by Don Brown
His heart pounding in the morning sun, with the breeze from the river in his face, Mark felt electricity flowing in his arms and legs.
Moments like this separated the men from the boys. Great lawmen like Jelly Bryce lived for these moments.
He had entered that zone. At a time when he and his men were on the blood trail, closing in on a cold-blooded killer, knowing their lives were on the line, Mark was stone-cold fearless.
What he felt, instead, was a killer instinct. In fact, this killer instinct saturated him. Nothing compared to it. Not drugs. Not sex. When the instinct kicked in, only killing could saturate it.
He knew his destiny was greatness. For only a rare man could stare death in the face without blinking. Jelly Bryce was such a rare man, and Mark Romanov would follow in Bryce’s footsteps.
In his gut, he hoped the animal would not surrender, that this would end in a gunfight.
Mark wanted to kill this guy—and to kill whatever other vermin were in the rat’s nest. Not only for trying to kill Caroline, but also for embarrassing him personally by slipping by the NCIS detail.
Nobody would embarrass him like that and get away with it. And if he got even a sliver of opportunity, that’s exactly what he would do to them—put an end to this once and for all.
Now was the time for leadership. And leadership he would show.
Motioning his three subordinate agents to stay down and behind him in single file, Romanov crouched to the corner edge of the brick wall.
Staying low, his head just a few inches off the concrete, he peered around the edge of the building, looking to his left. The red Mercedes sported a New York license plate and was parked between three black Mercedes, all with District of Columbia plates.
A cloud blocked the sun, and a shadow, along with a gust of wind, swept across the back parking area. The empty loading dock showed no signs of life. But a large open bay led into the back of the warehouse.
The assassin obviously had huddled inside the warehouse.
Now was the time to execute.
Mark unholstered his megaphone and held it up to his lips.
“Attention inside the warehouse. You are surrounded by federal agents. Come out of the warehouse with your hands up, and you will not be harmed.”
No response.
Mark motioned Agents Carraway and Naylor to fan out along the driveway, in a position out parallel to him but still not in open view of the back of the warehouse.
He again brought the megaphone to his lips. “You! Inside the warehouse! Federal agents! We know you’re in there! I’m giving you one more chance! Now come out with your hands up! This is your final warning!”
Mark checked his watch. He would wait thirty seconds, and that would be it. Fifteen seconds passed.
Twenty seconds.
Now twenty-five.
That was it.
“Okay! Move out!” Mark turned and pointed at Carraway, crouched off to his right about thirty feet. “Carraway, establish position behind that Mercedes.”
Carraway responded with a thumbs-up, then took off running at a diagonal angle, across the parking area, toward the black Mercedes.
The sharp, single shot rang across the concrete, the sound filling the air.
His heart racing, Paul thought about jumping out and running up the driveway to provide additional cover for the NCIS agents. But that wasn’t the smart approach, he decided. The one shot could have been fired by Mark Romanov or one of the NCIS agents.
Perhaps they had already nabbed the assassin.
Or maybe the shot had been fired against the good guys.
Either way, no one was escaping. Not on his watch.
He cranked the Suburban and pulled forward, parking it in front of the driveway, blocking any car that might try to escape from around the corner.
If someone charged out the driveway, the driver’s seat would be the most vulnerable and dangerous position to be in, in the line of fire of any gunshots. He got out of the Suburban, gun in hand, and crouched behind the vehicle, his pistol aimed across the hood and at the warehouse.
Special Agent Carraway lay in the middle of the parking area, his face kissing the concrete, his stomach bleeding in a puddle. He squirmed in pain, moaning in agony.
Mark held the wrist-radio transmitter to his mouth.
“Gentlemen, I’m going after Carraway. I’m going to open fire into the warehouse as I approach him. I need you to move out and pour fire inside as I make my move. Got it?”
“Got it, sir.”
“Roger that.”
Mark put down the bullhorn and, with his gun aimed in front of him, cut diagonally in front of the open bay door, firing multiple shots into the warehouse as he approached Carraway.
Naylor and Frymier stepped out into the open, unloading seven shots into the warehouse as Mark grabbed Carraway under the arms and started dragging him back to the side of the warehouse.
Return fire from the warehouse!
The first bullet whizzed by Mark’s head, which made him want to drop Carraway and kill the sucker who fired it.
A second shot rang out.
“Aaah!” Naylor yelled out. “It’s okay. My upper arm. I’m okay.”
Mark dragged Carraway over to the side of the building, out of the direct line of fire.
Carraway was conscious, but the bleeding had increased. He needed an ambulance, and fast.
Therein lay the predicament.
Calling an ambulance would mean the DC police would soon show up. Once that happened, they would want to take control. He would resist relinquishing control, and a jurisdictional tug-of-war would follow over who was in charge of this operation. It would be the same thing the Alexandria cops tried after the Ross Simmons shooting.
NCIS arrived on the scene first, investigating the shooting of a U.S. Naval officer, and then the local-yokel cops would show up like they owned the place.
The inevitable “Who’s in charge here?” argument would compromise the mission and undermine everything Mark was trying to accomplish.
Of course, because some of the thugs inside weren’t using silencers, the DC police would soon be responding to calls about the sound of gunfire anyway.
He needed to act fast, to finish this job while he still had total control.
“How can I help?”
Mark looked up. Captain Paul Kriete, wearing his summer white U.S. Navy uniform, stood there holding a pistol.
“Captain! What are you doing here?”
“Couldn’t resist. How can I help?”
“Pull this man down toward the street and call an ambulance.”
“Will do,” Paul said.
“I’ve got to get back in the fight,” Mark said.
“Roger that.”
How to get these clowns out?
An idea struck him. He held up his wrist and again spoke into it. “Naylor. Frymier. Any sign of movement?”
“Negative.”
“That’s a negative, sir. It’s dark in that warehouse.”
“Okay, I’m going to get something out of the car. If you see any signs of movement coming out of there, take ’em out.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Yes, sir.”
Mark sprinted down the driveway to the Taurus and popped open the trunk, barely noticing Paul Kriete kneeling over Agent Carraway at the end of the driveway.
He picked up a tear-gas canister and a gas mask, then sprinted back up the driveway and spoke into his wrist transmitter.
“Okay, guys. I’m gonna drop a gas canister in there. That should stir things up. Shoot if you get resistance. Acknowledge.”
“Acknowledge, boss. Roger that.”
“Okay. Here we go. Three . . . two . . . one.” Mark pulled the pin on the gas canister and reached around and tossed it into the open bay area. A shot ricocheted near his hand.
He held the wrist transmitter to his mouth. “Stand by, gentlemen. Stay covered.”
“Hey, boss. We got somebody coming out
with his hands up.”
Mark looked up to see a white male, perhaps in his late fifties, stagger out of a cloud of smoke. He was coughing and holding his hands over his head.
“Don’t shoot!” the man pleaded.
“You!” Mark screamed, pointing his gun at the man’s head. “Over here. Facedown on the concrete! Now!”
Still coughing, the man stumbled toward Mark.
“On your knees, now, or I’ll blow out your brains!”
“I’m not armed!” The man dropped to his knees.
“Naylor!” Mark screamed, his gun barrel jammed into the man’s forehead. “Get over here! Secure this scumbag!”
“Yes, sir.”
Naylor, who had been ducked down behind one of the black Mercedes alongside Frymier, made a low dash back across the concrete, exposing himself to potential gunfire. He arrived and stood beside Mark, looking at the pathetic man kneeling on the concrete.
“Cuff his hands and tie his feet.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Romanov! Heads-up!”
Shots rang out.
Another man sprinted out of the warehouse, running down the driveway toward Captain Kriete, guns blazing, firing in every direction as he ran.
Another shot rang out.
The man fell face-first onto the concrete, his loose pistol bouncing on the driveway beside him. And when he fell, Kriete stood on the other side of him, locked in a classic shooter’s stance, gun pointed straight out, aimed into the space the man had occupied half a second earlier.
“Good shooting, Captain!” Mark blurted, but he was instantly jealous that Paul Kriete, who was not even a federal agent, had scored the first kill in this operation.
In fact, maybe the operation was over.
Jets of anger flushed his body. Even if he had headed the operation, this wasn’t the way he wanted it to end.
But then, glancing first at the man Kriete had just gunned down, then at the man cuffed on his knees, he had another thought.
“The shooter’s still inside.”
“What do you mean, boss?”
“Remember the pictures from the drone?”
“What about it?”
“The shooter has gray hair. The guy the captain took out is bald. This guy we just captured has black hair. That means the shooter is still unaccounted for.”
“Good point.” Frymier pointed his gun at the man in captivity, still on his knees, hands cuffed behind his back, his feet shackled by chains.
Mark stepped over the man and jammed his pistol barrel into his right temple. “Who else is in there?”
The scumbag coughed. “I ain’t sayin’ nothin’ till I talk to my lawyer.”
“You want to talk to a lawyer, do you?” Mark put his shoe on the man’s head and kicked him over. The back of his head hit the concrete and he screamed in pain.
Mark kneeled down, put his knee on the man’s skull, grinding it into the concrete, and jammed his gun into the man’s ear.
“Look, scumbag. Here’s the way this is going down. You charged me with your gun, and I had to put a bullet through your head in self-defense. It’s gonna be hard to talk to your lawyer with a bullet in your head. Now, how many people are left in there, and where are they located?”
No response.
“Want to be that way, do you?” Mark stepped down onto the man’s head, riveting the pressure on his skull.
“Okay! Okay!”
“How many, scumbag? And where are they located?”
“Okay. One left. He’s probably in the office.”
“What’s his name?”
No response.
Mark stepped on the man’s head again. “I said, what’s his name?”
“Mr. T.! We call him Mr. T.!”
“Where’s the office?”
“Go through the garage. Through the door on the right. Down the hallway. Third door on the left. You’ll find him there.”
“Anybody else in there?”
“No! Just him.”
“You’d better not be lying to me. Because if you’re lying, your brains are scrambled eggs!” He jammed the gun barrel into the man’s mouth. “Got it?”
“I ain’t lying!”
“Watch him, Frymier. I’m going after that guy. If this one gives you any trouble, take him out.”
“With pleasure, boss.”
Mark strapped a gas mask over his face and moved toward the open bay of the warehouse.
Gun drawn, he stepped inside.
The tear gas was dissipating but not totally gone. Through the lenses of the gas mask, he could see boxes, wooden crates actually, stacked up against all four walls. The crates had “New York Concrete & Seafood Company” painted on them in red.
He realized he had stepped into a refrigerated warehouse, which seemed odd, considering that the bay door was wide open, allowing refrigerated air to escape into the warm morning sunshine outside.
Perhaps leaving the door open was a trap.
Or perhaps they just hadn’t gotten around to closing it yet.
Or perhaps they were expecting a shipment of whatever they were storing.
The boxes said “seafood.” But all boxes that contained illegal drugs were labeled with something else.
In Mark’s gut, he knew he had just stumbled upon a huge drug bust. This would explain why they weren’t too worried about refrigeration.
Cocaine didn’t need to be refrigerated.
A new surge of adrenaline shot through his body. Not only would he get credit for leading the operation against the terrorist assassin of naval officers, which in and of itself would make him a national hero, but he’d also be credited with a mammoth drug bust.
His expertise would be sought after on national news and talk shows, much like Mark Fuhrman and other cops who became national celebrities as a result of high-profile cases.
But he could only let that thought sink in for half a second.
First, he had a job to finish.
Off to his right, a single steel door, almost like a refrigerator door, led into the rest of the warehouse. It was closed.
Mark remembered the instructions from the man in captivity. “Through the door on the right. Down the hallway. Third door on the left. You’ll find him there.”
Aiming his gun in his right hand, Mark put his left hand on the knob and opened the door.
Fluorescent lighting lit a long, wide hallway with a concrete floor. The hallway looked to be about fifty feet in length from the doorway. Seeing no one, Mark stepped inside and closed the door behind him.
He removed the gas mask and set it on the floor.
Thoughts flooded his mind.
What if the scumbag had lied about the number of thugs left in the building?
Could this be an ambush?
Perhaps he should wait for reinforcements.
He hesitated for a second.
No point in worrying about that now.
Besides, delays or reinforcements would guarantee a battle for control of this operation. The risk was worth it. The greater the risk, the greater the reward.
And in this case, the potential reward was off the charts.
Softly, he stepped forward. Past the first door. Past the second door.
His back against the wall, he stopped just before he reached the third door. Careful not to expose his body in front of the doorframe, he reached over and rapped on the door three times, then pulled back.
“Federal agent! I know you’re in there. Come out with your hands up!”
Four shots rang out in rapid succession, with bullets flying through the door and into the opposite wall.
“Aaaaahhh!” Mark cried out, feigning being hit.
Another shot fired through the center of the door, and then a sixth shot down at the foot.
This cat was crazy.
Mark had to act. Now.
Holding his gun out, he stepped in front of the door, kicked it open, and with lightning speed unloaded six shots at the man behind
the desk.
The man slumped forward. Blood gushed from his head and chest.
Mark stepped forward, pulled the .357 from his back belt, and laid it on the dead man’s desk.
Mission accomplished.
CHAPTER 38
HEADQUARTERS
NEW YORK CONCRETE & SEAFOOD COMPANY
EAST 161ST STREET
THE BRONX
WEDNESDAY, 10:00 A.M.
Phillip D’Agostino slammed down the telephone. The family kept lawyers retained all over the country and fed money to the topflight criminal defense lawyers in New York, Washington, Miami, Chicago, and LA, whether or not they had active cases going, just in case.
Still, Phil hated calls from lawyers. Calls from lawyers usually meant something bad was happening. The call he’d just gotten from the family’s lead attorney in Washington, DC, Dickie DeMarco, was no exception.
And now Phil had to make another call.
“Hey, Vivian!”
“Yes, sir?”
“Get Big Sal on the phone for me, will ya?”
“Yes, sir.”
Phil sat back and lit up a cigarette. The nicotine filled his lungs, bringing instant relief. After calling Big Sal, he would have to call Maria. She would survive the loss, which was a silver lining in the cloud as far as Phil was concerned.
“Big Sal is on the phone, sir.”
Phil took another drag from the cigarette and picked up the phone.
“Sorry to call you with bad news, Sal. We just got a call from Dickie DeMarco in Washington. The feds raided our warehouse on the Anacostia River. Vinnie’s dead. No . . . no, I haven’t told Maria yet. No big loss as far as I’m concerned. The big problem is that they grabbed lots of stash, mostly cocaine.
“Now that the feds have raided our Washington facility, we’ll need to leave the country for a while. I’m sending the jet to pick you up. Be ready to fly in thirty minutes. We need to get out of Dodge. It’s just a matter of time before the feds will be crawling all over the place . . . Where are we going? First to Cuba, then Venezuela. We’ll all be enjoying a little Caribbean sunshine while our lawyers get this all straightened out. Yes . . . yes . . . Dickie DeMarco says with the right money we can make Vinnie the scapegoat and the ringleader, and the press will report him as being the godfather, and we can be back in business in a few months. Meantime, Dickie says just enjoy the sunshine and he’ll take care of the rest . . . Right . . . right . . . See you in a few.”