by Cate Noble
Bullets had bounced off his chest. His chest, not Max’s. Damn it, Dante had been invincible, too, in those strange hallucinogenic dreams. Jesus, what he wouldn’t give for it to be true.
“Must…help,” Dante croaked. “American. Embassy.”
The old woman shouted as the cart lurched to a stop.
He could hear other voices now, realized they hadn’t stopped for him. The voices grew louder. While he couldn’t follow words, the no-nonsense tone scared the shit out of him. He attempted to sit up. Had to…get away.
Rough hands clasped Dante’s shoulder, forced him back down to the floor of the crt. He tried to concentrate. There were two men, both in uniforms. Police? Or soldiers?
His mind fumbled to make excuses. He’d been hiking. Got lost. “Need hospital,” he rasped.
The soldiers continued to ignore him, talking again to the older couple. More arguing.
“A-merry-can,” the old woman singsonged.
“American,” Dante repeated. “American.” He shouted now, trying to be heard.
Seconds later, he was grasped by the ankles and dragged from the cart. His head thumped across the wood before slamming painfully against the ground.
Too late he realized his mistake. American. The prison had probably issued the Thai equivalent of an APB: for one sick American escapee. The uniforms. These weren’t soldiers. They were fucking guards.
And God help him…he’d die before he let them take him back.
Chapter 4
A Northern Bangkok District
March 10
(Four Months Ago)
The crowded, mazelike walkways surrounding the open-air market in this outer khet reminded Rocco Taylor of the canned sardines his grandfather used to bring along on childhood fishing trips. The tightly packed bodies, the pungent oily smell.
“One man’s bait is another man’s lunch,” Grandpa would say.
He wondered if Gramps would say that after being served fish head soup. Or chum chowder, as Rocco’s men called it.
God knows he’d choked down more than his share of that and other crap these past four weeks while trolling the backwaters of the Malay seas in search of drug merchants. Which in the backwaters of Malaysia pretty much meant every vessel.
This was his third trip in less than a year. The straits were more crowded than ever, as the growing thirst for illegal recreational drugs outstripped supply, most particularly in areas with stringent drug eradication programs. Just say no raised prices and demand. Hell, if the drug cartels could, they’d run the stuff out via submarine. Slimy bastards.
Rocco knew too well the evil their kind spawned. His sixteen-year-old nephew had been in and out of rehab four times in as many years, making it even harder to turn a blind eye while the stuff was blatantly trafficked.
For unlike the DEA and their international ilk, Rocco and his men weren’t after the routine suppliers. Their target was much, much smaller. One man. A highly elusive smuggler rumored to run nothing but SugarCane, the CIA’s uncreative code name for an outrageously potent grade of designer opium that allegedly financed a nasty enclave of terrorists.
Allegedly, as in no one was talking.
If ’Cane brought as much per ounce as he’d been told, then the terrorists co-oping its production certainly had more than enough money to buy a lot of silence. That, or the brass’s latest top-secret source was feeding them bullshit—yet another clever story designed to keep the forces of justice in this post-9/11 world distracted.
He stopped short. Damn, that even sounded cynical to his own ears. Maybe Maddy was right.
Maddy. He whipped open his cell phone, hit her speed-dial number, but then closed it before the number completely dialed. Damn it, she wasn’t his girlfriend anymore. Which meant he had no right to expect forgiveness for calling her in the middle of the night—or to expect a purring welcome when he sneaked into her warm bed unannounced.
So why keep her in speed dial? Self-torment?
The truth was he and Maddy had broken up numerous times before, but the longest they’d lasted had been two weeks. One or the other of them—Maddy—always caved.
Except this time. It had been two fucking months.
She hadn’t come running back and wasn’t exactly tossing him any opportunities to make up either. Did that mean she’d found someone else?
Give the big dumbass a prize. Of course that’s what it meant. The woman was gorgeous, sexy, smart. Driven.
She’d been perfect for him. Because she also worked for the Agency, he didn’t get hit with questions he couldn’t answer. Likewise, she didn’t whine when he took off with a duffle bag in hand, pulling a Houdini for days or weeks. Maddy was one of the few women he’d ever dated who truly understood and tolerated what he did.
But not the only one…
Shit. Therein lay the real truth; the real reason he and Maddy could never be together forever. He was still hung up on another woman.
Another woman who hated his guts and probably wished he was dead.
Yeah…he was cynical all right. He forced his thoughts back to the present, back to his last assignment: chasing that highly elusive smuggler.
As bad as Rocco wanted to capture the man, he seriously had to wonder if they were chasing ghosts—make-believe bad guys. A highly probable scenario seeing as his team had come up empty-handed again and again.
Rather than exhaust their welcome—the various Southeast Asian governments were helpful one moment, hostile and accusatory the next—Rocco and his men had been ordered out. Or almost out.
They’d been headed to New Zealand for a little R & R, rest and recon, when Rocco’s boss called with an urgent request.
Those were never good.
He had dreaded telling his team that leave was likely being canceled so they could chase another wild goose.
But as it turned out, only Rocco’s leave got canceled. Delayed actually. He’d been asked to do a favor—the kind you couldn’t refuse.
That Travis Franks, now his boss’s boss’s boss, had wanted to talk with Rocco personally was the first clue that this favor was very important and highly sensitive. Probably borderline illegal.
“A man using the name ‘Artel B. B. Quaid’ is being held in a remote Bangkok jail.”
Rocco had scarcely believed Travis. Artel B. B. Quaid—B. B. for Benton Brownleigh or Bubba Brothers—depending on who you asked—was an obscure alias created by Rocco’s late best friend and fellow CIA operative, Dante Johnson.
More than an alias and private joke, use of the name with both middle initials also signaled danger. Extreme danger. As in S-O-right-fucking-now-S danger.
Depending on context, it could mean the operative himself was in grave trouble or he was warning that his counterparts were at risk.
Context was crucial and in this instance they had none. They barely had a description: Caucasian, dark-haired, male, claiming to be American though he had no papers, no identification.
Worse, the man was reportedly delusional, supposedly from illness. Drugs, Rocco would bet. And if he’d made this trip for nothing, he’d make certain Mr. Quaid paid.
Because whoever the hell he was, he damn sure wasn’t Dante.
Just thinking of his late friend twisted a knife in Rocco’s chest. He’d known Dante since childhood. They’d built forts together, they’d fished together. Then they’d joined the Army together. Special Forces.
Following the escalation of hostilities in the Middle East, the CIA had recruited both men. Back then, the two rarely went on a mission without the other, and had saved each other more times than either recalled.
Unfortunately, he hadn’t been on the team a year and a half ago when Dante and two other agents, Max Duncan and Harry Gambrel, were killed in Cambodia. I should have been there.
To think that if it hadn’t been for Harry, Rocco would have been on that mission, too, didn’t sit well. Never would. And he didn’t give a rat’s ass if he was dissing the dead either. Harry Gambrel had been
a motherfucker. Period.
Rocco crossed a street, shelving the mental yakking. Blending into the crowd as best he could at six-two, he backtracked a few blocks then turned west, stopping several times to assure that his trail was unremarkable. An old habit he found himself doing even on dates.
Satisfied he wasn’t being followed, he proceeded more directly to the small jail where Mr. Quaid was currently housed. Locating the prisoner’s whereabouts hadn’t been easy as records weren’t fully computerized here. Or even accurate, especially in the smaller provincial jails that were privately run and seriously overcrowded.
Compounding those problems was the fact that one of Bangkok’s larger, more notorious prisons had recently burned down, meaning their incarcerated had been farmed out among local jails like this one as well.
Travis Franks had purposely not asked any official questions about Mr. Quaid, opting instead to have him checked out in person. Too often a prisoner disappeared after the State Department expressed interest. This time they hadn’t requested so much as a photograph, hadn’t even acknowledged the fellow as a pimple on anyone’s ass.
Still, Rocco had expected a little more information to be forthcoming from Travis. More than the prisoner was scheduled to have his foot amputated because of gangrene. But then Travis had gone uncharacteristically silent the last two days, not answering e-mails or phone calls.
Rocco had heard through the grapevine that all wasn’t rosy at the Franks household; that Travis had even scheduled an unheard-of vacation in an attempt to save his marriage.
Maybe he was off bonking his wife—which was why Rocco hadn’t pressed it. More likely, though, it was simply a case of too-fucking-busy syndrome. That and congressional hearings were two reasons Rocco had no interest in climbing the management ladder. He was and always would be a field operative. Born to sneak, raised to break rules, as Gramps said.
He hurried his steps, now eager to get this business finished. His instincts said Mr. Quaid was probably just another fool trying to avoid a Thai prison sentence. All those nasty things they said about prisons here were true. And worse. Destroying papers and IDs then claiming to be an American was an amateur’s trick. And a useless one.
If the name hadn’t sent up a red flag on a top-secret computer in a basement in Langley, the Embassy personnel would have eventually handled the matter, informing the poor sap that there weren’t any get-out-of-jail-free cards when it came to foreign legal systems. When in Rome, obey Roman laws!
Travis wanted Rocco to question the man on how he’d come up with that particular name. Had the man somehow gotten ahold of one of Dante’s old undercover IDs? Or had this person worked with Dante before, perhaps as a snitch? Or with some other snitch who had? Snitches of a feather…
The Agency was, as expected, interested in recovering their late operative’s assets. Reliable sources were in high demand these days.
Rocco secretly hoped for more. If the man had, in fact, worked for Dante, maybe he could provide a clue as to what had gone wrong eighteen months ago. The details were scant, the unanswered questions anything but. How had Minh Tran’s terrorists found Rocco’s friends? Travis Franks believed Tran had somehow scored inside, highly classified information. Translation: They had a mole. Hell, maybe Mr. Quaid was even it.
Sure, it was a long shot, but in this business, long shots were the norm. The name of the game was patience and thoroughness. Turn every stone. Every pebble. Every dog turd. Yeah, lots of dog turds.
Of course, it would be his dumb luck that the prisoner was already dead. Getting a foot amputated was the equivalent of a death sentence. If the infection hadn’t killed him, the surgery would. Prison surgery in this part of the world had a ninety-percent-plus mortality rate. Rocco would have preferred a bullet in the head, thanks.
His interpreter, a local contact arranged by Travis, met him a block from the jail. Rocco briefed the man, giving him only the barest of information about the prisoner and none about himself. That was one nice thing about Travis’s sources: they never asked questions. Because they were paid well not to.
At the jail, the interpreter played it perfectly, demanding to speak to the director regarding the American prisoner. Rocco remained mute, tried to look important. It was all a head game.
The bluff worked. When the BMOC appeared, he looked suspiciously at Rocco before speaking.
“He wants to know why you want to see Mr. Quaid,” the interpreter said. “He asks if you’re his legal counselor.”
Rocco shook his head and eased open his jacket to show he was unarmed. Then he reached into the breast pocket and discreetly withdrew a nice thick stack of Thai bhats. He handed the money to the interpreter.
“Tell him I won’t be long.”
In most third world countries, bribes were not only customary, but expected. And size mattered. Borrowing a play from Travis Franks’s book, Rocco made sure to bring along plenty of cash, not only for this, but also to provide the guard with inspiration to look the other way if he decided to teach Mr. Quaid a lesson about using a dead man’s alias.
Rocco glanced at his shoes while the money disappeared. Not that it mattered. It would take a slow-mo instant replay zoom to prove the police chief had taken the cash. The guy could give Penn and Teller a run for the money.
The interpreter smiled. “He said you’ll have to see the prisoner in his cell. Mr. Quaid is too ill to walk.”
“Ask him what Mr. Quaid is charged with and how he came to be arrested.”
The two men bantered rapid fire, then his interpreter bowed. “Mr. Quaid assaulted an officer who had asked to see his identification papers. An elderly couple fished him out of a river north of here and he promised them a reward for their help. The police suspect he escaped from another prison, perhaps even crossed the border from Burma. But with the influx of new prisoners, the chief has not had time to make proper inquiries.”
The explanation cast even more doubt on the prisoner being helpful. If it weren’t for the peculiar name…“Let’s get on with it then.”
“You’ll also have to be patted down,” his interpreter added.
After the weapons check turned up nothing—when in Roman police stations, you also don’t break the law—Rocco was offered a paper face mask and latex gloves before being led down a hall to the cell wing.
His interpreter refused to go all the way. Rocco didn’t blame him.
The place was noisy and vile, not that Thai jails had a reputation for being otherwise. Despair hung in the air like noxious smog. The mask did nothing to block it, nor the horrid stench of unwashed bodies and open sewage holes.
On top of that, they stopped at the worst-smelling cell. Mr. Quaid and his infection were rank.
The guard yelled and waved back the other prisoners, before pointing at the unmoving body on a cot at the rear of the cell. Rocco pressed the mask more closely against his mouth as he stared at the back of the prisoner’s head.
“Is he alive?”
The guard didn’t even blink, not understanding English.
Rocco made a few gestures. “Can he speak?”
The guard shouted a command in Thai. One of Quaid’s cell mates kicked the cot, but the prisoner didn’t respond, didn’t so much as move.
Great. He’d come all this way to visit a freakin’ corpse. Dead, the man was useless.
Rocco started to turn away, then stopped when he spotted the slightest movement from beneath the blanket.
“Mr. Quaid,” he had to shout to be heard above the din. “I’d like to speak with you.”
The response, spoken so soft he could barely hear, shocked him. “Rocco?”
Had he imagined it?
Rocco grabbed the bars, then turned to the guard. “I need to see him.” He pointed to his eyes, then to the prisoner. “I need to see his face!”
Once more the guard shouted at the other prisoners, who simply kicked the cot again. The man groaned, clearly in pain.
But slowly, slowly, he rolled over and
turned his head toward Rocco before opening his eyes.
Jesus. Mary. And Joseph.
It was Dante.
Dante.
Dante alive.
Rage strong-armed Rocco’s disbelief. He didn’t know how the hell this was possible.
“Hold on, man!” He had his cell phone open and punched in Travis’s speed dial, not bothering to check for a signal. Rocco always got a signal. It was a running joke; stand next to him and…The number was taking forever to ring through. Don’t fail me now. “Answer, damn it!”
Travis’s voice mail picked up. Swearing, Rocco dialed his home phone. His hands shook. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Hurry!
Travis’s wife picked up. “Sandy?” The connection was terrible. “I hate to bother you, but this is an emergency. I need to talk to Travis.”
The guard started shouting now, making it even harder to hear Sandy’s response. Rocco pressed the phone closer. “What was that?”
“He’s in the hospital.” Sandy started sobbing. “Accident…coma,” was all Rocco heard.
Stunned, he turned back to the prisoner. Dante. “I’m sorry, Sandy. I’ll have to call back later.”
He stepped closer to the guard.
“I need in there,” Rocco tried to signal. Damn it, he needed that interpreter down here right now.
The guard ignored him and instead waved his arms to signal that the allotted time was up.
“No. I have to talk to him.” More gestures.
The guard shook his head and pointed up the hall. Two men carrying a stretcher were working their way toward them.
Rocco’s sign language became more frantic. He pointed to Dante then toward the stretcher and shook his head.
The guard answered with his own hand signals. Pointing to Dante, then down to his own foot, the guard made a sawing motion. Then he pinched his nose to indicate a foul smell and tipped his head toward Dante once again.
Oh. Hell. No.
“You’re not amputating anything. He’s an American!” Rocco motioned to the stretcher and shook his head vehemently as he slashed his arms downward. “No fucking way!”