“Friend of yours?” I ask him.
He sighs. “Yeah...”
“Let’s go and say ‘hi’ then. Maybe they’ll give me some straight fucking answers!”
I climb out of the truck and walk toward the car; Schultz is just behind me. As I near the vehicle, the driver’s door opens and a man gets out. He’s dressed like Schultz—nice jeans, boots, a fitted shirt tucked in with the sleeves rolled up, mirrored sunglasses and short blond hair, styled and spiked. He shuts the door and stands in front of me, smiling.
“Hey, Boss,” he says, in a ridiculously happy British accent.
I feel my eyes go wide. I’m genuinely shocked…
“Holy shit… Josh?”
9.
09:57 CDT
“How you doin’, Adrian?” he asks, smiling. I’m guessing he loves the look of confusion and surprise on my face right now.
I can’t think of anything meaningful to say. After everything that’s happened, seeing Josh in front of me is just too much of a curveball to deal with at the moment.
“Where’s your hair?” I ask him, finally.
He laughs. “Figured it was time for a change. Needed to smarten up a bit, y’know… you like?”
“You look less like someone who listens to rock music and still lives with his parents, if that’s what you mean?”
We look at each other for a moment in silence, and then both burst out laughing before embracing like long-lost brothers. We pat each other’s backs.
“Man, it’s good to see you, Josh. What you up to nowadays?” I ask.
“What else?” he replies. “Watching your back!”
I frown. “Something really weird’s going on here, and I’m guessing you know what…”
He smiles that knowing smile of his, the way he always did when he knew things and didn’t want to tell you how he found them out.
“Josh…?”
“Okay,” he begins. “You’re about to get a lot of information, and you’re gonna have questions… can you please just wait ’til I’ve finished? I know you want to know everything all the time, but this thing is big and it’ll take time to explain.”
I shrug and nod. “Whatever,” I say, gesturing with my hand for him to start.
“Okay… when we went our separate ways, I went and got myself a job at GlobaTech, working with our old friend, Robert Clark. What I did was really complicated, and I won’t bore you with the details, but it was to do with their research and development business. Anyway, when Ryan here got the boot from the new president, Robert offered him a job as a consulting director…” He leans forward slightly. “You ask me, it’s one of those jobs they give a fancy title to that requires you to do absolutely nothing. Y’know, the kind of job that they award old people with too much time on their hands…”
He smiles, winks and stands up straight again, casting a quick glance to an unimpressed Schultz, who’s leaning against the hood of Josh’s car. I smile. The more things change, the more they stay the same…
“But seriously, Schultzy has done good for us since he came on board, so respect where it’s due. Anyway, we as a company were approached soon after by a couple of people with… questionable intentions, shall we say. Think Dark Rain, but more evil.”
“Lovely,” I say, remembering very clearly how that ended.
“Obviously, since the era of Bob Clark began, we don’t get into bed with such unsavory characters. But alarm bells were ringing nonetheless.”
He moves over to his car and leans against the door as he talks. I’m standing with my arms folded across my chest, waiting patiently for the part that explains why the last few days have gone to shit.
“We kept a close eye on the movements of these people, using the vast array of technology at our disposal. This was about a year ago, and there’s been very little to go on until the last couple of days when, you guessed it, you got involved!”
He laughs as I shrug innocently. “Hey, I didn’t ask for this,” I say.
“I know, I know… this shit just kinda finds you,” he replies with another knowing smile. “So anyway, we track these people all over the world—they’re on some mad recruitment drive, hiring the best and the baddest killers, mercenaries, scientists… you name it.”
“What for?”
He holds his hand up. “Ah-ah-ah, save the questions for later… I figured it was only a matter of time before they tried to recruit you. I mean, you’re the best assassin there is.”
“Was…”
“Whatever. Point is, retirement or not, these people knew where to find you and, in keeping with tradition, asked you to join them and tried to kill you when you said no.”
“Okay, Josh, the FBI has already told me something along these lines. A terrorist network nobody seems to know anything about has been going around recruiting people to work for them, for reasons unknown. The first three guys who came to me were apparently linked to someone called Yalafi Hussein. They were found dead in their rental car parked at the side of the interstate. Nothing to do with me, by the way. But they then sent two hit squads to kill me, and those guys I killed without prejudice. A real mixed bag of assholes, too, from all over the place. What’s going on, Josh?”
He sighs and looks at Schultz, who shrugs. “Just tell him,” he says.
Josh nods and looks back at me. “We do know who they are… they call themselves the Armageddon Initiative. They’ve got active cells all across the globe and seem to run what we think is their main base of operations from somewhere in Ukraine. Every time we try to track them via satellite, they disappear completely. We’ve got it narrowed to a thirty mile radius, but…”
“That doesn’t sound all that narrow,” I observe. “Are they underground?”
“That’s what I think, yeah.”
“So what do these guys want? What’s their plan?”
“We don’t know. That’s why I’m here. To ask you a favor.”
I take a deep breath. I can see what’s coming. “You want me to sign up with these assholes, don’t you? Be the man inside?”
Josh smiles. “That was my original plan, yeah. But that went to shit when you started killing them.”
“So what can I do? I just wanna be left alone, Josh.”
“I know, and I hate asking you… but we have a bead on Hussein. We have reason to believe he’s going to be in New York in the next twenty-four hours. We know he’s not in charge, but we think he has access to the people who are.”
“You seem to have the same information as the FBI—I wonder if they know where he’ll be tomorrow? Why don’t you just work with them?”
“Because GlobaTech has its own army, its own weapons, and its own planes. We don’t answer to the government because we’re in the private sector and, consequently, not funded by them. As long as we work under the radar, we’re very good at doing whatever we want. The government tends to make things like this public so they look good killing terrorists. But we both know that killing them doesn’t always stop them. We’ve got no one to impress, so we’ve taken it upon ourselves to lend a hand.”
“So you want me to go to New York and capture this Yalafi Hussein?”
He nods. “And bring him back in one piece to one of our sites for questioning.”
I sigh heavily. I’m retired—I don’t want any part of this. But I appreciate that a large, well-funded terrorist organization that hasn’t yet made it known what their plans are isn’t the best thing to leave unchecked. And I know Josh wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t necessary.
I think about my bar. I’ve got no business to run for a while, so I’ll only be sitting around with my thumb up my ass anyway…
What about Tori? She needs me, and I don’t want to leave her.
I wonder if Josh knows about her?
“I own a bar here, called The Ferryman,” I say to Josh, changing the subject. “It’s very recently been closed, pending some much-needed renovation. A bunch of terrorists shot the place to bits trying to kill me. Yo
u can still see it, though. Plus, there’s someone I want you to meet. Come on.”
I walk back to my truck, get in, and drive out of the police parking lot, with Josh and Ryan Schultz following behind me.
10:22 CDT
I arrive back at my bar as the chaos is winding down. The FBI crime scene team is still on site, but Sheriff Raynor and his deputies have gone, save for one who’s standing outside deterring anyone who tries to find out what’s happened by giving them the official, ‘There’s nothing to see here…’ line.
I walk around back, with Josh and Schultz in tow, and head up the stairs that lead to the main entrance to my apartment above. We walk inside and see Tori sitting on the sofa, hugging her knees to her chest. She turns as I enter and smiles. Her usually sparkling eyes are red, and tired from crying.
“Hey,” I say. “How you holdin’ up?”
“I’m fine,” she lies. “You alright?”
“I’m okay.” I smile and walk over to her, lean down, and kiss the top of her head. “I wanna introduce you to someone.” I take her hand, stand her up, and move her round to face the others. “Tori Watson, this... is Josh Winters.”
She smiles and extends her hand. “So you’re the famous Josh, are you?” she says, showing signs of her old self again. “Adrian’s told me a lot about you.”
He smiles and takes her hand. “Whatever he told you is either a lie, or I was drunk at the time...” He looks at me, smiling. Like a proud father would look at a son. “I’m happy for you, man. You have a good life here. All you need is a dog and a white picket fence, eh?”
Tori starts to cry and walks off, slightly embarrassed. I sigh and smile apologetically.
“Shit… something I said?” he asks.
I shake my head. “I actually had a dog,” I explain. “A stray wolf dog I called Styx. He’s under a blanket downstairs. He was with me nearly two years, and he caught a bullet in the attack earlier and died in my arms. I loved that dog, Josh.”
“Jeez... I’m sorry, Adrian.”
I glance over at Tori, who’s sitting on the edge of the bed across the room, staring at the floor. I turn back to Josh. “It’s alright, you didn’t know. Listen, I don’t know if I can help you with this,” I say. And it hurts me to say it. “I’ve got a life away from all that now. I can’t leave her, Josh. I love her.”
He nods, understanding and respecting my decision. “We’ll do what we can to keep you out of it from now on,” he says. “You have my word.”
“Thanks.”
Schultz steps forward holding his phone to Josh. “This is bullshit,” he says, interrupting. “He should just do as he’s goddamn told! Show him the photo already.”
We both look at him.
“Ryan, shut the fuck up, will you?” says Josh.
I love it when he loses his temper and curses—his accent is perfect for it!
“Ignore him,” he says to me.
“What photo?” I ask.
“Adrian, forget it.”
“What photo, Josh?”
Schultz sighs and thrusts his phone in my face. There’s a picture displayed on the screen. I move back slightly and grab hold of it, examining the image.
Josh mutters under his breath. “It’s nothing, Adrian, honestly. You’ve got your life here now, and I don’t want you involved. It’s not fair.”
I don’t acknowledge him. I’m too busy looking at the image. It’s a file photo, black and white, showing a man and woman talking. Judging by the background, it looks like somewhere in the Middle East. I don’t recognize the man. But the woman is very familiar.
“Josh…” I say, looking up from the phone and staring him straight in the eye. “Is this…?”
He lets out a heavy sigh and nods. “Yup… that is Clara Fox.”
10.
10:44 CDT
I wasn’t aware of anything around me. Like the world had shrunk, reducing my existence to nothing except this image on Schultz’s phone.
Clara Fox.
I fucking knew she was still alive!
I look at Josh, angry. “And when did you plan on mentioning this?” I ask him.
“Honestly?” he replies. “I wasn’t going to. Not after you said you wanted no part of whatever’s going on here. I respected the fact you’ve moved on and was gonna leave you in blissful ignorance.”
We both know my anger isn’t justified, and I calm down as quickly as I got fired up.
Tori appears next to me. “What’s going on?” she asks. “Is everything okay?”
Josh and I look at each other. He knows instantly that I’ve told Tori nothing about my old life, and he discreetly nods to me.
“Is this to do with what’s been happening here?” she asks.
“Yeah,” I reply. “Josh here works for a defense contractor who’s investigating the organization that’s been sending people after me. There’s, ah… evidence to suggest a link to an old mission we worked together, back when I was in the military. He’s asking for my help to sort it out.”
I feel awful lying to her, but it’s for her own good. After everything that’s happened here, the last thing she needs is to find out her boyfriend’s the world’s greatest hitman, trying to retire.
To her credit, she doesn’t even hesitate.
“You’ve gotta help them, Ady. It’s the only way to make sure we’re left alone, isn’t it?”
“I’m not leaving you. These guys are professionals—I’m sure they can handle things without me.”
She shakes her head. “Ady, I know you. If you let them go without you, you’ll walk round here, restless, wishing you’d gone with them. There’s nothing to do here that I can’t do myself. You won’t trust anyone else to stop this, either, so quit worrying about me and go be my action hero.”
She smiles and hugs my arm. I look at Josh and raise an eyebrow.
“Wow, she really does know you!” he laughs. He puts a hand on her shoulder. “Tori, this man is like a brother to me, and I can confidently say, hand on heart, that I have never seen him this happy. That makes me happy, and I thank you for that. And you’re right, you know him almost as well as I do, by the sounds of it.” He turns to me, taking the phone off me and handing it back to Schultz without looking. “And you… you should listen to your better half here. We need you on this. Neither of us trusts anyone other than you to fix it, and we both know it.”
I turn and walk over to the refrigerator, open the door, take out four beers, and place them on the counter. Opening the drawer underneath, I use a bottle opener on them, and then carry them over, two bottles in each hand, to the rest of the group. I hand them out.
I say, “Everyone—drink.”
They all oblige. Even Schultz, which surprises me. I look at the bottle for a moment, appreciating the taste.
“Tori, if I go, I don’t want you to stay here, okay? Go and stay with Nicki for a few days, I’m sure she won’t mind? If you need anything, you call the sheriff.”
She smiles and kisses me. “Don’t worry about me,” she says, seeming happier than she was five minutes ago. “I’ll be fine. You just need to go and fix this, so we can move on.”
She stands up straight and salutes before laughing. I laugh along with her while Josh looks on with that proud smile on his face again.
I look at him. “New York, huh?”
He nods and says, “That’s where our intel puts him at some point tomorrow. We need to track him, find out what he’s doing, and who he’s meeting, then apprehend him before getting out of there without alerting anyone.”
“Sounds simple enough.”
Schultz scoffs. “You’re still an arrogant son’ bitch, ain’t ya, son?” he says.
“Not arrogant,” I say, correcting him. “Just good.”
“We’ve got a plane fueled and ready to go on an airstrip at Fort Worth,” Josh announces. “It’s a five hour drive, so the sooner we hit the road, the sooner we can get you fully briefed and in the air. The flight will take around three-and-a
-half hours.”
I nod and look at Tori. Her flame-red hair is all tangled, yet still looks gorgeous. Her brown eyes stare at me, not quite full of life, like normal, but getting there. She smiles at me like she’s so proud of her man she can’t contain it. It makes me think I’m doing the right thing by agreeing to help Josh.
I look at him. He'll be close to fifty, nowadays, but he still looks younger than I do. He was always well built, so I figure it's his fitted shirt that makes him look like he’s been working out more. His change of image is staggering, considering he’s looked the same to me for the last twenty-seven years. But it suits him. It seems he moved on, too, and it’s good to see.
“Gimme half an hour guys,” I say. “I’ll meet you out front.”
11:20 CDT
I’m packing a shoulder bag with a change of clothes and some essentials. I’m wearing my jeans but no shirt. Tori’s lying in bed, wearing nothing. We spent ten minutes saying goodbye the way people in love ought to, then another ten minutes re-assuring each other we’d both be okay. My thinking is, whoever this Armageddon Initiative is, they’ll go where I go to try to kill me, so there’s no reason to come to Devil’s Spring if I’ve left.
And now I’m packing for a trip to the Big Apple.
I make sure I pack my Berettas, which, up until earlier today, I hadn’t touched in over two years. I’m not traveling on a civilian plane, so having them with me won’t be a problem.
“Are you sure you’re okay with me doing this?” I ask Tori as I pull my T-shirt on over my head.
“Will you stop asking me that,” she replies. “If I didn’t want you to go, I’d tell you. Josh is your friend, and he’s asking for your help. Besides, you’re going off to fight terrorists and stuff! That’s so exciting!”
I smile at her. It’s nice to see that some people still remain innocent to the harsh realities of conflict. Even after everything she’s been through in the last twenty-four hours, she’s still the same ol’ Tori that I fell in love with.
Deadly Intent: An Action Thriller (Adrian Hell Series Book 4) Page 6