Hunt Among the Killers of Men gh-5

by Gabriel Hunt

  Before Mitch could answer, the sound became loud enough for them all to recognize it.

  A chopper, incoming.

  Chapter 20

  Outside, crouched among the rocks, Mitch spotted the helicopter through binoculars, coming in soft about a hundred yards from the pagoda, the blades on powerful Ribinsk turboshafts spinning a silver halo above the craft.

  “It’s a Kamov,” she said. “The kind the Russians nicknamed the Orca. Jesus, there could be twenty guys in there.”

  Gabriel grabbed Qi’s upper arm. “Could you have been tagged somehow? Followed?”

  Surprise and incomprehension sparked within her dark gaze. “No, I…”

  Then brutal logic slapped her. “The Glock,” she said with disgust.

  “What Glock?” said Mitch.

  Qi snorted, angry at her own lack of vigilance. “Why would he have a Glock? Ivory prefers fully automatic pistols—that is why he has that Russian monstrosity. He would not have a Glock around unless it was disposable.” She drove a fist into her own hand. “Damn it. He handed it to me. He knew I’d take it. Stupid!”

  “He misdirected you,” said Gabriel. “Could have happened to any of us.”

  “He gave me the chance to shoot him with it!”

  “Well, obviously he was confident you wouldn’t take him up on it.” The location of the leaning pagoda had just ceased to be a bargaining chip. They had been made, blown, outfoxed.

  “Load everything,” said Qi. She was obviously envisioning some kind of glorious standoff that would get them all killed.

  “Wait,” said Gabriel. “Let’s see if they’re soldiers, Red Police guys or Cheung’s men.”

  “I see the bald guy from the casino,” said Mitch, still glassing the slope, where the men from the chopper were now climbing, hunched over in a protective crouch.

  “That is Dinanath,” said Qi. “Number Two, after Ivory.” She ducked into her armory and came up with a Nightforce-sighted LMT rifle, already zeroing in.

  “Wait!” said Gabriel. “No shooting! We can still—”

  Qi fired without hesitation just as Gabriel shot out a hand, bumping her aim off true. The 5.56 round spanged off a tree branch, severing it two feet from Dinanath’s head.

  Cheung’s crew answered.

  The rocks all around began to flint and chip with bullet hits, half of them silenced. The other half of the shooters didn’t care if they were heard, time-delay gunshots bouncing around the hillside and trapping them in a weird Doppler cone of weapons fire. Mitch, gunless, had hit the dirt, and Gabriel was trying not to get nailed by flying frags of rock.

  He took the binoculars from Mitch, peered through them. At least eighteen men were coming at them up a hillside with excellent cover.

  Qi could pick some of them off one by one, pacing her fire, but there were too many. She could never bag them all.

  Gabriel held her in abeyance until the first salvo wrapped.

  “Don’t,” he cautioned her. “We have something they want. We still have the upper hand. Cheung’s not even with them. Let me handle them.”

  Disappointment flashed in Qi’s eyes.

  “There will be no more shooting, Mr. Hunt,” came Dinanath’s voice over a bullhorn. “We have your brother Michael. You will cease fire and stand down now.”

  “Both of you, go now,” Gabriel said to Qi and Mitch.

  “What are you going to do?” said Qi, still bitter at being cheated of deaths she felt were owed her.

  “They want the Killers of Men, let’s give ’em what they want,” Gabriel said. “If they have Michael we have to dispense with all this pawn-pushing and get right to the royalty.”

  “Chess,” Mitch said in response to Qi’s blank expression.

  “You have a plan?” said Qi.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Gabriel said. “Just worry about getting away. If either of you stay, you’ll just wind up in cages. At best—that’s if they don’t just kill you on the spot. Go. Now. Take the back path down the hill.”

  Both women were staring at him stubbornly. What the hell did he have to do, point a gun at them?

  “We can set up in the shrine rooms,” said Qi. “Each of us with a rifle, and kill them as they—”

  Gabriel overrode her. “No. Don’t you see? That won’t save Michael—and it won’t kill Cheung. Please: go.”

  Bad trouble would have them crosshaired in moments. A tidal wave of downside was coursing up the hill toward them.

  “Get out of here,” Gabriel said. “Seriously. Leave them to me.”

  “You’re giving up,” Mitch said vacantly. She winced at a sudden spike of pain in her forehead. The last dose of the drug he’d given her had obviously almost worn off. It was why she was as lucid as she was—but it also meant she was just minutes away from suffering serious withdrawal.

  He held her face and snapped his fingers to focus her. “I’m going to surrender to them, yes—but no way am I giving up. You have to trust me. I haven’t lost my mind. I do have a plan. But if you two don’t get out of sight, pronto, none of it’ll work—understand?”

  “No,” she said—but Qi took her by the arm and began pulling Mitch away.

  Mitch wrested free and grabbed Gabriel’s jacket, turning him around, holding his torso between her hands, staring directly into his eyes.

  “You be careful, goddamn it, or I’ll come back and kick your ass,” she said. “Lucy’d never forgive me if I got you killed.”

  He nodded and she let go. Qi led her back into the pagoda, toward the rear archway.

  “Dinanath!” Gabriel shouted. “Hold your fire! I’m coming down!”

  Gabriel left the Colt behind one of the stone lions as he walked into the open, hands raised, to meet his captors.

  “I think you are lying,” said Dinanath as he circled Gabriel…

  …who was lying on the ground of the shrine room, trussed up with rope. Before they’d tied him up, Cheung’s thugs had gotten in some good punches, but when Gabriel hadn’t either resisted or spilled any useful information, their hearts went out of the procedure rather quickly.

  Gabriel quickly used his tongue to take inventory of his teeth. One wobbler; all still present in his mouth. His right eye was threatening to swell shut and his internals felt kicked down a stairwell—but this was all (he reminded himself) a necessary part of the plan.

  “Don’t believe me then,” Gabriel said, his voice a little slurred. “Ignore what I say. That’s your privilege. But if it later turns out I was telling the truth, Cheung will have your liver and heart for breakfast.”

  Dinanath wished Ivory were here to offer counsel. Hell, he wished Ivory were still in Cheung’s favor at all, rather than precariously teetering on the edge of a particularly fatal variety of disfavor. Perhaps victory today would enable Ivory to return from disgrace—he had, after all, provided the tin can for the dog’s tail and thus allowed them to discover the location of Qingzhao’s hideout. Perhaps Dinanath himself would be able to offer testimony that would restore Cheung’s faith in Ivory, whom he counted as a good colleague, if not a friend.

  But that would be sometime down the line, at best; in the meantime, Dinanath was on his own and had to figure out what to do about this American and his claims.

  “Put it another way,” said Gabriel. “All you have to do is check it out. I’ll show you myself.”

  “A trap,” said Dinanath. “You would lead us into an ambush.”

  “Why? So I can knock off or incapacitate a few of your men? When Cheung still has my brother? That would be crazy. I’m offering a trade because I have something Cheung wants and he has something I want.”

  The other men on Dinanath’s squad were starting to debate among themselves. Gabriel had uttered the magic words, in English and Chinese both: Favored Son, Kangxi Shih-k’ai, Killers of Men. Looking from man to man around him, he knew each of them had to be weighing how he might put the knowledge Gabriel was offering to use to advance his position with Cheung—maybe even to
claim the ten million dollar reward, if they could turn up the big guy’s bones.

  They had carried Gabriel into the room with the idol, deposited him roughly at its base. It glowered down at them (eyeless now; Gabriel had dislodged the red crystal and stowed it back in the trench before they raced out to spot the helicopter); the statue’s tarnished metal surface shone dully in the firelight and the strobe-sweep of the high-powered lamps each man carried as part of a basic assault kit. They were dressed for night-fighting, black-on-black.

  “If you think it’s a trap,” Gabriel said, “just make me walk in first. You can walk me in at gunpoint. Or I’ll go in alone. Whatever you say—unless you’re not the man in charge and I should speak to someone else who can actually get things done.”

  Anger flared in Dinanath’s sculpted face, so much like the idol itself—rough-hewn, broad-planed, admitting of no subtlety. This was, Gabriel had decided, a man who would not want his authority challenged. Third in line in Cheung’s pecking order, his rank made him answerable here. He had been granted this responsibility. He would want neither to lose face nor gain demotion.

  Dinanath squatted beside Gabriel and cracked him in the mouth again just to reassert his superiority.

  Gabriel spat a small gob of blood onto the ground. “If I’m telling the truth,” he said, “you get to bring the Killers of Men back to Cheung and Cheung will be all smiles. That’s what I want for my brother. If I’m lying, you can kill me then just as easily as now.”

  “You do not dictate terms for Kuan-Ku Tak Cheung,” Dinanath said, making sure the men heard him proclaim the chain of command.

  “Then let me talk to Ivory,” Gabriel said.

  Dinanath let a tiny snort escape him. “Longwei Sze Xie is dangerously close to becoming a Nameless One.”

  “Fine. Then it’s up to you. Untie me now and let me open it my way—or you can figure out the secret of the idol for yourself,” said Gabriel.

  “You will tell us.” Dinanath reconsidered his inflection. “You will tell us.”

  “I’ll tell you nothing. You can knock me around all you want, if you try hard enough you can kill me, but believe me, you won’t make me talk that way. Better men than you have tried it, and it’s never worked.” Gabriel prayed his sincere, self-confident tone was convincing them; he hoped like hell they wouldn’t test his claim, just to see. “Meanwhile,” he said, “how long do you have? Cheung’s a man who wants answers swers now. He won’t give you days or weeks to figure this out for yourselves. But I can show you. I’m unarmed, for god’s sake. You have nearly twenty men.”

  “The two women,” said Dinanath. “They are armed. Perhaps they are the ambush.”

  “The women are gone. They ran away. I don’t know where they are and that’s the truth. Anyway, do you really think two women can pick off twenty armed men? If they could, wouldn’t we just have done that when you were coming up the hill? What you’re saying makes no sense.” Gabriel shook his head. “I’m offering you a good deal.”

  “How American,” Dinanath sneered. “A deal.” He pressed his gun to Gabriel’s forehead. To one of his men he said, curtly, “Untie him.” Gabriel felt someone go to work on the knots at his wrists. They sprang free a moment later.

  “Very well,” Dinanath said. “I will trust you—but only so far.” He let Gabriel get up on his knees, and then unsteadily stand. “You will instruct us now as to what needs to be done.”

  “I’ll show you. Keep all the guns on me you want.”

  Dinanath’s cell phone trilled then, echoing in the chamber.

  “That’ll be Daddy,” Gabriel said. “Better answer it.”

  “Silence!” Dinanath dealt another backhand to Gabriel’s face.

  Gabriel felt his jaw swing and heard his neck tendons pop. His dentist was going to be overjoyed if he ever got out of this alive.

  Dinanath stepped away for a hushed cell phone conference out of earshot. As he spoke, Dinanath’s body seemed to shrink in on itself, diminishing. Awkwardly he returned and held the cell phone to Gabriel’s ear.

  “Mr. Hunt?” came Cheung’s voice. The man might have been excited or he might have been furious, but you couldn’t tell—he sounded as calm as still water. “My man has sketched the situation for me. If you would be so kind as to lend my group the benefit of your expertise, your trained eye, I would be greatly in your debt, and I am certain your brother would find any possible discovery to be of immeasurable value both to me and to your Foundation. Find me the Killers of Men and all debts are paid in full.”

  “All debts?” Gabriel said, trying to match Cheung cool for cool. He had to work his mouth back into speaking form first. “How about the women?”

  “You can have them if you like. I leave that to your judgment. I would only ask that they leave the country and never return. Do you agree?”

  “Yes,” Gabriel said. “But your man here is eager to pound the crap out of me some more, maybe shoot me, instead of getting you what you want.”

  “You have found the vault and know the way in,” Cheung said. “If I leave it to them, they shall still be loitering around there at this time next month. Prove your worthiness, Mr. Hunt, and rest assured that if anyone harms you further, it will be his final act on earth.”

  It was pretty clear who Cheung was talking about.

  “That sounds good,” Gabriel said, “but you’re not here. I don’t see how you can ensure my safety from wherever you are.”

  “You’ll have to take that risk, Mr. Hunt.”

  Gabriel raised his voice. “What if there’s treasure in the vault—gold, precious stones, old money? Shouldn’t you be here to ensure none of it goes astray?”

  “Not necessary,” Cheung said. “My men have discipline. Anyway, I have another pestersome matter I must deal with first.”

  Ivory, Gabriel figured.

  “You also want to be far away in case anything goes wrong,” said Gabriel.

  “We understand each other, Mr. Hunt.”

  “All right,” Gabriel said. “We’ll play it your way.” He heard the call terminate. It would have been good if Cheung had agreed to come immediately, but it didn’t matter much that he hadn’t. Cheung would not be able to stay away for long, not when it came out that Gabriel was, in fact, telling the truth. Even if the Killers of Men were not precisely what Cheung had expected—he’d want to see them for himself.

  Meanwhile, Cheung’s men here in the shrine room, had very clearly heard the words gold, precious stones, old money. Already he could see the men whispering, plotting how they might reteam to double-cross one another.

  It looked hopeless. It was perfect.

  “I can’t see the shrine room from here,” said Mitch, giving up on the binoculars. Her hands were shaking badly and her head was hurting. “We have to go back.”

  “No, we have to go forward,” said Qi. “It is as Gabriel said—we must take the head of the serpent. That is the thing I lost sight of.”

  They worked their way down the rock escarpment, closer to the reassuring cover of trees and brush, in darkness, undetected.

  “Cheung really wants those skeletons you found, dung and all?”

  “Yes. Although how Gabriel means to use them, I have no idea.”

  “You don’t think he’s just stepping up so we can get away?” Mitch kept glancing back, second-guessing.

  “No. That would be foolhardy.” Qi’s eyes were like flint chips in the dark.

  “Maybe just self-sacrificing,” said Mitch.

  “Illogical,” returned Qi. “That is why I believe he has another plan. He may be a reckless man, but he is not a foolish one. If it were only his life at risk, maybe—but with Cheung holding his brother, I have to conclude his choice was tactical.”

  “Well,” Mitch conceded, “I haven’t heard any shooting yet.”

  They could see the helicopter in the clearing below them to the west, on a flat mesa just big enough to provide a landing zone. Mitch got a better look at it through the nightsco
pe on the rifle Qi had thrust into her hands. She tried her damndest to hold it steady as she squinted to see through it.

  The Kamov was a Russian special ops aircraft about a decade old, comparable to the Bell 430 or the Sikorsky S-76, Mitch knew. The four-bladed coaxial rotor was still now. Many iterations of the Kamov were manufactured in Russia for foreign sale; knowing Cheung’s present orbits, this one had probably come into his hands via India. It was painted combat green over black and—interestingly—featured no registry numbers.

  The pilot still had his helmet on, and his buddy was holding at port arms an M4 with a stretch magazine. Both were smoking. The M4 was less accurate at distance fire than the M16 it largely replaced; still, you wouldn’t want to be within 150 meters of a 30-round spray…and Mitch and Qi were already well within the bubble.

  Qi tugged Mitch’s sleeve. “Can you fly that thing?”

  “Depends who you ask,” Mitch said. “The U.S. Air Force has some doubts.”

  Qi’s face fell.

  “But they’re wrong,” Mitch said. She started down the final slope.

  Chapter 21

  Right on cue, a wayward bat flittered out of the crack on the right side of the idol once Gabriel had worked the hidden lever. Its timing could not have been better. Dinanath’s men watched it wheel crazily around the upper curve of the shrine room until it found a roost.

  “Hold it,” said Gabriel, raising a hand. Dinanath turned to his crew and everyone froze. “See that bat? There could be more inside. We don’t know how large the chamber actually is. We have to be quiet and cautious.”

  Fully half of Dinanath’s force was conscripted to muscle the foot-thick iron panel, which yielded by degrees. Gabriel raised a hand and pointed at the small chalk mark he had made at about the midpoint of the panel’s arc—when the opening was slightly wider than a man.

  “Stop,” he said. “We must not open this all the way.”

  “Countermeasures?” said Dinanath.

  “Yes—remember your history. Traps in tombs. We must be silent and very careful. Do you smell that? More bats inside. The footing will be treacherous. Excess noise will disturb the bats. Have you ever done this sort of thing before?”