2. Travel Plans
Chapter 2
Travel Plans
Griff
Present Day
Transnistria, Moldova
My leg throbbed. The bullet wound I had received last Christmas while on a fun little vacation in Mourningkill told me it was about to rain. The ache was sharp, and constant, radiating up my hip.
I needed a fucking vacation.
At the very least, I had to quit getting shot. I was pushing my luck.
I pulled the black bag off of his head and finally studied the eyes of the mad man who had wrongfully thought that he could take us on.
Royce Matthews blinked his slime green eyes and stared up at me.
“You don’t even know what you’re fucking doing.” He fought his restraints. “You think you’re the good guys, don’t you, Captain America?”
I fought the inclination to laugh.
I always found it interesting as hell what people did in their final moments. Did they scream? Cry for their mom? Did they piss themselves? Only a few stood with dignity and died with their pride intact. I respected that. Those guys thought life was a game and saw getting caught by us as a last move. A checkmate, and now they had to do the sportsmanly thing and tip their King, and admit defeat.
I only hoped that in my last moments, I had the wherewithal to go out with dignity too.
I went over to the laptop, and flipped the camera around so that our little friend could see himself on the screen. I placed the outgoing call, and waited until I was greeted by the most powerful players in the US government.
President Davis Lau, Vice President Anders McCleod, the Secretary of State, Defense, the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Then, of course, the man most familiar to me, the Director of the CIA, Roland Griffith. The man I sometimes called Dad.
The circle was always kept small when we called. It was the only way to keep things secret.
“State your name,” I ordered my trussed-up guest.
He wasn’t going to state his name.
“Fuck you, you fucking traitor!” He spat at my feet.
I shrugged, and gestured for my partner, Agent Sierra, to come over with the papers, wallet, and other identification he had on him at the time of his abduction.
Of course, that was a nice way to put it.
Sierra and I had burned his house down. That bit of arson gave me a warm-fuzzy feeling, as I thought about the woman back home who had a real penchant for lighting things on fire. Fucking Pyro.
Then we picked people off, one by one, as they rushed out of the building from our hastily built snipers’ nest. My partner and I were on one side, and our Bravo Team at the outer perimeter, picking off anyone who made it through the first line.
It was an utter blood bath.
A woman with short, slicked black hair behind the CIA director nodded her head. Something about her was familiar, like I had seen her before. Was she the same CIA woman at the prisoner exchange?
“His identity is confirmed,” Director Roland Griffith nodded back to the woman, and I wondered if she was one of his analysts.
The President steepled his fingers in front of him, the entire room waiting with bated breath. I yawned, loudly, as I thumbed the safety of my Baretta.
Click. Safe. Click. Fire. Click. Safe . Over and over again, like the ticking of a clock. It reminded me of how Sierra’s thumb had frozen Matthews in place two years ago when she trained a loaded weapon right at his head.
My boss, Agent Oscar, lifted his brow, his eyes darting to my hand. A subtle warning telling me to knock it off.
I did.
“Mister Matthews,” The President said with far more respect than the man deserved. “You know that for your crimes, you’ll face death, by military tribunal.”
Matthews snarled again, not making a great case for himself.
The former SEAL had flipped and was in on a plot to attack a ceremony that would honor a Medal of Honor winner. That made him a very special kind of buddy fucker.
“However, we know that there are more like you out there. And we’re prepared to take the death penalty off the table if you’re willing to cooperate with–”
“I’ll save your pathetic offer,” Matthews narrowed his eyes. “We both know that I won’t take it.”
“Mr. Matthews,” the president continued. “Targeting democratically elected officials in a plot to subvert…”
Matthews laughed in a disturbing outburst. Long and awkward, he grew louder until, finally, like a villain in an action movie, his face closed him. He was neutral, like someone had turned him off like a switch. Like he had taken off a mask, then put it back on.
Fucking weirdo.
President Lau clasped his hands in front of him and then gave a sad nod.
“It’s a shame that your years of service are going to be reduced to nothing but a firing squad as a traitor.”
“The hilarious thing about you career politicians,” Matthews scoffed. “Is that your theories and book learning don’t mean shit. You were a lawyer, blah-fucking-blah. Your parents put you in the right schools, and you snow plowed your way to the White House. You never had to earn a thing, never actually had to work in state craft, did you? Just put on a pretty show, did a couple debates, and smacked your face on a few ribbons… you might as well be a real estate agent, with your face on a bus bench.”
President Lau’s ears turned red as he restrained his anger.
“If you had any experience, you would have known that commuting a death sentence wouldn’t do jack shit for me.” He smiled and laughed again, his thick lips pulling back to bare his square teeth. “What? So I can enjoy a life in Guantanamo Bay with all the scumbags I put away in the name of the red, white and blue?”
He cackled again.
“And we both know I’m not getting out of this room alive. If I was, you wouldn’t have sent Cerberus after me.”
The man had a point. We were hit men. Government hired but hit men all the same.
I was only waiting for a nod from the commander in chief because I would have loved to take my pistol butt to his face, right now.
“But maybe we can offer another inducement,” the woman behind my father stared right at the camera, breaking protocol by speaking without permission when she hadn’t been offered a seat at the table.
The President eyed Director Griffith, then the woman. But she chose not to acknowledge anyone. Her only focus was on Matthews.
“Your daughter, Suzy, and your ex-wife, Monica, are currently living outside of Arlington,” she said. “Suzy’s about to graduate with Honors.” She grabbed open a folder, then pulled out a picture, holding it up to the camera. The image of a young woman in a private school uniform dominated the screen.
“She’s been accepted into Johns Hopkins University with a Major in Security, Strategy and Statecraft.” She pulled the picture away.
A sick feeling twisted in my stomach. This was not how we did business. When dealing with American citizens we never, ever, made the kind of threats that woman was implying.
“She’s a very smart girl. How do you think her chances of employment will be after her father is declared an American Traitor?”
Matthews’ face darkened, and I wasn’t a hundred percent sure I wasn’t on his side. Threatening someone’s kid was off-base, even if we weren’t threatening to kill her.
But, then again, we were in the clandestine services, so that was never fully off the table either.
I glanced at Oscar who stood off-camera. He was… horrified. So was Sierra.
“Not that it would matter. Her mother won’t be able to help her pay for that insane tuition, after she loses her job at City Hall. Her job might be bureaucratic, but no one will trust her after the news of you gets out.”
Who was this woman?
This was out of line! We kept things secret. We didn’t let news get out. And if you were going to make a threat, you better be willing to go through with it.
“You wouldn’t fucking dare!” Matthews said with so much confidence that it made him sound… uncertain. He doth protest too much. “You want to keep this a secret. You wouldn’t let that information out.”
“Would you like to try me, Mr. Matthews?” The woman straightened, like she was ready to arm wrestle him through the screen.
Matthew’s ground his molars, and I got a headache just seeing how hard his jaw muscles worked.
I winced, and it drew his attention to me. He narrowed his eyes, which made me laugh again. There wasn’t a whole lot to fear about this guy anymore. Not when he was bound and gagged.
“You think this is funny?” He yelled, fighting against his restraints.
“Nah, man,” I said coolly. “Just because I'm laughing, doesn’t mean I’m joking.”
“Agent Kilo,” The CIA Director reprimanded, and I lifted my hands, taking a step back from the prisoner… I mean hostage… I mean… dead man.
“Think about this, funny man.” Matthews smirked. “You’ll never be safe. Not in your condo in DC, not in your Daddy’s house.” He looked over at the screen, right at my father. “And not with that bitch you’ve got hidden upstate.”
I let out a low chuckle even as my heart clenched.
The bitch upstate? Was he talking about Taz?
Adrenaline seeped into every vein. I was ready to blow his brains out right here, right now. If they harmed a single hair on her head, I would break each bone in their body, and light their skin on fire. I would wipe them off the face of the fucking planet!
My name and lineage were meant to be kept under wraps. And the thing about Taz upstate? That was a secret laid out on a few pieces of paper, the true significance known to only two people. One was me. The other was Sierra, who put two and two together, and found the meaning of life…
She picked me up after I was done convalescing from a bullet wound to the thigh in Mourningkill, New York. She’d commented on the pretty woman who was playing nurse while I healed.
Then a rather inconvenient bullet to the chest left me incapacitated. Agent Sierra had to get into my papers, to figure out what to do with me while I was unconscious. By the time I got the firefly tattooed over my chest scar, Sierra had scoured the internet like a stalky ex-girlfriend and found out everything there was about my secret desire. She’d nagged me incessantly about it ever since.
“Thanks for letting us know we have a leak.” I covered the mixed emotions swirling in my gut with a lazy chortle and rested a shoulder against the wall, not letting on that the implications of that information were monumental.
“If your people go after that bitch, as you called her, then they better bring a whole fucking Army,” I said with as little emotion as I could.
Because I will bring an Army of my own to hunt you fuckers down.
My pulse thrummed in my ears. How the fuck did they know about her? How did they know her association to me?
I had to get word to her, but not by phone, email or anything that could be traced. I had to go to her, in person. I’d bring a team if I had to.
Except she’d never allow that. She’d make me explain how, and why, and what for… and frankly, that was a conversation I wasn’t ready to have.
The coin in my pocket burned. The Challenge Coin with a three-headed dog of Cerberus on one side, and the letter K on the other. The coin that could be shown to any Federal agent, and have her funneled to a person in DC who could get word to me. The coin that she could show to anyone and raise a flare that would descend help in the form of the fucking US National Guard Special Forces, if necessary.
The coin I hadn’t given her because she’d know what she meant to me, and how she ranked in the hierarchy of scumbags in my life. And she wasn’t ready to talk about that night.
“Agent Kilo,” the CIA Director, was still calling me by my designator, but it was useless.
If Matthews knew who I was, what did it matter? Dad could shove it.
“Mr. President?” Dad turned to President Lau, silently asking him for the words that would end this conversation.
I looked over at the screen, thumbing it from safe to fire. Click. Click. Click.
“Get rid of him,” the President said, his face sour. I had thought his anti-Death Penalty stance was purely politics, but he looked disturbed. Like he didn’t want to approve of this extrajudicial killing.
Well, I’ll be…
Director Griffith pressed something on the console to cut the sound. Oscar, and my partner Sierra both covered their ears, as I lifted the pistol to Matthews’ forehead.
Just because I could, I added, “The only person that’s allowed to talk shit about her… is me.”
He grinned, his eyes full of mirth. Fucker was going to go down swinging.
“You don’t even know who she really is, do you?” He taunted, that evil laugh rising in his chest again. It was an irritating sound and it gave me great pleasure to silence him forever. “The things we’ll do to Trinity Blaze Guerro…”
I fired a single shot between his eyes. The pop echoed through the rotten barn that was our base of operations for this mission. Blood splattered across the ground, soaking into the swept dirt as his head fell back.
“Well,” Sierra said, pulling a chainsaw from the wall. “I plotted out where to dispose of him.”
The lifeless form kinda resembled a person sleeping in an airline chair, his head tilted back, and mouth wide open. His legs were splayed out in front of him like he was man-spreading.
People truly died the way they lived.
I shoved him with my foot to topple him to the ground, his fall kicking up dirt.
“We each get 5 pieces,” Sierra continued, turning on the saw. She shouted over its whirring blades, “And when you look at it on a map, it makes a smiley face!”
I tried not to laugh. But damn, it was hard when we did such twisted wet work.