Breaking Point

  The driver pulled straight out, and across the road before he wheeled the big SUV into a tight right turn broadside to Howard. The peeing man jumped out and ran around the car toward the fence, Howard could see him in the red glow of the brake lights. He was carrying what looked like a big pair of hedge clippers, and it took a second for Howard to realize that the tool wasn’t for trimming

  bushes but was actually a pair of bolt cutters.

  This was definitely a bad business, whatever it was.

  Howard came up, pulled his revolver and started across the narrow road toward the Explorer, crouching low as he moved. There would be at least three of them, maybe more, and covering them all would be a bitch, but what choice did he have? He couldn’t just let them drive away—at least not until he knew what was going on.

  The plinks! of the cutters snipping the chainlinks sounded crisp in the night.

  Howard had almost made it to the Ford’s passenger door when the driver looked up and saw him.

  “Incoming!” the driver screamed. “Incoming!”

  Howard zigged to his left, toward the car’s rear, just as a gunshot exploded inside the Explorer. An orange tongue of fire reached from the driver, the passenger window shattered, and the bullet passed somewhere to his right, close enough so he heard it whistle by.

  Bad guys—no goddamned doubt about it.

  The noise inside the SUV must have been deafening. The driver took his foot off the brake, and the brake lights went out, plunging the scene back into darkness.

  Howard still had the after-image of the gunshot seared into his retina, and his rods and cones or whatever weren’t doing their job. He rounded the back of the Explorer, dropped prone, and looked for a target.

  “Move the car,” somebody said. They didn’t sound the least bit excited.

  The driver stepped on the gas. The smell of burned tire filled the air as the Explorer screeched and lurched forward.

  Howard’s central vision was still fogged, but he turned his head to the left and caught a peripheral movement. They had shot at him, therefore they were bad guys. He hesitated for maybe a quarter second, then lined the revolver up on the movement and squeezed the trigger. He remembered to close his eyes as the shot went off, to save what vision he had left, and then he rolled to his left as fast as he could, three complete revolutions.

  Somebody screamed, and somebody returned fire. The dragon’s tongue muzzle blast lit the scene just enough for Howard to see there were two men standing next to a hole clipped through the fence, a third man lying on the ground. A bullet spanged off the road where he had been and the ricochet whined off into the trees.

  Howard scraped his elbows on the road as he swung the revolver sideways and pointed it where he’d seen the flash—

  “Move,” a man said, insistent, but not panicky.

  Whoever he is, he’s a lot calmer than I am—

  The scream of brakes forced Howard to glance away from his target zone just as he cranked off two more shots. He rolled again, and saw the Explorer’s headlights flash on as the SUV did a rubber-burning one-eighty.

  The driver was going to put some light on the subject, and that was bad—

  An answering pair of shots spewed more orange, and two more bullets hit the road inches away. If he hadn’t rolled, he’d have eaten both of them, and even so, the shooter had almost anticipated enough to hit him.

  Howard leaped up. He had to get off the road before—

  Too late. The SUV’s headlights found him. He took three steps then dived for the side of the road, hit in a sloppy shoulder roll, came up, and ran for the trees. More gunshots reached for him, but missed. The roar of the SUV’s engine increased as it headed back in his direction. The driver angled the vehicle, trying to find him with the light.

  Howard slipped on something, fell, and rolled, ending up on his back, feet facing the oncoming Explorer. He pulled his feet toward his butt, propped the revolver on top of his left knee, got a nice clear sight picture outlined against the oncoming headlights. He aimed at the windshield on the driver’s side. The SUV was fifty meters away and closing. He pulled the trigger, one, two, three, four—

  The gun stopped shooting after three times, clicked empty, but the SUV slewed off the road and angled into the fence, bowing a big section before it took out a post and stopped.

  His piece was empty, and there was still too much reflected light out here; he felt like a bug under a microscope. He scrabbled up and into the trees, managed to run into one with his right shoulder and spin himself around, but at least he was hidden. He dropped to the ground on his butt, thumbed the cylinder latch, shoved the cylinder out with his left hand, hammered the extractor rod with the palm. Empty shells flew. He grabbed a speed strip and started to reload. One, two, three—

  The SUV’s motor raced, and there came the sound of metal tearing. The motor roared louder, the tires screamed—

  He must have missed the driver. Either that, or the other two had gotten to the SUV.

  Load, load, come on, come on—!

  —four, five, six!

  He snapped the cylinder closed and crawled toward the road. As he reached the edge of the trees, the Explorer roared past, accelerating away.

  “Fuck that!” Howard yelled. He scrambled up, ran into the road, and whipped his gun up in both hands. The SUV was really moving; it was eighty, ninety meters away as he cooked off all six as fast as he could, closing his eyes to avoid the muzzle flashes—

  Again the SUV squealed into a one-eighty turn, and the lights came around to find Howard. But the car didn’t start back, it just sat there. Ninety meters—okay, okay, he had time to reload again—

  The SUV’s door slammed shut. Somebody got out?

  Howard ejected the empties, reached for another speed loader. Plenty of time—

  He saw the muzzle flash, felt the kick in his belly from a heavy boot as he went down, then heard the boom! from the weapon.

  Fuck! He was shot and his gun was empty. His side burned, over his right hip. Get up, John, get up, now!

  He half-crawled, half-rolled off the road and back to the woods. In the trees, he kept moving, his fist jammed over the bullet wound. He got as far as he could before his legs just quit working. He sat, fumbled for his virgil, managed to trigger the distress signal as he felt himself graying out. His last thoughts as he lost consciousness were of disbelief: How could somebody have hit a target at ninety meters like that? With a handgun, and only the headlights of a car in the dark?

  Hell of a shot ...

  Gakona, Alaska

  “What the hell happened?” Morrison said again and again. “What the hell happened?”

  The cool night air whistled through the car from the three holes in the windshield. Morrison, in the back, was probably in shock, but at that, he was a lot better off than Ventura’s two men. One of them was dead on the seat next to him, slumped against the passenger door; he’d taken one right between the eyes. The other man was lying next to the fence back at the pickup point, and he was just as dead, one to the heart. Nice work.

  The black man had done it. Ventura didn’t know who the hell he had been, but he’d screwed things up pretty good. How had the black guy managed to find them and set up his ambush? That had been a good trick. Still, it didn’t matter. He was probably dead or dying himself by now. Ventura had put one solidly into him; he wasn’t going to be causing any more trouble. If he was the Chinese’s primary attack, he’d failed, even though he had caused a lot of trouble. He should have been wearing a vest. Odd that he wasn’t. Ventura had his on.

  The client was alive, and they would rendezvous with more of Ventura’s team in a couple of minutes. Nice try, but no cigar.

  “What the hell happened?”

  “Relax, it’s okay now. They tried, but they failed. We’ll regroup and wait for them to contact us.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Listen, you can’t take this personally. It’s just business. They tried, they missed, so no
w they’ll deal. Nothing has changed.”

  “I could have gotten killed!”

  “And you still could. But none of this matters. What matters is that you aren’t dead now. You still have something they want, and they are still going to have to pay to get it. You move on.”

  “This is madness,” Morrison said.

  “Way of the world, Doctor. If you don’t want to get hit, don’t step into the ring. You’re here now, so we have to make the best of it. Think of it as a great story to tell your new friends someday.”

  He saw Morrison in the rearview mirror, his face dimly lit by the instrument lights. The man looked as if somebody had just told him there was a rattlesnake in his pocket.

  Ventura watched the road, his pistol in his lap. Amateurs just didn’t understand how the world worked. They took everything so personal.

  25

  Tuesday, June 14th

  Quantico, Virginia

  “Sir?”

  Michaels came out of a shallow sleep, blinking. He was in his office, on the couch. What—?

  One of the night crew—Askins? Haskins?—stood in the doorway. Must not be time for shift change yet. Michaels sat up. “Yes?”

  “We got a distress signal from General Howard’s virgil. From Alaska.”

  “What?” He still wasn’t quite awake and tracking yet. Where was Toni?

  “Federal Marshals found him, he’s been shot. An Alaska National Guard copter is on the way; he’s up near Gakona.”

  He looked at his watch. It was six A.M. He needed to wash his face and to find Toni. What had John gotten into?

  But before he could reach the door, his own com chirped its top-priority tone. He hurried to the receiver and picked it up. “John?”

  “No, it’s Melissa Allison.”

  The director. What was she doing up at this hour?

  She didn’t give him time to wonder: “I just got a call from Adam Brickman in the U.S. Marshals office. One of his men was wounded in a shoot-out in Nowhere, Alaska, attempting to serve an arrest warrant authorized by your office. So was General John Howard. They are alive, just barely, on their way to a hospital in Anchorage, but Brickman isn’t happy. I’m not happy, either, Commander, because when he started chewing me out for not warning his people this was a shoot-sit, I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.”

  Uh-oh. “I’m sorry, Madam Director, I didn’t realize there was any danger.”

  “You sent marshals and the head of Net Force’s military arm to pick up somebody—which is outside your charter, unless there are special circumstances. I’m going to be in my office in forty minutes. I suggest you be there when I arrive.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Michaels said.

  He cradled the receiver. Great. Just great. He had a federal marshal and John Howard shot up and the director of the FBI ready to tear him a new asshole. Great way to start the day, wasn’t it? Maybe if he was lucky, a big meteor would fall on him.

  “Alex?”

  Toni. “Hey,” he said.

  “What’s up? The place feels as if it’s about to explode.”

  He rubbed at his face with both hands. “Walk with me and I’ll fill you in.”

  In the air over British Columbia

  Because Ventura wanted to have a few words with the Chinese, he had Morrison’s phone when it rang. He used the headset, the engine and wind noise of the DC-3 being enough to interfere with hearing.

  “Dr. Morrison?”

  “No. Ventura.”

  “Ah, Luther. How are you?”

  “Why, I’m just fine, Chilly. Though I can’t say the same for your people. The feint was pretty good, but the follow-through was, well, sad. I expected better.”

  There was a moment’s hesitation. Then Wu said, “Much as I’d like to turn this to my advantage, I have to confess I don’t know what you are talking about, Luther.”

  “Come on, we’re professionals here, I don’t hold it against you, I realize it was just business.”

  “Nope, sorry, I’m not tracking.”

  Ventura considered it. There was no real reason for Wu to be coy. He knew that if they tried to snatch Morrison and failed, Ventura wouldn’t care; it was how things were done, they were men of the world here. “So you didn’t send people to, ah, have an informal chat with my client?”

  “No.”

  Ventura heard the “Not yet” in that single word, but he also had to stop and think real hard about the implications. Of course Wu would lie if it was to his advantage, that was to be expected. But Wu had to know he couldn’t gull anybody into believing that the Chinese were benevolent businessmen who’d never stoop to such a thing as kidnapping and torture. Sure, they’d pay if they had to pay, but if they could get what they wanted for free, they’d do it. They were as cheap as anybody else.

  So lying wouldn’t serve him at this point—Ventura didn’t trust Wu as far as he could fly by flapping his arms, and Wu knew it. And if Wu hadn’t sent a team, then who were those men?

  Had he just shot a couple of real federal marshals?

  “Dr. Morrison is okay, isn’t he?” Wu asked. “No problems with our little transaction? We were quite impressed with the test. We are ready to get down to brass tacks.”

  “He’s fine. Here he is.” Ventura waved at Morrison, who was listening to his half of the conversation. He held his thumb over the transmitter mike. “Wu. He’s ready to deal. And don’t get bent with him—he didn’t send his people after you. Those were legitimate feds.”

  Morrison’s eyes went wide. “It couldn’t be—”

  “You screwed up, Doctor. They figured it out, somehow, and now we have a whole new set of problems.”

  He handed Morrison the phone and headset. He had to make a couple of calls on his own to verify this, but if it turned out to be what he was now sure it was, he had some serious thinking to do. Very serious thinking.

  Quantico, Virginia

  Alex had gone off to see the director, and Toni took the opportunity to go to the gym. It wasn’t as big as the rooms in the main FBI compound, but she didn’t need much space. And early as it was, she was the only person there.

  Nobody had gotten around to cleaning out her locker—there was still a pair of sweats and a sports bra folded neatly there, along with her Discipline martial arts shoes, and, by chance, the clothes were still clean, though a little stale. She shook everything out and dressed, then padded into the gym. She could have worked out in her street clothes, she made a point of doing that every so often, but since she didn’t have any clean ones to change into afterward, that would have to wait for another time. If you couldn’t do it in your ordinary wear, it didn’t matter how terrific a move was; if you couldn’t use it when you needed it, it was pointless for self-defense. In a streetfight, you wouldn’t have time to take off your shoes, get dressed in your gi, nor ten minutes to stretch and warm up. Sweats and limbering exercises saved wear and tear on your clothes, muscles, and joints in the long run, that was why you did them, but they were luxuries, not necessities—

  “Toni?”

  She looked up and saw Jay. “Hey, Jay.”

  “Boss around?”

  “He had to go see the Dragon Lady.”

  “Okay, I’ll call him.” He was in a hurry. He turned and started to leave.

  “What’s up, Jay?”

  He paused. “You knew they found John Howard shot in the woods across the road from the HAARP compound?”

  “Yeah.”

  “He was choppered to a hospital in Anchorage, and it looks like he’s gonna be okay.”

  “Thank God.”

  “Yeah. He was supposed to be on vacation with his family. How’d he get to Alaska?”

  Toni shook her head. Here was another problem for Alex, one he didn’t need.

  He needed her. But she couldn’t go back to work for him. She couldn’t.

  Madam Director Allison was royally pissed. In her shoes, Michaels might have felt the same way, but he wasn’t in her shoes, h
e was in his, and they were getting real damp from nervous sweat.

  “And you felt you couldn’t pass this along to me? I had to find it out from some other agency?”

  He sat in the chair in front of her desk and nodded. “I didn’t see the need. Four federal marshals went to pick up one desk-jockey scientist. I met the man. He could hardly stand up without losing his balance. He had no history of violence, no record of having purchased weapons. I asked John to go along to keep us in the loop. It was a milk run.”

  “Yes, a run that turned into the milkman taking a bullet in the pelvis under the edge of his vest, and your meek scientist disappearing, not even to mention the head of your military arm taking a round.” She looked at the flatscreen on her desk. “According to the guards at this HAARP place, Morrison wasn’t alone. He was accompanied by a Dr. Dick Grayson. His identity turns out to be bogus.”

  Despite the situation, Michaels smiled.

  “Something funny about that I’m missing, Commander?”

  “Dick Grayson is the secret identity of Batman’s side-kick, Robin.”

  “Yes, well, ‘Robin’ is likely the man who plugged the marshal, along with John Howard, on his way out of town. The rest of the arrest team managed to gather themselves enough to pick up the trail. Morrison and his gun-toting friend took a small cart through the woods, cut a hole in the fence, and were presumably picked up by accomplices. The marshals found an armed dead man next to the hole in the fence, shot in the heart. No ID on the man.

  “There were signs that a car had left the road and plowed into the fence fifty yards away. The marshals called in the state police, and a few minutes ago a shot-up Ford Explorer was found at an old airstrip. There were three bullet holes in the windshield, five more holes in the back loading gate and bumper, and another dead man in the front seat. No identification on him, either. Probably Howard’s work.”