by Mark Greaney
Court held on to the submachine gun with his right hand, and his left hand squeezed the net on the pallet. His glove had twisted on his fingers, and he knew he could not hold on much longer. His boots kicked at the deck of the plane to try to find purchase as the climb angle grew steeper and steeper.
He was seconds away from falling backwards down the ramp.
But Gentry had one last chance. He lifted Markham’s rifle and fired a long burst over the pallet at Barnes, hitting him squarely on his chest plate, slamming his head back against the bulkhead hard enough to knock him out cold. The aircraft’s incline was forty-five degrees now, and the wounded Barnes lost his hold of the webbing, dropped to his knees, and rolled down the length of the plane towards the rear hatch.
This was Gentry’s ride off the damaged aircraft and he did not want to miss it. As the incapacitated operator bounded past, Court let go of the pallet and pushed off the floor with his boots and kneepads. Gentry leapt to his right and grabbed hold of the unconscious man by the parachute harness, and they sailed together out the open hatch and into the night sky.
* * *
Gentry hooked his arms around Barnes and crossed his legs behind his back. The L-100 disappeared above them, and soon the roar of the engines was replaced by the howl of the wind.
Court grunted and screamed with the effort of holding on as tightly as possible. He did not dare reach for the ripcord of the chute. If he lost his tenuous hold, he would never find it again in the black night sky. He was reasonably sure this rig would have a CYPRES automatic activation device that would pop the reserve at seven hundred fifty feet if its occupant was still in free fall.
Gentry and his would-be killer tumbled end over end through the cold blackness.
One of Court’s hands found a good hold on the parachute’s shoulder strap, so he released the other hand to find a similar grip. Just as he let go, he heard a one-tone beep that lasted less than a second.
Then the reserve chute deployed.
Court held on with one hand. This parachute was not meant for two people, one of whom was kicking and yanking, desperate to get a firmer grip, so the men fell too fast and spun around like a whirligig.
This continued for just a few seconds before Gentry began to vomit from the vertigo. He did not have far to fall, but his nausea had already turned to dry heaves before they slammed together on the ground.
Court’s impact was muted by landing squarely on the man in the chute. He checked on the other operator. He’d landed hard, face-first, with Gentry on his back. Court found no pulse.
Once on terra firma, Gentry got control of his heaving stomach, grabbed his thigh and writhed in pain for a moment, and then recovered enough to sit up. The first hues of morning were glowing to his left, showing him the way east.
Now that he had his bearings, he took stock of his surroundings. He was on flat ground, at the bottom of a gentle valley. There was a brook close enough to hear and goats bleating in the distance. The dead operator lay broken, the reserve chute flapping behind him in a cool, predawn breeze. Court searched the man’s gear and found a medical blow-out bag on Barnes’s hip.
He sat down on the grass and did his best to treat his wound in the dark. He assumed he had a long walk to reach the border and wanted to patch his injured leg so it could stand the trek. It was a clean wound, in and out, no major vascular or orthopedic damage, nothing much to worry about if you treated it early and well and did not mind days or weeks of throbbing discomfort. Gentry puked bile once more, his body and his mind just catching up to the chaos of the past five minutes.
Then he stood and slowly began walking north towards Turkey.
SEVEN
Fitzroy sat across from Lloyd on the couch in his office. Even as the older man listened to the other end of the satellite connection, his angry eyes did not flicker away from the young lawyer.
“I see,” said Fitzroy into the phone. “Thank you.” He terminated the call and placed the phone gently on the table in front of him.
Lloyd stared back, hopeful.
Fitzroy broke the staring contest with a gaze to the carpet. “It seems they are all dead.”
“Who’s dead?” asked Lloyd, the tint of optimism ever growing in his voice.
“Everyone but the flight crew. I am told there was a bit of a dustup in the aircraft. Courtland did not go down easily; no surprise there. The pilot found two of my men’s bodies in the back, no sign of the other four. Blood on the floor, walls, and ceiling, over fifty bullet holes in the fuselage.”
“My firm will compensate you for the damages.” Lloyd said it matter-of-factly. He cleared his throat. “But they did not find Gentry’s body? Could he have survived?”
“It appears not. There was a lot of gear lost, the plane flew for miles with its rear cargo door open, and among the unaccounted-for items is a parachute, but there’s no reason to assume—”
Lloyd interrupted. “If our target is missing out the rear of an airplane along with a parachute, I can hardly convince the Nigerians the job is done.”
“He was outnumbered five to one against a tier-one crew, all ex-Canadian Special Forces. Clearly I have fulfilled my end of our bargain. I ask you to now kindly carry out yours. Stop your threats to my family.”
Lloyd waved a dismissive hand in the air. “Abubaker wants proof. He demanded Gentry’s head in an ice chest.”
“Dammit, man!” said Fitzroy. “I did as I was told!” Fitzroy was angry, but he was no longer fearful for his son’s family. Shortly before Lloyd arrived, Sir Donald had called his son, had him collect his wife and children, and rush to St. Pancras Station in time to make the morning’s second Eurostar train to France. At this very moment they should be settling into the family’s summer villa just south of the Normandy beaches. Fitzroy felt confident Lloyd’s men would not find them there.
“Yes, you did do as you were told. And you will continue to do so. I have a very quiet but very ominous Nigerian back in my office who will not leave with my assurances only. I will need for you to ascertain the flight path of the pilots, and I’ll need to send a team to investigate—”
The phone on Fitzroy’s desk chirped with a distinctive ring of two short bleats. Sir Donald spun his head to it and then back up to Lloyd.
“It’s him,” said Lloyd, responding to Fitzroy’s obvious shock.
“That’s his ring.”
“Then answer it, and activate the speaker function.”
Fitzroy crossed the room and pressed a button on the console on his desk. “Cheltenham Security.” The voice that came through the line was distant. The words came out between labored breaths. “You call that a rescue?”
“It’s good to hear your voice. What happened?”
Lloyd quickly pulled a notebook from his briefcase.
“I was going to ask you the same thing.”
“Are you hurt?”
“I’ll live. No thanks to the extraction squad you sent to pick me up.”
Fitzroy looked to Lloyd. The young American scribbled something on his notepad and held it up. Nigeria. “Son. I heard from the flight crew about the melee. These were not regular employees of mine. Just a mer cenary unit I had used once before. I was rushed to get a team together after the Polish pulled out.”
“Because of what happened in Iraq?”
“Yes. That whole sector has become a no-go zone after your little demonstration yesterday. The Polish refused to go in. The men I sent instead let me know they’d do anything for money, despite the risks. Clearly someone got to them, bought them off.”
“Who?”
“My sources tell me Julius Abubaker, the Nigerian president, is after your head.”
“How does he know I was the one who waxed his brother?”
“Your reputation, no doubt. You have reached the status where some jobs are so difficult or high-profile that they just have to be you.”
“Shit,” said the voice through the line.
Fitzroy asked, “Where are y
ou? I’ll send another team to pick you up.”
“Hell no, you won’t.”
“Look, Court, I can help you. Abubaker leaves office in a few days. He will leave with unimaginable wealth, but his power and his reach will be lessened once he is a civilian. The danger to you will soon pass. Let me bring you in, watch over you until then.”
“I can lie low on my own. Call me when you get more intel on the men after me. Don’t try to find me. You won’t.”
And with that, the connection died.
Lloyd clapped. “Well played, Sir Donald. Quite a performance. Your man didn’t suspect you at all.”
“He trusts me,” Fitzroy said angrily. “For four years he’s had every reason in the world to think I was his friend.”
The American lawyer ignored Sir Donald’s anger and asked, “Where will he go?”
Sir Donald sat back on the couch and ran his hands over his bald head. He looked up quickly. “A double! You want a head in an ice chest? I will bloody well get you a head in an ice chest! How the hell will Abubaker know the difference?”
Lloyd just shook his head. “Weeks ago, before the president demanded we kill him, he asked us for all the intelligence we had on the Gray Man. I happened to have photos, dental records, a complete history, et cetera. I sent that to him, thinking the son of a bitch would just kill Gentry himself before the hit on his brother was carried out. Abubaker knows your man’s face. We can’t use a body double or, as you suggest, a head double.”
Fitzroy cocked his head slowly. “How the bloody hell did you come by this information?”
Lloyd regarded the question for a long moment. He picked at a piece of lint on the knee of his pants. “Before I moved to Paris to join Laurent, the Gray Man and I worked together.”
“You’re CIA?”
“Ex. Definitely ex. There’s no money in patriotism, I’m afraid.”
“And there is money in hunting down patriots? Threatening to hurt children?”
“Good money, as it happens. The world is a funny place. I copied personnel files when I was with the agency. I planned to use them as a bargaining chip if they ever came after me. It’s just serendipity that these documents have proven useful in my current position.” Lloyd stood and began pacing Fitzroy’s office. “I need to know where Gentry is now, where he’s going, what he normally does when he goes into hiding.”
“When he goes into hiding, he simply vanishes. You can kiss your natural gas good-bye. The Gray Man will not turn up on anyone’s radar again for months.”
“Unacceptable. I need you to give me something, something about Gentry I don’t already know. When he worked for us, he was a machine. No friends, no family that he gave a damn about. No lover stuck away for those long nights after a job. His SAD file is about the most boring read imaginable. No vices, no weakness. He’s older now; surely he’s made associates of a personal nature, developed tendencies that will help us figure out his next step. I’m sure you can tell me something, no matter how trivial, that I can use to flush him out.”
Fitzroy smiled a little. He sensed the desperation in his young adversary.
He said, “Nothing. Nothing at all. We communicate via untraceable sat phone and e-mail. If he has a home or a girl or a family hidden away, I wouldn’t know where to tell you to look.”
Lloyd walked over to the window behind Fitzroy’s desk. The Englishman remained on the sofa and watched the uninvited guest pace the office as if Fitzroy himself were the visitor and Lloyd was the proprietor of Cheltenham Services.
Suddenly the American spun around. “You can offer him a job! An easy job for big money. Surely he won’t turn down a high-paying milk run. You send him on a new mission, and I’ll have a team there to ambush him.”
“Bloody hell, you think he’s survived out there this long by being a fool? He has no interest in earning wages at the moment. He’s busy blending into his surroundings. You had one shot to take him out, and you made a mess of it. Go back to your office and lick your wounds; leave me and my family alone!”
Fitzroy noticed a nervous twitch in Lloyd’s face. It was replaced, slowly, by a smile.
“Well, if you won’t help me use Gentry’s weakness to flush him out, I will be forced to use yours.” He pulled his phone from his pocket and smiled at Don Fitzroy as he spoke into it. “Pick up Phillip Fitzroy and family. They’re at their summer cottage in Normandy. Take them to Château Laurent.”
Fitzroy rose to his feet, “You bloody wanker!”
“Guilty as charged.” Lloyd’s tone mocked the Englishman. “My associates will hold your son and his family at a secluded property LaurentGroup owns in Normandy. They will be well taken care of until this matter is resolved. You will contact the Gray Man and give him their location, tell him the Nigerians are holding your only child, his adoring wife, and their darling little kiddies there. Tell him those black savages promise to rape dear Mommy and slaughter the rest of the clan in three days unless you give up your assassin’s location.”
“What good will that do?”
“I know Gentry. He is loyal like a fucking puppy. Even though he’s been kicked around a few times, he will defend his master to the death.”
“He won’t.”
“He will. He’ll take it upon himself to save the day. He’ll understand the police are useless, and he will move heaven and earth to get to France.
“You see, Sir Donnie, Court Gentry’s compass never has pointed true north. He’s a hit man, for God’s sake. But all his operations, both with the CIA as well as in his private practice, have been against those he deems worthy of extrajudicial execution. Terrorists, Mafia dons, drug dealers, all manner of nefarious ne’er-do-wells. Court is a killer, but he thinks himself to be a righter of wrongs, an instrument of justice. This is his flaw. And this flaw will be his downfall.”
Fitzroy knew the same about Court Gentry. Lloyd’s logic was sound. Still, the older man tried to appeal to the young solicitor. “You needn’t involve my family. I will do as you say. I’ve already shown you that. You don’t have to hold them for me to tell Gentry they are held.”
Lloyd waved a hand in the air, striking down Sir Donald’s offer. “We will take good care of them. If you try to trick me, some sort of double cross, then I will need leverage against you, won’t I?”
Fitzroy stood and crossed the room towards Lloyd, slowly and with menace. Although he was easily thirty years older than the American lawyer, the former MI-5 man possessed a larger frame. Lloyd took a step back and called out, “Mr. Leary and Mr. O’Neil! Would you step in, please?”
Fitzroy had given his secretary the day off; he was all alone in his workplace. But Lloyd had brought associates. Two athletic-looking men entered the office and stood by the door. One was redheaded and fair-skinned, on the downside of forty, with a simple business suit that bulged at the hip with the impression of a gun’s butt. The second man was older, near fifty, with salt-and-pepper hair cut in a military high and tight, and his jacket hung loose enough on his body to hold an arsenal tucked away from view inside.
Fitzroy knew muscle goons when he saw them.
Lloyd said, “Irish Republicans. Your old enemies, though I shouldn’t think we’ll give them much to do. You and I will be seeing a lot of each other in the next few days. There is no reason our relationship should be anything less than cordial.”
* * *
Claire Fitzroy had just turned eight years old the previous summer. It was the end of November now, and she and her twin sister Kate had expected to stay in London throughout the wet, gray, and chilling autumn without a break from the routine. Up each weekday morning early for the walk to her primary school on North Audrey Street, out of class and into thrice-weekly piano practice for Claire and vocal lessons for Kate. Weekends spent with Mummy in the shops or Daddy at home or on the football pitch. Each fortnight one of the girls would have a friend over for a slumber party and, as the dreary London skies of fall morphed into the drier but drearier skies of winter, all
Claire’s dreams would turn to Christmas.
Christmas was always spent in France at her father’s holiday cottage in Bayeux, just across the channel in Normandy. Claire preferred Normandy to London, fancied a future for herself on a farm. So it had been a great moment of surprise and adventure when the head-master of her school stepped into the girls’ class Thursday morning, just after roll, to call Claire and Kate out and back to the office. “Bring your schoolbooks, ladies, please. Lovely. Sorry for the intrusion, Mrs. Wheeling. Do carry on.”
Father was in the office, and he took each girl by the hand and led them out to a waiting taxi. Daddy had a Jaguar and Mummy drove a Saab, so the girls could not imagine where they were going in a taxicab. Mummy sat in the vast backseat, and she, like Daddy, was serious and distant.
“Girls, we’re off on a little holiday. Down to Normandy, taking the Eurostar. No, of course nothing’s wrong, don’t be daft.”
On the train the girls barely sat in their seats. Mummy and Daddy stayed huddled together talking, leaving Claire and Kate to run amok up and down the car. Claire heard Daddy ring Grandpa Don on his mobile. He began speaking quietly but angrily, a voice she had never heard him use with Grandpa Don. She stopped following her sister as they attempted to hop down the complete length of the car on one leg. She looked to her father, his worried face, the biting tone of his voice, words impossible to hear but impossible to interpret as anything other than anger.
Daddy snapped the phone shut and spoke to Mummy.
The only time young Claire had ever seen her daddy so visibly upset was when he yelled at a worker fixing the sink in their town house after he’d said something to Mummy that made her face turn red as a strawberry.
Claire began to cry, but she did not let it show.
Claire and her family left the Eurostar in Lille and took another train west to Normandy. By noon they were in their cottage. Kate helped Mum in the kitchen wash fresh corn for dinner. Claire sat on her bed upstairs and looked out to the drive below, to her father. He marched up and down the gravel speaking into his mobile. Occasionally he rested a hand on the picket fence along the garden.