Burke's Revenge: Bob Burke Suspense Thriller #3 (Bob Burke Action Adventure Novels)

by William Brown

  But there was this new irritant, this fellow “Burke.” Whoever he was, he had a major general in tow and was also a key part of their circle. Shaw didn’t know the extent of risk Burke posed yet, but he would find out tomorrow, after he was finished with tonight’s mission. It would be the first one with his strike team, and therefore his top priority. These men were the cream of the crop from his recruits, Army mostly. With Enderby to lead them, under Shaw’s direction, they would strike and strike and strike again. And if anyone got in his way, like Burke or any of the others, he would strike them too.

  All of those were important, but he had almost forgotten about the C-4. Tonight aside, the C-4 had to be his priority for the moment. He drove north to the Campus Student Union, parked in one of the reserved faculty spaces, and dashed down the rear stairs to the coffee shop. He was halfway across the room before he realized Al-Karman’s chair was empty and stopped. His books and tea cups were there, but no chemist and no McDonald’s bag. Perhaps he was in the restroom, he wondered, so Shaw sat down in the empty chair opposite and waited. After five minutes, he went to the nearby restroom and looked inside. Al-Karman was nowhere to be found. So he walked back to the cafeteria, to the food line, and asked the old black woman at the cash register.

  “That nice Arab boy who always sits at that table? No, no, I ain’t seen him since lunch, maybe. I think I saw him leave with another man.”

  “And he left all of his stuff there? What did this other man look like?”

  She thought for a moment, and then said, “He was big, with dark hair, and…” but that was all Henry Shaw had to hear. It was Mergen Khan. Damn! He had no doubt what that meant. The big animal was squeezing him out, and those loose ends had become even more important. Snip, snip. Time to move.

  Henry Shaw drove his Peugeot up to Fort Bragg. When he reached the Educational Center, he drove into the rear parking lot and saw three civilian automobiles parked next to each other in the center under one of the tall sodium-vapor light poles. He parked next to them, and George Enderby got out of his old maroon Pontiac, meeting him halfway.

  “Are they ready?” Shaw asked. “Are they ready to die for their faith?”

  “They are,” Enderby answered nervously.

  “How many do you have?”

  “Nine including myself. Ten if you are coming as well.”

  “I can’t let them see me, not yet… but you could only get eight men?”

  “I thought more would come, but these are the best, all Army or ex-Army, armed with the M-4s you brought us, and well drilled.”

  “All right, all right. Eight will be enough, and we’ll build on them.”

  “Now, will you tell me the target?” Enderby asked eagerly. “Is it the Special Operations Group? The Airborne Corps Headquarters? Or the 82nd?”

  “With nine men? Even an old Marine like me can see we’d need ten times that number to pull off an attack like that. No, I have a much better target in mind — the North Commissary.”

  Enderby looked at him in shock. “The North Commissary? But…”

  “It is much more than those headquarters you mentioned, with all their colonels and generals. The commissary is the heart of the Post, its most democratic institution, cutting through all ranks and families, much as the hospital and the PX do. I remember when I was in Marine boot camp at Parris Island. There was nothing like finding your hand reaching into the cooler for the same package of hot dogs or a six-pack of beer as a full colonel or a major general to make you think you are all the same.”

  “Yes, but the commissary…?”

  “Think about it, Enderby. We will shatter the morale and sense of safety in the lower ranks, their wives, and their families, like nothing we have ever done before. And it should pose no risk. There are no armed guards inside the building, no one to stop them. Remember, I want your men in uniform, but no patches or nametags. They can inflict massive casualties, take off their ski masks, and vanish into thin air. That is the ultimate definition of terror; and I assure you, this master stroke shall reverberate through the entire American military establishment around the world in minutes.”

  When Henry Shaw reached Stephanie’s apartment on the north side of town, he parked in the shadow of a large oak tree down the street from her apartment, pulled out his cell phone, and pressed her number. With luck, they would both be home and he could hit the Trifecta today.

  When a familiar young woman’s voice answered, he said, “Hey, Steph, it’s Henry.”

  “Why, Professor Shaw, what a pleasant surprise.”

  “It could be; are you and Amy home?”

  “We sure are. What do you have in mind?” she asked in a playful voice.

  “A lot of things. But I wonder if you could help me out with something first.”

  “Of course I will, Henry. What do you need?”

  “I have a friend who I’d love to join our little… games, but he’s very prim and proper, and he’s going to need a lot of ‘coaxing.’ ”

  “Really?” she giggled. “You know how good I am at ‘coaxing.’ ”

  “That’s why I called you. I’m meeting him in the rear parking lot of an office building at Morganton and the Expressway, across from Westwood Shopping Center, in ten minutes. It’s not far from your apartment. It’s a brick building with some US Government offices in it, like the FBI. You’ll see the signs; you can’t miss it. Wait for me out back if I’m not there.”

  Shaw remained in his car for a few minutes and his patience was soon rewarded. He saw Stephanie bounce out of her townhouse, get in a small green Hyundai, and drive away. The professor didn’t wait. He pulled on his paper-thin Italian driving gloves again, got out of his car, and walked up the sidewalk to Stephanie’s front door.

  He pressed the buzzer on her mailbox. A minute later, he recognized Amy’s voice as she answered, “Yes, who is it?”

  “Henry Shaw, Amy.”

  “Oh, gee, Steph’s already gone to meet you, Henry.”

  “I know, Amy. But I have a big surprise for her and I need your help.”

  “Sure, Professor, come on up.”

  He knew the layout of their apartment, and when she buzzed him in, he found himself in a narrow hallway facing her.

  “So, what’s the big surprise?” she asked suggestively as she turned and began walking back toward the great room.

  “Oh, you’ll see real soon, Amy,” he said as he closed the door behind them and caught up with her, grabbed her chin with one hand and the back of her head with the other, and gave them both a sharp twist. Her neck snapped like a dry chicken bone. As she began to fall, he caught her and carried her into the bathroom. There was a cup on the sink. He filled it with water and poured it in the center of the floor in front of the toilet. Holding her by the shoulders, he shoved her forward so her head struck the side of the tub. She fell on the floor, where he positioned her body at an awkward angle so it looked like an accident, as if she had slipped and fallen. He doubted it would pass any serious forensic examination, or even much of an amateur one, but that would take a day or two, which was more than enough time.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Fayetteville

  Shaw parked his Peugeot in the lot at Westwood Shopping Center and hurriedly walked across the highway to the rear parking lot of the commercial office building where the FBI offices were located. The lot was nearly empty, so it was easy to spot Stephanie’s green Hyundai, which was two rows back from Pendergrass’s ugly gray government sedan. She jumped when he suddenly opened the passenger side door and slipped into the front seat next to her.

  “Jeez, Henry! Where did you come from? I was watching…”

  “Poof! One of my magic tricks, Steph.” He grinned and put his hand on her thigh. “This is going to be a lot of fun, you’ll see. My pal Tom is with the FBI, and…”

  “The FBI?” She frowned. “I’m not going to get in any trouble, am I?”

  “No, no, we’re going to do a little ‘role playing,’ that’s all. We�
�ll be the cops and you’ll be our snitch.”

  “Is that supposed to be sexy?”

  “It will, by the time we’re done. You give him a call and tell him you have some information on one of the bombings, but you’re too scared to come inside. Tell him you’ll talk to him down in the parking lot, but only if he comes right now, before you completely lose your nerve.”

  “Are you sure this is okay?” she asked, still hesitant.

  “Steph, don’t you trust me? It’s just a little role playing. We’ll have a blast back at your place, with handcuffs, body searches, and some ‘enhanced interrogation.’ You’ll love it. Go ahead and call him. Then you go over and stand next to his car until he comes outside. When he starts talking to you, I’ll come up and surprise him; and then the two of us will talk him into that little party back at your place.”

  She still wasn’t too sure about it, but she got out of the car and made the call. Three minutes later, he saw Pendergrass step through the building’s rear door. He paused to glance around, saw Stephanie standing by his car, and began walking toward her. As he did, Shaw stepped out of the bushes at the side of the rear door, came up behind him with his Beretta out, and pointed it at the back of the FBI Agent’s head.

  “Nice to see you again, Special Agent Pendergrass,” Shaw began, only to have the man spin around and face him.

  “Shaw!” Pendergrass’s eyes narrowed as he found himself looking down the barrel of a 9-millimeter automatic. “One problem with amateurs who fool around with automatic pistols is they always forget to chamber a round, and forget about the safety,” he said as he suddenly reached for the Beretta’s barrel, hoping what he said would make Shaw pause and think.

  Unfortunately for Pendergrass, Shaw pulled the pistol back just far enough to be out of Pendergrass’s reach, and replied, “One problem with professionals who think everyone else is an amateur, is sometimes they’re wrong,” and shot the Special Agent in the forehead. “Semper Fi, asshole!” The gunshot sent Pendergrass toppling over backward at Stephanie’s feet. She had been standing behind him wide-eyed and open-mouthed, her face splattered with blood.

  “Sorry, Steph,” he told her as he shot her in the forehead, too, “but you’re another problem I don’t need anymore.” She collapsed on the pavement next to Pendergrass. Shaw stepped forward and shot them each in the head one more time. Stephanie had left her purse in the car, so she had no other ID on her, but Pendergrass did. Shaw took his wallet and badge case, and then dragged Stephanie behind the bushes near the building’s rear door. He rolled her over onto her back, pushed her skirt up to her waist, and ripped her panties off.

  “What a waste,” he said sadly as he looked down at her, and then went back for Pendergrass. He dragged him behind the bushes too, pulled his pants down to his knees, pushed her legs apart, and laid him on top of her. Would anyone believe it? Of course not, but it would provide a useful distraction. He grabbed her purse from the Hyundai and walked back to his Peugeot, figuring he would toss it in the river along with Pendergrass’s things once he got up on the Route 41 Bypass.

  Well, he thought, that made it three down, and only that vexing troublemaker from Sherwood Forest to go. Snip, snip, snip.

  Fort Bragg has two commissaries, the original one in the northeast quadrant of the post, cleverly named the North Commissary, and the “new” one, now twenty-five years old, in the southwest quadrant, called the South Commissary. Linda and Dorothy grabbed their “boy toys” and dragged them out to stock up on steaks, baking potatoes, hamburgers, bread, corn-on-the-cob, lots of pasta, frozen pizzas, beer, and all the other “essentials” that a dozen men might want when they were “going to the mattresses,” as Bob called it, whatever that meant, which probably wasn’t what Linda hoped it might mean.

  The North Commissary was more convenient to Sherwood Forest. They crossed the river, swung north through the city, shot up Bragg Boulevard, and were walking in the front door at 7:45 p.m. Inside, most commissaries were indistinguishable from the big civilian grocery stores in town. Seen one, you’ve seen them all. And having done many of these “power” shopping trips before, they didn’t waste time once they got inside. The well-practiced “Op Plan” was for each couple to take a cart, with Bob and Linda heading to the condiments while Ace and Dorothy hit produce, with plans to rendezvous fifteen minutes later at the fresh meat counter in the back of the store before they moved on to bread and beer. Normally, they would have brought Ellie with them to run and fetch things up and down the aisles, but she had some homework, so they had to do their own running and fetching tonight. Unfortunately, the commissary closed promptly at 9:00 p.m., which made the two to three hours between dinner and closing the busiest times of the day.

  As they passed through the front doors, Bob stopped Ace and told the women to go ahead for a minute, and they would catch up. When they were out of earshot, he told Ace, “Text Koz. Ask him what’s going on down at that hangar. Is there any chance they could get inside and see what’s in there?”

  Ace pulled out his cell phone and began typing with both thumbs. “As bad as I am with these things, I’ll probably end up ordering a pizza or starting a nuclear war… There, all done.” They stood in the front aisle for a few more moments until the reply came through. “ ‘All quiet,’ he says. ‘One of the brothers drove off a while ago in the Mercedes. The other one’s still inside. Not much chance of getting in. He says there’s almost always one of them inside.”

  “Copy. Tell them to continue to observe and report.”

  Bob caught up with Linda as she was foraging through the paper plates and napkins, and they worked their way through the upright frozen food freezers to the open coolers along the back wall and the meat department. That was when Bob heard a sound from the front of the building that he never thought he would hear again, certainly not stateside in a family support facility like an Army commissary. It was gunfire, no doubt about it, with the distinctive sound of a 5.56 NATO round, which meant it came from a U.S. Army M-16 rifle or an M-4 carbine. The gunfire was immediately followed by screams, crashes, and the sound of broken glass — the nightmare of every American soldier with a family.

  When the gunfire started, Bob was bent over one of the coolers, pulling out a dozen steaks. In the blink of an eye, twelve years of combat instincts took over. He looked up and saw Ace and Dorothy coming down the rear aisle toward them. He and Ace exchanged quick glances. From Ace’s expression, he’d reached the same conclusion Bob had. They both turned and looked down the aisles toward the front of the store. That was where he saw two men in U.S. Army ACUs and ski masks, shooting at people with what looked like the Army’s new M-4 A1 carbines. That was not good news. The M-4 was a shorter, compact version of the Vietnam-era M-16, and every bit as lethal.

  Bob immediately grabbed Linda and shoved her through the swinging doors into the back room of the meat department. “Here,” he told her as he tossed her his cell phone and began looking around the cutting tables. “Call Sharmayne Phillips. She’s in my ‘Favorites.’ And call Pat O’Connor. Tell them that the North Commissary’s under attack.” By the time he finished, he had found what he had been looking for — cutting knives and meat cleavers. In a dustup, Bob had always preferred a gun, especially a semi-automatic pistol or a long-barreled sniper rifle, with which he was an expert. Being officially retired now, neither he nor Ace carried pistols or any other weapons on post beyond a ballpoint pen. Those had been more than adequate, but any port in a storm. He was equally adept at hand-to-hand combat and even a knife would do in a pinch. Besides, anyone who ever knew him understood that “the Ghost” was never “unarmed,” even if all he was carrying was his fingers and toes.

  But knives? Whether throwing them or for close-in blade work, they were probably his least-used skills, because he rarely let an enemy get that close. Still, whether it was a roll of blueprints or a clipboard, he could be as deadly as he needed to be. He quickly pulled out a half-dozen carving knives from the rack and hefted them for
weight and balance, as Ace pushed Dorothy through the far doorway. The blades appeared sharp and well-honed. In rapid succession, he tossed three knives to Ace, handles first, keeping two other knives and a heavy meat cleaver for himself. Time wasn’t on their side, so with a quick nod, the two men headed for the doors.

  “Stay in here,” he turned and told Linda. “Both of you. Get behind the freezer or something, but don’t come out!” Linda started to say something, but the look in his eye told her it was not negotiable.

  As he and Ace ran back up the center aisle, the shooting had gotten worse, if anything. Bullets smacked into the ceiling, the shelves of packaged food, and the rear walls. To the left and right, he saw men and women lying in the aisles or squatting behind their grocery carts, while a dozen or more were running his way toward the back of the store, pushing and shoving, not wanting to be last. Without giving it any thought, Bob ran right at them, up the center of the aisle holding the heavy meat cleaver in his left hand, an 8-inch carving knife in his right, and a second long knife tucked in his belt. The customers who were running toward him took one look at the grim, murderous expression on his face and got out of his way, parting like the Red Sea before him.

  By the time he was halfway up the aisle, he had already acquired his first targets. About thirty feet ahead of him stood two gunmen. They were standing at the head of the aisle, one of them with his M-4 pointed to the left and the other pointed to the right. That gave Bob a two- or three-second advantage, which he didn’t waste. He ran at them even faster, bringing his right arm back and throwing one of the carving knives at the gunman on the left. The gunman must have sensed movement or caught the flash of a tumbling knife blade coming at him out of the corner of his eye. He turned his head and his upper body toward Bob, but instead of bringing the rifle barrel around and firing, he froze, precisely the wrong thing to do.