His Walking Dead ringtone sounded through the stereo speakers, and an unknown Missouri number flashed on the dashboard screen. He answered with a cautious hello.
“Jake? It’s Cat,” the halted voice rasped from the speakers.
“You okay, man?”
“Yeah, ran to the other side of the house to get the phone.”
Jake guessed Cat hadn’t run more than ten yards in the last decade. “Must be important.”
A couple of heavy breaths punctuated with a belch. He guessed Cat was seconds from throwing up a bagful of Cheetos. “Did you track down Hart yet?”
“Yeah, we did. Bear and I interviewed him at the FBI headquarters a couple hours ago. Told us his part in a scheme with Sean Mack, but the guy is scared shitless. I halfway felt sorry for him. Seems like he’s a cog in a much bigger wheel.”
“Where is he now?”
“Still at the FBI headquarters, I guess,” Jake said. “He didn’t give us much information, because I don’t think he knows much. Why?”
“You know how much I pride myself on giving accurate information, right? I mean, it’s how I make my living.”
Jake wheeled left and merged onto I-35 south heading into downtown. “What did you do?”
“If word hit the streets I gave a customer some bad intel, my reputation would be toast. There may be guys out there who—”
“Spill it, Cat.”
“It may be nothing, but you told me to check on Jerry Hart with Trajor with the name Androv associated with it, and Sean Mack with MedFire who had Polovich by it. I told you Mack was with the SVR and Hart was the red-blooded American boy.”
“Yeah, what about it?”
“Ummm…I accidentally switched them.”
Jake missed running into the concrete barrier splitting the middle of the Heart of America Bridge by a hair. “You did what?”
“I’m sorry, man. The Russian names associated with the two guys confused me. They all sound alike, Androv, Polovich. I wrote the wrong thing under each guy’s name. Mack is the American and Hart is the Russian with the SVR.”
“Jesus Christ.” Jake’s foot grew heavy on the gas pedal. “You one hundred percent sure?”
“Five hundred percent sure. But you have him locked in the FBI headquarters, right? Shouldn’t be a problem.”
“I gotta go, Cat. Thanks.” Jake disconnected the call and punched up Foster since he never nabbed Stone’s number. He explained the situation to her and asked for Stone’s cell.
“I’ll text it to you, but hold on and I’ll conference him in.” The line went silent for a moment before Stone’s voicemail played. Another beep later and Foster returned. “Shit. Let me climb the phone tree and find someone. I’ll call you back in a second.”
Jake counted the light poles flashing by. He passed twelve when Foster called back. “Sam logged out an hour ago. So did Jerry Hart.”
“What the hell?”
“He told a guy in our office Hart was going to cooperate, and he was taking him back to his hotel room in protective custody rather than spend the night in an interrogation room.”
“Is that unusual?”
“For the FBI? Very. For the CIA? Who knows? I’m at the hospital with Snell, but I’m gonna head to his hotel.”
Jake’s foot grew heavier on the gas pedal. “What hotel?”
“The Residence Inn on the Plaza.”
“I’ll meet you there.”
Jake twirled his cell in his hand. Why would Stone leave with Hart? Maybe he thought he struck a deal to get Hart to talk. If Hart was just playing with him, Sam could be walking into a trap. He hit the speed dial for Bear.
“This police station coffee sucks ass,” Bear said.
“Cat screwed up.” Jake barreled past the River Market into the heart of downtown Kansas City. “He switched the names by mistake.”
“Wait…what?”
“Hart played us. He’s the fucking Russian spy. Mack is the American. Well, the dead American. Keats said his body was found at some storage unit earlier today.”
“What else did that scumbag have to say?”
“That Andrew Connelly is the Wolf.”
Bear exhaled. “Who the hell is the Wolf?”
“Another Russian spy. I’ll explain it later. We gotta find Stone. He and Hart left the FBI an hour ago.”
“What for?”
“I don’t know, but Foster is heading there from the hospital, and I’m on my way. I just passed the River Market.”
“Don’t leave me out of this,” Bear said. “You’re only a couple of minutes from me at the police station. Pick me up out front.”
After two minutes, another unanswered call to Stone, and a couple of near fender benders from running red lights, he skidded to a halt near the entrance to the police station. Bear jogged along the sidewalk and jumped in the cab.
“Stone didn’t answer his phone,” Jake said. “Call Foster back. We’re going to beat her there. See if she knows Stone’s room number.”
Luckily, traffic ran light at eleven at night, and Jake only burst through two red lights before he screeched south on Broadway and burned blacktop heading toward the Country Club Plaza, an affluent fifteen block shopping and restaurant district most known for its fabulous Christmas lights and art fair in the fall.
“Room 201.” Bear shoved his phone in his pocket. “Why would he take Hart out of the interrogation room, much less remove him from the building?”
“Let’s hope Hart stays in pretend mode. Goddamn it, I can’t believe he fooled me.”
“Dude, we all got played and there’s some serious experience dealing with lying dirt bags between the four of us. Holy shit.” Bear sucked in through his teeth and dug his hooks into the dashboard as Jake hopped a curb and passed a half-dozen cars parked at a red light. “I know you’re pissed, but would you mind not killing us before we get there?”
The Plaza was five minutes away, and Jake worked through the implications of Cat’s identity switch. His first thought was Keats lied to him in their meeting at the casino, but thinking back on the conversation, it dawned on Jake that he asked bad questions, riding high on wrong assumptions.
“I’m more confused than a homeless man on house arrest,” Bear said. “If Hart is in this spy ring, why would he turn himself in to us?”
“Maybe he’s scared. The Wolf, aka Connelly, is also an ex-KGB spy who is killing anyone involved with this scheme and, as far as we know, only Sokolov and Hart remain. Maybe Hart figures since Mack is dead and Sokolov is in the wind, there’s nobody to refute his little innocent story of being a poor pawn in the grand plan.”
“That’s a lot of maybes, and it still doesn’t make any sense why Hart would come in like he did.”
Jake reached West 46th Terrace and cranked the wheel to the left, the hotel materializing. “Well, we’ll be able to ask him in a minute.”
They hopped out and strode through the front doors to the elevators, past an indifferent front desk clerk clicking away on a computer. Once on the second floor, they turned right, their steps quiet on the dark maroon carpet. Room 201 sat at the far end of the hallway. They passed Room 203, and the blaring sounds of a war movie cranked through the door. Jake stopped short of Stone’s half-open door. He and Bear exchanged worried looks and pulled out their weapons.
“Call his cell again,” Bear whispered. “I don’t want to blaze in there with guns drawn if he’s taking a dump.”
Jake pulled out his cell and punched redial on Stone’s cell. A faint generic ringtone sounded from inside the room. After a few rings, he disconnected. Jake pointed his Sig Sauer with his right hand and pushed the door open with his left, exposing as little of his body as possible. He took a few tentative steps into the hotel room, the scent of tabasco sauce swirling. Bear crept behind him, and they swept their sights on the empty living room and kitchen area. A plate of half-eaten chicken wings and empty beer bottles lay abandoned on the coffee table. The half-open door to the bedroom revealed a bod
y sprawled on the bed. Jake pushed the door open with his foot, a two-handed grip on his pistol.
Stone lay crumpled on the floor. Hart was face up on the bed with his head hanging off the far side, the red bloodstains from two bullet holes in his chest spreading across the white comforter.
“Goddamn it,” Jake muttered, shoving his gun into his waist holster.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Jake pressed down against Stone’s throat, and a strong pulse thumped against his fingers. A goose egg marred his forehead, and the hotel iron lay on the bed next to Hart. Stone’s unconscious hand wrapped itself around the butt of a Glock 19. Jake pried the gun loose and set it on the nightstand. Bear checked Hart for a pulse and dropped his head. Dead.
“Damn,” Bear said. “Stone all right?”
Jake flashed a thumbs up. “He’s breathing. Better call 911.”
“How did nobody hear gunshots in the hotel?”
“Maybe because of the neighbor’s blaring war movie.”
Bear punched in 911 and reported the situation to the operator while Jake called the front desk and asked for security. They both relayed the situation to their respective parties and waited. Before security arrived, Bear checked Hart’s pockets, tossing a wallet, a half-eaten roll of Life Savers and four pieces of Nicorette gum in sharp edged cellophane packs.
“Jerry was trying to quit smoking.” Jake opened the wallet. The slots in the billfold held a couple of credit cards and gift cards to Target and Starbucks. He thumbed through a handful of dollar bills and unfolded a receipt.
“What’s that?” Bear asked.
“Receipt for Centerfire dated five days ago. It’s a nice gun range out in Olathe where I bought my Sig Sauer. Interesting.”
Bear checked the receipt over Jake’s shoulder. “What?”
“The receipt is for two shooting bays. Hart went with someone.”
“Hello?” A young guy in a dark suit and slicked back hair edged into the room. “I’m the manager.” He gawked at the body on the bed and turned bone white, wavering on his lanky legs.
“You going to puke?” Bear asked.
“Maybe.” The manager’s eyes glazed, and his lips blanched.
“If you’re going to yack, do it in the bathroom,” Bear said, pointing. “Police will get pissed if you spew chunks on their crime scene.”
Instead, the manager turned his back and gulped air. A groan emitted from Stone. Jake shoved the Centerfire receipt in his pocket and knelt by Stone, patting him on the back.
“Easy, Sam,” Jake said. “You got a hell of a bump on your noggin.”
Jake helped Stone to a sitting position against the bed. Stone’s eyelids fluttered as if trying to get his bearings. “What happened?”
“We hoped you could tell us. Came in here and found you on the floor and Hart dead on the bed. Looks like you shot him.”
Stone’s glazed eyes wandered to Jake’s face, like he was in a daydream. He winced when they caught the light from the nightstand lamp which Jake turned off.
“I shot someone?”
“Hart. Twice,” Bear said. “You don’t remember anything?”
Stone dropped his chin. “I don’t know. Maybe. Give me a minute.”
Bear mouthed the word “concussion” and ticked his head towards Stone’s gun. Jake grabbed the gun as the manager’s cell phone rang. He answered it, listened, and put the phone back in his suit coat.
“The police are on their way up.” The manager straightened his tie and smoothed back his dark hair. “I’ll go meet them.”
“Sam,” Jake said, “think for a minute. What happened? Why’d you take Hart from the FBI headquarters?”
Stone’s face crunched like he tried to solve the square root of pi. “I don’t know. Jesus, my head hurts.”
Two Kansas City cops, in dark navy uniforms, stormed the room, hands on the butts of their holstered pistols. Jake explained the situation, and the cops pointed them to the living room. A minute later, two paramedics hefted a bulky duffel bag through the door. Jake pointed into the bedroom.
“What do we do now?” Bear asked.
“Wait for Foster, I guess,” Jake replied. “See how Stone is and proceed from there.”
“This shit could take forever. Time’s wasting.”
Twenty minutes later, Stone sprawled on the living room couch, Foster burst through the door and darted to his side, and two Kansas City detectives joined the party. One of the detectives knew Bear, which helped relieve some of Jake’s concerns they would get wrapped in a spider-web of bureaucratic red tape. The detectives took concise statements from Jake and Bear, stating they followed up on a case with Stone, and Hart was a potential witness under Stone’s protection. Rather than fuel any wild speculations, Jake and Bear made the mutual decision to keep the Sokolov and Wolf business quiet. Foster tipped her head toward the kitchen, and Jake and Bear followed.
“What the hell happened?” Foster asked, voice low. “Sam says he doesn’t remember anything.”
“If I had to guess,” Jake said, “Hart smacked him in the head with the iron and Stone squeezed off a couple of shots before he went down for the count. But Hart played along fine and seemed eager for the protection. Why the change? Why go after Stone?”
“Maybe it’ll come to him, but they want to haul him to the hospital to run some tests. I’ll take him there. See if I can figure out why the hell he took him out of our headquarters in the first place.”
“You see Snell?” Jake asked.
“Yeah, she’s getting cranky. She’s pissed we’re in the middle of the hunt, and she’s stuck in a hospital bed with IVs jammed in her arms. What are you guys gonna do?”
Jake checked his watch and the hour on the face generated a yawn. “Not much Bear and I can do. We need some info on this Wolf character and what happened here. Maybe Sam knows something, but he can barely remember his name at the moment. Plus, my ass is dragging like an old dog.”
“Go catch some sleep,” Foster said. “You look exhausted. I’ll call you if I find anything out from Sam.”
As much as he didn’t want to abandon the hunt, if he didn’t get a little shuteye, he’d be no good if they came up against Connelly or Sokolov. “All right, Bear and I will head back to my place and catch a few hours of sleep. Let’s regroup in the morning and find out where we are.”
Jake and Bear checked in with the detectives who told them to stay reachable. Jake handed them his card with his name and cell number. Twenty minutes later, they entered Jake’s apartment.
Bear sulked in the living room like a kid who dropped his brand-new ice cream cone in a pile of dog crap. “You should get a new couch. This thing kills my back.”
“Sorry, big boy,” Jake replied, “but you ain’t sleeping with me. What would the boys at the station house say?”
“What if I offer to spoon with you?”
Jake rocked his head back and forth like he considered it. “Would I get to be in the front or the back?”
Bear snorted. “The front, of course. You think you’re getting those skinny arms around this waist?”
Jake flashed his back as he walked into his bedroom. “Forget it then. See you in the morning.” He grinned as Bear grumbled from the living room. He shut off the light and fell on the bed, exhaustion pulling him into the mattress. Christopher’s face floated across his closed eyelids, and Jake prayed they’d find him before it was too late.
Chapter Fifty-Three
By eight o’clock the following morning, Jake and Bear were elbow deep in breakfast fare at the diner near his place. The greasy spoon was crowded for a Thursday, so they kept their voices low. While Bear slogged through his second order of bacon, Jake received a text from Foster. Stone slept through the night and remembered a few details. She said she made an appointment to talk to the Human Resources Director at MedFire at ten o’clock, and perhaps they could meet for lunch. Jake agreed and filled in Bear on the text.
“You going to lick the plate?” Jake asked a
s Bear finished the bacon by licking his fingers clean.
“Possibly. You gonna try and stop me?”
Jake waved his hands in surrender. “No way. I never get between a wild animal and his food.”
“You’re smarter than you look. What do we do now?” Bear asked as the waitress dropped the bill on the table. Jake managed to snag it before Bear could. As he pulled money from his wallet, the receipt he snagged from Hart fluttered to the table. Two bays. Hart rented two bays.
“Want to take a ride to Olathe?” Jake asked. “We should check out Centerfire.”
“The two-rental bay deal? You thinking they have security cameras there?”
“I know they do. Plus, I bet you twenty bucks I can outshoot you on the range.”
Bear puffed with indignation. “Bitch, please. I could outshoot you while in a coma.”
“Unless your gun gets slippery from the bacon grease on your hands.”
“Hey, don’t mess with my bacon.”
* * *
They pulled into the near-empty parking lot at Centerfire. The sign on the front door indicated they didn’t open until ten o’clock. A bullnecked guy with a Neanderthal chin and sandalwood crewcut passed by the door and pointed to his watch. Bear responded by flashing his badge. The guy unlocked the door.
“What’s up, officer?” he asked.
“Manager around?” Bear asked. “We need to talk to him.”
“That’s me for today. I’m Clint.” The man extended a hand which Jake and Bear both shook as they introduced themselves. “Nice to meet you. Come on in.”
Clint held the door open for them and they walked through the showroom. Two glass gun cases on either side of them housed rental guns of any type you could want from pistols to shotguns to rifles. At the center of the showroom were shirts, hats, and shooting accessories mixed in among leather couches. A door in the back led to the shooting ranges consisting of sixteen bays, eight on either side of the door. Jake pointed out the security cameras mounted in the ceiling.
Jake Caldwell Thrillers Page 72