Talkin' Jive

by Erik Carter

  “All right, then. Six million going once … going twice …”

  There was a CRASH from the side of the room.

  A gaping, torn hole burst through the thin partition wall that cut the conference hall in half, and an armed man ran into the room, having shouldered his way right through the wall.

  It was Dale.

  He had both hands on his Model 36, swinging it left and right.

  An entire half of the wall toppled over with a loud bang, sending a gust of air through the room.

  “Federal agent!”

  The guests all fled for the exit. They knew that this man was there for Asa, and they were more than happy to abandon him. They hid their faces with their hands, trying to conceal their identities.

  Asa looked at Lebedev, fleeing with the rest of them. Lebedev looked back at him and gave him a small shrug that said tough luck.

  And then he was gone.

  Dale, though, wasn’t watching the other men. He had his gun aimed at Asa, both hands wrapped around it. There was a cold, determined look on his face as he moved toward him.

  With the guests gone, the room had quieted. The faint screams from the closet in the back could be heard again.

  Dale kept moving toward him, gun leveled.

  Asa just watched for a moment, keeping his eyes locked on Dale. He breathed rapidly, shallowly, nearly hyperventilating.

  And then he screamed out loud, throwing his head back, feeling the veins in his neck bulge.

  “You just cost me millions of dollars and my goddamn freedom!”

  “Oh, I heard the auction,” Dale said, looking over the top of his gun. “Pretty clever. Have your Soviet buddy raise the bidding then take the money and run, getting Russian asylum and protection, knowing whoever won tonight wouldn’t dare retaliate against the Soviet Union when they never got the intel they were promised. Were you and Lebedev splitting the profit fifty/fifty?”

  Asa was again impressed with Dale’s ability to put the pieces together. So he gave him a small, respectful nod. “Sixty/forty, actually. I did organize everything, after all.”

  “Shrewd. But now you’re right back to where you started two years ago when you were indicted. A federal fugitive with nowhere to go.”

  “All thanks to you.”

  “Put down the disk, Lutz. It’s over. You’re at the end of your rope. No more bargaining. No more scheming. No more silver tongue. You’re out of options.”

  Asa gave him a smile. “Oh, am I?”

  He cocked his head to the side, as if listening carefully for something. He put a perplexed look on his eyes and an obnoxious smile on his lips.

  “You hear something?”

  Dale scowled at him as he continued toward him. But then his expression changed. He’d heard it. The muffled screams from the back side of the room.

  “What is that?”

  Asa began moving slowly to his right.

  “Don’t move! Who’s in that closet?”

  Asa ignored his command. He kept easing to the side until he got himself into position. He now stood between Dale and the closet. He started walking backwards, toward the screams.

  “I said don’t move!”

  “Are you gonna shoot now, Dale? With the closet behind me? What if you miss? What if one of those bullets goes straight through me?”

  “Who’s in there?”

  Asa was truly flustering him now. Delicious.

  He shrugged. “It’s locked, Dale. And I have the key.”

  Asa arrived at the closet. He stopped, his back facing the door.

  “Open it!”

  “Whatever you say. You’re the man with the gun.”

  Asa slowly reached into his pocket and took out the key. He unlocked the door, opened it.

  Inside, with her mouth gagged and her hands tied, was Penny Whitworth.

  Chapter Seventy-Three

  Dale felt his mouth open and the gun dip slightly in his hands.

  Penny was crouched on the floor of the closet, still in the green scrubs she’d been wearing when Dale had last seen her at the airport. Her hands were bound with thin, blue, nylon rope. A cloth was stuffed into her mouth, secured in place by another cloth that was wrapped around her head, tied in the back. Her eyes were bloodshot, cheeks red and streaked with mascara. She was trembling. She looked right at Dale.

  “Your little friend,” Hendrix said. “She was so proud of her new job.”

  Dale remembered how Penny had excitedly shown Dale her name tag at the airport, flicking it with her finger. He glanced at it now.

  Penny Whitworth, RN

  Davidson Memorial Hospital

  And he remembered what she’d said to him, that she was about to start her first shift at her new job. In one little exchange with Dale, she’d given Hendrix a name, location, and time to track her down.

  Hendrix suddenly reached behind his back and pulled out his Beretta 70, aimed it down toward the floor at Penny.

  She screamed louder, shielded her head with her bound arms.

  “Like I told you before, Dale, you could learn a thing or two from me. Never go into a situation without a backup plan. Always use your head. Now here’s what’s going to happen. I’m getting out of here, Penny’s coming with me, and if you want her to remain alive, you’re going to put down that gun.”

  Dale stared at him, didn’t lower his gun.

  “I said put it down!” Hendrix shouted.

  Dale still kept the gun on him.

  “If I put this gun down, you’ll walk out of here scot-free. You’ll shoot the federal agent; then you’ll shoot your only surviving witness, Penny; and then you’ll stroll out of the building. I’m calling your bluff, Lutz. I won’t give up. You know this. And as long as I’m around, you need Penny alive. She’s your last bargaining chip. The last resort of a lifelong loser.”

  Dale recognized how strong of a communicator Hendrix was, but Dale was no slouch when it came to language either. Dale was gonna turn the tables on this asshole, use the magic of language against him for once. After all, words were the most powerful weapon.

  Hendrix stared into him, growled. He grabbed Penny, yanked her to her feet. He stood behind her, gun to her temple.

  She looked at Dale, pleading.

  “Then it appears we’ve reached a bit of a stalemate,” Hendrix said, speaking from behind Penny’s shoulder.

  “It would appear that way.”

  “But I do still have one advantage.”

  “What’s that?”

  Hendrix motioned his head toward Penny. “I have cover. And you’re completely exposed.”

  He turned his gun on Dale and fired.

  In the split second before Hendrix squeezed the trigger, Dale recognized that he truly intended to shoot. Dale had enough experience to recognize when someone was feigning and when someone meant business.

  Hendrix meant business.

  Dale dove to his right, sliding behind one of the columns as a bullet ripped into it. A moment later, two more bullets struck the column.

  The shots stopped. Dale peered out.

  The door at the front of the conference hall was open. In the dark hallway beyond, Dale could see Hendrix running away with Penny.

  Dale jumped to his feet, aimed his Model 36.

  No clear shot, nothing that wouldn’t endanger Penny.

  Hendrix and Penny rounded the corner and disappeared.

  Dale sprinted out of the conference room and into the darkness. The thuds of his footsteps echoed off the walls. At the end of the hall, he turned the corner, and saw Hendrix with Penny at the bank of elevators. There was the ding of an arriving carriage. Hendrix fired his Beretta into the buttons on the wall then pushed Penny into the elevator.

  Dale arrived just as the elevator closed, getting a brief glimpse of Hendrix and Penny, her eyes looking into him again with utter fright. The doors shut.

  He shoved his fingers into the crack of the doors, tried to pry it open. Nothing. He could hear the carriage begin to
descend.

  He looked at the elevator controls. Utterly mangled, springs and metal and wire dangling off the wall.

  He turned, saw the door to the stairway at the end of the hall, and sprinted to it.

  Chapter Seventy-Four

  Asa finished untying Penny’s hands then yanked the gag out of her lips.

  “Creep!” she screamed the moment her mouth was free.

  He spun her around violently, stuck the Beretta into her back.

  “Now, listen,” he said. “We’re walking out of here, and you’re going to play it cool. Just be a good girl, and this will all turn out fine for you.”

  Penny was trying to be tough. She’d stopped crying, but her body was still shaking violently. He could tell she was working hard, but in vain, to control it.

  He kept the gun on her back and put the other hand on her hip, keeping her close. Her ass was pressed against his crotch. A nice ass. He squeezed himself in tighter.

  “There’s a guard in the lobby,” he said, leaning around her, speaking softly, his lips brushing her ear. She pulled away. “Don’t get any ideas. He doesn’t need to get hurt. But I will if I have to. So just play it cool. Okay?”

  She didn’t reply.

  “Okay?”

  He jammed the barrel of the gun hard into her back.

  She screamed out.

  “All right!” she said.

  She shook harder now.

  Asa watched the numbers above the elevator doors as they dropped.

  3 … 2 … 1.

  Ding.

  The doors began to open.

  “Let’s go.”

  Chapter Seventy-Five

  Dale’s footsteps clattered loudly up and down the stairwell. It was dark and musty and had that smell that only comes from old buildings and antiques. He rushed down the steps haphazardly, nearly losing his footing.

  He reached the bottom floor, pushed through the exit door, and entered the lobby.

  He saw the night watchman lying on the floor behind his desk, bleeding profusely and grabbing at his shoulder.

  He ran up to him, dropped to his knees.

  The man grimaced, pointing to the exit. “I saw rope on the elevator floor. And the girl was crying. When I walked up to them, he shot me. They went out the front door and headed right.”

  Dale hesitated. He knew the man needed medical attention, but Hendrix was getting away with the nuclear secrets. And Penny.

  The watchman saw his hesitation.

  “I already called an ambulance,” the man said. “Just go!” He jabbed a finger toward the front entrance.

  Dale nodded and sprinted away.

  Chapter Seventy-Six

  Asa and Penny moved down the sidewalk among the nighttime crowds. Asa kept his gun concealed behind her back. There was a strong breeze, and it tossed her hair about. They strolled as casually as possible.

  Penny shuddered again.

  “Shut your mouth,” Asa said quietly.

  When they’d exited the elevator back at the Hamilton National building, Asa had tried to be as casual as possible when he and Penny entered the lobby. But the night watchman’s suspicions had been immediately aroused. The man had stood up and approached them. Asa didn’t have the time to talk his way out of the situation. So he just shot the man in the shoulder.

  He could have killed him, and, of course, that would have been a better solution. One less witness. But for some reason Asa still couldn’t bring himself to kill another person. He wished, then, that he’d brought Cody with him instead of leaving him in charge of the forces at Y-12. But who would have guessed things would have turned out this way? Who would have guessed he’d end up tangling with someone like Dale?

  As he thought about it now, the unanswered questions frustrated him even more. Who was this federal agent? How had he found out about Asa’s operations? Asa realized that he never even learned Dale’s last name.

  No matter who he was in the rest of the world, Dale was the thorn in Asa’s side that was keeping him from his goals. Maybe Asa hadn’t been able to bring himself to kill the guard or any of the others that had to die along this journey. But he could make one exception. For Dale. He could kill Dale.

  He looked back to the Hamilton National Bank tower. The front doors swung open. Dale ran out of the building, saw Hendrix and Penny, and started sprinting toward them.

  Hendrix turned back around and picked up the pace, shoving Penny in the back. There was an alley ahead, to the left.

  He turned the corner.

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Dale turned off Gay Street and sprinted into the alley where he’d seen Hendrix and Penny go. They were farther down the alley, almost to the end, running away.

  “Freeze, Lutz!”

  He fired off a warning shot, into the ground.

  Hendrix whipped around and fired back in his direction, no hesitation. The rounds flew all around Dale.

  He jumped behind a dumpster. Bullets pinged off the metal.

  Dale listened. And counted. Four shots. And the shooting ceased. It was quiet now but for the wind whistling between the walls. A smile came to Dale’s face. He knew the danger had passed.

  So he stood up.

  And stepped out from behind his cover.

  Keeping his gun aimed, Dale casually walked down the center of the alley toward Hendrix, who was about fifty feet away, hiding behind Penny. Hendrix’s gun was under her chin.

  “You remember that scene in Dr. No, Lutz?” Dale said. “The one where Bond counts the number of rounds his enemy has fired? That’s a standard Beretta 70, .32 ACP. You’ve fired eight rounds. Three in the conference hall, one into the elevator controls, and four now. You’re out of ammo.”

  As soon as Dale finished his sentence, he bolted toward them.

  Hendrix let go of Penny and took off, dropping his gun to the ground. He took a right at the end of the alley and disappeared from Dale’s sight.

  As Dale ran past Penny, he gave her a little smile and said, “Be right back.”

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  Asa raced frantically down the sidewalk, pushing people out of his way, looking behind his back every few feet.

  Dale was behind him. And gaining. But that was all right because Asa had one more option left. It was an impromptu thought, a bit of resourcefulness. And it was only a couple blocks away.

  He took a left onto Church Avenue. There was an overpass in front of him, and he saw his destination.

  His salvation. His way out of this mess. His final option.

  Asa was a survivor. No matter how many times life had tried to crush him, he’d always found a way to slither out from beneath its boot. A person simply has to remember that there are always options. Never give up. Use your head.

  He continued toward the overpass, moving even faster.

  Chapter Seventy-Nine

  Ahead of Dale, Hendrix turned a corner. Dale chased after him. People screamed, moved out of his way at the sight of his gun.

  Dale followed Hendrix onto an overpass that spanned a busy highway. Dale saw where Hendrix was headed, a large building that sat atop the overpass. There were buses all around it. In big letters across the side of the building was:

  KNOXVILLE AREA TRANSIT

  It was a windy night, and the gusts were even more powerful on the overpass. Dale felt his hair whipping to the left side of his head. The stronger wind made running more difficult, but Dale was far faster than Hendrix, and the gap closed rapidly. They were only a few yards apart. The entrance to the bus station was still half a block away. He yelled out to Hendrix over the wind and the highway traffic.

  “Give it up, Lutz! I’m gaining on you. You’re out of options.”

  Hendrix glanced back over his shoulder. He looked exhausted, and by the expression on his face, it was evident that Hendrix recognized that Dale was about to catch up.

  He slowed from a run to a hopeless jog to a defeated walk. Then he stopped. And turned around. Waited for just a moment. A
nd then did something very bizarre. He crossed the street, going away from the bus station to the opposite side of the overpass.

  What the hell was he up to?

  Hendrix walked to the sidewalk and stopped next to the short, cement wall.

  Dale continued after him, his Model 36 still aimed in his direction. He stepped onto the sidewalk and looked over the wall. A divided, four-lane highway ran beneath the overpass, several feet below. The traffic roared. Semis whooshed by.

  “You’re not entirely correct, Dale,” Asa shouted over the traffic. “I do have one more bargaining chip.”

  He held up the disk.

  “This.”

  He extended his arm out over the rushing vehicles, dangling the disk between two fingers. It flapped in wind.

  “Stop right where you are,” he said.

  Dale did as he was told, coming to a halt. He kept his gun aimed at Hendrix. They were about fifteen feet apart.

  “You know what the punishment is for treason,” Hendrix said. “Death. I have absolutely nothing left to lose, and one way or another I’m getting on one of those buses and getting the hell out of here. I hold in my hand some of the nation’s most valuable secrets — schematics and figures and charts for the most destructive technology known to man. Put that gun down, or I drop the disk. Sure, it could get destroyed, run over by a truck. But maybe it’ll land on one of the trucks. Or maybe it’ll get carried off in the wind. And get lost out there in the world. On your watch. Do you want to be the federal agent who lost the nation’s nuclear secrets? Put. The gun. Down.”

  Dale hated to give Hendrix any sort of power, but he couldn’t deny that the man’s words were now screaming through his mind.

  Hendrix was right. The information on that disk was enough to start a third world war. It was enough to give enemy forces the information they would need to bring the United States — hell, the whole free world — to its knees.