by Jack Flynn
The one that stood out most, and had stayed with her after she was fully awake, was one that started out the same as the dream that she had been having for years. She was at Nantasket Beach again. She could see Ollie up ahead of her, and she tried to run to him. At first, as always, her feet slipped beneath her, and she was able to make no headway. This time, though, her feet gained traction, and she was able to catch him. His back was to her, and when she reached him, she threw her arms around him, sobbing. She was so relieved and happy to finally be able to touch him again that it took a moment for her to notice how skinny he was. He’d always been a cherubic, healthy child, but now he was nothing more than skin and bones.
As she hugged him tighter, she could feel him grow skinnier and skinnier, until all she could feel through his clothes was brittle bone and sinew. She turned him toward her, and screamed in horror when she saw his face. She could tell it was him, but he there was nothing left but a skull with patches of grey skin. He had no eyes, and the flesh of his nose had decomposed so badly that she could see the bones around his nasal cavity.
And then he spoke to her. His voice was reedy and distant, and it sounded like he was speaking to her through a long metal pipe. ‘The water,’ he said. ‘It’s warm today.’
She shook her head, not comprehending. Her head and her heart were still clouded by the horror of what had become of the little boy who was the greatest love she had ever known.
‘I think I’ll go in the water today,’ he said. She thought he might be smiling, but she couldn’t tell. There wasn’t enough flesh around his mouth to be sure.
‘No,’ she said.
‘You have to let me go,’ he said, and now his voice sounded even more distant.
‘Why?’ she demanded.
‘There’s nothing left,’ he said. ‘I think I’ll go for a swim. I’ll be careful in the waves.’
He turned away from her and began to walk toward the water.
‘No!’ she screamed. She reached out to grab hold of him once more, but as she touched his arm, the bone turned to ash. ‘No!’ she screamed again. She panicked and tried to wrap her arms around his chest, but as she did, his rib cage disintegrated and fell through her arms. She kept trying to hold him until every part of him vanished, and all that was left was a tattered shirt. In her head, she could hear Vincente Carpio’s maniacal cackle.
She’d come back to consciousness with a start, drenched in sweat, her pulse beating so fast she wondered whether she was having a heart attack. It had taken fifteen minutes for her to compose herself enough to sit up on the cot, and she still wasn’t sure that she’d really recovered from the dream now. Nor had she recovered from the revelation that Carpio was the one who had killed Ollie. There were too many thoughts and emotions swirling for her to think clearly.
‘Special Agent Steele?’
It was Warden Stevens speaking to her, and she realized that she had been lost in her remembrance of the awful dream. There were other members of the transfer detail in the room, and they were all looking at her curiously. She didn’t know what to say; she had no idea what aspect of the process they’d been discussing. Her mind raced, looking for something to say to inspire confidence, or at least allay any fear that she might have lost her mind.
Just then her phone buzzed. She pulled it out and looked at the caller ID.
‘Sorry, I need to take this,’ she said. It was weak, but it at least allowed her to escape further scrutiny for a moment. She stepped out of the room.
‘What are you doing calling me?’ she demanded as she answered.
‘I needed to talk to you,’ Cormack said. There was no apology or defensiveness in his tone. ‘I got a call. Someone offering me information about Carpio’s brother.’
‘I told you, I need you to stay out of this.’
‘I know,’ he said. ‘I didn’t say that I would, though.’
‘I need you to say it now. I have this under control. I have all the information I need.’
‘No one has all the information they need,’ Cormack said. ‘You can always have more.’
‘Cormack, listen to me,’ Kit said. ‘It’s a trap. Soh wants you dead. I know that for a fact. This would be one way to accomplish that. Please don’t go. Just stay wherever you are until this is all over.’
‘I’m not sure I can do that.’
‘You have to. For me. I …’ She almost said the words.
‘You what?’ He’d heard it in her voice, she could tell, and that scared her almost as much as the dream about Ollie had. ‘You what?’ he asked again.
‘I want you to be safe.’
She could hear him breathing on the other end of the line. ‘That’s it?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I thought you were going to say something else,’ he said.
‘You were wrong.’
‘Was I?’
She could feel her pulse racing the way it had when she woke from the dream. She could feel the sweat forming on her brow. For a moment she thought she might collapse, but she took a deep breath and steadied herself. Then she spoke to him with all the control she could manage. ‘Don’t call me again,’ she said.
She ended the call, and stood in the hallway for a moment, trying once again to compose herself. And then, once she’d felt the shaking subside to the point where she thought it might not be noticeable, she walked back into the room.
‘OK,’ she said to the men gathered in the office. ‘Let’s go through this one more time.’
Sixty-Five
Soh watched the boy carry the backpack toward the front of the crowd that had gathered at the Federal Courthouse. He was one of his best soldiers, in spite of his age. Suarez had recruited him himself. He recognized the alienation in the boy’s face. He had been separated from his mother at the border after making the months-long trek from El Salvador to the United States. His mother had been detained, and he had been taken into protective custody. He hadn’t seen her or spoken to her since the night they were picked up by the Border Patrol a mile inside the country more than two years ago. He was transferred to a holding facility in Massachusetts while she was deported. Eventually, he was settled with an El Salvadoran family in Lynn. Suarez trolled the schools, looking for kids like him who were searching for someone to give them purpose.
His name was Pedro. He was fourteen years old, and he had taken to gang life like he’d been born to it. His anger was potent, and he was vicious when convinced that his viciousness was in protection of his new gang family. He was also unquestioning in his loyalty. When asked to perform any task, he carried it out without hesitation or question. So it was not surprising that he never asked Soh why he was being asked to put on a backpack and walk into the heart of the protesters.
There were two other boys wearing similar backpacks, but Pedro was the only one whom Soh was sure Suarez would miss. But he also knew that he would get over it. He had sent more people to their deaths than he could count in his lifetime. Any guilt that he believed he might have would be short-lived.
* * * * *
Suarez kept his hood up to conceal his tattoos. He had strolled along L Street for a half hour, passing the modest house on the corner twice. There were two cars out front. One was a tiny, beat-up Honda – the sort that a nineteen-year-old girl might drive. The other, though, was a newer Mustang with tinted windows and a spoiler on the rear. This was the kind of car that a younger man would drive. Suarez knew that Buddy Cavanaugh didn’t have the means to drive a car like that, and O’Connell drove an older sedan, which meant only one thing: O’Connell had left a man – maybe more than one – to guard his daughter.
Suarez wasn’t surprised. O’Connell was smart enough to know that his daughter was still a target in the war. It was the reason Soh had sent Suarez here now. She represented a pressure point for O’Connell like none other. The fact that Suarez would have to get through those protecting Diamond O’Connell would make his task more complicated, but not impossible. Few of O’Conne
ll’s men had real experience with war and killing the way that Suarez did.
And Suarez had the element of surprise on his side.
* * * * *
The Conley Terminal Facility was the largest cargo holding facility in Boston. It was directly across the Reserve Channel from the union office, and spread out for nearly a mile from South Boston toward Fort Independence. Vast cargo containers were stacked in endless rows, like some giant child’s building blocks.
Cormack O’Connell steered his Buick up L Street from his house and turned right onto East First Street. The entrance to the terminal was at the corner of East First and Farragut. It was a secure facility, surrounded by tall barbed-wire fences. At the terminal entrance, Cormack was required to show a series of passes and identifications to get through, but his position as head of the union permitted him full access.
Once through the gate, he drove down a series of pathways between the cargo containers stacked thirty feet high. Off to his left he could see the giant cranes that were used to load and unload the containers from cargo ships.
It took a few minutes for him to make it all the way to the far end of the facility, but eventually the stacks of cargo containers grew smaller and sparser, until there was a clear space a few hundred feet from the water. Cormack pulled his car to the side of the last container and parked it. He sat there for a moment, wondering what would happen next. It was just a few minutes before eleven.
He got out of his car and walked into the middle of the small clearing. He kept his hand on a gun he had hidden in his pocket, and he looked furtively for any spot from which someone might hide to take a shot at him.
He looked at his watch again, and saw that it was now just after eleven. For a moment he thought that the call had been some sort of a diversion, and it was likely that no one would show up. Just then, though, he heard an unmistakable rhythmic beating above him. He looked up and saw the helicopter coming in low and fast. It pulled up short and landed at the very far end of the clearing.
Three men got out of the helicopter. One was small and slight, carefully attired in a perfectly tailored suit. The other two were also well dressed, though in suits that were not as well tailored, and they towered over the first man. Both of the larger men held automatic pistols and were pointing them in Cormack’s direction. They approached Cormack, and the smaller man smoothed out his blond hair, which had been disrupted by the helicopter’s blades.
‘It’s convenient transportation, but it doesn’t do much for one’s personal presentation,’ the man said by way of introduction, straightening his suit.
‘It’s also fairly conspicuous. You may draw the attention of the police,’ Cormack pointed out.
‘It seems the authorities have all their attention trained a mile north of here, at the courthouse,’ the man said. ‘Besides, we will be gone before the police would be able to get here to investigate. You are Cormack O’Connell. We’ve never had the pleasure.’ He didn’t hold his hand out. Cormack still couldn’t place the accent that adorned his high-pitched voice.
‘You know who I am,’ Cormack said. ‘I don’t know who you are.’
‘Nor do you need to. I have never done business here before, nor am I likely to again.’
‘What sort of business do you do?’
‘I sell arms, Mr O’Connell.’
‘Guns?’
The prim little man gave a chuckle, as though Cormack was too naive to truly understand the way the real world works. ‘Guns only in large quantity. Most of my business involves heavy artillery. Tanks. Missiles. Even the occasional aircraft.’
‘Interesting,’ Cormack responded. ‘What brings you to Boston?’
‘A peculiar order. One which I fulfilled, but about which I have reservations. For obvious reasons, I can’t go to the authorities. From my inquiries, I was informed that you are the authority that those who can’t go to the police deal with.’
Cormack digested this. ‘What was the order?’
‘It was an order placed by a man named Javier Carpio.’
‘For?’
‘Two Stinger missiles, and two thirty-three foot transportable port security boats, each armed with one mounted fifty-caliber machine gun and two M60s.’ The man let that information sink in. ‘Javier Carpio is well known to me by reputation from his work in El Salvador. He was a leader of the resistance against the American-backed government forces. When he placed the order, I assumed, naturally, that they would be delivered there. I was unnerved when he indicated that the delivery was to be here. Had I known that that was the intention, I would never have become involved in the transaction.’
‘You’re afraid that they will be used to kill Americans,’ Cormack noted.
The man shrugged. ‘If a school is bombed in a place like El Salvador, or a plane is shot down in Malaysia, there is a momentary outcry, and then people move on with their lives. The governments in those countries do not have the resources to interfere with my business, and the American government does not generally get involved beyond minimal cooperation.’ He paused. ‘But if Americans are killed – particularly on American soil – well, then your government brings its full force to bear. I would not want to be implicated in that.’
‘So, what do you want me to do about it?’
‘I have heard that you have connections with the federal authorities. You have the information now, and you can pass it on.’
Cormack shook his head. ‘Why would I want to get involved?’ he asked.
‘Because, Mr O’Connell, you are already involved. If those missiles are used against Americans, the authorities are likely to learn of my involvement and come after me. If I am caught, I will, of course, tell them that I gave you this information. It may buy me some leniency. And you will have to answer for not having done anything with this information.’
Cormack didn’t bother thinking the implications through. It was irrelevant. There was no question that he would relay the information to Kit Steele.
‘One more thing,’ the man said.
‘What?’
‘Your organization has a leak. There is someone working against you. You need to understand that.’
Cormack frowned. It was a concern that had nagged at him.
The diminutive man nodded and he and his bodyguards walked back to the helicopter and climbed aboard. He was gone as quickly as he had arrived, and Cormack stood in the middle of the clearing, looking out toward the outer harbor, his mind racing. As he looked out, he suddenly noticed that there were more commercial ships in the harbor than he’d ever seen before – far more than was authorized or would be safe. It was as though someone had scheduled all of the traffic for one moment of the day.
And suddenly it all made sense.
* * * * *
Soh had moved to Bond Drive, a quarter block from the garage entrance at the back of the courthouse. The end of the street, where it ran into Courthouse Way, was blocked off by a contingent of Boston’s finest, outfitted in riot gear, standing behind flimsy wooden barricades. The crowd on Bond was thinner and less agitated than the crowd in the front of the courthouse itself, but it was still a solid contingent, and he could sense the tension in the way the officers regarded those staring down the small street toward the portal through which Vincente Carpio would be driven. That was fine with Soh; it made it less likely that they would wander out into the crowd to create a problem.
He regarded the fifteen-foot garage doors, currently pulled closed. The doors were made of solid steel, and it was unlikely that any common firearms would be able to breach them. Javier Carpio had been very specific – he wanted Soh to paint an area five feet above the door through which Vincente Carpio’s van would travel.
All Soh could focus on was the power he would have if the plan was successful. He felt in his pocket for the large laser pointer, and leaned against the building, hood up, trying not to be noticed.
Sixty-Six
Kit Steele’s phone buzzed, and she saw Cormack’s number o
n the caller ID. She turned her ringer off and put the phone back in her pocket. She couldn’t afford to be distracted now, and Cormack was unquestionably a distraction.
She was in the transport van with Vincente Carpio, headed into the city. There were four heavily armed and armored security squad members with them, alternately watching Carpio and checking outside the van for anything unusual. There were three other federal vehicles in their convoy, each with a complement of armed guards from a combination of federal and local law enforcement agencies. It seemed that while no single agency wanted responsibility, none of them wanted to be accused of failing to supply support.
Carpio had been loaded onto the van more than an hour before. She had watched him in his cell on the video monitor, and he had spent almost the entire morning on his knees. She thought perhaps he was asking God to help with his escape, but she knew that he had lost all faith long ago. In any event, she was sure that no deity could help set him free now. She knew what his plan was, and she knew that she would stop him.
* * * * *
To Diamond, the thaw felt like a new beginning. It seemed to signal, somehow, that the nightmare of the previous weeks was at an end. She knew that it wasn’t, though. Cormack had left two men downstairs in the house to guard her, and that was reminder enough that the danger remained. These two were younger and bigger than Joe Konicki had been, and that gave her some sense of comfort.
She’d slept late that morning. It felt good. She needed her sleep. Pregnancy wasn’t fully agreeing with her, though it wasn’t nearly as bad as she’d heard. She’d had some morning sickness, but that seemed to pass, and now all she had was a little nausea every morning until she got some food in her. The baby seemed to have come through the ordeal on Long Island strong. Strong and hungry, she thought with a smile. Like Buddy. Maybe that meant it was a boy. It didn’t matter to her one way or another, all she wanted was a healthy baby.