A garbled response was audible from the handheld radio, followed by the distinct sounds of gunfire. So much for tactical surprise, Logan thought, and inched between a black Toyota Land Cruiser and the median.
The sounds of a crash to his left in the disorienting dark cloud sent a lurch through his stomach as he prayed they wouldn’t take a hit head-on. Screams mixed with the rumbles and turned Logan’s blood cold. This is hell on earth. Right now, at this moment, this is hell.
He forced himself to block it out, to compartmentalize the compassion he felt for the innocent caught in the chaos. He had one purpose—find the vice president and end his madness. He exhaled and drove forward, fingers clenching the luxurious leather of the steering wheel.
“Moving . . . two down . . . one . . . vehicle . . . fire,” said an ethereal voice from the radio.
“Doesn’t sound good,” Jack said.
“No. It does not,” Logan replied, “but if we don’t get out of this nightmare, our chances of success crash to zero like the hills around us.”
A large green van had hit the median, and Logan navigated the Mercedes to the left around the wreck. He glimpsed the panicked driver still at the wheel, helpless and shell-shocked in the maelstrom of sound and destruction. He glanced in the rearview mirror and saw nothing but swirling dust. Cole, you better be on our six, brother.
“Try him, Jack,” Logan said.
Jack depressed the button on the radio. “Bravo Actual, you back there?” Jack asked.
No answer.
Holes appeared in the cloud, and random beams of sunlight pierced the roiling dirt and dust, as if the Sun God himself were shooting at point-blank range into the mass. Moments later, the Mercedes escaped the clutches of the cloud, and Logan and Jack both breathed a sigh of relief—until they saw the scene of carnage in front of them.
The Mercedes had reached the curve and now faced the long straightaway to the east tunnel. Chaos reigned, as Logan realized the earth had finally stopped shaking, though he was all too aware that aftershocks would be coming at some point.
Out of the swirling dust, Logan saw the east tunnel entrances had collapsed like the west ones, sealing the stretch of highway off in both directions from the rest of Caracas. Dazed drivers emerged from their vehicles, the initial shock creating confusion and disorientation. Logan already knew there was only one way out of the kill zone—down the side of the steep hill through the mountain forest to the district he’d spotted earlier, if it hadn’t been destroyed in the initial quake. Soon, the other drivers would figure it out as well, which shifted Logan into his next gear, and he accelerated through the traffic.
“You see it? We need to find him before more people start exiting their vehicles and this turns into a shooting gallery full of innocent bystanders,” Logan said.
“Then go faster,” Jack commanded.
Logan saw the second Mercedes emerge from the cloud, which had begun to dissipate, which will also eliminate the concealment we have from the three Tiunas. More good news. At least Cole and Santiago made it.
“Got it,” Jack said. “Seventy-five yards ahead, in the right lane, his right lane.”
Logan’s eyes shifted and immediately landed on the target. He saw the silhouettes of four men sitting in the SUV, and his adrenaline surged as he closed in on his quarry.
“What the hell are they doing?” Jack said.
“Trying to figure out what to do next and likely calling backup of some kind,” Logan said.
A sudden sustained burst of machine-gun fire reverberated across the highway, no longer drowned out by the trembling of the ground.
“Here we go,” Logan said. “Now it really starts.”
Jack didn’t respond, as he understood the wave of panic that would soon course through the throng of disoriented drivers. A natural disaster was one thing, but man-made violence was another. Screaming and running were next on the morning’s agenda, and both men knew it.
“Get as close as you can, and once they start to react, we go,” Jack said, as he pulled up a black bandanna to conceal the lower part of his face, his eyes already concealed by dark Oakley sunglasses.
The last piece of the ambush had been simple, as well as Santiago’s idea. Other than Jack’s source and his assets, who were dressed as normal Venezuelan bikers, the ambush team was adorned in tactical black fatigues with black Kevlar vests with “SEBIN” written across them in white letters. On their heads were black baseball caps with the SEBIN emblem. They’d briefly considered wearing Venezuelan army fatigues, but Santiago and Hector had emphasized one point above all else: because of the current political environment and oppression, people feared the SEBIN more and would respond more quickly in the middle of a chaotic situation. Logan and his team were about to test that hypothesis.
Logan accelerated the SUV and moved to the shoulder in order to minimize the obstacles. He glanced out the window and saw the edge of the mountain drop away into the forest only a few feet to his left. Absent guardrails, random trees and bushes were the only barriers to prevent a vehicle from plunging to its destruction below.
He closed the distance to fifty yards and heard Cole Matthews’s voice erupt from the radio. “You two take twelve to three o’clock. We’ve got twelve to nine o’clock.”
“Roger that,” Jack said, and added, “Radio silence until this is over. Happy hunting.”
Forty yards to the Land Rover . . . thirty yards . . . almost there.
Logan’s luck ran out, and the driver and passenger in the front seat of the Land Rover pointed animatedly toward them. A moment later, the left rear door opened up, and two men emptied out onto the highway. Logan recognized the graying hair of the vice president—acutely remembering that he’d been fooled once before by an imposter in Northwest DC, mere weeks ago. A middle-aged man in his late thirties holding an all-black short-barreled version of an AK-47 7.62mm assault rifle propelled the vice president forward away from the vehicle.
Logan slammed the brakes of the Mercedes and turned the wheel to the right so that the vehicle slid to a halt, angled and facing the Land Rover directly. Cole Matthews executed a similar maneuver behind them.
“Let’s do this,” Logan said with determination, and Logan and Jack opened their doors. Sounds of gunfire a few hundred yards behind them mixed with screams and shouts. Hope Jack’s guys are taking it to them, Logan thought, and exited the vehicle, his H&K 9mm MP5 with its red dot reflex scope at the ready position.
Instinctively recognizing that the two Mercedes SUVs had not arrived to assist them, the driver and front passenger of the Land Rover had already exited the vehicle. The passenger held an enormous shotgun with a modular, distinctive shape and a barrel that resembled that of an assault rifle. Great. An AA-12 automatic shotgun. This is going to get loud.
The passenger pulled the trigger and a series of BOOMs tore across the parking lot of the highway.
From the driver’s side of the Land Rover, a second gunman opened fired with an Uzi submachine gun.
Heavy slugs and 9mm rounds struck the front of the Mercedes SUV, as well as the door behind which Logan took cover. Whatever armor package the criminal who owned the SUV had purchased had been worth it, as the slugs failed to pass through the doors. After the eighth round in the box magazine had been fired, both Logan and Jack emerged from behind the doors.
Both the shotgun-toting gunman and the Uzi operator had ducked back behind their doors to reload, thinking the cover would provide relative safety.
Logan and Jack seized the opportunity and acted as the aggressors, quickly combat-walking toward the vehicle, an MP5 trained on each side, vertical sway minimized.
Steady. Steady. Wait for it, Logan thought, his right eye fixed through the red dot scope on the passenger door. He exhaled and moved, finger on the trigger, no longer on the side of the trigger guard. Point of no return.
The passenger stepped out and began to turn. He never completed the rotation as the first 9mm round from Logan’s suppressed H
&K caught him in the left temple, killed him instantly, and dropped him to the ground, the AA-12 clattering to the concrete.
Jack had similar results with the driver, although his target managed to complete his turn, and two 9mm rounds struck him in the face. He reflexively pulled the trigger in death, and the weapon discharged as its owner fell, sending a streak of bullets into the eastbound lane that struck a man who’d been running away from the sounds of combat.
Goddamnit, Logan thought in outrage. Can’t you fuckers just die without wrecking more lives? That’s more blood on your head, Mr. Vice President, and your ledger is going to come due.
The vice president and his escort were now forty yards away and moving quickly, using the shoulder as a running lane. The eastern tunnel entrance was still one hundred yards away, and Logan realized it wasn’t fully blocked by falling rocks and debris.
“I’ve got the escort,” Logan said, and broke out into a full-out sprint onto the shoulder, knowing Jack would be close behind him but at a slower pace.
Logan had only run ten yards when automatic weapons fire erupted much closer than the last time he’d heard the M60. Bullets pinged off the cars to his right, a windshield shattered, and another scream of pain rose above the chaos. Logan dove to the pavement and slithered behind a white Toyota Land Cruiser.
From underneath the rear bumper, he searched for Jack or the Tiuna that had crept up on them in the aftermath of the earthquake. Guess Jack’s source and his guys didn’t fare so well against the technical. One damn job to do . . .
* * *
Cole Matthews was right behind Logan’s Mercedes when the earthquake struck. When the hillside collapsed into the eastbound lanes, he was certain they were going to die. Yet he had pushed the SUV through the cloud amid the screams and panic and emerged behind Logan.
He had no view of the gunfight that broke out between Jack’s band of criminal mercenaries, but he’d paid attention to the ebb and flow of the battle, noting when the M60 had gone silent. He’d assumed Jack’s outlaws had done their job, which was why he’d been surprised when the M60 had opened up four vehicles away, targeting Logan as he ran after the vice president. Assuming won’t just make an ass out of you, it will fucking get you killed, genius.
Cole looked through the rear and side windows of the SUV and spotted the Tiuna twenty yards diagonally behind them to the right. Cars were littered and parked in random directions, providing him with an idea. No way. This is something better suited for Amira. She’s the crazy one. He’d seen firsthand Task Force Ares’s lethal female operator drop down the side of a building under construction in Khartoum. But she’s not here—you are.
“The gunner isn’t paying attention to us. I’m exiting the vehicle and dropping down out of sight. Exit behind me, count to ten, and then light that fucker up. It will buy me the time I need,” Cole said, and opened the door.
“Time for what?” Santiago asked, even as he grabbed his MP5 and prepared to follow Cole.
“To take them off the battlefield and not get myself killed,” Cole replied, and grinned under the adrenaline rush he felt as he dropped to the pavement.
Within seconds, Cole scurried under the SUV toward the Tiuna, his Glock 17 9mm—no longer suppressed—held in his right hand. He’d left the MP5 in the Mercedes. He was either going to succeed or die trying, and the submachine gun would only interfere with what he had in mind.
The gunner continued to strafe the area where Cole had last seen Logan, and he hoped his friend had reached cover. While only a 7.62mm machine gun—it wasn’t a .50-caliber Browning, thankfully; Logan had told him what he and John had done to the insurgents who had ambushed them in Iraq with .50-caliber mounted technicals—it was more than enough to tear large holes into metal, skin, and bone.
Cole left the undercarriage of the Mercedes and found himself under the white SUV that had turned to its left before stopping. Certain he was still unseen, he moved as quickly as he could, scooting forward on the pavement, his black SEBIN Kevlar vest scraping the ground under his chest.
Once he reached the end of the SUV, exactly as he had anticipated, he left the safety of the Toyota and slid beneath a brown station wagon. Who the hell drives these things? It was like something out of National Lampoon’s Vacation. He half expected Chevy Chase to pop out and tell him he was on a quest. One more to go.
Halfway under the station wagon, he heard gunfire from behind him as Santiago opened up on the Tiuna. Move faster.
Cole picked up the pace as a sense of urgency spurred him on. He reached the bumper of the station wagon and avoided the muffler that hung down to the ground. Didn’t get that fucking thing at Midas. That’s for sure.
The last vehicle he needed to get to was a red Nissan Pathfinder a few feet away from the National Lampoon vehicle. Don’t think. Just move. He left the safety of the station wagon, crawled into the open air, and rolled to his left until he looked up and found himself staring into the Nissan’s undercarriage.
Santiago’s MP5 went silent, but the Tiuna’s gunner continued to fire, this time toward Hector. Cole crawled as fast as he could in the confined space. He reached the back of the Pathfinder and looked up, exactly where he thought he’d be—less than two feet away from the side of the Tiuna, directly between the front and rear driver’s-side doors.
Please God, let this work. Cole Matthews exhaled, felt the stillness from his training take over his mind and body, and acted like the trained killer that he was.
He low-crawled forward and stood up, raised the Glock with his right hand, brought his left up to meet it, and sighted on the gunner’s head in one fluid motion.
The gunner sensed his presence, but it was too late, even as he tried to swivel the M60.
The Glock bucked twice in Cole’s hand, both rounds striking the gunner in the lower part of his face, killing him and spraying blood as he crumpled down through the open turret into the Tiuna.
Cole was already moving, as the driver did exactly what he’d expected: he began to open his door. Cole switched the Glock to his left hand, and as he reached the opening door, he lunged his right hand under the left that held the Glock and pushed the Tiuna’s door open. He fired with his off hand point-blank into the left side of the driver’s head, adjusted the Glock, and fired two more shots at the passenger.
The driver had been killed instantly, but the passenger wasn’t as fortunate: the first round tore through his neck and sent blood spraying across the inside of the Tiuna. The second round struck him in the jaw, destroying his features, but it still didn’t kill him. Cole raised the Glock slightly, squeezed, and ended the dying soldier’s suffering. The Tiuna and its M60 would torment the innocent bystanders on the highway no more.
Cole inhaled deeply and scanned the surrounding environment. Chaos reigned across the road, but no more threats presented themselves, at least for the moment.
Once he’d emerged from under the last vehicle, he’d dispatched the three soldiers in less than four seconds. He admired his macabre handiwork and quietly thanked the instructors at Fort Bragg for years of relentless training.
* * *
Bedlam had fully consumed the enclosed mountaintop stretch of highway. In the initial aftermath of the earthquake, at least two-thirds of the drivers trapped between the tunnels had exited their vehicles and remained stationary and confused with nowhere to go. But once the shooting had started, the inherent fight-or-flight instinct had kicked in with ferocity, compelling people to run, even if they didn’t know which way.
Once the M60 had ceased firing, Logan had launched himself into a full-out sprint, leaving the MP5 where he’d crouched for safety. Since most had seen the black-clad SEBIN officers and army soldiers engaged in a firefight, the bystanders—like cockroaches scattering at the appearance of light—fled before Logan as he pursued the vice president and the last remaining hostile.
The vice president was halfway to the tunnel entrance when the steady thrum of a deep vibration grew louder. Screams from peop
le mistaking it for an aftershock increased in pitch. Logan smiled, even as he pumped his legs furiously. Air support. About goddamn time something goes our way.
* * *
Inspector Hector Salazar stared through the open starboard side door of the SEBIN Eurocopter AS532 helicopter as it skimmed the treetops on the left side of the mountain range. Once they’d received the radio call for assistance as the earthquake struck, the pilot had rocketed them out of the city toward the tunnels.
After the events at the Humboldt Hotel, he’d had the air maintenance crew install the door mount for the M60 machine gun and its box magazine of 7.62mm ammunition. He’d figured for the ambush they had planned, if things went poorly, a more precise weapon than the 20mm mounted cannon might be required. As he held the pistol grip of the machine gun, his forefinger straight and off the trigger, he realized his planning and preparation were about to be tested.
As the helicopter sped over the draw around the left side of the mountain that held the first tunnel, Hector spotted the first large plumes of dirt from the landslide. Just a few more seconds.
In the moments he had left before the Cougar arrived at the ambush, he prayed for Santiago’s welfare. He thought about Camila and the emotional roller coaster she and her father—a man that Hector considered a blood brother, a truly good man in a country of corruption and chaos—had been riding since Santiago’s beautiful wife, Maria, had succumbed to cancer. It was why when Santiago had approached him after he’d been enlisted by the SEBIN director and the president of the Supreme Tribunal, Hector had never hesitated. Whatever Santiago needed to help his daughter, Hector would help him do, no questions asked. The fact that they were now working with American agents had been a bit of a shock, but Hector was a man of practicality. And if working with agents of a foreign power would help their cause and their country, then so be it.
The helicopter dropped to one hundred feet above the mountain and flew around the end of it to reveal the scene below. Mother of God, Hector thought, and reflexively inhaled at the carnage on display.
Rules of War Page 13
