Wait.
Maybe she was losing her mind, but she could swear she’d heard those exact words before. And not just the same words, but the same cadence, the same scream following.
“Please! I’m begging you…no!”
This wasn’t a woman being tortured.
At least not here, not now.
It was a recording. Set on an endless loop. A tactic.
As part of her training with the Instructor, she’d been locked away for days, nothing but the sound of electronic humming in her head. That time, instead of the nonceasing overhead lights, she’d been left in complete darkness. Food had been delivered through a slot in the door. She’d had no contact with another human being for a week.
Fleming knew all the ways to break a person down. Suffering through them had once been part of her training. Implementing them had once been part of her job.
That didn’t make her immune to their effects.
But now that she knew the woman was a recording, she could focus on that. She could take note of the repeating words, concentrate on something besides the feelings they engendered.
And just maybe she could manage to hold on.
Hammett
“The difference between a highly trained operative such as yourself and a garden-variety killer is intent,” the Instructor said. “Only psychopaths kill for fun.”
Hammett knew she sometimes killed for fun, and that made her a psychopath. At least, that’s what her training taught her. Hammett’s own opinion of herself was somewhat different. She recognized in herself an alpha predator. One who did what she wanted to, answering to no one. If she used, hurt, or killed for her own satisfaction, it was not psychopathic, because it wasn’t a disorder. If anything, it was an advantage.
Santiago, however, had a serious disorder. That guy was insane.
Shortly after solidifying plans at that awful clown motel, Santiago and Speed had gone off in search of a vehicle while Hammett used her tablet to transfer funds into her team’s bank accounts, pausing occasionally to flirt with Javier and Isaiah, even throwing a few pity smiles Jersey’s way. Seduction had also been taught at Hydra, and men were particularly easy to manipulate. Hammett flirted so frequently that she was often unaware of it. But in this case it was to foster good morale and allegiance. The only tricky part was to make sure no jealousy took hold. The goal was team-building, not team-destroying.
When Speed texted FOUND WHEELS, Hammett led her team into the lot and found him in an eighteen-wheeler parked alongside the hotel, alongside the outdoor portion of the water park. It was a Mack, the cab bright red, hauling a trailer adorned with a hyperrealistic graphic of people on a beach enjoying soft drinks.
Jersey climbed into the cab with Speed, and Hammett led Isaiah and Javier around the back, opening the trailer door. They found Santiago with the unfortunate driver, who had been tied and gagged, sitting on a stack of cola cartons.
The man had been partially flayed. He wriggled, screaming, the exposed muscles in his chest glistening like strawberry jelly. Santiago stood over him clutching pliers and a utility knife, the look on his face not dissimilar to a pregnant woman, glowing.
“My man, that’s just nasty,” Isaiah said.
Javier unbuttoned his suit jacket, leaving his hand on his belt.
Hammett checked to make sure the lot behind them was empty, then closed the door.
“This one’s a fighter.” Santiago’s voice was almost a purr. “I may keep him around for a while to play with.”
“Just kill him,” Hammett ordered, annoyed. “Play on your time, not mine.”
Santiago emitted an extended, drama-queen sigh, then slit the driver’s throat.
Hammett frowned. She’d done worse to people, but there was a time and a place. And, for the most part, a reason. Murder, especially bloody murder, left evidence. Random murder in public places was asking for attention.
As the truck driver bled out, Hammett drew her Wilson Tactical Supergrade .45 ACP from her hip carry with a speed rivaling that of any famous dead cowboy, pointing it at Santiago’s face.
“I want to be clear that I won’t tolerate screwing around while on this op. You’re being paid professional rates. Act like a professional.”
Santiago’s eyes narrowed, but he tilted his chin up to the gun and pressed his lips against the barrel.
“Promise,” he said after the kiss.
Hammett was aware that Isaiah and Javier had shifted their weight, angling away from her. She sensed the tension in their bodies, could almost taste their eagerness to pull their weapons. Dropping to one knee, she spun and pressed her gun to Javier’s belly while simultaneously pulling the M-Tech tactical fighting knife from the tearaway sheath on her right calf and holding it inside Isaiah’s thigh.
“Do you gentlemen promise as well?” she asked, smiling brightly.
Both had their hands on their guns but hadn’t drawn them.
“I like fast women,” Javier said, but his eyes were cold.
“Is that a yes?” Hammett checked her peripheral. Santiago’s body was relaxed, his expression amused.
“I am a consummate professional,” Javier said, letting his arm fall to his side. “But I admit, when this mission is over, I’d be interested in doing some decidedly unprofessional things with you.”
“Mr. Brown?” Hammett glanced his way.
Isaiah put his hands down. “I, too, am a professional.”
“No come-on, Mr. Brown?” She was almost insulted.
“I’m married.”
Hammett tucked away her weapons almost as quickly as she’d drawn them, then smoothed out the Velcro split in the calf of her boot-cut jeans. Funny. The man would kill for money, but somehow considered cheating improper.
His loss. And no matter, in the long run. While flirting was useful in commanding men, it didn’t have quite the impact of proving you could murder him before he blinked.
“Impress me,” she said, looking pointedly at Isaiah, then letting her gaze linger on Javier.
The truck revved, slipping into first gear. Hammett turned away, walked deeper into the cab, avoiding the growing pool of blood on the trailer bed, and took her tablet computer from her purse. She spotted three blips on her GPS map. Hers, Fleming’s, and Chandler’s.
Chandler was close.
Hammett considered her sisters. Chandler was good. Almost as good as Hammett was. And Fleming, despite her handicap, had proven incredibly resilient. She wondered, briefly, if it would be possible to recruit them. After all, she’d previously done so with their other siblings. Hydra was excellent at leaching humanity from its trainees. Causes were foolish. Even revenge, satisfying as it might be, was a waste of their particular talents. Money and power were much worthier pursuits.
But recalling all the trouble those particular two sisters had caused her, Hammett dismissed the notion.
It would be more satisfying to watch them die. Horribly, if possible. And though vengeance wasn’t professional, missions sometimes result in collateral damage. If Chandler got in the way, she’d be eliminated.
With extreme prejudice.
Tequila
Tequila finished up with the dogs and then kept his position, waiting and watching. No guards came out to investigate. He couldn’t find any other cameras other than the one over the kennel, aiming at the sandpit in the enclave.
He decided to get a higher look, and searched his pack for the case Harry McGlade had loaned them. Inside the stainless-steel box, encased in foam, was a toy helicopter no bigger than a robin.
But this was one seriously pimped-out toy copter. Front-and rear-mounted pinhole cameras. Global positioning tracking device. A thirty-minute battery. And several things no consumer protection agency would ever approve of: a gun barrel that fired a single .380 round, and a M6 detonator/blasting cap with a shaped shrapnel charge.
“You blow it, you bought it,” McGlade had said. “And this sucker is worth more than most new cars.”
Tequila
took a few minutes to assemble the rotors and familiarize himself with the controls, X-axis/Y-axis sticks with a dial for rotation and buttons marked SHOOT and BOOM. There were also two LED displays that were surprisingly clear, and an LCD that reported longitude and latitude.
He directed it to lift off, and the thing hovered in the air with only a slight buzz and hummingbird-like flutter of the rotor. After playing with it for a few minutes, he had to admit he wanted one, but not for the firepower.
Not far from Chicago was the Stillman Nature Center, and on Tequila’s last visit he’d seen a great horned owl that had appropriated a squirrel nest in an enormous oak tree. He’d wanted to climb up and get a closer look in the nest, but didn’t want to risk being thrown out of the preserve. The helicopter would be an ideal way to satisfy his curiosity.
He landed the chopper on the roof of the cannon building, affording him a good view of the area via the tiny chopper’s camera, and then he tugged one of his custom .45s from his shoulder rig. After whistling twice, he took careful aim and shot the kennel camera fifty meters away, blowing it to bits.
One eye on his Rolex Submariner and the other on the LCD screen’s view of the enclave, he slipped inside the building and leaned his back against the rusting, blast-resistant door. The building’s interior was dark and hot and musty-smelling, punctuated by the occasional beam of sunlight streaming in through various broken windows.
Exactly thirty-six seconds had ticked by after he shot the camera when a hatch opened up in the sandpile. Two men in generic black jumpsuits, their sidearms holstered, emerged from the hole. Performing a standard military sweep of the area, they converged on the kennel.
Tequila pushed the stick on the helicopter, and the tiny machine rose off the roof. He took a wide arc around the kennel, then aimed for the enclave, intent on flying the copter into the entrance to take a peek.
One of the guards picked up a piece of the camera and said something into his walkie-talkie that Tequila couldn’t make out, and they began to head back to the enclave. Damn. Too soon. The helicopter hadn’t gotten to the hatch yet. In seconds it would fly directly into their line of sight.
Tequila mule-kicked the steel door, hard. The clang reverberated through the building.
The guards’ heads turned in his direction. They drew their weapons and immediately began to jog his way.
Tequila lurched up from the door and went into motion, dividing his attention between escape and steering the helicopter toward the entrance. Eyes glued to the LCD as he tried to fly sideways and keep the camera on the guards, he stumbled on some refuse on the floor.
He recovered his balance before going down and made it into the corridor. The building was large, the size of a modest home, with several rooms branching off the narrow concrete hallway. In moments the guards would enter, and he would be caught in what cops called a vertical coffin, a long hallway with nowhere to go but dead. He needed to find a place to hide.
He yanked open the nearest door, revealing a completely empty room. The next was the same, barren of all furniture, not even a closet to hole up in. Racing down the corridor, he peered in door after door, looking for cover. But each room had been stripped, no tables, no cabinets, no equipment.
He checked the LED, saw he was flying erratically, missing the hatch by several meters. Tequila reversed direction on the helicopter and hovered. The camera swung around to reveal the guards right outside the building entrance, one of them reaching for the door he’d just kicked.
In seconds they’d be inside, and the best he could do was sit in an empty room and wait to be discovered.
Unless he killed the guards.
He considered that for a moment. It would solve his immediate problem, but their absence would put the compound on alert, making it impossible to save Chandler’s sister.
Self-preservation, or help the woman?
The door opened.
Tequila looked up, hoping for rafters or even a lighting fixture, but there was nothing but bare walls and a poured concrete ceiling.
Tucking the remote control in his waistband, light doused against his body, he jumped anyway. He kicked one leg on the near wall, launching himself over to the far wall. Tequila kicked himself off that as well, using momentum and his leg muscles to propel himself higher, like an Olympic floor exercise, only vertical.
One final kick, and then he straightened out his body, stretching hard and fast, wedging himself against the shadowy ceiling with his toes on one wall and his fingertips on the other, his body bridging the hallway, nine feet up.
He held his breath as the guards entered the corridor.
A cramp seized Tequila’s fingers, the muscles unused to bearing his weight in this awkward position.
The guards began to walk his way, weapons at the ready, their boots scuffing concrete.
Using the sound of their footsteps to mask his movement, Tequila spun like a pig on a spit, rotating his back to the floor. Stretching his body taller than he thought possible, he braced with one hand, using the other to place the remote on his chest. He craned his neck to see the screen, his forehead touching the ceiling, and used his free hand to control the helicopter, flying it toward the hatch entrance.
The guards walked beneath him—
—and stopped.
“Could be another damn deer,” one of them said.
“Deer destroyed the camera, then ran in here?” asked the other. “Why would it do that?”
“Nature fighting back. Could be it got sick of being hunted, wanted to lash out.”
They shared a chuckle.
The cramp in Tequila’s fingers bloomed into full-on agony. His arm began to shake. It was a familiar feeling, going back to his long-ago training days, his coach screaming at him that muscle fatigue was all in the mind, even though he’d been hanging from the rings for over an hour.
He concentrated on flying the toy chopper, but controlling it with only one hand was difficult, and once again he overshot the hatch door.
“Maybe it was someone from the damn cleanup crew. Getting nosy. Saw us coming and ran in here.”
“That would be a mistake.”
Tequila heard the sound of a gun slide being racked, the cartridge loading. The arches of his feet began to spasm.
“Wait, what time is it? I think those union pricks left for the day.”
“So maybe this piece-of-shit building is falling apart, and the camera blew up because it’s typical military-issue crap.”
Another chuckle.
Tequila’s shoulders began to seize.
He figured he could hold on for maybe another four seconds.
The guards didn’t move.
Three seconds.
Two…
One…
Tequila’s muscles gave out. But he didn’t. He remained in place, even as the cramps became so bad he completely forgot about the helicopter.
So bad he forgot about everything.
But he still held on.
Tequila thought he heard the guards begin to leave, but couldn’t confirm it. He was locked into a private hell of his own making, forcing his body beyond the limits of endurance, holding out until even the screaming voice of his coach was drowned out by the pain signals being beamed into his brain.
Don’t fall!
DON’T FALL!
DON’T FUCKING FALL!
He fell.
He turned in the air.
He landed on one leg and one knee, cradling the remote to his belly.
The Ukrainian judge gave him a 2.3.
But the guards were gone.
Reality returned, and he bit his lower lip not to cry out from the agonizing, knotted cramp in his left hand and feet and back and…everything. The helicopter had fallen sideways into a jumble of weeds, and he worked the controls frantically with his right hand, trying to get it to lift off.
Seconds ticked by.
The pain wouldn’t abate, but he got the chopper up, the cameras now level.
&nb
sp; He winced.
The guards had nearly reached the sandpile.
The helicopter was between them and the entrance.
Tequila said, “Ah, hell.”
Then he stood up and kicked the metal door again, convinced the clang echoing down the hall was tinged with regret.
As before, the guards’ heads swiveled around, and this time they sprinted to the cannon building.
Tequila looked up at the ceiling. There was no way he could do that again. He had to find another way.
He made his way up the hall. A window glowed at the end, its filthy, shattered glass held in place with rusty chicken wire.
Tucking the remote into the crook of his arm like a halfback, he sprinted, hunching his shoulders and then throwing himself into the air at the window—
—bouncing back off because it was reinforced with iron bars.
Tequila landed on all threes, refusing to drop the remote control, even as his head rang. He shook himself like a dog and stood up, just as the guards reached the door.
Chandler
“A mission is only as good as its team,” said the Instructor. “If your backup fails, you fail. And failure can mean death.”
When I came to, my first concern was the sensation of a sharp stick drilling into my stomach. Memories flashed through my mind—the chip, the pain, Lund with his fingers in my belly…
I startled, eyes wide, immediately jackknifing to a sitting position, unable to hold it because the pain took away my breath.
I still reclined on the sofa, but the plastic and towels were no longer beneath me. Instead a blanket covered my bare shoulders and a bandage wrapped my aching middle. My cropped hair was damp with sweat. It was nearly dark outside, a yard light filtering through the farmhouse window’s wavy glass.
A rustle came from somewhere in the room, and Lund’s face appeared in my field of vision. “How are you doing?”
“You’re…still here.”
“Where else would I be?”
“How long have I been out?”
“About twenty minutes.”
“Oh, shit.” Once more I tried to sit up. Agony seized my stomach, sharp and precise, like an icepick into my belly button.
Flee, Spree, Three (Codename: Chandler Trilogy - Three Complete Novels) Page 36