Recon

by David McCaleb

  Before he could, Lori jerked him down the adjacent checkout aisle. He ran after her outside. She leaned into a freezer and lifted out two bags of ice. “Stay here. Then choke out the driver.” She turned and walked across the street.

  What driver? Red’s taxi had dropped him and sped off an hour ago. Why’d she take bags of ice? Lori approached a red Audi A4 parked in front of a white Subaru. A sporty model. The Audi’s driver glanced up from a glowing screen, then scrambled out his door. He grabbed the plastic bags from Lori with one hand, holding the rear door open with the other.

  That’s my girl. The ice must’ve been meant to set up the driver so Red could put him to sleep.

  As the man dropped them into the trunk, Red snuck up behind and locked his neck into a choke hold. The driver couldn’t scream. He struggled for a few seconds; then his body collapsed. Red started to push him into the trunk with the ice, then lowered him to the sidewalk instead. He’d be safer there and come to in a few seconds.

  Lori slid through the driver’s door. Red followed, shoving her across the console to the passenger seat. “I’m driving. You navigate.” Manual transmission. Perfect.

  Shouts came from inside the store, echoed by three cracks from the Galil, then pops from the pistol. He shifted into second, redlined the tach, popped the clutch, and they shot forward as all four wheels squealed on the damp pavement. Steered like it was on rails. The turbo whined and gulped air as he slapped the shifter through its gate.

  Lori buckled her belt and fingered her phone. Straight black hair, pale skin. She looked like the wife from The Addams Family. Kind of turned him on. “What’s your exfil?”

  She lunged at him and shoved his shoulder. “What the hell was that about?”

  With his wife, the line between sorrow and anger often blurred. “What was what about? I’m making this up as I go.” He yanked the wheel to avoid a pothole. “You OK?”

  “Why’d you bring Dad?”

  Bring her father? She trying to blame her mess on him? “I didn’t! You did.”

  She clenched her fingers into fists. “Why’re you here at all?”

  This was going nowhere. “Always wanted to visit Jerusalem and pick up a hooker. You’ll have to do.”

  She aimed a punch at his chin, but the shoulder strap stopped her swing short. She jabbed at his head with her off hand. He tapped the brakes, and the seat belt snatched her neck. “Calm down and get us back to the airport.” He paused at a stoplight, downshifted, and accelerated through the intersection into an on-ramp. No idea where they were headed, but it was away from the supermarket.

  “We’ve got a safe house ten kilometers from here. We can hole up, make some calls, and ensure all’s clear before we show our faces in public.”

  “Who’s Paili Baum? That name mean anything to you?”

  “No.”

  “Then we’ve got a name. You can check her out once we’re stateside. Finish what your father started.”

  “Dad knew he was dying when he said that. Whatever he was planning, it’s already in motion. We need to get to the safe house.”

  Red glanced in the rearview. A streetlight glinted off a white Subaru five seconds behind them. “We’re not going to your safe house.”

  Her eyes bulged. She shouted, “You’re out of your depth, Tony! Trust me. We can’t head to the Tel Aviv airport without making sure no one is going to be looking for us.”

  Hadn’t they worked through the trust issue back in the forest? Dr. Sato wasn’t doing their relationship any good. “I’m the one who just killed an assassin with a $1.99 steak knife. You attacked her with a grapefruit. And missed. I’m not the one out of my depth. Did I mention black hair makes you look like a Goth hooker?” Abreast of an exit ramp, he slammed on the brakes and twisted the wheel. The vehicle drifted sideways, tires trailing smoke. He applied power, pulling into a turn, rear bumper slipping past yellow crash barriers, throttling onto the ramp at ninety kilometers per hour. He glanced into the rear. Four doors. Enough room for booster seats. Maybe Lori would let him trade in the Explorer for one of these.

  The white Subaru made a sudden lane change and followed. He yelled over the engine and tire noise, “We can’t go to your safe house because we’ve got a tail. Just verified it.”

  Down a short straightaway the chase vehicle seemed to gain. Red steered between two storefronts, one with a neon shoe in the window, then made another quick turn into an alley. He slammed on the brakes and cut the lights. “You trust me?”

  She turned in his direction, but darkness obscured her expression. “Right now I think you’re a cocky, chauvinistic, egotistical sonofabitch.”

  “You knew that when you married me. But do you trust me?”

  “Yes! Whatever. Pull off the road if you’re trying to hide.”

  “Good. Then relax. You’ll need to be loose for this.” Red shifted into reverse, gunned the engine, and released the clutch. He twisted to see through the rear windshield, and the vehicle raced back down the alley, aimed at the road from which they’d just come. The intersection was dim, and a brown cement wall stood on the opposite side. Lori braced against the seat. As they closed in, other headlights sped toward the same intersection. He pressed the pedal all the way down. Needed to time this perfectly. Past the point of no return. With a crack, he collided with the chase vehicle. Metal crunched. Glass crashed. A sharp bang, an airbag curtain exploded down the rear windshield, and the car was filled with the acrid, phenolic scent of spent gunpowder.

  Chapter 32

  Gas Station

  Red leaped from the car. The Audi’s trunk was folded upward. The Subaru had been knocked from the roadway and was straddling a sidewalk, pinned between the Audi and a tall cinder block wall. One of the chase vehicle’s tires was canted, and its strut poked through the hood like a compound fracture. A hot mist of sweet-scented antifreeze rose from the wound. Behind a splintered windshield, the driver wrestled with his seat belt.

  Red dove through the warm cloud and landed on the hood. He punched through the windshield, reached between the spokes of the steering wheel, and grabbed the driver’s collar. It was the same blond man from the supermarket. A brown mole interrupted a crease on his forehead. Young looking, but his blue eyes were wide. Not familiar with the sting of surprise. No wonder Mole-Man was backup. Red jerked him forward and slammed his face into the wheel. Time to school gen X on the pain of failure. He repeated the motion like the cycling of a rifle bolt till Mole-Man’s terror was replaced with the numb glaze of unconsciousness. The shattered safety glass fell out of its seal and lay across him like a crystal blanket. Red leaned into the vehicle and probed the floor with his fingers. They landed on the hard outline of a Glock, and he snatched it up. He patted the unconscious driver’s pockets and jerked out two spare magazines.

  He scrambled away and slid off the hood. Tires chirped, and headlights turned onto the side street, aimed at the accident. An engine roared as a dark blue van raced toward them, moving too fast for neighborhood traffic. Twin orange marker lights glowed from the edge of the vehicle’s large side-view mirrors.

  Red hopped into the driver’s seat, tossed the weapon into Lori’s lap, slapped the vehicle in gear, and stomped the gas. Glass and metal tinkled like wind chimes as the vehicles separated. Three bullets cracked through the rear door, coming from the direction of the gaining vehicle. The alley was narrow with cars lining both sides. He plowed through potholes as the Audi accelerated.

  Options? No quick response could come from the Det. Keeping a tight lid on the investigation, Red hadn’t involved anyone besides Carter. So, no Hellfire missiles from a Reaper drone soaring forty thousand feet in the air. No response team prepositioned on the ground, either, ready to jump in and lend support. And this screwup was his own doing. He was the one who’d wanted to trail Lori like a lone wolf. It was as if they were right back among the trees of Pikes Peak National Forest, sever
ed from support, scrambling for their lives.

  He slapped the shifter into third and sped onto a dark straightaway, dimmed streetlights lining the median. “I can lose the van. But now we’re driving a car anyone can spot. Police will pull us over just because we don’t have taillights. Need to ditch this one and get another. Maybe at a parking lot.”

  Lori twisted to see out the rear window, reached, and yanked on the deflated airbag. She grunted with the effort, and it tore loose. “Get clear, then find a gas station. That’s the best place to make a trade.”

  But they needed to avoid cameras. “No. Most gas stations have CCTVs.”

  She shoved the curtain into the floor and stomped it down. She racked the Glock’s slide, shoved it and the two mags of ammo into the waist of her jeans, then untucked her blouse as a cover. “We won’t be in-country long enough for it to make a difference.” She patted his knee. “You did well, Tony. But brute force won’t get us out of the country. We’ve got to blend in. Disappear. We’re not at Pikes Peak. This is a landscape I’m familiar with.”

  * * * *

  Lori gripped Tony’s hard and calloused hand as they walked along a cracked sidewalk in front of two-story stucco townhomes in muted browns and tans. Each had a Kia or Toyota sedan parked in front, end to end. Impatiens or pansies dotted window boxes. But just across the quiet street sprouted a tangle of derelict apartments with broken balcony rails and shattered windows. The sidewalk was lined with sedans clad with multicolored body panels and wheels resting on cinder blocks. The air was still and cool, though heat radiated from the pavement.

  They’d ditched the Audi several blocks away at the end of another row of houses. They’d backed it up against a hedge to conceal the damage. Another few blocks’ walk and they’d be at a gas station they’d spied. Passing a deep green bush, she inhaled the honey scent of blooming camellias and gardenias. She took a deep breath, willing her strides to slow. The walk was oddly…pleasant. A chance to think and enjoy her husband’s presence. And he was finally here, in the moment, with her. So often he was present in body, but mentally off on training or planning the next op. Ever since ditching the Audi, for five whole city blocks, he’d listened to everything she said. He was depending upon her as an asset. She wasn’t just extra baggage.

  She squeezed his hand. “Why’d you shave your beard?”

  A streetlight glinted from the corner of his eye. “Carter said it’d be a good idea once I got here. In case I got caught on some TV doing something stupid. Like tossing steak knives at women.”

  A car passed, and the headlights shimmered on his dark mop. “How’d you dye your hair so fast?”

  “Black shoe polish. All I could find on short notice.”

  Impressive. And it explained why his skull shone like plastic spaghetti. “You look like one of Jackson’s Lego men. Darth Vader.” She pointed to a fanny pack clipped to his waist. “What’s in your man bag?”

  Red smirked and shook the oversized accessory. “Empty. Got it same place I picked up the razor and shoe polish. Wanted to blend in. Look like a fem tourist.” His eyes narrowed. “Don’t tell Carter I wore this thing.”

  They passed beneath a silver maple, and Red’s boot slammed into a section of sidewalk raised by one of the tree’s roots. He seemed to study the path a few feet ahead. “Sorry about your fa—”

  “We’ll talk about that later.” Couldn’t go there right now. Her father’s death had actually seemed to lift her spirits, like an asthmatic receiving a hit from an inhaler. Was elation part of the grieving process? Or was she that screwed up?

  A raven flew down the middle of the road, beneath the cones of light cast by streetlights, its shadow slicing down the twin yellow lines, bisecting suburbia from ghetto. A lifetime of pent-up frustration at her father yearned to scream, Good riddance, you womanizing cheat! At the same instant, an idyllic child just wanted to hurt at the loss of her daddy. She turned her gaze away from the run-down apartments and searched the sidewalk ahead.

  They covered the rest of the distance in silence. A clear, cool summer night. They’d have to come back and visit Jerusalem again, during daylight hours, without the Jewish mafia chasing to kill them.

  Turning a corner, she spied three rows of gas pumps beneath a green steel canopy. Fuel vapors stung her nose. As they stepped closer, a woman in an orange Hyundai sedan pulled up. She slipped her keys into the front pocket of blue sweatpants.

  Red opened the door of the convenience store, and Lori stepped inside. She darted down an aisle of chips and soda. Two CCTVs only, both aimed at the cash register. Red studied bubble gum while she picked up a tube of kosher Pringles and glanced out the window. The woman gassed her car and returned the nozzle to the pump, then headed for the store.

  Lori stepped back outside and stopped her near the door. She purposefully stumbled with her Hebrew. “Excuse you. Which road to Route 60? Toward Rock Dome?”

  The lady gazed at her blankly with pink, pudgy cheeks dangling with uncertainty and fists resting on full hips. A smile broadened upon her face. “Route 60?” She spoke slowly, as if to a child. “You’ll need to drive south.”

  As she relayed the directions, Red stepped out of the store, head turned away and coughing over his shoulder as if he had a nasty cold. He slammed into Lori, who fell against the woman, jolting her. She slipped one hand into the woman’s pocket, the other around her back, as if to keep her from falling.

  Once steadied, Lori turned to Red. In German, she shouted, “Watch where you’re going, Aldrik! You could’ve hurt us!” She brushed the woman’s shoulders. Switching to Hebrew, “Sorry, you idiot. My instructions thank you. You injure me?”

  The pudgy woman’s smile returned, though she rubbed her chest where Lori had collided with her. She fumbled through the remaining directions, explaining a few more turns, then continued on her way inside the store.

  Once out of her sight, Lori sprinted to the Hyundai, pulled the stolen keys from her pocket, and started the engine. She accelerated out of the lot. “Gas stations are best because you know the car is full. Sometimes people even leave keys in the vehicle.”

  She probed the side of the seat, pushed a lever, and slid it back. Woman must’ve been a pygmy. She thumbed her phone and opened the map app. Should be a fifteen-minute drive to the address of the safe house. She flipped a toggle and adjusted the side mirrors, then reached to the rearview. A dark van ten seconds behind flashed into the brilliant beam of a streetlight as it drove past the row of dilapidated apartments.

  Chapter 33

  Extreme Prejudice

  Red sank lower in the passenger seat of the Hyundai and glanced into the side-view mirror. “Looks like the same van.” He leaned into his seat belt as Lori made a sudden turn down a side street. The chase vehicle followed. He pulled his phone from his jeans pocket and punched Redial.

  Carter answered on the first ring. “It’s about time! What the hell you doing in the West Bank?”

  Like a worried wife. “Love you too, dear.” Red imagined him in the command center, staring at an oversized monitor to track Lori’s tag moving around Jerusalem. The same fate that would have been inflicted upon Red if he hadn’t decided to get back on the field of play. Red’s tag, removed by Lam as he tried to dig frags out of Red’s bullet wound, was taped to the collar of Roadkill, the family’s new mutt. To the Det and anyone else watching, Red was relaxing at home.

  He was pressed against the door as Lori pulled another turn. The van continued to follow, though at a distance. They could outrun it again, but their pursuers were hanging back. It was as if they were attempting to be discreet. Surely they knew they’d been spotted. Another variable must be in play now. What did the enemy have planned? Other players on the field? But where? “Need help. Call in Captain Richards. Tell him to get Brooks and all the other liaisons in the command center. I want Joint Special Operations Command, CIA, FBI, NSA, and anyone else that
might have assets on the ground in the West Bank. We need to lose a tail, with extreme prejudice.”

  A second passed before Carter’s reply. “You certain? Getting those guys involved will cause irreparable harm to our investigation. Not to mention your misappropriation of resources. You could be looking at jail time.”

  Carter had been slaving for months on the investigation into who was trying to kill Lori, all below the radar. But now even this operation was a bust. The drop never occurred. All they had was a name. Paili Baum. Red had to gain control, some form of certainty around their situation. “Need to get out of the West Bank. We’ve got a tail that won’t go away. And I think there may be others.”

  “What are they driving?”

  “A blue van. Nissan, I think.”

  “And you?”

  What did it matter? “I don’t have time for this, Carter.”

  “Just tell me what you’re driving!”

  “An orange SUV.”

  A shuffle of papers sounded through the earpiece. A faint knock, as from tapping on a table. “Get to Hafez Ibrahim Street. Head east on it. It’s a ten-minute drive from where you’re at. We’ll take care of the van.”

  Who was “we”? “How you gonna—”

  “I need to get things in motion. Signing off.” The phone went dead.

  Red twisted to peer back through the rear windshield. Two headlights glowed ten seconds behind them, flanked by orange dots. He glanced around the interior of the stolen vehicle. Black pants with dirty brown knees lay in a tangle of clothes on the backseat. A yellow hard hat rested next to it. The scent of stale cigarettes rose from the blue cloth interior. He might find a crowbar or hammer he could use as a weapon in the far back, but if they were caught in a firefight only the Glock would prove useful.