But her mind whirled with what she had heard. Irina was at war with her father! And Kit's uncle was being used as a blunt tool to fight the lion-haired man… was it possible her Uncle Rich didn't know he was being used?
No, he was too intelligent. Too intuitive.
At least, she hoped so.
Boris's hands were rough on her as he started pushing her toward the door. Instinctively, her sore muscles stiffened for a fight.
Shouting from outside the cabin door froze them in their positions.
Irina turned her head as if she could see through the door. "Shit!"
In the dim lighting, her made-up face turned ashen.
Boris let go of Kit and moved quickly. He now held a large square handgun and crouched near the door.
Still, Kit felt a rush of hope envelop her.
THIRTY-SIX
Feeling the gentle motion of the anchored ship reminded him of a long-ago day on river crowded with humanity and rusting hulks.
Hearing Sarge's voice on the phone, the nerves his raspy tone disguised, the barely suppressed cockiness. Maybe that had done it. In any case, Brant was transported elsewhere for a few moments, moments that stretched beyond their physical boundaries and lasted forever, or seemed to, like the nightmare you can't awaken from.
It was a memory he had mostly repressed, but now it seemed suddenly very important that it flash through his mind at this very point in time.
The rush of images made his head swim.
The river of primitive rust-spattered vessels and the maze of crooked piers is below and all around him, and his head swirls with the influx of stimuli. Smells, sounds, sights, the tinny bleating of a radio broadcast in sing-song Vietnamese.
Brant is Loot again, almost forty years younger.
(Why this memory, right now? he asks himself.)
Loot stoops low to enter the oversize sampan, following Sarge's wide bulk and brushing aside the homemade patchwork curtain as it falls back into place. Below them, the sluggish water slaps at the canted pilings and the boat's rusted metal hull. Inside, the yellow lamp casts a pallid glow that barely cracks the gloom, but slivers of light poke through the wooden cabin as if it were made of interlaced fingers.
Pango is already here, as this meeting place is also where he lives most of the dry season. Pango is not his real name, but it's how Sarge has bastardized the unpronounceable sounds, and Pango is more than happy to answer to it as long as the forbidden American dollars keep coming. Sarge's network spans downward from Pango, whose many relatives unwittingly work for Sarge. Sarge has brought in Loot and a couple of the other Rats for specific deals, but kept the business rather low-key for the last six months. A steady stream of cash has been exchanged for potent drugs from the Golden Triangle and weaponry from various sources in the ARVN – old French MAT submachine guns, Korean War-vintage American M-3 grease guns, and the occasional late-World War Two German piece, as well as the ubiquitous AK-47 and countless Chicom copies nearly indistinguishable from the original. The drugs have been turned over into other forms of contraband. But as the initially slow withdrawal of American forces begins to gather steam, Sarge has caught wind of several investigations into black market dealings and smuggling involving American soldiers. He has decided to close down his shop, no matter how lucrative dealing with Pango has been. Loot has only recently started to profit from the deals, but the cash has come in handy. No one's been hurt, he tells himself, and he has a houseboat in mind for when he retires from Army intelligence.
Today, Pango has visitors. Normally, Sarge and Pango meet alone. But this time Sarge has floated the need for the dissolution of the partnership and perhaps some of Pango's better sources want to be present. To argue? How trustworthy is anyone up and down the chain of contraband?
Loot wonders why he's involved in any of this at all. He's been a silent partner from the beginning, averting his own officer's eyes and early on, quietly, allowing some in his squad to profit from the situation in which they all found themselves. Any money scrounged from the black market goes home to families who might have to fend for themselves at any time, given the Rats' main duty and occupational hazard in the tunnels. Hazardous duty pay is negligible – Rats earn an extra fifty dollars a month for what they do. Loot's share of the dirty money has gone into a tackle box tucked at the bottom of his footlocker back at HQ. He has no one to send it to but his brother, and he's not likely to do that. His needs on base are few, usually limited to a few drinks and occasionally a girl at the club or back in Saigon while on R and R. Sometimes a clinic visit after that. Nothing else.
Sarge plops down on a stool and stares red-eyed at Pango and the two dirty-shirted visitors who stand slightly behind him, their hands out of sight in their pockets and hidden behind Pango's bulk. Muscle? Partners? Loot surreptitiously fingers the .38 in his own pocket. Suddenly the oppressive air in the low-slung cabin seems to tilt sideways and lighten.
"What's with the company?" Sarge asks Pango. "You don't trust the Sarge?"
"I no trust no one," Pango says, sticking out his lip. "You bring company?" He pronounces his Rs like Ls, just like in the movies. Loot almost loses it and breaks out into laughter. Maybe a little less pot would be advisable next time.
"This is my partner, the Loot. These your partners?"
Pango smiles with many black teeth. They look like rotted corn kernels lined up unevenly. "Yes?"
"We can deal without them."
"No-no-no," Pango sings. "They no go. Stay."
A look flutters between the two guys, the extra guys, and even though they're standing behind Pango, it's as if the same look flashes across his features.
Sarge hesitates. Loot can sense that something's gone wrong. The laughter dies in his throat. The two extra guys, he thinks, the two extra guys. This is shit, it's all going to shit.
Sarge glances back at Loot. In the gloom, Loot's not sure whether a certain look has passed between them, too. Or not. It's too subtle. Or is it? Loot tightens his grip on the familiar snub-nose in his pocket and starts to increase pressure on the trigger – he knows just how much pressure by now – wondering if this is what they came for or if it has just gone bad on its own. Pango suddenly springs sideways and his two goons bring their hidden hands up.
In a blur, Loot sees Sarge's hidden hand spit fire and one of the goons take a round in the cheek. His dead hands keep firing the Chinese machine pistol into the cabin's colander of a ceiling.
Loot's .38 barks twice and the other goon spins sideways, but he's still bringing some sort of weapon to bear. Sarge swivels and takes him down, too, his four .45 slugs wiping out most of the man's features and the top of his head.
Loot hears himself screaming, turning to see Pango run at them with a sword held high, a long rusted blade about to hack at Sarge, who's turned too far the other way to react. Loot barely aims, his finger squeezing the trigger over and over in desperation until the hammer clicks on a spent cartridge. Three of the four rounds take Pango high in the chest, but his forward motion carries him into Sarge and they both go over, Loot scrambling out of the way and trying to see where the sword has struck.
Then there are two blasts and Pango's body arches up, his back shredded by the close-up slugs, Sarge's last two. He comes down and the uncontrolled blade narrowly misses Sarge again.
"Jesus!" Loot thinks he says, but he's not sure. "Jesus!"
Sarge looks up and grins, blood smeared over his chin and neck. "Nothin' to it," he says, his eyes crazed, hopped-up, in the darkness of the cramped quarters. "No fuckin' problem, man."
"Christ, Sarge, fuckin' move your ass out," Loot says, among other things he can't quite hear in the aftermath of all the shooting. He prods one goon with his boot, half expecting him to rise up and start shooting.
Sarge groans and rolls over, getting to his feet slowly, almost slipping in the blood splattered and pooled on the deck. He drops the empty magazine out of the .45 and replaces it, jerks the slide raggedly, and slips the pistol back int
o a cargo pocket. "Gotta find the brass," he says. One never knows when Army CID will take an interest in the murder of locals.
Then Pango scrambles up with inhuman speed, his white shirt ragged and bloody, and the sword is in his hand again, slashing downward and its blade almost cleaves Sarge's head like a fireplace log, but Sarge sidesteps at the last second, grabs the hand holding the sword – swatting it aside – and slits Pango's throat with a grunt of effort.
Loot has raised the .38, but it's too late and anyway the hammer falls on three, four, five spent rounds. He keeps firing in nervous jerks but the gun is silent, then Sarge takes it out of his hand.
A never-ending crimson curtain spreads on the deck below them as Sarge wrestles Pango's corpse downward, his neck a wide-open gristle chasm.
Jesus.
Sarge and Brant lived through that day, slipping off the sampan like ghosts a few hours later, the grisly business over – just one leaky boat out of a thousand jammed up in ragged rows on the river's bend – and onto a crowded dock even as whistles signaled the coming MPs. They'd been tipped off, Sarge later said, which was why he had to terminate the partnership.
Terminate.
It was so businesslike. So impersonal.
But immediately after the shooting, Sarge had urged Loot to help him finish the needed clean-up. Loot had resisted, but Sarge had growled something about payback if he was stuck with the mess on his own. Loot looked into the sergeant's dead eyes and took him at his word. Bandanas tied over their mouths, they had got to work with the rusted sword and a blunted cleaver from the grease-reeking galley, hacking and sawing at the bodies until the three resembled nothing human at all. Loot watched Sarge saw the three heads off their spinal columns, kick them into a burlap sack along with a small pile of severed fingers, weigh the bag with a length of chain, and softly lower it into the murky harbor water. Below the sampan, fish gathered to sup on the chunks of human meat dribbled like bait off the side in buckets.
Loot had gagged on the smell of human offal and bone chips, the bloody hamburger meat smell cloying in his nostrils like a physical presence, but he had helped. He had no choice. He saw the bucket filled again with hacked-up chunks of Pango and his goons, but now they were just meat in a fly-ridden market stall.
Sarge laughed at the sick look on Loot's face.
Loot had slugged Sarge then, once in the right eye.
"Fuckin' could have told me, you moron."
"You wouldn't have come, boyo."
***
Now with Sarge's voice and words from the cell phone call just moments before still ringing in his ears, Brant felt his heart slow and time begin to flow like molasses below his feet. Something like an alarm bell was ringing in his head, way back, somewhere in the back of him mind, and he struggled to bring it forward. Smitty was dead, and now that Sarge was on his way here alone, their number had dropped to four, three on-site.
Smitty was dead.
He'd survived Nam and who knew how many other illicit "jobs" for Sarge and now he was dead. Brant felt the weight of it. His niece's life was important and he'd needed the help, sure, but it was Sarge who had gleefully called in their old squad mates, involving them in something even Brant himself couldn't quite identify, couldn't qualify. It was a snatch, sure, but what was the underlying motive? There had been no ransom demand. There had been no communication whatsoever. And the guy who'd been fingered – maybe fingered too easily, Brant thought – that guy seemed too cautious, if he was running so easily. And he'd been easy to attack, Brant's thrusts clumsily parried at best.
Brant let it all flow through his mind once more, then he shrugged and checked the bolt on the HK, making sure it was cocked and a row of 4.6mm slugs was queued up in the magazine, ready for use. He had considered using the Woodsman, but he knew he'd need more firepower if they stumbled onto Goran's goon force. They had to be somewhere aboard. He'd tucked the old Colt into a holster under his jacket, along with his Glock. The HK machine pistol had a built-in suppressor that might soften the noise of the high-velocity bursts, but he would know only after he used it. He hoped he wouldn't have to.
But he had to find Goran and his posse. Before they found him.
He headed down the dim passageway, after telling Digger to cover him and watch for his signal. There were doorways on both sides, set about twenty feet apart, reminding him of Goran's dungeons. The crew's quarters should be empty. The ship was about to sail, so they should be occupied. Or not aboard yet. Where they shouldn't have been was in their cabins. Slowly, Brant went from door to door, crossing the hall's threadbare carpeting diagonally. He opened each unlocked door and cracked it open, keeping his weapon off to the side but ready to use. The doors led to empty cubicles, hammocks and bunks strewn about in haphazard confusion with footlockers and duffel bags.
Brant checked most of the doors quickly. In less than a minute, he was down to two doors ten feet apart and side by side at the far end of the hall. As he approached, he could hear voices inside what might have been a double-size compartment, for sounds came from behind both thin doors. His head began to throb, and his breathing intensified. Nerves?
He strained and soon identified Goran's voice. And moments later, Irina's voice. Then he was startled to hear another voice, a softer, more suppressed voice – Kit. It was Kit's voice. Now he understood why his head had begun its cycle of pain again. He turned and waved Digger down from his post covering him from the opposite end of the corridor. Brant's hope was that he and Digger could kick in the doors and surprise the occupants.
The outside hatch twenty feet in front of Brant flew open, catching him by surprise and freezing Digger in mid-step halfway down the hall. The black-suited thug entering the superstructure stopped in his tracks when he spotted Brant and Digger in the corridor. His eyes widened in shock, seeing armed strangers infiltrating the ship, but he was good – very good. Immediately he raised his Uzi, already firing as he did so, a long burst that probably half-emptied his magazine. But Brant was good, too – had been good, and still was. His reflexes flattened him against the bulkhead and the burst missed him, mostly going high due to the small weapon's hard to control recoil. But the first half-dozen 9mm slugs splattered across the corridor and Digger wasn't quick enough, sidestepping toward the bulkhead but still caught by at least two, which flipped him around and flung him backward a dozen feet. His HK sprayed uselessly into the walls and ceiling, his finger curled around the trigger.
Brant peeled himself off the wall and fired the HK on full auto, a short burst – but at 950 rounds per minute it was almost two dozen slugs. They riddled the guy in the doorway as he fought to bring his Uzi to bear again, tossing him like a bloody rag doll back through the open hatch and out into the night.
The surprise element was gone, disintegrated by the loud blast of the dead guard's Uzi.
Brant saw that Digger was already sitting up, apparently mostly unhurt. His Kevlar had stopped at least one slug, and he signaled Brant almost laconically to go ahead, that he would follow. That was typical, so Brant concluded Digger really was somehow unwounded.
He turned his attention to where he'd heard the voices, knowing the situation had unalterably changed.
Before Brant could kick in one of the doors, it was flung open from the inside and a flash of blue suit came into his sights. Brant squeezed the trigger for a split second and the HK spit lead and then went silent, the bolt in the rear position. But the ten or so slugs ripped through the blue-suited guard who'd been unfortunate enough to be closest to the door. Brant reloaded in one swift motion. Behind him, Digger dragged himself into covering position at the other doorway and nodded.
Kit was behind one of those doors, probably a hostage.
He couldn't just go in blasting. He would be risking her life.
After everything he'd been through to find her, his mind just could not accept that it might be his own actions that would kill her.
Brant kicked the rattling door open again.
He was
greeted with furious gunfire.
His finger spammed on the trigger.
THIRTY-SEVEN
When Colgrave heard the muffled sounds of gunfire, she was already almost around the front of the ship's superstructure. With Digger watching Brant's back, it had occurred to her that she should attempt to cover his forward front – the hatch at the opposite side of the superstructure. She hugged the shadows and followed the bulkhead forward, trying to keep her body from being reflected on the lighter paint of the superstructure. As she rounded the forward corner, she saw a series of portholes with lights shining behind the glass. The lighting seemed to be similar in all ports, perhaps indicating a single cabin or chamber lined with multiple portholes. She duck-squatted low so as to not cast a shadow onto the glass, then continued until she was just a few feet away from the end of the superstructure. She gingerly poked her head around the corner and peeked along the bulkhead and toward the rear of the ship.
Movement. There, at the rear of the superstructure block, a guard headed
for the fore end of the ship.
And his route would take him past the hatch she intended to open, not far from where she now knelt. If he walked past the hatch, he would be even with her position only seconds later.
She backed off and waited, silently clicking off the safety on her HK. Then, on second thought, she let the HK hang from its strap and opted for the silenced Glock. She'd have to deal with him either before he entered or as soon as he bypassed the hatch. But before she could lean around the corner and take him out, he must have opened the hatch and entered the corridor. She was a split second late. He was frozen in the open hatch, probably having come face to face with Brant and Digger. Too thin a target, even for an expert like her. Then his Uzi roared out a burst and the silence was but a memory now. She sighed and swung around the corner, waiting for the reinforcements to come. In the meantime, a rapid burst from inside that sounded like a high-pitched blender – apparently from an HK – ripped through the guard and tossed him like a rag doll back out the doorway. There was quiet for several agonizing seconds, and then more muffled gunfire from inside the ship's cabin space.
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