Once Dead

by Richard Phillips

  It was a shame he wasn’t going to get the chance to ask her that and other questions. Unlike Rita Chavez, she had once been a highly trained CIA field operative. And, even though those skills were likely to be a bit rusty, Jacob had no intention of screwing around with tasers and drugs. The silenced Sig P226 would terminate whatever threat Janet Price might pose.

  Nolan Trent may not have been able to tell him much about what Janet had been up to in the last couple of years, but he had delivered on Jacob’s high-priority intelligence request. Not only did Jacob know Janet’s room number at the Hotel Stein, he knew that she had purchased a single ticket to tonight’s performance of Lucio Silla. He also knew that she had left the hotel parking garage in a blue Audi A5 coupe at six p.m., allowing plenty of time for a nice dinner before the opera.

  Pulling into the Hotel Stein parking garage, Jacob slid the black Mercedes coupe into the first available slot, one level below the street entrance, and turned off the vehicle. A quick press illuminated the green LED watch display. 9:23 p.m. He had at least two hours before Janet Price returned from her night at the opera.

  Before he settled in for the wait, he needed to make the required preparations. Grabbing the small duffel bag from the passenger side floorboard, Jacob climbed out of the vehicle and walked the spiral driveway back to the entrance. Positioning a tiny camera and its Wi-Fi broadcast unit just inside the entrance, he checked the signal strength. Good. He’d have to recheck it from the lower levels and, if necessary, position some repeaters, but he doubted he would need them.

  Next, Jacob located the hotel’s primary breaker box. He didn’t bother with the breakers themselves, instead wrapping a wad of C4 around the power cable coming into the box, affixing a wireless detonator to the C4. He had little doubt that the explosion would trip some upstream high-voltage breakers, plunging the entire block into darkness.

  Repeating the process on the emergency lighting fixtures on each of the first three levels, he turned and walked back to his car, removed a couple of items, and tossed his kit-bag into the vehicle’s trunk.

  Without placing them on his head, Jacob switched on the night-vision goggles, verified that they were functioning properly, and switched them off, fully aware that even the dim parking garage lighting would have dazzled him had he tried that test with the goggles properly positioned over his eyes. He wasn’t worried. When he turned them on for real, too much light wouldn’t be an issue.

  CHAPTER 62

  It had taken Janet every ounce of persuasion she could muster to convince Levi Elias to provide the identities that would get her and Jack into Kazakhstan with the latitude to move about as freely as they would need to. Unfortunately, setting up those identities required considerable back story and preparatory work, which meant they would have to wait several days before they would be delivered. In the meantime, Jack and Janet had split up, each using identities they had previously obtained to check into different Salzburg hotels. Until the NSA came through, there was nothing to do but wait.

  Janet had checked into Hotel Stein, a centrally located four-star hotel, under the name of Judith Kroner. An American from Tampa, Florida, she was in Salzburg as part of her three-week European vacation.

  Overlooking the Salzach River, her second-floor room had a beautiful view of the old town’s famous Petersfriedhof Dom cathedral and the Festung Hohensalzburg fortress, the latter perched atop a hill less than a kilometer away. It wasn’t the largest room in the hotel, nor was it the smallest, but it was nice, with wood floors, khaki-colored walls, and two floor-to-ceiling windows draped in purple. The narrow desk beside the southernmost window provided a lovely spot to clean her weapons.

  In keeping with her tourist identity, Janet had outfitted herself in an elegant black evening dress and attended this evening’s performance of Lucio Silla at the Salzburg Opera House. Now, having thoroughly enjoyed the experience, she was tired and ready to get back to the hotel and crawl into bed for a good night’s sleep.

  It took her a half hour to make her way back to Hotel Stein’s parking garage. Stepping out of her car, she slammed the door and clicked the lock button on the black key fob. She walked to the elevator and pressed the call button. As she waited, a distant explosion echoed through the basement garage and, except for the Audi lights on their one minute timer, all other lights went out.

  A scuffing sound to her left brought Janet’s head around, sending an electric thrill up her spine. Thirty feet from where she stood, a man carrying a silencer-equipped pistol stepped out from behind a dark van. As he walked calmly toward her, his left hand moved to adjust a pair of night-vision goggles perched atop his forehead. Then, as Janet kicked off her high heels, the Audi headlights went out, swaddling her in pitch-black darkness.

  CHAPTER 63

  Jack paced his living room. Despite the fact that he had booked an executive suite at the five-star Hotel Lacher, tonight he felt caged. It was as if he should be out there in the night, doing something, something besides waiting.

  He’d had a fabulous dinner at the Roter Salon Restaurant. It would have been nice to look across the table at Janet Price. But that hadn’t happened. And he couldn’t shake the feeling that, after tonight, it might never happen.

  Goddamn it! What the hell was wrong with him?

  He didn’t even know what hotel she was in. It made sense. Operational security. Neither one of them knew the other’s location. And they wouldn’t know until the NSA delivered the mission package. It was the only way to be safe.

  Screw safe!

  Why the hell had he agreed to this arrangement? Because it made sense. Because it was logical. Since when had he started being logical? But Janet was logical. And she was hot. So he had allowed her to convince him that this was what they both needed to do. Split up. Lay low. Wait for the package.

  It was all wrong. He felt it in his marrow, felt it in his soul. Somewhere out there in this city, in this night, Janet was in trouble. And because he didn’t know what he needed to know, he couldn’t do a damn thing about it.

  Jack focused, trying to attune himself with that extra sense he often experienced. In the grips of his addiction, he felt its directional pull. But tonight, because he consciously wanted it, it wasn’t coming.

  Another thought occurred to him, a frightening one. Maybe his inner demon wanted Janet to die, wanted him to bathe in the white-hot rage that event would ignite inside him. Maybe that was why he couldn’t feel the pull.

  Parked in the parking garage, the rented black BMW sedan waited to carry him into the night. Jack slid into his shoulder holster, covering it with his navy blue jacket. He wouldn’t keep it waiting any longer.

  CHAPTER 64

  As the empty parking slots slowly filled with hotel guests returning from their evening outings, Jacob moved his car down to the next level. Using his cell phone to monitor the wireless video feed from the camera he had positioned at the entrance, he examined the make, model, and license plate of each car that entered. When Janet’s blue Audi passed the camera, he switched off the phone, grabbed the night vision goggles from the passenger seat, and stepped out of the car.

  Moving back into the shadows behind a nearby van, Jacob positioned the goggles on his forehead, ready to be pulled down and switched on in a single, smooth movement. In his gloved right hand, he held the silenced Sig at his side. His left thumb rested on the small device that would trigger the explosion to cut all power to the hotel.

  The bright headlight beams swept past and then turned sharply as Janet parked the car in one of the empty slots. Jacob watched as she closed and locked the door, then turned and walked toward the elevator. Wearing a lacy black evening dress and high heels, her hair twisted into a tight bun atop her head, she carried a woman’s silver wallet-purse in her left hand. Perfect.

  He waited as she reached the elevator and pressed the call button, keeping a mental count in his head. Having taken the ride from here to the lobby and back, he knew the minimum time the elevator required to des
cend to this level. He also knew how long it would take for the Audi headlight timer to expire.

  Jacob pressed the button on the remote detonator. Rewarded by the sound of the distant explosion and accompanying power outage, he stepped out from behind the van and reached up to grasp the night vision goggles. Thirty feet away, Janet Price spun toward him, kicking off her shoes as she turned. Then the Audi’s headlights went out.

  Pulling the goggles into place, Jacob switched them on. There she was, white hot in the goggles’ artificial green glow. As he started to raise the Sig, a sudden flash of bright light wiped away his enhanced vision, dazzling and blinding him as a loud horn blared. Not exactly a flash-bang grenade, but effective. The woman had waited just long enough for him to activate the goggles before pressing the car alarm button on her key fob. Tearing the goggles from his head, Jacob raised his weapon, expecting to see her dodging away through the cars.

  Instead she was on top of him. Something sharp glittered in her hand as he brought the Sig around. Pain exploded in his right hand as the object speared through it, sending the gun clattering across the concrete floor. Jerking his hand off the six-inch hair needle, Jacob attempted a left hook that the woman spun to avoid.

  Seeing the needle glitter in her spinning fist, Jacob threw back his head, taking a cut high up on his left cheek, a cut that barely missed his eye. Her leg sweep landed him on the flat of his back, sending tiny white lights flashing across his vision. He rolled to his feet just in time to see her dive beneath a Mercedes, her fingers closing around the butt of his Sig.

  Jacob didn’t pause to think. He just ran. Turning the corner on the parking ramp, he heard the spat of the Sig and felt tiny bits of concrete spray his neck. Away from the headlights, in the dark his hip grazed the rear of a parked car, forcing him to feel his way along as he continued up the ramp.

  Three more shots sounded behind him and from the muzzle flashes he could see that she was pursuing. Unable to see him in the dark, she was firing in a spread pattern, hoping to land a lucky shot. Feeling his way around another corner, Jacob saw street lights and put all his effort into getting to that exit before Janet Price found her own way to that last corner.

  Outside, he turned right, and merged into the crowd of people that had exited the hotel’s dark lobby and gathered on the sidewalk. Plunging through them, he rounded the corner onto Platzl, slowing to a walk as he moved through a narrow alley and onto the Imbertstiege, the two hundred and fifty steep steps that led to the top of the hill overlooking the Salzach River.

  Leaving the steps, as he moved into the dense foliage, Jacob heard sirens converge on the hotel he had left behind. He leaned back against a tree, a brief pause to let his breathing and heart rate return to normal. The puncture wound in his right hand was painful and blood dripped from the shallow cut in his left cheek, but neither injury was serious. More than anything, Jacob was mad at himself.

  Meticulous preparation and attention to the smallest of details were two of his defining characteristics. But tonight, he’d severely underestimated Janet Price, a mistake that had very nearly killed him.

  Shit! She’d almost killed him with his own gun.

  Instead of the rusty, ex-CIA agent Jacob had expected, he’d encountered a highly skilled and aggressive killer. She wasn’t just Jack Gregory’s accomplice. An asset with the special skills that Janet Price had displayed had to be working for some government. But which government? She’d quit the CIA with a cover story, so it wasn’t the United States.

  Janet had serious sponsorship and that changed the equation. As Jacob headed away from the sirens and left the flashing lights behind him, he made a decision. It was time to step away and do the preparatory work he should have already done.

  Next time he’d know what government she now worked for. Next time he wouldn’t underestimate Janet Alexandra Price.

  CHAPTER 65

  Jack turned southeast onto Schwarzstrasse toward the flashing lights and sirens two blocks away. He rolled down the window to get a better feel for how many police and emergency vehicles were involved. At this point it sounded like only a couple of Polizei patrol cars and a fire truck, but it made him nervous. As he got closer, he saw that the Polizei were diverting traffic across the river over the Staatsbrücke, away from a crowd, many in their pajamas, that had gathered in front of the darkened Hotel Stein.

  Stopping by the Austrian policeman, Jack hailed him in German. “Officer, what is the problem? I need to get to my hotel.”

  “You can’t stop here. Move along.”

  Jack nodded and complied. Once across the bridge, he found the first parking place, climbed out of the car, and walked back across the bridge toward the crowd gathered outside the hotel, a crowd that was getting larger as police and firefighters evacuated guests from within. As Jack stepped off the bridge, the sound of additional approaching sirens indicated that a call for reinforcements had been issued and, as they began to arrive, he saw that they were all police cars.

  He shouldered his way into the guests that were now being herded farther away from Hotel Stein. Turning to a fully clothed bald man, Jack let concern creep into his voice.

  “What happened?”

  The man gestured back toward the hotel. “I was in the lobby. We heard a loud explosion and then everything went dark. Someone said they thought they had heard muffled gunshots in the parking garage. Now the police are evacuating everyone.”

  From the corner of his eye, Jack saw a woman pushing her way through the crowd toward him. When she stepped closer, he breathed an audible sigh of relief. It was Janet. Shoeless, she was wearing a torn black evening gown. Her disheveled hair hung limply over her shoulders, several strands sticking to her sweaty, bare throat.

  Before he could ask the obvious questions, she slid her arm through his and pulled him away from the hotel at a steady walk.

  “I hope you brought a car.”

  “Parked just on the other side of the bridge.”

  “Good. I can’t get to my room and I don’t really want to answer a bunch of police questions, once they get around to interviewing witnesses.”

  “You’ve got blood on your arm.”

  “Don’t worry, it’s not mine.”

  Together they, along with a number of other guests who had decided it would be safer to watch from the far side of the river, made their way across the Staatsbrücke. Once inside the car, Jack headed southeast, paralleling the river on Rudolfskai, not going anywhere in particular, just giving himself some time and space to think.

  Janet turned to look at him.

  “Have you been following me?”

  “No. I couldn’t sleep, saw the commotion from my hotel, and decided to check it out.”

  A wry grin spread across Janet’s grimy face. “Ah Jacky Boy, you were worried about me.”

  “Never crossed my mind.”

  She laughed and reached over to pat his cheek. “That’s sweet, but I can take care of myself.”

  “I take it you’ve worn out our warm Salzburg welcome.”

  She leaned back in her seat and looked at the passing city lights. “Looks like.”

  As Jack circled the outskirts of Salzburg and then got on the A1 autobahn headed northeast, Janet described the evening’s events. She hadn’t gotten a clear view of her attacker’s face, but he’d been a professional, not one of Roskov’s gangsters. To have tracked her down, he had to have access to some serious intelligence assets. That probably meant the CIA was now taking direct action to purge Jack and anyone who might be helping him. It meant they knew Janet’s face.

  Jack thought the Czech Republic offered the best opportunity to lay low while they waited on the NSA to deliver, and Janet didn’t argue. In the meantime, having abandoned another set of false identities and belongings, they needed replacements from a man Jack knew of in Linz. But this guy was nobody’s friend.

  But first they both needed new clothes and some basic supplies, including some packaging materials. Janet’s evening gow
n had a fair amount of her attacker’s blood on it. Tomorrow, after they had wrapped it appropriately, they’d let DHL prove just how fast overnight delivery to Fort Meade, Maryland, really was. If Janet’s NSA connections came through, they would know who had ambushed her by the time they reached Kazakhstan.

  CHAPTER 66

  Twenty-eight-year-old Daniel Jones was his father’s son . . . and damn proud of it. His dad had been a great man. More than that, he had been a great American. Throughout history there were men who tugged the strands of fate, reshaping destiny with their actions. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt. These were all great men, but they had been leaders, not shapers. The shapers were those who had been willing to get their hands dirty in defense of great causes: Andrew Jackson, Joshua Chamberlain, George Patton.

  These were men’s men, ordering soldiers to hold their fire until they saw the whites of their enemies’ eyes, ordering men to fix bayonets and charge when they were low on ammunition, driving an army into the oppressor’s heartland. These were men who shaped history.

  Captain David Jones, killed in action in Somalia facing overwhelming odds, had been such a man. Had he survived America’s misguided attempts at nation building, he would have proved it. And even though Dan had grown up stunted and bespectacled, his five-foot-three-inch frame housed a brain that befitted his father’s great desire to restore America’s lost vision. Tonight, Dan would carry out a task that would have made his father proud.

  As opposed to common opinion, America’s best days were not behind her, but ahead. And although that path was a hard one, it was necessary that this great country pass through a terrible trial by fire. Nolan Trent had told him only vague details of the grand scheme in which Dan would play a small but crucial part. Dan didn’t know how he had come to the deputy CIA director’s attention and he didn’t care. Nolan had chosen wisely and Dan was now going to prove just how wise that choice had been.