by Brent Towns
Knocker tried the door, which was locked. Shit, he’d have to go in hard. Having studied a picture of Abbas until the image was burned into his brain, he took a deep breath and kicked the door open.
It crashed back with a loud bang. Knocker had the M4A1 carbine at his shoulder in the firing position. He had no sooner entered when the first shooter appeared. Knocker fired twice, and the man sat down hard without firing a shot. Shouts echoed throughout the building as the startled terrorists began running around, gathering themselves.
Knocker moved past a staircase into another room toward the front of the building. There he found another shooter, who he put down quickly. The man did not fire a shot before Knocker killed him.
Hearing footsteps tromping down the stairs behind him, he whirled to fire but wasn’t fast enough. Instead, he was forced to dive into the room in which he’d just killed the second shooter to avoid a hail of bullets.
Knocker grunted as he hit the hard-packed floor, then rolled onto his back and sat halfway up with bullets ricocheting around him. Catching sight of the shooter, he fired his weapon. Three down.
Knocker scrambled to his feet and swiftly moved to the base of the stairs. He aimed the carbine upward and waited for several seconds in case another shooter was coming down them, but he was clear.
The former SAS man began moving up the stairs, his actions as fluid as water. Reaching the rough landing at the top, he almost walked into a storm of 7.62 rounds. He fired reflexively, his years of training and muscle memory providing the aim.
The M4 rattled noisily, and the shooter jerked violently under the impact of each shot. His arms flung out wide, and he squeezed the trigger involuntarily. Bullets punched into the wall as he fell.
The count was four down, but not one of them was Abbas.
Knocker moved slower now. There was no telling what he might find. There were three rooms upstairs; he cleared the first two and went to the third. “Abbas, are you there?”
There was a drawn-out silence, then, “I’m in here.”
“Come on out. I’m here to take you home.”
“Home where?”
“Back to the US. But we have to leave now.”
There was a moment more of silence before Abbas appeared. “We’d better go then.”
“Yes.”
Knocker led the way down the stairs and had almost reached the bottom when he sensed rather than saw the danger. He threw himself to the floor, twisting as he went and bringing up the M4. A handgun cracked and the bullet tugged at his pants leg, missing the flesh. The former SAS man fired, and the bullet took Abbas in the chest.
The CIA man fell forward and landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs. “Shit!” Knocker scrambled forward.
Abbas was still breathing but wouldn’t last long. “Why?” Knocker asked savagely.
“The…The Ghost was right.”
“The Ghost? Where is he?”
“Gone.”
“Damn it, Abbas. What about Akira? What about your damn country?”
“This is…is my country.”
“Where is he? The Ghost, where?”
Abbas coughed. It was wet. “He knew your people would come, so he left.”
“My people? You work for the CIA—”
Abbas shook his head vigorously. “No. We do not. Not anymore.”
Knocker thought for a moment before something troublesome occurred to him. “You said—”
Abbas was dead.
“You killed him,” Akira stated.
Knocker stood and turned to face the woman, who had her handgun trained on him. “You too, huh? I should have figured it out sooner, but—”
“The Ghost is a great warrior. He will unite the kingdoms and lead us forward as one against the infidels.”
“He’s a bloody murderer.”
“He will lead the martyrs into battle against our enemies and to the ultimate victory.”
“Fuck it,” Knocker said and shot her.
Knocker carried her into her home and dropped her on the floor. Akira let out a yelp as her wounded leg sent bolts of pain through her. She scrambled away from him as he checked the flesh wound in his arm from where she’d shot him after he’d fired. He grunted and walked over to her, took a handful of hair, and dragged her to the center of the room.
The former SAS man let her go, and she slumped. She looked up at Knocker and spat in his direction. “Listen,” he said. “The only reason you’re still alive is that I don’t particularly want to kill you, understand? But don’t push your luck.”
“Do it!” she snarled.
“What I don’t get is why you didn’t betray me earlier?”
She said nothing.
Knocker reached into his pocket and took out an encrypted phone. He punched in a number, and a voice answered, “Slick speaking.”
“Slick, it’s Knocker. I need a favor. Are you at work?”
“Shit, Knocker! I’m at my desk.”
“Don’t let on it’s me—”
“You know these things are recorded, right?”
“They are?”
“Yes.”
“Fuck. You need to find one from a week ago where I called a number in Waco.”
“What? Why?”
“I was talking to some cow I met at a bar—”
“I don’t want to know.”
“She was a good shag.”
Slick sighed. “Knocker, what do you need?”
“I’m going to send you an address in Mosul, Iraq. I want you to look for any feed you can find of a man with a funny walk leaving the building there anywhere in the past two…no, three weeks.”
“Why?”
“I can’t tell you. I need you to trust me on this one, mate. It’s to do with what I’m working on.”
“All right, I’ll see what I can come up with.”
“Thanks, you’re a good chap. How’s the rest of the team?”
“They’ve flown to Hawaii.”
“Lucky bastards. They get all the fun. Don’t forget about that call I made.”
“I’ll fix it. Now, let me get to work.”
Knocker disconnected and made another call. After a few minutes, the call was rerouted to its destination.
“Joseph.”
“Admiral, I’ve got news. And you’re not going to like it.”
Chapter 4
Sunset Sands Hotel, Honolulu, Hawaii
“I could really get used to this gig, Reaper,” Axe said as he watched two ladies walk past him, wearing string bikinis and walnut-colored tans. “Yes, sir, I really could.”
“Just keep your eyes on the prize, Reaper Four,” Cara said from the other side of the crystal-clear pool.
“I never took them off it, ma’am.”
Kane grinned. He could imagine Cara rolling her eyes about now. “I must say, ma’am,” Axe continued, “you certainly fill out a bikini yourself.”
“Keep it up, Axe, and I’ll smash this wine glass and come over there and stab you in the eye with the stem.”
Brick interrupted their banter. “All right, people, game faces on. I’ve got our target coming out now.”
“Does he have girls with him?” Axe asked.
“As a matter of fact, he does,” Brick said. “And three bodyguards.”
“I call shotgun on the ladies,” Axe said with a grin.
“Careful, Casanova,” Thurston said over the comms from the ops room in El Paso. “I’ll lay good money on them being fighters.”
Kane sat up on his sun lounge. He watched the small procession walk around the far side of the pool and take up residence at two tables they pushed together and said into his comms, “Reaper Five, go.”
“On it.”
“Hey, Reaper, I think one of those gals just winked at me.”
“Axe, don’t even move…oh, shit. What the fuck are you doing?”
Nothing says trouble like a bearded, six-foot-and change, grinning buffoon with tattoos, dressed in flowery swimming trunks
. Kane heard him say through the comms. “Gents, ladies. How are we today?”
One of the big bodyguards stood up and approached Axe. He said something in Japanese and waited.
“What the hell is he doing, Reaper?” Cara asked.
“I really have no idea.”
“All right, I’ll go and rescue him before he screws this up,” Cara sighed.
“Please do.”
Cara got to her feet and walked in the direction of the Yakuza boss and his entourage. “You know what?” Kane said. “You really do look good in that red bikini.”
“Bite me.”
As she reached them, Kane heard her say, “What are you doing?”
Axe mumbled something, and Cara stepped closer to him and gave him a shove. “What did you say, asshole? Were you flirting with these bitches?”
Axe said, “What if I was?” Cara shoved him hard enough to make him stagger and fall toward Ishida. The Yakuza boss put his hands up to stop him from landing on top of him. He spoke savagely to Axe, something about cutting his balls off if he didn’t go away. Axe apologized and walked away. Cara slapped him up the back of the head as he went.
“What the fuck was that, Axe?” Kane growled.
“If you would ask our tech guru to switch his frequency, you’ll find out that I just bugged our friend over there.”
“Stupid,” Kane growled in a low voice.
“Maybe, but we might get something.”
“Slick, did you get that?”
“Already on it, Reaper.”
“Cara?” Kane said.
“Yes, Reaper?”
“Hit the asshole again.”
“With pleasure.”
Brick’s job was to get eyes and ears inside the suites booked by Ishida and his group. He took an elevator to the fifteenth floor, got off, and turned left, heading along the hallway to the end door that led into the suite.
“Slick, I’m here.”
“All right, wait one.”
After a few seconds, the electronic door lock beeped, and its guts made the snapping sound that indicated the door was open. Brick drew his suppressed M17 and eased into the room, closing the door behind him.
The first thing he did was sweep the suite for hidden surprises. Then he took out his cell, which Swift had worked on before he left. After three minutes, Brick had located three hidden cameras and two mics. “Slick, did you get the frequencies?”
“All good, Reaper Five. I can use the cameras and mics, but maybe place a camera of our own and a mic somewhere, over.”
“Copy that.”
That took another two minutes.
“Reaper Five, copy?”
“Copy, Bravo.”
Thurston said, “Have a look around and see if you can find anything that might be useful.”
“Roger that.”
He started in the main bedroom, looking through drawers, being careful to place everything back where it was found. Then came the luggage, and again, everything went back exactly. “I’ve got nothing,” Brick said as he walked back out into the main living area.
“All right, Reaper Five, get out.”
Brick started toward the door, then stopped. “Bravo, copy?”
“What’s up, Reaper Five?”
“Ishida killed his old accountant, which means he has a new one. Now, if I had an accountant that turned on me, I wouldn’t want to be letting the next one—”
“—out of my sight,” Thurston finished for him. “Which means that one of his entourage is most likely his new accountant.”
“My thoughts exactly, ma’am.”
“Get out of that room, Reaper Five, and wait for my instructions. There are four more rooms on that floor booked by Ishida. Stand by.”
“Bravo to all Reaper call signs. We believe that one of the entourages is an accountant. We believe it is one of the three ladies.”
Kane looked at the three women in their bikinis. Two were dressed in white, one in black. He raised his cell and took a photo. “Ma’am, I’m sending you a picture of the one I believe fits the bill.”
“That was quick,” Cara said.
“Three women, one wears a black bikini, the other two are in white. The one in black has a bodyguard glancing at her with a monotonous regularity like he’s either got a hard-on for her or she’s under his special watch.”
“Stand by.”
A minute later, Ferrero came back over the comms. “Reaper, it looks like you were right. Her name is Heidi Fuchida.”
“Did you say, ‘Heidi’, Zero?”
“Affirmative, Reaper. Her mother was American and her father was Japanese. Keep an eye on them; the mission has just evolved.”
“Make it evolve faster, Zero,” Cara said. “It looks like our little bird is leaving. And her bodyguard is going with her.”
“Reaper Five, you need to pick it up,” Thurston said.
“Pick it up? I just got in here, ma’am.”
“She’s on her way back with company.”
“Understood.”
Brick swept the room and found another camera and a mic, which Slick attended to while the former SEAL started sifting through anything that might be helpful. Once more, he checked drawers and luggage but came up with nothing. “Slick, how do accountants do everything these days?”
“Electronically, my web-footed friend.”
Scanning the room, Brick said, “So, we’re doing this all wrong. I should be looking for something small. Something—”
After a period of silence, Swift said, “What is it?”
“I might have something.”
It was a small figurine of a Chinese dragon. “Why would you have that?”
“Brick, you need to pick it up faster,” Thurston said with urgency. “They’re in the elevator. Forget it and get out.”
Brick ignored her and picked up the figurine. He shook it gently and heard the rattle. “Bingo.”
“What are you doing, Brick?” Kane asked.
“I’m onto something.”
“Get out, damn it. You heard the general.”
There was a small door in the bottom of the statue. Brick opened it, and out came a small thumb drive. “I’ve got it…I think.”
“Got what?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Put it back and get out.”
“What if it’s important?”
“What if she finds it gone?”
Brick reached into his pocket and took out the contents—a few dimes and a pack of gum. He broke it in half and placed it into the statue, then closed the door and shook it. Sounded almost the same.
“All right, I’m—” The door snicked as the electronic latch opened, “Too late.”
Brick headed for the balcony, went out the sliding door, and slipped around the corner out of sight. Unless she came out, there was no way she could see him.
“Brick, are you good?” Kane asked impatiently.
“For the moment.”
He peered around the corner and saw the woman looking around the room. It was almost as though she could sense that someone had been in there. Brick saw her go over to the small statue and pick it up. She gave it a shake and replaced it, reassured.
Walking over to the bed, she began to undress. First off was the bikini top, then the bottom. Brick turned away before the bottom came off and waited until he could hear the water running in the shower before he spoke. “Bravo Four, talk to me.”
“Her shadow is out in the hallway, Reaper Five. There’s no going that way.”
“What background do you have on her?”
“Name, Heidi Fuchida. She’s a resident of Osaka. Father is native Japanese; her mother is American. She went to Harvard, sent there by her family. Studied business, and once she graduated, she returned to Japan. Worked with a couple of big firms, then for some reason, she went to work as an accountant for a company which was owned by Ishida.”
“There’s nothing stating why?”
“No.”
“Can you do a quick search into her financial status?”
“Give me a minute.”
“No rush. I’ve got all day.”
“What are you thinking, Brick?” Kane asked.
“Maybe she’s not working for him by choice.”
“That’s a big assumption, Reaper Five.”
“She could be good for the DEA if she is, though.”
“You there, Brick?” Swift came back to him.
“Copy.”
“He’s paying her fifty thousand a month.”
Brick had to stop himself from emitting a low whistle.
“There is an anomaly, however,” Swift informed him. “A portion of it is going to an account registered to her parents, the other into a different account which is virtually untouched.”
“She’s not spending it?”
“Nothing apart from a couple hundred here and there. Enough to live off, and that’s it.”
“What about an apartment?” Brick asked.
“Ishida owns it.”
“How much is in the account?”
“A hair under a million and a half.”
“She’s taking money for her parents but not for herself.”
“That’s about it,” Swift confirmed.
“Reaper, copy?”
“I’m here,” Kane replied.
“What are our friends up to down there?”
“Just enjoying the rays. Why?”
“I’m going to have a talk with Heidi.”
“That’s not advisable, Reaper Five.”
“She might be our way in. If we can turn her to our side, then we can get Ishida’s itinerary. It’ll help us to get him, and she can form a case for the DEA.”
“General, are you listening to this?” Kane asked.
“I’m here.”
“What are your thoughts?”
“It’s worth the risk.”
“Ma’am, we’re going to need to give her something,” Brick told Thurston.
“What are you thinking?”
“Protection for her parents. Maybe get them on a plane to the US.”
“If that’s what it takes, I’ll authorize it, Reaper Five.”
“Thanks, ma’am.”
He waited until she had showered and dressed before he acted. When she went into her bedroom, he entered the living room and hid beside the door. As she came out of the bedroom, his hand snaked out, and he clamped it over her mouth.