Termination Limits: Tom Kintrell Book 1 (Tom Kintrell Thriller Series)

by R. J. O'Rourke

  “Don’t know yet, but I’ll figure it out sooner or later,” said Alvarez.

  “On a brighter note, our little genius in the cyber unit has furnished us with a list of spec ops guys who have been dismissed from the service or left under peculiar circumstances. There are twenty-two names on the list that goes back five years. One of them lives fairly close by in Bryn Mawr, on the Main Line,” said Kintrell. “I’ve called Stryker and he actually knows the guy. He’ll meet us at the guy’s place of business, just outside West Chester.”

  “Should we bring a posse with us?” asked Alvarez.

  “Stryker didn’t think so. He said it’s very unlikely this guy would be involved in something like this, and if he was, he wouldn’t be there when we arrived,” replied Kintrell.

  As they made their way to the parking garage Alvarez said, “Why does Stryker believe the guy isn’t involved?”

  “He didn’t get into specifics, just said highly unlikely,” said Kintrell.

  “Still think we should be tactical when we approach him.”

  “Agree,” said Kintrell.

  It took them more than an hour to reach the address in West Chester. The property was on a rural road, off Route 322. There appeared to be a main building, a one-story grey stucco rectangular affair and two smaller Quonset huts, about fifty yards further into the property from the main building. Stryker was waiting for them in the parking lot, phone to his ear. As they exited their vehicle, they heard gunfire. Both of them crouched, pulling their weapons. They then looked at Stryker who was laughing while he waved them over to where he stood.

  They warily approached Stryker, weapons at their sides.

  “Sorry, guys, I should have mentioned there is a small arms and rifle range here. Let’s go inside.”

  The reception area consisted of a desk and a smattering of chairs gracing the walls. An attractive young woman wearing a camo-pullover and black tights sat at the desk.

  “Can I help you?” said the young woman, smiling.

  Kintrell and Alvarez started to pull their creds when Stryker said, “Tell Roddy that Norm Stryker is here.”

  The receptionist entered the door behind the desk. A few seconds later she held the door open as Stryker, Alvarez, and Kintrell filed into the office.

  Rodrigo Almeida rose. Stepping around the desk he extended his hand to Norm, smiled, and said, “Hey jarhead, how ya doin’?”

  “Just peachy Roddy, you a millionaire yet?”

  “Yeah, but don’t tell my wife.”

  “These are Agents Kintrell and Alvarez of the FBI,” said Stryker.

  As Almeida shook their hands, Stryker mentioned the purpose of their visit.

  “We’re looking into the recent deaths of the two politicians. We thought you might be of some help?”

  Eyebrows raised, Almeida said, “How so?”

  He then gestured toward a couch against the wall and grabbed a chair that faced the desk, swung it around to face the couch, and nodded to Stryker to do the same. As Kintrell and Alvarez made their way to the couch, Kintrell took note of the photos that graced the walls. Pictures of Almeida with friends in BUPS, either in Iraq or Afghanistan, one of Almeida in greens with various ribbons, a Bronze Star and Purple Heart among them.

  After they were seated Stryker started the questions, while Kintrell and Alvarez studied Almeida.

  “We’ve come to the conclusion that whoever’s doing these killings are, or more likely were, special operators. Perhaps guys who had a gripe about something.”

  “So, do you want to help these guys or stop them?” said Almeida straight-faced.

  Kintrell knew he was joking but didn’t react, just kept his eyes on the man.

  After a few chuckles, Almeida said, “Why do you think it was special ops guys?”

  Kintrell answered this one.

  “The way these executions were carried out shows meticulous and daring planning, and the only evidence left behind is something they wanted us to find.”

  Almeida nodded his head, “The weapon, huh.”

  “Yeah,” replied Kintrell, as he continued to stare at Almeida.

  Almeida looked from one to the other then started laughing.

  “Sorry, I was a little slow on the uptake. I guess I would be a suspect. Yes, it’s true, I was very bitter when I was confronted with the option of resigning my commission or being cashiered out, but it turns out it was the best thing that ever happened to me. My business is thriving, I go pretty much where I want to when I want to, and I don’t have to worry about getting my ass shot off in some shit hole. At first, I missed the rush the operations afforded me, but I wouldn’t trade my life now for anything. As far as the reason for retirement, I would have done the same thing again in the same situation.”

  “Sorry, Roddy, we have to run down every lead we can, we really don’t have anything now,” said Stryker.

  “You’re probably right about these guys being operators,” Almeida said. “Just a thought, how far was the shot on the congressman?”

  “Roughly four hundred yards,” Alvarez answered.

  “If it was a new weapon, it would have to have been zeroed. Whoever made that shot would need to have a place where he could fire that weapon at that distance, so there wouldn’t be any guesswork, when it came time to shoot.”

  “That’s good, Roddy, what else?” said Stryker.

  “Well, you probably thought of this, but the guy who planted the grenade was a ghost, probably no taller than I am and quiet in the field, maybe former Marine Force Recon. Those fu … dudes can sneak up on a snake.”

  “How long is your range?” said Alvarez.

  “We have two. Our pistol range is twenty-five yards and rifle range, two hundred yards.”

  “Are there any ranges in the area that stretch out to four or five hundred yards?” asked Alvarez.

  “There’s one near Downingtown and a couple in the Lancaster area,” said Roddy.

  “Tell me something, Roddy. If you were these guys, what would you be doing now?” asked Kintrell

  “Well, if they are operators, they already know what they’re going to do. Whatever it is, you’re not going to expect it. You’re probably thinking that they’ll go for the softest target available, so they’ll probably opt for a hard target, depending on the ordnance available to them. Do you have any idea what is available to them?”

  Alvarez spoke up then. “That’s classified, Roddy, but they have some scary weapons at their disposal.”

  Kintrell added, “We believe these are the people responsible for a theft of a cache of weapons at Camp Lejeune, a few months back. They grabbed some M-60 machine guns, a few antitank weapons and three or four weaponized drones, among other things.”

  “You’re kidding me! Those things will make a dent. Didn’t know the Corps still had any M60s. I’m pretty sure they’re using the M240b now,” said Almeida.

  “I guess they didn’t know what to do with the 60s, so they just stored them,” replied Stryker.

  Alvarez knew what Kintrell was doing so she was studying Almeida closely to pick up on any reaction to what Kintrell was saying. If he reacted a certain way to the false information Kintrell was imparting, that would be a tell.

  “I’m going to have to ask you to keep what I’ve just told you entirely to yourself, Roddy,” added Kintrell.

  “Sure, no problem.”

  “What exactly do you do here, Roddy?” asked Alvarez.

  “A little bit of a lot of things. We provide hand-to-hand combat instruction to law enforcement, and sniper training to the various SWAT teams. Right now, we’re doing a ton of high-end security and surveillance installations—both for corporations and wealthy individuals. We also do some weekend survival training. We also have some defense courses designed primarily for women. We have membership programs for the range, and I have a license to sell firearms, though I limit that to mostly high-end stock, tournament-rated bolt action and shotguns. We also repair weapons.”

  “Th
anks for your time, Roddy, and should you hear anything at all from the spec op community, please give us a ring. It may be popular in some circles what these guys are doing, but keep in mind they are murdering people, people with wives and children,” added Alvarez.

  “True enough. There’s a foundation set up specifically for special op guys out in Gettysburg. I actually was invited to join. I met with them when I first got out and they were very helpful. Some wealthy retired judge set it up. They’re very protective of the people they’ve helped, so I doubt if they’ll even talk to you guys, but I have some contacts there. Maybe I can make some quiet inquiries.”

  “Thanks, Roddy, and maybe I can get a rematch with you sometime?” asked Stryker.

  “Sure, Norm, I reserve Saturdays for some training,” said Roddy.

  They filed out of the office then made their way to the parking lot and stopped at Kintrell’s car.

  “What’s the rematch all about?” asked Alvarez.

  “Roddy was born in Brazil and he and his family emigrated to the U.S. when Roddy was seven years old. His father was some sort of advanced master of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Roddy started studying it when he was five. He held a training class for the precinct I was attached to. Now Roddy is only five feet nine and weighs maybe one seventy-five. He was going to show us some grappling maneuvers and how to break some holds. He asked for volunteers and this dude steps forward—big old boy. Probably went about six two and solid, a weight-lifter. Roddy’s evading the guy while the guy was trying to grab him and Roddy’s talking the whole time, not even breaking a sweat. The big guy’s getting madder and madder. Finally, the big guy tried to punch Roddy. Roddy dropped to the ground, balanced on one leg, and spun with the other leg extended, catching the big guy behind the knees. The big guy goes down hard and Roddy’s got the guy in a weird hold where the guy’s arm is going to break if Roddy puts any more pressure on it. The guy taps out and Roddy continues talking as if he’s discussing the weather. Being the idiot I am, I then volunteered to be his next crash test dummy. I’ve had a lot of judo training and a smattering of Taekwondo, so I could do some grappling, but it was no contest. That one hundred seventy-five pounds of his is coiled steel. It took him less than two minutes to subdue me.”

  “What’d you think, Lanny?” asked Kintrell

  “There was no reaction when you threw out the false information of the weapons taken at LeJeune. No dilation of the eyes, or subtle facial expressions. He just looked interested. If he knew you were bullshitting him, he didn’t give it away. He’s either totally innocent or scary good at this game, which is also worrisome,” replied Alvarez.

  “His file was heavily redacted so I’m not sure why he resigned his commission,” said Kintrell.

  Stryker filled them in. “I had a conversation with a guy I met here while I was on the pistol range a few months back. This guy was a veteran of the first Iraq action. He claims to have heard that Roddy’s unit was ambushed while on patrol near Kandahar in Afghanistan. They managed to break out of it but two of his men were left behind. Roddy captured one of the ambushers and used some persuasive tactics that would run afoul of the Geneva Convention. The insurgent gave up the probable location where his friends would have taken the captives. Roddy told his CO he wanted to go after them, but the CO said no, he didn’t want to lose any more men. Roddy put a team together of like-minded individuals and they went after their men. They found the insurgents, killed most of them, and rescued one of the captives. The other one had been used for target practice by the insurgents. They brought both the survivor and the dead soldier back to their base. Roddy then reported to his CO and explained what he had done, telling him that the men who went with him thought they were following orders. They had no idea they had been ordered to stand down. The CO was in a quandary. As much as he liked Roddy, he couldn’t let it slide that he disobeyed a direct order and endangered his men. Roddy said he understood, so in order to avoid court martial and bring dishonor to the service, he resigned his commission. To this day, he and his former CO are good friends.”

  “Good guy to share a foxhole with,” said Kintrell.

  “Yeah, man,” said Stryker.

  “So, we’re pretty much back to where we started,” said Alvarez.

  “Interesting what he said about hard and soft targets though,” said Stryker.

  “Problem is, there are too many targets,” said Kintrell.

  “Norm, Lanny and I are going to go over the rest of the names on that list to see if anything jumps out at us. Do me a favor and run down those ranges in Downingtown and Lancaster. Try and find out if anybody strange came in the last couple months with an MK13. I can’t see these guys making a mistake like that, but you never know.”

  Chapter 13

  The judge finished reading the personnel files of Kintrell and Alvarez, thought about it for a while, then placed a call to D.C.

  The phone was picked up on the third ring.

  “Are you encrypted?” asked the judge.

  After a few seconds, the voice on the other end said, “I am now.”

  “I want Kintrell removed from the investigation and if he can’t be removed at least sidelined to a lesser role,” said the judge.

  “Why?”

  “He was with the teams for six years. He’s a bit of a wild card. He’ll know how my men think. He might be able to anticipate some things that would prove to be bothersome,” said the judge.

  “Okay, I’ll figure something out. By the way, our lady friend from Colorado is stirring things up in the Congress, trying to bolster the rest of her cronies to stand their ground, blah blah. You may want to think about an interdiction before the deadline.”

  “Can you give me some information that might soften the blow?” said the judge.

  “There are some contaminated sites left over from old mining interests in California, Idaho, and New Mexico. A no-bid contract was awarded to a California company called Revital Ltd., to clean up the sites. Revital Ltd. is owned by Tanniger Industries, a holding company based in Sacramento. One of the managing partners in Tanniger happens to be the congresswoman’s husband.”

  “Good. Thanks, and I’ll think about the congresswoman,” said the judge

  The judge then placed another call.

  “Hello?”

  “Encrypt.”

  “Roger that.”

  “Move up the timetable on Colorado,” said the judge.

  “How soon?”

  “Earliest possible window. One other thing, we go dark now. All electronic communications, no matter how trivial, encrypted.”

  “Roger that.”

  ***

  Kintrell and Alvarez spent the rest of the day going over evidence and witness statements to no avail. They had nothing.

  While they were discussing their next move, Alvarez received a phone call from Dede McGriff, telling her to come to her office.

  “What was that all about?” asked Kintrell.

  “I don’t know, she didn’t say, just to come alone. She sounded tense, like she was worried about something.”

  Alvarez headed for Dede McGriff’s office.

  She was immediately ushered in by Dede’s assistant. Dede was on the phone but pointed to a chair. Alvarez sat and scanned the office. The walls were adorned with photos and various awards Dede had garnered over the years. On her desk was a photo of her son Robert, in Marine Corps dress blues. Robert had been killed by an IED in Afghanistan three years before.

  Dede had never spoken of it to anyone in the office, but it had changed her, aged her. Prior to her son’s death she was gregarious and energetic, always smiling, complimentary to her staff, level-headed and positive. Now she was businesslike. She still was a keen organizational problem solver but gone was the impish gleam in her eye. Now it was just a job. She was distant with everyone, except Kintrell. It was said he reminded her of her son.

  Dede hung up the phone and smiled at Alvarez. “Anything doing with the guy in West Chester?”

>   “He was helpful, but we all feel he’s not involved in this.”

  “What’s your next move?” asked Dede.

  “Kintrell and I are going to focus on rest of the names of those special ops guys. Stryker is following up on rifle ranges that stretch out to five hundred yards.”

  Dede looked thoughtful. “I’m being told by someone in D.C. that the investigation is going to be turned over to a task force run by Special Agent Dixon out of New York. You and Kintrell will be reporting directly to him. In case you’re not aware of it, there’s some bad blood between Kintrell and Dixon. I don’t want you getting caught in the crossfire. I’d hate to see your career take a hit over this. Tread softly around Dixon.”

  Alvarez was at a loss. “How could this affect my career?”

  “Agent Kintrell, as you have probably surmised, doesn’t suffer fools well. As I’ve mentioned before, he’s not very diplomatic. He’s one-part Sherlock, one-part Javert and one-part mean ass timber wolf. He doesn’t care if he’s ever promoted, probably because he has money to burn. He just wants to hunt bad guys, especially murderers. Probably has to do with his parents. He’s liable to say some things to Dixon that would be … inappropriate. If you’re standing next to him, you may be perceived by Dixon to be an enemy also. He can be vindictive.”

  “What happened between them?” said Alvarez.

  “There was an incident when Tom was working in New York. I don’t want to recap the whole thing but Tom broke protocol, but in so doing he saved the lives of one agent and more than likely, a couple hostages. Dixon wanted him fired so Kintrell requested a transfer, and that was the best solution, both for the Bureau, and Tom.”

  “You mentioned Kintrell’s parents. I thought they died in a plane crash.”

  Dede thought for a minute. “It’s not common knowledge and I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, and it shouldn’t leave this office, but it may help you in understanding him. Tom’s parents were on Flight 93.”

  “My God! I had no idea. That does explain some things.”

  ***