“Or an act of terrorism,” I said.
Eric opened his mouth, closed it, and was silent a moment. He had a thoughtful expression on his face, eyes distant and intense. I recognized the look. The gears were turning, and the permutations were calculating. He was on to something.
“Eric, what are you thinking?
“You might be right. It might be an act of terrorism, but I don’t think so.”
“Then what?”
He looked up at me, his eyes suddenly clear. “A distraction.”
All eyes turned to him.
“From what?” Holland asked.
“I don’t know. I haven’t worked it all out yet. But think about the timing. The shootings and kidnappings the FBI has been investigating, the crime wave in the city, the attempt on Elizabeth and Sabrina…it’s too much to be a coincidence. There has to be a connection.”
As soon as he said it, I felt like someone had dropped a huge stone on my gut. My hand slapped against my forehead and I cursed myself for not putting it together right away.
“Shit. Those motherfuckers.”
“What?” Eric asked.
“SRT. I can’t believe I didn’t see it sooner.”
“Wait, you mean the Storm Road Tribe?”
“Yes.”
There was a pause. The others stared, waiting.
“You gonna elaborate, or what?” Holland asked.
I shook my head. “Later. For right now, we need to get our heads back in the game. Thompson, reach behind you and hand me that duffel bag.”
He did. I opened it and took out a black plastic case. From the case I removed a high-resolution digital camera and a large zoom lens.
“Eric, scope out your side of the district. Let me know if you see anything I should photograph.”
“On it.”
“Everybody else, eyes on the ground. Let Eagle Two know if you see infected. Anybody got a GPS?”
Thompson held up his.
“Good. Holland, you be the eyes. Thompson, feed coordinates back to Great Hawk.”
Thompson opened the starboard side door and activated his GPS. Holland moved to that side and attached a tether line to his harness before sitting down in the doorway. I moved closer to the port side door and began snapping photos.
The damage to this part of the district was negligible compared to what the areas east and south had suffered. From what I could see, it appeared most people here had sheltered in place and were just now emerging to find out what happened. They spoke to each other in huddled groups, swaddled against the cold in blankets and rags. Children clung to their parents, the smallest of them held tight in protective arms. Most of the adults I photographed were armed with at least a blade or a bludgeon, and more than half had firearms. That gave me pause. On the one hand, I could not blame these people for wanting to protect themselves. On the other, if a big Gray or a swarm of fast movers showed up, the guns might do more harm than good.
“Eagle Two, Eagle one. How’s it looking over there?”
“Situation is contained, Eagle one,” Great Hawk answered. “The infected are down. Half of our personnel are now assisting with the evacuation. The rest are on patrol.”
“Let the Army handle the evacuation. I want our guys back in their vehicles and searching the district for infected. Send Alpha and Bravo north, Delta and Echo west, Charlie and Foxtrot can handle the south and east respectively.”
“Roger that, Eagle One.”
“Roark, bank right and take us along the edge of the perimeter. I want to see if there were any more breaches on this side.”
“Copy.”
The Blackhawk turned and gave me a broad view of the perimeter fence along the edge of the district. I held up the camera and scanned the periphery to see if there was any movement outside the border. I saw none. As we neared the northernmost point, we came to an old hotel that looked abandoned. As we passed the hotel, I scanned the broken windows. Through the openings, I could see signs of occupation, probably left by squatters and opium addicts. If any of them had been here when the bombs went off, they were gone now. I was about to shift my gaze when I saw movement at the edge of my vision. Adjusting the camera, I zoomed in and began snapping pictures.
And that was when I saw them.
There were two men. One was a hulking brute with dark skin and a swirl of strange tattoos on his exposed skin. The other was lean and tall, though not as tall as his companion, with a high forehead, patrician nose, and close-cropped gray hair. They both looked in my direction at the very moment I focused the camera on them. The shutter had time to snap twice before they turned away and disappeared.
And who might you be?
Something was not right about those men. I thought about Agent Kaminsky, and how he always put surveillance on crime scenes to take photos of those who came to gawk. When I asked him why, he had told me that criminals and murderers liked to return to the scene of the crime. In fact, they were often on scene when the cops showed up, unable to pull themselves away from the gratification of watching the police try to piece together what they had done.
“If there’s one thing these guys all have in common,” Kaminsky had said, “it’s ego. Narcissism like you wouldn’t believe. They love to watch us pick through the evidence and scratch our heads. Makes them feel smart, feeds their egotistical need for power and superiority. Some of them even talk to the cops and try to insert themselves into the investigation. Those are the worst ones. Fuckers get off on re-living their crimes.”
I was about to give Roark the order to bring us down in the hotel parking lot when static broke through on the radio.
“Eagle One, this is Alpha. We found another big Gray. Enga-”
The squad leader’s words were cut off by a roar and a crash of metal. I heard shouting and screams of agony and the unmistakable chatter of gunfire before the radio went silent.
“Alpha, what’s going on? Give me your location.”
No answer.
“Goddammit, Alpha, where are you? Respond.”
Roark looked back at me. I cast a final glance toward the hotel and then angrily motioned for Roark to turn southward. As I did, Thompson slapped me on the arm and pointed out the starboard side door. A red flare was streaking upward into the sky, leaving a trail of dark smoke in its wake.
“Holland, get back on the gun.”
He moved to comply. As the Blackhawk banked and headed south, I called up the pictures I had just taken on the camera’s display. Eric noticed what I was doing and moved over to look.
“What do you got?”
I held up the camera so he could see it.
“Okay, who the hell are those guys?”
“No idea. But they chose a damn good position to watch the attack play out. Give you one guess why someone would do that.”
Eric did not have to answer. When he looked up at me, the icy glint in his eyes told me everything I needed to know.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Heinrich
Abandoned Hotel, Refugee District
Maru turned a corner, ducked inside an empty room, and emerged with a black duffel bag.
“It was him,” Heinrich said, trying to get his heartbeat under control. “It was Garrett.”
“The Blackthorn?” Maru asked as he knelt to open the bag.
“Yes. The Blackthorn.”
Heinrich’s second-in-command opened the duffel and pulled out a MK-18 carbine. He passed it to Heinrich, along with a messenger bag full of spare magazines. Then he reached in and grabbed the same for himself.
“Did you see the camera?” Heinrich asked.
He had caught a glint of light when the helicopter passed him, almost panicking when he thought it was a sniper scope. But then he had looked through his binoculars and realized it was a camera lens, and worse, who was behind it. The face had been unmistakable. He had studied it closely in photos taken by his surveillance teams over the last few months. In that time, he had memorized every scar, every hard angle of cheek and
jaw, the eerie gray eyes, even the way the man’s canines looked just a bit too long when he smiled. It had never occurred to him the Blackthorn commander might someday return the favor.
“Yeah, Chief. I saw it.”
I’ve been so careful, he thought, turning his anger toward himself. All that effort to hide my identity, and for what?
Heinrich leaned against the wall behind him and gently smacked his head against it. There were so many precautions he should have taken. He should have grown his hair and beard long so he could easily change his appearance. He should have turned the room into a proper sniper hide and not just an observation post. He should have ducked out of sight as soon as he had seen the Blackhawk flying in his direction. He should have posted one of his men in that room to watch the attack and feed him intel via radio instead of doing the job himself. And now, because of his own grinning hubris, his identity had been compromised.
Why? After all this time, how could I screw up so badly?
Heinrich took a deep breath to clear his mind. Then another. After a few seconds, he was able to separate his emotions from the situation and look at things objectively.
He understood the problem now. For the last two years, he had known nothing but victory. The Storm Road Tribe had carved through the city’s underworld like a scythe. The various gangs and crime syndicates had tried to resist, but one by one, Heinrich had dismantled them. He had not, however, done this through brute force. Rather, he had used the skills he had gained as a Marine and an intelligence officer to carefully plan attacks that pitted his rivals against one another. And it had worked beautifully. He now controlled the entirety of the Colorado Springs vice trade and, more importantly, he had used his burgeoning wealth to pay off dozens of cops, a handful of judges, several city officials, and even a few well-placed federal agents. And he had accomplished all of it without ever revealing himself to anyone outside his trusted circle of operatives.
The city was his now. Drugs, prostitution, extortion, gambling—he controlled it all. And there was nothing concrete connecting him to any of it. He could walk the streets like anyone else, the people around him unaware of the danger that moved among them. It had all been going so perfectly.
Until now.
Now they had his picture. And Maru’s. Heinrich looked at his right-hand man with concern. Maru’s size and tattoos would make it impossible for him to hide in plain sight. Heinrich would have to be careful getting him out of the city.
Unless…
Maru had his back turned, hands busy with the contents of the duffel bag. Heinrich’s MK-18 had a short suppressor on the end of the barrel. He knew if he fired, the muffled report would be inaudible outside the building.
His hands tensed. His right index finger slipped over the trigger. It would only take an instant. Shoulder the weapon, a steady squeeze, and problem solved. He stood that way for a long few seconds, his mind turning over the possible outcomes. Then he relaxed, let out a silent breath, and let the weapon hang. Now was not the time. For the moment, he needed his enforcer at his side. There was a lot of work to do, and he would need someone reliable to help him do it. And besides, killing Maru now would raise too many questions among the tribe. If the man became a liability later, he could deal with it then. But for now, Maru was more valuable alive.
The big Maori finished rooting through the bag, then zipped it closed and slung it across his chest. Standing, he turned to look at his chief.
“What do you want to do?”
Heinrich held up an index finger, closed his eyes, and listened. The sound of the Blackhawk was diminishing, the thrum of rotors receding into the distance.
“I think the chopper is heading away from us.”
“I think you’re right, Chief.”
Heinrich opened his eyes and considered what this meant. If Garrett had thought the man he had photographed was involved in the attack, the chopper would be landing in the parking lot right now. The doors would open, soldiers would pour out, and he and Maru would be trapped like rats. But none of that was happening. The Blackhawk was moving away. When he thought about it more calmly, he realized he may have been overreacting.
What was there, after all, connecting him to the attack on the Refugee District other than his presence at the hotel? No one had a clue as to his underworld affiliations, much less his identity or what he looked like. If Garrett showed the photos to anyone, they would see a big dark-skinned man standing next to a tall white man in his late forties, and that was all. They had not been armed when the photos were taken. Nor had they been engaged in any obvious criminal activity. For all anyone knew, they were just a couple of bystanders who heard the commotion and came to gawk. If asked why they had run from the chopper, they could simply mention the door-mounted minigun and say they had not wanted to be mistaken for ghouls. It was the kind of response any government-hating denizen of the city’s slums might offer.
The more he thought about it, the more Heinrich felt his tension dissipate. He held out his rifle to Maru and nodded at the duffel bag.
“Put the guns away. We won’t need them.”
Maru hesitated. “You sure, Chief?”
A thin smile. “Yes, Maru. I’m sure.”
*****
An hour later, Heinrich exited a carriage taxi, paid the driver, and stood before the entrance of the Red Barrel Tavern. He made a show of adjusting his coat and putting on a knit cap while scanning the street. The neighborhood around him was primarily residential with a few small stores, street stalls, and the lone tavern. The tenement buildings were mostly made of wood, interspersed with a few concrete survivors of the artillery fire that had devastated the area nearly eight years ago. It had once been a prosperous section of town, but the changing fates of the post-Outbreak world had seen it reduced to working-class status. Which, in the Springs, was half a rung up the ladder from abject poverty.
It was Heinrich’s favorite haunt. The streets here were like a maze. Anyone not familiar with the area would quickly become lost without a guide. The people living here were violent, suspicious, and quick to relieve the unwary of their worldly possessions.
A couple of children, neither of them older than ten, started moving in Heinrich’s direction. The dirty faces of the two boys shined with angelic hopefulness as they approached. When Heinrich glanced over, the boys clutched each other, looking as pitiful as Dickensian orphans. Heinrich put a hand in his pocket, wrapped his fingers around a knife, and fixed them with a flat, predatory gaze. The children stopped, stared, and slowly backed away. The innocent faces transformed into hateful scowls as they slunk off to find a softer target.
Heinrich walked up the steps to the tavern and pushed through the front door. The bright glare of the noonday sun vanished instantly, swallowed by the gloom of the stuffy interior. He breathed in the scents of marijuana, opium, spilled booze, urine, old vomit, and the all-pervading stench of unwashed bodies. Before the Outbreak it would have been unbearable, but these days, everything and everyone smelled awful. It had bothered Heinrich at first, but over time, he had gotten used to it.
He walked past rows of rough-hewn tables to the long, polished bar. A couple of men glared balefully at him as he approached. The bartender noticed and leaned down to whisper something to them. They listened for a few seconds, and when they looked at Heinrich again, there was fear in their eyes. The men picked up their drinks and moved to the other side of the room.
“What can I get for you, Mr. Blain?” the bartender asked.
Heinrich took a seat. Blain was the alias he used when conducting business in this part of town.
“Is Tobias here?”
“I believe so. Would you like me to go get him?”
“Yes. But first, pour me a Stall’s Reserve.”
The rail-thin bartender complied. A clean glass appeared in front of Heinrich, followed by a pouring of neat moonshine. Heinrich lifted it, watched the liquor swirl like a transparent cloud, and then downed it in one gulp. When he exhaled, the
burn was instant and welcome. He sucked air in through his teeth as he set the glass back on the bar.
“Refill, sir?”
“Yes. It’s been one of those days.”
After refilling the drink, the bartender said, “I’ll go get Tobias for you.”
Heinrich nodded dismissively, and the man scurried away.
Less than a minute later, Tobias appeared and took a seat next to Heinrich. His face was dominated by a long scar running from the lobe of his ear to the tip of his chin. He was several inches shorter than his chief, but what he lacked in height he made up for with solid muscle. The stocky marauder placed his thick forearms on the bar and leaned toward Heinrich.
“How’d it go?”
“Wonderfully. Better than expected.”
“Did they get out? You know the…”
“No.” Heinrich took a sip of his drink. “The situation is contained.”
Tobias nodded, looking relieved. “That’s good. Don’t want those things running around all over the city.”
“Not yet, anyway.”
Tobias glanced nervously at Heinrich. His mouth opened, wavered, and then clamped shut. Finally, he said, “So what’s our next move?”
“Are the other cells ready to go?”
“Yes sir. Awaiting orders.”
“Good. Tell them to sit tight. I want to see how things play out.”
“Will do.”
Tobias began to stand, but Heinrich stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Tobias?”
“Yes?”
“Keep it quiet. Understood?”
“Yes sir.”
Heinrich watched with amusement as the man scuttled away. The bartender appeared and asked if he wanted another drink. Heinrich nodded.
Phase one complete, he thought. Now he needed to watch and wait. If things played out to his favor, the remaining cells could stand down. He would order them to destroy the remaining Grays and life could go back to normal. If things did not go his way … well, he had something for that too.
A smile curved his scarred mouth as he got up and left the bar.
Surviving The Dead | Book 9 | War Without End Page 15