(Wrath-08)-Evil In The Darkness (2013)

by Chris Stewart

  The gang leader’s leg collapsed, his kneecap shattered. Four-tenths of a second later, the sound of the gunshot reached him. He cried in agony and fell onto the dirty street.

  Sam shot a full burst now, aiming over the attackers’ heads. Brick, mortar, dust and shattered pieces of metal exploded all around them as half a dozen bullets impacted the side of the building next to where they stood. Some of them screamed. All of them dropped to the ground, their guns aimed in various directions. Azadeh fell, throwing her arms up to cover her head between her knees.

  The crowded street exploded with crying, fleeing people. A couple of the men hunkered down and shot, sending random bullets into the air. Then they froze, looking for the shooter, not considering the vital need for cover, foolishly leaving themselves exposed out on the street. Sam aimed again, this time more carefully, and fired again. Another man went down, a quarter-sized hole through the middle of his chest. Another screamed, threw down his weapon, turned and ran. The remaining men continued shouting to each other, pointing left and right. They searched up and down the street, their eyes jerking frantically. Sam remained hidden in the second corner window of the building, a full city block away. If they can see you, they can kill you. He barely raised his head above the windowsill.

  Another shot, this one another warning a few inches over the tallest man’s head. Cries and screams of fear and pain and anger. One of the men moved and hid behind another. A couple of them took up firing positions, but their handguns were no match for the shooter—that was painfully clear.

  Another shot, this one between them.

  That was it. They got the message. This wasn’t a fight they were going to win.

  The men scattered and ran. Some fled up the sidewalk, heading north. A couple ran into the crowd, bending low among the panicked people who were running up and down the street.

  Sam waited until the shooters had disappeared, then lifted his head above the window and called out. “Azadeh, can you hear me?”

  She stood slowly. It was too noisy. She didn’t hear him call. Screams and cries and people running on the street surrounded her. Her eyes darted left and right.

  Sam called again, but she still didn’t hear him.

  Standing in confusion, she hesitated, then quickly turned and ran, moving down the street toward him, back in the direction from which they had come.

  “Good girl, good girl,” Sam coaxed her even though she couldn’t hear. “Don’t look back, just keep on running. I’ll be waiting for you down on the street.”

  He watched. She was getting closer. He did a final check for the gang members, then called her name again. She looked up at him, finally hearing his voice. He motioned to her and she understood.

  Leaving the window, he ran back through the hallway and down the stairs and met her on the street.

  Fifteen minutes later, they pushed into Mary’s apartment building and made their way up the stairs. Knocking on the door, they waited desperately until Mary let them in.

  “Where have you been?” Sara asked in a worried voice as they rushed into the room.

  Sam and Azadeh glanced at each other but didn’t say anything.

  They had already decided there were a few things the others didn’t need to know.

  * * * * * * *

  Across the street from the apartment building, a soldier in a dark uniform watched through a long-range scope. The glass in Mary’s apartment had been tinted with a layer of opaque film to keep the sun out, but he still could see enough, and he reached up to the radio transmitter at his neck.

  “I’ve got them,” he said.

  “Are you certain?” the controller asked.

  “Yeah, it’s them.”

  “Stand by,” the controller told him.

  Three minutes later, the controller came back. “Stay in position. Keep a tag on her.”

  “For how long?” the soldier asked.

  “Until we tell you.”

  The soldier answered, “Roger,” and sat down for the wait.

  TEN

  Vienna, Virginia, Twelve Miles West of Washington, D.C.

  Brucius Theodore Marino stood in the bedroom window looking out on the street. A dozen stalled cars still cluttered the road, though most had finally been pushed out of the way, the worthless metal carcasses left at awkward angles along both sides of the street. The houses in the neighborhood were old, a mix of red-brick, two-story Victorians and old southern plantation homes with white siding and green or black porches that wrapped around from the front doors to the sides. The street was narrow, with old trees draping their branches over the pavement, almost forming a tunnel of branches and leaves. All was quiet—it was still very early in the morning—and he couldn’t see anyone on the sidewalk or the street.

  Which meant almost nothing.

  He knew that they were near.

  He stood, feeling the oppressive lack of sound. He wasn’t used to silence and certainly not used to being alone. He had staff: security men, personal aides, drivers, butlers, maids, and chefs. He had three full-bird colonels whose only jobs were to attend to his travel schedule, and four-star generals climbing over themselves to see that his will was done. He had black sedans, underground bunkers, military helicopters, and jet aircraft at his beck and call.

  No, he wasn’t used to the silence, especially the silence of being alone.

  But he was alone now. Alone in a way that he’d never been before.

  He stood behind the lacy curtain, then moved slowly to his right, looking farther up the street. The residential lane turned into a T intersection at Lawyers Road, which cut through Vienna from the northwest on its way toward Washington, D.C. Ironic, he thought, he’d spent his entire life working as, with, for, and against various lawyers. He worked, ate, slept, partied, ran, philosophized, argued, skied, hunted, and drank with various lawyers—pretty much spent his entire life with members of the second oldest profession. Yet, he would happily admit that he hated them all. Shakespeare’s notion was genius: They should kill the lawyers first.

  His grandfather had been a lawyer. His father had been a lawyer. He was a lawyer, graduate of Harvard Law. But his son would never be a lawyer. He would simply not allow it. Not unless they killed him first and buried him somewhere underneath Lawyers Road.

  How a lawyer and business leader found himself the civilian commander of the greatest military force in the world, Brucius didn’t know. Looking back on his life, he sometimes wondered. Trading the boardroom for the bunker—was it a worthy sacrifice? “Hey, with a crazy name like Brucius, what’d you expect?” his wife had used to tease. “Where’d your mom come up with that one?” He figured that was as good an explanation as any other: It was all his mother’s fault.

  Frowning, he looked out, his heart racing, his palms sweating at his side. He heard footsteps behind him and quickly turned around. His daughter knocked once and entered the small bedroom. “Dad?” she said in a questioning voice. “You’re up early.”

  “So are you.”

  She glanced at the still-made bed. “You didn’t sleep at all last night.”

  “I slept some.” He nodded to the leather chair.

  She frowned in displeasure, a growing look of concern on her face.

  “Where’s Kyle?” her father said, asking about his son-in-law.

  “We heard they’re setting up a government aid center at the Metro station in Falls Church. He’s going to walk down and see if we can get some baby formula and milk.”

  He winced at her words, a crush of pain and guilt sweeping over him.

  He could get them milk. He could get them baby formula. He could get them anything they wanted and he could get it right now. He could make sure his daughter and her family lived. He was, after all, one of the most powerful men left on earth, and he could have more power. He could have anything he wanted.

  All he had to do was come out of hiding. All he had to do was go along.

  She watched her father’s face and stepped toward him.
“Daddy, are you OK?”

  He tried to smile at her. “It’s eight or nine miles to the Metro station in Falls Church.”

  “Kyle’s in good shape. No big deal for him. And if we could get some formula, that’d be a really good thing.”

  Her father’s face contorted in pain again.

  “Dad, are you OK?” she pressed a second time.

  He nodded at her sadly. “I’m fine. Really.”

  She shook her head in frustration. “I don’t think you are, Dad. I don’t think you’re fine at all. Look at you. This is absolutely crazy! Do I need to remind you who you are? Do I need to remind you of the position you hold? I don’t know what you’re afraid of, I don’t know anything anymore, but surely the government can protect you. If things are as bad as you say they are, if you don’t trust your own people, there has to be someone—the Secret Service, maybe—someone you could trust to keep you safe.”

  He waved a hand to dismiss her, then turned away, glancing back toward the window. She took two steps toward him and paused. He knew he looked old, many years older than he had seemed just a few weeks before. She held her hand to her mouth, then folded her arms. “You’re scaring me, Dad. You’re scaring me very badly.”

  He turned and walked toward her, put his hands on her shoulders, and looked deep into her eyes. “I’m sorry, honey, more sorry than you’ll ever know. I don’t mean to scare you. I don’t mean to do anything. A few more days, a few more hours maybe, and I’ll be out of your way.”

  “Out of my way, Dad? What does that mean? You think I consider you a problem, something I need to get out of my way? This is crazy, Dad, crazy. I’m really worried about you now.”

  He tried to smile again, a weak effort she didn’t buy. “No reason to be frightened for me,” he said a quiet and perfectly unconvincing voice.

  “Are you kidding? Either there’s a really good reason or you’ve completely lost your mind. You skulk around, hiding from your shadow, refusing to let me answer the phone. Everything’s a secret. I can’t open my front door. For heaven’s sake, Dad, you’re scared to death, and yet you dismiss your security detail, telling them all to go home. You leave your own house and go into hiding, coming here to stay with me and Kyle. Yes, Dad, I’m frightened for you. I’d be stupid not to be.”

  The baby started crying from the nursery down the hall, low at first, a few grumbles that were muffled by the door, but quickly growing with displeasure as the infant sought something to eat.

  The young women tried to pull away from her father’s grip. “The baby,” she whispered when he didn’t let her go.

  He tightened his hands against her shoulders, looking into her brown eyes. “I’m so sorry,” he repeated. He said the same thing to her at least once or twice a day.

  She looked at him, her eyes tearing with concern. “Don’t you say that to me, Daddy. Don’t you ever say that, OK? You’ve got no reason to be sorry. Don’t you ever tell me that again.”

  * * * * * * *

  A small crowd of boys had assembled on the corner, watching in disbelief. A car that was working! They stared as the black SUV drove quickly up the street.

  The driver pulled over two blocks from the objective and turned off the ignition. The four men sat for a moment talking, then got out. One of them turned and walked toward the group of teenagers. He said something to them and they scattered. Rejoining the group, he talked another moment with the men before three of them started walking, leaving the driver to guard the car. Very little about the men was subtle. Black suits. White shirts. Dark glasses. Black Bacco Bucci lace-up shoes. The driver had a Heckler and Koch MP5K machine pistol hanging from a strap around his shoulder. A thin wire ran under his dark suit to the receiver in his ear.

  No, they were not subtle. But the fight was out in the open now, and they didn’t care about subtlety anymore.

  The war had started. It was upon them, the first battle taking shape. Assassins and saviors were on the move now, their forces rushing together, opposing soldiers crashing toward each other on the street.

  The first casualty or survivor of the battle would be the Secretary of Defense. Whether he lived or died depended on who got to him first.

  The three men walked a hundred yards together. At the corner, they split up. One of them turned east. The other two stayed together, walking toward Lawyers Street.

  ELEVEN

  Vienna, Virginia, Twelve Miles West of Washington, D.C.

  The man walked toward the rising sun. Approaching the road that ran behind the target, he glanced back toward his comrades, but they had already disappeared. He turned. Walking quickly, almost jogging, he moved down a narrow driveway, then jumped a low fence and made his way through the backyard. A dog yelped at him, but he ignored the dog. Twenty feet from the back fence, he started running, then jumped, his powerful legs driving him up. Pulling himself over the fence, he dropped onto the other side.

  A huge backyard lay before him. Lots of shrubs and oak and sycamore trees. Grass and a small goldfish pond. A large hedge along the swimming pool. He bent to his knees beside the vinca plants and studied the house. No movement. He listened. No sound. To his right, the lawn sloped away, allowing a walkout basement at the back of the house. He listened once more to the voice inside his tiny earpiece, then crouched and ran toward the door.

  * * * * * * *

  The Secretary of Defense watched as his daughter pulled away from him and turned for the bedroom door. Standing in the center of the room, he listened as her footsteps faded down the hall. The baby was insistent now, crying loudly, the hunger driving him, and Brucius could hear his daughter’s soft voice as she tried to soothe him, the creaking of the crib’s wood frame as she lifted the child into her arms.

  He stood for a moment, looking toward the window, then moved to the bed and sat down. His shoes had been pushed under the mattress rail and he leaned over, put them on, and tied them quickly. Straightening his back, his hands on his knees, he listened to the silence once again. The baby wasn’t crying now and he wondered how, without formula, she’d made him stop. Standing, he opened the bedroom door and moved down the hall toward the nursery. Pushing back the door, he looked inside.

  No one was there.

  The bedroom window was open, a quiet breeze blowing the light curtains back.

  He called his daughter’s name, then heard footsteps downstairs in the kitchen and quickly moved down the hall.

  “Jenny, you down there?”

  No answer.

  He descended the stairs, stopped at the bottom and listened again, then walked toward the kitchen. Morning light filtered through the hallway window, and shadows from the swaying oak tree in the backyard moved across the back porch. He thought he heard his daughter’s voice and walked into the kitchen.

  The room was empty.

  The backdoor was open. He glanced out. No one was in the yard.

  He instantly panicked, running into the living room. No one. The house was quiet and empty. It seemed he was alone. He couldn’t be! Not so quickly! How could they have gotten in?

  “Jenny! Jenny!” he cried. “Kyle! Are you here?” He ran to the front door and found it locked. He looked through the window to the front yard. Not a soul in sight. He ran toward the basement, calling their names. Pushing the door over the narrow steps, he peered into the dark. A cool flow of air blew up against his face.

  * * * * * * *

  The two men stopped at the intersection of Lawyers Road, standing beside a six-foot fence. The target house was halfway down the block and they studied the scene before them: rows of handsome Victorian and plantation homes, heavy trees, their leaves gold and orange and ready to fall, a dozen dead cars pushed to the curb, a quiet road, a quiet breeze.

  Not a soul in sight. A quiet morning.

  The leader listened to the receiver shoved inside his ear canal, pressing it more firmly into place, then cocked his head.

  They couldn’t take the target until they killed the others who were also af
ter him. They couldn’t kill the others until they found them. And they didn’t know where they were.

  Eighteen thousand feet above them, a pilotless drone moved silently through the empty sky, its sensors looking down, its hypersensitive radar, visual, infrared, and ultraviolet sensors scanning the two-block radius around them inch by inch. Far away—from what location, the leader didn’t know, perhaps an unknown base inside the United States, but more likely from a CIA site overseas—a military pilot controlled the drone, flying it by satellite-remote control, the drone’s sensors relaying what it sensed or saw. And the Predator reconnaissance aircraft saw everything. It could count the squirrels in the trees around them from their body heat, detect the coolness from the water trapped in rain gutters from the downpour the night before, sense the vibration on the front windows of the various homes enough to know if anyone was speaking inside. The man looked up, feeling naked, knowing the Predator could read the heat that escaped through his shirt collar accurately enough to estimate the heartbeats in his chest, knowing it could fire its Hellfire missiles at him and he would never know, the explosion killing him seconds before he ever saw or heard the missiles coming at him through the air.