by C. R. Daems
"I hope they don't drag this out," Jody said as I got up to leave. "You have good disguises, but they are bound to notice if they tail me for several days. Besides, I'd like to get this over with—it's creepy."
"I think the odds are good, judging by the type of people we're dealing with. They aren't the patient type. They like instant gratification, so I think you will get your wish." I went back to my room and dressed in my six-months-pregnant-Sally outfit, applied makeup, and headed for the lobby. I didn't notice anyone I knew or who looked to qualify as a candidate for the Kazak school. So I walked outside, unfolded my map, and engaged one of the valets to help orient me—while scanning the area. I thought I recognized a man sitting in a nearby car...Bobbie something or other, unless my imagination had shifted into overdrive. As I stood talking to the young valet—who was getting frustrated while trying not to show it—Jody caught a cab and the car with Bobbie followed, which confirmed he was part of the team.
"Thanks for your patience, young man," I said, handing him a twenty. "You've been very helpful." I left him open-mouthed and speechless. "Now, could you get me a cab?"
Nodding his head as though his neck was on a spring, he ran off. Two minutes later, a cab appeared and he opened the door for me. "Thank you, ma'am," he said as he closed the door with an ear-to-ear smile.
"Drop me someplace close to the Quarterdeck," I told the cabbie as I settled back, putting my hand into the pocket which had an opening into the baby-pouch where I had a Glock and extra clips. As an extra precaution, I also had a knife strapped to my calf under the flared skirt I was wearing. Pregnant-Sally was a redhead, complete with a light complexion and freckles.
When I arrived Jody was sitting in the outside area, so I went inside, sat, and ordered a Bay Crab soup and a large glass of milk to keep up pretenses. I finished my soup well before Jody's entrée was gone and left to get ahead of her on the trail to the Arlington House.
I found a spot about halfway and sat as though resting. Some thirty minutes later Jody came along, asked if I was all right, and kept going when I nodded. No one followed, to my surprise and annoyance. I didn't see Sammie or Bobbie, so either they were well hidden or a third member of the team was tailing her. Or maybe there were too many people on the trail and they decided to wait for...for heaven only knew. Besides, three could cover the area from a distance since the terrain was relatively flat and there were only a limited number of exhibits in the area.
Jody toured the Robert E. Lee Memorial, the Civil War Unknowns, the John F. Kennedy Gravesite, and the Women in Military Service areas. I decided to watch from a distance as it would be less conspicuous if someone were watching Jody. I saw no sign of anyone following her, but at this distance I couldn't be positive and felt like the FBI or Secret Service must feel when guarding a dignitary—helpless. Unless the Assassin was careless or stupid, I was too far away to be effective in an emergency. It was getting on toward the regular Saturday night Netherlands Carillon Live Concert, with Edward Nassor scheduled to perform next. When I arrived Jody was sitting close to the Carillon, so I picked an area off to the side, which gave me a good view of the area and the audience.
I remained frustrated and nervous as the evening wore on and I hadn't seen anyone I recognized or who appeared to follow Jody. A bad sign since it meant they weren't planning to ambush her here but someplace else and, while I was prepared for here, I wasn't for somewhere else. I could do nothing except stay vigilant and hope they were waiting for dark or for Jody to be alone.
There are few benches on the Carillon grounds, so many of the families attending brought their own blankets or folding chairs. If I hadn't been so worried, I think I would have enjoyed Nassor's musical performance on the Carillon's fifty bells. As it was, I couldn't have named one song he played. I was too busy repeatedly searching in vain for some sign of the killers.
The performance ended around eight, but the attendees didn't begin leaving until well after dark. Jody had also lingered, talking with a small group of stragglers, hoping the killers would appear. She was, therefore, one of the last to leave. As I rose to leave I heard the puff-sound of a silencer and was slammed in the back and propelled forward onto my stomach.
"Good disguise, Megan. I almost didn't notice you tailing Jody." Sammie's gravelly voice had an amused ring to it. I couldn't blame him. He had caught me napping. I had been so busy watching Jody and forgot to watch myself.
Pain exploded through me as he repeatedly kicked me in the ribs. A firestorm raged in my chest and my head spun like a tornado. Knowing I was on the verge of losing consciousness I fought to quiet my mind—panic would mean my certain death.
Ironically, I was fortunate that it was Sammie. His sadistic nature wouldn't allow him to kill me quickly. He would want to enjoy causing me pain while hoping he could make me beg for mercy and proving him superior. I moaned for his benefit. It helped to focus and quiet my mind—no thoughts of living or dying, revenge or hate, justice or punishment. I would have only one chance. Curling into a fetal position gave me access to my leg, and I removed the knife I had strapped there and let it lie along my forearm.
He laughed as kicked me again and again. He then shoved me with his foot so I rolled onto my back.
"They should have failed you the first year. You were pathetic. Look at you!" His voice rose and his face twisted with raw hate. "Bobbie, Neil, and I are each worth ten of you, yet they kicked us out and kept you two sorry bitches. More equal rights bullshit." He put his foot on my neck and pushed. "They'll kill Jody at the hotel, but I wanted you, the bitch who thought her shit didn't stink. I always wondered who you fucked to pass. It doesn't matter now. Any last words before I kill the great Kazak Megan?" He threw his head back and laughed.
Blood squirted over my hand as my knife sliced through his pants and the femoral artery.
He stumbled backward, grabbing his leg with one hand. "You fucking bitch!"
As his gun rose toward me, I rolled away while reaching into my pouch for my Glock. I felt multiple heavy blows to my vest, and pain lanced through my leg as I continued to roll. I stopped on my back, fighting to breathe from the hammer blows to my chest and back, which sent waves of pain crashing inside my chest.
Hate burned in his eyes as he jammed in another clip, raised his gun, and fired just as I rolled again onto my stomach.
Multiple bullets tore through the grass where I had been lying as I steadied my elbow in the ground and aimed for his groin. Dirt sprayed into my face as I fired. Sammie screamed incoherently and collapsed into a sitting position, head bent his face a twisted gargoyle of pain and rage. While he fought to stop the bleeding with his hands, I shot him in the head.
It took all my strength to pull out my tablet and type Jody a warning.
Bobbie or Neil Carlson are waiting for you in the hallway. Be careful.
I sent it urgent which would alert her even if her tablet were closed. Then I cut off a strip from my skirt and made a tourniquet to stop the bleeding in my leg. The leak slowly went from gushing to oozing.
"Are you hurt? Were you and he attacked?" A young man asked as he came running over to me. His uniform said he was a park attendant, so he was probably in the area to clean up after the event.
"I'm Kazak Megan." I pushed back my sleeve to show my tattoo and held it so he could see. "This is a life and death matter. Another Kazak is going to be assassinated minutes from now if I can't get to her. I need a taxi or some way to get to a place where I can get a taxi. NOW!" I shouted to jolt him out of his wide-eyed shock as his eyes locked on Sammie. His gaze shifted back to me and my arm. I almost screamed when he pulled out a flashlight and shined it on my arm.
"NOW!"
"Is he—"
"Yes, now. Hurry!" I said and lay back down, pain pulsing like a living organ.
He opened his cell and walked a few feet away. Couldn't blame him. Sammie was a bloody mess.
"Fred, this is Nick. I have an government agent at the Carillion who has ..." His conversati
on with Fred seemed to last for hours, knowing each second of additional delay getting to the Virginian Suites could mean the difference between Jody living or dying. The holdup seemed to be Fred's quest for answers Nick didn't have.
"Give me the phone." I tried to shout, but it took three tries to get Nick's attention. I waved and he came back and handed me his cell. "Fred, I'm Kazak Megan. I need to get to the Virginian Suites immediately or another person will be killed. Do whatever you have to do to get me there in the next five minutes." I closed the cell to keep Fred from asking more stupid questions. I had enough sense to realize I was better off waiting than trying to run—stagger—off to find a car on my own.
A short time later a car came driving across the field. I got to my feet, feeling like a centenarian who’d crashed her motorcycle into an eighteen-wheeler. Every nerve in my body screamed for attention, my breathing was labored, probably from my cracked ribs, my head dizzy, and I was having trouble maintaining my balance. I probably looked like a survivor out of a horror movie.
"You need to go to the hospital...agent," the short plump man said as he exited his pickup truck. "I've called the police. They can send someone to help your—"
I pulled up my sleeve to show my badge and raised it to within inches of his face. "Drive me to the Virginian Suites. Now! Ignore speed limits and lights. Her life and maybe other innocent lives depends upon you getting me there fast," I said while staggering toward the passenger side door. Getting in was like climbing the stairs at the Washington monument. I think I may have passed out, because I only remember flashes of the drive there.
To Fred's credit, he did ignore the laws, because we had a police car on our tail for the last mile or so.
Ignoring the pain wasn't hard with my mind on Jody, but the body couldn't ignore the effects of the damage: I was limping badly, lurching every few steps, dizzy, and weak. I saw Bobbie rising from one of the lounge chairs in the lobby when I was halfway to the elevators.
He stood frozen, uncertain what to do.
I wasn't. I shot him, which sent the lobby into panic, with people running helter-skelter or crouching behind furniture.
I decided there was nothing I could say that would make sense to the panicked lobby, so I said nothing and continued limping as fast as I could toward the elevators. I didn't need some well-meaning hero tackling the mad-woman with a gun. As I reached the elevators, one was just closing. I stuck my hand in between the closing doors and they opened.
"Out." I waved my gun toward the lobby. Two couples scurried passed me.
I stepped in, pressed seventh floor button, and called Jody on her cell.
"I'm a little busy right now," Jody said, and I could hear automatic gunfire in the background.
"I'm coming up in the elevator. Get ready in ten ... nine ..." My legs wouldn't support me any longer, and I slid down the wall into a sitting position.
"He's to your right of the elevator, shooting right toward me—"
"Four ... three ... two ... one ..." The elevator stopped, there was a short delay, and then the door slowly began opening. I fired as soon as I could see Neil, not concerned whether I hit him or not. I just wanted to distract him.
I had only fired two shots when the elevator doors and the inside of the elevator just above my head was shredded with a short blast of automatic fire, followed immediately by silence. When I rolled partway out, Neil lay in a pool of blood with his head partly blown away, and Jody was limping past him toward me.
"You look like roadkill," she said as she entered the elevator and pushed the Lobby button.
"Stay away from shiny surfaces," I said, which started us laughing. I stopped abruptly when the pain I had managed to distract returned with a stored up vengeance. When the door slid open, several men in SWAT gear had their weapons pointing at us.
"On the ground!" the sergeant shouted.
I slowly raised my arm with my badge in it. "We're Kazaks: Jody the Wolverine and Megan the Wolf." I managed to stand and limp out of the elevator with Jody's help, ignoring their orders to stop. Mr. Witton will explain events to your commissioner after we've briefed him, but for now we need a medic before we bleed to death, sergeant."
He stood there not sure what to do, staring at my tattoo. "Gerson, Jackson, help these Kazaks to the paramedics."
"There's another dead body on the seventh floor," I said as a six-foot-four guy supported me in the direction of the lobby. I noticed he was dialing someone on his cell, probably to verify my identity. I don't remember much after that.
* * *
When I woke, the light coming in the window said it was a new day, the IV in my arm said I was in the hospital, and Matt the Panther’s presence said ... I wasn't sure what that said.
"About time you woke up," Jody said from the other bed in the room.
"Are we under arrest?" I asked.
"No. Witton wanted to make sure we weren't bothered by the police or reporters. Everyone wants to know what happened last night. They claim you executed an innocent man in Virginian Suites Hotel and left bodies all over the city," Matt said, shaking his head and grinning. Just then Witton entered the room and closed the door.
"You two made the headlines. I'd imagine any reporter who got an exclusive from you would be up for a promotion and earn a large bonus. So what happened? You first, Megan. You were supposed to be watching Jody's back."
"I forgot to watch mine." I gave a small laugh and discovered my body didn't think it was as funny, and various jolts of searing pain reminded me of the night’s activities. "When Jody checked in at the Virginian, I recognized..."
He wouldn't let me give a general synopsis and insisted on hearing each and every detail. Then it was Jody's turn. He let her give a general accounting up to her entering the hotel.
"As I was getting out of the taxi, I got an urgent message from Megan warning me that Bobbie and Neil were planning to ambush me at the hotel. I recognized Bobbie sitting in the lobby reading a newspaper and assumed he was there to alert Neil. In the elevator, I pressed three, five, and seven and got off at five. Then raced up the stairs to the seventh floor. Neil had positioned himself to shoot into the elevator with his back against the wall so he could watch the door to the stairs. I arrived a couple of seconds late because the elevator had already arrived empty, so he was watching the door to the stairs. I got off a shot, but it was hurried because his automatic weapon was spraying bullets, and I took one in the vest and one in the arm. After that it was pretty much a standoff. I took another in the vest and leg and think I hit him in his vest and twice in his leg. Then Megan warned me she was coming in the elevator. When the elevator door opened, Megan fired at Neil, causing him to turn toward the elevator, and I finally got a clean shot. After we made sure Neil was dead, we rode the elevator to the lobby and were taken to the hospital."
"You think you got them all?" Witton asked.
"Yes. Sammie was very talkative while he kicked me for his failure to pass the fourth challenge."
"Why did you kill Neil?" Witton asked.
"Lynn Protocol." I raised my hand and regretted it instantly as a hundred little men with clubs beat against my damaged ribs. "If you think of Jody as my client who needed my help yesterday," I said through clenched teeth.
"Not for revenge. He was in your way and a potential danger to Jody." Witton nodded. "Well, done…except for getting shot and requiring time off," he said as he left grinning.
* * *
Jody and I spent the first two weeks after leaving the hospital resting, at physical therapy, and with a private nurse the company provided at the condo facility, The next four weeks we spent recuperating: taking short trips into Washington D.C. to see the sights and briefing Kazaks returning from assignments. Witton had us write up what we had learned during our assignment.
"I still don't understand how having an AK-whatever shooting at you gives you an adrenaline rush. Walls aren't even any protection against the avalanche of metal they spew," Jody said while lounging on
her couch, drinking a cappuccino.
"You aren't supposed to get hit. That does take away some of the fun."
"You forgot to mention that last time." She punched me on the arm. "I'm glad you showed up. Neil and I were at a standoff. It was only a question of who would run out of blood or bullets first."
"I've concluded I'd rather be a Kazak protecting clients than a client or protecting a client from a distance," I said, thinking back over our recent experience.
"I suspect our convalescing and vacation time won't last much longer. Witton's short on Kazaks, and we are the only two currently working alone," Jody said. "Which is good, because I can see you are getting antsy to dance with another AK-whatever. I, on the other hand, wouldn't mind another assignment, however I can do without the combat weapons."
CHAPTER EIGHT
Senator Burns
"How are you feeling?" Mr. Witton asked Jody and me after we had sat. Ann Marie had arranged for an early morning meeting.
"I'm good. I've been working out and feel ready for an assignment," I said, thinking that was what he wanted to know.
"I'm also ready for an assignment," Jody said. "So long as I'm not paired with Megan. She attracts automatic weapons like damp wood attracts termites."
"She does, doesn't she?" Witton nodded agreement. "As you are aware, we always have more potential clients than available Kazaks, and the avenging triad killing two and put you two out of commission hasn't helped. And the Committee has a priority client who they claim can't wait. So I need one of you." He scanned us, willing to let us to decide.
I looked to Jody, who was frowning at me.
"I'd like an assignment, but I'm not as antsy as Megan. She's been acting like a racehorse in the starting gate," Jody said, grinning in my direction.