Gemini Man--The Official Movie Novelization

by Titan Books

  “So I was pulling a trigger for Clay Verris,” Henry said.

  Patterson let out a long breath. One of the main reasons he had quit drinking was his deep and abiding resolve to avoid the humiliation of hitting bottom. But somehow he had managed to do that very thing after getting sober.

  “Henry, I regret my lack of candor, but listen—” Patterson said, babbling again.

  “How many other times did you do this to me?” Henry demanded. “How many times did you spike a file and send me out to AMF someone who didn’t deserve it?”

  “Never,” Patterson said promptly. “Not ever. This was a one-off, I swear on my son’s life.”

  He could practically hear Henry thinking it over, trying to decide whether he was a liar or a fool.

  “All right,” Henry said after a bit. “Agent Zakarewski is not a part of this.”

  “Henry I can fix this, but I need both of you to come back,” Patterson said.

  Henry gave an incredulous laugh. “To what?” he said and broke the connection again.

  Patterson stood in the hallway staring at the phone. It was pink—not just pink but pink, the pinkest pink he’d ever seen. He had no idea how he had failed to notice that.

  “Hey, mister.”

  He turned to find the girl he’d borrowed the cell from standing behind him with her friend. “What do you want?” he asked, annoyed.

  “If you’re done, I want my phone back.” Without waiting for him to answer, she plucked it out of his hand and walked off with her friend. Patterson could hear the beep-beep-beep of rapid texting.

  He sighed. He had just made the most expensive phone call of his life and now he had to let the principal finish bitching at him. “Better put that in your spray-tan fund,” Patterson called after the girl.

  “Yeah, whatever,” she said, still texting.

  CHAPTER 8

  Leaning against Baron’s Jeep on the beach, Danny watched Henry take the SIM card out of the phone, break it in half, and grind the pieces into the sand with his foot. He looked pretty peeved and she didn’t blame him. She felt the same after listening to the phone conversation he’d just had with his handler—correction: ex-handler. Henry had put it on speakerphone so she and Baron could listen.

  Patterson’s protests of innocence seemed sincere but in this business, everyone knew how to do sincere. And of course he was going to claim he’d had nothing to do with the assassins. What fool would admit trying to kill you? Hell, if you caught someone standing over you with a goddam butcher knife, they would still deny everything. What do you mean, kill you? I’m not even mad at you! What knife? I didn’t notice—how did that get there?

  But the crucial word in the conversation had been Gemini. She knew what Gemini was and she also knew that a lot of people at the DIA weren’t overjoyed about its connection to the agency. But she’d never seen anyone react the way Henry and Baron had. They were actually spooked, and the name Clay Verris spooked them even more. Danny hadn’t thought anything could shake Henry’s composure, which spooked her. She had better find out as much as she could, she told herself, because if it scared Henry—well, she didn’t even know how to finish that sentence.

  She turned to him and said, “Okay. Gemini.”

  Henry’s eyes were hooded as they swiveled to look at her. “How much do you know about them?”

  “Privatized paramilitary, owned by Clay Verris.” Danny watched his face carefully for a reaction to the name; there was none but Baron winced. “Agency does a ton of business with them. Is there more?”

  The two men traded looks. “Baron and I served under Verris in the Marines—Panama, Kuwait, Somalia,” Henry told her. “He started Gemini after he left the Service. Tried to hire us. We both said no.”

  “Except I was smart enough to move 1500 miles away,” Baron added, chuckling.

  “Yeah, that was pretty smart,” Henry said, climbing into the Jeep’s front passenger seat. “I blew that one.”

  Danny took a last look around at the beach and the gorgeous blue water where the Aztec was moored close to the shore. If the rest of Cartagena was this beautiful, she could understand how a person might decide to throw it all over for a place in the sun. She was far from ready to even think about that herself. But she wouldn’t have minded turning her phone off for a week or two of vacation time here.

  Assuming, of course, that things worked out so well that the agency not only let her keep her job but gave her a replacement for the phone she had tossed into Buttermilk Sound.

  Now she was getting too far ahead of herself, she thought as she got into the Jeep’s backseat. She had to take things one step at a time. Or in her case, one life-changing crisis at a time.

  * * *

  In spite of everything, Henry could feel himself untense as Baron drove them to his place. Baron had been trying to get him to visit for years—decades—and he had always managed to find reasons not to. Baron had accused Henry of dodging him and asked if it was because he was so completely out of the business. Henry had finally confessed that yes, he had been dodging him, but only because he didn’t think he’d last even half a day in a place where he couldn’t catch a Phillies game.

  In truth, however, Henry had been afraid that Cartagena would seduce him the same way it had Baron and he would succumb to the pleasures of a life without stress or sniper rifles or targets, let alone the Phillies. He hadn’t been ready to give any of that up yet, not permanently, and still wasn’t. He had no idea when he would be ready; he only knew he wasn’t there yet.

  Baron drove them along a river lined with fishermen; a few of them were pulling in catches as they passed. Henry could hear Danny in the seat behind him moving from one side to the other, trying to see everything all at once. It was nice traveling with kids, he thought wryly; they weren’t too jaded to appreciate the scenery. Ha ha.

  Or was that less a joke than it was a message from his subconscious? He’d found himself thinking of Danny not as a daughter exactly, but someone similar, maybe a niece. Only he didn’t have any brothers or sisters, so she would be kind of an adopted niece, like the daughter of a good friend. Except he couldn’t imagine Baron or Jack Willis as her father. Not Patterson, either, not any more. And certainly not Lassiter—her species probably ate their young.

  After several miles, Baron turned away from the river onto a road that he said led to the Old Town. “For some of us, Old Town is the only town,” he said as they went through a fish market filled with people haggling or gossiping or whatever civilians did in the course of a typical day; Henry couldn’t really imagine. He’d never gotten a handle on this kind of life. And yet when Patterson mentioned their having saved lives, these were among the ones he was referring to.

  The fish market gave way to a church courtyard with a collection of impossibly beautiful statues of saints Henry was pretty sure he’d never heard of and wouldn’t have believed in anyway. At one time, he’d have taken it for granted that Baron didn’t, either, but now he wasn’t so sure. Not that it mattered; saints or no saints, Baron was his brother. When Henry had called, Baron had dropped everything and come to help, no questions asked.

  Baron slowed down and brought the Jeep to a stop in front of a large, two-story building painted bright canary yellow. Henry thought it was one of those boutique hotels that only the ultra-rich knew about. He turned to Baron, eyebrows raised.

  “Here she is,” Baron told him, obviously pleased at his reaction. “Casa Baron.”

  The house was even more impressive inside. Henry turned around and around in the entry hall, goggling at the staircase curving under a skylight, the polished tile floor, and the tropical plants in hanging baskets or in planters running along the walls. Baron pushed Henry gently toward the light and airy living room, still bright even though it was now late in the day. Danny made herself comfortable on the sofa opposite a floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the ocean. The water seemed to stretch out forever.

  “Damn, Baron, you’re the king of Cartagena,”
said Henry, taking in the high vaulted ceiling and wood beams.

  “I get by.” Baron chuckled with fake modesty as he went to the nearby drinks cart. “Plus, we got an awesome hardware store down the street. Henry loves hardware stores,” he added to Danny, looking over his shoulder at her.

  Danny shifted restlessly on the sofa. “Yeah, great. Let’s make small talk. I want to know more about Clay Verris and Gemini.”

  Henry hesitated and looked at Baron but he was rattling glasses to show he was too busy with their drinks to answer.

  “Verris tried to hire you,” Danny prodded, “and you said no. So that’s why you hate him, because he offered you jobs you didn’t want? There’s got to be more to it than that.”

  Henry shrugged.

  “Come on, Henry,” she said, slightly impatient now. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  The unadorned honesty of the question caught him off guard, although it shouldn’t have. It was the only kind of question Danny had ever asked him, at least since he’d showed her the photocopy of her DIA badge. He sighed.

  “Clay Verris gets billions every year to clear targets any way he sees fit,” Henry said. “That’s Gemini—off-book kidnappings, torture. They’re who you call when you need twelve Saudi princes to quietly disappear. Or you want someone to train your death squads.”

  Danny’s expression showed she knew that still wasn’t everything and she wasn’t going to settle for anything less than the whole story.

  “When I was six weeks into sniper school,” he went on after a moment, “Clay Verris put me on a boat, and took me five miles out. He tied weights to my ankles, then threw me overboard and told me to tread water until I couldn’t any more.”

  Danny’s jaw dropped. “He didn’t know about your fear of—”

  “Of course he knew.” Henry couldn’t help laughing a little. She may have had an exemplary record with the agency but she still had a lot to learn. “That was the point.”

  “So, what did you do?” Her eyes were wide and serious.

  “I treaded water for as long as I could,” Henry said. “Then I drowned. Dead.”

  Baron’s bright, beautiful living room was gone and he was back in the ocean, sinking down into a cold, dark death, unable to feel his fingers and toes, his arms and legs too heavy to move, his muscles completely used up, drained and done. By then, his head was the only place he had any sensation. How icy the water had been as it covered his face. He could remember that so clearly, so vividly, the same way he could remember his father’s enormous grin and the terrified little boy in those mirror shades. Dying in the ocean had seemed like the last bit of his father’s malice, a booby-trap set to go off at a time and place where there was no loving mother to come to his rescue Henry’s last breath had escaped him in a stream of bubbles as he died in the dark and the cold.

  Abruptly he came back to himself and the late afternoon light in Baron’s living room. Danny was sitting on the edge of the sofa cushion, waiting for the rest of the story, her eyes wide with dismay. They didn’t do things like this where she came from, or so she thought. Baron had heard the story before—had one of his own that was just as bad—but even he looked a little spooked.

  “He fished me out,” Henry continued, speaking quickly now. “Put defibrillator paddles on my chest, shocked me back to life and told me I was now ready to serve under his command.”

  Danny’s expression was horrified and revolted. Yeah, a whole lot to learn.

  Baron came over with a bottle of Jose Cuervo Especial Silver and three shot glasses. He handed the glasses around and poured a generous measure into each.

  “To the next war,” Baron said, raising his glass. “Which is no war.”

  “No war,” Henry echoed.

  “No war,” Danny agreed, which earned her a smile of approval from Baron. Henry expected her to cough a little and was surprised when she didn’t. Then he remembered this was a woman who drank boilermakers.

  “When I leave here,” Henry said to her, “you’re going to stay. The farther away I am from you, the better off you’ll be.”

  “Sorry, that’s not your call,” Danny informed him in a final, almost prim-sounding tone.

  “Yeah, yeah, I know,” Henry said, exasperated. “You whipped the guy in the marina, you’re a real badass. But this is different. You’re not ready.”

  Danny’s expression darkened. “Hey, old guy,” she said, not at all prim now. “You want some teeth knocked out, too?”

  Baron laughed like she’d found his ticklish spot. “I like her,” he told Henry.

  “I do, too,” Henry admitted. “It’s annoying as hell.” He sat back on the sofa, suddenly feeling drained, as if he’d used the last of his energy to tell Danny the story about drowning. He ran a hand over his face. “Need some shut-eye, man.”

  “Sure,” Baron said cheerfully. “You folks want one room or—”

  “Two,” Danny said, quickly and emphatically, as if it were crucial to make this clear. Then her face reddened with embarrassment. “Two,” she repeated quietly.

  “Hey, I can put him in the garage if you want,” Baron offered.

  “Separate rooms will be fine,” Henry said. “I’m so tired I don’t even care if there’s a bed.”

  “There is one, use it or not—your call. Follow me.” Baron chuckled. “Think you can manage the stairs, old guy?”

  “Very funny,” Henry said, then added, “Hope so.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Henry had been awake for a few minutes, lying quietly to get his bearings, when he heard a flock of birds near the open window of his bedroom suddenly take flight. Something had startled them. The sound of startled birds was different from birds just doing their bird-thing and taking off; it was a very subtle difference but Henry had always been able to tell.

  He rolled out of bed onto the floor, crept to the window, and peeked over the sill. Three houses away, a man in a black baseball cap moved from a higher roof to a lower one. There was a rifle bag over his shoulder. Henry could tell he was several grades above the guys that had come after him in Georgia. His cap was pulled low so Henry couldn’t see his face but there was something familiar about his movements, like he was someone Henry knew or had at least seen before, although he was pretty sure they had never met personally. No one he came up against in the field lived to regret it.

  The answer came to him unbidden: Gemini had sent him. The indoctrination and training gave their operatives a particular look—their moves, their posture, even how they carried their weapons (and used them). Verris was so particular about it, he trained all his guys personally to the point where they might as well have been clones.

  Staying low, Henry dressed quickly, grabbed his burn bag, and slipped out of the room. He found Danny in a downstairs bedroom, sleeping as deeply as ever. She must have been right about that clear conscience thing, he thought. Hell, she had even been able to sleep on the goddam Corsair.

  Henry crawled over to her bed, found the Glock in her burn bag, then put his hand over her mouth. Her eyes flew open and she looked terrified until she felt him putting the Glock in her hand. He uncovered her mouth.

  “Two hundred yards away,” he whispered. “Rooftop.”

  Danny nodded silently, all business now. Henry felt a sudden surge of affection for her. Even though she had a lot to learn, she was a quick study and she didn’t whine.

  “When he sees me leave, he’ll follow,” he said in a low voice. “Go with Baron, someplace safe. Please,” he added as she opened her mouth to argue. She nodded again, reluctantly.

  He found Baron on the couch in the living room. His friend had dozed off watching the flatscreen on the opposite wall. Henry’s eyebrows went up; hadn’t there been an art print hanging there yesterday when they had come in? Right now there was a Colombian game show on with a frantic host and even more frantic contestants, but fortunately the sound was off. The remote sitting in Baron’s lap looked like something NASA would use to control satellites. If t
hey could get the World Series in Cartagena, Henry thought he might have to seriously reconsider Baron’s offer.

  But not today.

  He put his hand over Baron’s mouth. Baron’s eyes opened, found Henry. “Shooter, your three o’clock. Acknowledge,” Henry told him.

  Baron nodded, gestured for him to move back, and lifted the sofa cushion, revealing a respectable cache of weapons. Henry gave him a solemn look of admiration. Then he grabbed a case containing a disassembled sniper rifle, ammunition, and a few grenades for his burn bag, and tucked a Glock with a silencer into his waistband.

  “You’re a shitty houseguest, you know that?” Baron said in a half-whisper as he watched Henry tool up. “Most people bring flowers or a bottle of vino. How the hell did they find us?”

  “Listen to me,” Henry said. “Danny’s good, she’s really good. But she doesn’t know how much she doesn’t know. Take care of her, all right?”

  Baron nodded.

  “Thanks, brother,” Henry said.

  Henry got up and headed for the front door, keeping himself too low for a clean shot but not so low that he was completely out of sight. Bracing himself, he stepped outside, slinging the burn bag over one shoulder as he closed the door behind him. The bag was a bit heavier now but he didn’t mind the extra weight. For a few seconds, he held very still, scanning his surroundings and listening.

  Good morning, Cartagena.

  He began walking briskly toward the center of Old Town, doing his best to look like he was off to spend the day sightseeing and shopping, and not at all like he was toting a bag full of weapons because someone was trying to kill him.

  * * *

  This guy was good.

  Henry didn’t catch a glimpse of him for at least ten minutes, and even then it was only by accident. Crossing a street, he happened to look down and saw his stalker’s reflection in a puddle of water. Henry turned casually and, hiding the pistol in his hand behind his open shirt, fired at him. It wasn’t his preferred method of taking a hostile down but it was a shot he’d made before.