PRIMAL Reckoning (Book 1 in the Redemption Trilogy, the PRIMAL Series Book 5)

by Jack Silkstone

  “I’m looking at the mine. Dude, it’s fucked up!”

  “You’re pretty damn observant. Aden and his buddies hit us hard.”

  “You OK?”

  “What the fuck do you think, Howard? Billions of dollars have just gone up in smoke and I’ve been left holding my dick.”

  Howard swallowed.

  “You better have called me with answers, because if I go down for this, I’m dragging you under with me.”

  “Look, um…”

  “I thought as much. You’ve got three-fifths of fuck all haven’t you?” He paused. “You find me Aden or it’s all going to come out in the wash and you’ll end up in a supermax sharing a cell with an angry ass-fucker called Maurice.” Pershing terminated the call.

  Howard stared at the satellite image as he contemplated the severity of the situation.

  Ben clicked to another shot. A different angle revealed a row of huge dump trucks, all on fire. “So, what the hell happened out there?”

  “Objective Yankee is what happened. We need to put everything we’ve got into an intel pack. This needs to go to the top.”

  ***

  Bishop saw Christina off at El Paso International, then took a cab to Horizon airport. Ten minutes out of town, the privately owned airport was the preferred location for private jets.

  He walked across the tarmac to where the PRIMAL Gulfstream was parked. The aircraft’s tail number had once again been changed. More of Chua’s counter-intel procedures. He walked up the stairs and stuck his head into the cockpit. “Where we off to, fellas?”

  “Jamaica, mon,” said Mitch in his best rasta accent.

  “Jamaica?”

  Mirza glanced back from the co-pilot’s seat. “Vance’s orders. He’s redirected us there to meet with Chua.”

  Mitch finished his preflight checks and started the turbofans. The whine of the powerful engines filled the cabin. Bishop went back and secured the door before returning. “So, anyone going to tell me what the hell is going on?”

  Mirza shrugged. “We don’t know much more than that. Got a message from the Bunker directing us to Norman Manley airport in Jamaica. Chua and a few others are already in location. They’re establishing a forward operating base. The CAT is still on the island with the rest of the team. Once we’re airborne I’ll check in and find out more.”

  “Roger.” Bishop moved back to the cabin and strapped himself in as they taxied out onto the runway. He yawned as the plush leather seat embraced him. Within seconds he was dozing, head back, mouth open. He stayed that way as the turbines screamed and the jet rocketed down the runway. They were at cruising altitude when a gentle shake woke him.

  “You’re drooling on my leather seats,” said Mitch.

  “We there yet?” Bishop frowned as he spotted Mirza sitting in the chair opposite reading the Gulfstream’s flight manual. “Um, who’s flying the jet?”

  “Autopilot, mate. We’re about five minutes from beginning our descent.” Bishop glanced at his watch. He’d been asleep for nearly an hour and a half. “I thought we were going to check in with Chua?”

  “He called already. Going to brief us once we hit the ground. In the meantime, if you can please return your seat to the upright position, raise your window shade, reach down and grab your panties, because Mirza is putting this bird on the ground. One way or another.”

  Mirza gave him a cheesy grin and thumbs-up. He followed Mitch back into the cockpit.

  “Hey, wait a minute. Mirza, he’s only just started learning to fly. This is a bloody expensive jet!” Bishop was about to unbuckle his seat belt when the jet banked hard throwing him against the arm of the leather recliner. “You ball-bags.” He laughed as he wrenched his belt tight.

  With only a few abrupt corrections the landing was smooth and they taxied toward a hangar nestled in a freight handling area. Bishop stared out the window at the rusted iron walls as the jet came to a gentle halt. The cockpit door opened and Mirza appeared wearing a broad smile. “Very nicely done,” Bishop said as he opened the door and lowered the stairs.

  “I’ve got a good instructor.”

  “Steady on, you’ll give the pommy bastard a big head.”

  Mitch appeared wearing a baseball cap proclaiming ‘WORLD’S BEST PILOT’.

  Bishop shook his head as he walked down the steps. “Too late.”

  They knocked on a side door and a full minute passed before a lock was drawn and PRIMAL’s slightly-built intelligence chief greeted them. “Welcome to Forward Operating Base Kingston. Come on in.”

  “Not quite five-star is it?” Bishop said as they entered the old hangar. Light streamed in through rusted holes in the curved tin roof. The air was heavy with an earthy stench that reminded him of mushrooms.

  “No, but it’ll do. I’ll give you the tour.” Chua took them across the empty hangar floor to the back, which was jam-packed with Pelican cases, crates, and black bags. To the side was a line of stretchers and bedding. In a small corner office they found Flash. Chua’s offsider was connecting a network of laptops.

  “I can’t believe Vance let you off the island.”

  Flash flipped him the bird. “Good to see you too, dick-lips.”

  He sat on a desk. “So you guys going to bring me up to speed?”

  Chua sat on his metal chair. “There’s a detailed team briefing at 2100 but I’ll give you a quick heads-up. We’ve decrypted the emails Flash lifted from GE and we’ve uncovered some pretty heavy stuff. They’re essentially the action arm for Manhattan Ventures and Investments. MVI raise capital and invest in highly speculative, unethical ventures. They send in GE to do the groundwork and maximize profit through force. Essentially they’re the opposite of Tariq and GE is their version of PRIMAL.”

  “Making Pershing my ultimate nemesis.”

  Chua nodded. “Yep, and we haven’t even touched the sides of what these guys are up to. We know they’ve also got CIA black contracts, but those are compartmented from the MVI side of things. As for MVI, well they’ve just finished establishing a rare-earth mine in DRC, and we’ve uncovered a new operation down in Venezuela.”

  “Well, we can scratch their Mexican aspirations.”

  “Good work; both Vance and Tariq wanted me to pass on their thanks. You’ll be happy to know they’ve made it our top priority to bring the entire organization down.”

  Bishop got up from the desk. “These fuckers have tried to kill me twice. There won’t be a third. I’ll see you at the briefing.” Leaving the office, he heard a voice that made his heart lurch.

  “Aden.” Saneh Ebadi’s long hair bounced as she strode toward him. The former Iranian operative’s striking features were stern as she came to a halt a few feet from him. “You had us worried there for a while, soldier.” Her face softened and she managed an ever so slight smile. “I’m glad you’re safe.”

  She looked radiant. The Indonesian yoga retreat had left her with a golden tan that accented her hazel eyes.

  “Thanks. Hey, I was wondering if you’d heard anything from Aleks?”

  She shook her head. “No, the last I heard he was still looking for Kurtz somewhere in Asia.”

  “Oh, so no sign of Kurtz yet.”

  “I think he’s going to need some time.”

  “Yeah, well if you hear anything let me know.”

  She reached out and touched his arm. “Look, we’re going to be working together on this one. Are you OK with that?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, no problems. I just feel sorry for Pershing and his buddies at GE.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because after what they did in Mexico, I’m going to crush them.”

  “No Aden, we are going to crush them together.”

  “I like the sound of that.”

  CHAPTER 37

  GES TRAINING AND OPERATIONS FACILITY, VIRGINIA

  Charles King held on to his baseball cap as the silver Eurocopter EC175 flared and touched down on the grass landing zone. Once it powered down he approach
ed, pulled back the sliding door of the luxury chopper and waited for the sole passenger to alight.

  Jordan Pollard, chairman and majority stake holder of MVI, stepped down from the helicopter, straightened his suit, and followed King’s direction to the ATV parked next to the helipad.

  They were on Ground Effects Services’ 2500-acre training and operations facility located in southern Virginia. The sprawling complex housed four weapons ranges, an urban warfare facility, a driver-training course, rappelling towers, and a dense vegetation training area. It also had a fenced-off black-ops staging facility complete with a Sensitive Compartmented Intelligence Facility.

  “Charles, how’s the family?” Pollard asked as King started the buggy and they drove past the shooting ranges.

  “They’re good, sir. Sandy has put on a bit of a spread for us. The boys are still at camp.”

  “She’s an amazing cook. I can’t wait.”

  With his cap, black polo shirt, and tan cargos, King looked more like a security guard than the CEO of Ground Effects Services. They drove in silence through a densely forested area until they reached a security checkpoint. Black uniformed guards carrying AR carbines recognized both men and waved them through. They pulled up in front of a modern home that was modeled on the old plantation manors common in the area. It had red brick construction, with tall white columns either side of the door and a row of gabled windows on the upper level.

  Pollard gripped the ATV’s roll cage and groaned as he pulled himself from the buggy. “Damn knee.” He hobbled after King and followed him into the study where he lowered himself into a leather recliner.

  “So what in God’s name happened down there?”

  King poured him a tumbler of whiskey, neat, then walked across to a panel on the wall and activated a communications jamming system. “We were attacked by a team of highly trained, enabled, and motivated mercenaries.”

  “What brings you to that conclusion?”

  “They armed the ranchers, did a recon on the mine, targeted the Chaquetas Negras, shut down Longreach, and then they destroyed the mine. If I didn’t know better, I would bet my money on it being an ODA mission.”

  “Do you have any idea who they are?”

  King nodded. “The CIA is calling the ringleader Objective Yankee. He’s the guy Pershing tried to kill and he appears to have been involved in terrorist activities for a few years now. We’ve got a lead on one of his associates. A German national, former GSG 9. I’m sending one of my men to Germany to track him down.”

  Pollard got out of the chair and walked to the window. It was tinted, covered in a reflective film designed to scramble the beam of a laser listening device. He gazed at the trees thirty yards away. “How much information do these people have on us?”

  “It’s hard to say. We can assume they got most of Wesley’s emails from his phone.”

  Pollard grunted. “That idiot. What does he know about the agency contracts?”

  “Nothing.”

  “So, you don’t think they’ve been compromised?”

  “No, sir.”

  “What about Venezuela?”

  “It’s possible, but highly unlikely.”

  Pollard continued to stare as he sipped the whiskey. He spoke softly, “This little problem in Mexico has cost me a lot of money. And when I say a lot, I mean well over a hundred million. So you can understand that I am a little angry about it. In fact you might say I am furious.”

  King swallowed.

  The chairman turned from the window and fixed him with an icy stare. “So, what I want to happen is this. I want the people who are responsible found. I want them killed and I want their families killed. I want every living trace of them removed from the face of the earth.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Your man Pershing, where is he?”

  “He’s at a safe house in Texas with one of our tactical teams.”

  “And what’s your opinion on his performance?”

  “He’s one of our best men, sir.”

  “Are you saying he isn’t responsible?”

  “None of us saw this threat coming. It was a wildcard. We’ve been targeted by professionals.”

  “Reel him in then. I want him to take point on this. He’s been at the firing end; he knows what these people are capable of. Give him all the resources he needs, but if he screws up again, he’s done. You understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I already spoke to the Contracting Director. The analyst that Pershing was working with will be moved to the facility here. The CIA is taking this attack on US interests very seriously. They’ve agreed to foot the bill for the investigation. You will be taking the contract.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “These people are going to find out what happens to people who fuck with me, Charles. My lawyers are going to sue the Mexican government under the Free Trade Agreement.” He pointed at him. “And you’re going to kill the men who attacked us.” He placed the tumbler on the table and headed toward the door. “Now let’s have lunch. Did your wife make that potato salad I had last time I was here? Goddamn, it was delicious.”

  ***

  Keep reading for a preview of PRIMAL Nemesis.

  AUTHOR’S FINAL WORDS

  When I first started writing this series, I did it entirely for me. It was therapeutic sending my operatives around the world taking down scumbags and dealing out justice. But, along the way a lot of people joined me on this journey. They email, instagram, tweet, Facebook, and leave reviews telling me how much they love the series and its characters. You guys are now the reason I write. So let me know what you think so I can continue to grow and learn as a writer. Leave a review and spread the word.

  In case you didn’t know, Reckoning is the first in a trilogy that pits the PRIMAL team against their deadliest enemy yet. You can expect Nemesis and Redemption to hit the shelves ASAP. In fact, if you keep turning the pages you’ll see I’ve included the first chapter of the next book in the series.

  Back to it.

  JS

  EXCERPT FROM PRIMAL NEMESIS

  PROLOGUE

  CARACAS, VENEZUELA

  Antonio Lopez gripped the flagpole with both hands and waved it furiously. The bandana obscuring his face hid a broad grin. In the last ten minutes the small group of university students had swelled from a few hundred to thousands. There was now a sea of brightly colored flags swaying as the army of demonstrators marched toward Altamira Square. Calls for freedom, less corruption, and more security filled the air as they surged forward. There was an energy around them that filled Antonio with hope. Hope that Venezuela could force change on a government bloated with corruption and nepotism. Hope that they could make a real difference.

  He passed the flag to the supporter by his side and fished his smartphone from the pocket of his jeans. The Twitter message he had sent from an anonymous account had been retweeted over four thousand times. Word had spread, and more and more demonstrators were joining the revolution.

  The twenty-year-old student was one of a handful organizing the demonstrations. A leader in the secretive Movimiento Estudiantil, or Student Movement, his job was to use social media to rally thousands of students to pre-designated points around the city. They were always one step ahead of the Venezuelan police, the military, and the colectivo paramilitary groups. Of the three, the colectivos were by far the most dangerous. Lacking the discipline of the government agencies, they had already beaten dozens of young demonstrators. But even they couldn't stop what had been started; the revolution was gathering momentum. The government would soon be forced to listen.

  "Antonio, Antonio." One of the other protest organizers, Camilla his girlfriend, tugged at his sleeve. The petite brunette held up her phone. "The police are rallying at the square."

  "OK." He checked his own device. Sure enough, the tweets were starting to flow. The colectivos, politically motivated militias, were also starting to gather their forces. It was time for the leadership o
f the Movimiento to fade away. The demonstration would continue without them. He sent a text message to the other leaders. They would meet tonight to plan the next round of demonstrations and evaluate their tactics.

  He took his girlfriend by the hand and led her out of the crowd, down a side street.

  "I feel terrible leaving them," she said once they were clear of the turmoil.

  He pulled the bandana from his face. "The work we’re doing is too important to risk being arrested. Who will organize the demonstrations if we’re captured?"

  "True." She was quiet as they walked down the street, hand in hand.

  When they reached their bikes, Antonio unchained them. "Let’s meet tonight at your place. The others will be there as well." He leant across and kissed her. "We are doing the right thing, you will see. Go home and study. Venezuela needs doctors."

  He rode off in the direction of his house. The noise of the protests grew softer as he cycled away, replaced by the wail of sirens as a column of police cars raced past him. He managed to suppress a grin. By the time they got there most of the students would have already left. It was only the hardliners that would remain, those looking for a fight.

  He pulled his bicycle up in front of his house and checked his phone’s messages. He had confirmation that all five of the Movimiento protest leaders would be at tonight’s meeting. That was good news because tonight they would have a guest attending, a member of the Voluntad Popular Party. People were starting to take notice.

  ***

  "Boss, you might want to have a look at this." Pete, the team’s intel specialist was sitting in front of an array of screens in the corner of an old sugar warehouse.

  James 'Jimmy' Scott, the leader of the six-man team, hauled his compact frame off a tattered couch and ambled over to the makeshift intel center. It was 2000 hours on a Friday night and his boys hadn't seen any action for a week. "You actually got something useful this time?" he said as he stuck his Tom Selleck-inspired moustache over Pete’s shoulder.