Rules of War

by Matthew Betley

  Victor stood still, suspended as his life fled his body, chasing his son into the afterlife, and then he fell backward, pulling President Pena with him toward the edge.

  Logan leapt forward and covered the short distance in two strides as the dead man fell. Logan dropped the Iridium and the Glock as he moved, his entire being focused on one point feet away.

  Victor’s corpse toppled over the edge, as if plunging backward into a pool, and then he released his death grip on President Pena and disappeared below the edge into the real pool of oblivion.

  President Pena was already falling when Logan dove into the air, his arms outstretched. The president’s upper body kept falling, and his torso and buttocks disappeared below the edge as the president let out a terrified scream.

  All Logan saw was black Italian shoes, kicking upward, as gravity pulled the rest of their owner down. Logan’s hands shot out, and he latched on to the president’s ankles. Logan’s chest landed on the dirt, and he pressed down with all his might as if driving the president’s legs into the ground to fix him in place. Logan felt the president’s upper body strike the side of the cliff below the ledge, and Logan was jerked forward with the impact. Oh, Christ. You’ve got to be kidding me.

  As the president shrieked in terror, reflexively swinging his arms wildly, Logan struggled to retain his grip on the man, and he wondered how much time he had left before he was pulled over the edge to join the body of General Cordones. “Stop moving or you’ll kill us both!” Logan shouted. Come on already.

  Two sets of hands gripped his legs and his belt, and the rushing figures of the two assassins blurred by Logan’s face as he was stabilized. He watched in appreciation as the two men bent over the edge, one on each side, and reached down into the dark. Logan felt President Pena cease his flailing, and Thomas and Frederico squatted down and leaned backward, pulling the president up by his arms into a sitting position. Logan scooted backward, rolled off to the side, but still held on to the president’s legs as the two assassins pulled the president forward to his feet.

  For a terror-stricken moment, Logan envisioned the two assassins losing their grips and President Pena falling backward off the cliff, swallowed alive by the forest below. But instead, his body rose, and he reached the moment of inertia and fell forward, stumbling away from the edge. Marcos caught the president and held him steady as he regained his equilibrium.

  Logan looked up from his back and saw Jack smiling down at him. “Always have to be the hero, don’t you?”

  “As do you, Jack. As do you,” Logan replied, his body sore from the impact with the ground and the bullet he’d taken in the back earlier in the day. “Now, help me because you know we’re not done.”

  The smile disappeared from Jack’s face, replaced by a hard mask of determination. He bent down and pulled his former Marine up to his feet, and said, “Are you absolutely sure about this? I’m good with it, but you’ll have to carry it. You know that, right?”

  There was no hesitation as Logan replied with a hard edge to his voice, “Without a doubt. This ends tonight.”

  Logan walked over to his fallen Glock and the Iridium. He picked both up and held the Iridium in front of him. “Are you still there, sir?” Logan asked.

  “I am,” President Scott replied. “Who died?” He knew the shot had taken someone’s life.

  “Jack took out General Cordones, but President Pena is alive,” Logan said.

  “And everyone else, including Baker?” President Scott said.

  “Yes, sir. We’re all in one piece, banged up, but alive.”

  “Good. Then do what needs to be done, and leave the line open,” President Scott said.

  “Roger that, sir. Stand by,” Logan said, and turned to face President Pena and Vice President Baker.

  CHAPTER 54

  “I really wish General Cordones had reconsidered. I truly sympathized with the man,” Logan said, glancing back and forth between the traitor and the socialist dictator. Jack and Cole were on his left; Marcos and the two assassins, his right. “His son paid for your policies with his life, and I don’t blame him for questioning your sincerity. In fact, I don’t trust you either, Mr. President. Maybe you deserve to die for what you’ve done; maybe you don’t. But that’s not my call. We’re giving you one chance to do the right thing. The details will come later, but what’s important at this very minute is that you understand how serious we are, how committed, to ensuring you do it.”

  “I don’t understand,” President Pena countered, pleading. “I said I will do it, and I will.”

  “I hear you, and you sound sincere, but I think you’ll be more convinced in just a moment. Just bear with me,” Logan said.

  Logan shifted his attention to Vice President Baker, the Glock steady in his hand and pointed at the man’s chest. “I told you earlier this evening that I wanted you dead, that you deserved death for the crimes you’ve committed, for the lives you’re directly responsible for ending. But I also told you that you had a higher purpose, and that purpose is about to be served.”

  Logan lowered his Glock and said, “Mr. President.”

  From the Iridium, President Scott said, “Josh, you chose evil and the wrong path, betrayed your oath to your office, the Constitution, and the country. Another innocent man died tonight, a retired DC police officer whose only crime was to be the father of one of this nation’s greatest clandestine warriors. And that I cannot forgive.” He paused. “For all that you have done, I—no one else—sentence you to death.”

  Logan turned to Marcos Bocanegra, who waited silently, and nodded.

  “I know it was you who told the Los Toros cartel where I’d fled. Only Cain Frost knew my plan to escape, but I know he confided it to you, as you were the senior Council member in the Organization. I don’t know why you were tying up loose ends three months ago, and I don’t care. But they told me the order came from America, which means that it had to be you,” Marcos said with a deep, seething rage.

  “I’m sorry,” Josh replied, staring back at his executioner. He knew what was coming, and he tried to compose himself, if only to convince himself he wasn’t a coward. “I thought they’d kill only you. I was eliminating anyone who knew what I was, before the insurrection against the Founder. I only wanted you dead, but from what I heard after, you’d fallen in love. Don’t fool yourself—you doomed her the second you became involved with her,” he said, his voice rising in rebuttal. “Her death is on you. She was your collateral.”

  “No, you evil motherfucker,” Marcos said with a pure hatred so thick Logan thought he could taste it. “She was my pregnant fiancée.”

  He raised the Glock and fired three shots that struck Joshua Baker in the chest. The onetime vice president collapsed to the ground and folded inward, his evil heart shredded by the bullets.

  Marcos stared at the new corpse and lowered the Glock back to his side.

  Logan noticed a slight tremble in the killer’s gun hand, and he wondered if he’d ever find the peace that would steady that rage. He knew that Marcos would be overwhelmed with guilt, and then he remembered that Marcos had once worked as an enforcer for a vicious drug cartel. Baker’s last words, while cruel, had been like a thousand knives in the healing wound that was Marcos’s pain because of one thing—there’d been an underlying foundation of truth to them. But that was for Marcos to handle as he saw fit. Logan had one last item to address.

  No one spoke, and President Pena stared wide-eyed at the sudden execution of the second most powerful politician in the United States and one of the most powerful men in the world inside the Organization. Vice President Baker had waged a secret war, and he’d just lost to this assembled group of warriors.

  Logan stepped forward, the Glock still held at his side, and stopped inches from President Pena. He wore a mask of merciless coldness when he spoke. “Now do you understand?” It was a simple question that explained everything, the future that could be or the alternative he could suffer.

  “I do,
” President Pena said softly without a trace of hesitation or insincerity.

  “Good, Mr. President, because I only want to say this one time, and I’m sure you’ll understand why. If you do anything to undermine this arrangement, one that will give billions of dollars to your country and your people, then I promise you that you will suffer the same fate as that traitor right there,” Logan said, and gestured to the dead body that bled onto the dirt. “Because there will be no place for you that is safe from me. No matter what, I will come for you. Do you understand?”

  President Pena realized he’d never met a man as terrifying as the American that stood before him. His will was a force that emanated from his pores like sweat. The threat was so simple and sincere that he knew it would be done. This man will hunt me down and kill me. “I do. And I will do what’s necessary” was all he said.

  Logan’s green eyes blazed, and then his features softened slightly, the merciless gaze transformed into something more human, and he nodded as he stepped back from the Venezuelan leader. “Good. Mr. President, did you catch all that?”

  “I did. Then we have a deal, Mr. President, one that I will honor, and one that I sincerely hope will help the suffering people of your nation,” President Scott said, turning his attention to Logan. “Logan, please return the president to his people and his palace. Once he’s safe and secure, get back here as soon as possible and bring the vice president’s body. We have a burial to prepare.”

  Logan understood the charade would continue, but he’d already resolved that internal conflict. The man was a monster and a traitor, but he would be mourned by his son and the country as a good father and a patriot. It was necessary to maintain the balance of power in the US. Some prices are worth paying, Logan thought.

  “Mr. President, I’ll make sure they have everything they need,” President Pena said, eager to be of assistance to his new economic partners who had just saved his life.

  “I appreciate that,” President Scott said. “In that case, gentlemen. Your nation thanks you, even if they don’t know for what, and I thank you. See you soon,” he said, and the line went dead.

  “Mr. President, it’s time to get you back. I believe we’ll all fit on the Hind, if that works for you,” Logan said.

  “I’ve never been on one, believe it or not,” President Pena said. “I’ve seen them in demonstrations and now this, tonight. Just never flew in one.”

  “Well, sir, there’s a first time for everything,” Logan said, and allowed himself a small smile.

  After the past few days, he realized no truer words could be said. He thought about his wife, their unborn baby, and an uncertain future. There will be many firsts yet to come. And he welcomed each one.

  EPILOGUE

  Logan sat in the suede rocking chair and gently pushed back and forth on the carpeted floor. He stared out the window over the expanse of the acre-and-a-half backyard to where the property dropped down into an area of dense foliage and the bluff beyond. At the bottom ran the Occoquan River, winding its way behind the Reilly’s Bluff subdivision and to the southeast before emptying into the Potomac. The view reminded him every single time of the airfield in Venezuela more than seven months ago. It was severe, swift, and certain, and more importantly, it had been the president’s call, not yours.

  He felt no remorse over the execution of Joshua Baker. He was a traitor guilty of high crimes, murder, domestic terrorism, and the devil knew what else. It wasn’t his death that bothered him, but rather the cover-up they’d all agreed to before returning his body to US soil. The vice president had received a hero’s burial with full honors at Arlington Cemetery. The original story had miraculously stuck with the media: the vice president had been kidnapped by a militia in Montana upset about his blockage of an oil pipeline. His body had been found at an abandoned ranch owned by members of the Montana Freedom Movement, and the media had relished the idea of blaming a right-wing extremist group.

  The only solace that Logan took in the entire affair was that Joshua Baker’s son, eleven-year-old Jacob, would never know the true, treacherous nature of his father. As evil as Joshua Baker had been, Logan hoped that his son would grow up to be a kind, caring, confident man, the exact opposite of his father. How he could do that to his son, I’ll never know, especially now that I have her.

  Logan looked down into the angelic face of two-week-old Sophia Addison West, and he felt the warm envelope of love and protection fall over him. As a new father, it was a different kind of love than the one he had for his amazing and beautiful wife, and he was still getting used to it. From the first moment he’d held her after clamping and cutting the umbilical cord before handing her to his wife after twenty-seven hours of labor, he’d felt the bond that Santiago had told him about in Atlantis. “There are only two kinds of people in this world—those with kids, and everyone else.” And somehow, he now found himself in that first category.

  He smiled at the memory, not of Santiago, but of the last time he’d visited Venezuela, six weeks after the day of the earthquake. It was the knowledge that the CAR T-cell therapy had worked on Camila Rojas. The receptors that had been produced and infused into her body had eradicated her cancer. She was in complete remission, another sign that occasionally cosmic forces took mercy on the young and innocent. It was also symbolic, as the entire country of Venezuela seemed to be on a rebound, a partial economic remission, from the scourge of socialism.

  In the immediate aftermath of the quake, aid had been flown and shipped in to provide food and medical supplies for the ravaged people. The bank in Switzerland, after a clandestine visit by a member of the CIA with all the appropriate account documentation, had transferred billions of dollars to multiple aid agencies, including several nongovernmental organizations that were “guided” by the US Treasury Department at the direct orders of President Scott. In what many assumed was an act of mercy, the president had also lifted sanctions, allowing US investors to acquire Venezuelan debt. In return, President Pena had restructured Venezuela’s national oil company in order to cut down on corruption and regulate production. The effect of such measures had been nearly instantaneous, especially with billions of dollars in aid rebuilding the infrastructure: the economy was slowly rebounding as hyperinflation began to creep back down. The mass exodus of millions of people had ceased, and the people were no longer starving. All in all, I’d call that a win, Logan thought, although he knew the country had years of rebuilding ahead of it.

  Even the Russians seemed to be offering legitimate assistance, at least in a very Russian way. The Russian ambassador to Venezuela, the man who had befriended Victor Cordones in the hour of his spiritual need and had aided in the general’s plans, had been killed two weeks after the earthquake in a single-car accident that reportedly had been caused by motorizados. Those motorcycles can be dangerous, Logan had thought at the news, satisfied at another loose end tied up neatly, albeit in blood.

  Sophia let out a small gurgle, opened her baby-blue eyes, and stared up into her father’s deep, bright-green ones. He knew she had no depth perception yet and couldn’t make out more than shapes, but he didn’t care. He was as much hers as she was his. The bond had been forged.

  Logan grabbed the baby bottle from the cherrywood nightstand, absentmindedly noting that Pottery Barn would be depleting his funds for years to come. Sarah was asleep but had pumped several ounces for the bottle before lying down for a nap at Logan’s urging. Like all new mothers, she’d barely had any sleep with nursing Sophia every few hours. Logan knew things would get better soon, at least from what he’d been told, but that place seemed a long way off at the moment.

  He felt a hand squeeze his shoulder, and Sarah said, “How is she?” He hadn’t even heard her approach. Getting soft already? Losing that tactical edge now that you’re a dad?

  “You were supposed to be sleeping,” Logan replied softly. “That was the whole point.”

  Sarah laughed quietly. “I know, but I couldn’t. It is only fifteen hundred,
after all.” She still used military time after all the years she’d spent with Logan and Marines. She leaned down and kissed Logan on the cheek. “She’s an alert one, aren’t you, princess?” she asked, transitioning into baby talk midsentence.

  “Hey, that reminds me,” Logan said. “Did you know there is an actual Disney Princess Sofia? I was looking for toys online and stumbled upon it. If nothing else, at least she’ll have her own show.”

  “I’m not sure which is more disturbing—you waging war on very bad people or watching Disney Junior princess shows. I think it’s a toss-up.”

  “That’s not fair, babe. I can evolve. I might even learn a thing or two. I hear those shows are very informative. John told me all about them, and I trust anything he says,” Logan added playfully.

  Sarah scooped up Sophia and then settled into Logan’s lap as he wrapped his arms around them both.

  “How is Amira?” Sarah asked, worry in her voice.

  “Since John moved into her apartment, you know how close those two have grown. They’re nearly inseparable. I’m just glad he’s there for her, to help her grieve. I can imagine what she’s been through, but I don’t want to. The only thing that seems to help is time, and even then, not always,” Logan said. “At least she knows what happened to the man responsible, that he won’t ever be able to do to anyone else what he did to her. For someone like Amira, I think that helps, even if just a little.”

  Sarah was silent, and then changed the topic. “I love you,” she said simply.

  Logan squeezed her tightly, inhaled deeply, the scent of the baby filling his nostrils, and let it out with a slow exhalation. “And I love you,” he replied. “Check that,” he interjected, falling into military jargon. “I love both of you.” He kissed Sarah on the top of her head. This is what it’s all supposed to be about. Family.

  As the three of them rocked silently in the chair, lulling Sophia back to sleep, Logan found himself truly content and deeply calm for the first time since childhood. It was a sense of pure belonging and tranquility in the knowledge that he was exactly where he was supposed to be at this very moment in his life. He didn’t know how long it would last. But what he did know was all that mattered was the present, and that was more than enough for now.