Chapter 1
THE EXPEDITED MEDICAL TRANSPORT company occupied the rear of a nondescript building in an equally nondescript industrial park in East New Orleans.
Although a few tech start-ups were sprouting up here and there, attracted by low commercial rents and easy access to downtown, the area remained a monochromatic landscape: squat buildings of corrugated steel amid a welter of chain-link fences and shabby one-way streets.
As J. F. Foreman pulled into EMT’s parking lot and eased his Cadillac DeVille Concours into his space, he felt—as always—that he liked the industrial wasteland just the way it was.
Talk of a new “tech corridor” being established here was just that: talk.
Silicon Valley had a lock on that enterprise, and he didn’t see things changing anytime soon.
Besides, the computer industry was never going to cause much of a change, beyond a lot of secretaries and accountants losing their jobs: look at Gateway, its stock way overvalued and headed for a fall. Apple, already moribund, would be next.
By force of habit, he glanced around before killing the engine.
He grabbed his briefcase and stepped out into the overpowering humidity of a Louisiana summer.
He shut the door, locked it, and gave the new Caddy an affectionate pat.
The Japanese could try taking over the luxury segment with their Acuras and their Infinitis, but Foreman had always bought American and always would.
He took another, briefer look around, then walked up to the smoked-glass entrance to his business, which instead of a company sign merely bore a small tag reading PLEASE PRESS BUZZER.
But Alice had seen him approaching, and the door popped open with the hush of a well-oiled lock just as he raised his hand toward it.
“Morning, Alice!” he said cheerfully to his secretary-receptionist-accountant. EMT was a small outfit, less than a dozen employees. “Is everybody there?”
“Yes, Mr. Foreman. They’re all waiting for you.”
“Thank you.” As he passed her, heading for the reinforced metal door of his office, he looked back to give her one last smile—noting approvingly as he did so that the short-barreled 12-gauge was in its proper place below her desk, easily accessible.
He entered his spartan office, shut and locked the door behind him, hung up his suit jacket, and placed the briefcase—which was empty—on his desk.
Then he slid behind the desk, accessed a safe behind a wooden panel, and withdrew a thin folder.
Closing the safe, he walked toward a second door set into the rear wall of his office.
It opened into a conference room, with a table around which six men were already seated.
He looked at them in turn. Each glance was brief, but his highly tuned instincts could spot anything even remotely out of place.
The men all looked calm and alert, with nothing in either their dress or expressions to alarm him.
Anybody else might find such a motley aggregation—some dressed as plumbers or electricians, others as businessmen, one in a cheap tank top—peculiar.
But all J. F. Foreman felt was satisfaction.
He placed the folder at the head of the table, then took a seat behind it. “Gentleman, we’re on for August 9.”
He was pleased at how this announcement was greeted. Eagerness gleamed in their eyes, not unlike what he’d seen in the marines when he’d told his squad a new mission was in the offing.
After leaving the armed forces, Foreman had spent a few years as a guard in a private bank, then as armed escort for Middle Eastern billionaires visiting the United States.
In their own ways, both jobs had opened his eyes to the state of the security industry—and within it, a niche that seemed ripe for exploiting.
So he’d taken his small inheritance and founded Expedited Medical Transport.
Despite the name, EMT had nothing to do with health care. Rather, it acted as a courier service—a kind of bespoke armored car company—for high-value customers and corporations who wished to move their assets, in whatever form they took, as inconspicuously as possible.
Over the last three years, Foreman had built a client base sufficient for his operational needs.
He had two heavily reinforced medical transport vans—armored cars, with their high visibility, were precisely what he didn’t want—along with a small fleet of backup and escort vehicles.
He was careful in choosing which clients to take on and ensuring the goods transported were legal, not weapons or drugs: he did not wish to attract the attention of the authorities or get involved in a gang war.
His few employees were carefully curated and vetted.
Most were ex-military or ex-police; all were well trained in the use of weapons and had concealed carry permits.
All were single. All dressed for “work” in their assigned ways, be it businessman or blue-collar.
And all lived far apart from each other and did not fraternize.
This last element was vital to Foreman. It was easy to guard against one bad egg trying to steal from his boss.
An internal conspiracy among several, however, to hijack a delivery was more difficult to prepare for.
That was why Foreman took on only one job at a time and always used the entire team; why he paid them extremely well—and why he’d carefully drilled into them an ironclad rule: if one of his men went rogue during a delivery, the rest were to incapacitate him without hesitation.
This was also why he always assigned four men to the delivery vehicle, and three others to the escort car that followed.
He had a perfect record, and he intended for it to remain that way.
He had just been given the green light for a new delivery, and now it was time to brief the team. He gave one more quick look around the table, his gaze stopping at Arnold Carson, whom he’d met during the Gulf intervention and considered his informal second-in-command.
“A Gulfstream G-IV SP will be landing at the Lakefront Airport at approximately twenty-one hundred hours the night after next,” he said, opening the folder.
“Our package will be aboard. We are to deliver it to a location within a three-hour drive from the airport, over interstate and primary roads.”
Everyone knew Carson would be handed an envelope with the precise location on the actual day of the op.
“The package itself will be unusual. It will be a woman—in fact, the client herself.”
This raised a few eyebrows.
“Naturally I have no photographs. But she is Asian, about five feet tall, and thirty years old. A small attaché case—Hermès, brown, crocodile—will be handcuffed to one wrist, and will remain there until she reaches the destination.”
He took a deep breath. “Other than that, there should be nothing out of the ordinary. She will ride in the transport vehicle, inside the safety chamber. There will be no need to speak with her. Now: are there any questions?”
Carson shook his head. The rest remained silent.
Foreman nodded. “Good. Then make the usual preparations. We’ll meet back here at fifteen hundred on the ninth. I’ll inform you of any updates should it be necessary.”
As they rose to leave, Foreman spoke to the man in the tank top. “Proctor? Got a minute?”
Proctor halted and waited for the others to leave.
Proctor was Foreman’s most recent hire. He was promising but inscrutable.
He’d been with EMT half a year and had performed his duties flawlessly.
Foreman wasn’t the kind to fully accept somebody until he was absolutely sure of their qualities—but Proctor was not an easy one to pin down.
He’d provided excellent references from his most recent employment as a security guard.
He was an excellent shot and was accustomed to taking orders: obviously ex-military.
He was six foot four, ripped as hell, but he also carried a quality of litheness and grace that seemed God-given rather than the product of a gym.
Yet he’d declined to specify what branch of the military he’d been in, or in what capacity, and he was evasive regarding details of his personal life.
When asked, he’d shown Foreman discharge papers that were equally imprecise, indicating he’d been involved in classified work, which he had nothing to say about.
He had little to say, period. While this might have put off a more traditional employer, Foreman sought out qualities like these.
Since his hiring, Proctor had reported for work, accomplished his duties faultlessly, and left when the op was done.
Foreman sometimes worried about his men getting too chummy with one another—but with Proctor, it was the opposite.
He had none of the swaggering, jocular tough-guy attitudes his other men had.
Foreman had kept a close eye on Proctor, worried that the reticence might be from PTSD, but in the end he realized the man was just quiet.
“You know Rodriguez is still out.” This was Foreman’s seventh employee, missing from today’s meeting. He was currently in the hospital with diverticulitis. That meant Foreman was a man short—one risk of running so tight a ship.
Proctor nodded.
“That means I’ll need to shift you from the escort car and give you Rodriguez’s position in the van. That leaves only a driver and navigator in the tail vehicle, but it’s more important the asset be fully covered.”
“Understood.”
“I’m glad to hear it. Because this is an opportunity, Proctor: a high-value transport. Do a good job, keep it clean, and there’ll be a nice bonus for you at the end.”
Proctor nodded again.
“That’s all. Come by the office tomorrow at three for your briefing.”
The man rose and left the conference room the way the others had taken. Foreman stared at the door as it closed behind him, chewing his lip meditatively, for a long time.