Chapter 15 #3
“Easy, mate,” Piet murmured, but his own heart had speeded up a little, the predator catching scent of the prey. It was the end game, now. “She’s logged onto the site.”
He tapped furiously at the keyboard. A three dimensional map came up, rotated, the floor plan of a tall building.
A green dot flicked on the 9th floor. “And she’s…
yeah, she’s in the Morrison Building. Right fucking now.
” He manipulated the image, input some data.
“And she’s on the 9th floor. Hang about…
” He pulled up the building’s space allocation specs he’d pre-loaded during the flight.
“Right. So she’s on the 9th floor in an office called Wordsmith.
” He brought up the site. “A translation agency.” He shot a glance at Montez. “She know languages?”
Montez shook his head, confused. “Not that I know of.”
“You have any incriminating material you shouldn’t have in other languages, like Arabic?”
That made Montez pause. “No,” he said finally.
“Then what the fuck’s she doing in a translation agency?”
“Hell if I know.”
“Christ,” Piet began in disgust, lifting his head to automatically check the street. His eyes widened. “There she is!”
“What? Where?” Montez shouted frantically, but Piet was already out of the car and running after a slender figure about twenty meters ahead of him.
Palmer looked behind her, but she wasn’t focusing on him. She had no idea who he was. Maybe she was looking for a taxi.
Well, he’d give her a ride, all right.
In a few strides he had caught up with her. She was prettier than in her pictures, with rich red-brown hair that shone in the sunlight, fine features, green eyes. Though right now she was crying.
Of course.
She’d just seen the video of her friend.
Well good, she was off balance.
The whole op was embarrassingly easy. Didn’t take more than thirty seconds. Smooth, textbook.
Piet reached out and put his hand around her upper arm.
That was the thing with civilians—they never reacted.
Touch him unexpectedly and he’d break your arm before you knew it.
Fuck with him in any way, and you’d find yourself staring at the haft of a knife that was buried between your third and fourth ribs, the blade slicing deep into your heart.
But not Ellen Palmer, oh no. Even in a state of shock, she was clearly going to speak civilly to him. Whatever she was going to say was lost, though, because the syringe he had hidden in his palm sank deep into her bicep and her eyes rolled up in her head.
The Mercedes had rolled up behind him, stopping with the back door not a foot from him. At least Montez did this right.
Ellen Palmer’s knees buckled.
He caught her before she fell.
Harry was putting together a quote for a client, but his mind wasn’t on it. His mind was in the small, pretty office across the hallway from RBK Security, where his woman was. He had to really focus on what he was doing, because Ellen’s beautiful face kept floating across his field of vision.
She’d been so solemn this morning, so sad. Distant and reflective, staring out the window at the scenery without really taking it in as they drove across the bridge and into the business district.
The incident yesterday had really spooked her. Well, hell, it had spooked him. But he was a soldier. You dodge the bullet and forget about it. There will be another bullet, but not today. Nicole was okay, the baby was okay, move on.
Ellen found it hard to move on. She had a tender heart, which made him even more determined to shield her. Crissy had had a tender heart, too, and she’d been mown down by the creatures of the night. No one was going to touch Ellen, ever again. He’d move heaven and earth to prevent it.
There was an email, from Ellen.
Before he could read it, Nicole stuck her head into his office, Sam hovering behind her.
“Harry?” Nicole looked worried and for a second Harry was terrified that she was bleeding again.
Man, she’d scared the shit out of him yesterday.
He’d hidden it from Ellen because she was out of her mind with worry and guilt, but deep down the thought of losing that little girl they were all looking forward to so much was horrifying.
But it turned out that Nicole was concerned about the only thing worse than losing the baby.
“Harry,” she said softly, “it’s Ellen.”
“What?” Harry rose on legs that felt suddenly hollow. What could possibly be wrong with Ellen? He’d left her in Nicole’s office, which was as safe as modern technology and three determined and savvy men could make it. “What about Ellen?”
In the field, Harry was known for keeping his cool. That emotional detachment that had defined him his whole life came in real handy on ops, and in firefights. It was easy for him—just disengage the gear that drove his emotions and he was firing on all cylinders. Fast and cool and deadly.
That deserted him now while cold terror roiled his guts.
“She’s gone, Harry.” Sam stepped forward, face sombre. “Nicole was in the bathroom and when she came back, Ellen wasn’t there. She’d thrown up in a wastepaper basket. She just ran out, the chair was thrown back from the desk. I clicked on her computer monitor and, shit man, I saw why she ran.”
Oh God. “What? What was there?”
Sam hesitated. “Not good.” He turned to Nicole, said gently, “Wait outside, honey,” and kissed her cheek.
Looking sad, Sam placed the laptop on Harry’s desk while Nicole closed the door behind her. Harry clicked on the space bar to turn the screen on and felt a rush of rage at the image. He processed it immediately.
A dark-haired young woman, pretty underneath the tears and terror, duct taped to a chair. He quickly scanned the background but there was absolutely nothing there. Not even a digital image specialist could pick up anything, he was sure. A bare gray space, no reflections, no objects.
Just stills of a poor terrified woman, straining against the restraints, bucking with pain, a big hand pinching the brachial plexus.
It was excruciating, the kind of pain that could reduce a person to shuddering bedrock, down to something barely human.
“Wait,” Sam said. His face was dark and grim. “There’s more.”
Another still. Something torn and broken appeared. Red and savaged. Barely human.
“Christ,” Harry breathed.
“Yeah,” Sam grunted.
“Fuck,” Mike chimed in. Harry hadn’t heard the door open and close. Mike had extrasensory perception when it came to trouble. “That’s serious shit.”
“There’s audio.” Sam clicked on the icon and put a hand on Harry’s shoulder. “It’s real bad, Harry.”
A surreal digitized voice that sounded like it came from the lowest reaches of hell buzzed. “Ellen Palmer, this is your friend Kerry…”
He listened to the message through to the end, fury rising.
Bullshit. That woman was dead. They were fucking with Ellen’s head, trying to get her to show.
Harry was sweating. He looked up at his two friends, his brothers. “She saw that. That’s why she vomited.” He clicked on his email and read with growing horror the message she’d sent him. “And Christ, that’s why she’s gone. She went to the FBI.”
“Well, fuck.” Sam looked puzzled. “She wants to go to the FBI, why didn’t she wait for you to take her?”
“I think she wants to ask for protection while they put together a case.” Harry met his brothers’ eyes. “She blamed herself for what happened to Nicole. She kept saying it was her fault. She’d be totally freaked if this was a friend of hers.”
“Wasn’t anybody’s fault except for that fucker Montez,” Sam responded heatedly.
“Yeah, I know. Try to convince her of that. I’ll talk to Welles, see what I can do.
” Aaron Welles, former Ranger, now FBI. A good friend.
Harry would explain the situation, they’d debrief Ellen and he’d convince her to come home.
Actually, going to the FBI was a good move and one he’d have gotten to eventually.
“Shit!” Harry and Sam turned to Mike, who was pointing to the monitor that showed the building’s security cams. “She didn’t make it to the FBI. Look at that!”
The three men watched in horror at the scene unfolding. Mike had rewound. The white letters in the lower right hand corner said Monday, April 14, 12:05 pm. A quarter of an hour ago.
Ellen running out of the building, stumbling. The quality of the digital tape was so good Harry could see the silver tracks of tears on her face, the trembling of her hands. She turned right and walked quickly on the wide sidewalk, glancing back often, hoping for a passing cab.
Across the street a tall blond man stepped out of a Mercedes and ran toward her.
Harry’s blood froze. Adrenaline flooded his system making the scene appear as if it were in slow motion though he knew it was in real time. He was in combat time as he watched the takedown.
Ellen turning her head around once more, soft curly hair swinging over her shoulders, wiping at the tears on her face.
Hurrying, but slightly unsteady on her feet.
Eyes, mouth blurred with shock. He could tell the exact moment she saw the tall blond man running toward her, the slight hesitation.
The instinctive attempt to help. As she slowed to see what he wanted, the black Mercedes left the curb, slowly made its way down the street.
“Oh hell. Haven’t seen him in years.” Mike’s deep voice. Harry nodded without taking his eyes off the screen.
“Who?” Sam asked. “Who is he?”
“Piet van der Boeke.” Mike’s deep voice was clipped. “South African merc. Go to guy for a lot of people. Really good at tracking. He’ll kill if the price is right.”
That shut Sam up.
All three men leaned forward as the screen showed van der Boeke reaching Ellen, clasping her arm…Ellen buckling, van der Boeke scooping her up, throwing her in the back seat of the Mercedes which had caught up with them, jumping in the passenger seat, the Mercedes accelerating out of the frame.