Robert Ludlum's the Treadstone Exile

by Joshua Hood

  Fifteen minutes after merging onto George Washington Parkway, he felt the Town Car slow. Shaw looked up, frowning at the line of brake lights ahead of him.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Carter said, toeing the brake.

  “I thought they were done tearing up the roads for the year.”

  “They are,” Carter answered, “or at least that’s what they said.”

  “Looks like they lied,” Shaw said, seeing the flashing DDOT sign ahead and a signalman waving the cars toward the off-ramp.

  “Why the hell are they diverting us here?” Carter wondered as he reached for his GPS.

  “Apparently wanting to watch the game in the comfort of my own living room is too much to ask,” Shaw said.

  “Sir, I hate to be the one to tell you this,” Carter said, merging onto the off-ramp, “but they don’t have a chance.”

  “Is that a fact?” he asked, looking out the window.

  “Afraid so,” Carter said, following the road as it twisted to the right. “The problem with your Mets is you’ve got no offense.”

  “Oh, here we go,” Shaw said.

  “I’m serious, sir . . .”

  But Shaw was too focused on the solitary figure standing on the side of the road, a bare signpost five feet to his rear. The way the man casually lifted his hand to his mouth when the Town Car passed reminded him of Iraq and the insurgents who stood on the side of the road watching the convoys.

  The memory sparked a long-forgotten scratching at the base of Shaw’s skull. A ragged itch that put him instantly on guard—and sent his hand dropping down to the 9-millimeter Walther PPK.

  Who was he, and was that a sign?

  Before he could shout a warning, the road hooked hard left, the blind turn catching both Shaw and his driver off guard.

  “Hold on, sir,” Carter said, his knuckles bone-white on the steering wheel.

  He let off the gas and cranked the wheel hard over, cursing, fighting against the centrifugal force trying to shove the Town Car off the road.

  In the backseat, Shaw braced himself against the door and was reaching for his seatbelt when a flash of movement drew his attention to the tree line ten yards ahead.

  What in the hell?

  He leaned forward and was squinting through the darkness when a pair of spotlights came to life. The blaze of white light through the passenger window hit like a flashbang and Shaw raised his hand to his face. He blinked away the stars in time to see a jacked-up pickup with a solid-steel bumper cannonballing down the firebreak.

  “Carter, watch—”

  But before the words were off his lips the truck slammed into the Town Car’s front right quarter panel, the impact blasting the glass from the passenger-side window and sending the vehicle spinning across the road.

  Shaw threw himself to the floorboards a split second before the tires hit the curb and then the Town Car was airborne, pinballing off trees, glass shattering, metal crumpling as it tumbled down the embankment and slammed nose-first into an ancient oak.

  * * *

  —

  Shaw’s senses came online like a computer after a hard reboot. His hearing came back with the high-pitched hum and the cotton feel that came from shooting a rifle without earplugs.

  He tried to sit up, but the lance of fire in his head left him dizzy and panting in the darkness. Shaw collapsed back into his seat, hacked against the residual powder from the airbag, tasting the copper tang of blood on his lips when he spit.

  Where am I? What happened?

  Slowly the details of the accident came back and he remembered the signalman diverting them off the expressway. The missing signpost and the truck barreling down the firebreak.

  Ambush.

  The word blinked on and off in his mind like a neon sign, and lying there in the backseat, Shaw knew this wasn’t over.

  They’re coming back. You need to move.

  “C-Carter,” he grunted. “We have to move. You hear me, son?”

  Silence.

  The door was jammed, and Shaw was forced to kick out the window, the shattered glass cutting at his legs when he climbed out. He grabbed the door handle and hauled himself upright—the shooting pain radiating from his knee almost sending him to the ground.

  He limped to the front of the vehicle, one look at the blood sprayed across the window and his driver’s caved-in skull telling him everything he needed to know.

  The dump of adrenaline that had come with the collision was wearing off, and Shaw found himself rocked by a sudden wave of dizziness. He sagged against the car, knowing from his ragged breathing and the cold, clammy feel of his skin that he was going into shock.

  He was on the verge of passing out when the snap-crack of dried branches drew his attention to the crest of the hill. Shaw looked up, a pair of red-lensed flashlights bobbing down the incline sending his hand dropping to his hip.

  But instead of the cold steel of the Walther, Shaw found nothing but air.

  Shit.

  Knowing there was no time to look for the lost pistol, he grabbed the door handle and, using the last of his strength, wrenched it open, the creak of the hinges loud as a rifle shot in the still night air.

  Carter’s body lolled, and Shaw leaned across him, glass cutting his fingers as he pawed at the SIG 229 holstered at the man’s hip. He got a hand around the grip, but when he tried to pull the pistol free from the holster it wouldn’t budge.

  He could hear the assassins off to his left, the muted footfalls through the undergrowth and the crimson throw of their lights off the crumpled hood telling him they were closing in fast.

  He gave the pistol an angry jerk, but still the holster refused to turn loose of the SIG.

  Why the fuck won’t this come out?

  Shaw was panicking now, the awareness of his encroaching death coiling around his heart like an icy snake.

  You need to calm down. Figure this out before it’s too late.

  He studied the holster strapped to his driver’s hip, fully expecting to feel the white-hot burn of a bullet at any second. Instead, he felt a plastic thumb break on the inside of the holster. The plastic tab reminded him that while he still carried old school leather holsters, Carter and pretty much everyone else on the payroll had shifted to Kydex—plastic holsters that came with built-in Level II retention.

  He thumbed the retention latch to the rear and this time the SIG came out like greased lightning. Pistol in hand, Shaw stumbled backward, his leg buckling beneath him as he rolled free of the door.

  He tumbled to the dirt, falling across a jagged strip of metal that sliced his face, the rush of pain and the spurt of hot blood down his cheek forgotten the second he heard the voice from the rear of the car.

  “We’ve got a live one.”

  Shaw rolled onto his back and shifted his body until he had a clear line of sight through the shattered glass of the back door. He brought the SIG up in a two-handed grip, centered the sights on the figure he saw through the back glass, and fired three quick shots.

  Thinking the shots had come from inside the car, the second shooter opened up—hosing the interior of the Town Car with lead.

  Still on the ground, Shaw flipped onto his stomach, laid the front sight on the pair of legs standing on the other side of the vehicle, and sent a 9-millimeter hollow point through the man’s kneecap.

  The joint exploded like a ripe melon and the shooter screamed in pain, managing a half step back before tumbling to the ground.

  Shaw grunted to his feet and limped around the back of the Town Car. He paused at the hood and looked down at the man sprawled out on the ground. Too tired to bend down and check his pulse, he put a bullet though the top of his skull.

  On the other side of the car he found the second shooter busy trying to secure a tourniquet around his thigh—his H&K MP7 still lying in th
e dirt where he’d dropped it.

  Shaw kicked the submachine gun into the weeds and limped over to the man, gun smoke still coiling from the barrel of the SIG. He stopped in front of the shooter, eyes void of any emotion as he studied him over the pistol sights.

  “H-help me and . . . and I’ll tell you everything,” the man begged.

  “Thanks, but I’ve got this one all figured out,” Shaw said before pulling the trigger.

  39

  LUANDA, ANGOLA

  After leaving the Hotel Sunshine, Hayes drove back to the beach, found a shaded alley close to the Fortress São Miguel, and parked. He rolled down the windows and studied the beach bar two hundred yards to his south through the binoculars.

  From the exterior the Rusted Nail was warm and bright. Everything from the neon-yellow awning that covered the back deck to the tables overlooking the ocean exactly as it should be.

  But it was the tanned woman in the white tank top cleaning the windows who held Hayes’s attention. He thumbed the focus knob and zoomed in on her face as a pair of early risers stepped into view. The woman stopped what she was doing and turned to greet them, an easy smile spreading across her face.

  She seemed perfectly at ease standing there in the sunlight, not a care in the world, but Hayes saw past the façade, noting the outline of the pistol at the small of her back and the faded scar on her chest when she reached up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear.

  The conversation lasted all of thirty seconds and then the woman was alone, the smile falling from her face as she scanned the street. Her green eyes darted like hummingbirds in flight, searching for something she sensed more than saw. She scanned left to right, taking in the movement closest to her before jumping across the street.

  Then she was looking directly at him.

  Hello, Charli.

  Her gaze lingered on the alley for less than a second, and while Hayes knew there was no way she could have seen him parked deep in the shadows, for an instant he could have sworn there was a hint of recognition in her eyes, a glint that left him feeling exposed. But he brushed it off, returned the binoculars to the passenger seat, and pulled the faded baseball cap over his eyes.

  Well, this ought to be fun.

  * * *

  —

  Hayes woke up at noon, sweating from the sun beating down on him like a bully with a magnifying glass. The scene before him had changed; the plaza that had been empty before was now full of tourists taking pictures of the ancient fort and eyeing the wares the local craftsmen displayed on linen sheets.

  He wiped the sweat from his brow, the savory scent of roasted meat and vegetables wafting from the grills of the sidewalk vendors reminding him that he hadn’t eaten in twelve hours. But it was the sight of the blue-coated police patrolling the plaza that told him it was time to move.

  Hayes started the engine and pulled out of the alley, in search of a phone to call Mallory and food to assuage his hunger.

  He found both three miles to the east at an open-air market, where he ate two bowls of calulu, a traditional fish and vegetable stew, downed a liter of bottled water, and then paid the shop owner twenty bucks to use the man’s phone.

  Hayes dialed the number, adjusted the Beretta at his hip, and waited for the call to connect.

  This time it was Wikus who answered.

  “Thought you were told to come to the hotel, errand boy. What happened, you get lost?”

  “If you think that I’m coming anywhere near that place, you’re dumber than you look,” he answered, glancing down at his watch.

  In Grand-Bassam he hadn’t cared if they’d tracked the call, but now that he was in the same city as Mallory and her merry band of pirates, Hayes wasn’t taking any chances.

  “So you need to figure out another spot, someplace nice and open where I can see you and you can see me. Got it?”

  “Listen here—”

  But Hayes was done taking orders.

  “You’ve got fifteen seconds. Yes or no?” he demanded.

  “I will let Mallory know,” Wikus growled.

  “Good. I’ll be in touch,” he said, ending the call.

  Hayes pulled on his shades, tugged the brim of the ball cap down over his eyes, and stepped out into the street. He needed to buy a phone and a few other items before heading back to the Rusted Nail.

  He climbed into the Land Cruiser and, wanting to stay away from both the city center and the Hotel Sunshine, drove north—a hint of a plan forming at the edge of his mind.

  His first stop was the AngoMart on the Estrada Zango, where he bought a brace of burner phones to communicate with Mallory, a baby monitor, and bandages and iodine for his wounds. On the way out, he paused at the bank of pay phones outside. Incredibly, one still had an ancient phone book attached. Hayes ripped it from the chain and hurried to the SUV.

  He spent five minutes conducting countersurveillance, making sure that he hadn’t picked up a tail before pulling into a parking lot. Hayes’s Portuguese was rusty, but thanks to the ads inside the phone book, he was able to find the section for hardware stores. After consulting the map the man at the airfield had given him, he located one five miles from his current position.

  Anywhere else in the world Hayes could have covered the distance in fifteen minutes max, but like the rest of Africa, traffic in Luanda was a bitch, the streets packed with cars and vendors darting in and out of traffic selling everything from yellow jugs of gasoline to bushels of fruit.

  Good thing I’m not in a rush.

  During his time in the 82nd Airborne, Hayes’s knowledge of explosives was limited to pulling the pin on a grenade and throwing it before it exploded in his hand. Everything else was handled by chemists—trained professionals—who worked in military armament facilities.

  It wasn’t until he went to the Special Forces Qualification course at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, that Hayes learned that everything he needed to make something go boom could be found at a hardware store.

  By the time he arrived at his destination, the ancient A/C had given out and the clutch and brakes were hot from the constant stop-and-go of the street.

  But Hayes made the most of his commute, using the drive to compile a list of what he needed, so that when he finally stepped inside the store and grabbed one of the rickety carts, he was ready to go.

  Most of the items, like the sections of lead pipe, dry cell batteries, road flares, and the household cleaners, were easy to find. The more esoteric components, on the other hand, taxed both Hayes’s imagination and his limited knowledge of basic chemistry, but he made it work and, three hundred dollars later, had what he needed.

  After everything was loaded up, all that was left to do was find a base of operations—somewhere he could work undisturbed until it was time to head back to the Rusty Nail.

  40

  LUANDA, ANGOLA

  It was noon when Cyrus Vandal pulled into the parking lot of the Hotel Epic and parked beneath the shade of a coconut palm. He climbed into the backseat of the 4Runner, stripped out of his travel clothes, and dressed quickly in a pair of khaki chinos, a white silk button-down, and a pair of leather deck shoes.

  After clipping the SIG 365 onto his belt, he shrugged into a light-blue sports coat and climbed out. He moved to the rear of the SUV, paused to check his surroundings, and when he was sure that he was clear, opened the hatch.

  One of the first rules he’d been taught at Site Tango was how to blend in—avoid drawing unnecessary attention. Most of the tactics and techniques were obvious, like don’t walk into a five-star hotel carrying a bulky cargo bag and the olive drab rucksack, which was why he’d requested the cooler-sized Pelican case and the nondescript backpack that were sitting in the back of the SUV.

  With all the gear packed into the case, it weighed well over a hundred pounds, but Vandal effortlessly lifted it out, set it lightly on the ground.
He grabbed the pack, slung it over his shoulder, and closed the hatch.

  He extended the Pelican case’s telescoping carrying handle, slipped a pair of Ray-Bans over his eyes, and started toward the entrance.

  At three hundred and forty-one feet, the glass-fronted hotel was one of the tallest buildings in the city, and from the balcony of the three-thousand-dollars-a-night Presidential Suite, Vandal knew he’d have a commanding view of the capital.

  The only problem was that the current guests, a Mr. and Mrs. Alistair Chadwick from Virginia Water, Surrey, had the room booked for the rest of the week.

  But that wasn’t Vandal’s problem.

  He was halfway to the door when the Bluetooth rang in his ear.

  “Yes?” he answered.

  “It’s done,” Skyler advised, her voice tiny in his ear.

  “Good. Call me back in fifteen.”

  Vandal ended the call and stepped up on the curb, followed the walkway beneath the awning, offering a nod to the man in the gray suit holding the door.

  He stepped inside, pulled his sunglasses off, and, after slipping them into his coat pocket, scanned the interior.

  Despite himself, Vandal was struck by the understated elegance of the lobby. The white marbled floor, chromium staircase, and the teardrop chandeliers that hung from the ice cube–white ceiling seemed to reflect Luanda’s commitment to atone for its violent past. While he, on the other hand, was just getting started.

  With that thought in mind, Vandal started across the lobby, where a red-faced man was shouting at the manager.

  “Do you know what this is?” the man demanded, waving a credit card in the man’s face. “It’s a bloody Amex Black.”

  “Mr. Chadwick, if you could please calm down,” the manager begged.

  “Calm down? Calm down?” the man bellowed. “First you tell me that my credit card has been canceled and now you want me to calm down?”