The Gift of the Dragon

by Michael Murray

  Callan released the air from his dive vest, and his weighted belt brought him down to the bottom of the river. He hand-walked himself over to the cloud of mud and foam behind the Folie and let the wash from the engines push him until he made contact with the Endurance’s bow.

  He located the two powerful neodymium magnets in his equipment bag by their handgrips and used these to walk himself down the slimy, steel hull of the Endurance until he arrived at the position he had memorized from the specifications. Callan fired up his underwater welding torch with the special tip, designed to drill through thick steel for underwater oil-rig and wreck-salvage work. The Aqualance quickly made a small hole in the steel hull of the Endurance. Callan shoved a high-temperature silicone plug into the rapidly cooling hole before much water entered the yacht. Then he pushed a large-gauge hollow needle through the half-inch-wide plug. The blunt end of the needle attached to a hose that went into his pressurized tabun tank. If McAlister’s specifications were correct, the needle was now poking into the ventilation system, which piped air along the underwater hull to reduce the amount of energy needed for cooling. You should have put in a bigger fuel tank instead of playing with green tech, Laird!

  He opened the valve. So far, the operation had taken three minutes. He attached the padded tabun cylinder to the two magnets and then dropped the rest of the equipment, stripped off his underwater welding mask, and let the current push him down along the Endurance’s hull, along the starboard side, where the hawsers ran down to the horn cleats on the seawall.

  Callan stopped between the waist-thick fenders, which kept the Endurance’s hull from hitting the seawall. He put his knife in his teeth and slowly climbed up the fender until he could reach the hawser coming from the bow of the yacht. As his head rose above the seawall, he looked carefully around. At this hour, no one walked on the marina’s path, and a jasmine bush in a large pot mostly obscured Callan’s location. The white flowers smelled sweet.

  Quickly he went hand over hand up the line and peered into the ship for the deck guards. The one patrolling the main deck should be on the port side now. Seeing and hearing no one, he flipped over the side and lay still. Callan pulled his Glock with its Gemtech silencer out of the dry bag he carried in a rubber fanny pack and screwed the silencer into the barrel of the gun. By now, the crew inside the boat should be passing out from the tabun. He needed to eliminate the night watch before one of them noticed their comrades inside the ship were down.

  Laird

  He sat in his ready room behind the bridge of the Endurance, reading on his laptop. Laird’s aide, Jordan, had pieced together a report on Thorn’s mission to Sugarloaf Key, from what they could reconstruct, once their response team had finally managed to clear the scene of local law enforcement. The report spoke of a disaster. Laird clenched his fist, breaking the pen he was holding, his muscles bulging up his arm. Thorn had missed targets before, but losing a whole team was unprecedented. Laird and Michel Thorn had thought differently in many ways, but the tasks of the Guardians, protecting Apple Creek’s many interests—and the one big secret—often required brutality like Thorn’s. At stake stood not just the financial interests of the corporation but also the much more important thing those financial interests protected. We are the sword and the shield.

  Now a woman who should be dead and a man who should not be helping her had blunted Thorn’s sword. Laird looked back at the pictures in the report, images sent by Thorn’s team when they captured Jacob Castellan, his unfortunate sister, and her little girl. Laird would have handled it differently. However, he had a policy of not second-guessing his field operatives. A very long time ago, he had realized that sending out men with guns and telling them to handle a situation meant accepting that you are ordering death and destruction for some people who may not deserve it. Let Franklin McAlister quote Sun Tzu. Laird preferred George Patton. A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week.

  He often needed to send his teams out with less-than-perfect information and expect them to do their best and come back with the mission accomplished. In this case, that went wrong. He studied Castellan’s file. The man had volunteered when the Twin Towers were hit, and had fought in Iraq and then Afghanistan. Four combat terms. In the Marines, he had risen to lieutenant colonel. Law degree from Abraham Lincoln University. Entered the FBI, rose quickly to a field agent specializing in corporate crime. Had some successes working with informants and broke several big cases. Suddenly, Laird sat up. Staring at the screen, he spoke a word to his smartphone, “McAlister.”

  After a few rings, he heard, “Hello, Laird, what is it?” Franklin McAlister sounded impatient.

  “I just had one of my top field agents killed by a man who got fired from the FBI because he wouldn’t stop investigating Sam Sangerman’s death.”

  “Interesting.”

  “Interesting!” Laird exploded. “You’ve got Stoddard in your pocket! Why am I just finding out about Jacob Castellan now?”

  “Is this a secure line?”

  “Of course it’s secure, Franklin, I’m the chief security officer, remember?”

  “Relax, Laird, it was not something you needed to know.”

  “What? I didn’t need to know that Stoddard fired an FBI agent for poking into Sangerman’s death? You forgot I’m tasked with keeping anyone from knowing about that?”

  “I know what your job is, Laird.” McAlister sounded more irritated.

  “Well, maybe you don’t know yours, then, Franklin. You aren’t to make decisions about what information to give me. Robert made that very clear.”

  “Robert is dead, Laird. Things change.”

  “Dead on a hunting trip with your son and nephew!”

  “Jackson worked for you, Laird. You trained him. You gave him clearance, a clean report. You had better know he had nothing to do with Robert’s death.”

  “Ian wasn’t there when Robert died. Why is that?”

  “Ian left Robert and Jackson in the wilderness to get supplies so they could stay out longer on a hunt. There was no human threat, and Robert should have been able to take care of himself against animals. He carried several large guns. Surely you don’t blame Ian because Robert chose to use a spear against a grizzly?”

  “Yeah, he should’ve been safe.” Laird realized this discussion was going nowhere. He took a breath. He had a team investigating Robert Brandon’s death in the wilds of Montana. They would tell him what really happened soon enough. If Ian McAlister had anything to do with the death of his friend, he would crush the life from those mocking blue eyes of his. The young man might be an almost freakishly skilled fighter, but Laird had been around much longer and knew much dirtier tricks he could call on when needed. Things the kid’s never heard of.

  “Robert isn’t what I called you about.” Laird dropped his voice low. “You need to tell me now, what does Castellan know about Sam’s death?”

  “He has some idea that it was not an accident. He was asking questions about why the company stock went to us so quickly after his death. Stoddard put him out on his ear on a charge of misusing government equipment. Surfing porn sites on the job or something. He was last seen drinking his sorrows away in Hialeah. How did he come to kill your man?”

  “I’m going over the report. Castellan had help. From Alice Sangerman.” Laird held his breath.

  “Really? I thought she was dead.”

  Laird could detect no hint of surprise in McAlister’s voice. After thousands of interrogations, he knew the sound of surprise. “Your assassin said she was dead.”

  “He had a pretty good photo of her being shot.”

  “Callan Grant’s a deserter, Franklin. You should’ve turned him over to me, not hired him. He can’t be trusted.”

  “He gets jobs done. I recall that you and Robert were supposed to take care of the Sangermans, and now it appears you have only partially completed that.”

  “Well, Grant didn’t get this job done either.”

/>   “True. Alice Sangerman is hard to kill. She has eluded us both several times and now, apparently, has eluded you again.”

  “One of my best teams,” Laird admitted.

  “I’m glad only one of Sangerman’s offspring is still alive. So what are you going to do about it?”

  Laird did not feel that McAlister was really interested in the conversation. Does he know where Sangerman is? An insincere beat underlaid McAlister’s intonation. Not that Franklin McAlister ever sounded all that sincere. It might be more nerve-racking if he did. “Still gathering intelligence. I’ll put together another team and I will find them. Likely they are still close by. We have eyes watching the airports and major roads. There are many places to hide in South Florida, but we’ll find her.”

  “And then?”

  “I’ll have to see. Maybe we made a mistake. She’s one of us. Why is Castellan working with her? What did he find out about Sam? I want to know what’s going on. Everything, before I decide.”

  “You’re growing weak, Laird. Letting her live would be a disaster for all of us!” Now he sounds interested! “You and your family would have to go into hiding if it were publicly known that she was alive. So would mine. I will not have that, Laird.”

  “You threatening me, Franklin?” Laird said it mildly as he could, to gauge McAlister’s response.

  “Ha! That is a good one, Laird. No, I am not threatening you. You have nothing to fear from me. Locate Alice, and let me know. If you don’t have the cojones to do what needs to be done, I will send Ian.” With that, the phone went dead. Laird stared at it for a minute. His gut screamed at him that McAlister was up to something. Something bad. He reached for the internal ship’s phone to call general quarters when a gray mist came through the vents. Laird’s eyes went wide, and he strained to reach the phone.

  He could not move his arm.

  Chapter 13, Time to Go

  Jacob

  Jacob arrived back at their floor, huffing a bit from the heavy black duffel bag he carried. It held no parachute equipment. Alice must still be affected by her head wound more than she seemed if she thought parachuting from the forty-seventh floor to be a smart way to get on board the Endurance.

  Jacob walked into the room with a new plan. The FBI would need to be satisfied with Northwin, and Jacob felt sure he could get the man to admit he hired Thorn to make the hit on Alice and himself. Everyone wanted Alice. Jacob now counted himself in that group. He couldn’t say exactly why he wanted her. He knew where he did not want her: dead or in a prison cell. He didn’t want her anywhere near Northwin, at least until Jacob had the man bound securely. He also did not want her in an interrogation room in Langley. After what they had gone through together, getting back into the good graces of Stoddard no longer stood at the top of his priority list.

  Jacob felt sure of Alice’s innocence, and he vowed to prove it and help her get back what Northwin and Apple Creek took from her. I will get her justice!

  He felt as if he had just woken up from a long, dark dream and stood in the light for the first time in many years. Behind him lay the ladder-climbing, the proving himself to his comrades and agents, the one big case to show his worth once and for all. Behind me also lies Nanette, dead due to my arrogance! Ahead of him was the chance to find out what really happened to Alice’s father. Maybe to recover for her what should belong to her.

  He couldn’t put her on that boat with Northwin. It would be too easy for Jacob to make the call to Price then. One call, and he could go back to being the heroic agent with a secure job and a pension, one up on the guys in the agency, with a great story to tell around the barbecue. Having handled so many suspects who turned in their best friends for a small bit of comfort in a moment of stress, he knew how easy it would be. Keep her off the boat, and deal with Northwin by himself. That’s the safest way forward.

  There was one problem with this new plan. She would never let him go down to face Northwin alone.

  Out on the street, Jacob had found a man he knew. In his hand now he had a bag with a plastic bottle of the Red Bull Alice loved. A few minutes ago, Jacob had injected into it—with a fine-pointed insulin syringe—a solution of Ambien and Valium that should put anyone to sleep for several hours. He hoped it would be enough to overcome the generous dose of caffeine and sugar contained in the bright red liquid.

  Alice squealed with delight when she saw it. “Just what I need before jumping off a building and trying to land on a boat!”

  Jacob smiled, twisted off the top, and handed her the bottle. “Let me grab a shower, and then I’ll get the stuff ready.”

  Ten minutes later, Jacob emerged from the shower to find Alice staring at the big duffel bag with a look of confusion. “Jacob, this bag looks as though it just has a bunch of old clothes in it. Tell me you aren’t planning on sewing parachutes out of these?” She held up a dirty pair of jeans.

  Jacob smacked his head with his hand. “Shoot, hon. Sorry, I grabbed the wrong bag from the car. I’ll go down and get the right one. Just let me get dressed.”

  “Okay. Well, good. I mean, we may have hooked up and be engaging in death-defying stunts together, but I am not doing your laundry!” Alice laughed at her own joke. Jacob laughed also, noting with relief the bottle of Red Bull lay on its side on the table, with only a little spilled out.

  “Whew, usually drinking that stuff gets me wired, but I must have eaten too much for dinner. I’m going t’lie down while you get your act together here, Jacob.”

  “Sounds good.” Jacob stopped by the door. “I’ll be back in a few minutes, and then I’ll get the stuff all sorted and ready to go before I wake you.”

  Alice waved and headed for the bedroom. Jacob went back out the door and down to the hotel bar. He had a Coke and then went back up to the room. Alice slept soundly, just as he had hoped. She looked peaceful with her yellow hair covering her face, which rested on her hands, folded as if in prayer.

  Softly he said, “Sleep until summer, darling.” Or at least until I return to show you a picture of Thorn securely locked up. Or dead.

  Callan

  Callan paused at the steel door behind the bridge. McAlister’s specifications showed Northwin’s office lay behind its brass handle. Eliminating the men on the Endurance’s watch had taken only a few minutes. Night-vision gear was not comfortable to wear, and the guards wore none tonight. That gave Callan the advantage of the sighted man in the blind’s kingdom. The first he took out with his knife, easing the body quietly into the shadows and then cutting its head off. The second, on the foredeck, he shot with his silenced forty-five, dropping the man where the body could not be seen from the shore. The corpse made a thumping sound, which brought the final guard to the front of the bridge deck to see what had happened. Another easy shot took care of that problem. Callan took those two heads off as well. These Guardians are not getting up again! Light blazed through the porthole on the door. He took off his night-vision gear and put it on the deck.

  Cautious that Northwin might have found some way to shield himself from the tabun, Callan tried the door. Open. He stepped in. There across the desk, hand reaching for what looked to be an alarm button, lay Northwin's body. Excellent!

  Callan thoroughly bound Northwin to his heavy, steel desk chair with duct tape and then removed the syringe of bispyridinium oxime from his kit. “I hope the Egyptian sold me the right stuff, old man. Otherwise, this may be your last sleep. Instead of your penultimate one.” Mine too, Callan thought as he injected himself after injecting Northwin. Necessary risk. I can’t interrogate him from behind a mask!

  Callan sat back in the other chair and watched as Northwin slowly woke up. Callan looked around the office. Glassy-eyed animal heads up high. Down lower, pictures of kids. Northwin’s wife. Callan had met her once, long ago. Soon, he would see her again. A picture of a ship hung on the far wall over a small computer desk.

  Callan walked over to it. “USS Michigan” read the caption below the paddle wheel-powered vessel. He he
ard a moan behind him and turned back to see Northwin staring at him.

  “You look like something the devil’s finished with,” Callan said.

  Northwin strained against his bonds.

  “Don’t bother. Duct tape. You know how strong it is.”

  “You are an ever-loving nut case, Callan! You will not survive this night! My men—”

  “Right. Your men. They’re out, dying, Laird. Tabun gas. Deadly to men, women. Deadly to Andracia. Drilled a hole in your hull. You should’ve better trained your watch.”

  “There are twenty on this ship!”

  “Dead or dying now.” Callan dropped the rubber case with the antidote on the desk. “Some could recover as you did if you give me what I want.” Callan stared at Northwin, watching his eyes. “Was Michel Thorn on this ship?”

  “Michel died a few days ago. Killed by Alice Sangerman.”

  Callan’s fist slammed the table. “That idiot! Getting killed by a girl before I could take care of him properly!” Callan leaned on the desk, glaring down at Northwin. “So Thorn was too weak to take out Sangerman. You see, Laird, you should have kept me on instead of Thorn, when we had our little falling-out.”

  “She might well have killed you, Callan. You and Thorn were an even match.”

  “Bullshit, old man! He was a hothead. Didn’t plan carefully. He relied on luck. I spit on luck!” Callan took a breath. “Luck is a fantasy to give hope to lazy people who lack skill. Alice will never beat me. She will never kill me. I know it!”

  Northwin sighed.

  “Does it depress you, Chief Security Officer, to know just how alone you are? Do you feel responsible?” Callan’s hand flashed out, knocking Northwin’s head hard to the side. Blood ran down from his lips. “Wake up, old man! You wanted me. Here I am. How does the master of the universe feel now?”