Brown, Dale - Independent 04

by Storming Heaven (v1. 1)

  “So what? We all do something for money, one way or another. If I think about it, I’ll go fucking nuts.” Fell noticed that Lake had all but lost his sophisticated accent and speech pattern, and had digressed almost all the way back to his New Jersey accent. It was a fitting signal of how he had slid into the depths of the criminal world. “Check on the plane and the security setup again, Ted.”

  “It’s too early, Harold.”

  “I want them ready in twenty-four hours,” Lake said. “They’re ready when I say they’re ready. And no more calling your bimbos. We’ll be out of the damned country and out of her and everyone else’s life in just a few days. Ted ... get used to the idea.” He stepped away from Fell’s door and back down the hallway, but glanced back at his attorney. Fell was staring blankly at the telephone again, as if trying to check on something—or someone—far away.

  Lake couldn’t stand it any longer. He charged back into Fell’s office, reached Fell’s desk before the attorney’s eyes even registered that he was back in the room, and hit the redial button on Fell’s phone. On the small LCD screen at the top of the phone, a number with a 202 area code popped up. “All right, Ted, what in hell’s going on? That’s Washington, D.C. Your girlfriend lives here in Manhattan. We don’t have any brokers in D.C. Whose fucking number is that?”

  “It’s the forwarding number for the new deputy of the security team we hired, Ha—”

  “Don't fucking lie to me!” Lake shouted. “What in hell did you do? Who did you call, Ted?” Fell appeared as if he were going to try his story one more time, but Lake grabbed his shirt collar in both hands and shouted, “Answer me!n

  “Hardcastle,” Fell said in a weak voice. “National Security Council... the guy on TV, in charge of the air defense stuff...”

  “Oh, shit, tell me you’re fucking kidding ... oh, shit, oh shit,” Lake said. He unplugged the PBX cable from the phone, dumping the phone log memory from the unit, then left it unplugged. “You asshole—you didn’t use the secure exchange. Cazaux is bound to find_out.”

  “I am out of this, Harold,” Fell said. “I am out of this entire operation. I’m getting the hell away from butchers like Cazaux and psychos like Ysidro, and if you had any brains you’d get out too.”

  “But what did you say? What did you do?”

  “I was going to leave a message on the NSC’s voice mail,” Fell said. “Hardcastle himself answered it. I told him the location of Cazaux’s mansion in Bedminster, and I told him about the hostage he’s got in there.”

  “What hostage? What in hell are you talking about?” “He’s holding a woman in a third-floor apartment, Harold. He’s beating the hell out of her.”

  ‘ “Dark hair, exotic-looking, kind of spacey?” Fell’s expression told Lake that he had guessed correctly. “That’s Cazaux’s astrologer, you idiot. Varga, or Vega—I don’t know the bitch’s fucking name. She’s no hostage, Ted— she likes getting beat up. She gets off on it. You called the authorities to try to rescue her? She’s the one who’s probably been telling Cazaux to do all this in the first place! She’s as weird as he is. They’re like both out of a fuckin’ horror movie.”

  “Oh, God . . .” It made sense now—he thought he was helping her, while all along the woman was going to get her kicks watching Cazaux slice him up into little pieces. Shit, Fell thought, what in the hell am I doing here? “Well, that doesn’t matter,” Fell said, thinking hard and fast. “I’m not doing this for her—I’m doing it for me. I’m tired of standing by and watching Cazaux rip this country apart.”

  “So you ratted him out,” Lake said. “Jesus, Fell, our lives aren’t worth spit anymore.”

  “We’ve got an escape plan worked out, Harold. Let’s do it. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

  “I’ve got forty million dollars in options contracts being executed in the next six to ten hours, Ted. I can’t leave. I’ll have to sign a proxy, pay someone to execute the contracts, sign for the cash. I can’t risk this operation with any of that.”

  “Harold, I’m out of here,” Fell said. He told him about the woman, about how she had tried to get him to pull a gun on Henri Cazaux and then watch Cazaux kill him. “I told the authorities about Cazaux and how they can find him. If anyone escapes the raid, they’ll try to hunt us down. I want to be safely hidden long before that. I’ll help you get out, too, but if you want to stay I can’t help you.” ,

  Lake thought about it, but only for a moment—he knew that Fell was right. Cazaux and his cronies were completely out of control, and the slightest screwup would mean instant, deadly retaliation. Even if Fell hadn’t already made the decision for them, Lake knew it was time to get out. “All right, Ted, you’re right,” Lake decided. “Notify the flight crew and the security detail—we leave immediately. I’ll execute the contracts and the cancel orders and have the funds sent by the bank to Townsend at the mansion—he’ll know what to do with the cashier’s check. Jesus, I hope the FBI nails Cazaux, because he will hunt us down for sure.”

  Bedminster, New Jersey

  Three Hours Later .

  The first guard heard it while it was still a long way off, a heavy, slow rhythmic beating against the sky. He raised his left hand to his ear until the cuff of his left sleeve was even with his lips and said, “Station three, chopper, south, big one.” .

  “Copy,” the security shift officer responded. Everyone knew that Tomas Ysidro, the chief of security, would be listening in to the guard’s channel, so responses were quick.

  The first guard withdrew a Russian-made monocular nightvision scope from a case at his side and scanned the sky. His line-of-sight visibility was extremely limited, but his job wasn’t to scan the sky, but the treeline, about seventy yards away, and the long gravel driveway leading to the main dirt road. The rain had stopped, but the clouds were thick, scuttling across the sky on strong low-level winds as the summer night storm passed. He could see the glowing yellow eyes of a small animal, a raccoon or possum, scurrying from tree to tree, doing some nocturnal hunting. The night-vision scope always revealed all sorts of animals—deer, foxes, rabbits by the bamful.. .

  . .. and men. The guard chuckled as he watched one of the other guards emerge from the trees, about a hundred and fifty yards away, zipping up his fly after taking a piss in the trees. He saw a puff of smoke trickle from his mouth—the asshole was smoking on duty with the brass in the house. He was using a light shield around his cigarette so Ysidro or Cazaux wouldn’t see his glowing cig, but the night-vision equipment clearly showed the smoke. If Ysidro saw that, he’d kick his ass. It was a hell of a chance to take just for a lousy cigarette.

  He lowered his night-vision binoculars and listened for the helicopter—nothing. “Station three, clear,” he reported.

  “Copy.”

  The guard relaxed a bit, letting the scope dangle on its neck strap and crossing the Colt AR-15 assault rifle, the semiautomatic version of the standard Army M-16, in his arms. Bedminster had very little air traffic at night, but the estate was just a few miles from Interstate 78 and State Route 206, so they got visitors once in a while. Interstate 78 was the main drag between Newark and Allentown, and choppers and light planes often followed the interstate at night when—

  A sudden sound made the guard alert. He put the AR-15 in his hands and dropped to one knee, scanning the treeline for any hint of motion. He knew from Army training that at night the edges of the eye picked up motion better, so he carefully scanned the treeline. He was fully exposed where he was standing—too far away from the house, but close enough to be illuminated by the light from a few windows and too far from the trees to take cover. He reached for the scope...

  “What the hell are you doing out in the open like this, asshole?” The guard was so startled he nearly fell over into the wet grass. Tomas Ysidro had succeeded in stepping out of the front door of the house right up beside him, and he didn’t hear a thing. The guard shot to his feet, swinging the AR-15’s muzzle around at Ysidro, who caught the barrel
of the rifle and yanked it out of his hands. “Jesus, Vaccarro, what’s with you?” Ysidro asked, giving the rifle back- '

  “Thought I heard a noise, sir.”

  “Yeah, it was me, burping and farting all the way from the house,” Ysidro said. Cazaux’s third-in-command was carrying a sidearm holstered in a quick-draw shoulder rig, but his hands were full with a burger and a mug of coffee. “Now get the hell out of the light.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What about that chopper?”

  “Heard it for about thirty seconds, well to the south,” the guard said. “Didn’t hear it approach. Big one.” .

  “Good call—it helps to keep the whole detail on their toes,” Ysidro said. “I’ll send one of the new guys out to spell you in about—”

  This time they both heard it—a loud snap! of a twig, on the treeline. Ysidro pushed the guard hard to the right to get him out of the light, the coffee and burger went flying, and a SIG Sauer P226 9-millimeter automatic was in his hands in the blink of an eye. “Call it in, damn it!” Ysidro said in a loud whisper.

  “Station three, intruder east on the treeline,” the guard radioed. He took cover behind a tall bush and retrieved the nightvision scope, quickly scanning the—

  He saw a lone figure, running toward the house beside the gravel driveway. The guard raised his AR-15, sighted with the scope—then recognized the runner. “Mick, damn it, what the hell are you doing?” the guard whispered into his radio. The running man dropped to the ground, waving his rifle at the treeline. “Mick, answer up!”

  “What?” the second guard radioed back—the first guard could see him talk into his left sleeve while holding his earpiece in his left ear. “Was that you talking, Tommy, you asshole?”

  “Was that you on the treeline?” the first guard radioed back. He saw the guard named Mick lower his head in nervous exasperation. He lifted his sleeve mike to his lips. “Station three, secure. Stand by and I’ll clear the treeline.” He saw the second guard start to get to his feet, angrily brushing himself off and shouldering his rifle on its strap. “Mick, stay put until I clear the—”

  Tommy saw the second guard named Mick suddenly turn toward the treeline, and seconds later he heard another sound—but this one wasn’t a twig.

  An unknown voice shouted, “Freeze! Federal agents!”

  Mick fumbled with his rifle, but he didn’t get it up to his waist to try a shot from the hip before he heard three quick pop-pop-pop's from a suppressed automatic three-burst submachine gun, and Mick went down.

  “Intruders, treeline east—federal agents!” Tommy radioed. He scanned the treeline and saw only one figure, dressed completely in black, with a military-style helmet, ballistic face mask under a pair of night-vision goggles, black fatigues, and black body armor with the words u.s. marshal on the front under a combat harness. “I only see one, treeline east! I—”

  The greenish image of the marshal suddenly disappeared in a puff of fire, and the guard dropped the night-vision scope and rubbed the pain from his eyes. The security supervisor inside the mansion had activated the motion-sensing land mines that ringed the compound, and the first marshal was history.

  “Lost contact with Davis on the ground team at target thirteen,” the airborne assault leader reported. “I heard a challenge, then shots, then nothing.”

  “I’d call that an ‘officer needs assistance,’ ” Deputy Chief Marshal William Landers said. “Should’ve known it would be target thirteen—my unlucky number.” Dressed in full body armor and protective headgear, Landers was aboard one of the three CV-22 PAVE HAMMER tilt-rotor aircraft just outside Cazaux’s Bedminster home. Landers was the number-two man in the U.S. Marshals Service, a twenty-one-year veteran, an experienced field agent, and former commander of the Marshals’ Special Operations Group, also known as SOG. “Let’s go in using assault plan Alpha.” The PAVE HAMMER, formerly one of the Hammerheads’ antismuggling aircraft and still sporting its distinctive Department of Border Security high-visibility orange markings, lifted off from the interstate rest-stop parking lot and leaped into the sky, rotating its wingtip engine nacelles so the two large rotors were pointing at a 45- degree angle for more forward speed.

  From other staging areas nearby, two more CV-22 tilt- rotor aircraft lifted off at the same time and raced for the estate. There were several large homes in the Bedminster area described by the unknown informant during his brief phone call, so the Marshals Service had immediately dispatched several agents from the New York City, Philadelphia, and Newark offices into the area to start surveillance on each suspected residence. Unfortunately, it had taken the apparent death of a marshal to find the right one. Now, the three CV-22 aircraft, each carrying ten fully armed SOG agents, were encircling Henri Cazaux’s mansion in the hopes of capturing the world’s most wanted criminal.

  Landers’ CV-22 took only two minutes to approach the estate. Flying low and slow, the hybrid airplane-helicopter slowed by swiveling the rotors to full helicopter position. When it was about five hundred yards from the mansion, it activated its bank of four 3,000-candlepower NightSun searchlights and turned them onto the front door of the mansion. Landers, standing between the pilot’s and copilot’s seats, watched their approach through the CV-22’s telescopic TV camera. At two hundred yards, Landers clicked on the public address speaker: “Attention. This is the U.S. Marshals Service. We have a federal search warrant and demand entry. Come out of the house immediately with your hands up.”

  “U.S. Marshals, my ass,” Tomas Ysidro said to Henri Cazaux. “Let’s take care of those motherfuckers ourselves, Henri.”

  The two terrorists finished donning their own assault uniforms—skin-tight protective black body suit, Reactor combat gloves, balaclava hood, black Hi-Tec trail sneakers, and a combat ALICE harness laden with pistols, knives, grenades, and other tools and devices. “Can’t risk it, especially not with assault aircraft out there,” Cazaux said.

  “We play it right, one of those choppers could be ours.”

  “I said, we cannot risk it,” Cazaux snapped. “The time to play action hero will come, Tomas, and I want you with me when it comes. But for now, we need to survive to execute the rest of our plan. Execute the escape plan and we will meet in the Catskill ranch in six hours. We’re going after a prize much greater than a few tilt-rotor aircraft,” Cazaux said, extending a hand. Ysidro took it, then they embraced. “Bonne chance, mon ami. ”

  “Fuck you too, my friend,” Ysidro said in return. He pulled up his balaclava, then turned to his security supervisor. “Deactivate the land mines for ten seconds after you see the door open light, then turn ’em back on.” His eyes flared for an instant, punctuating his last order: “And I want to hear plenty of fireworks out here or I’ll come back and stuff your nuts down your throat. Hear me?”

  “I heard an explosion, then lost contact with Davis,” one of the other ground agents reported. “I’m thinking the place is mined.”

  “Shit,” Landers said. “That entire front lawn might be mined—that takes care of our landing zone.” He turned to another person watching the scene below next to him. “Thoughts, Agent Harley?”

  U.S. Secret Service Agent Deborah Harley, wearing the same body armor and assault gear as the U.S. Marshals— except her body armor said treasury agent on the front— studied the TV image carefully. “I don’t see those guards on the rooftop anymore—we’re going to have to assume the roof and that balcony over the front entrance are booby- trapped too. Let’s—”

  “Unit One, this is Three, four motorcycles leaving the house at high speed,” one of the other CV-22 pilots radioed. “One each cardinal direction.” Harley and Landers picked up one of the motorcycles barreling northbound, going at least sixty miles an hour straight for the woods.

  ‘Try to stop them without killing them!” Harley shouted.

  “All units, clear to engage riders, try to interdict only, do not shoot to kill.” Landers knew it was a useless command—anytime a weapon was used during a
mission like this, death was always a possibility, especially with the weapons the CV-22s had. Trying to wound someone with a weapon designed to destroy an armored vehicle or a building was sometimes just not possible.

  The pilot of Landers’ CV-22 pulled the trigger on his control stick to the first detent, which activated the gun camera and slaved both the tilt-rotor aircraft’s Hughes Chain Gun and the thermal sight in the CV-22’s nose to the pilot’s line-of-sight—the forward-looking infrared sight followed the pilot’s head movements, and the Chain Gun slaved itself to the aiming crosshairs superimposed on a clear glass reticle in front of the pilot’s right eye. When the crosshairs settled on a spot just a few feet in front of the motorcycle’s tires, the pilot pulled the trigger to the second detent. A fifty-round burst of cannon fire that sounded like a chain-saw blade cutting through the aircraft’s aluminum skin rattled through the PAVE HAMMER aircraft.

  The motorcycle rider obviously saw the Chain Gun’s muzzle flash, because he veered hard left as soon as the cannon fired. The motorcycle skidded on the slippery grass, and the rider threw himself clear as he went down. The motorcycle skidded straight ahead and was instantly turned into scrap metal by cannon fire.

  The CV-22 pilot swooped lower. The rider rolled along the ground for several feet before coming to rest in a halfsitting, half-prone position, shaking cobwebs out of his head. He was wearing a dark skin-tight suit with a mask— Harley or Landers couldn’t recognize him. “Turn facedown and spread your arms and legs,” Landers shouted over the PA speaker when they hit the rider with the spotlight. To the pilots, Landers said, “Hover right over him, guys. We’ll fastrope right over him and haul him up with the rescue winch. We’d just better hope he’s not laying right on top of a mine or we’ll—”

  “He’s moving ... damn it!” the pilot swore. He was distracted enough to lose sight of him as the rider got up and ran underneath the PAVE HAMMER. “Aft gunners, keep an eye out for—”

  There was a loud bang! and the CV-22 heeled sharply over to the left. The pilot corrected for the shove, gained a little altitude, and experimentally swung the tilt-rotor aircraft’s tail around so they were facing the forest. No caution lights illuminated, and the aircraft responded normally. “What happened?” he called on interphone. “Someone sing out.”