Cryptid Quest: A Supernatural Thriller (The John Decker Supernatural Thriller Series Book 8)
Page 7
“How are we going to do that?”
“Not sure yet.” Decker stepped out of the restaurant and started across the patio, moving toward the grassy expanse of Praça da Saudade. He realized the gun was still in his hand. He unscrewed the suppressor and put it into his pocket, then pushed the weapon into his waistband and covered it with his shirttail. Running around the streets with a pistol in plain view was a good way to get yourself shot.
As they reached the road and crossed, the first police car came into view, turning onto the street several blocks distant. At least five more followed behind. From the other direction Decker heard ambulances, the tone of their wail different from the approaching cops. Not that there was much the paramedics could do. He suspected those left on the patio were beyond saving.
“Hurry.” Decker pushed Rory along, and they entered the square.
The archaeologist pushed his glasses back up on his nose and stumbled forward as they ran down a wide central pathway that led to the monument in the middle.
Behind them, the first police cars arrived at the scene. Shouts went up and doors slammed. Decker kept Rory moving forward, aware that the cops would turn their attention to the surrounding area just as soon as they realized what had happened.
They reached the other side of the square. The road wasn’t busy, and they barely had to slow down. After waiting for one lumbering delivery truck to pass by, the pair sprinted across the street. Decker scanned their surroundings at intervals, looking for the black SUV and its murderous occupants. But they were nowhere in sight. Having discovered that Rory and Decker had escaped, they probably decided discretion was their best option, given the circumstances. But that didn’t mean it was now safe. The gunmen could appear again at any time.
“Do you actually have a plan or are we just running aimlessly?” Rory asked, as Decker led him into another alley between two dilapidated buildings.
“I have an idea that might turn into a plan if we’re lucky,” Decker said. “Does that count?”
“You’re not filling me with confidence.” Rory sounded winded. He was slowing down, too. He reached out and grabbed Decker’s shoulder. “Hold up. I need to catch my breath for a moment.”
Decker looked around. The alley was not a good place to stop. But he didn’t want to end up carrying an exhausted Rory either if they ran into more bad guys.
“Fine,” he said. “We’ll stop, but only for a few minutes.”
“Deal.” Rory leaned against the alley wall and sucked in air, bent double. He looked at Decker. “Do you have any idea who those guys are?”
“Not a clue.” Decker wished he did, because then they would know what they were up against, and why. “But I know we need to keep moving.”
“We can’t just keep going aimlessly.”
“We aren’t going to.” Decker took out his phone, which worked almost anywhere and was untraceable. Any calls he made were secure too, all thanks to CUSP.
“Who are you calling?”
“The only person who can help us,” Decker said, dialing a number from a business card he’d removed with the phone. After two rings, a familiar voice answered the call. It was Paulo, the taxi driver who had picked them up from the airport.
Decker told him what they needed, and where they were, then ended the call. He turned to Rory. “You ready to move yet?”
“I think so.”
“Good. Because now we have wheels.”
14
Decker led Rory to the other end of the alley, which came out on a wide three lane one-way street with shuttered and closed businesses on both sides.
“We need to look for a church,” Decker said, glancing around.
“Huh?” Rory sounded perplexed. “I wouldn’t mind a little divine intervention right now, but do you really think praying is the best course of action when we’re being chased by a bunch of armed men who want to kill us?”
“I don’t want to go inside and pray,” Decker said. “That’s where we’re meeting Paulo. He said it would be an easy landmark to find because of the steeple.”
“I see something that looks like a church down there,” Rory said, pointing to a large white building a couple of blocks east. “Maybe that’s it.”
“I don’t see anything else that looks like a church.” Decker set off toward the building at a fast pace.
Rory hurried to keep up. “Of all the people in the world, why did you have to call that crazy taxi driver? He’s almost as dangerous as those gunmen.”
“Who else would you have me call?” Decker asked. “We’re in an unfamiliar city, and we don’t know anyone.”
“What about Adam Hunt? He must have contacts here.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. But think about this, no one except CUSP knows that we’re here.”
“You think Hunt or someone else in CUSP sent those men to kill us? That doesn’t make sense.”
“I don’t think CUSP had a hand in this, but I do think that someone within our organization is feeding information to persons unknown.”
“A mole.”
“Precisely. It makes sense. We’ve been under surveillance since the minute we landed.”
“Then how do you know we can trust the taxi driver?”
“I don’t,” Decker said. “But he was one of several taxis waiting at the curb when we left the airport. He couldn’t have known we would choose his cab. Not only that, but if he was in on this, he could’ve just driven us somewhere remote and had us shot without needing to send armed men into a public place.”
“I still think we should call Hunt and tell him what happened.”
“Not yet. I trust Adam, but we don’t know if someone around him is compromised. And don’t forget, although our phones are secure and can’t be externally tracked, I’m not sure if that level of security extends to our employer. A rogue operative inside CUSP might be able to pinpoint our location once those goons that attacked us back at the restaurant report their failure.”
“Then we should turn them off,” Rory said, reaching into his pocket and taking his phone out.
“I’m not sure that would do us any good,” Decker said.
“Why not? If the phone’s turned off, it won’t communicate with cell towers anymore.”
“These aren’t ordinary phones. And even if they were, we shouldn’t assume that simply shutting them off will stop someone at CUSP from tracking our location. The National Security Agency can find a phone even if it’s not on. It would be foolish to assume our own employer doesn’t have the same capability.”
“So why haven’t we ditched them already?” Rory looked uncomfortable now. He glanced around, as if he expected to see the black SUV barreling toward them.
“Because there isn’t anywhere safe to do so. We can’t allow these phones to fall into the wrong hands.”
“We destroy them.”
“Too risky,” Decker said, as they drew close to the church.
“What can we do, then? I don’t want to walk around transmitting our location to whoever they send after us next.”
“You won’t have to.” Decker spotted a familiar car at the far end of the street, speeding toward them. He steered Rory across the road to the church, where they stopped. “Our ride is here.”
“Yay.” Rory watched the taxi pull up to the curb with a sour expression. “This evening has turned out so great. We haven’t had anything to eat because a pair of homicidal maniacs wearing masks shot our waiter, then tried to kill us, and now we’re about to get into a car with the worst driver on the face of the planet.”
“A driver who’s probably saving our lives right now,” Decker said, pulling the taxi’s rear door open and motioning for Rory to climb in. After the archaeologist complied, he went around the car and climbed in the other side.
Paulo turned to face them, looking between the front seats. “My friends, it is good to see you again.”
“Wish I could say the same.” Rory clipped his seatbelt.
“Did you get
what I asked for,” Decker said.
“Sure, sure. I got them.” Paulo grinned, handing Decker two small screwdrivers. “Easy to do. Found these at the taxi depot in the repair of bay.”
“Perfect,” Decker said, taking the screwdrivers.
“What are those for?” Rory asked.
“Hang on.” Decker unlocked his handset and accessed the encrypted partition on the phone’s hard drive. He used a retina scan to unlock the file containing the coordinates of both their base camp, and the pyramid structure. He studied them, committing the string of numbers to memory, then activated a purge of the phone’s drive, wiping the data, along with everything else on the unit.
“Now your phone.” Decker held his hand out.
Rory complied.
Decker activated the suicide app on Rory’s phone and burned that hard drive too. But he had to go one step further. He took one of the small screwdrivers and inserted it into the first of a pair of holes that sat on each side of the charging port. “The only way to guarantee we won’t be tracked is to remove the batteries. I asked Paulo to find us a couple of precision screwdrivers. One with a Torx head and the other flat. I figured the taxi depot would have them because they need to repair the radios and such in their cabs.”
“Smart thinking.” The fear on Rory’s face eased a little.
“Thanks.”
After removing the screw from the second hole, Decker inserted the flat screwdriver between the phone’s case and the screen, then pried them apart. He lifted the screen out of the way and quickly unclipped and removed the internal battery. A minute later, he’d done the same to his own handset. He handed Rory his phone back, along with the extracted battery. “All done. Now we can’t be tracked.”
“And we can’t make any more calls, either.” Rory returned the phone to his pocket.
“An inconvenience, but a necessary one.” Decker leaned forward and tapped Paulo on the shoulder. “Take us back to the hotel.”
“Sure.” Paulo swung the wheel and sped away from the curb.
Rory looked at Decker. “I thought you said we couldn’t go back to the hotel.”
“I did, but we still need our travel bags. I don’t know about you, but I have no desire to spend this assignment wearing the same clothes every day.”
“How are we going to do that? The minute we walk inside that hotel they’ll spot us if what you said is true.”
“That’s why we won’t be going in there,” Decker said with a wry smile. “I have a better way to get our stuff.”
15
Decker looked out the taxi window and studied the Casa Amazonia. They were parked across the road from the upscale hotel next to a bar from which throbbing Latin music played at levels that must surely have been contributing to hearing loss for those inside. They had picked this spot deliberately. Anyone surveilling the hotel for Decker and Rory’s return would not give the taxi a second glance, assuming it was there to collect some reveler too drunk to make their own way home. Especially since Rory hunkered low in the back seat, out of sight.
“I don’t see any suspicious persons,” Decker said, scanning the valet parking attendants at their podium and occasional guests that wandered in and out of the building. “But it doesn’t mean they’re not in the lobby.”
“Or maybe there’s no one waiting for us at all,” Rory said. “We could just walk in there and get our own stuff. Or better yet just spend the night in a comfortable bed instead of hiding out here.”
“You want to wake up with a gun pointed at your face?” Decker finished studying the hotel’s exterior and slid down out of sight next to Rory. “If we spend the night here, there’s no way we live to see the morning.”
“I know. Doesn’t mean I have to like it.” Rory adjusted his glasses, which had somehow survived the attack on the restaurant patio and subsequent chase. “What’s your genius plan for getting our gear?”
“That’s where our taxi driver comes in,” Decker said. He looked at Paulo. “You think you can handle it?”
“Go to your rooms and get bags?” Paulo grinned. “Easy as cake.”
“It’s pie,” Rory said. “Easy as pie.”
“Hey.” Decker nudged Rory. “Don’t correct the man when he’s about to put his life in danger so you can have clean skivvies.”
“I am in and out in a Jiffy.” Paulo shifted the car into park but left the engine running. “What are the room numbers?”
“Three twenty-six and three twenty-seven.” Decker held his hand out toward Rory. “Give me your room key.”
The archaeologist rummaged in his pocket and came out with a key card, which he handed to Decker.
Decker took the card and handed it to Paulo along with his own. “You good with this?”
“Sure, sure.” Paulo nodded and opened the driver’s door. “I am quick. Stay here.”
“Be careful, too,” Decker said. “We don’t know who attacked us, but they mean business. They won’t hesitate to take you out if they realize what you’re doing.”
“Do not worry about me. I can handle myself. I grew up in shantytown out by the free-trade zone. Very bad place.” Paulo flashed a toothy grin and closed the cab door before jogging across the street toward the hotel.
Decker watched him enter the lobby and then reached into his pocket. He removed the gun taken from the man he’d incapacitated in the restaurant kitchen and examined it. He screwed the suppressor back on to the barrel. “This is an unusual weapon for a person to be carrying here in Brazil.”
“What do you mean?” Rory peered at the gun with a look of disdain on his face.
“The gun isn’t Western. It’s a Makarov PB, sometimes used by the Soviet army, and the weapon of choice for the FSB. This particular model was made specifically for them.”
“FSB?” Rory’s eyes widened. “Aren’t they the successors to the KGB?”
“They are, indeed.”
“You think Russian intelligence is behind this?”
“Actually, I don’t. I think it’s more likely that this gun was acquired on the black market. It’s also possible that the men who attacked us are Eastern European. The upheaval in that area over the last few decades has displaced a lot of bad actors. They could be mercenaries hiring themselves out to the highest bidder.”
“In other words, we still don’t know who they are.”
“Pretty much.” Decker checked the magazine. There were still five bullets left. He wondered how many of this gun’s other bullets were responsible for the bodies back at the restaurant. He pushed the thought from his mind.
“That barrel you screwed on to the front of the gun,” Rory said. “It’s a silencer, right?”
“Suppressor. Silencer is a misnomer. This reduces the sound when the gun fires, but it does not eliminate it.”
“That’s why we could still hear the gunshots.”
“Correct.” Decker nodded. He turned the gun over in his hand and examined the frame above the grip. He ran a finger along, noting the rough metal there. “Definitely a black-market weapon. Serial number has been filed off. They knew what they were doing, too. Like how much metal to remove. There isn’t even a hint of the number left.”
“What does that mean?” Rory asked.
“It’s untraceable. No way to know when this gun was manufactured or who it might have been assigned to.”
“How do you know so much about this stuff?” Rory was staring at the gun. “I wouldn’t know the difference between that thing and a water pistol.”
“I spent years working for NYPD, most of it in the Homicide Division. We saw a lot of unusual guns. The first time I came across a pistol like this one was at the Manhattan penthouse of a Russian oligarch. He’d said some stuff the Soviets didn’t like and believed he would be safe in the USA. He was wrong. FSB agents tracked him down and made sure he wouldn’t be able to say anything ever again. They made it look like a suicide, of course. When we arrived at the scene, a Makarov was lying next to the dead man.”
r /> “But you figured out he didn’t kill himself.”
“We suspected it. Even had security footage of the probable killers entering the building. It was easy to ID them. The FBI kept meticulous files on all the personnel operating out of the Russian embassy. Problem was the men were traveling on diplomatic passports. The hit was state sanctioned. We couldn’t touch them, and they got away.” Decker had been watching the hotel’s main doors ever since Paulo disappeared inside. Now he saw the taxi driver emerge carrying a pair of bags. He started across the road, stopping briefly as a car sped past, then continued toward the taxi.
Behind him, two more men exited the hotel, dressed in smart charcoal gray suits.
Decker stiffened.
They could be a couple of businessmen looking for a cab to the airport, or they might be going out in search of a restaurant serving late-night fair. But he didn’t think so. There was something about them that didn’t feel right. The way they glanced around, furtive and on edge. As if they were summing up their surroundings.
Decker rolled his window down, intending to shout a warning to Paulo. But before he even had it halfway, the two men reached into their jackets and pulled out sleek black pistols, which they aimed at the retreating and oblivious taxi driver.
16
Decker didn’t wait for the men to gun Paulo down in cold blood. He had the Makarov in his hand. He aimed it to the left of the two gunmen, toward the valet podium, which was currently standing unmanned. It was close enough to make his point, but still a safe distance from any innocent bystanders.
He pulled the trigger.
The gun kicked, almost causing him to fall backwards thanks to his bad shooting stance in the back of the taxi. The bullet did its job, though. It smacked into the podium and sent the two startled gunmen diving for cover. They took shelter behind the concrete columns that held up the hotel’s portico.