Shadow War

Then there was silence.

From his position at the window Schwarz shifted his Steyr AUG, scanning the area. Nothing moved. He snapped the barrel to a different vector and found all still.

Carl Lyons stood at the point of the unit’s triangle formation, his smoking shotgun pointed downward, his ears ringing from the booming of his own weapon.

For a second he couldn’t understand Schwarz’s frantic shouting, then his hearing returned well enough for him to make out what his teammate was hollering. Lyons spun, searching the floor for Blancanales.

He saw the unconscious Latino sprawled out, one hand still clutching his weapon, the other resting on an ugly mess of a wound leaking blood across his lap. Schwarz burst through the door and began checking Zetas bodies as Lyons made his way through the carnage toward his downed friend.

Blancanales’s breathing was shallow and forced, his color obviously bad, even in the uncertain light. Blancanales himself often served as Able Team’s field medic, so it was from his kit that Carl Lyons stripped the first-aid equipment.

He set down his shotgun and brought a soft, OD green plastic package to his teeth and ripped it open. He moved Blancanales’s hand to the side and spilled the contents of the packet on his open wound. Instantly the coagulation powder went to work, clotting the blood around the puncture wounds.

Since Blancanales’s breathing was uncompromised, if laborious, and there was no other obvious wound, Lyons dedicated his attention to that injury first. Behind him Schwarz kept his weapon in one hand and used his other to call in the team’s helicopter.

“Help us,” moaned one of the hanging prisoners.

“Shut up,” Lyons snapped.

He finished securing a second pressure dressing over Blancanales’s wound. The Latino’s eyes fluttered open, glazed with pain, and Lyons could see the man struggle toward coherency through the force of sheer willpower.

“We good?” Blancanales asked.

“Yeah,” Lyons answered softly. “Jack’s coming. We’ll have you medevaced in no time. I hear the chopper now.”

“The girl?”

“She’s out, buddy. You’re lucky you’re still spry for such an old fart.”

“Screw you,” Blancanales said. His teeth were gritted through the pain. “Help me stand.”

“Negative,” Lyons said. “You’re bleeding internally. You try to walk, and you’ll rip your guts open.”

The big ex-cop put a heavy hand on Blancanales’s chest, keeping the stubborn man down. As he did so, he noticed the man’s abdomen pushing out and becoming rigid right before his eyes. The internal bleeding was bad, Lyons realized, rapidly filling the spaces between his internal organs inside his torso. The clock was ticking on the wounded man.

Blancanales winced as he sank back down and Lyons pulled a loaded morphine syringe from Blancanales’s medic kit. As he prepped the needle, he called over his shoulder at the third member of the team. Outside he could hear the sound of Jack Grimaldi’s chopper.

“How we doing?” Lyons asked.

“Good,” Schwarz answered. Having made sure all the hostile personnel were down, he walked over to the hanging men. One of them was a dripping corpse. Brains clung to the dead man’s shirt and blood spilled freely down his body from the gaping hole in his head, creating a growing puddle at his feet.

“Who knows Hart?” Schwarz asked the remaining two prisoners, using the CIA case officer’s pseudonym. “Come on, who knows Hart? I hope to Christ it wasn’t this guy.” The Able Team commando gestured toward the corpse.

Gonzales turned his head. “Bellicose Dawn,” he muttered. He felt exhausted, dried out like a piece of fruit turned to leather in the sun. “Hart wanted to know about Bellicose Dawn.”

“Let’s get you out of here,” Schwarz said.

While Lyons gave Blancanales a shot to help him manage the overwhelming pain, Schwarz began undoing the manacles locked around Gonzales’s wrists. The informant sagged onto his feet, fighting back tears of relief. He stripped off his sweat-and blood-soaked shirt and tucked it into his pants to cover himself. He felt a sudden urge to spit on the bodies of Lagos and the unconscious Marta, but restrained himself. A distracted part of his mind cataloged the vivid, ugly scar on Lagos’s throat.

“Don’t get bashful now,” Schwarz warned. “I got a hurt brother, and you’re coming out to help me get one of the stretcher benches attached to my chopper.”

“My family—” Gonzales began.

“Covered,” Schwarz cut him off. “Your boy Hart already arranged that. Now let’s move.”

“What about me!” the last prisoner demanded, his voice frantic.

“Don’t worry. You’ll only be hanging a few more minutes. We’ll call the locals and tell them they have a cleanup on aisle ten. You’ll be fine.”

“You can’t leave me hanging here!” the man cried.

“People judge you by the company you keep, asshole,” Schwarz snapped. “Now shut up or I’ll leave you like your friend. At least he’s quiet.”

The bluff worked and the man fell silent.

In minutes the wounded Blancanales was loaded onto the stretcher and then the Little Bird as Carl Lyons coordinated with Stony Man control on local response and emergency medical treatment for the wounded Able Team operator.

Gonzales was loaded onto the helicopter, and the Little Bird lifted off as the first units of the NOPD were making their way to the scene. The incident would remain an official mystery with its own PR story for the press.

The lid was off Bellicose Dawn.

CHAPTER SIX

Gary Manning used his key card override on the door. The electronic indicator light flashed red, then amber, then green. The automatic lock snapped back with an audible click, and he turned the lever handle. The door swung open under his touch then stopped as the chain caught.

Manning growled like a bear and put his shoulder to the door. The chain popped loose with a sharp sound and the door flew open. Hawkins rushed in, his silenced pistol up and ready.

He used the weight of his body to keep the door to the hotel room open as Encizo rushed into the room hard on his heels. Manning followed.

Phoenix Force stopped and stared.

Her rubber dress pushed up above her thighs, Bellucci straddled the nude al-Shalaan like a cowgirl on her pony. In one hand she held the end of a corded rope fashioned into a choker around the Arab powerbroker’s neck. With her other she used a riding crop to urge the hopping man into continued motion. From the welts and livid red marks on the man’s buttocks the dominatrix had not been shy about using the whip.

With each buck Bellucci hopped, causing her augmented breasts to bounce wildly. Al-Shalaan was barking something as the woman struck him. Phoenix Force’s dynamic entry caused the pair to snap their heads around in shock.

Bellucci screamed as she saw the men rush in. Al-Shalaan threw himself straight to the floor, squeezing his eyes shut against the vision of four sound suppressors bearing down on him.

Manning blinked, stunned by the incredulous imagery before him, then training took over and put his conscious mind in the passenger seat.

“Freeze!” he shouted in French. Then added, “Secure the room.”

Hawkins and Encizo immediately stood and pushed deeper into the suite, methodically clearing the room as James rushed toward the intertwined sex partners under the unwavering cover of Manning’s pistol.

“Don’t shoot!” the woman shrieked in terror, using French as Manning had.

“Stay down!” James snapped, and shoved her clear of al-Shalaan.

The featherweight woman tumbled off her partner’s back and slid across the marble tile of the floor. Her riding crop went spinning away. She curled into a terrified ball. James slid his pistol back into its shoulder holster and reached down with his free hand to snatch the loose end of the rope wound around al-Shalaan’s neck.

He jerked the man to his feet, pulled the auto-injector clear and jabbed it into the side of the terrorist facilitator’s neck. A second dose went straight into the man’s bloodstream. James shoved the man against the wall and let him slide to the ground.

“You want to dose the woman?” he asked Manning.

“Clear!” Encizo and Hawkins called in French from deeper inside the room.

“Yeah,” Manning answered.

The Canadian holstered his pistol as Encizo and Hawkins came back into the entranceway. Drawing his auto-injector, he moved toward the cowering prostitute. She tried to scramble away from him, but he was too quick and too strong for her. He pinned her against the bar. Her arm swung desperately, knocking a tumbler of ice and gin to the ground where it exploded into glass shards with a pop like a gunshot.

“I’m sorry, this won’t hurt,” Manning said in French, finding manhandling the woman a distasteful task.

Mission first.

He leaned his weight against her body and applied the auto-injector into the soft, smooth flesh of her neck. The woman’s heart was racing in terror, and the drug affected her almost instantaneously. He lowered her to the floor, avoiding the spilled liquor and broken glass.

Manning rose and surveyed the scene. James was using a tactical folding knife to cut the ropes from around the neck of the unconscious al-Shalaan. Hawkins was quickly shoving the Saudi prince’s attaché case, cell phone and laptop into a black nylon gym bag. Coming across the man’s suit jacket lying on the floor, the Southerner lifted the man’s leather wallet from the inside pocket and threw that in, as well.

Encizo was at the open door, scanning the hallway for witnesses and bystanders while covering the slumped bodies of the guards. He had collected guns from every man and dropped them inside a waist-high ceramic vase set beside the entrance to the room. Manning was satisfied that the operation was unfolding as smoothly as could be expected.

“We’ve picked up our uncle and we’re coming home,” he said into his throat mike.

“Copy,” McCarter and Price echoed.

“Get the wheelchair,” Manning said to Encizo.

Encizo disappeared around the edge of the door as he darted down the hall. Manning turned and crossed the room’s foyer to help James hoist al-Shalaan’s limp body off the floor. Behind them Hawkins had methodically made his way around to the woman’s purse, dumping the contents out onto the bar.

He let out a long low whistle as he shifted through the mess. “Jeez, how much drugs does this woman have?” He shook his head as he pulled up the menu on her phone and read some numbers, quickly scanning for prefixes that might be important. “Nothing.”

“You got everything?” Manning asked.

“Yeah. All we have time for. I haven’t found the room safe, but it wasn’t on our op plan anyway.”

“Let’s go,” James said.

Encizo came back into the room, pushing the wheelchair ahead of him. Without preamble James and Manning slung the unconscious body of al-Shalaan into the seat. The big Canadian stacked the man’s loose clothing on his naked lap. This was a discreet hotel. If a VIP was being escorted dead drunk and naked to a waiting car by his entourage, then it was best not to make the situation hotel business.

Phoenix Force moved out of the room and passed the sprawled bodies of al-Shalaan’s guards. They turned down the hallway opposite the elevator bank. They moved quickly in a quintessential VIP protection pattern.

“Let’s go, guys,” McCarter said in the earjack. “The valet is giving me grief.”

“Pay him off, we don’t need the heat. The package is naked.”

“Whose fault is that? Just hurry. This fussy little man out here has numbered days if he blows that goddamn whistle at me one more time,” the ex-SAS commando said.

“I believe him. We’d better get moving,” Manning said.

“It’s nice to know cooler heads prevail,” James muttered.

Phoenix Force reached the end of the hall and opened a door set off to the right of the stair access entrance. They stepped into an Employees Only area where the hotel maids kept their cleaning carts and the bellhops cached folding trays for room service. A freight elevator stood to one side of the long, narrow staging area.

They moved quickly to the elevator, and Manning pulled a firefighter override key from his pocket and called the lift straight to the floor.

The elevator door opened with a pneumatic hiss and Encizo pushed the wheelchair inside.

McCarter’s voice came over the com link. “I’ve got sirens.”

“Copy,” Manning said. “We’re headed to the lobby now.”

The doors sealed shut and the elevator jerked as it started its descent. The inside of the freight elevator was deep and wide, big enough for a small forklift to fit into. The walls were dented and painted a flat, institutional white above metal plating that ran about halfway up the sides. It smelled like cleaning products.

McCarter spoke into the com link. “I’m moving to Route Bravo. The first gendarme has arrived.”

“Copy,” Manning acknowledged.

The elevator slowed, then halted and the door slid open. A rail-thin bellhop with slicked-back hair looked up in surprise.

Manning stepped forward in the manner of an arrogant bodyguard and brushed past the man. “Move!” he snapped in German.

Behind him Phoenix Force rolled out of the elevator and began to navigate the warren of halls behind the hotel’s lobby, heading toward the loading docks. They caught some stares from janitors and building workers, but no one said a word to the hard-eyed men.

They hit the back dock moving briskly. As if taking a cue from some off-scene director, McCarter pulled up into the loading bay. He was driving the stretch Hummer as part of the cover, right down to the chauffeur’s uniform. He locked up the independent disc brakes and jerked the heavy vehicle to a stop. Manning heard the sound of the automatic locks disengaging and quickly jerked open the back door on the big vehicle.

Hawkins and Encizo put their hands under al-Shalaan’s arms and catapulted him out of the wheelchair as James pulled it away, thrusting him through the open limo door. There was a shout from behind them, but the team ignored it as they leaped after the unconscious man and into the vehicle.

McCarter slammed his foot to the gas pedal before Manning had time to pull the door closed behind him and the big vehicle hurtled out of the loading dock and onto a side street.

“What’d you do?” McCarter demanded.

A Fiat suddenly appeared in front of him and he jerked the stretch Hummer into the other lane to avoid a rear-end collision.

In the back, the Phoenix Force commandos rolled up against the side of the vehicle with the sudden sharp swerve. They struggled to get the unconscious Saudi into a seat and a safety belt around him. James managed to click the buckle just before McCarter slammed on the brakes.

James was thrown backward, bouncing off the granite mass of Manning and landing on top of Encizo. The men scrambled to fit themselves into seat belts as McCarter slalomed the gigantic stretch Hummer in and out of traffic.

“This is bollocksed!” McCarter snarled to no one in particular.

“Let’s just get to the jetty!” James called back. “It’ll take them a while to shift the pursuit to the water. By that time we’ll have scuttled the boat and be gone.”

“That’s what I’m doing, mate,” McCarter agreed.

He tapped his brakes, snapped the steering wheel to the left, gunned the gas and zoomed past a black four-door sedan, then he cut the wheel back to the right. Behind him a single siren and flashing light bar became three.

Hawkins crawled over the barrier between the backseat and the driver compartment through the open glass divider. He swung down, twisted and slid into the shotgun seat. McCarter darted around a heavy diesel truck stacked with crates and the motion threw the former U.S. army commando up against the passenger door. Hawkins snatched hold of the handle above the window to steady himself.

“Let’s use the improved clearance on this thing,” Hawkins said. “Cut through something, drive over something. Those patrol cars are low-slung.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

Hawkins looked at the NSA field version of the vehicle’s navigation device and watched their GPS coordinates speeding through the map display of the French city. He saw a series of switchback turns coming up on the road ahead toward the team’s exfiltration point.

McCarter burned through an intersection against the light. Horns blared in sudden panic, and the Hummer rocked on its suspension like a boxer avoiding jabs. They crested a rise and through a break in the buildings, and the Briton could see empty black under a dark sky. Behind them a police cruiser gunned forward and tried to pull parallel. McCarter swerved to cut him off and bullied the cop back with the superior weight of the stretch Hummer.

“Up ahead. Take that alley,” Hawkins barked, “drive across the parking lot and down the hill. There’s no way the cops’ll follow us in their cars. It’ll buy us minutes as they try to navigate the switchbacks down to the shore.”

“That’s crazy!” McCarter shouted. “We’ll flip for sure.” He jerked the wheel in a tight, 180-degree spin then let it flip back around. “Hold on!”

The Briton reached down and flipped off the all-wheel drive, switching the custom setting to front-wheel control. He tapped the brakes and the rear wheels of the Hummer locked up, screaming in protest as McCarter just managed to slide the rear end around.

The knobby front tires of the sliding vehicle clawed at the asphalt. They met the curb of the sidewalk and bucked up into the air. The rear wheels caught hold and as the front of the Hummer bounced back down McCarter snapped the vehicle back into all-wheel drive.

“Who dares wins,” McCarter gritted.

T HEY SPED INTO THE NARROW alley Hawkins had indicated. The former SAS commando struck a pair of garbage cans with the stretch Hummer’s heavy bumper. They bounced up into the air, spilling trash across the windshield, then bounced off the hood and flipped up over the vehicle’s roof. McCarter snapped the wheel to avoid a larger, industrial-size green garbage bin and scraped the wall of the alley. There was a shower of sparks, then the screaming of metal peeling away from metal as his sideview mirror was snapped off.

“Oh, we’re having fun now,” Hawkins said.

The stretch Hummer rocketed out of the narrow alley and shot across the street. McCarter lay on the horn as he cut across two lanes of traffic. A forest-green Audi locked its brakes as the Hummer suddenly loomed in front of it. The little coupe turned sideways, its rear end fishtailing.

The Hummer’s front wheels struck the edge of the sidewalk and bounced up again. McCarter wrestled the massive vehicle over a parking divider, uprooting a sapling as he did so. He weaved in and out of sitting vehicles as he crossed the parking lot. A middle-aged couple in evening dress appeared at the edge of his headlights.

The woman screamed and the man had the presence of mind to jerk back. McCarter turned his wheel, kissed the side of a parked Fiat and shot past the terrified couple.

“Sorry!” he yelled, knowing they couldn’t hear him. He glanced at his sideview mirror to see how close the pursuing patrol cars were, and then remembered he’d ripped the driver-side mirror clean off the body frame. His eyes darted to the passenger-side mirror. He saw spinning lights emerging from the alley across the street.

He turned his gaze forward again. A thick hedge of arborvitaes formed a wall at the rear of the parking lot. He cut his eyes toward Hawkins, then back toward the wall of foliage. He never slowed.

The bucking of the vehicle as it hit the curb rattled their teeth hard. Then the heavy bumper struck the arborvitaes like a battering ram and the Hummer slammed through and out the other side.

For a second McCarter couldn’t see anything but the rubbery, fanlike needled leaves. The Hummer hurtled through a shoulder-high fence of 4x4 planks and turned them into splintered kindling.

Then there was nothing.

The Hummer hovered for a moment out into open space and Hawkins had an absurd, momentary flashback to his childhood and the television show The Dukes of Hazard. The Hummer tilted as they hovered and they could see the lights of the city plunging down the steep hill below them.

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