Curious, the killer joined his partner and kneeled beside her, gripped her drenched hair, and turned her face toward him to confirm the kill. “What about the deputy?” he asked his partner, who stood over him. The woman blinked.
“Live, or die,” an unfamiliar voice said. The killer didn't have to look up to know that he was on his knees below the deputy marshal who was wearing his partner's outfit.
The killer pivoted the MP5 in his hand intending to take out the woman, before he was shot himself, but…
Winter helped Sean to her feet. Using the rain and his palm, he wiped away the chunks of mud his bullets had splashed. Winter scanned the landscape through the night-vision goggles he had taken from the dead assailant inside the shack and saw nothing that was a danger to them. He didn't look down at the killer's ruined skull. He removed the goggles and tore off the rubber hood.
“I felt the heat from your gun when you shot. Did you have to shoot it so close to my head?” Unbelievably, Sean was angry.
“He wouldn't have fallen for it otherwise. Let's find a radio.”
“Where?”
“Should be one on the boat.” He reached into Sean's coat pocket, took out his SIG, and put it in her hand. He checked the magazine of the MP5 in his hand and, finding it too light, discarded it for a full one he robbed from the dead man at his feet.
He had expected to find the assassins' boat waiting at the dock for them, but there were only the two he had seen there earlier that day. Running down the switchback, he and Sean approached the dock through the freezing rain. Winter scanned the surrounding area all the way down to the sport-fishing boat. When he looked back up at the tree line he saw, off to the right, the shape of a Little Bird, a four-place military helicopter. He hoped there had been only the three assassins he had killed-one being the pilot.
Winter stepped over the transom after Sean.
“Watch the path,” he told her. He climbed into the cockpit of the boat. The windshield was smeared with water, obscuring his view of the dock, the switchback, and the radio tower. Sean stood in the rain with her hood up, aiming Winter's gun at the switchback,
Just as he discovered that the key was missing, Winter heard something hit the deck behind him and turned to see the styrene key fob on the floor at Sean's feet. She stood, staring up at the flying bridge above Winter, her face a frozen mask. A red dot danced in the center of her Navy-issue raincoat.
“Lady, throw that pistol over the side.” The Southern accent was thick.
Winter nodded at her to do so. She hesitated, then tossed the handgun out, the rain swallowing the splash. “Now, Deputy Massey, five seconds to toss out that chatterbox or I'll light the bitch up. You can't hit me without me doing her.”
He studied the crimson spot that moved from Sean's jacket to her face and back to her heart. He studied Sean's gaze to see exactly where her eyes were aimed. The only question was how close this fourth killer was standing to the edge. Winter switched the rate-of-fire selector to full automatic and raised the barrel.
“Five… four,” the killer mocked.
Winter concentrated on the red dot playing on Sean's face, now her neck, and down onto the coat.
Winter fired on three-the bullets ripping the fiberglass ceiling to shreds. As he fired, he was aware of Sean being knocked backward off the transom and into the water by a single shot from the man's weapon.
A black-clad body fell sprawling onto the deck. Where the man's legs were chewed up, arterial blood spewed. His pistol was stopped by the transom.
Winter ran to the stern and pulled Sean up into the boat. She began coughing immediately, fighting to breathe.
“It's okay,” he said. He checked her face and neck, and she opened her eyes. “Just knocked the breath out of you.” He tore open her coat and saw the. 45 round deformed against the ballistic vest under her coat.
“You let him shoot me.” Her voice was raspy.
“You're fine.”
“You let him shoot me!” She slapped him, hard.
He lifted the assailant's pistol, a SOCOM. 45-caliber H amp;K fitted with a noise suppressor. Leaving Sean, he moved to the supine killer, who stared up into the rain, blinking slowly. The bubbles of blood between his lips told Winter that one or more of the bullets had entered his chest after going under the vest-his shattered lungs were filled with blood.
“How did you know my name?” he asked the killer.
The man smiled, smearing dark blood over his teeth. His eyes were losing their focus. He grabbed Winter's ankle, coughing up blood. He said something but the sound was gobbled by the thundering rotors of the attack helicopter that seemed to be suspended over the dock like a wasp, blasting the boat with wind, drumming rain and blinding light. The Cobra's. 30-caliber minigun seemed to be aimed at his chest, about to blast him into confetti. He was dressed exactly like the dead man on the deck.
“You, on the deck-hands on your heads, do not move!” Winter waited for a second, then stood, locking his hands over his head.
The switchback swarmed with running men dressed in black.
“Sean!” Winter called out. “No matter what anyone asks, don't discuss anything that happened before Martinez went down. Understand?”
The men in black slammed Winter and Sean facedown onto the deck.
35
Ward Field, Virginia
Herman Hoffman stood waiting outside the cavernous hangar in the dark. Since Ralph was flying the Justice Department's plane, the first part of the operation was a success. He knew the boys on the island side had to have done as well, since their degree of difficulty was far lower.
He watched as the jet turned onto the final approach and came in hot and flaring just above the asphalt. Ralph taxied the jet past the helicopter and, cutting the engines, rolled directly into the hangar.
Herman watched as the clamshell door came down and Ralph descended the steps. He picked up the Polaroid camera from the table and returned to the cabin to take the proof-of-death pictures. Two other men came out of the plane a few seconds after the fourth flash.
The first man down was wiping matter and blood from his face with a towel. He saw Herman's proffered hand. “Sorry, sir,” he said, laughing. “I'm afraid the government's nice plane is totally ruined.”
“Nice to have you back home, Lewis,” Herman said, smiling. “Ralph, get the fireworks set and let's get in the sky.”
36
Rook Island, North Carolina
Rain splattered noisily against the blue tarpaulin and the water that ran under it came out dyed pink. The SEALs had covered the corpse to protect evidence. Winter and Sean sat in the boat's cockpit, where rain dripped through the ragged fiberglass. One of the divers handed up Winter's SIG Sauer to a young SEAL, who removed the magazine, cleared the breech, then set the pistol and its magazine on a seat cushion.
Sean had been quiet since the SEALs arrived ninety minutes earlier. She sat huddled in a wool blanket, not meeting Winter's eyes. Winter had identified himself and explained that four unknown men, all dressed like SEALs, had killed the six radar-station crew and another US marshal, before he had killed them.
The SEAL commander approached Winter, clipping his radio onto his belt.
“Lieutenant Commander Reed is on his way here. He's shore patrol.”
“Has anybody contacted my people?” Winter asked.
“I'm not sure,” the young man said.
Drained of adrenaline, fatigue had caught up with Winter. He felt bone-weary.
“Poor Angela,” Sean said softly. “How could anybody do something like that?”
Winter didn't know what to say. He felt grief for Martinez-it was so totally senseless for her to die like she had and, worse still, after the package had left.
“What if he'd shot me in the head?” Sean asked suddenly.
“I'd never hand my gun over to a killer. I did the only thing I could.”
“Who was the guy who shot me?” Sean asked.
“No idea.”
>
“He seemed to know you.”
She had a point. He had no idea how the man he had shot through the boat's roof could have known his name.
Winter felt the boat rock slightly. He turned to see two men in shore patrol coats climb onto the vessel. The older of the pair squatted, lifted the edge of the tarpaulin, and studied the corpse.
The SEAL commander said, “Sir, this is United States Deputy-”
“I know who he is,” the older man interrupted, looking directly at Winter, ignoring Sean Devlin. “Deputy, I'm Lieutenant Commander Fletcher Reed. I'm going to handle this until the NCIS investigators get here.”
Fletcher Reed was in his early forties, built like a gymnast twenty years past his last medal but ready and willing to go out and compete again even if his heart exploded doing it. His head was a perfect rectangle topped with hair that would have made a bristle brush jealous. He had small ears and a neck that flared from his sharp jaw out to his wide shoulders. His eyes were so dark there was no difference between the irises and pupils. If he had ever owned a sense of humor it was not apparent from his grim countenance.
“Do you have any questions before I ask a few?”
“Have you contacted the USMS?”
“That has been done. Now, what the hell is this, Massey?” he demanded.
“A corpse,” Winter said.
“Does the corpse have a name?”
“We weren't formally introduced.”
Reed stared hard at Winter, the two men studying each other across the wet tarpaulin. “In my experience, having a bunch of heavily armed individuals come onto a radar station in peacetime and wipe out six sailors and your partner in such a senseless and brutal manner is hardly a normal event. I'm sure as hell not going to stand here and listen to you making flip remarks.”
The man's words made Winter feel like an ass. Sean sat staring down at her lap.
“I understand the seriousness of this,” Winter said evenly. “They were doing their damnedest to add us to their tally.”
“Can you tell me why this man and three of his pals killed six unarmed sailors and that female deputy over at the house?”
“Angela Martinez,” Sean said abruptly. “Her name was Angela Martinez.”
Reed kept his eyes locked on Winter.
“No, sir,” Winter said.
“You mean to tell me you don't know?”
“I can't tell you what their motive was.”
Reed laughed disdainfully in total disbelief.
“This is an official United States Justice Department operation. Only the attorney general of the United States can release me to give you that information.”
“What about Ms. Devlin?” Reed countered.
Winter gritted his teeth. They had obviously searched the house and found Sean's identification.
“Classified.”
“And what exactly can you share with me, Marshal?”
“I'll be happy to tell you what happened after they killed Deputy Martinez.”
Fletcher Reed seemed to be chewing that over. Reaching a decision, he nodded. “Barnett, take notes.”
As Winter went through the story detail by detail, the young ensign scribbled notes. Although Winter had just been trying to keep Sean alive, he had wanted nothing worse than to escape the killers. Killing the men in black had been necessary. He didn't tell Reed this. Instead, he told him how he had hidden Sean in the storage cabinet, climbed up onto the girders in the radio shack from the ruined console, dropped down and broken the assailant's neck, then taken his clothes. He didn't mention the fact that the man under the tarp had called him by name. Neither of those facts was relevant to Reed's investigation.
Reed turned to his assistant. “You get all that?”
“Yes, sir.” The SP closed the notebook and slipped it into his breast pocket.
“Best get you two back over to the house,” Reed said, smiling for the first time. “Sounds to me like you've earned yourself a rest, Massey.”
Winter knew that Reed's smile, which looked genuine, was designed to make Winter confident that Reed was giving up on pumping him further, which was crap. The officer was going to keep right on trying to slip around the classified wall Winter was standing behind. For Reed, and men like him, the ability to classify information was the sole providence of the armed forces.
Winter figured the contest between them, as long as it was allowed to continue, would be an entertaining one. And anything that took his mind off the gruesome event was welcome.
“One more thing,” Reed said, like it was an afterthought. “I'd like for you to take a good look at your attackers without their masks. In case you do know who they are.”
“I'd be happy to,” Winter replied.
“You, too,” Reed added, nodding at Sean.
The two killers' corpses, along with the radio operator's, were laid out under the awning of the radio shack, covered by opaque plastic sheets. Sean stood beside Reed, across the three bodies from Winter, shivering under the blanket.
When Reed motioned, the sheet was pulled off the first one. Sean looked away. The body belonged to the man whose neck Winter had broken in the radio shack. He was naked-how Winter had left him-and his hands were at his sides. His head was cocked so that it appeared he was looking at something high over his left shoulder. “No,” Winter said.
“Have you ever seen this man before, Ms. Devlin? Could you look at his face?”
Sean glanced down momentarily and shook her head.
The technician replaced the sheet, moved to the second corpse, and lifted the covering away.
Sean shut her eyes, took a deep breath, and shook her head. “No.”
Winter studied the man he had shot point-blank with the MP5 as Sean had lain on the ground beneath him. The muzzle blast had scored and burned the skin around the entrance wounds in the upper rear quadrant of his skull. The hydrostatic pressure had caused the eye to bulge from its socket. Where the three-shot burst of 9-mm bullets had exited, the now one-eyed head looked like a poorly scraped out jack-o'-lantern. The missing brain matter and bone fragments had been placed inside a plastic bag, which rested beside the corpse's neck.
“Him?” Reed asked, staring at Winter.
“No.”
Winter felt for Sean. For most, violence was something that happened to unlucky people in some place made fictional by being on their television screens. Winter had never envied that virginal ignorance more than now.
“According to where your empty brass was, you shot the one at the house from a good thirty feet away,” Reed told Winter.
“About that,” Winter agreed.
“All three in the head. Quite a shot, considering you just saw your partner go down.”
“Your point being?” Winter asked.
“Under those conditions, most people would have been lucky to have hit the guy with a shotgun, that's all. You went for the head, not the torso.”
“He was wearing armor.” Winter could not explain how he was able to put his bullets exactly where he wanted them to go. It was an ability that he had discovered while training at Glynco. He didn't know how he did it, he was just glad he could.
“The men have no identification on them. Their weapons aren't available outside our Special Forces.”
“Maybe they got them from wherever they got that Navy chopper they flew here in. They look like soldiers to me.”
“This stinks,” Reed said. “You outwit and kill four men with superior weapons, obviously professionals, without breaking a sweat-”
“Hey!” Sean yelled, startling the men, who turned to her. Color rose in her cheeks. “I have nothing to add to what Deputy Massey has already said, and I am getting sick of watching you men bump chests.” She pointed a finger at Reed. “Unless you have some new torture to subject me to, I am going to walk back to the house, take a hot shower, and change into some dry clothes.”
And with that she whirled and strode off toward the trees.
“She's no
t accustomed to this,” Winter said, watching her go.
“Neither am I,” Reed said sourly.
Winter followed Sean.
“Marshal!” Reed called out. “I need that suit you're wearing. It's evidence.”
Winter caught up with Sean. “God in heaven,” she muttered.
Winter couldn't think of anything to say, so they walked to the safe house together in silence.
37
Winter stood for ten minutes in the shower and let the hot water pound him. Then he cut the heat and stood in a chilled stream. Reed and his partner had already opened Winter's drawers and searched everything before he and Sean had reentered the house. The only thing he had come to the assignment with that he cared about taking out again was his life.
He dressed and went to the kitchen, where Reed was seated at the table reading what appeared to be the preliminary report of the SEAL commander. The younger shore patrolman was standing at the counter reading through his notebook.
“Feel better?” Reed asked, without looking up.
“Much,” Winter said, pouring himself a cup of coffee.
“The men didn't come in on that helicopter. Appears it was for their escape.”
“Sorry?”
“We found three chutes near the radio shack, so three of them parachuted in. According to a trace I ran, that chopper was turned into a spare-parts donor due to questionable airworthiness.”
“Obviously the record is wrong.”
“A King Air passed by at twenty-five thousand feet,” Reed told him. “The trio jumped from it and sailed four miles using membranes, wings stretched between their ankles and wrists.”
“HALO jumpers.”
“The helicopter probably came in below radar after the radio shack was knocked out. The drop plane is in the Caribbean at the moment, on auto pilot. F14s are flying alongside waiting for it to run dry.
“Massey, we both know those assailants were here because of whatever you people were doing here. You and Martinez, Ms. Devlin, or maybe one of the people who left earlier was their main target.”
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