by Gary Haynes
“Don’t worry, ma’am,” he said. “I’ll keep my promise.”
Her head flopped forward as she appeared to pass out.
Tom sucked his teeth, stared hard at Proctor. “You’ll pay for this.”
Proctor nodded. “You want revenge; I’ll fight you for her. I win, she goes with me. You win, you take her home.”
“That’s not gonna happen,” Tom replied.
Proctor’s eyes darted from Tom to Lester, his handgun pressed against the back of the secretary’s head. “How about this, Yank? Let’s say it’s still me and you, man to man. I win, you give me twenty minutes before you raise the alarm. You win, you can leave me for the French.”
Tom thought about that for a moment. “And the secretary goes with us either way?”
“As I said.”
“Don’t do it, Tom,” Lester whispered.
But Tom figured it was his best option in the circumstances. The secretary would live whatever happened. If Proctor took his chances with the French, it was likely he’d be picked up and either extradited, or do serious time here. But at least he could finish it without risking her life, which was something he would have jumped at just an hour before. Still, if Proctor was prepared to release the secretary so they could go at it, he wanted to know why this man thought he and Lester would keep up their end of the bargain. Although Lester had a bullet lodged in his arm, he still looked as if he were about to turn the Englishman’s face into hamburger meat.
“Why the trust?” he asked.
“A man gets a reputation. Yours is being a man of your word.”
Crane, Tom thought.
“And you gave her a promise, after all,” Proctor said, gesturing to the secretary. “Looks like you’ve kept that, too.”
“You hear that, Lester?” Tom said.
“I did. But I don’t like it,” Lester replied, his SIG pressed against his thigh. “And y’all ain’t agreed the rules.”
“The rules?” Tom asked Proctor.
“A submission,” Proctor said.
“Now take that damn gag off her,” Tom said.
“All right, but she stays in the cell until this is over. And the cell stays locked.”
92.
As Proctor untied the secretary’s gag she groaned loudly. Tom rushed forward, ignoring the Englishman, and picked her up in his arms. He lowered her gently onto the bed pressed against the bare-brick wall, manoeuvring her so that she was in the recovery position. Close up, the extent of her beating looked even worse, and Tom noticed that her irises were a milky-white, the green pupils rolling as if she was drugged. He clenched his teeth. But Proctor was a big guy and trained, no doubt. He told himself to bury the anger. It would slow him down and cause him to make mistakes, just as Lester had said.
Tom walked backwards, joining Lester at the open doorway. As Proctor stepped forward Tom and Lester eased back out of the room. Proctor shut the door, swinging over the metal arm and locking the padlock, leaving the key in place. He led Tom and Lester into the adjacent room, which like the cell had a wooden table, although it was three times the size and had a dozen unwashed dishes on it, together with empty bottles of wine and water. The only other item was a compact DVD player. Proctor walked over to the table and lifted it, using his muscular thighs to take the weight, as he lent back and carried it over against the far wall. Clenching his jaw, Tom watched Proctor kneel down and slide in a DVD. As he pressed a button he said he thought it was a good idea to mask the sound of the fight; the secretary looked a little fragile as it was. With that, the sound of heavy metal basted out.
“Didn’t think it would be Miles Davis,” Lester said, above the din.
“Anything goes wrong, get the secretary outta here.”
Lester nodded and leaned against the whitewashed wall, cupping his injured arm. Tom removed his backpack, the MP7s, his field-scope and SIG. He walked into the centre of the room where Proctor was waiting for him.
They faced one another, a heavy drum beat and a screeching guitar cutting through the air. Proctor cracked his knuckles, threw a right hook. Tom ducked, hit him just below the heart with a stinging jab, and heard the man groan. As he straightened up he punched Proctor in the left eye, temporarily disorientating him.
He waited a second, watched the Englishman raise his guard before kicking him with the instep of his boot, connecting with Proctor’s exposed ribs. Proctor winced, but lunged forward, and, throwing a blur of combinations, brought his right boot up deceptively, catching Tom in the lower stomach. He doubled over.
Proctor unleashed a powerful uppercut, sending Tom reeling back as his teeth crunched together. He rushed at Tom, his face contorted in an ugly glare, and grabbed him around the thighs, lifting him, his momentum sending them backward. They crashed into the table, the DVD missing a few beats before starting up again. As the table rim cut into his back Tom grimaced. Proctor let go of him and weaved upward. He punched Tom on the temple with a vicious hook, which spun him around. Before he could recover, Tom felt his head being grabbed about the ears. A split second later, his forehead was smashed into the table.
Tom felt dazed and nauseous; a rivulet of blood oozed from his lacerated head. As Proctor let go of him he collapsed. Blinking as the blood seeped into his eyes, Tom glimpsed Lester raise his SIG. He just managed to shake his head a fraction, willing his friend to back off.
“Don’t get up,” Proctor said.
“I’m not done,” Tom replied, his voice barely more than a murmur.
But he couldn’t see where the next attack would come from. A swinging boot soon put paid to that disability. It crashed into his mouth, jarring his head. He spat more blood, flayed about with his right arm hopelessly like a blind man. The second kick landed between his open legs. He sucked in air and curled up into a ball, the pain so acute that he wished he’d capped Proctor when he’d had the chance.
“You had enough?” Proctor asked, backing off.
Tom moaned on the floor.
Then he calmed himself as best he could, zoning out. The pain eased a fraction. He struggled up, although his head was still a blur, his breathing reduced to short gasps. He put his arms out to steady himself. But Proctor rushed in once more, hitting Tom with a shoulder barge and grabbing him around the waist. The two men stumbled sideways, Tom vaguely attempting to elbow Proctor in the nape of his neck but failing. As he released the bear hug Proctor flipped his head up and caught Tom with the back of his skull under the chin. Tom fell again, hitting his head on the tiles, the searing pain making him almost retch as his heart rate spiked.
Proctor loomed above him and kicked him in the exposed right kidney. Tom let out an agonized cry. As he felt his head swim Proctor pulled his right leg back to kick him again. Knowing it could be his last chance, Tom galvanized his depleted strength into one action, lashing out with his leg, hitting Proctor squarely on the side of the kneecap with his toecap. Buckling, Proctor screamed out in pain. Tom willed himself up, blood covering his body, as he soaked up a hit of dopamine. Twisting sideways to lessen Proctor’s strike options, he feigned a right. Proctor’s head tilted to avoid it, and Tom hit him in the exposed jugular vein with a hook, swivelling his right side from the foot up, increasing the momentum and power. Proctor crumpled, moaning morbidly.
He hit the tiles hard, his head bouncing. Kneeling down behind him, Tom went for a sleeper hold. He wrapped his arm around the Englishman’s throat, his bicep squeezing against the right side of Proctor’s neck as his forearm pressed against the left.
Simultaneously, he used his free forearm to press the man’s head down.
He began to crush the windpipe. Proctor gasped for air like a beached fish. Bending sideways, Tom saw panic flicking across his pale-blue eyes. He knew he couldn’t find an angle of attack, and that the Englishman’s strength was ebbing fast. Proctor made a mewing sound, and began to tap the floor as best he could with his right hand: I submit. But Tom kept up the pressure. He bent forward again, and, as he saw Proctor’s eyes r
olling back, he knew he was seconds away from unconsciousness. A minute or so after that and Proctor would be dead.
But he released the sleeper and rolled off him. He heard Proctor moan and then gasp as the air was drawn into his starved lungs. He watched Lester kill the music before lying flat, feeling as if his body had been crushed in a vice: every bone seemingly on the cusp of fracturing.
93.
“You really gonna let him live?” Lester asked, pulling Tom up.
“Yeah,” Tom said, wiping blood from his forehead.
“That’ll need stitches.”
Tom bent over at the waist, breathing hard to clear the haze and reduce his pulse rate.
“I thought you were gonna kill him.”
“I guess I prefer protecting people more than killing them.”
“Sometimes that’s one and the same thing,” Lester said.
Yeah, I know, Tom thought. But not this time. He eased his torso up, his hands pressed against his lower back as he cricked his neck. “Let’s get you fixed up. Take the secretary home.”
“Me? You need a mirror, man. And what about Karen?”
Tom closed his eyes and massaged his temples. He consoled himself by thinking that her body would be cared for by the French. Besides, there was no alternative. If they took her body on the jet with them, rigor mortis would set in after three hours and bloating after that. The thought made him almost gag. After what she’d said about her parents, he didn’t want them to see her in that kind of state. Leaving her behind would’ve been what she’d have wanted. She would be preserved as well as possible in the local morgue, the made-up cadaver a less gruesome sight for her parents to identify.
Wiping spittle from his lips, he said, “The French will take care of her. We ain’t got the facilities on the plane. You know her parents?”
“No. But I’ll track ‘um down real quick.”
“Thanks, man.”
Tom looked at Proctor. He was in bad shape, still semi-unconscious. He’d leave him for the French. His word was good.
Lester stared hard at him. “You shoulda killed him. For Karen.”
Tom sighed, patted his friend’s good arm. Shaking his head, Lester said he’d go ahead to fetch the Land Rover, adding that he could manage it for the short distance to the chateau, and that it wasn’t the first time he’d had to drive wounded and one-handed.
With blood falling in small clots from his forehead, Tom walked out of the room. As he got to the makeshift cell he turned the key, swung back the hinge and opened the door. He saw the secretary lying on the bed. She was still suffering from some form of drug. He guessed that she’d been sedated to enable her murder to be carried out more easily. That and the beating Proctor had given her.
Her eyes flickered open and she gasped as she registered him. He could see even more clearly now that her captivity had taken its toll, her face almost unrecognizable. He picked her up in his arms and carried her from the cell like an exhausted child.
“We should be in DC in the next nine hours, ma’am,” he whispered.
As he walked towards the vestibule he passed Karen’s shrouded body in the entrance hall. He closed his eyes and tried to imagine her in the afterlife. He’d grieve for her, although now wasn’t the time. He’d go home to Louisiana, hang out for a couple of weeks. Mourn her there.
When he got outside, a light drizzle was falling.
He stood still, holding the secretary in his arms, the moisture playing upon his face. He thought about his mother. He’d saved a woman’s life, but one he had grown to care for had died in the process. But he was just a man. And men had no right pretending to be anything else.
Attempting to clear his mind of extraneous thoughts, he saw the car heading up the gravel roadway. As Lester got out and opened the rear passenger door Tom laid the secretary onto the back seat, feeling her body trembling beneath the blankets. He asked Lester to gather up the guards’ cellphones, if he could manage it.
Watching his friend walk back into the chateau, he phoned Birch. Birch went into a rant at first, but calmed down after Tom confirmed that the secretary was safe and that he was bringing her home. He relayed everything that had happened, including the whereabouts of those kidnappers who’d died and those who were still alive, emphasizing where he’d left Proctor. Birch ordered him to wait there for the French to arrive, but Tom said that he didn’t trust anyone at this juncture and that he wasn’t going to let Lyric out of his sight until they’d landed in DC, even if it meant his pension. He cut Birch off then.
With a reddened piece of torn cloth around his head like a bandana, Tom drove the Land Rover back to the private airfield near Rouen, due to Lester’s bullet wound. The trunk was loaded with the seized weapons, the lasers and sound system. The secretary was lying across the back seats, her head propped up on one of the backpacks against the door. Sitting beside Tom, Lester was tending to his injury as best he could with the contents of a med kit he’d brought with him from onboard the jet. But Tom knew he’d been hit in an artery, and that he might have to risk a detour to the nearest hospital.
No one had spoken since they’d left the chateau. The drizzle had turned to rain and the car’s wipers were on full power. Tom turned off the highway to Rouen onto the back roads that led to the airfield. After thirty seconds or so, the sound of a helicopter could be heard as it passed above them, although the overhanging branches meant that it couldn’t be identified.
“That French Special Forces?” Lester asked.
Tom pressed the electric-window switch and craned his neck on a straight section of road, the raindrops splashing on his face. He still couldn’t see the helicopter, but it was clear from the noise that it was heading in the same direction as them, rather than towards the chateau.
“If it is, they need a new navigation system.”
“Good job we acted when we did, then,” Lester said. “Just wish Karen had been going home with us, too.”
So do I, Tom thought. So do I.
He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out the watch that the secretary had given him back in Islamabad. He thought he’d use it as a tool to break her silence. He flipped the watch over, glanced at the back: To Tom with heartfelt gratitude. Linda G. Carlyle. US Secretary of State.
“I still got it, ma’am,” he said, holding it up behind his head as he drove. “Your middle name, ma’am. Maybe I’ve earned the right?”
He put the watch back and adjusted the rear-view mirror. The secretary looked blank and closed her eyes, coughing.
It was the look, a split second, no more. But it was enough for Tom.
“Ma’am,” he said. “What does the T stand for?”
The secretary coughed again.
“The T, ma’am?”
“Hey, Tom, ease up, man,” Lester said.
“The T?” Tom said, ignoring him.
“Theresa,” she mumbled.
“Jesus!” Tom said, smacking the steering wheel with his palm.
“Shit, man, what’s up?” Lester said, pulling out his SIG and checking for a tail.
Tom slammed down the brake pedal. The car juddered to a stop by a grass verge. The woman fell into the footwell.
“Why you stopping the goddamned car?” Lester asked, rebounding back in his seat.
“The secretary’s middle name begins with a G,” Tom said.
“It’s the drugs, man. Drugs do that. Least as far as I recall they do.”
Tom drew his SIG, turned and stared hard at the woman as she struggled up onto the seat. “If you got a weapon, take it out with your thumb and forefinger.”
“A weapon? Tom, you lost it or what?”
Tom didn’t blink. The woman put her hand behind her back and eased out a Ruger LCP. The Ruger was a six-round pocket pistol that weighed a little over a quarter of a kilo. But Tom knew it was as deadly as a Glock at close quarters.
“Toss it in the footwell,” he said.
She did so.
“Now take it off,” he bark
ed. “All of it. Or I’ll do it for ya.”
The woman removed the green-coloured contact lenses before licking her fingers and digging them into her face, ripping off blemish-ridden skin-like layers, false scabs, a plastic lesion and a made-up bruise. Lastly, she rubbed her face clean.
Tom froze, his heart racing. Then he blinked, shook his head. He couldn’t believe it. He felt bile rise in his throat, choking him.
“You gotta be freakin’ kiddin’,” Lester said.
It was Karen.
94.
As Swiss’s Range Rover took a sharp right-hand bend into a field a mile or so from his apartment in Pentagon City, he saw his private helicopter parked on the asphalt helipad about thirty metres away. I’m safe, for now, he thought. The allotted time for the secretary’s death had passed, but no one had rung him to confirm the kill. Nothing had appeared on the Internet, either. Briefly, he wondered if the Saudi ambassador had decided to have her killed in accordance with the timeframe imposed by the video, but dismissed the idea. He was the conduit to Proctor and his men. He wouldn’t be bypassed on such an important decision. Besides, Proctor had no notion of the ambassador.
When he’d tried to contact the chateau, no one had picked up. Likewise the various disposable cells of his men, which had been switched off. He knew that something had gone wrong. The operation had been compromised, not because it was a flawed plan, he’d thought, but because someone knew something.
He’d been unsettled by the conversation with General Dupont; and the special agent, Tom Dupree, might have talked to someone before he’d been taken to the warehouse. Although if he had, he’d taken it to the grave with him. But Proctor had told him that there were three intruders at the chateau. He couldn’t conceive of how two men and a woman could’ve overpowered his men there. They were the best he had, handpicked especially for the task. But there had been only one option for him in the short term. Get to somewhere safe, find out what exactly had happened, and take it from there.
The car hit the tarmac roadway that led over the field to the helipad and Swiss unbuckled his seat belt. He heard the sound of the sirens before the buckle strap snapped back into place. He turned and saw three black SUVs speeding up behind. FBI, he thought. Even if his two bodyguards managed to kill them all, the helicopter would be tracked, forced to land, or shot down by an F-35 stealth fighter within the hour. But then he figured the chance of his bodyguards taking out a dozen or more agents was about as likely as him getting invited to the next presidential dinner at the White House.