“Position secured,” Moreland broke in on the earpiece. “Hostile sentry one is in view.”
“Position secured. Clear line of sight,” Timms followed.
Agent Conrad marked their positions on the tablet with green circles and Sydney could see where the first sentry was marked nearly between both points. “Bringing chopper one on the line.” She clicked the merge button on her earpiece and she could immediately hear the faint humming of the rotary blades. “Chopper one on the line. Hostiles are holding positions. Note that hostile two is close to the heat periphery.”
With a forward wave she began picking her way through the grass towards the last marker for the first sentry. Alex Vaughn walked on her right and Briggs trailed her on the left. A half dozen BPD fanned out behind them, keeping pace, but letting the FBI take the lead.
“Hostile is ten yards in front of you,” Moreland said into her earpiece.
She squinted into the dark and cursed herself for not having proper field equipment to see with night vision. She could see the faint outline of something white. Her breath hitched and she signaled for two of the police officers to go left and around and for two to go right. Briggs moved with the left group and as he did so, she picked up her pace and in a few strides she was close enough to the hostile to make out his full outline against the backdrop of the ignited building. The other officers moved into the darkness and past the first sentry, continuing on to the second sentry location.
Vaughn picked up speed as the groups rustled past on their flanks and the hostile turned his head to the left, hearing the footsteps, just as Alex Vaughn came up from his right and pressed his Beretta against the side of the man’s head.
“Don’t move, cocksucker.” Vaughn cocked the hammer on his Beretta to emphasis the point. The two police officers in the group shuffled to his side, making their presence known.
The sentry dropped whatever was in his hands instantly and threw his hands into the air with a flourish. “Please don’t shoot!”
The voice sounded familiar to Sydney but she couldn’t place it.
“Turn around nice and slow,” Alex Vaughn said.
He turned around and as he did so the moon lit up his face enough that Sydney blurted out,” Randal? Randal Boone? What are you doing here?”
A relieved Randal Boone lowered his hands with a trembling sigh. “Agent Price!” He looked at Alex Vaughn and then at the ground. “I’m, erm, I’m working, ma’am.”
One of the officers that picked up the dropped items walked over and handed Sydney something that looked like a walkie-talkie and a recording device, along with a press credential.
“Jesus Christ,” Alex Vaughn hissed.
“How the hell did you find out about this operation?” Sydney asked. Her glare sent Randal Boone back into a stammer.
“Well, erm, ma’am, Agent Price, ma’am, that’s a police blotter. I heard, I heard the call go out and thought, well hell, a man’s gotta earn a living. I thought I might get a good story out here while everyone else covers the mall. Plus, I knew you were at the Galleria and if you were coming here, I thought it might be related.”
“You fool,” Sydney blurted. “You could have jeopardized everything.”
Randal Boone looked back at the ground and Alex Vaughn held a stare so intense on the man that she thought he might punch him right there.
Turning to the officers she said, “Take this man to the staging area and hold him there until we are done here.”
“Yes, ma’am.” They closed in on Randal Boone, one on either side and grabbed him, leading him from the scene despite his hushed protestations.
As he was being led away, Alex Vaughn watched the trio with a scowl on his face. “Who is he?”
“A reporter. He asked me questions at the Galleria.”
Just then Briggs broke in on her earpiece. “Hostile two is not here. I repeat hostile two is not here.”
Shit.
“Agent Conrad, I need satellite playback from the last sixty seconds.” Sydney crossed her fingers as she and Alex Vaughn made their way to just outside the target building where the rest of the team awaited. She could hear the muffled voices of men inside the building talking, and even from outside she could tell there was a strained calm in the timbre of the conversation.
“Ma’am, satellite infrared images show the hostile entering the building moments before our men arrived.”
Do they know we’re here?
Her phone started buzzing on her hip and she was fast to click the silent button. She tilted the screen so she could read the text just in case it was important.
Officer Zgoda. Fuck. He probably has an update on Charlotte.
If there was ever any doubt about that, it disappeared with the next text. She sighed. She had no choice but to proceed. She waved her men into their positions and the two groups split off, two each climbing the exterior metal stairs on either side of the building, while Briggs stayed with her and Vaughn to help breach the front door.
Chapter 22
Ivan could feel a bead of sweat work its way down his forehead, no doubt leaving a lazy trail of salt in its wake. He had his twin Glocks leveled at the stairs as he crouched behind his Mexican ally. For his part, Eddie lay on his belly and held the AK-47 steady and pointed in the same direction. The footsteps came on like a slow moving wheel in need of grease as step after step gave a metallic groan in protest.
Christ. Were we that loud coming up here?
About a half dozen steps from the ledge of the doorway, just out of sight, the steps stopped creaking. Just past the dull thud of his own heartbeat, Ivan could make out the sound of whoever waited below breathing in shallow rasps.
He opened his mouth to say something, what he wasn’t sure yet, when two shafts of silver moonlight swung into the room from rectangular openings at either end of the building, but high enough to be even with their own perch. He hadn’t seen those access points from the darkness down below, as it was they both emptied out onto a walkway that ran parallel to his own position. A steady stream of men flooded in through the illuminated doorways, shadow by shadow, lining the catwalk.
A voice spoke from the stairwell directly in front of him. “Come out boys. There’s more than ten of us and we’re all packing automatics.”
Eddie glanced back at him, his Ak-47 clutch in between white knuckles, but he set his eyes and tapped the trigger with his index finger. Ivan admired the grit. But from his vantage point he could see out of the manager’s office at the firepower leveled at their tiny wood cube that sure as shit could have been made out of cardboard for all the good it would have been at stopping bullets.
He leaned over and tapped Eddie and whispered, “Sorry friend.”
“What for? I know the rules, right? Let’s get this over with then.”
He stood up as Ivan walked past him and said, a bit louder, “Alright. We’re coming out.”
“That’s it boys. Nice and easy. I want to hear metal hit the floor now.”
They dropped their weapons and as they did so, an old man peeked his head over the lip of the stairs and looked in and then quickly darted back beyond the ledge. He was older than Ivan remembered, but the scar he saw on the man that sliced from the bottom of his lip to the tip of his chin sent Ivan’s eyebrows furrowing in confusion.
“Dick? Dick LoGalbo? That you?” Ivan took a step forward just as the old head darted back around.
“You know anyone else this pretty? “ He pointed a pistol at Ivan and Eddie who came to the doorway and took a tentative step forward as Uncle Dick waved them down the stairs in front of him. He circled back and grabbed up the Ak-47, slinging it over his shoulder and whistled in admiration as he pushed the twin Glocks into his waistband.
“I thought you said you had an automatic.” He looked back and nodded his head towards the old man’s pistol.
“Funny thing about the Nivskys, eh? They believe whatever the fuck you tell em.”
As Eddie walked past he made a small l
unge at the old man who flinched backwards and brought his gun around in a hurry. “Funny thing about old men, they still got the bark but not the bite,” he taunted.
They started to walk down the metal steps as almost a dozen sets of eyes watched them descend.
“So you got Mexicans doing your dirty work, Ivan?” Uncle Dick scoffed and nudged him down another step with the barrel of his pistol.
“Seems like you’re the one doing the dirty work for a pack of Russians.” Ivan spit on the floor.
“What? I thought you’d be impressed. They’re your people. Or did you forget, you fucking mutt?”
Ivan felt his hands clench and the heat build up behind his ears. He would have turned and split that old fucker’s nose and worried about the hail of bullets after if he hadn’t seen a small silhouette dart through the front entrance a dozen feet below them.
Was that a fedora?
He couldn’t be sure. But then a moment later the door opened again and another man swung into the room behind whoever just entered. As he contemplated the newcomers and leaned forward to take another step, the room lit up instantly into a bright ball of orange flame. Heat blasted the left side of his face and for a moment he went blind with the bright light of the fire. The flames roared around him and the faint burn of electricity threaded around the sure smell of charcoal. Instinctively, he looked down as he shielded his eyes.
The sound of clapping came from above him, slow and steady.
“Welcome to my parlor said the spider to the fly.”
Apparently someone feels like being a show off.
When his vision came back into focus, he noticed several things happening all at once. Underneath the metal stairs and along the bottom of the floor ran a metal grate and as Ivan looked down he saw a small figure creeping along the bottom of it hidden in the flickering shadows of the burning furnace. If he hadn’t looked directly down at that exact second he would never have seen whoever it was creeping in the depths like a rat.
He took another shove in the back from Uncle Dick who seemed to feel confident with eight men, a few with automatic weapons, making their way down another flight of metal stairs to meet them. Ivan noticed the two men with automatic weapons stayed on the catwalk holding their rifles at the ready. They looked over the room from their perch.
To the right of the stairs, in between the front door and the first step, a large and angry looking man carrying a shotgun had a man with two pistols and a Fedora with his hands up. With a thick eastern European accent he ordered, “Drop them on the floor.”
The man with the Fedora turned around at the same time Ivan cleared the last step of the stairs and when he did Ivan immediately stopped his descent, one foot lingering in the air, inches from the floor. His face looked more purple and bloody than he remembered, a bit older perhaps, but the steel in his grey eyes remained the same. Ivan swallowed and finished his last step.
“Rafael. How you been?”
“Been better.” Rafael Rontego looked around; Ivan saw his glance fall on the automatic weapons on the catwalk. “It’s a bit red in here for my taste.”
Ivan smiled despite the situation, but the Russian with the shotgun didn’t think the comment was funny. He let everyone know by driving the butt of his gun into Rafael’s unprotected stomach and dropping him to the floor and onto his knees with a gasp as the air fled his lungs in search of a more hospitable domain.
A tall Russian with a black widow clinging to his hand laughed when he saw Rafael Rontego fall to the ground. “There is the American cowboy!” He studied the three of them and asked to no one in particular, “Who are these two?”
“A few more of Don Ciancetta’s friends.” Uncle Dick pushed Ivan in the back so that he stumbled forward.
“Very good. Three heads for the price of one. Our friends will be pleased, no?” The Black Widow grabbed his chin as if he was more intrigued and curious than anything else.
“Extremely pleased.” Uncle Dick grinned. “They might even forgive you for deciding to use their money for your Chechen cause before you took care of their business.”
The Russian nodded his head. “Chechnya struck back today. They get their blood as well. How you Americans say? Two birds with one rock. Perhaps four birds.” He pointed to Uncle Dick and his lackey with a shotgun and said, “You and you. Kill them now.”
They raised their weapons and Ivan refused to close his eyes. If they were to kill him, he would take it standing up, looking death in the face. He noticed Mexican Eddie mumbling something, perhaps a prayer, but Rafael Rontego also stood upright and silent.
But instead of the exploding muzzle of the weapons in front of them, there was the soft sound of breaking glass. Tiny shards fell out of a window near the roof of the building, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. As one, their gaze darted to one of the men on the catwalk who stumbled, tried to grab the rail, missed and toppled over the side. He landed with a thud, while the other man on the walkway looked on, unable to react.
A second sprinkle of glass.
Wait for it.
The remaining man on the catwalk clutched his throat and, almost as fast, blood poured from between his fingers and he fell to his knees in a desperate attempt to breathe.
The place erupted. Doors on either side of the catwalk flung open and boys in blue with shiny shields on their chests stormed in with guns pointed down below. The front door blew off its hinges in a smokey explosion.
The three of them didn’t wait another second. They bull-rushed the two men with guns leveled on them and drove them back to the corner of the furnace. Uncle Dick got two quick shots off but Ivan didn’t stop, he tackled the man to the floor right next to the grate that ran the length of the building. He brought his fist up and punched him in the teeth. He felt them inadvertently stab into his knuckles but he also felt the skin give way. The old man was no match for him. He lay there in a daze and Ivan punched him again. Eddie stumbled up and retrieved his AK-47 from the floor. Holding it in one hand and not even looking at the old man lying on the floor, he pulled the trigger, pouring several bits of lead into the man’s chest, causing the body to gyrate on the floor.
Looking over to his right, Ivan saw Rafael Rontego disarm the man with the shotgun using some sort of spin move that put his back to the man and tucked the barrel of the gun under his armpit. With it trapped, he used his other hand to pull his pistol from the man’s waistband and, tucking his arm down, he pointed the barrel of his pistol backwards and over his shoulder, underneath the poor man’s chin.
He fell in a cloud of blood that ejected from the back and top of his head.
Rafael Rontego wasted no time grabbing his second pistol from the body. Gunfire erupted all around them, but most of the men on the ground were running and hiding behind the unused furnaces that lined the factory floor. Bullets clanged off metal and reverberated around the room, whistling as they passed.
Ivan didn’t know what to do as Eddie and Rafael huddled behind the furnace lighting the room and casting eerie shadows along the floor and walls. Rafael Rontego held both of his guns out from his body, ready to shoot anything that came around the side of their furnace. Eddie clutched his AK-47 but he labored to breathe properly as he crouched alongside them. Ivan grimaced when he realized both of Uncle Dick’s bullets had found their mark in Eddie’s stomach. His shirt was torn and spots so red they looked black seemed to be growing along his abdomen.
A smattering of bullets bounced around them as the shooters began to hone in on their location. Between the furnace and the gunfire he had to shout above the roar to be heard.
“What now?” he said, as if the assassin held a magical answer.
He didn’t say anything, he merely pointed. The grate below them lifted out of its crease in the floor and a small brunette head poked out.
“You coming Dad?”
Chapter 23
He knew he was fading in and out of consciousness. The only mystery, as far as he was concerned, was which par
t contained reality and which part was some sort of fucked up delirium.
The lighthouse tipped him off that he dreamt or that his subconscious decided now was as good a time as any to make its presence known. When he was a kid he’d climbed the stairs of the beacon of light on his own. For an eight year old, each step upwards contained the promise of adventure. He went up at night while his parents slept in a hotel room on the Carolina coast.
For a few glorious minutes he looked out on the ocean from the highest place he could find. The silent alarm he triggered brought the police and it was the first time the stern hand of the law clasped him on the shoulder.
Then he was sitting in his Del Avant condo looking out over the city, a hundred thousand lights beneath him.
Just another climb.
He drifted back to the hotel on the Carolina coast. His father had more brown and grey in his hair back then. Back then he was alive too. His face was more bemused than stern when the officer informed them what had happened. When the fuzz left, his father turned with a twinkle and asked, “How’d you do it Chris? Middle of the night. Ten miles.” He sighed. “You do know you’re only eight, right? So. How’d you do it?”
Chris looked at his hands as if they were painted red. “I didn’t tell anyone and I just went.”
His dad squatted low so that they were eye to eye. “Well, then I think you learned three important lessons tonight. Wouldn’t you say?”
He remembered being very confused and wondering if he expected an answer.
His father spoke first. “You learned to pick something and go after it.” He held up one finger. “You learned to make a plan and keep it close to the vest.” The second finger popped up. “And third and most importantly. Never bring the police to your family’s door.” Then his hand shot out and smacked Chris on his face so hard that tears welled up instantly in his eyes.
Buffalo Soldiers (An Upstate New York Mafia Tale Book 2) Page 23