“What do you want me to do?”
“I'm trying to figure that out. When I was in the assassination business, there was a secret organization called the 'Black Hand.' It was named after a group of assassins founded in Serbia in 1910. While spreading murder and mayhem throughout that part of the world, they were the people responsible for the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand and, by the way, starting World War I.
“I had been approached about joining the new organization and instead picked retirement. There are five of them, each specializing in a certain way of killing.”
He held up his hand with one finger up. “We've probably seen the work of the fire guy in the death of the building inspector.”
Another finger went up. “The explosive guy almost got you and probably killed your accountant.”
Finger number three went up, “There is someone, probably a woman, who kills with poison.”
What the hell had she gotten into?
He must have seen her momentary distraction, because he put up a fourth finger and said, “Pay attention, please. The fourth person kills via accidents of various sorts, including faked muggings.”
“I don't see how this affects me ...”
Putting his thumb up in the air, he said, “Because I want you to be bait for the fifth assassination, a sniper.”
Chapter 11
Jill Ringler, the Third Finger of the Black Hand, started reeling in her prey.
A Denver City Councilman, his health circumstances made completing her assignment that much more difficult—she had already poisoned the City Council coffee pot with thallium sulphate, but because of his health, he couldn't drink coffee. Some of his fellow council members may survive, but they would be bald and have the potential of major organ failure for the rest of their lives.
Phil Van Wyk, her target, was an insulin-dependent diabetic who needed to inject himself at least twice a day. His diabetes was probably a result of his obesity.
The poison she had selected was one of her favorites—death was instantaneous and undetectable—Saxitoxin.
Yes, it was a major pain in the ass to create, raising butter clams and culturing them with Alexandrium minutum, a dinoflagellate—a type of marine plankton. Then boiling the poison from the gastric tract of the butter clams and concentrating it to the level that she liked to work with. It had the advantage of being one hell of a great poison—she had read that one gram was enough to kill a million people. The bad news was that she couldn't just poke him in the arm with it in public as he would die within minutes—she wanted to be somewhere else when the body was found.
So she had passed him a note on his way to the current council meeting, held every Monday night at 5:30 p.m., unless it was a major holiday. She had expressed an interest in meeting with him to discuss something of major importance to him and his constituents. Of course, she was appropriately dressed for her flirtatious invitation—in a low cut dress that showed off her assets appropriately. A blonde wig and a smattering of makeup would help confuse any investigation into what would look like a death by natural causes.
She maintained eye contact with him during the meeting. It was ironic that he only drank bottled water while his fellow council members slurped poisoned coffee.
Thallium sulphate is soluble in water, colorless and virtually tasteless and odorless. It's mechanism of action was mainly from the fact that charged thallium atoms are almost exactly the same size as potassium ions, which are critical to many bodily functions. It essentially mimics the action of potassium, replacing working ions with inert ones that cripple the nervous system. One decent-sized dose was generally enough to kill someone if it wasn't caught in time.
Yes, there was a cure for it—potassium ferric ferrocyanide, a chemical better known as the dye Prussian blue. But the treatment had to be started very quickly otherwise a horrible death would result. There was an irony in her dosing of the coffee pot labeled “For use of the City Council ONLY!!!” Their snobbishness would lead to their death.
As the meeting was wrapping up, she retired to where she had set her trap—a nearby hotel bar. Van Wyk was single; divorced and, despite him being an obese slob in her eyes, had managed to do pretty well scoring young women—power was always a powerful aphrodisiac.
The implication was that if her proposed 'meeting' went well, they would retire to a room in the hotel for consummation of the deal.
She settled into a darkened corner booth, luxuriating in the feel of use softened leather on her legs. The air conditioning blew cool, tasteless air into her face. There were several other couples scattered throughout the place, all in similarly secluded tables and booths. A travel weary salesman, his ill-tailored suit revealing that he should have replaced it ten years or fifty pounds ago, hit on everything that walked by with a vagina. He had given her lecherous stare as she had passed by and she had ignored him, hopefully letting him know that she was completely outside his class. It didn't stop him from completely undressing her with his eyes, and it almost made her wish that she wasn't on a job, otherwise she'd have shown him that it wasn't right treating women like disposable pieces of meat. Death, after all, was the final high and she had a couple things in her purse that could make that more than true.
Right on time, Phil Van Wyk waddled into the bar. Thank goodness, Denver had a ban on smoking in bars—she hated the smell of cigarettes and this job was thankless enough. As he approached, the overwhelming stench of his body made her reconsider her dislike for the smell of cigarettes.
He settled into the booth, causing it to creak in protest and gave her a toothy smile.
“Hello, Ms. Martin. I understand you have a proposal for me?”
Fluttering her eyelashes, she said, “Why yes.” She deliberately lengthened out her vowels, almost like a soft drawl. In her experience, vulnerable men loved that way of speaking—it melted their hearts kind of thing and made it easier to kill them.
Eight years of advanced education ending in a doctorate in pharmacology with a minor in bioengineering meant that, unless she was willing to be a slave for a drug company, she would not be able to even service her student loans while earning thirty percent less than her male colleagues, and led to this career choice. She was one of five highly trained killers in a highly secret organization and had fifty-six operational kills to her credit—not including tonight's tally. She had been able to pay off her student loans within one year and purchase beach houses on both coasts and in several places around the world so she could continue to study poisons from ocean, sea and lake dwelling creatures.
She could hardly wait to get back to her studies of the Blue-ringed Octopus—the venom contained in one golf-ball sized creature was enough to kill twenty-six people.
The bartender, in obvious deference to the powerful man at her table, shuffled over and handed Van Wyk a wine list. “Councilman Van Wyk, thank you for gracing us with your presence this evening. What can I get you both this evening?”
Van Wyk's piggish eyes glanced over the wine list. “How about a 1978 Leroy Meursault Narvaux, if you have it. If not, I guess we'll have to suffer with the 2003, but don't bother with the 2002.”
She tried to keep her expression neutral—he'd just ordered a four-hundred-dollar bottle of wine. Yes, she did indulge herself occasionally with a bottle of outstanding wine and did know a bit about them. Chemistry was chemistry to her, be it a complex neurotoxin or a fine Burgundy.
Hopefully, he was paying for it. But that probably wasn't in the cards for her. And what the hell was a hotel bar doing stocking such an expensive wine? There was something fishy going on here. Probably it was a relabeled crap wine of a lesser vintage and the pin heads that Van Wyk picked up wouldn't know the difference and be impressed enough to shed their good taste and panties.
No matter, she realized that she wasn't going anywhere with this man further than this bar and kept from vomiting. She had a backup plan—the Saxitoxin was best used when injected, but could be taken orally—deat
h would occur later, but it would still happen.
The bartender came over with a bottle and made a great show of uncorking it in front of them, handing the cork to Van Wyk for sniffing and examination, before pouring a couple of ounces into Van Wyk's glass. He swirled it around in the glass, stuck his pig nose into the glass and snorted. Van Wyk, apparently satisfied, took a tentative sip, swirled it around in his mouth and then nodded in satisfaction.
She had to appreciate the entire performance although it disgusted her.
The bartender finished his pour into Van Wyk's glass and then poured a similar amount into hers. Taking a cautious sip, she knew that the whole show was an act—this wine had come no farther than from California. Yes, it was a decent wine, but was a Merlot, not a Burgundy—not even with a stretch of the imagination.
She nodded, playing along. The bartender set the bottle on the table and shuffled off to leave them in peace.
Van Wyk raised his glass and said, “A toast.”
Tapping her glass against his, she said, “To a successful future business relationship.” Where I kill you and then go buy a great bottle of wine with the proceeds.
Taking a large swallow, he said, “I agree. What did you wish to discuss with me tonight?”
While fiddling with her small satchel under the pretense of finding some papers, she palmed the container of Saxitoxin.
She handed over the fake proposal for a new shopping mall in Van Wyk's district and watched as he poured through them. If the plans had been for real, they would bring a multimillion dollar project, providing lots of new jobs from construction to store clerks. It was a scam that she had used before with some success—just changing the names, dates and locations as appropriate.
His eyes gleaming in anticipation, Van Wyk said, “Are these for real?”
Taking a sly sip of wine, she nodded. “All I need is some help with getting rezoning. I have the financing, tentative contracts with a dozen stores and a couple that want to be anchors.”
“And you put this together?”
“Yes. I represent a consortium of real estate brokers, financiers, banks and interested investors. They put up the money and I speak for the group.”
“What do you get out of this?”
“I set it up, getting a percentage off the top of the gross for the first five years. The percentage then lessens, but I do pretty well for myself.”
He glanced at the documents again. “I need a moment here. I'll be right back.”
Van Wyk slid out of the booth, still clutching the documents in his sweaty hands.
She knew that he was going to make some phone calls to see if she was legit. This wouldn't be a problem as she had a fully licensed and respectable corporation set up in friendly Delaware that, while looking more than legit at first glance, had layers upon layers of concealment as to the true purpose and ownership. A phone call or two, no matter to whom, wouldn't knock anything loose that she couldn't deal with.
Under the pretense of pouring more wine into his glass, she emptied the vial of Saxitoxin into his glass. Another tasteless, odorless and generally difficult to diagnose poison.
She added some more wine to her glass and took a sip. Serendipitously, she wiped down the surfaces of the table that she had touched with a small, flesh-colored cloth. She'd clean her glass and the bottle before leaving.
Van Wyk came back, a greedy smile on his face.
Settling down, he took a long swallow of his wine and said, “So, what's it worth to you for this process to all go smoothly?”
She shrugged. Very shortly, he was going to start feeling the effects of the poison and she wanted to get out of here before that happened.
The chirping of a new text message on her Blackberry saved her, breaking the conversation.
“Excuse me a second.”
She had another job. Anyway, it was time to get this resolved.
“I'm sorry, I have to go, it's an emergency.”
The look of disappointment on his face was something she would remember for a long while—maybe fifteen minutes.
“Give me your card, and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.”
He dug out a card and wrote another number on it. Handing it to her, he said, “That's my private cell. Don't hesitate to call me day or night.”
Yeah, all I'm gonna need is a Ouija Board to be able to do that.
“Thanks. I'm so sorry about this. I was so looking forward to our discussing this further.”
And he was going to have to pony up for the wine.
Taking another sip of wine, he made a face.
“Something wrong?” She asked. The poison was working as expected.
“No.”
She made a point of taking another sip of her wine, leaning down so that he could see her cleavage, and wiping down her glass. Yes, there were probably traces of something that could be traced, but it wouldn't lead to anywhere.
Shaking his wet, meaty hand, she gathered up her papers, put them back into her briefcase and made her way out of the bar. She had an appointment with a member of the Colorado House of Representatives.
###
Leo wasn't happy about having to use Jackie as sniper bait, but was impressed with her solution to the problem. She would sneak into the building using a back entrance that wasn't on any of the blueprints—Nathan had it built as part of his paranoia. It looked like a broom closet in a storage room in the business behind White Hat Enterprises, but if you pressed on a panel, it would open a door leading into Nathan's office.
She planned to hook up a web camera, tie it into a monitor or projector and then move that around under Leo's direction in front of the windows. Hopefully, the sniper would take a shot at the monitor, missing her completely. He planned to take out the sniper. It was a difficult project. His training had focused on being a sniper, not the counter-sniper role. But he'd been reading and studying for years on the subject, besides being one hell of a shot with top notch equipment, so he figured on having better than even odds.
They had checked out of the room that Leo had rented under the name of the guy who tried to kill him. They drove for a while and found a hot sheet hotel and rented a room. Both of them got a little rest by sleeping on the floor, not being willing to trust the beds or strange smelling sheets.
After breakfasting at a fast food restaurant, Leo found a secluded parking lot where he could get ready to work.
He dug out ten of his specially loaded rounds of ammunition. He made sure his dope sheet was securely taped to the stock of the rifle, not that he would need it as he knew the trajectory of his ammunition like he knew his right hand. If there was a thirty-five mile an hour gusting wind, in seventy-six percent humidity and with an ambient air temperature of eighty-two degrees, at a range of five hundred yards, he would be able to take the shot without thinking about it.
This is the kind of thing that he relished, him against another person. Yes, there was that sometimes in the coin business while you were trying to buy or sell coins for the right price, but here the stakes were of a magnitude higher.
He cleaned the lenses of his spotting scope, checked the batteries of his laser range finder and his Kestrel wind and humidity gauge. After setting the gear out that he would need, he carefully packed everything else away.
Where he was sitting, on the roof of a building perpendicular to Jackie's business, wasn't the best place to be, but given the choices, it was the only option. He was far enough back that he wouldn't be seen, but he still had a decent field of view of where, if there was one, a sniper could take a shot at Jackie. If it was a more up close and personal hit, he could take out the assassin before they got too close.
It had been hell lugging all of his equipment up to the roof, using a ladder purchased at a hardware store. It was laying next to the roof, hidden from view on the other side of the building he was currently hiding on.
The only problem would be aerial observation. Luckily, where Jackie had her business was within a mile
or so of the Rocky Mountain Arsenal—which was now basically a wildlife preserve—so hopefully no one would have much of an excuse to fly over his position. If so, he was prepared to duck into an air conditioner unit on top of the building—he had taken off an access panel and there was more than enough room in the industrial-sized device for him and all of his equipment.
He had considered that someone might have booby trapped the office, with a bomb or fire, but beyond some detailed instructions to Jackie, he couldn't protect her for very long. The idea was that she would sneak in, get the information that the accountant had set aside for her, and then set up as bait for a half an hour or so. If nothing happened, she would sneak back out and meet him behind the building.
They would communicate via portable radios that Leo had purchased at a local Radio Shack. But, because he was afraid of being tracked and of breaking his concentration when he was trying to take a shot, communication would be kept to a bare minimum.
Jackie was silent on the drive to the office.
When he pulled up, he put the truck in park. He grasped her hand and said, “Good luck.”
She looked him in the eye and said, “If you're good enough, you don't need luck. But the same to you.”
He watched her walk towards the building and then put the truck into drive. It was time to go hunting.
Chapter 12
FBI Agent Jeff Silver wasn't having a good day. He had several investigations going, including a bank robbery ring that had hit five banks in the past two weeks. The robbers had a sense of humor, wearing Ronald Reagan masks, and were very well organized. They were polite, appeared to male, but other than that, no one had much of an idea as to who they may be. He suspected that it was a roving band that would hit a city for a couple of weeks and then disappear, only to pop up again in some other part of the country.
Then he had the mystery man found in the trunk of the car. The device used to conceal the crime with fire was a type of super thermite. It appeared to be based on military Thermate-TH3 with a couple of interesting variations. Conventional thermite was hard to reliably ignite; the Thermate-TH3, while easier to light, was still difficult. The arsonist had tweaked the recipe to make it more stable, longer lasting and lowering the ignition temperature.
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