The Coalition: A Novel of Suspense

by Samuel Marquis

  On the fiftieth floor of the Union Plaza Building, from behind a reflective office window, a woman watched the procession with detached interest through high-powered Leupold binoculars. The woman was unusual in several respects. A pair of perforated black leather gloves encased her nimble hands. She wore a special disguise and was fluent in six different languages. And concealed in the hardcover carrying case at her feet was a Barrett M82A1 .50-caliber semiautomatic scoped rifle, broken down into five separate components. She was intimately familiar with the lethal weapon; for more than a decade now it had been her closest companion.

  The woman was of Italian heritage, but with her clever disguise, polyglot mastery of languages, and surgical alteration of her Roman nose, it was impossible to tell. Her given name was Angela Ferrara, but years ago she had forsaken her real name for aliases. Her current alias was Skyler, no last name. She also had a nom de guerre —Diego Gomez—a fictitious name created by her control agent. The invented Spanish assassin remained a mystery, a phantom of the files in the hands of the international law enforcement community.

  For her own security, Skyler was determined to keep it that way.

  She continued following the black motorcade through her binoculars. The motorcade turned right onto Bannock Street and pulled to the curb behind the speakers’ platform in the western end of the plaza. To the distant west, beyond the jungle of glass and steel of downtown Denver, the snow-shawled Rockies stretched toward an unseasonably warm mid-November sun and periwinkle sky. Skyler had spent the last few hours periodically gazing at the shimmering mountains, her eyes drawn like a magnet. They brought back pleasant childhood memories of family vacations hiking and skiing in the Dolomites of her native Italy.

  Before her life had changed—drastically.

  The car doors opened. The man and his handlers emerged from the Lincolns. Skyler took in the chiseled face captured in countless photo-ops, noting the famous boyish smile, as the man shook hands with party loyalists.

  Five days after winning the presidential election, William Ambrose Kieger was returning to the home state of his vice-presidential running mate, Katherine Fowler, to pay tribute to the people of Colorado who had played a pivotal role in his capturing the White House. Fowler—the two-term, red-meat senator from the Centennial State—was in Colorado Springs today giving a similar speech in support of the president-elect.

  But Skyler didn’t care. She was here to do a job. In fact, she was here to kill, just as Don Scarpello and Alberto—the heartless bastards—had long ago killed her inside.

  With notepads, microphones, and cameras in hand, the claque of awaiting pool reporters called out questions from the rope line to Kieger and his growing entourage. Still smiling, he playfully answered a few of them as he moved toward the speakers’ platform, protected by a phalanx of Secret Service agents.

  Setting aside her binoculars, Skyler opened the case on the desk. She smiled confidently to herself as she pulled out the sniper rifle’s lower receiver and set it on the floor. The lower part of the weapon contained the adjustable bipod, magazine feed, trigger, and stock. She took the metal bolt and carrier and attached them to the lower receiver with an audible click. The upper receiver housed the barrel, various springs, and the scope mount. She pulled the upper section out and joined it to the bolt carrier group and lower receiver. Then she withdrew the fluted Krieger precision single-point cut-rifled barrel from the upper receiver and locked it into position. Finally, she adjusted the length of the lower receiver’s bipod to exactly eight inches.

  The man and his coterie continued toward the speakers’ platform. When the group reached the security checkpoint behind the platform, it was funneled through a bank of magnetometers.

  Skyler reached for her custom-fitted Brügger & Thomet baffle-type sound suppressor. It was a critical component of today’s operation, for it would substantially reduce both the muzzle sound signature and ground echo, either of which could give away her position to the Secret Service countersnipers stationed on the rooftops in front of her. With several quick turns of the wrist, she screwed the suppressor into the threaded barrel.

  The crowd roared as the man took the stage. Even through the glass, Skyler could hear the sound filtering up. She reached for her binoculars again, training them on the plaza below. She watched as the man shook hands with several local dignitaries before being escorted to a chair on the left side of the platform. Another man, whom Skyler recognized from her dossier as Colorado Governor Jackson Stoddart, stepped forward to the podium to make the scheduled introductory remarks.

  Somehow, the whole scene seemed oddly incongruous to her. Here she was about to wreak bloody death and mayhem in the plaza and the damned place looked like a carnival: the shimmery festiveness of the crowd packed onto the grassy lawn; the multicolored richness of the banners and American flags ruffling in the crisp autumn breeze; the hundreds of balloons, arranged like clusters of grapes, festooning the platform. Everything seemed out of place, like stage props brought to the wrong movie set.

  Setting down her binoculars, Skyler reached into her case again and withdrew perhaps the most critical item: the Leupold Vari-X III long-range M1 sniperscope. The Leupold’s maintube was a monstrous 30mm diameter, allowing for the generous range in elevation and windage adjustments required to account for bullet drop and wind drift. She slid the sniperscope into position on the upper receiver, and only then did she step back to admire her handiwork.

  What lay before her was a lethal rifle almost five feet long and weighing slightly less than thirty pounds. Fully assembled, the “Light Fifty” was a bit dated and far from gracile, but like a fine old wine it was still in a class of its own. One of the most accurate long-distance sniper rifle in existence, in the hands of a master shooter the weapon was capable of upper-body hits beyond a half mile. Skyler had paid over ten thousand dollars for the military rifle on the black market and thought it well worth the price.

  As Governor Stoddart spoke on, Skyler pointed the muzzle directly at the eight-inch-diameter hole cut in the reflective window. The diamond glasscutter and hydrofluoric acid solution had etched a nearly perfect circle. The circular pane of glass, held in the hole by clear tape, would not be withdrawn until just before she fired and replaced right after. It would take the Service an hour or more to find her position after the fatal shot. By then she would be long gone, leaving behind only the clues she intended found.

  That was the plan.

  But sometimes even the best laid plans go awry.

  CHAPTER 2

  WHEN KIEGER launched into his speech—a speech Skyler knew would take between twelve and fourteen minutes—she took time to study the countersniper positions once more through her binoculars. Teams were posted on the seven tallest buildings surrounding the plaza: the State Capitol, Judicial Building, Public Library, Art Museum, Denver Tribune Tower, Petroleum Building, and Adam’s Mark Hotel. Because of their close proximity, the countersniper and spotter on the twenty-story hotel posed the gravest risk.

  Taking a knee to make her final scope adjustments, she nestled the heavy-duty Kick-Eze shoulder pad on the stock against her shoulder. She then sighted the soft target’s head and upper torso through the scope. The heavy black lines of the duplex reticle converged from all sides of her circular field of view. The thick lines pointed to a thinner crosshair centered on Kieger, who came through so clearly, Skyler could see his lips moving, his auburn forelocks riffling in the breeze.

  She felt the tension pick up inside her. Though the professional’s professional, she was not so brazen as to be overconfident. This was the biggest assignment of her career, and getting out alive was going to be precarious despite her meticulous planning. She had taken out powerful businessman, government officials, “most wanted” terrorists, and rival snipers—a total of fourteen individuals in Europe, the U.S., Canada, and South America. But never before had she faced such a sizable security detail.

  All of Skyler’s targets in the past had been men. She
hated men—how the hell could she not after what Don Scarpello and Alberto had done to her?—and wanted to kill them all. But she had never harmed a woman or child, accidentally or otherwise. Nor would she ever kill a man in front of his family. Which was why she was relieved that Kieger’s wife and three children were not present for this political event. If they had made an unexpected appearance, she would have had to scrub the mission.

  Still keeping her eye on the scene below, Skyler took a minute to carefully adjust the angle click elevation and windage dials. Then, with the calm of an experienced diamond cutter, she tweaked the low-profile knob on the side of the scope’s turret to make the parallax adjustment. When finished, she had not only corrected for the bullet drop and prevailing wind drift, but had even better resolution of her soft target. Next she turned the power selector ring until the upper sixteen inches of Kieger’s body filled the opening in the scope’s duplex. With her target perfectly framed, she read off the distance-to-target number on the rear of the power selector.

  Eight hundred twelve yards. Nearly one-half mile—in a stiff crosswind no less.

  It will be a challenge. But you have risen to many such challenges before. Stay true in your hold.

  She reached for the ten-round magazine on the floor. With a firm upward movement, she clicked it into place in front of the trigger. The magazine was packed with .50-caliber Raufoss hi-explosive-incendiary-armor-piercing cartridges; each one was six inches long, green- and silver-tipped, and cost more than one hundred dollars on the black market. A single HEIAP round would not only be an immediate kill with a hit on any portion of the target’s head, chest, or torso, but the shrapnel would leave behind a difficult—not to mention misleading—ballistics story.

  After chambering the first round and dry firing the rifle with the safety on, she scanned the room to make sure nothing would be left behind except what she wanted found.

  Then she went through her mental checklist.

  Only one last thing remained.

  Skyler took out her rosary and kneeled down to pray. Closing her eyes, she pressed her hands together into a steeple and brought the string of crimson beads to her lips with her fingertips. There was no need to ask forgiveness for what she was about to do; she knew that it was unforgivable, that righteousness was little more than a stepping stone to hypocrisy. Nor did she plead for a keen eye or steady hold, or pray for a clean escape. Instead, she surrendered herself unconditionally before God, in all her imperfection, and gave Him praise. She concluded her supplication by kissing the rosary again and declaring, in a soft voice, “Glory be to the Father.”

  Now she felt cleansed, purified, but not absolved.

  She knew she would never be absolved.

  The preparations were now complete: mind, body, and rifle were ready.

  It was time to fulfill the contract.

  Skyler’s heart quickened as she pulled the glass from the window and again brought the stock of the rifle to her shoulder. She locked onto her soft target; his image in the scope was unwavering, crystal clear. She heard the distant cheer of the crowd, the president-elect’s baritone voice broadcast over the loudspeakers. The sounds mingled with the noisy traffic on Colfax and Broadway.

  Her throat went dry.

  Our Father who art in heaven...Once you fire, close the hole quickly. Don’t give the countersnipers time to lock on.

  Calmly, she moved the rifle a fraction of a millimeter to the right, until the thin crosshairs of the calibrated reticle were lined up directly on Kieger’s heart. Inside, she felt a palpable sense of danger. Her job demanded absolute perfection; there were no second chances.

  Thy kingdom come...Project the bullet to the target.

  Breathing in a controlled rhythm, she tightened her left hand around the buttstock and visualized the lengthy parabola the bullet would take in its travel path to the kill zone.

  Give us this day our daily bread...Control your hold.

  Her finger curled confidently around the trigger, as it had so many times before. There was no wobble or quiver; her hands were steady as a surgeon’s.

  And lead us not into temptation...Don’t think—just feel.

  Holding steady on the target, she willed herself into an almost trance-like state, the sniper’s cocoon. With a world-class shooter’s discipline, she summoned all her resolve, every ounce of concentration and professionalism she could muster, and channeled the energy into the shot.

  The field of fire turned preternaturally calm, noiseless.

  Her mind was totally lucid and unencumbered: no anger, no fear, no guilt, no doubt.

  There was only the rifle, her soft target, and the invisible arc connecting them.

  “But deliver us from evil. Amen,” she murmured aloud, concluding her prayer.

  And then, gently, she squeezed the trigger.

  CHAPTER 3

  TO FBI SPECIAL AGENT KENNETH GREGORY PATTON, it was all too sudden, too jarring and unexpected to be real. One second, President-elect William Ambrose Kieger—the enormously popular moderate Republican—held the audience before him in quiet rapture; the next, there was a loud BOOM and a puff of smoke and wet pink cloud of blood and tissue flew out his back.

  Good Lord! Patton gasped in silent disbelief, unable to process this sudden and unusually grisly sensory input.

  Then he saw the president-elect’s body twitch once and his arms fly out helplessly, as if he were groping through the darkness.

  He saw blood spray over those standing closest to the podium, like crimson paint spattered across an empty white canvas.

  He saw the poor, luckless leader lose the unwinnable battle with gravity as his legs buckled like a stringless marionette and he slumped to the wooden platform.

  He saw a nearby Secret Service agent go down hard, blood gushing from his torn pant leg.

  But despite what his eyes told him, he couldn’t believe that what was not supposed to happen was actually happening. The violence seemed too horrifying to be real. The world seemed to move in slow motion, as if he was caught up in a terrible nightmare.

  And then the realness of it all came crashing home as he heard an urgent voice slice through the horrible incubus, summoning him back to reality.

  “Pathfinder down! Pathfinder down!”

  Suddenly, the world around him began to roll forward at ridiculous speed as the plaza turned to bedlam. He saw six Service agents rush to the president-elect, who was sprawled face down, his back opened up to expose a gruesome, spongy mass. He heard a collective shriek of horror and saw people recoiling from the scene in panic, running in every direction, staggering, colliding, the pandemonium spreading like a contagion as it moved through the frenzied crowd.

  When the shot was fired, Patton and his five-person FBI team were fifteen feet away from the speakers’ platform, next to the press bleachers. They were here in a supporting role to the Service—which was in charge of Kieger’s personal protection detail—and their assignment was to control the ingress and egress of pool reporters from the press bleachers. Suddenly, those very reporters they were supposed to control jumped from the bleachers and flooded toward the platform. Patton and his team struggled mightily to hold them back, but the numbers were too many, the collective force too great, and they were, ineluctably, swept up in the tidal wave.

  Up on the speakers’ platform, the Service had formed a human barricade around Kieger to shield him from further gunfire. Four agents reached down to lift him up, their faces contorted in a collective rictus of desperation.

  “Get Pathfinder out of here! Move it!”

  Still struggling in vain to control the reporters, Patton jerked out his Saber hand-held radio and tried to contact the Secret Service command post. But all he got was the hiss and crackle of static. Meanwhile, the four Service agents carried Kieger’s limp body to the north side of the platform, leaving behind a trail of bloody footprints. In the chaos, Patton was swept up again and pushed forward to within a few feet of Kieger as paramedics came rushing up ca
rrying a stretcher. Still clinging to a shred of hope, he searched for any sign of life as the president-elect was transferred to the stretcher.

  But there was nothing—not a goddamned thing.

  “Move it! Get him to the ambulance!” a Secret Service agent barked.

  The paramedics hoisted the stretcher and were off and running, the Service clearing a chute out in front to the waiting ambulance. The agents were relentless, using both agility and brute force to accomplish their objective. But Patton could already tell that it was all in vain.

  Suddenly, his radio squawked to life, a clear urgent voice from the Service command post.

  “Bureau One, this is Command!”

  He keyed the mike. “Command, I read you!”

  “Proceed to Colfax Avenue and post your team in a line from Bannock Street to the east side of the Annex Building! Block the escape of any potential suspects fleeing northward along Bannock. We’re getting Pathfinder the hell out of here!”

  “I copy. Do you have an isolation on the shot?”

  “That’s a negative, Bureau One. Get your team moving. Now!”

  Patton quickly radioed his team and relayed the instructions. Then he blazed off, fueled by pure animal adrenaline and a sense of patriotic outrage that burned inside like a wildfire.

  CHAPTER 4

  WHEN SKYLER SAW the bullet strike her target, she knew it was a kill. Everything that followed was like a fast-forwarded Zapruder clip as she replaced the window glass, disassembled her weapon, and made her getaway.

  The expertly crafted weapon in her hands was not something to leave behind. It wasn’t just a gun—it was the source of her power. In the unreal world of the assassin, she was as powerful as any man, more powerful even, and with her Light Fifty and a few explosive armor-piercing rounds, she was invincible. As proof, she need only look down in the plaza below.