase, King began nosing around. At the far wall, he noticed a desk. Since the scientific tools and such meant nothing to him on the lab tables, he walked over and took in the desk. There was a computer, several files, a printer, and a few other office supplies on top. Nothing of use. But there was one drawer that was partially open, and inside he could see a notebook. King glanced up at Kuznetsov, who was closing up the briefcase. King reached in the drawer, grabbed the mini moleskin notebook, and shoved it in his pocket. As he learned last year in Greece, notebooks like these can be not only gold mines but also the difference in many lives being saved. It could be just the musings of an old man, but it could hold a whole lot more.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Washington, DC, 6:00 p.m.

  “Warshaw is on the m
ove,” Director Lucas said.

  President Gibbons sat up in his chair and leaned toward the phone on his desk where the director’s voice was coming through the speaker. Gibbons had just come out of a Homeland Security meeting with his top officials, and the only topic on the docket that day had been the new virus. Gibbons had high hopes that King and his team could stop it, but he had to plan as if they wouldn’t. He could not let things get out of hand like they had when the coronavirus came to the States from China. If this deadly new virus had been COVID-19, the country would have never recovered. That’s why he had no choice but to stop travel from outside the lower forty-eight states. Since hearing how the virus had traveled to the small towns in Alaska, and possibly in vials that were intercepted in Moscow, everyone in the meeting unanimously agreed.

  He had to protect his citizens, regardless of the potential political and economic backlash.

  “Where’s he going?” the president asked.

  “He and his family have left their home. We have men following him.”

  “So, they are going out to a late lunch? What the hell are you saying?”

  Director Lucas cleared his throat. “Sorry, we also have men watching the pilot of his Gulfstream G650, who just arrived at the airport. We don’t know yet, but it seems likely that’s where Warshaw is headed.”

  If Director Lucas was correct, Gibbons didn’t like the timing of this at all. His meeting about the travel ban and next steps on securing the United States had ended only thirty minutes ago. However, that was enough time for someone to get word to Warshaw that travel outside the United States was coming to an end for the time being.