by James Samuel
“They’re coming.” James wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Blake, how’s it going?”
“I’m fine. But I don’t have a gun. I’m going to go get me one.”
“Just sit down. You’re no good to us like this.”
“We don’t have time. I can hear them,” said Dylan.
The chokepoint wasn’t the best and wasn’t the worst. The ancient rocks provided them with little cover. James just hoped they wouldn’t get flanked.
The first Khmer Rouge sprinted down the trail. James raised his weapon and fired with Dylan in tandem. Two men dropped and fell, rolling to a halt twenty feet away.
James pressed himself against the wall. The lethal rattle of an AK-47 sprayed the forest.
He returned fire, managing to catch the guerrilla in the leg. The Kalashnikov released another burst as he fell. Birds for miles around shrieked and yelled as they scrambled to get away.
“We can’t hold them off forever,” said James as more fire peppered their position. “We’ll run out of bullets before they run out of men.”
“Just let them know the cost is too high for them to keep coming,” said Blake.
“Does anyone remember what’s down the trail?” asked Dylan as he fired another shot.
“Only the outpost, but it’s not close,” replied James.
“Give me some covering fire,” said Blake. “I’m getting that gun.”
“Blake —”
James cursed as Blake broke cover and ran towards the nearest Khmer body. They almost emptied their cartridges to keep the hordes at bay.
Blake wrestled the AK-47 free of the dead man and ran at a crouch back towards their position. Another hail of fire followed. The trail rippled as the hot metal thudded into the ground.
The American darted back behind cover and screamed like a wounded dog. The AK-47 fell from his hands as he clutched at his ankle.
“Keep them off us,” James ordered as he rushed to Blake.
Blake propped himself up against the rock face, agony written in his face.
“Idiot.” James felt like slapping him. “You could have gotten yourself killed.”
“I got the god damn piece. Shut up. It’s only my ankle.”
James inspected the wound. Thankfully, Blake’s thick boot acted as a natural bandage. The hard leather almost plugged up the hole in the side of his left ankle. He wasn’t a doctor, but he knew he would survive.
James stuck his pistol into the back of his trousers and equipped the AK-47. “Take Blake down the trail,” he called to Dylan. “Just keep following the path. There’s only one. I’ll hold them back.”
“No.” Dylan ducked back behind cover. “I’m not going to let you sacrifice yourself.”
James gave him a dumbfounded look. “I’m not sacrificing myself, much less for you two. But he’s going to slow us down. Get a head start.” He raised the weapon. “This is more than enough to give us some time.”
Dylan nodded and picked up Blake. He balanced on one foot with a now permanent grimace on his face. They hobbled down the trail at a snail’s pace, out of sight. James turned back to the advancing men and opened fire. He hoped they’d get the message soon.
An hour passed as James fought a fighting retreat. He jumped from safe place to safe place. Still, they came. It wasn’t until the remaining Khmer Rouge reached the decimated outpost that they appeared to hesitate. They stopped charging blindly with gritted teeth and Rambo-like screams.
James bolted to catch up to Dylan and Blake. He found the two men resting on a bend in the trail. Now they were bound by the mud. Any deviation and they’d go the way of Adam.
“How long can we keep going like this?” Dylan moaned. “He needs a doctor, or he might lose the foot.”
“Then why are you stopping?” James snapped. “Go!”
James retreated towards the trail. He heard their voices echoing through the trees. His ammo wouldn’t last forever. He’d already started conserving his fire. Like a rabid dog pack, still, the soldiers pursued them.
The three men pushed onwards. The going down was easier but no less fraught with difficulty. A turned ankle could mean three dead men. The thought tortured James during every lull in the fighting.
Still, they pushed on.
Chapter Forty-Four
Phnom Penh, Phnom Penh Province, Cambodia
Sinclair already had what he wanted. Jacob Finch had hacked into the mainframe of the Cambodian military and the central government. Kravaan was the traitor. It was the only explanation for his sudden promotion. He’d also mentioned the presence of a mysterious Chinese figure named Shao Fen. Now all Sinclair needed was James to return.
“Mr. Sinclair!” Nhek beeped his horn and brought his tuk-tuk to a halt with a little crash against the curb. “Is Mr. James back?”
Sinclair raised a hand. “Not yet, Nhek. Sorry. You’ll have to come back later.”
“It’s no problem. It’s no problem.” Nhek hopped off the tuk-tuk. “I stay here with you.”
Sinclair took a deep intake of breath. He’d hoped to have some peace before James returned.
Nhek approached the table, a happy grin plastered across his face.
“Sit down,” Sinclair offered. “I’ll get you a beer.”
“You are most kind, Mr. Sinclair.”
Sinclair raised a single finger at Mr. Arun inside. They’d come to an understanding during Sinclair’s many hours in the guesthouse. Now they could communicate through hand signals.
“The boy Kosal is doing very well, Mr. Sinclair,” said Nhek as he flopped onto the chair. “Very well.”
“The boy?” Sinclair inclined his head.
“From Mr. Chea. The boy Mr. James took from the bad place. He is doing very well. Very sad though.”
“Oh?”
Sinclair had to wait for the answer as Mr. Arun arrived with the beer and exchanged polite Khmer greetings with Nhek.
“I try to take him to his family. To his village.” Nhek shook his head. “But they are very bad people. They don’t want him anymore. They say bad things because he escaped. The family want more money. So, I take him home, and he is my son now.”
“Oh.” Sinclair moved in discomfort. “That’s really quite awful.”
“It’s normal in Cambodia. They sell their children for money. I don’t like these people, Mr. Sinclair.”
“Oh,” Sinclair managed to spurt out. He moved to his wallet and opened it up, displaying the wad of American dollars. “Here, let me help you. For the child.”
Nhek’s face fell like he’d watched a family member pass away before his eyes. “Mr. Sinclair, no, no, no. I have enough. Mr. James gave me money. I take no more. I work for my money.”
Sinclair blushed and tucked away his wallet. He assumed Nhek had dropped in and mentioned the child as a ploy to get a quick payday. He felt cold, ashamed for his mercenary thoughts. Before he could stammer out an apology, his cell phone vibrated on the table in front of him.
Sinclair seized it and looked at the ID. An unknown number meant trouble.
“Yes?” he said.
“Sinclair?”
“James?” He cleared his throat and lowered his voice. “James? What’s going on?”
“I’m on my way back now.”
“What do you mean? What happened?”
“Prak’s dead. Preap’s dead. Adam’s dead. Blake got shot in the ankle. He needs a doctor. Preap was working for Prak. He almost got us killed.”
Sinclair turned his gaze on Nhek, who was suckling away on his beer.
“I’m fine though. They stopped following us after a while. We almost had to run down the mountains. Just tell Thom and Gallagher that it’s done.”
“Will do.”
Sinclair wanted to know more. He wanted to sample every juicy detail. But he only had eyes for Nhek. It was his friend who had betrayed them. Could he trust the smiling tuk-tuk driver at all now?
“Nhek,” Sinclair said when he ended the call. “Who are you wo
rking for?”
“I don’t understand, Mr. Sinclair.”
He placed his phone on the table and stared into Nhek’s eyes. “Your friend Preap was a traitor. He was working for the Khmer Rouge the whole time.”
“Oh no, no, no, that’s not possible. Preap is a good, good man now.”
“He’s dead.”
The words hit Nhek like a hammer bashing away against an anvil. His eyes filled with tears.
“He turned James and the others over to Prak. Now he’s dead and what’s left of them are coming back here. I want to know why you’re doing this. What are you looking to get out of it?”
Sinclair observed the impact of his words. He knew psychology. He knew the signs of a liar.
Nhek struggled to hold himself together as tears flowed down his cheek. He wiped them away with a veiny hand.
“Mr. Sinclair, please —”
“You better start talking. James is on his way back and he’ll want an explanation. Men were shot because of Preap.”
“I... I didn’t know.” Nhek sniffed. “I didn’t know anything. He was my good friend.”
Sinclair paused. He saw no lies in Nhek’s face, only a man grieving.
“I don’t want to hurt Mr. James or you.”
“Nhek, why did you get into this business when you had no reason to. Tell me the truth. What do you want from this? Is it money?”
Nhek blubbered. “No money. No money, Mr. Sinclair. It is for my family.”
“Start talking. Now’s the time. James isn’t happy,” Sinclair warned.
Nhek wiped his snot and tears away with the back of his sleeve. “My brother, Mr. Sinclair. He was a policeman. One day he was taken away. They never found the body.”
“What does that have to do with this?”
“Mr. Sinclair, I know it was Pen Thom. I want justice for him and my family.”
Sinclair leaned back in the chair. The plastic shifted under his overweight frame.
“He was a good friend of Mr. Thom. A good friend. Then something happened – my brother never said why – then he disappeared. It was Mr. Thom. There is no coincidence.”
“How do you know your brother is dead?”
“I know, Mr. Sinclair, I know. When people disappear in Cambodia they are gone.” Nhek hung his head. “They are dead.”
“Then if you know who did it, why didn’t you do anything about it?” asked Sinclair. “You even drove him here to meet me.”
“I am not good with violence. I only want peace. I hoped you and Mr. James would help me.”
“That’s why you wanted to help so much?”
“Yes, Mr. Sinclair. I am sorry. I am sorry to keep secrets. You are my friends, Mr. Sinclair.”
Sinclair weighed up Nhek’s story. Now it all made sense. It had always bothered him as to why Nhek always seemed to hang around them like a lost mosquito. But how could he give justice to Nhek, even if he believed him? Thom was the client. They were mercenaries, not Samaritans.
“Nhek,” Sinclair sighed. “This is a lot of information to take in. I’ll need to talk to James about it.”
“You will speak to Mr. James?”
“Yes, Nhek, I’ll speak with Mr. James.”
Nhek brightened at that and bull-rushed Sinclair with thank yous and renewed pledges of allegiance to James and himself.
Sinclair could only raise a brief half-smile. As much as Nhek appeared like one of life’s nice guys, he didn’t know if he could do anything to give him justice. After all, his industry didn’t deal in justice.
Chapter Forty-Five
James kept a low profile after returning to Phnom Penh. After leaving Blake and Dylan at the local hospital, he allowed a day to pass to allow time to meet with Sinclair to sift through the pieces. So much had happened during his time away in the Cardamom Mountains; he needed Sinclair to fill in the blanks.
James and Sinclair left the guesthouse and ventured into a Cambodian restaurant close to the Tonle Sap inlet that linked up with the Mekong. The simple restaurant consisted of little more than tables, chairs, and photographs of Cambodian landscapes. James sat with his back to the obligatory picture of Angkor Wat at sunrise.
He polished off the remainder of his fish amok. The sweet curry came in a bowl of banana leaf and held a strange consistency James compared to custard. He licked his lips of the subtle flavour of lemongrass before leaning back in his chair. A strange mixture of local Khmer pop music and Western hits blared over the speakers affixed to the walls.
“So, where do we go from here?” asked James.
Sinclair flicked his eyebrows. They’d spent most of the meal discussing the current field of play. Prak was dead; another name crossed off the list. The Khmer Rouge were out of commission as a viable threat and they’d struck a blow against General Narith. Now, though, they had Kraavan to deal with and the mysterious power of Shao Fen.
“That depends on what Thom wants. He’s the client; he gets to decide.”
James rolled his eyes. “What does Thom know about conducting an operation like this?”
“Nothing,” Sinclair confirmed. “He’s a politician’s bootlicker. But he’s still the client, and Gallagher will be on our backs if we exceed our mandate. We were lucky not to get pulled out of Cambodia completely after that Prahn Sambath business in Kampot.”
James folded his arms. He preferred clients who listed their objective and gave them full creativity to handle it their way. People like Thom didn’t realise this was only handcuffing them and making it harder to do their jobs.
“Fine. Then how’s Hun Sen after all this? You must have been reading the papers while I was away.”
Sinclair shrugged. “There was a march outside the palace yesterday in support of the King. The papers were asking how this could have happened. They never went too far, but Mr. Arun said that they went further than usual. Sen controls the media in this country. It’s the first seeds of a rebellion.”
He continued tucking into his second fish amok, slurping at the flaky white fish ground into the sweet curry.
“Get in touch with Thom. I want to meet him,” said James. “We need to move.”
Sinclair stopped scarfing down his food. “Really, now?”
“Now. Every hour we lose gives Narith a chance to regroup. We don’t even know who this Shao Fen is or what he’s planning.”
“Well, he’s Chinese.”
“Great. That should narrow it down,” James said sarcastically. “Just get on the phone to Thom now.”
Sinclair clattered the cutlery on the table, leaving little orange stains on the tablecloth. He pulled out his phone and clamped it to his ear with a pouty look playing on his face.
“I’d like to set up a meeting with you. It’s a matter of urgency,” said Sinclair.
James tapped his fingers on the table. His experience in the Cardamom Mountains made him want to kill Narith and get out of this country as soon as possible. Watching a man consigned to death after he stepped on a landmine was a step too far for him.
“Fine. He’ll meet us at sunset at a Buddhist temple here. Wat Phnom is its name.”
“Why’d he want to meet us there?”
Sinclair resumed consuming the remains of his amok. “Maybe he’s a Buddhist?”
James nodded. “So, which corner are we fighting? Kravaan or Fen?”
He swallowed a mouthful of food. “Kravaan. He’s the immediate threat. If Fen is the real power behind all this, we need to blunt his sword and then we can use the time we get from it to take the initiative. Right now, I feel like we’re spending our time reacting to everything they do. How’s Blake anyway?”
“Fine. He’ll be back on his feet soon enough.”
James refused to think about Blake. His headstrong approach had almost got them killed. He’d spoken little of the retreat down the mountains. Blake had slowed them up allowing frequent attacks from the guerrillas. Only Dylan’s firm urgings had managed to keep him far enough ahead to avoid getting them pinned dow
n.
“And Dylan?”
“Shame he’s working for Xiphos, not us. He’s worth more than what they’ve got him doing.”
“Oh?” Sinclair smirked. “Has James got a newfound respect for someone?”
James returned the smile. “I have. Never thought I would say that about someone working for Xiphos. We should stay in contact with him. You never know, he might be able to help us again.”
“Remember, he’s working against us.”
James looked to his empty banana leaf plate. He didn’t want to consider that he could find himself facing Dylan across a battlefield. The young American had his weaknesses, but he’d grown in those mountains. Watching his superior turn into pâté had hardened him. This business always came with those defining moments.
“Don’t get attached to him as you got attached to the Montoya girl.”
James’ head snapped up. “And just where the fuck is that coming from?”
“I’m just saying, sometimes you get attached to the people you meet, and you let it get in the way of your job. Just saying that you shouldn’t think anything about Dylan because he might be the reason we don’t finish this the way it should be finished.”
“Fuck off, Sinclair.”
Jessi Montoya had become a big focus of James’ time in Mexico. After rescuing her from a drug lord, they’d developed something between themselves. Reluctantly, James had let her go and encouraged her to return to the protective embrace of her brother, another drug lord. She’d refused and promptly disappeared. Nobody had heard from her since, not even James, with all the intelligence resources at his disposal.
“So.” Sinclair wiped his mouth with a red napkin. “With that out of the way, let’s go meet Thom. Hopefully, you won’t have any feelings of respect for him too.”
“Fuck off, Sinclair.”
Chapter Forty-Six
Sihanoukville, Preah Sihanouk Province, Cambodia
Dylan, once again, found himself in the backroom of the Lucky Dragon Casino. Shao’s centre of operations in Sihanoukville, Dylan hadn’t visited this room since he’d been forced to kill to prove his loyalty. It still gave him the creeps even after the blood had been removed. No amount of scrubbing would wash out the stain of death.
