by CJ Petterson
Sully crossed the street and made his way toward a drab green Jeep. His eyes scanned the empty street as he zipped up his baseball jacket halfway. He took a last look around then slid onto the seat and fired up the engine. He planned to make a stop at his ex-wife’s house and find out more about the plane crash.
In front of Mirabel’s house, two blocks off the main drag on a dark street, Sully spotted a black Ford Expedition idling without lights. Instinct, honed by his job — his real job, the job no one in this town, not even Mirabel, knew about — kicked in and alarm bells went off in his head. He slowed and took a sideways glance at the Ford on the way past but couldn’t make out the driver through the dark-tinted windows.
He turned left onto the next street and stopped in front of the first house that showed no lights in the windows. With an eye on the street, he reached under the instrument panel, pulled a SIG-Sauer P228 from its hidden holster, and stepped out of the Jeep with his gun hand close to his side. An undercover CIA agent licensed to carry, he kept the SIG within easy reach 24/7.
Where the limbs of a pine tree provided cover, he shoved the gun under his belt at the small of his back and hopped a chain-link fence. “No dogs, no dogs,” he whispered like a prayer as he cut through the back yard. Bent low, he ran through two more backyards and across another driveway before he stopped and hunkered down behind a bush just to the rear of his target. As he watched, he knew he was right. The driver’s window began a slow slide down into the doorframe, and the fiery ash of a cigarette butt drew a lazy red arc in the darkness. The makings of a getaway car were all there. In front of Mirabel’s house?
Sully shrugged off his jacket, discarded his hat, and lurched into the middle of the street, mumbling unintelligible lyrics to some unidentifiable tune. When the driver leaned forward in his seat and cocked his head toward the side-view mirror, Sully recognized the dim reflection. A local nickel-and-dime hood with a full rap sheet. The window was still open when Sully staggered into the door. “Shay, buddy — ”
The driver swung a Glock through the window. Sully snapped the man’s arm against the window frame and chopped his right hand across the bridge of the gunman’s nose. Reaching past the dangling arm, Sully grabbed the man’s throat, silencing the scream. The man struggled then went limp, his larynx crushed. “Damn,” Sully whispered and shoved the lifeless body down across the front seat. “Didn’t mean to do that.”
When he opened the door and toggled the power button to roll up the dark window, he caught the aroma of a floral aftershave. He checked the safety on the Glock then shoved it into a back pocket. Sully shut the car door with a muffled click, pulled his gun, and headed toward the rear of Mirabel’s house.
Under a garden stone near the steps, he picked up a spare house key. His feet made no sound as he took the stairs two at a time and keyed open the deadbolt on the back door. He eased the door ajar, slipped inside, and stopped dead when he heard Mirabel’s voice.
“You didn’t find what you wanted because you’ve got the wrong woman. And you killed a good man for no reason.” Mirabel’s voice was almost a whisper.
Sully inched forward. Who’s she talking to?
“Good is a rather subjective description.”
What the — ? The accent of his old adversary was unmistakable. Now the aromatics in the limo made perfect sense. Saint John. What was the hired gun doing here?
“The plane crash was to have been the solution to my problem,” Saint John said. “Alas, that failed, and here we are. Imagine my dismay when I discovered you had survived. I must compliment your tenacity.”
Sully shook his head as the shock of finding Saint John in Mirabel’s house gave way to confusion. What did he want with Mirabel? Where was Karadzic? Sully couldn’t see him, hadn’t heard him, but knew Saint John’s long-time goon would be close.
“I am nothing if not tenacious,” Mirabel said.
“Tony. Assist Dr. Campbell to her feet.”
Sully took that as his cue. Okay, SinJen, old man, let’s see how tenacious you are. Sully raised the SIG and stepped into the lighted room. “You, Stumpy. Move away from the lady.”
“Sully!” Mirabel jumped up, breathing fast, a hesitant smile on her face.
Saint John got to his feet and grabbed Mirabel’s arm as Karadzic reached inside his coat jacket and lifted out a gun. Sully recognized Karadzic’s favorite weapon, a Makarov 9mm. His Russian-made piece had a threaded barrel equipped with a long muzzle brake. It wasn’t about the speed of drawing the weapon; it was all about being quiet in the neighborhood. Saint John’s face flattened into a bored look, and he waved Tony aside. “Mr. O’Sullivan. What an unpleasant surprise. Since you’re standing here in front of me, I presume I’ll need to find a new driver.”
Sully let his gaze slide from Karadzic to Saint John. “Good help is so hard to find these days. You’re a long way from home, SinJen. Mirabel, come over here.”
Mirabel struggled to free her arm as Saint John tightened his grip. “I don’t think so,” he hissed.
Saint John’s eyes narrowed. “You’re not here alone, are you?”
“You’re on my turf, SinJen. What do you think?”
Saint John seemed to weigh the question and then gave Mirabel a shove that put her between Karadzic and Sully.
Mirabel grabbed at Karadzic’s arm as he got off a shot. The silencer emitted a loud pop, and the bullet thudded into the wall over Sully’s head. Sully barreled past Mirabel and slammed into the Croat. The men sprawled onto the kitchen floor, their guns sliding across the tiles.
Mirabel stumbled back into the desk, grabbed the letter opener, and lunged at Saint John. She buried the point in his arm. He yelped and threw a left-handed punch that caught her at the end of his reach and sent her to the floor.
Mirabel’s fall distracted Sully enough to lose his grip on Karadzic, who scrambled to his feet, legs pumping like pile drivers. One of his knees connected with concussive force with Sully’s temple and cheek. Ears ringing and vision blurred, Sully struggled to get up.
Karadzic found his gun and swung around to fire. Sully grabbed for the gun as Karadzic pulled the trigger. With Sully’s hand blocking the slide, the semi-automatic jammed. Sully grunted in satisfaction and pain as he yanked the gun out of the man’s hand. Karadzic’s face registered shock and anger before he bolted out the kitchen door while Saint John disappeared through the front door.
Sully shook the fog out of his head — Karadzic’s knee had come close to knocking him out — retrieved his gun, and raced out the front door. He watched Saint John’s Expedition vanish down the street and then stuffed the weapon under his belt. Back in the living room, Sully picked up Karadzic’s Mak, dropped out the magazine, and set the gun on the table.
Mirabel had her back braced against the doorjamb as she watched him disarm the weapon. Without warning, her wobbly legs gave way, and she slid to the floor.
Sully dropped to his knees beside her and gathered her close. “It’s okay, babe. It’s all over. They’re gone.”
“Who are you?” she breathed into his chest.
“It’s me, Sully.”
“Idiot. I know that, but the geologist I know doesn’t carry a gun,” she said, disbelief in her voice. “Who are you really? Who were those men? You knew them.”
He held her tight for a few moments then lifted her up and sat her in the overstuffed chair. “Rest a minute.”
She shook her head. “Got to call Evan. And a locksmith.”
“I’ll make the calls. You relax right here. I’ll hang around for a while in case the bad guys come back.”
Mirabel dropped her head back and, as soon as it touched the back of the chair, fear’s adrenaline rush visibly left her. Her breathing slowed, her eyelids drooped.
“Come on,” Sully said and helped her to bed. He tilted her over on top of the bedspread where
she sagged into the mattress, and her muscles relaxed with a convulsive twitch.
“Can’t let them get away. I promised Dan.” She was mumbling before she finished her sentence.
Sully stroked her cheek and smiled. Its velvety softness triggered an unexpected but familiar response. After watching her slide into a place that was neither sleep nor wakefulness, he called the sheriff’s office then the locksmith. He walked out of her earshot, tapped in another number, and spoke quietly for several minutes before returning to hover over Mirabel.
Sure she was asleep, Sully headed to the bathroom, set his gun on the counter, and washed out the gash the Mak had put in the webbing of his thumb. He wrapped a strip of gauze around his hand and went to the kitchen to build a compress out of ice cubes and a dishcloth. With the makeshift icepack pressed against the rising lump on the ridge of his cheekbone, he rattled the doors and checked the windows.
When he was satisfied every opening was sealed tight, he shoved the chair and TV around until he could keep his back to a wall and still see the television and both doors. He leaned his face against the icepack and pushed a button on the remote control. The TV screen flickered on in the middle of a blaring commercial. He touched the mute button, laid the SIG on the broad arm of the chair, and settled in to watch the monitor without sound. He didn’t expect Saint John to return anytime soon, but the assassin was known for doing the unexpected.
CHAPTER TEN
Three miles out of Mendocito, Saint John’s Expedition pulled up behind a white Maybach. He knew the limousine’s presence was not an exercise in subtlety. The elite, custom-built Mercedes-Benz was all about influence and power.
Saint John stared at the car and vaguely wondered about the person inside. He knew someone had been sent with a message. He nodded to Tony, who got out of the driver’s seat, walked around to the other side of the vehicle, and dragged the chauffeur’s deadweight out of the front seat. After disappearing into a patch of brush for a few moments, Tony returned, dusted off his pants legs, and opened the rear door for the contract assassin.
At the same time, a Japanese man, small in stature and liveried in black, opened the rear door of the Mercedes. Saint John ducked into the unlit interior, and the door shut behind him with a soft click.
Saint John sat silently while the shadowy figure in the back seat with him inhaled through tobacco that had been rolled into an unfiltered rod. The brief glow of the ash revealed the long, slender tube was braced between two bony fingers and thumb in the European manner. Saint John waited in a thickening miasma of pungent gases.
“The plane crash failed to accomplish our objective,” the smoker said, the thickly accented words rolling with difficulty over the tongue.
Saint John did not turn toward the voice. “I am aware — ”
“Tonight, a complication arose, and you failed in another inept attempt to eliminate the target.”
Saint John stiffened. How did you hear so soon? “Running into Mr. O’Sullivan was indeed an unexpected complication, but one I look forward to solving with all possible haste.”
“Twice, Mr. Saint John. Twice, you have failed. Our employer is not pleased.” The voice sounded hollow and tinny, almost garbled by the amplifier held close to the vocal cords. The electronics disrupted and corrupted the words as though the speaker had no voice box.
Saint John did not know if the speaker was a man or a woman, but he considered the question moot. Its answer did not interest him. He shifted slightly in his seat and rested his injured arm carefully on his leg. “I can assure — ”
“We have heard your assurances before. You assured a solution to the problem in less than a month. More than three weeks have gone by since the contract was made. Important issues remain unresolved. How many days will pass before you accomplish all that you promised?”
“I will complete the contract within the time specified,” Saint John answered, using measured tones. “You know my reputation.”
The tinny voice turned even more brittle. “I am instructed to give you this message: ‘We have enjoyed a long and productive relationship, Mr. Saint John. It would, perhaps, not be beneficial to either of us to bring that to an abrupt close.’”
If there had been a light on in the car, the figure might have seen anger flare in Saint John’s eyes. But Saint John swallowed his ire. “Certainly such action would not please me, either.”
“When, within the week … ” the speaker paused as if to emphasize the deadline, “you have succeeded in your task, your fee will be wired to your account as agreed. It would not be wise to fail again.” The unseen speaker fell silent, and the threat hung suspended between them like the blade of a guillotine.
After several moments of continued silence, the door opened, and Saint John understood the conversation was at an end. He stepped out into the dirt, walked back to the idling Expedition, turned, and watched the tail lights of the Mercedes fade into the distance.
“Get me the first-aid kit,” he said to Karadzic before he threw his jacket into the back seat, and Karadzic shut the door behind him.
While his new chauffeur drove toward Mendocito, Saint John flipped open his cellphone and thumbed in a phone number. “You should have told me of O’Sullivan’s involvement,” he said when someone answered. “I welcome the opportunity to even an old score, but there will be an additional fee.” Saint John listened a few more seconds before deleting the number from the cell’s memory and closing the phone with a slap. He pulled at the shirt sleeve already stuck to the bloody souvenir Mirabel had given him and embraced the sting. It would add an edge to his thoughts as he formulated the details of a new plan.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Mirabel opened one eye and squinted at the digital clock on the nightstand until the fuzzy numbers came into focus. Nine forty. Her muscles complained as she stretched like a cat, and she groaned when the fogginess of sleep cleared enough to remember Saint John’s visit. She kicked free of the covers, swung her tanned legs over the edge of the bed, and discovered she was no longer wearing shorts and a T-shirt. “Ah, geeze.” Of the only two nightgowns remaining in the drawer — she had torched her other gowns in the desert bonfire — it was just like Sully to choose the red silk with its deep décolleté. The flannel granny gown sprinkled with tiny pink flowers would have been more to her liking under the circumstances.
She rubbed sleep out of her eyes with the heel of her hands. Under the base of the mirrored lamp, she spotted the raggedy edge of a sheet of paper torn out of a wire-bound binder, probably one of hers. Her name was scrawled in a bold hand across several lines. She opened the note and read:
Left at seven. A friend is keeping watch while I’m gone. He’s in that white and green Ramcharger at the end of your driveway. His name is Frank Griebe. Retired FBI. Coffee’s made, bagels in the bag on top of the microwave. Back soon.
She padded into the living room and peeled back the curtain.
A barrel-chested man with a neatly trimmed white beard and a pair of half-rim glasses bridging his nose was parked right where Sully said he would be. His longish, silver hair reached to the neck of the black T-shirt that stretched across broad shoulders and muscular arms that belied the fact Sully said he was old enough to retire. Her guardian seemed to be doodling on a folded newspaper.
“Don’t know you,” she said softly, “but those desert pinstripes on your truck say you spend time in the desert.”
In the truck that sported the telltale scratches on the side panels that come from driving off-road through scrub brush, her guardian looked up, grinned, and waved. She clutched the front of her gown together and backed out of view.
She retreated to her bedroom, fanning the heat out of her cheeks, and switched on the radio that she kept tuned to a news and weather station. She dropped her gown on the floor in front of the bathroom door and taped a plastic trash bag over the bandage on her stit
ched thigh. Then she stood under the shower long enough to change her fingertips into prunes and the bathroom into a steam room before she’d exhausted the hot water in the fifty-gallon tank, and the spray turned cool.
“Rats.” She wrapped herself in a blanket-sized towel and considered going back to bed until the hot water tank recovered. “If Santa wasn’t waiting out there,” she murmured.
She toweled off then rubbed aloe lotion and a sunscreen over her sun-dried face and arms. As she bent to repair the bandage on her thigh, she discovered the hot steam had loosened stiff muscles, and the aches had subsided to a manageable, vague tenderness. She raided the laundry basket for a pair of faded blue khakis she’d hacked off at the knees, slipped her arms into an oversized white shirt — one of Sully’s, she noted with surprise — and stuck her feet into a pair of well broken-in running shoes. After a quick glance in the mirror hanging on the closet door as she rolled up her sleeves, she pushed her short, curly auburn hair into place with her fingers and headed for the coffee and bagels.
• • •
Frank Griebe’s meaty hand felt around under the stack of newsprint on the seat of the Ramcharger, found a cellphone ringing the notes of Beethoven’s Fifth, and flipped it open. He read the caller ID, grunted, and tapped the answer button. “Hey, Sully.” His voice resonated from deep within his chest.
“Hey, buddy, anything happening?”
“Been quiet all morning. You bringing breakfast?”
“It’s almost noon. How about a burger and fries?”
“Nah. Thanks anyway. Supposed to be watching my cholesterol. I’ll find something later.”
“I’ll be at Mirabel’s in about twenty minutes, okay?”
“Has to be. You find out anything?”
“My cell’s on the tail end of a charge. It’s cutting out. I’ll talk to you when I get there.”