October's Ghost

by Ryne Douglas Pearson

  She was there. She was alone. She had to do it.

  “Stay down,” she told the clerk as she pushed him to the floor and walked through the glass door to the lot. Sullivan was at the door of 106, something in his hand. The door started to open before she could shout a warning to him. It was going to be two against one, she realized, catching her mistake in ratio a split second later.

  * * *

  Tomás heard the key turning in the lock, grabbed his Browning, and jumped into the latch side of the doorway. As it began to swing inward, he flipped it with one hand and stepped into the opening, his gun pointing at...

  “Sullivan?” Tomás said it with a surprise that caused his bedridden partner—who had expected just an over-zealous cleaning woman—to sit bolt upright despite the pain.

  George Sullivan was equally shocked. His jaw dropped, then his eyes left their lock on the face and saw the gun. “You... You...”

  Tomás reached for Sullivan with one hand and pulled him toward the doorway. As he did, he saw past the stupid reporter—little more than a walking dead man, now—and to the parking lot. Walking toward him were two men. One was lifting something in his left hand, and the other was reaching under his coat.

  * * *

  “Freeze!” Frankie yelled, startling the two men who had appeared with guns. Their heads jerked to the left, then the nearest one began to turn the same way, his hand emerging from the hidden side of his body with a...

  Her Smith & Wesson was already pointed at them, and she squeezed off two quick shots at the nearest one. He immediately fell backward, toward his companion, who was also now spinning her way. The second one was a lefty, which meant that his gun would take just a hair longer to rotate enough to fire. But that hair was too long. Frankie fired twice more, one of her shots registering in the head of number two, which briefly was crowned by a grotesque halo of pink and red mist that was lit by the morning sun. It disappeared as he crumpled to the ground, his partner collapsing atop him in a heap.

  * * *

  Tomás froze briefly as he watched the shootout erupt in front of him. Why were the cops shooting each other? The two guys coming at him with guns had to be cops just following Sullivan, but who had shot them? And how did Sullivan find them? There were too many questions, too many things racing through his mind, and too many distractions for him to notice that the deadeye shooter, some chick, was almost on top of him.

  * * *

  Art heard and saw the exchange from a hundred feet away. He slammed on the brakes through the intersection of Twelfth and Vermont, cranking the wheel right and skidding up over the curb to a stop. Andy already had the mic in his hand.

  “King Eight! Shots fired! Agent needs help!”

  * * *

  “Drop it!” Frankie said with as much authority as she could muster, but obviously not enough to overcome the determination to die in the perp pulling Sullivan into room 106.

  Tomás jerked the reporter past him, tossing him to the floor, and leveled his Browning at the chick with the gun. His sights were almost on her, his mind wishing the sweet young thing a nice trip into the hereafter, when a strange, cold blackness spilled in front of his eyes, like a waterfall of darkness cascading over his body.

  Frankie’s two shots were right on the money, placed where they had to be—the head. The perp’s torso had been blocked as Sullivan was thrown inward. Both 10mm rounds entered through the cheeks, one below each eye. They exited straight back, taking large chunks of brain stem and skull with them. The wet red spray was visible on the dirty white door as number three fell.

  One was left. One of Thom’s killers. Frankie continued her fast walk to the doorway, turning in and crouching with her weapon, sweeping the room from right to left. Outside, in her peripheral vision, she saw a head peek around the corner of the building on Twelfth. Behind she could hear footsteps, running footsteps, and car tires grabbing hold of asphalt with the terrible sound of a panic skid.

  All those things were inconsequential, though. Her senses were narrowing their focus to the scene before her. The scent of gunpowder and whiskey was pulled through her nostrils with every rapid breath. Hands grabbing for something, a glass tumbling to a carpeted floor, and the pleas of the condemned assaulted her auditory filters. The gun felt hot and very light in her hand, as though she were holding a feather. And her eyes... Her eyes saw everything in the room at once and then focused with an instinctive, highly selective tunnel vision on what mattered most.

  “Drop it!” she said, stepping toward the man on the bed. His gun was pointed at Sullivan, who was half lying, half sitting in the corner nearest the bathroom.

  “I’ll kill him!” Jorge screamed, his words broken as though tortured by pain. Tears streamed down his face, and the pistol trembled slightly in his hand. But he kept it pointed directly at the whimpering reporter. His finger pressed on the trigger a hair.

  “AND I WILL BLOW YOUR FUCKING BRAINS ALL OVER THE ROOM!” Frankie said, stepping still closer. And closer. And closer, until the smoking barrel of her weapon touched Jorge’s temple. He winced as the hot steel burned the tender skin on the right side of his face.

  Art swung into the room as Russo and Mercer approached from Twelfth. “Behind you, Frankie,” he said. A quick look to the ground at his right confirmed that the guy in the doorway was very dead. He knew that to his rear Burlingame and Smith were covering the other two recipients of Frankie’s shots, though he didn’t know their condition.

  He also didn’t know the condition of his partner. Slowly he slide-stepped toward her and the perp, coming up easily on her right.

  “I said drop it,” Frankie repeated, her grip steady, the Smith & Wesson barely moving. “Now.”

  Jorge squeezed the trigger a slight bit more. “I mean it. I’ll kill him.” Another gun appeared to his front, and his eyes shifted to see straight into the barrel.

  “She means it, too,” Art said, his own finger applying pressure to the trigger. “So do I.”

  Death suddenly seemed certain for Jorge. Death. The end. Over. Defiance and bravado lost their appeal with that revelation. He did not want to die. Not for the sake of finishing a lousy job. No way. He backed off pressure on the trigger. “Okay. Okay. I give.”

  “Finger off the trigger, and lay it on your lap,” Art directed. The perp followed the instructions without hesitation. “Cover me, partner.”

  “Got him,” Frankie said robotically as Art reached in and picked up the Browning.

  “You all right?” Art asked Sullivan, who sat wide-eyed, his chest heaving, in the corner.

  “I... I... I...” It was all George could get out as his breaths came in deep, heavy waves. He was alive. Alive! “I’m alive.”

  “Yeah,” Art reacted. “Good for you.” Fucking idiot. There would be time for that later. “We got him.”

  Frankie pressed the barrel harder against the perp’s head, until he began to lean away and down to the pillows. You killed Thom. YOU KILLED THOM!!!

  “Partner.” Art swiveled his aim slowly left until it was centered on the man’s head. He didn’t want to move it anymore. “Frankie.” Don’t make me do it. Not again. “Frankie.”

  She heard her partner’s words. They were almost pleas, but pleas for what? For her not to do something? Just like this scum hadn’t done anything to Thom. Like... Like...

  “Bring your right hand slowly to your back,” Frankie said, waiting for the suspect to comply before having him bring the other back. “Cuff him, Art.”

  “Gladly.” Art holstered his weapon and brought out his handcuffs. A sigh of relief escaped his lips, for many reasons. Their suspect was now in custody.

  Frankie backed away and holstered her own weapon. She felt as though she hadn’t breathed in hours, in days even, and took in a deep, cleansing taste of air. Looking down, she saw Sullivan, now in a semi-fetal sitting position, his chin tucked between his knees. He looked like shit, and she hoped he felt like it, too.

  “Next time, hotshot, someone
might not be there to save your ass,” Frankie said directly to him. His eyes came up, then looked away. Frankie walked through the door without commenting further, passing Dan Burlingame on his way in.

  “You keep your face down,” Art said to the suspect. “You so much as move, and I’ll shoot you just for the fun of it.”

  Burlingame came up from behind. He eyed both Sullivan and the perp before speaking. “The two outside are dead, Art. Three total.”

  The sound of approaching sirens began. Art knew there’d be a symphony of them in the next minute. “Jesus, Dan.”

  “Hell of a job of shooting,” Burlingame commented. “Four on one, and she cleaned up.”

  “Yeah,” Art agreed without glee. Killing was killing, even when justified. It was never the best way. Sometimes it was the only way. This time it didn’t have to be. “Watch him,” Art said to Burlingame. He was standing over Sullivan a second later.

  “You sorry sack of shit.”

  George looked up, his eyes red but dry. There were no more tears left in him. Hardly any emotion. Just a sobering realization that his life was poised on the edge of the drain and ready to slide in.

  “You nearly got my partner killed ‘cause she had to save your ass,” Art bellowed. “And why? Why the fuck did you come looking?”

  “I... I needed the story.” Sullivan swallowed hard. “I need something.”

  Art spit out a disgusted breath. “Yeah, you need something, all right. You need a fucking lesson in life. Look around, huh. You see what you caused? What you caused because you ‘needed a story’? Bullshit! You’re a fucking crybaby who only has his booze to keep him company!”

  “No more booze,” George said simply.

  Art wondered if the claim was true. Probably not, despite the fact that the guy seemed stone-cold sober. “Wonderful first step, hotshot. Now try and fix all this.”

  Sullivan looked to his left, leaning forward to see past the plain wooden dresser. The body of the man who had dragged him in the room lay against the doorframe. Beyond that, in the parking lot, were what looked like two more bodies. And farther still, leaning against the hood of an awkwardly parked car, was the woman who had saved his life.

  “Tina,” Art said, calling the other agent in. He took what he hoped would be a final look at Sullivan, and he didn’t know what to feel about him right now. It couldn’t be pity; that would be too generous. Hate? For what, for being an idiot? Anger in part. But what else he should think of George Sullivan eluded him. Only distaste was prevalent in his mind at the moment. “Get him out of here.”

  Art turned away as Mercer lifted and led Sullivan from the room. He took a few steps toward the bed and rolled the suspect over. The movement caused a grimace of pain. “Listen carefully, whoever you are, you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent....” Art finished the Mirandizing of their suspect, then lifted him with a one hand grip of the man’s shirt to a sitting position against the headboard. There was another wince. “Now we’re gonna have to talk.”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CONNECTIONS

  General Walker finished relating what he had just been told a few minutes before. The story was met initially by silence from Marshal Kurchatov and Colonel Belyayev.

  “You have just answered your own question, General Walker,” Kurchatov said. “I, too, would activate the Moscow ABM system if such a thing had been told to me.”

  “Yes, but this appears to be an action taken not because of prudence, but because of mistrust,” Walker explained. “Your president’s tone was very provocative, I am told, and I say that not to challenge his motivation, but just as a point of concern.”

  “Well, President Konovalenko, unfortunately, has more than just himself to answer to. And those who demand such satisfaction in times like this are not the most accommodating people.” Kurchatov smiled with the knowledge of one who had juggled both the political and military hats in his career, a process he knew was unfamiliar to CINCNORAD. “And distrust is their ally, not their enemy.”

  “Your words are calming, Marshal. Possibly they can be for President Konovalenko as well.”

  Gennadiy Timofeyevich would be feeling the pressure, Kurchatov knew, and he was well aware who from. Yakovlev and Shergin. The interior minister he could do nothing about, but Shergin was his subordinate and was at the end of the direct line temporarily connecting NORAD with the Voyska PVO. Neutering the commander of the Motherland’s air-defense forces, at least temporarily, would split him from that weasel of an ally of his. Yakovlev would then stand alone, without an inroad to the military. Gennadiy Timofeyevich could then eat him for breakfast.

  “I will speak to my people, and then I will speak to the president,” Kurchatov said, thinking on what his words would be for the latter. “One of our missiles in Cuba, eh?”

  “At least in part,” Walker expanded.

  “Yes. The part that matters, apparently. It is not so hard to believe. I was but a young captain during that time. Things were very confused, and information was hoarded as if it were gold.” In these days as if bread, the marshal thought. “As I gained rank and experience, I learned that there are many impossible things that are actually realities cloaked in secrecy.” Kurchatov smiled knowingly. “Someday, possibly, I can tell you of such things.”

  Walker returned the expression. “And I to you.”

  “So such a thing as you tell it is not beyond my belief, but...” The pause was punctuated by concern. “Those who are not here, those who cannot see and feel that you are in no way trying to deceive us, well, to them such a happening could be seen as less than fact. Even as a threat.”

  “That’s my concern,” Walker said straightforwardly.

  Kurchatov nodded concurrence. “And mine. Let us try to calm any fears that may be developing. Colonel Belyayev.”

  Kurchatov and Belyayev followed General Walker from their quarters to the force-monitoring console. A new duty officer was in the left seat and stood respectfully as the Russian defense minister took the seat to his right.

  “This one?” Kurchatov asked, pointing to the handset lying in the unmarked cradle. A nod affirmed his question, and he picked it up. The pre-dialed sequence, routed through three secure voice communications switching centers, searched for a connection at Voyska PVO. After a first failure—which took less than a second—the switching computers tried again. Another failure.

  “No connect,” a microchip reported in a disembodied male voice.

  Kurchatov pulled the receiver away, looking at it in a reaction that was as natural as it was unproductive. Colonel Belyayev took the phone from him, pressed the cradle switch down, and waited for the connection again.

  “No connect.”

  “Something is wrong,” Belyayev said. His words were tinged with the barest amount of a question, and his eyes silently waited for CINCNORAD to answer.

  The same result came from General Walker’s attempt. He picked up another phone and called NORAD’s communication center—its own switchboard. “I want an analysis on the direct line between the force-monitoring console and Russian Air Defense Headquarters...fast.”

  Belyayev and Kurchatov alternately watched CINCNORAD and the displays, the tension obvious and growing. Everything so far had been as the Americans had said. Everything. Even the Cuban revelation, though unexpected, was not the thing to cause confident hearts to stir. But this. A malfunction at this time? In combination with all else? If this became known to the president’s enemies in Moscow... The defense minister isolated by a communications failure? That discovery could be very dangerous. Marshal Kurchatov hoped, simply, that the sarcasm in his thought would turn out to be baseless.

  The phone buzzed, and Walker snatched it up. “Yes.” He listened for less than thirty seconds. “You’re certain?”

  “General Walker?” Kurchatov said after CINCNORAD had hung up.

  “The direct circuit has been disconnected. Cut at the source.”

  The defense minister’s eyeb
rows arched to the center of his forehead. It cannot be... “Why would you do this? Why would you isolate us?”

  Walker’s head shook. “Not us. Marshal. You. The link was severed at your end. In Moscow.”

  The thick black lines of hair over Kurchatov’s eyes shot upward, ending the expression of anger. The emotion now was plain fear. “Dear God.”

  * * *

  Greg Drummond stood personally by the secure fax and took the pages as soon as they came out. He made a duplicate copy and was in his office a minute later. Mike Healy was waiting for him.

  “Here,” the DDI said, handing the copy to his Operations counterpart.

  “Sam Garrity?” Healy said skeptically before reading the word-for-word wiretap transcripts just sent from the Bureau. Drummond had given him only what he had learned from Gordon Jones’s quick call, namely that they had a suspect in the leak, and, the big twist, that the leak’s contact was also directing two men wanted in the killing of Francisco Portero—the keeper of the tape.

  Drummond ignored the question and read through the conversation, picking out important details first. “ ‘Off the director’s desk’? ‘Scribbles’? What the hell is he saying? There’s no way to get anything written off this floor. Security would have caught it in their sweep. Anything Anthony left on his desk would have gone in the burn bag.”

  “Well, he got something,” the DDO said. “ ’Cause he knows about the missile. And so does his contact—whoever that is.”

  “Gordy’s guys down in Miami are setting to take him real soon,” Drummond said with pleasure. Only nailing the man who’d caused his directorate to become suspect would bring greater joy.

  Healy scanned farther down the transcript, his mind seizing on two passages. “Greg, look halfway down. You see that?”

  “ ‘This isn’t like before,’ ”Drummond read.

  “And then: ‘...that guy a while back wasn’t just making it up’.” Healy looked up. “You don’t think...”

  Deputy Director, Intelligence, Greg Drummond, not a man prone to violent urges, knew exactly what he’d like done to the man filling his thoughts at the moment. “He had to know, Mike. The asshole had to.”