****
“Hey, hey wake up.”
Brad was pulled back to semi-awareness from some dreamless place beyond sleep by a stranger’s voice. He was lying on a bed of misshapen lumps at the bottom of a pipe; something or someone warm was pressed against his chest and belly.
“Wake up, come on, wake up.”
The pipe was rolling. Mosquitoes were buzzing in his ear, biting his face. It was not a pipe he was lying in, it was a boat. He was with Ranya, he remembered more now. He had been a prisoner. He remembered that he had been tied down, and he remembered the water and the electricity and the pain, but now he was free, unless he was only dreaming again.
Brad twisted and looked up; he was lying in the front of a narrow boat, which was tied alongside a low wooden dock. Standing on the pier, outlined against the stars, a man was looming over them. He was wearing some kind of bizarre hat or helmet, a football or lacrosse helmet perhaps, but in place of any face shield there was a fat tube mounted in front of one eye. Ranya stirred and rolled onto her back against him.
“Where are we?” she asked the man on the dock.
“I’m sorry, but that’s not part of the deal. This is just the place where you two get out. Straight up the dock there’s a path to a house; that’s where you’ll spend the night, and maybe longer. I unlocked it and turned the gas on. You’ll have hot water in a little while. Make yourself right at home. Get cleaned up, fix yourself something to eat, and find some warm clothes.”
Brad asked, “But where are we? If we have to get out, if we have to run, we have to know where we are.” He pushed the stiff canvas covering off of them and sat up in the bottom of the boat.
“You don’t need to know, and anyhow it doesn’t matter. You’re on an island; you can’t run away from here without a boat, and you’d need a chart and a GPS, so forget it. You two just need to stay here until somebody comes and gets you. Might be me, might be somebody else. Probably tomorrow afternoon. Just keep an eye on the dock…anybody that ties up here and gets on the dock and pulls up crab traps, that’s your ride. Then you just come on out and get in their boat and do like they say, all right?”
“All right, we’ve got it,” replied Brad. “And thanks, we really appreciate what you’ve done for us.”
“Oh, a boat ride’s not much, not in the scheme of things. Say, you don’t happen to have a cell phone on you, do you?”
Ranya sat up next to Brad and pushed the stiff canvas tarpaulin off of her; she found her fanny pack amid the piles of boat junk and pulled it onto her lap. The man directed a small beam of light onto the bag to assist her as she unzipped it and pulled out her new throwaway phone. He looked away; the light was too bright in his night scope.
“Let me have it, okay?” the man said. He switched off his flashlight and crouched down and she gave him the phone. He said, “Thanks,” and tossed it underhanded far out into the river. “We can’t have any phones or radios here; you might have already compromised this place just by bringing that cell phone with you. We don’t transmit anything from here; we don’t even bring cell phones, not ever. Very few people know about this place, and even fewer know where it is, and we want to keep it that way. I’m sorry, but we have to be real assholes about security here.
“If you put on a lantern, keep all the shutters down, and don’t take it outside. And don’t use the kerosene heater. I know you’re cold, but if you heat the whole place up too much, it’ll make the cabin shine like a beacon on infrared. Try to stay inside during the day, or at least stay away from the river: the idea is to not be seen, okay? There’s propane for cooking, and there’ll be hot water for a bath. Well now, let’s get moving, shall we?”
They were both stiff and cramped from their rough sleeping positions, and they awkwardly climbed out of the rolling boat and up onto the dock. No names were ever asked or offered. The skinny man with the crazy one-eyed helmet handed Brad his flashlight. Brad took the light, and shook the boat man’s hand. “Thanks, I hope we’ll meet again. If there’s anything I can ever do for you, I hope I can return the favor.”
The man regarded Brad and Ranya for a moment, the green glow from his single night eye faintly illuminated the right side of his face.
“Yeah, there is something you can do. Be worth it. A lot of folks who didn’t need to get involved stuck their necks out a mile for you tonight.” The man untied his lines from the dock cleats and tossed them over as he hopped lightly back aboard his skiff, grabbing the console to steady himself as it rolled. Brad and Ranya stood side by side on the dock, their arms around each others’ waists. The big brown-painted Evinrude coughed to life. The man spun his wheel hard and smacked the throttle to the rear, and the boat cut a backwards J turn away from the dock.
“Just be worth it!” the boat driver yelled over his shoulder, as he cut the wheel the other way and shoved the throttle lever forward. The dark hunting boat, lighter now by two people’s weight, leaped onto a plane and shot down the river and was almost immediately lost in the blackness.
42
“Gold leader; Victor Poppa. I’ve got lights out in the bedroom, and it sounds like the television is off.”
“Is that him or her, over?”
“Um, that would be her. The light’s still on in bedroom number four; that’s his study. He’s still connected on line; it looks like he’s still on the computer, over.” The Special Training Unit’s counterfeit “Virginia Power” van was parked diagonally across the tree-lined street from Leo Swarovski’s house in Long Bridge, an affluent community southeast of Richmond. The STU technicians inside the van had his house under several forms of surveillance. Their internal radio communications were digitally encrypted, so they spoke without fear of being overheard.
“Victor; Gold Leader. Tell me about the outside lights again, over.”
“Gold, there’s motion triggered lights front and rear. The front light is tripped by walking on the sidewalk in front of the house. The backyard light’s only triggered by someone inside the fence. The alley behind the garage is clear; no lights, over.”
“Victor; Gold. So you’re sure we can pull into the alley without triggering the light, over?” The four black Suburbans and the blue conversion van of the STU assault teams were parked a half mile from the targeted house. They were concealed in a small parking lot behind a two story professional building, primarily containing medical offices.
“That’s affirmative Gold.”
“Then we’ll go as briefed. Gold One in the alley and through the patio door, Gold Two up the back porch, and Blue on the street, over.”
“Roger Gold.”
“We’ll wait thirty minutes after he turns in and do it.” After playing the supporting role Saturday night on the Edmonds raid, and after Sunday night’s failure to capture Frank Gittis after their long highway pursuit into western North Carolina, Michael Shanks was anxious to lead his team on a successful raid.
The Gold Team was going to enter Swarovski’s one story brick home simultaneously through three doors, giving him no chance to reach for a weapon or even to get out of bed. Shanks was personally going to lead Gold One, smashing through the sliding glass door from the side patio directly into Swarovski’s bedroom. If as expected they were asleep, they’d be turned into Swiss cheese before they could sit up or roll over. Swarovski and his wife both were known to be crack shots, and Shanks did not intend to give them the opportunity to put a hand on a weapon, at least not until they were dead.
Dead, Swarovski could be assisted in safely firing off a few shots from his own bedside pistol, to justify the killings. Shanks even planned to have one carefully aimed shot fired into the composite armor plate on the front of his kevlar vest. That well-aimed shot would provide more than enough “proof’ to convince any skeptics in the media that the ATF law enforcement team had ample reason to riddle the Swarovskis with bullets: it would be an obvious case of self-defense. Gun powder residue on Leo Swarovski’s hand and arm would clinch the case, just to be certain.
“Roger Gold. Uh, Gold, he’s getting an outside phone call. Let me catch this, wait one over.”
There were three rings of a telephone. The technicians in the Virginia Power van heard Leo Swarovski’s voice through their head sets.
****
“Do you know what time it is?” Swarovski asked, agitated.
“Leo, the ATF is coming, get out while you can,” said the male caller, who sounded somewhat excited.
“What did you say? Who is this?”
“Leo, the ATF is coming, get out while you can.”
“Is this some kind of joke?”
“Leo, the ATF is coming.” The call was terminated.
****
“Gold Leader; Victor Poppa. You’re not going to believe this, over.”
“Who called? What did they say?”
“He said the ATF is coming, that’s what he said!”
“What? Can you play it for me?”
“Sure, this’ll just take a second…hang on. Here it comes.”
The digitally recorded phone conversation was played back, going out over the radio to the waiting STU Team at their forward staging area. All of them heard the brief warning conversation through their ear pieces; they paused in the middle of cigarettes and hushed conversations to listen to it.
“Damn! Let’s hear it one more time,” said Gold Leader Michael Shanks. The audio technician replayed the entire call.
“Can you trace the call?” asked Shanks.
“Already got it Gold.”
Bob Bullard’s voice came over the net. “Anybody recognize that voice?”
“He sounded familiar,” said Michael Shanks.
“It sounded like our boy George Hammet to me,” said Bullard.
“Yeah, that’s confirmed by the trace Bob,” added the audio tech. “It came from Hammet’s cell phone.”
****
With his legs and arms exposed, Brad was being eaten alive by clouds of mosquitoes and biting no-see-um sand fleas, and he wasted no time running up the path from the dock following the flashlight beam, with Ranya right behind him.
The cabin was a thirty foot wide square plywood shack with an angled corrugated roof. Located barely above the high tide level, the place was built a yard over the sandy ground on cinderblock pilings. It was partly surrounded by boxwoods and low trees, but they didn’t stop to study their surroundings beyond that.
Cinderblock steps led up to a screen door and a solid wood interior door facing the creek. Brad jerked them both open and Ranya pulled them closed behind her. Once inside they met in an intense embrace, squeezing each other almost with desperation, her face buried in his neck while he kissed her hair. The room was lit madly by the flashlight which Brad held behind Ranya’s back, its beam moving across the ceiling as they swayed and turned together, but their eyes were tightly closed and they didn’t notice.
After a minute of holding each other and holding back their tears, Brad reluctantly broke away and crouched down, scratching both legs from his ankles to his thighs. “I’m so sick of bugs! Wherever we go, I want it to be a place with no bugs!” He sat on the floor, still scratching at his ankles. “I’ve had a really, really bad day!” he said, laughing and crying at the same time. Ranya shed her two packs and sat down Indian style, facing him.
“It could be worse you know; you could still be tied to that door.”
“That’s true, but I don’t know what’s worse: being tied down on that door, or the no-see-ums!” He grinned at her while he kept scratching. “I sure hope they’ve got some itch medicine here.”
“Whose place is this anyway?” Ranya unzipped her new green rain slicker and tugged it off. She was only wearing her new gray sweatshirt beneath it; her damp denim jacket, t-shirt and bra were crammed into her daypack.
“I have no idea. I don’t even know which state we’re in.” They stood up together, and Brad shined his flashlight around the room, which took up the front half of the cabin. It was a combined living room, dining room and kitchen. Screened windows were covered on the outside by plywood shutters which were down and latched shut. On a low coffee table in front of an old sofa was an array of flashlights, candles, a bowl full of matchbooks, and an oil-fueled hurricane lamp. Ranya studied the lamp, then she lifted the globe and lit the wick with a match, and a soft yellow light suffused the room.
Tacked to a cabinet door above the kitchen sink was a numbered list of instructions for using the house, and another checklist for putting it back into the proper inactive state before leaving. Evidently, the cabin was meant to be used at least occasionally by unfamiliar visitors.
They read through the list. Brad switched on the 12-volt power system and tested the electric water pump, and then he lit the propane stove and turned it back off again. He said, “It’s just like a boat or an RV; it’s all 12-volt and propane. A solar panel on the roof charges golf cart batteries down here under the counter, but not that much runs on electricity anyway. Look, even the fridge runs on propane.” He found its pilot light switch and turned it on. The list told how to check the level of the water tanks outside; they were filled (or not) depending on the amount of rainfall caught on the cabin’s corrugated roof.
For drinking and cooking water, there were several clear plastic five gallon jugs on the floor. Brad opened one and lifted it onto a counter-top dispenser. They both looked in the cabinets above the sink and stove and counters for drinking cups, and found them well stocked with canned soups and stews, powdered juices, cans of soda, and several liquor bottles. He took down a pair of plastic cups, filled them with drinking water from the dispenser, and they both drained them. It had been hours since either had had anything to drink.
“God, I can’t believe any of this. I just can’t believe any of what’s happened today.” Brad was both numb and alert, operating on stale adrenaline.
Ranya pulled down a six pack of Coke and a half-full bottle of Bacardi rum. “Will that fridge make ice? I never saw one that ran off of propane.”
“I think it will, sooner or later. Maybe by tomorrow.”
“Well, you’re a sailor right? You’re used to roughing it, so let’s just have a nice room temperature rum and coke. Why wait for ice?” She poured an inch of dark rum into two tumblers, then popped open a can of cola and filled them up.
“Cheers,” he toasted her, and drank half of the cup, welcoming the sweet anesthesia. “I’ve got so many questions, but I’ve got to find some itch cream before I go crazy!” He was scratching one calf with his opposite foot.
The large front room they were in had two doors in its back wall. Brad went through the door on the right side; it opened into a small bedroom. There was a double bed against the back wall under a shuttered window; it was covered with a floral-pattern comforter. Another door led from the bedroom into a small bathroom; an old fashioned full-length porcelain bathtub took up almost half of the space. A hot water heater stood in one corner, it was hissing and humming. Like the rest of the house, the bathroom seemed to have been put together from a collection of castoff or salvaged furnishings and appliances, probably brought in a piece at a time by boat over many years.
Mounted to the wall above a chipped porcelain sink was a medicine cabinet which Brad pulled open; his eyes settled on a row of ointment tubes. “Oh, thank you, thank you God; I finally get a break! I swear I’m going to coat my legs with this stuff.” He grabbed a tube and unscrewed the cap and began smearing the white cream on his ankles.
Ranya said, “I’ve got a better idea. Did you know that I crawled through a filthy canal today, looking for you? I stink, I itch, and I think I’ve got things crawling around under my clothes. The motorboat guy turned on the propane for the hot water heater, and I can hear it running, so I’m taking a bath right now. And…you’re welcome to join me, if you can fit in too… Then after we wash up, we can take turns rubbing lotion on each other. Believe me, you’re not the only one with bug bites and scratches.”
She hung the oil lamp on a nail,
sat down on the edge of the tub and began to run the water. “You have no idea how much I need this bath! I’m getting in whether it’s hot or not.” She pulled off her muddy running shoes, then she crossed her arms and grabbed the bottom of her new gray sweatshirt to pull it over her head, but then she paused. “Can you give me a little head start? I feel like a total skank, okay?”
“I understand. I’ll get the drinks.”
****
When Brad returned a few minutes later he brought candles with him, which he set up and lit on the sink and on top of the medicine cabinet and around the edge of the tub. Then, he left again and returned with a portable stereo and a small plastic case that he put on the floor. His eyes were on Ranya; she was rinsing shampoo out of her hair with a hand held shower on a long white hose. She made no effort to cover her sudsy breasts, which jiggled as she scrubbed her scalp with her other hand. The electric pump was still chugging away, and the tub was half-filled with warm water. She said, “My hair feels like it’s full of twigs and bugs and God knows what. You’ll have to check me for ticks and cooties, I swear. Hey, what’d you find, a radio? Does it work?”
“The radio doesn’t work, I just found new batteries for it but the antenna’s gone and I’m only getting static. I don’t know about the cassette deck; it must be twenty years old. I found a box full of cassettes, but it’s all old stuff. Let’s see: Allman Brothers, Led Zeppelin, Eagles, Pink Floyd, the Doors, Neil Young…”
“Put in the Eagles; I know all their songs. We used to play it at the store.”
Brad popped in the cassette, and hit “play.” After that it only took him a few seconds to pull off his shorts and shirt and join Ranya in the tub. He sat facing her, sliding his long legs past her soft slippery hips; she drew her knees up out of the water to make room for him. The first guitar chords rang out in the cramped bathroom, and then Henley and Frey began to sing “Take it Easy.”
Enemies Foreign And Domestic Page 61