Wet Work: The Definitive Edition

by Philip Nutman

SLEEPY HOLLOW, VIRGINIA.

  FRIDAY, JUNE 2.

  3:02 A.M.

  Corvino had made good time despite traveling on foot, and three hours after he’d left Georgetown he was in Sleepy Hollow, a quiet suburban area a little south of Route 66. He’d crossed the Potomac via the Key Bridge after skirting a roadblock on the approach ramp, scaling a slope behind the six National Guardsmen who were stationed around the row of jeeps and a truck which blocked the roadway. Getting onto the bridge had been easy. Getting off hadn’t, and he’d killed a guard who’d nearly stumbled on him hiding in the shadows as he crept towards the exit ramp in Virginia where the bridge joined the Washington Memorial Parkway. He’d silenced the man with his knife, laying the body down beside the fence, hidden by a support. But the corpse had been discovered by a second guardsman within minutes, as he was slipping away from the off ramp. The guardsmen had searchlights at the roadblock and he barely managed to duck behind a clump of bushes before they lit up the surrounding area. Fortunately, an explosion in Colonial Village distracted them long enough for him to break cover and make for the Curtis Parkway on the other side of the Washington Memorial Road.

  Colonial Village was a chaos of flame and smoke. The suburb burned street by street, with firemen and the National Guard unable to contain the conflagration as police and Emergency Services evacuated residents from nearby houses. A fire-department helicopter hovered overhead monitoring the steadily spreading flames.

  Using the shadows, Corvino stuck close to Wilson Boulevard. Running parallel to Route 66, he knew Wilson would take him towards Falls Church. He’d made it across the Fairfax County line at Seven Corners and stopped. He was suddenly tired.

  He remembered killing the woman who had been tearing flesh from the doorman’s corpse.

  Self-disgust seared like acid in his mind. He wasn’t Dominic Corvino anymore, he was a ravenous cannibal, and the knowledge sickened him. He relished the succulent taste of the dead man’s flesh, the hot, salty flavor of the blood. His mouth salivated at the memory, his stomach churning.

  He had to get out of the open, find somewhere safe and ride out the vile craving. He couldn’t do it again—wouldn’t give in to the desire—however much his insides cried out for food.

  A large white house stood five hundred yards back from the boulevard, screened by a row of fir trees. Corvino slipped through the open gateway and skirted the front yard. The house was dark. If anyone was home they were asleep. Fine. All he wanted was to get into the cellar, rest up for a few hours and depart before daybreak. He crept around to the left where he could see the faint outline of storm-cellar doors that would lead under the house.

  A large padlock secured the doors. No problem. He took a silencer from an inner pocket and attached it to the Browning. The shot made a dull thud, blowing apart the lock. He opened the right-hand door and entered.

  When he came to the bottom of the steps he paused, listening.

  The house was silent. He took his Zippo lighter out and lit it. The flame chased away the darkness. The cellar was neat, orderly: a stack of old garden chairs, a sun lounger, a dusty exercise bike on a stand, piles of cardboard boxes, a workbench with regimented rows of tools. A child’s dollhouse sat in the farthest corner. To his left, steps led up to the house’s interior. He switched on a side lamp clamped to the workbench, extinguishing the lighter. It would do. The sun lounger looked inviting. But first he needed to check upstairs.

  As he reached the top step he noticed the door could be locked from the inside. Good. He didn’t want any unannounced visitors while he rested. Corvino listened at the door, then turned the handle.

  Light from the half-moon shone in through the kitchen windows to his right, revealing that the entrance to the cellar lay in an alcove to the rear of the room. Like the cellar, the kitchen was neat, tidy. There was no sign of recent habitation, not even a bowl or plate on the drying rack. Maybe the occupants were on vacation. He slipped back through the gap in the door like a shadow and locked it behind him.

  His eyelids heavy with sleep, Corvino lay down on the lounge chair and was unconscious as soon as his head touched the frayed cushions.

  He did not dream.

  Sobbing.

  Someone was crying.

  Deep sobs of desperation.

  He sat up suddenly, pulling the Browning from his shoulder holster.

  Where was he? It took a few seconds to orient himself. He was in the cellar. The sobs were coming from upstairs.

  He checked his watch. It was 5:33 A.M. He’d slept for two hours. The pain in his stomach was still there but had dulled, twisting like a blunt knife. The first glimmer of dawn leaked through the two small windows above him. He should get moving.

  The sobbing ceased; then a cry of pain lanced the silence.

  If there were people in the house there could be others in the yard. He would have to kill them.

  His stomach spasmed.

  No. He’d kill them, but he wouldn’t do that again.

  Corvino moved stealthily up the stairs, slowly unlocking the door. The sobbing had resumed. Whoever was crying was near the kitchen. He opened the door a crack.

  Between sobs the male voice beseeched God to put him out of his misery.

  Corvino pushed the door open just far enough to allow him to slip through. Treading softly, he crept into the kitchen. The sobs melted to an exhausted whimper, coming from the hallway leading off to the left of the kitchen. As he moved around the table situated in the middle, he saw a man laid out on the floor at the bottom of the stairs that led up to the second story.

  The man whimpered in pain.

  Corvino cocked the gun as he stepped closer.

  Judging by the twisted angle at which the man lay, his back was broken. He was dressed in cotton pajamas and a blue bathrobe. One foot was bare, the other slippered.

  Corvino’s left shoulder brushed against a small framed picture on the wall as he moved around to get a clear view of the hallway. The picture fell to the carpet.

  The man started.

  “Who’s there?”

  He tried to turn his head but couldn’t, the slight movement making him cry out again.

  “Help me, God help me!”

  Corvino approached the man. He was frail and looked to be in his late sixties, a thin covering of silver gray hair barely covering a head patched with liver spots.

  The man tilted his head back, rolling his eyes up to look at Corvino.

  “Thank God,” he wheezed. “My back—broken. Please, help—”

  Then he saw the gun.

  “Who are you?”

  Corvino ignored the question, looking up the stairs.

  “Take whatever you want,” the man said suddenly. “Money. I have money. Just call for an ambulance. Please, just take what you want, but get help. I can’t move.”

  “Who else is in the house?”

  “No one.” The man said, eyeing the gun.

  Corvino started cautiously up the stairs.

  “There’s no one here. Please, help me. It…” he tried to stifle a groan. “Hurts.”

  Corvino continued up the stairs.

  The man groaned again.

  The house had four bedrooms. All were empty. Only one showed signs of being used. The man was telling the truth.

  Corvino descended the stairs, stopped and sat, looking down at the man.

  “What happened?”

  “I tripped, couldn’t keep my balance. Oh, God, it hurts!” The man grabbed at his stomach with his right hand. His left arm appeared paralyzed.

  “What hurts?”

  “Hungry…so hungry. Please,” he implored.

  “What do you want—meat?”

  “Yes!” the man hissed. “Meat. I want steak.”

  Corvino raised an eyebrow, replacing the gun in its holster. He got up and went to the man. Crouching down he touched his forehead. It was cold.

  “When did this happen?”

  “I don’t know,” the man replied. “Lost all se
nse of time.”

  Corvino examined the man’s body. The spinal column was broken above the pelvic girdle. Probably some internal damage, too.

  He was dead like Corvino. Dead and alive.

  “Help me…so confused.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “We should check on the children. They’re too quiet. They’re up to something. You know John’s…” The sentence trailed off as the man’s eyes glazed over. “Don’t leave me, Elizabeth,” he murmured. “Don’t leave me, don’t leave me…”

  Corvino stood up, taking the Browning from its holster. He aimed at the man’s head and fired.

  He sat at the kitchen table deep in thought.

  He wasn’t going mad and he hadn’t been drugged.

  He wasn’t the only one who was dead and walking around, but the knowledge didn’t reassure him. Every question racing through his mind begged another. There were no answers. His thoughts spiraled down into an ever decreasing circle.

  Spiral.

  There was no point sitting here trying to make sense of it. If answers were to be found, he’d only find them at Langley.

  The kitchen clock showed 7:02. He should get moving. But first he’d try the phone again. There was one on the counter next to the oven.

  He lifted the receiver.

  The line was dead.

  BROOKLYN.

  7:11 A.M.

  Sandy lay in bed, staring at the ceiling. Jared slept beside her in the crook of her arm, his child’s breathing gentle, soothing against her chest.

  Her head throbbed where it had banged against the wall, and she could feel a large bruise. Her neck felt sore where the man had grabbed her. Just the thought of him made her shudder.

  Her rescuer, Dick Austin, was downstairs.

  After she’d spoken to Nick, he’d barricaded both the front and rear doors while she drank the herbal tea he’d made her. The attacker’s body was in the cellar. Dick had removed it once he was sure she wasn’t going to pass out. The man had lived down the street, Dick had told her. He didn’t know his name, but he’d heard he was an ex-con who worked at an auto shop over on Bedford Avenue.

  She didn’t care. He’d tried to rape and kill her. He was dead.

  Her mother was dead. Liz and Roger were probably dead, too.

  But Nick was alive, and so was she. And she wasn’t alone with Jared. Dick had told her his wife and son were dead, and had asked if he could stay.

  She realized she hadn’t thanked him for saving her.

  You’ve got to get out of the city, Nick had said. Things are falling apart. She had firsthand experience of that terrible knowledge. Head for Maryland, Nick had suggested. Go to Elliot’s farm in Keaton.

  How? The roads were blocked. It was too dangerous.

  By boat, Dick had suggested. Being in Williamsburg, they were near the East River. There were boats moored down by the Williamsburg Bridge. Dick had never handled a boat, but if they could find a decent-sized vessel they could head out into the New York Bay to the Atlantic, following the coast down the Jersey shore, past Delaware. They would turn inland at Chesapeake and float all the way up to Aberdeen. Keaton was twenty miles inland from there, up near the Pennsylvania border. It would be safest that way.

  The journey might take a couple of days, but that would give Nick time to lay his own plans and get out of Washington. He’d had enough. The situation down there was bad beyond belief. Several of the cops he knew were considering deserting. The whole thing seemed hopeless.

  Sandy heard movement downstairs. The sounds of the refrigerator door closing, crockery in the sink.

  She slipped from the bed, careful not to wake Jared. She needed to talk to Dick.

  THE FARM.

  LANGLEY, VIRGINIA.

  7:23 A.M.

  As Corvino reached the last bend in the road before the entrance to the Farm he pulled the dark green Saturn over to the right, halting the car on the grass next to a large copse of trees. He’d hot-wired the vehicle a mile outside of Country Club Hills, having decided to risk traveling by road. He badly needed to rest, to eat.

  He needed answers.

  And now he was in sight of Langley.

  He left the car, keeping close to the trees, making for the main entrance a quarter-mile down the road.

  The early morning was tranquil. Bird calls whistled from the dense woodland surrounding the road. The air smelled fresh, vibrant, making him recall happier times backpacking in the mountains. But those times were gone. Somewhere between his death and resurrection, a new world had emerged from the one he’d known, and he felt like a traveler wandering without a map. Nothing in this new landscape could be taken for granted.

  Like what awaited him at the Farm.

  The gate was usually guarded by a two-man team, but he suspected security would be a lot heavier with the state of emergency. He wanted to get an idea of what he was walking into before he went knocking on the door.

  As he came around the bend he saw the road was deserted. He’d expected a major roadblock and troops, but that obviously wasn’t the case. He crossed over to the opposite side so he could spy on the main gate from the cover of the trees.

  The Farm’s entrance was down a small side road cut into the woodland, a gray concrete security post and an electrified gate set back two hundred yards from the turning. As he drew abreast, he saw two CIA security men positioned at the gate—one man inside the building, a second standing by the electrified fence. Both were dressed in standard CIA uniform—dark suits, white shirts, dark glasses. The man by the fence carried a high-powered radio and had an M-16 slung over his shoulder. The agent inside the building appeared to be reading a magazine, Corvino observed as he crept up to the large window at the structure’s front. They seemed relaxed, like it was business as usual, but he wondered how they’d respond if he just stepped out of the trees and approached them. Maybe they’d been briefed to shoot on sight. Anything was possible.

  The guard by the gate turned at the sound of approaching vehicles, and Corvino lowered himself behind the bushes.

  Two jeeps appeared around the curve of the road that led to the Farm, followed by a large blue van, the kind used for surveillance. The jeeps held four men in each. All were dressed in combat fatigues and armed with M-16s.

  The gate swung open smoothly as the vehicles approached, the guard waving them through. The soldiers looked like Special Forces, Corvino noted, as the jeeps reached the road, but being too far away to read the insignia on their jackets, he couldn’t make out which group they were from. A third jeep trailed behind the blue van, also containing four men.

  His eyes widened as the jeep passed him.

  Skolomowski sat in the back seat, the Pole’s face impassive as the vehicle followed the van.

  So the Pole was back in the land of the living, too, which meant Lang was probably at HQ as well. Ryan must have called him in once the trouble started.

  But where was the mini-convoy headed?

  Another question. One he didn’t need an answer to right now.

  Deciding there was no point playing games, Corvino emerged from the bushes, walking slowly towards the entrance. Neither guard noticed him until he was twenty yards from the gate.

  The one inside the post saw him first and signaled urgently to his partner outside. The suit spun suddenly, pointing the M-16 at Corvino’s chest. He raised his arms, halting.

  “Hold it there!” the guard ordered.

  Corvino didn’t move.

  “Who are you?”

  “Corvino,” he shouted back. “Covert Operations.”

  “Where did you come from?” The suit who’d been reading the magazine came out of the building, a 9mm pistol in his right hand.

  “From D.C.” Corvino replied.

  “What’s your clearance?”

  Corvino looked back blankly.

  “Call Section Leader Ryan Del Valle. I work for him.”

  The second guard said something to the one with the M-16 that Corvino didn’t catch.

&nb
sp; “Come forward slowly. Keep your hands in the air.”

  He complied.

  The magazine reader went back inside the post and opened the gate. The suit with the M-16 walked slowly towards Corvino. “Hold it there.”

  Corvino halted.

  “Lie face down on the ground. Keep your hands behind your back. Don’t even think about moving.”

  He complied, lowering himself slowly to the dirt road.

  The guard came within five feet of him as the magazine reader emerged again from inside the post, his gun trained on Corvino.

  “Roll over, keeping your hands under your back.”

  The guard searched him, removing the .45 automatic and the Browning, then the combat knife from its boot sheath.

  “ID?” he asked, kicking the guns aside.

  “I don’t have it with me.”

  The guard shouldered the M-16, producing a pair of handcuffs from his jacket pocket.

  “On your front.”

  He cuffed Corvino with unnecessary force, the metal biting into his wrists.

  “Get up,” the guard ordered, scooping up the handguns. “Move.”

  He pushed Corvino towards the open gateway.

  The other guard closed the gate behind them and radioed the Farm while his colleague told Corvino to face the wall.

  Corvino rested his forehead against the cool concrete, closing his eyes, the barrel of the M-16 pressing against the base of his spine. The cuffs were painful, rubbing against the bone. There was no point complaining, the guards were just doing their job.

  “He’s clear,” the guard from inside the post said, emerging from the door. “They’re sending someone to pick him up.”

  The suit who’d cuffed him grunted, seemingly disappointed his prisoner was kosher. “Sit down,” he snapped, jabbing the automatic rifle into Corvino’s back.

  He turned around slowly, his eyes narrowing as he assessed the suit. A typical CIA grunt. Clean-cut, tense and a little too enthusiastic. Perfect Secret-Service-drone material. Corvino lowered himself without taking his eyes off his captor. A shattered kneecap would soon educate the suit’s attitude. But there was no point considering petty retribution; the guy was just being a good little worker-ant, carrying out orders.