by Oliver North
It was a false hope.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Jake wasn’t too sure what to expect when Tommy stuck his arm out his car window and waved them to the curb just three blocks from Park’s residence. The only thing he knew for sure was that the young Korean criminal was furious at him for being forced to stand in the hallway with the two security men while Jake and Park conversed in private.
Both cars pulled to a halt midway between two lampposts. As Jake hastily inserted loose rounds into his magazine and reloaded his Glock in the front seat of the Range Rover, Tommy jumped out of his car and headed toward the undercover vehicle.
Jake could see the agitation in Tommy’s face and quickly activated the hidden recording device. By the time the enraged Korean criminal opened the Rover’s passenger-side door and sat down, Jake had both hands on the steering wheel but was ready to react if necessary.
“Why didn’t you want to talk back there?” asked Jake, trying to defuse what he now believed to be a potentially volatile situation.
“Why did you carry a gun into Park’s residence?” demanded Tommy, his anger flaring.
“Whoa, partner. Let’s turn it down a notch or two,” said Jake, a take-command expression on his face.
Tommy repeated the question a bit more sedately but the hostility simmered.
Jake was turned in his seat facing Tommy, watching his eyes, prepared to strike should the street thug decide to attack; never underestimate the enemy. Jake responded with subdued sarcasm. “I always carry a gun. We live in a dangerous world.”
“I’ve had enough of your crap. Are you a cop?”
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” said Jake, shaking his head.
Tommy inched closer, seeking to get in Jake’s face, not the wisest move in this situation, his dark eyes raging. “No, I’m serious. Are you a cop?”
“No, Tommy. How many deals have we done?”
“That’s not important.”
Jake took the offensive. “What do you mean it’s not important? We’ve done close to a half-dozen deals. I’ve brought your containers across the border. I’ve been to your warehouse where you store all kinds of swag. Has it ever been raided? Has anyone been arrested? Have you even been stopped by anybody in law enforcement? Cops? Deputies? Chippies? Feds? Would a cop allow you to get away with all that?”
“Tell me again you’re not a cop. If I ask, you have to tell me; otherwise it’s entrapment. I know the law.”
In at least half of his undercover assignments, the target asked the same question. Thanks to Hollywood the bad guys believed a law enforcement official if asked had to answer honestly. Jake wasn’t about to take the time to educate this criminal entrepreneur. From experience Jake knew Tommy would be able to discuss the finer points of the law with his attorney after the indictment.
“Tommy, read my lips. I’ll speak very slowly. I . . . am . . . not . . . a . . . cop.”
Tommy still wasn’t convinced, his eyes boring through the undercover agent.
Jake threw up his hands as if in mock surrender. “Okay, you got me. I’m a supersecret undercover agent assigned to thwart international criminal conspiracies. I’m MI6, CIA, FBI, as well as LAPD and somewhere at home I think I have a sheriff’s badge. I’m really the Lone Ranger and I’m here looking for Tonto, my faithful Indian companion. . . .”
Jake could tell his over-the-top rant had worked to calm his accomplice. He continued in a quieter tone, intending to sound conspiratorial. “Do you want to know why I needed to meet with Park? Would that make you feel better? But since you’re so big on the law, as I understand it, if I tell you, you’re part of the conspiracy. In on the score, in on the beef; that’s the way the game is played. So tell me, do you want in?”
Tommy thought hard. He stared out the passenger window, the night growing darker by the minute as Jake’s aggressive offense played with the Korean street thug’s mind.
“Yeah, I want in,” said Tommy with some reluctance.
There was a pregnant pause before Jake answered, “Reid hired me to kill Park’s daughter, Jenny.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Reid’s willing to pay fifty thousand dollars for me to kill Jenny, and if I take the contract you get a third.”
“Why?” asked Tommy, now almost pleading for an answer.
“The why isn’t important.”
Tommy sat there trying to gather his thoughts.
“So do you want your third of the fifty grand?” asked Jake.
Tommy sat in disbelief, his head pounding, his hands beginning to shake. He began to massage his temples, believing that might relieve the stress. There was prolonged silence before he spoke again. “Did you tell Park I brought Reid to you? Please, Jake, tell me you didn’t tell Mr. Park I had anything to do with this.”
“Tommy, are you in or out?”
“Jake,” said Tommy, again almost pleading.
“Your name never came up. I gave Park a chance to buy out the contract. There is no way I’m going against a man as powerful as Park. I may be crazy but I’m not stupid. I want to be on his side when this comes down. Besides, he knew about it.”
Tommy jumped on Jake’s last statement, incredulous at the thought as his head snapped to the left, focusing on Jake’s eyes. “What do you mean he knew about it?”
“Those gunslingers he had in his office, the two boneheads he sent to babysit you in the hallway . . . they were at the pier when I met with Reid.”
“Are you sure?”
“Tommy, I was there and so were they. The best thing we did was come here tonight. Park knew all about it, or at least he would have figured out the details eventually. We’re golden. We’re on the A-team, the varsity, and if all goes well, we’re in the starting lineup.”
Tommy breathed an audible sigh, slowly blowing out the tensions that choked him seconds before. He smiled as he turned to Jake. “Do I still get a third?”
Jake gave his passenger a playful swat to the back of his head.
“Are you happy now?” asked Jake.
“Yeah,” said Tommy, still with the smile on his face. “But if I find out you’re a cop I’ll kill you.”
Looking Tommy in the eye, Jake said, “Good! That makes us even.”
“How so?” asked Tommy.
“If I find out you’re a cop I’ll kill you.”
Tommy offered a nervous smile as he exited Jake’s car. “I’m going back to Mr. Park right now and clear this up. I need to get out front on this. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Whatever.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The black GMC Yukon pulled from the driveway and headed north. In what would prove to be a fatal security lapse, the Green Hornet and Kato failed to look south and see the five sitting in the Honda Pilot.
“Get ready to move,” whispered Kareem.
Just as he started the engine and prepared to drive forward, Candy spotted Tommy pulling up to the security gate. “Wait!”
“Why would he return?” asked one of the terrorists in the backseat.
“Quiet,” whispered Candy—unaware that a woman giving orders to a radical Islamist would be an unforgivable offense.
They watched Tommy punch the call button on the security arm extending out over the driveway.
“Yes,” came a male voice in heavily accented English loud enough for those in the Honda Pilot to hear.
“Mr. Park, I’m sorry to bother you again. I know it’s getting late. I just spoke with Jake. May I come back in and explain about Reid?”
“You’ll need to wait a minute. I have to deactivate the alarm system.”
Hearing the exchange over the speaker at the gate, Kareem said, “Get ready!”
“For what?” asked one of the men from the backseat.
“Change of plans. As soon as Tommy pulls forward we move.”
“This was not the plan,” said the man in the backseat as he looked to the others.
“It is now! Take out the secur
ity cameras as we rehearsed. Everybody gear up! Now!” said Kareem, handing latex gloves to his four passengers.
He reached into the backseat and grabbed an aluminum baseball bat he kept behind the driver’s seat. It served as a convenient legal weapon that wouldn’t be questioned by the police if he was pulled over. He handed it to the shortest of the three men in the backseat. “Jam this between the brace and the gate after it swings open.”
As Tommy’s Lexus cleared the gate and headed down the driveway, the Honda Pilot pulled in a few seconds behind. Inside the SUV, everyone was wearing black cotton balaclavas, the preferred attire of terrorists and thugs. The masks had holes for only the mouth and eyes, covering the head and neck.
Two of the men jumped from the backseat of the vehicle. One fired paintball pellets at the overhead camera focused on the front gate. The balls splattered and within seconds an opaque film covered the lens, obscuring visibility. The other man jammed the metal baseball bat into the gate’s hinges, preventing it from closing.
Kareem drove through the open portal, stopping long enough to pick up his two co-conspirators, then slowly made his way up the driveway after giving Tommy enough time to enter the residence.
From the driveway the occupants of the SUV saw lights come on in what Candy had told them was Park’s first-floor office. Kareem turned to the others and said quietly, “We go now.”
CHAPTER FORTY
As the team exited the Pilot, the men maneuvered with military precision toward the door. Using a heavy steel handheld battering ram, two men instantly destroyed the lock. As the door burst open, the third terrorist tossed a flash-bang grenade, designed to stun anyone within ten yards of the detonation. The bold flash of light essentially blinded an individual for five seconds while the loud blast deafened and incapacitated those in the room.
The grenade performed as advertised—momentarily disorienting everyone on the ground floor of Park’s residence with a thunderous explosion.
Kareem was the first to enter and looked left, his AK-47 in a combat-ready position. The security guard stumbled through the open door of his office located exactly as Candy detailed. From just a few feet away, Kareem fired a burst of five rounds, all striking the intended target.
The raiding party moved quickly, clearing the living room. Two of the men and Candy moved down the long hallway to the bedroom seeking Jenny and the child. Kareem and the other terrorist headed toward Park’s office. Pale smoke from the flash-bang and gunfire permeated the room and the smell of the pyrotechnic metal oxide mix hung in the air.
Park raced to the antique oak desk in his study and ducked down behind the heavy piece of furniture. Tommy followed, squatting next to Park.
“Do you have a gun?” asked Tommy.
“It’s in the safe,” said Park, pointing to a large oil painting on the far wall concealing a safe.
Before Tommy could mount a counterattack, the masked intruders kicked in the door to the study and Kareem rolled a second flash-bang into the room.
Tommy, not knowing the lethality of the device, threw himself on Park in an attempt to shield his boss. Though the flash-bang was far from deadly unless it detonated next to someone’s head, Tommy’s act of loyalty to his criminal mentor was the stuff of underworld legend.
The grenade’s concussion filled the room with noise and smoke. Two invaders rushed forward, circling the desk, with Kareem shouting in English for the two men to surrender. As Tommy moved to his left off Park, there was a moment of hesitation as he tried to recall where he had previously heard the voice of the lead gunman.
Adrenaline is a survival aid. It prompted Tommy to jump up from the floor and grapple with the nearest attacker, wrestling him to the ground. With a stranglehold around the Middle Eastern intruder’s neck, Tommy viciously bit the man’s ear, a pathetic shriek evidencing the pain, both men now struggling to survive.
With his free hand, Tommy reached for the intruder’s AK-47, which had fallen to the floor during the melee. Kareem, stunned the attack was unfolding in ways no one anticipated, saw Tommy grasp the weapon. As the two men wrestled for control of the dropped weapon, the bartending “wannabe” jihadist opened fire.
The burst of ten rounds from Kareem’s AK-47 had a predictable effect. Both Tommy and Kareem’s fellow jihadist were hit multiple times.
Tommy’s arm was shredded from the blast, flesh hanging from shattered bone. But with his good arm the Korean street hustler attempted to lift the intruder’s weapon and take aim at Kareem.
It was a futile effort. The “convert to the cause” unleashed another burst of fire at the young Korean criminal capitalist and finished him. Turning to the man Tommy had tried to shield, Kareem screamed at Park, cowering behind the desk, “Stay where you are! Arms, spread-eagle! Now!”
Park submitted to Kareem’s commands and sprawled on the floor, hands held far from his body. With his weapon trained on Park, Kareem moved to his Lebanese companion and noted the man was no longer struggling for breath as he lay in a large pool of blood.
Keeping the muzzle of his AK pointed at Park, Kareem squatted next to his terrorist partner and felt for a carotid pulse—he found none.
In the immediate aftermath of the grenades and gunfire, Kareem heard the whimpers of a child as the other three assailants pushed Soo Min, Jenny, and Gracie into the room. Blood poured from a large gash above Soo Min’s eye where she’d been pistol-whipped by one of the misogynistic Lebanese terrorists.
The attacker had Park’s wife by the hair, maintaining control as she fought her captor and struggled to get free. Jenny, a hood over her head, was compliant, controlled by the flex-cuffs securing her hands behind her back. The third intruder held the little girl, who screamed when she saw the slaughter.
“What happened?” asked the terrorist, referring to his friend lying on the floor as he tried to subdue a frightened Gracie.
“Later,” said Kareem.
One of the masked intruders picked up the weapon lying next to Tommy and slung it across his shoulder.
Soo Min struggled again, seeking to escape, and the jihadi pulled her toward him. She lost her balance but before she hit the floor, the attacker yanked hard on her jet-black hair, preventing her from collapsing. She screamed in pain and fear. The intruder swung the weapon, smashing it against the back of her head, opening another wound. Then he threw her to the floor.
Park, ignoring threats from Kareem, struggled to his feet to aid his wife but was greeted by the sharp slash across his face from the barrel of Kareem’s AK-47, draining him of what little strength remained. He crumpled to the floor and Kareem shouted, “If you get up again I will kill you!”
“Let the women go!” shouted Park.
“We don’t need the old one. You can have her but you’ll see the other two again when you answer our demands,” said Kareem as he threw a note at Park.
With that the attacker dragged Jenny and Gracie from the office, the young child’s shrieks echoing down the hallway. Park may have been a criminal and the agent of an enemy regime, but he was also a grandfather.
As the attackers were preparing to depart, the North Korean crime boss made another attempt to aid his unconscious wife. Kareem, in an act of gratuitous cruelty, turned from the doorway and smashed the butt of his AK-47 into the old man’s face. “Stay down!” he shouted as he fired off three rounds into the wall of the office. “We’ll be in touch.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Jake pulled from the curb and flipped a disc into the CD player. Elvis blasted from the speakers. Though he was exhausted, he was celebrating two back-to-back high-risk meetings. Every time he could walk away from one of these events without getting killed or discovered it was a victory. Tonight was a doubleheader win for the good guys. He had managed to sell himself to a criminal kingpin—and the subsequent “rededication ceremony” in the front seat of the Range Rover proved successful with the crime boss’s gangbanging associate.
Though Jake had often been told by others he cou
ldn’t “carry a tune in a covered basket,” he joined the King of Rock and Roll in a lively, off-key rendition of “Jailhouse Rock.” He checked his mirrors, took several side streets, and circled two cul-de-sacs. He was clean but tired. An hour of undercover work is like an eight-hour day to mortals, and he had been balancing too many nonstop undercover days and nights without respite.
After crooning with the King he headed east on Huntington Drive. He turned right on Rosemead Boulevard and then right again into the North Woods Inn/Kohl’s parking lot, the prearranged meeting spot.
As he negotiated his way through the parking lot, looking for Trey Bennett, he hoped this would be a quick debrief and a chance to get home to his firm but very lonely mattress.
Jake spied them and groaned. Instead of just Trey, there were three others standing next to a tan, government-issue Ford Taurus parked beneath a “mushroom cap” sodium-vapor light a few rows back from the Kohl’s main entrance. Jake shook his head when he realized Trey was accompanied not only by their immediate boss, Rachel Chang, but by ASAC Charles Hafner and Wilson, the Agency spook.
Trey and Rachel were in casual attire but Hafner and Wilson were in business suits. All four were drinking coffee from white Styrofoam cups as they chatted, awaiting Jake’s arrival.
When Trey spotted Jake pulling into a parking space about fifty yards away where there were no lights, he hustled over to the Range Rover before Jake could exit the vehicle. “You okay? Everything go well?”