Sailing into Death (CJ Washburn, PI Book 2)

by James Paddock

  Rory looked over at Sam and nodded his head.

  From his pack Sam produced two black cloth bags with drawstrings. He approached first CJ and then Stella, handing them the bags.

  Rory pointed to the two walls full of tables. "You two go sit on a table, one at each end. Put those hoods over your heads. Pull the drawstrings tight. Don't worry about not being able to breathe. You will breathe just fine."

  Once they were seated on their tables CJ looked across at Stella. I'm sorry, I love you he wanted to call out to her. At no time in his life had he ever felt so helpless.

  "Put the hoods on now," Rory said.

  They did.

  "I don't care what you hear, you leave the hoods on. Do not remove them for any reason. Is that understood?"

  CJ took a deep breath and tried to relax.

  "I want to hear a yes," Rory added.

  "Yes," Stella declared, a little too loud.

  "Yes," CJ echoed.

  "Very good."

  And then there was silence except for an occasional sniffle from the G8 crowd. CJ filled his lungs and then slowly exhaled. He closed his eyes as though such would increase the scope of his hearing. He needed to know what they were doing that required that only he and Stella be sightless. The only thing he could tell was that they were moving around, but he couldn't venture even the slightest guess as to what they were doing. Looking in briefcases and purses maybe? Doubtful. Someone came near him and then walked away. More moving around, maybe thirty seconds worth and then Rory said one word.

  "Now!"

  There came a rapid series of pops, fifteen... twenty of them on top of each other, like muffled automatic gun fire. In the middle of it came screams and cries.

  CJ jumped off of the table.

  "Sit back down, Mister Washburn," Rory said, no more than four feet from CJ.

  CJ didn't move, just listened to the cries and sobs. The popping sound had stopped.

  "Sit down or I'll shoot your lady in the head."

  CJ felt back for the table and then pulled himself upon it.

  "Very good."

  None of the weapons CJ had seen had sound suppressors, so what was that? And then he considered the weapons, the design that resembled the Bushmaster. The magazine was not curved like the Bushmaster, the barrel shorter, the sights of a different configuration. And the stock... something about the stock was very different, a shape unlike any he'd ever seen. It was more like a... a what? Round. Why was it round?

  It was round because it was a tank! A small compressed gas tank. These were not totally new terrorist weapons like he'd at first assumed. These were...

  ...paintball guns!

  CJ would have jumped off the table again, ripped off his hood and attacked them physically if he hadn't remembered they were also carrying what certainly were deadly sidearms. Besides that, he was wearing a bomb and they had the triggering device.

  So he sat and listened to the sobbing, trying to make sense of what had just taken place.

  Rory had said that no one was going to die, that all they were doing was delivering a statement, a message, that they first had to get everyone's attention. This would certainly get everyone's attention. The media would be on this with everything they had... UIRA terrorists play joke on the G8, shoot them with paintball guns. Not at all the bad guys like everyone would at first think... really didn't want to hurt anyone. They just wanted to make their statement, get their message out. They were very considerate.

  The media would be painting them as the "Paintball Army" who were only trying to get Great Britain to pay attention to their demands, maybe gain a bit of support from some of the other G8 countries, gratitude that it was only paint.

  A big practical joke at which the world would laugh while listening to their statement.

  CJ continued to listen to the noises in the room, sniffling and shuffling. There came what sounded like a door closing and then a few voices, accents, another language. A few of the G8 people were talking.

  CJ cautiously slid off the table. The voices stopped. He waited for Rory's warning but nothing came. He turned his head back and forth, listening for something, anything that would give him a clue as to what was going on.

  A woman whispered.

  Someone shushed her.

  Neither Rory, nor any of the other three, admonished them. It only meant that they were no longer in the room, that they were gone, leaving behind two and half dozen scared men and women in a room with two individuals wearing explosives on their bodies and hoods over their heads.

  CJ reached up and grabbed the ties around his neck, loosened them and then paused for a few seconds. When no warning came his way he lifted the hood.

  Nearly every head was turned toward him, eyes big, questioning, almost all frightened. The G8 delegates were splattered with red paint, as well as the wall behind them. The staff on the floor at their feet received only splashes from the pellets that hit their bosses. It appeared that only the eight delegates were targeted.

  CJ looked closer. No, he was wrong. Only one was targeted, the British delegate of course. Those close to him received some of the splash-over.

  He looked across at Stella, sitting perfectly still on her table, hood over her head.

  "They're gone," he called to her as he ran across the room. In an instant he had her hood off, had pulled her from the table and into his arms, or as close as he could get her to him with a pair of vests full of C4 between them.

  "What? What?" Stella struggled out of his grasp to see past him, to see what had happened.

  "Paintball guns!" he screamed.

  She looked at the crowd, who were starting to stir a bit more, and back to CJ. "Paintball? They shot them with paintballs?" She stumbled back against the table.

  CJ nodded his head up and down. "Yes! It was all fake." He pulled off the security jacket and then bent his head down so that his nose was close to the top of the C4 packet he had earlier started to pick at. He sniffed and closed his eyes. It wasn't oily like he would expect C4 be.

  "Smell this," he said to Stella.

  She gave him a quizzical look and then bent forward and inhaled.

  "What does that smell like?" he said. It had already come to him but he wanted to get her confirmation. He certainly couldn't afford to be wrong.

  "I..."

  "First thing that comes to mind," he said. "What is it?"

  "Playdough?"

  "Exactly! And look at the color. C4 is generally between a white and light brown. This is a medium brown, way too dark."

  He put his hands on the wire that Rory said had armed the vest, that by disconnecting them would detonate the explosives.

  "Stop!" Stella yelled. "What if you're wrong?"

  CJ looked down again, touched the material, squeezed off a piece and put it to his nose.

  "This entire operation was fake. They used fake guns to gain attention. I'm not wrong. We're wearing fake explosives." With that he disconnected the wires. Nothing happened. In seconds he had the vest off and was helping Stella out of hers. He spotted her purse.

  "Give me your SIG," he said.

  "Why?"

  "Just give it to me." When she did, he said, "Find a phone and call 911." He stepped away and started for the door.

  "Where you going?" she called after him.

  "I'm going to try and catch up to them." With that he was into the hall and running. He missed a turn, doubled back and eventually found the exit door, bursting out into the bright sun. He blinked a couple of times, looking off into the parking lot where they had left the vans. Of course the vans were already gone. He looked about, as far as he was able to see in all directions. There was no sign of either of the dark-green paneled vans.

  He turned around to go back in and found himself facing two men with guns pointed at him, wearing official looking uniforms with badges.

  "Put your gun on the ground," one of them said with much authority.

  Damn! CJ thought and carefully bent forward, placing
Stella's SIG Sauer in front of his feet. This was not the time to try and reason with cops, or in this case, Marriott Hotel security. He straightened up and, without being told, put his hands behind his head and backed up two steps.

  Chapter 43

  It was better than an hour before CJ was reunited with Stella, in another conference room at the opposite end of the complex. The Tampa Room, as well as most of that side of the hotel, had been evacuated until it could be determined for certain that the suicide vests were in fact fakes and after they were taken away by heavily suited men in a heavily armored vehicle.

  The two of them sat together at a table, sipping coffee under the watchful eye of a pair of local police officers when Agents Taffer and Washburn came in. Taffer flashed his badge at the officers.

  "We've got this now."

  One of the officers picked up an evidence bag and handed it to Taffer. "Detective Reason said that you'd probably want this."

  Taffer looked at the gun inside the bag. "What is it?"

  "A SIG Sauer MOS-22. It's registered to the woman, a Ms. Stella Summers. When her companion here, Mister Clinton Washburn, was apprehended by hotel security, he had it in his possession, brandishing it about."

  "I wasn't brandishing it about."

  The officer looked over at CJ. Taffer held up his hand without looking his way, the obvious sign of, "Shut up!"

  CJ sat back and crossed his arms over his chest.

  "That's the report from hotel security," the officer continued. "Mister Washburn claimed that he was trying to chase down the perps who'd terrorized hotel guests with paintball guns and fake explosives."

  "What else has he told you?"

  "Other than names and descriptions of the perps and the vehicles, including plate numbers, not much. Said he wouldn't talk to anyone else except you guys. I'm assuming you know who these people are, maybe even what exactly took place here."

  "We do and yes, we do," Taffer said. "We very much appreciate the time and effort you've put into this mess, keeping it low key and all. The wrong kind of press on this and we'd have a panic on our hands."

  "I can't disagree," the officer said. "A bomb scare that ended up being false. A panic is what we don't need. It is worrisome, though."

  "How's that?"

  "It appears that they pulled this off without a hitch. What if it had been real bullets and real explosives?"

  The officers departed and the agents sat down with CJ and Stella.

  "I nearly turned the hotel upside down searching for you last night," Josh said. "Had to flash my badge to get them to let me look at their videos, reminding them of what happened to you two the other morning. Spotted you on camera going out with two men." He looked at Stella. "And then someone came running out of the elevator with your purse."

  Stella shook her head back and forth. "Talk about scary. They made me drop it in the elevator. I about had a heart attack when the guy came out with it; thought he, or one of us, was going to get shot. That's what they told us; we'd get shot if we talked to anyone. I was shocked when I was allowed to hold on to it."

  "How did you manage to keep it after that, with the SIG Sauer in it?"

  "I think they forgot about it until we were getting ready to leave the house this morning. I told them I was on my period and that my tampons were in it."

  Josh sat back. "Oh."

  "The guy they called Miles actually searched it," CJ said, "not finding the SIG in its secret compartment. He pulled out her package of tampons and then reacted like it was a poisonous snake. It'd have been funny if the situation hadn't been so serious."

  To cover his embarrassment, Josh said, "So how are you guys doing?"

  "Okay now," CJ said. "It looked pretty bad there for a while."

  "We thought we were wearing the real thing," Stella said. "I wasn't functioning very well." She pointed to the gun. "Nearly the entire time I had this within my reach but I could never get the guts to pull it out."

  "I'm glad you didn't," CJ said. "The automatic weapons may have been paintball guns, but the pistols they were also carrying were the real thing. They'd have killed you in a second, of that I'm sure."

  "Wish I'd been there to see security take you down holding a pink SIG Sauer," Taffer said to CJ. "Surprised they didn't think it was a toy."

  CJ snorted a laugh. "I can't fault them. In their eyes, if it looks like a gun, it's a gun. They made the right call. Any idea where the terrorists went?"

  "Best guess is back toward Tampa or St. Petersburg. We've got the house under surveillance, but we don't expect them to show up there. We had eyes on the place within minutes after the local police passed the address you gave them. The boat you talked about was gone as well."

  "Think that might have been their get-a-way transport?" CJ said.

  "Maybe, but if that's the case, they haven't had enough time to rendezvous with it yet. From here they'd have to drive some distance to meet it and we have a state-wide BOLO out on both vans."

  "I don't see what the point of the boat would be," Stella said. "It certainly wouldn't make for a fast get-a-way."

  Taffer's phone rang. He turned away to answered it.

  "You were both chained up in the house?" Josh said.

  "Basically, yes," CJ said. He went on to give a short summary of all that happened from their abduction to when they left for the summit.

  Josh pushed the chair back and leaned forward, elbows on knees. "So they took you just to have someone to wear the vests?"

  "That and to get us off the street."

  "You were figuring things out too fast?"

  "That's kind of what I'm thinking, yes. The fact that we were also handy to wear the vests was a bonus; maybe a solution to a problem."

  "A problem?"

  "They'd installed the chain, anchored to the wall, in preparation for this. It's not something one just has hanging around in case a visitor needs to be held against their will. They had someone else lined up for the job, but it fell through. Like Ms. Danohough maybe, and Douglas. They obviously knew about Douglas. Had been using him for some time, I'd bet. They'd feed him information, false information about the mission, so that it'd get reported to his handler and thus on to you guys. While you were off chasing invisible boats full of arms and explosives and bringing in the HDRU, they were busy getting ready for the G8 mini-summit."

  "Then why kill him?"

  "I think sometime Thursday night he got wind of the real mission and then I showed up. Not only did they have to silence him but they also had to get rid of anyone who he talked to. That was his wife, his mother and me."

  "What was that?" Taffer said, pocketing his phone as he returned to the table.

  "Dad thinks that Douglas and Danohough were killed because Douglas discovered the real mission, to paintball the G8 delegates, and was about to report it to us. He also thinks that they were initially lined up to wear the vests."

  "And you two were recruited to take their place?" Taffer said.

  CJ nodded.

  "The call I just received was our liaison with the local police. One of the vans was spotted in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Kissimmee, twenty minutes or so southeast of here."

  "Not west?" CJ said. "They weren't going back toward Tampa?"

  "From Kissimmee they could still go anywhere; east, west, north or south. It may be that they split, each dumping their van in exchange for other, less visible transportation."

  "Probably staged there yesterday," CJ said.

  "Or early this morning. By-the-way, the license plate numbers you two provided were found to belong to two other vehicles, not dark green vans. Owners of said vehicles–they both live down in Naples–are being tracked down as we speak. I'd be willing to guess that they don't even know that their plates are gone.

  "Also, the locals have already run the VIN on the van they found. It and another just like it were stolen from a lot in Atlanta about a week ago."

  "If I were a betting man," CJ said, "I'd put money down that the second v
an will be found parked in another parking lot within the same distance as the first, probably in the opposite direction."

  "It does appear that this was very well planned out."

  "Right to the minute," CJ added. "It was as though everything was orchestrated. They had somebody inside the Marriott who reported exactly when the G8 people were finished with their breakfast and assembling in the Tampa Room."

  "That could be anyone from guests to staff," Taffer said.

  "Or someone hanging around acting like a guest," CJ said. "Rory Pickens, the leader of the team that raided the meeting this morning, knew exactly where he was going when we entered the building."

  "Didn't the cops say there's a witness who said they saw six people with security blazers and ball caps departing the hotel this morning?" Josh said.

  "That's right," Taffer said. "So there were two inside the hotel watching the movements of the summit people and they left with them."

  "And I'm sure it was all rehearsed," Josh said.

  "Likely a couple of times," CJ said. "You're going to have a lot of video to go through."

  "If they keep the tapes that long," Taffer said.

  "If this summit was supposed to be a secret," CJ said, "how did they find out about it?"

  "It's not all that easy for eight countries to send delegates and their staffs to the United States without someone figuring it out and blabbing. The investigation is going to be tedious, no doubt about it."

  "So, what was the statement?" CJ asked.

  "Statement?" Taffer asked. "What statement?"

  "Pickens said that they were presenting a statement, that they had to get everyone's attention first."

  "Haven't seen anything."

  "Maybe they're releasing it directly to the press," Stella said.

  Taffer pulled out his phone and walked away again.

  "Did you notice that only the British delegate got hit with the paintballs?" Stella said. "I couldn't tell with his people all around him, but it looked like he took one in the face. EMS transported him away."

  "Paintballs aren't that much fun," Josh said. "The report is that he caught one in the eye; may have some permanent damage."