Without another word, he turned and strode down the hall where Agent Holman stood cooling his heels.
“Boss is sure pleased with us.” Roy hung up his cell phone after speaking with Alex.
Sunday morning found him and Connor parked in their van east of the Mall on Independence Avenue, their focus spread between the Capitol and the Senate office buildings. Security footage and traffic cameras had yielded more shots of the mystery food truck, most recently outside the Dirksen/Hart Senate building; an odd happenstance for what most people and especially Congressmen, considered a day of rest.
The way Roy had it figured, the sniper was prowling, maybe scoping out his next target. Or maybe, the target was already marked and just didn’t know it. They’d checked the last reported sighting, but came up with nothing. For now, it was a game of wait and see.
Most private contractors in the covert surveillance business would have been challenged and rousted by FBI or Metro PD. Since 9-11, federal law had drawn a strict zero tolerance line in the sand. Any infraction in the vicinity of federal property could and would bring repercussions from any number of federal bad boys, including the Secret Service’s very capable and accurate sharpshooters. Three assassinations had only made the Feds more intense. But for the grace of the FBI contract, Roy and Connor would have been targets too.
“He should be pleased,” Connor answered, his nose planted in the bank of monitors.
“Director Strong didn’t look none too happy though. Guess he’s not a morning person.”
“Nope,” Connor answered automatically, his mind not on the conversation like Roy would have preferred.
He had to admit, not only was the young man a good operator, but he’d made Alex and The TEAM look good. The kid should have been a politician. He’d compiled a Situation Report, a sitrep, for the FBI Director that hit all the high notes, including a detailed description of the fast food truck, precise ballistics, and the standing theory on how the sniper might have been able to take those three fatal shots.
He’d then supported every argument with surveillance photos and offered Roy’s expert opinion as to the sniper’s profile: most likely an older man, ex-military, and trained by the very government he’d now declared war on. If that wasn’t enough, Connor had craftily inserted rock solid evidence of Harley’s whereabouts during each assassination, again with enough pictures to reject Agent Holman’s claim of Harley as sniper and Judy as accomplice.
“Still can’t figure what evidence the FBI thought they had on Harley though.”
“Ah huh.” Connor supplied another half-interested response, only this one made no sense.
Roy jumped off his chair to double-check the monitors. “What are you looking at?”
Connor’s focus never strayed from the monitor he had his nose against, but his tapping foot betrayed his nervous energy. “I’m working.”
“A girl? I should have known.”
Their rooftop scope had caught live action crossing the street. Connor’s target was the sweet young thing dressed in extra long legs and strappy red heels that matched her short skirt and revealing sweater top. Long black hair swung cheerfully behind as she bounced along the crosswalk, her movement full of grace, vitality, and good old-fashioned sex appeal.
“You, junior agent, are a horn dog. She’s a cutie, but a mite young for my taste.”
Connor spun around on his chair to face Roy. “You want me to grab us some coffee?”
“Hell no.” Roy grinned. “All you want is an excuse to get into that little gal’s trajectory. I know how you young guys think, and it ain’t with your brains. ’Sides, you’d probably forget the coffee once you caught up with her and I’d still be thirsty.”
“Seriously? You think I’d forget an old man’s coffee?” Connor’s eyes were teasing, mischievous, and their normal lady-killer blue this morning. A look shifted across his face that made Roy think the kid might beg. Roy swiveled the scope back to the work at hand. “Focus.”
“Just because you’re way past your prime, doesn’t mean I am” Connor let out a low whistle. “Damn. I see you, oh yes, honey, I do see you.” His foot tapped like an old coonhound with an itch.
“You’re incorrigible.” Roy didn’t ask again. By the time he’d checked several other feeds, Connor was back on task, more or less, and another long day of covert surveillance had begun.
But Roy lived to tease. “I’ll make the coffee run. You want anything?” he asked as he stepped to van door.
It worked. “Oh sure, I see how it works. I’m stuck in here with a... with a...”
“Stop feeling sorry for yourself. You want coffee or not?” Roy couldn’t help but grin. The girl-hungry kid was an easy mark.
“Ah, Roy.”
“Come on. I’ll get her number if I run into her. You want a muffin too?”
“I’m serious. You’ve got to see this. I think our mystery truck just parked down the street.” Connor scooted out of his chair so Roy could verify.
“Who drove it in?”
“That’s the thing. I don’t see anyone. Looks like the truck drove itself. The front seat is vacant and the windows are darkened. I don’t see anyone, do you?”
Roy checked another angle of the same shot. “Sure not. Looks like an open cab. There’s a curtain behind the driver’s seat. I can see that much.”
“You think someone drove it here by remote control? Never thought of that. Crap. Our sniper friend could be running his entire operation by robotics.”
“This ain’t Hollywood. There’s a flesh and blood man in the rig. We’re just not seeing him yet.”
“You do know robotics are not science fiction, don’t you?” Connor insisted. “Look at the drones coming out of McCormack Industries. In ten years they’ll replace boots on the ground.”
“Not going to happen. Keep an eye on the truck. Anybody takes a step out of it, and they’re ours. I’ll advise our friends at the Bureau.”
Nineteen
Harley woke to the cheerless face of a strange man sitting in the corner of his room. He looked familiar, but Harley couldn’t be sure. His brain had told him wrong too many times lately. Between body parts and shopping carts, he wasn’t sure what was real and what was illusion. Minutes ticked by.
Harley ventured a guess. “You in the wrong room?”
The man looked up, startled and kind of sad. “How you doing, son?”
Great. This guy’s my father? The man had tired blue eyes, but he didn’t seem old enough. No way. He can’t be my old man.
Dressed in running pants and a gray sweatshirt with bright gold USMC screaming across his chest, he looked kinda like he might be a friend. Maybe. Harley would have known for sure if that sweatshirt was olive drab and screamed ARMY like a truly decent shirt should.
“I’m good,” Harley answered because that’s what soldiers tell each other. They could be half-dead, shot to hell, missing limbs and an eyeball, but still insist they were good.
“Thought I’d see how you’re doing now that you’re no longer FBI property,” the man said quietly. “I told Judy I’d sit with you while she ran home to get her massage table. We’ve been worried.”
“Judy?” Harley asked as he pulled himself into a better sitting position. “Oh yeah. The nurse.”
The guy sounded familiar. Maybe he knew him. Heck, maybe this guy could explain how he’d gotten the welts around his wrists. He held up one hand intending to ask, but the man beat him to it. “The FBI cuffed you. I guess you didn’t much appreciate it.”
FBI? Cuffed? The memory eluded him like so many others.
“They were out of line. They should have never done that.”
“Am I a prisoner or something?”
“No. They’re just jackasses.”
“I know you?” he asked as politely as possible. No sense in offending the first person he ran into in, umm, wherever he was.
The man rose to his feet. Harley jumped, startled at the man’s sudden movement. Anxiety roared to a
fever pitch. In one split second, fight or flight stomped the living crap out of him all over again. Harley reached for the rifle even though he knew it was not alongside his leg anymore. His lungs clamped shut. He couldn’t breathe.
“It’s okay,” the man soothed like he needed to calm a skittish dog. Oddly, it worked. The tone in his voice melted a lot of Harley’s unfounded nervousness. The guy pulled his chair next to the bed where he sat again. “Take it easy. Just thought we could talk until Judy gets back. That’s all. Do you remember me?”
“Nope.” That was one thing Harley was sure of. He didn’t know shit.
“Did Mark stop by last night?”
Harley started to shake his head, but he did recall a dark-haired guy with a little blond sticking close to his side. They were both extra kind, and…. Oh yeah. Mark and Libby. They had a new baby. JayJay. They were his friends. Good to know.
“He was here. Why’d you want to know? You looking for him?”
The man with blue eyes relaxed. “No, but I hoped you’d remember me too. I’m Alex.”
Harley stared, his mental fingertips whirling over the damaged Rolodex in his head. Alex. Alex. Nope. Not coming up with anyone named Alex. His feet started tapping a fast beat against the sheets as anxiety ramped up again. This guy was making him nervous.
“You remember Whisper and Smoke?”
Again with the frantic mind search. No guys named Whisper or Smoke bubbled up. Tension slithered over the back of his skull. His hair prickled. Do I know anything?
“No problem. Whisper is my black Shepherd.” Alex kept talking softly. “Thought you might remember him. He thinks you and Kelsey walk on water.”
Kelsey? Harley blinked. Okay, that name sounded familiar. Kelsey, huh? A lightning storm flashed in his broken brain. Not Kelsey, but Kelsey Girl. Yeah. That was her name and she… And she…
“I think I might know her. Sexy brunette? Long legs? Small boobs?”
A soft smile crinkled the corners of Alex’s eyes. “She’s my wife.”
Shit! Harley coughed because he wanted to die. Mortimer, you dumb ass. First time you open your mouth, you stick your whole damned leg in.
“S-s-sorry.” Embarrassment flamed up his neck and the walls closed in. “Didn’t mean to—”
“Forget it. She wouldn’t mind.”
Smart or not, Harley caught the drift in the sad words. Something had happened to Kelsey.
“She okay?”
“I hope so,” Alex whispered.
His lack of detailed information created another wave of nerves. The man needed to leave. Harley feared the answer to his next question because he knew so little. What had he done? What hadn’t he done? He asked it anyway. “Did I... hurt her?”
“You’d never hurt Kelsey, son.” Alex shook his head and there was that word again. Son. It spoke of a link, but it soothed as much as it aggravated.
“You love Kelsey, and she loves you.”
That didn’t help. I love his wife? She loves me? He doesn’t have a problem with that? Somehow, Harley could not believe he was that kind of dumb. The weight of the world sat square in his chest, and he could not catch enough air. Nothing made sense. This Alex dude didn’t look like the kind of guy who’d allow another dude cheating with his wife.
“You saved her life a couple years back. You rescued her.” Alex kept making it worse.
Harley squeezed his eyes shut, wishing it were easier to think. Still.... Rescuing a man’s wife seemed like a good thing, a lot better than cheating. Kelsey Girl. Help me out here. Send me a sign.
The image of a black German Shepherd filtered up through the spinning Rolodex. The goofy dog growled like he thought he could talk. Droopy ear. Shiny, black licorice lips. He’d found something. Someone. Another flash hit Harley’s memory board, lighting it up with information.
Harley gasped. Suffocation escalated into hyperventilation. An image of a gentle woman tied to a tree, her hair chopped off and her face bloody. Kelsey. Whisper kept licking her; she kept crying. He climbed onto her lap, whining like he was telling Harley, I found her. Stay back. She’s mine.
Another man’s face, a man with greasy blond hair and a rifle, penetrated the fog. He fell to his knees with Harley’s bullet in his skull. Anxiety fled.
“I killed her ex,” he declared firmly. Proudly too. Air filled his lungs. Now I remember. Hell, yeah, I’d send Nick Durrant to hell every chance I got.
A spark of relief lit Alex’s tired eyes. “Yes, and I’m grateful every day you did.”
Harley straightened in his bed and sucked in a deep breath. Okay. Alex can stay. We’re solid. We’re good. “I get the feeling you’re my boss?”
“I’d like to think I’m more than that.”
Harley found himself pulled into a bear hug. Alex was right. The embrace felt bigger, like Harley had hit shore, like Alex was anchor and compass all rolled into one. Maybe more.
“You run yourself down all the time, but you are no idiot, Harley. You’re a damned sharp man and a professional sniper. You’ve made this world a better place. Give yourself some credit. I’m lucky you work for me and not some other security company. Hell. We all are.”
Whoa. That came out of the blue, but it helped.
“So tell me about Rick Cross, Snakes Flynn, and Kent Roosevelt.”
Shit! The universe shifted in a hard about-face turn. Harley choked. One minute hero, the next—what? Bastard? Coward? Shame crept up the back of his throat. Alex leaned away, but the lightning rod of his arm and hand remained solidly connected. “It’s time to remember, son. Trust me. I’ve been through it too. I’m right here.”
Thousands of memories downloaded spontaneously.
BLAM! Playing poker at Camp Wolfe in Kuwait with the guys. Hot stretches of desert. The most ungodly dust storms that swallowed the whole sky. Brown-eyed children. Unbearable tension. Every-damn-where.
OOMPH! Direct hit. Mongrel dogs he wasn’t supposed to touch much less sneak food to. Relentless Scud attacks. Night skies full of the wrong kinds of light and thunder. Ancient men with leathery faces and deep-set eyes. The smell of sewer and death. Always death....
INCOMING! Humvees. MRAPs. IEDs. IEDs. The download seemed stuck in a loop. IED. IED. One particular IED.... That IED. That one particular sonofabitchin IED.
He gulped, his fingers automatically searching the back of his head for a handful of blood. Sure enough, only the one he’d expected to find was different. Bigger. Bloodier.
“Where’s my men? You know don’t you?”
“You tell me.” It wasn’t what Alex said or how he said it, but something about those words felt like a winding circular staircase that morphed into an endless chute with a killer drop-off at the end of the ride. Terror ratcheted up Harley’s throat, stealing breath with every tightening crank until it hurt to inhale.
“Rick.” He was barely able to spit the name of his buddy out of his dry mouth. He tried again, his heart ready to explode. “Rick Cross. Where is he?”
Darkness pushed the peace away. Harley wanted Alex to leave and never come back, but he couldn’t let go of the man’s arm. He was drowning in desert sand, and Alex was the only life vest in sight. He gripped his boss’s shoulder. “Don’t lose me.”
“Never.” Alex pulled Harley into a solid wall of brotherhood that knew the cost of a man’s heart in war.
Harley sucked in a deep breath through his nostrils, snuffing back the wave of terror building up in his head. The words fell out of his mouth, the sorriest words he’d ever known, like bells tolling. Funeral bells. “My men! My men! My men!”
The curtain of smoke parted, and Harley saw them clearly. Corporal Rick Cross, best damned liar in the 4th Infantry. Man, the guy could spin a yarn that would make the truth look bad. A guy never knew when Rick was being straight or lying through his teeth, but the stories he could tell. The jokes. The concussion from the IED threw him off the side of the Humvee where shrapnel laid him low. So much blood. Shoulda never gone to war. Shoulda been
a stand-up comedian. Shoulda lived....
Harley gripped Alex harder, his breath coming in short, tight huffs, and Alex hanging on with a death grip. Sergeant Kent Roosevelt’s grinning face showed next, truly a brother from another mother. Black as the deepest south, Kent was deeply Baptist and profoundly religious. Said that’s why he’d joined the Army, to be all he could be cuz his mama would whup his butt if he didn’t make something more out of himself than a fry cook at the local barbecue hut.
Of course she cried her eyes out the day he enlisted, but he was the closest thing to a brother Harley’d ever known. An only child straight out of New York couldn’t ask for better family than the 4th. Or a better brother than Kent.
The flood of memories continued. Captain Percy Flynn who insisted everyone call him Snakes or risk a verbal slap down. His baby brother had recently joined up. About time. Snakes was proud. Got all misty-eyed and everything.
Carlton Jenner, proud new daddy who’d show anyone who would listen, and even some who wouldn’t, the latest picture from home of his brand new baby girl. She had pink pajamas with little gray tabby kittens. And she’d never remember her Daddy cuz she never got the chance to meet him, not even once.
Harley choked. He wanted to meet that baby girl, to hold her and tell her what kind of man her daddy was. He wanted to smell her hair and hug her little baby-powdered body, maybe pour some of her father’s love for his country into her.
By the time the show ended, Harley was limp and convinced. Death alongside them would’ve been noble. Living without them sure wasn’t. “I killed ’em.”
“No, you didn’t. War killed them. You were just there when it happened.” Alex clamped onto Harley’s hand, one of those extra strong and mean clamps that would still be holding a two-by-four joist together long after the tornado blew the house away.
“But I left them.”
“So? You damned near got your head blown off. What else could you have done?”
“They’re gone, and I’m... Not.” He cringed at the pathetic sound of those words in his ears.
“No.” Alex bumped the right side of Harley’s chest very gently. “They’re not gone. They’re right. Everyday. Don’t ever forget them. Honor them. Let them be the heroes they are. They gave you a gift. Not a curse.”
Harley (In the Company of Snipers Book 4) Page 16