Reprisal!- The Eagle's Challenge

by Cliff Roberts

  Ron had slipped onto the hotel roof just before dawn and sat waiting for Garza to show at the fourteenth green shortly after one o’clock. Everything was planned down to the second and should work perfectly, as long as Garza didn’t decide to cancel his game today or to change the order in which he played the holes.

  Tom, Ron and Alex were in communication via their wireless comlinks, although until Garza started moving, they would remain silent on the off-chance that someone might be able to listen in. They had all packed the night before and loaded the van, so afterwards they could be on the road without hesitation.

  Once Ron had eliminated Garza and Primo, the guys were to meet up at a small cafe just off Highway 27 going north, just outside of town. They hoped that after Garza and Primo were eliminated, the security detail would be in a state of mass confusion and would fail to send out men to look for strangers to blame without having someone directing them to do so. They wondered where Garza’s number three man was—Anastas Soto, Garza’s in-house killer. They hadn’t seen him since early yesterday when he left Garza’s burned out compound.

  Ron sat under a small umbrella as the time slowly ticked by. He’d brought a couple of travel magazines with him to help pass the time and several small bottles of water to ward off dehydration. The magazines turned out to be mostly pictures, so they were quickly skimmed and discarded. He then spent time looking over the town of Boca Barranca, taking in the sights of the local hotel pools, the beach and the golf course. He was amazed with the clarity of the Leupold 120x scope. He could clearly make out the beachfront hotel where Garza had moved after the villa fire, and he was able to look right into windows where the occupant hadn’t take the precaution of closing their blinds when they went to sleep last night. Ron had wished he’d brought his camera, except the pictures probably wouldn’t have turned out very well from this distance. After all, his camera only had a 10x lens, not the Leupold’s 120x power scope.

  As Ron continued looking around, he noticed there were several maintenance men working on the golf course, cutting weeds and trimming the trees, while another crew mowed the grass and reset the pins on the greens. Some of them didn’t seem to be doing too much other than looking around, which seemed a bit strange to Ron. In reviewing Alex’s notes about the golf course, there had been no mention of the grounds crew working while Garza was on the course. In fact, it was just the opposite. No one was allowed on the course while Garza was there. He fully expected the crew was looking around since they knew they had to leave before Garza got there. He let it go.

  Ron also found Alex had been right in that the hotel was the only place in town with a clear view of a reasonable portion of the course. Even though he was five stories above the course, the large number of trees with their lush thickness, the hilly terrain, and the numerous three- and four-story vacation villas made it hard to see anything other than small strips of green here and there, and the fourteenth green. Only the fourteenth green gave a reasonable chance he’d have a clear shot. Even the parking lot where Garza’s caravan would be parked was mostly blocked from view by the damn trees! The place was absolutely beautiful but a real pain in the ass for a sniper.

  Alex broke the silence at about 11:15 a.m., telling Tom and Ron the subject was en route to the golf club. Tom had been napping under a large banyan tree at the edge of the mountains, just outside of town to the east of the golf club. East of town, there were only a few scattered houses tucked in among the trees due to the frequent landslides during rainy season. That suited Tom just fine—the fewer people to see him, the better. This particular spot also shielded him from the golf club, since he couldn’t see any part of the course due to the heavy undergrowth, the hilly terrain and the trees.

  Alex slipped into traffic behind Garza’s caravan, being careful not to get too close. He did his best to keep about hundred yards between them. Traffic didn’t seem that bad when they first started out, but as they weaved their way through the town, traffic increased, slowing the progress to a snail’s pace. Alex became more nervous that he would lose sight of Garza as more and more cars entered the only through traffic artery in the area. Despite his growing concern, Alex didn’t dare follow any closer for fear of being discovered. About halfway to the golf course, Alex noticed a white Honda that didn’t seem to have any qualms about following too closely. It would race up to the caravan and then fall back a bit, only to race up to it again. It was if they wanted to get Garza’s attention. Alex shared this little tidbit with Tom and Ron who both thought it was probably some local just trying to get to work or something. It couldn’t be someone trying to follow the subject; no one in their right mind would tip their hand in such a way. Alex wasn’t so sure, but he did his best not to worry about some dumbass and focused on his job.

  The Garza caravan went straight to the golf club as it always did, where Garza and Primo met with their foursome partners for the day and quickly headed for the first tee. The white Honda, the same one that had been crowding Garza’s caravan, stopped just past the gate to the club and sat idling. They had a clear view of Garza and his foursome driving off in their golf carts to the first tee. After Garza and his golf buddies slipped around the corner of the building, the Honda slowly crept down the road until it reached a cross street, where it turned left and sped off.

  Alex’s well-honed gut knew something was wrong, and the Honda had something to do with it. When he shared his feelings with Tom and Ron again, they still didn’t think it was anything to worry about. Tom even suggested that the Honda might be a new security team Garza added after the fire. Ron concurred that it wouldn’t be out of character for Garza to add additional security after being attacked and cited the fact his caravan had four additional men attached to it since the fire.

  With their field of vision obscured except in the area around the fourteenth green, Alex and Tom would wait on Ron to confirm the subject was approaching before they made their final move to create the diversion.

  Everyone knew Garza would take at least an hour and a half to reach the fourteenth green, so they settled in for the wait. Ron quickly grew tired of waiting and out of boredom, broke the radio silence.

  “Hey, you guys find any good places to eat?” Ron asked over the comlink.

  “What?” Tom asked, not sure he heard Ron right. “Did the subject stop to eat?”

  “No. Have you found any good places to eat in your travels?” Ron repeated, enunciating a bit more clearly this time.

  “Oh, yeah. Yesterday, I found a great little cantina on the side road to Puntarenas. The waitress was really hot!” Alex chimed in.

  “What’s the name of the place?” Ron asked, before Tom could cut in.

  “It’s the Golden Parrot,” Alex replied.

  “Stop it!” Tom yelled out over the comlink.

  “Stop what?” Ron asked in his most infuriating tone.

  “Stop talking!” Tom shouted.

  “Hey, I was just asking if you guys knew of place to eat lunch. After all, I’m getting pretty hungry sitting around here!” Ron shot back, his voice tinged with hurt feelings.

  “Shut up! We’ve got a job to do and we can’t do it if you keep talking about eating. So, shut the hell up!” Tom shouted again into his comlink.

  “Okay, I’ll stop talking about eating. What about souvenirs?” Ron quipped, causing Alex to chuckle.

  “When we’ve finished with this job, I’m going to kick your ass all the way back to Israel!” Tom shouted over the comlink.

  “You might find that it isn’t so easy!” Ron replied, goading Tom.

  “Shut the fuck up,” Tom stated sullenly.

  “Yeah, where is our subject now?” Alex interjected.

  “Alex, shut up as well!” Tom blurted out, his voice almost cracking, as he was quickly reaching his boiling point.

  “I haven’t seen him since he pulled into the club, but his advance guys are walking up the fairway, so I expect him to show in few minutes.” Tom and Alex left their hiding spots and mo
ved up to their staging points in order to be ready when Garza finally showed at the fourteenth green. “They are usually one hole ahead of him.” Then he asked, “Hey, there seems to be a lot of groundskeepers today. I thought, according to your notes, there wasn’t supposed to be anybody on the course while our subject was playing? What’s up with that?”

  “Yeah, you’re right. There sure seems to be a lot of groundskeepers, especially around the club house, but I haven’t heard anything,” Alex shared, having been a regular in the local cantina, which was the golf club staff’s hangout the last couple of weeks.

  “Guys, shut the fuck up! I don’t want to hear about the lawn guys, and we won’t be here for lunch or dinner! So shut up, unless it is to tell us to start our diversion or if someone is about to shoot you!” Tom curtly demanded. “Tell me you understand!” he shouted over the comlink.

  “Yes, Dad,” Ron moaned in reply.

  “Yes, boss!” Alex replied curtly in the military style Tom was used to and expecting.

  The comlink fell silent as Tom and Alex reached the opposite ends of the golf course and sat idling, awaiting Ron’s signal to start. Ron lay flat on the roof, looking over the edge at the golf course. He scanned the fourteenth green with the rifle’s scope, looking for the first sign that Garza was approaching—golf balls falling onto the green.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  The three of them sat in silence as they waited for Garza to appear. Each of them went over in their minds what they had to do and the manner in which they would do it. Tom sat almost in a trance, focusing his mind, visualizing the entire mission from start to finish. Ron practiced chambering a round, over and over, and Alex sat flexing his hands and arms, so that he would be ready to pull his punches when he scuffled with Tom after he was sideswiped by him.

  The minutes ticked by as slow as molasses flowed in winter, until finally, Ron clicked his comlink and said Garza was coming up the fairway. The flight of four golf balls had landed on the green as if they were birds coming in to land in a field.

  Alex tugged his seatbelt tightly and pulled away from his parking space in front of a small shopping mall while Tom snugged his seatbelt then sped away from the shade of a banana tree he had found overhanging the fence of the golf course about a mile down the road. It created the perfect shady spot, blocking the sunlight just right at midday. Ron shifted nervously, forcing himself to steady his breathing and slowly letting his index finger caress the trigger, waiting for the right moment to squeeze.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Ron noticed the groundskeepers beginning to spread out and drop to the ground, and a couple even stepped behind trees.

  Alex clicked the comlink. “Ron, have you spotted the subject yet?”

  “He’s just crossed the open space on the fairway. He’s walking and talking with one of today’s buddies,” Ron replied.

  Primo wasn’t anywhere in sight, but Ron wasn’t concerned with him. The main target was Garza, and he was too close to eliminating him to worry about the secondary target.

  Tom and Alex were quickly closing in on each other, when the white Honda turned the corner behind Tom and raced up on him. Alex called out a warning, alerting Tom to the possible danger. Tom checked his mirrors to confirm it was a white Honda and that it was, indeed, closing the distance between them. Tom increased speed and told Alex to be prepared for a stronger bump then they had planned. He then called out to Ron to check to see who was in the Honda, which took his eyes off the green. Ron swore into the comlink and quickly switched his attention to the white Honda barreling down on Tom from the rear. A quick glance and Ron informed Tom the driver appeared to be Hispanic but he wasn’t wearing a suit, as Garza’s men usually did. He then switched his attention back to the course as he told Tom and Alex he thought the Honda was just some local with a NASCAR fantasy. Alex and Tom hoped he was right and slowed down considerably just before they clipped each other’s driver’s side front quarter panels.

  The collision was loud, and every head at the golf course turned instinctively to look in the direction of the noise. Garza’s men brought up their guns to their shoulders but failed to lock them in place. Slowly, they allowed them to droop as they discovered the noise was just a fender bender on the nearby road.

  The security team smiled to a man as Alex jumped from his car and ran to Tom’s car, wildly waving his arms and shouting insults. Tom slowly opened his door and pulled himself out of the car, just as Alex stepped forward and got in his face. It was almost comical as Tom, standing six-foot-three and Alex, who is just five-foot-nine, squared off.

  Ron scanned the green, looking for Garza. He found him in a sand trap in the southwest corner of the green, and that was when Ron heard the first shot. It was a small caliber handgun, followed quickly by the unmistakable sound of an AK-47 on full auto. At that moment, Garza was knocked down by his security team into the sand trap, which provided them with at least some cover from the shooter. Just that quick, Ron had lost his shot, and all hell broke loose on the golf course.

  When the shot rang out, both Tom and Alex instinctively ducked behind the car and pulled their own Sig-Sauer forty-caliber handguns. The Honda that had been trailing Tom revved its motor and cut around the two crashed cars. It then battered its way through the fence and onto the course, with two men hanging out of the back windows of the car firing AK-47s at the men on the fourteenth green. Luckily, the shots were poorly aimed, and the bouncing car didn’t allow for them to improve their aim. The grounds crew was also firing at the men on the green, but they were ineffective as long as the men on the green could keep the bunker between themselves and the attackers.

  Garza’s SUVs, filled with members of his security detail, wasted no time in racing to their boss’ aid. They plowed through the practice putting green that was next to the parking lot and then crashed into and through the snack bar, once they cleared the corner of the club house. Finally reaching the course, they pulled onto the nearest fairway, gunned their engines and raced across the course towards the fourteenth green. As they went, they tore up the fairways and the greens they encountered in their mad dash to help their boss. Before they could arrive, though, the men with Garza in the sand trap bunker concentrated their fire on the fast approaching car and riddled it with bullets, killing all four men before they could slow enough to bring their aim under control.

  The grounds crew continued to fire and make slow moves trying to improve their positions, but they quickly refocused on the charging trio of SUVs, leaving Garza and his men on the green to slip into the tree line where they had better cover.

  Tom and Alex watched in shock as the Honda blew past them and onto the course. Neither one of them reacted to the situation until it was too late to be effective, and then they just stared over the hood of their car watching the battle progress.

  “Ron, did you take the shot?” Tom yelled over the comlink.

  “Negative! I had no shot! No shot!” Ron replied.

  “Shit! Can you take one now?” Tom asked.

  “Negative! Garza and Primo have run off into the trees. I’ve got nothing!” Ron griped.

  “Who the hell are these guys?” Tom blurted out.

  “I don’t know! I didn’t invite them!” Ron quipped. “The Honda is out of the fight, and the grounds crew is focused on the SUVs tearing up the fairway. What do you want to do now?” Ron inquired.

  “Hold tight and keep an eye open for Garza. We’ll try to figure out where he’s gone to ground.” Tom told Ron as he and Alex slipped across the small open space between the road and the golf course, following the path Honda had cut through the fence on its ill-fated mad dash to the fourteenth green.

  “Watch our backs for us, will ya?” Tom said Ron over the comlink as he and Alex moved along the drainage ditch that ran between the fence and fairway. The gunfire had dropped to an occasional pop that made sneaking along in the tall weeds on the edge of the ditch and tree line that much more nerve-racking. There was no way of telling where the sound
was coming from or where bullets were targeted. Alex and Tom were lying flat in the dry, open ditch, listening for any movement, when Ron spoke quietly over the comlink.

  “I’ve got you two about twenty feet from a group of the grounds crew—four men. They’ve taken cover in a sand trap to your left up near the edge of the green. I can pick them off as they pop up to check on the situation, if you’d like,” Ron suggested.

  “Go ahead take the shots, but it sure seems stupid to kill the guys who are trying to do our job for us!” Tom explained.

  “Yeah, but they completely screwed the pooch, and I doubt they will be able to finish the job,” Ron stated flatly, and then added, “I’ll start cleaning out the nest. Hold still while I clear a path for you get through,” Ron said as the first man peeked around the edge of the bunker. A bright red dot appeared on his forehead as blood sprayed over his friends in the bunker. His bunker mates all looked horrified as the dead man’s body slumped into the sand and jerked several times, before ceasing to move. Suddenly, the other men broke from the bunker and began running for the shelter of the tree line some fifty yards away. Ron quickly pinpointed the fleeing targets and fired rapidly, instantly killing two of the three retreating men. He only wounded the third man, since he hurried too much trying to catch him before he made the tree line. Despite Ron missing an instant kill shot, the man was still mortally wounded, and he died just ten feet from the tree line from blood loss only a few short moments after being shot.

  After waiting a few minutes to be sure no one was lying in wait for them, Tom and Alex slowly crept through the grass to the edge of the fairway and then dashed across the open ground to the sand trap and jumped in. The first man Ron had shot lay in the sand trap face down. He was dressed in blue jeans and a white work shirt similar to ones nearly everyone wore around here. It was the uniform of the manual labor class throughout Central America.