As if in slow motion, wreckage and broken glass spun in all directions. The Jeep bounced back down on its suspension, rocked twice and was still.
Chapter Forty-Two
Ben hit the concrete and rolled twice as if he’d parachuted out of an aircraft, clutching his bag containing the precious journals. He sprang to his feet at the instant the Jeep smashed into the back of the white GMC.
He hadn’t known exactly what he was going to find at the end of the drip trail he’d been following all the way from the intersection pile-up. He’d reckoned on finding trouble, but not the battle zone he saw as he sped down the ramp. In those short seconds, he’d taken in the whole situation. The van, the blue Ford and a silver Lincoln sedan all clustered together. Four men on their feet, two of them his old friends from Ireland and Madeira. The heavy-looking ape who’d been riding in the Ford was now slumped in its back seat, clutching a bloody shoulder. Another man he’d never seen before was lying dead in a pool of blood underneath what was left of a bullet-riddled Honda.
He’d spotted the woman there, too. Wondered who she was and what she was doing here. But there wasn’t time to dwell on that right this minute. Two concrete pillars stood between him and the carnage of vehicles, spaced about twenty feet apart. He ducked behind the nearest.
Ben knew his dramatic entrance wouldn’t faze these guys for long. Even before the echo of the crash had died away, gunshots began cannoning off the concrete pillar he was hiding behind. The problem with impromptu plans was that you didn’t always get time to figure out the details in advance. Such as how to deal with a gunfight when you hadn’t brought a gun. He also knew the two men well enough by now to know that if he didn’t return fire, they’d quickly suss out that he was unarmed. All they had to do then was walk over and put him down.
That was when he noticed the arm. It was lying on the concrete midway between his pillar and the next one along, still twitching after being detached from its former owner. At one end was a bloody mush of flesh and trailing sinew and muscle. At the other end, the dead fingers were still wrapped around the butt of what Ben instantly recognised as a mini-Uzi submachine pistol.
There was a lull in the firing. Ben peeked round the corner of the pillar and saw Ponytail and his friend both changing magazines. Now or never. He leapt out from behind cover. One of the other men let off a shot that whined past his ear. Another punched through his bag. He ran straight for the fallen Uzi and bent down and snatched it from the disembodied hand and made it to the other pillar before the enemy could get him in their sights. Pressed tight against the pillar, he quickly examined his new weapon. Apart from the dead man’s blood all over it, it was shiny and new and clean, with an extended mag, maybe fifty rounds. Not bad, but not enough. He was badly outgunned by these guys. It was getting to be an unpleasant habit.
Ben darted the Uzi’s stubby barrel around the edge of the pillar. One touch of the trigger released a burst of fire that sounded like thick cardboard ripping, only massively amplified. A yellow stream of spent brass spewed from the ejector port. He saw the enemy fall back for cover behind their vehicles.
A tongue of flame suddenly leapt out from the clouds of black smoke that had begun to pour out of the crashed Jeep; then another. In a few more seconds, the whole thing might catch light. Another movement caught his eye as the back door of the blue Ford swung open and the injured ape staggered out, clutching a pistol. Ben scraped the Uzi along the bullet-chewed edge of the pillar and let off another burst. Before the guy could get a shot off, he’d been thrown half back into the car with his arms outflung and head lolling sideways.
Ben whirled back behind his pillar and checked the Uzi’s magazine. About half his rounds were gone already. Submachine guns had a troublesome way of chomping through their ammo too quickly. Even more troublesome, when he didn’t have a spare magazine. His opponents, by contrast, didn’t seem to be short of them.
The smoke from the Jeep was thickening, drifting like a black fog over the vehicles and obscuring Ben’s vision of his opponents. Then one of them came lurching out from behind the silver Lincoln sedan. At first Ben thought he was mounting an attack, then realised he’d been driven from cover by the choking smoke. He was bent double with coughing, his gun hanging limp in his hand. Ben wasn’t interested in playing fair, not against these odds. He trained the Uzi on the guy and hosed out about half his remaining rounds. The man recoiled backwards and sprawled over the back of the Lincoln. The lightweight Uzi was hard to control and some of the bullets sprayed into the car’s silver bodywork, shattering its tail lights. The smell of gasoline quickly began to pierce through the tang of cordite. Ben realised he’d punctured the tank.
A slick of spilled fuel rapidly spread across the concrete, under the dead man and under the wheels of the Jeep nearby. Two seconds later, another dart of flame jumped from the smashed car and ignited the pool on the ground. A curtain of fire instantly leapt up. Both the Jeep and the Lincoln were engulfed in the fierce blaze.
‘We need to get the fuck out of here,’ Ritter said to Moon as the fire drove them back towards the van. They were three men down, and what should have been a neat, low-key job was quickly degenerating into an ugly mess. He looked around for the woman.
She was nowhere in sight. There wasn’t time to start searching the whole place for her. He swore. The boss would be furious that they’d lost her. But there was nothing for it: this was downtown Tulsa, and not even McCrory’s connections within the police department could hold the cops off an incident this major. He decided to cut his losses.
‘Let’s go,’ he said to Moon. Moon looked disgusted, but he was thinking the same thing. They ran to the van, flung their weapons into it and jumped in after them. The flames from the burning Jeep were licking all around the badly bucked rear of the GMC. Its front end was almost as badly crumpled. But it was a tough old crate and it cranked into life, good for a few last miles before they’d have to abandon it.
Ritter slammed into reverse and stamped on the gas, shunting the blazing wreck of the Jeep backwards out of the way and crushing what was left of Quincy under his wheels. Then he swung the van violently around through the pall of smoke and headed for the ramp with a squeal of tortured rubber.
Ben emptied his last few rounds at it as it sped away, trailing plumes of smoke and debris. He watched it hit the ramp and roar up the slope and disappear around the spiralling bend towards street level.
Any minute now, there’d be more traffic as police and fire trucks began to arrive on the scene. Ben stepped quickly out from behind the pillar, tossed away the empty submachine gun and peered through the smoke. The two men he’d shot weren’t coming back to life, and the mangled body of the one who’d been crushed and run over was just about as dead as anyone he’d ever seen.
So was the Jeep. A new speed record for destroying rental cars.
The woman Ben had noticed before suddenly reappeared and stepped tentatively out from between two undamaged parked cars a few metres away. Her face was sooty from the smoke. Her eyes were streaming with tears and she had a hand over her mouth. She ran past the blaze to the shattered wreck of the Honda and crouched briefly beside the dead man there, gazing sadly down at him. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know him well, but he seemed like a good man.’
‘Who was he?’ Ben asked.
She stood up and frowned at Ben. ‘What do you mean? I thought you were working with him.’
Ben shook his head.
‘Then … you’re not Special Agent Dobbs?’
‘I’m not agent anybody,’ he said. ‘My name’s Ben.’
‘You’re a Brit.’
‘I’m not from around here, that’s for sure. But if we’re going to have a conversation, we might want to do it elsewhere. We won’t be alone here for long.’
She stared at him mutely for a second or two, as if trying to decide whether to trust him, then nodded. ‘Wait,’ she said, and ran back a few yards to retrieve a pistol that was lying on the concrete.
/> ‘You could take your pick,’ Ben said, looking at all the weaponry scattered about.
‘Sentimental value,’ she said. She aimed the gun at him. ‘You’re telling me the truth, aren’t you? You’re not gonna try anything? Only I’ve just about had my fill lately.’
‘Cross my heart and hope to die,’ Ben said.
‘All right,’ she said after a moment. ‘Just remember I have this. I’ve shot two men already today.’
‘Understood,’ Ben said.
She stuffed the gun in her jeans pocket. ‘My car’s seen better times,’ she said, gazing wistfully at the Honda. ‘And that was Morrell’s Lincoln before someone set fire to it.’
‘I think that was me,’ Ben said. ‘Sorry.’
She pointed. ‘There are escalators leading up to street level. That’s where I was headed before all this happened.’
Ben could hear the familiar wail of sirens fast approaching. ‘Nothing like local knowledge,’ he said to her. ‘Lead the way.’
Chapter Forty-Three
By the time they’d ridden the lift up from the subterranean car park to the mall above and reached the exit, the whole place had been invaded by a swarm of police who were trying to contain the crowds of terrified shoppers driven from the mall in a mass panic by the sound of gunfire and explosions from down below. A pall of black smoke was pouring from the mouth of the car park entrance and climbing into the late afternoon sky as a fleet of emergency vehicles screeched onto the scene. A chopper was hovering overhead, its thud mingling with the chaotic noise of sirens and hysteria. Pitched gun battles evidently didn’t happen every day in downtown Tulsa.
Gazing up and down the packed street, Ben could see no sign of the white van. It must have managed to get away unnoticed just in time. ‘I didn’t catch your name,’ he said.
‘Erin Hayes,’ she replied, frowning at him. ‘Aren’t you going to tell me who you are?’
‘Let’s get some coffee,’ he said.
The coffee shop they found quarter of a mile away was already alive with the breaking news of the incident. ‘I heard an eye witness said it was a buncha Muslims,’ one guy said. ‘Goddamn a-hole terrorists,’ someone else kept insisting loudly, over and over, until someone shushed him as a report came on the little TV above the counter and they all gathered around to stare. Ben bought two coffees and took them over to a booth by the window, far enough away from the focus of attention for him and Erin to talk privately. They could hear the helicopters and sirens even from this distance. Now and then a patrol car went screaming down the street outside, drawing stares from anxious passers-by.
‘So, Ben,’ she said after a long gulp of coffee. ‘It is Ben, right?’
‘Ben Hope. Nice to meet you, Erin.’
‘I suppose I should be thanking you for saving my life.’
‘That makes a difference from pointing a gun at me. My pleasure.’
‘Except I still don’t know who the hell you are, or where the hell you popped up from all of a sudden.’
‘Long story. What did they want with you?’
Her eyes moistened suddenly and her coffee cup began to shake in her hand. Now that she was safe, delayed shock was beginning to set in. ‘They were trying to kidnap me. They’ve been after me for days. My life … everything … just fell apart. They’re going to kill me. I know it.’
‘That’s not going to happen, Erin,’ Ben told her. ‘Why are they after you?’
‘Because of something I witnessed,’ she said, working hard to compose herself. ‘Something they did. Them and their boss.’
‘You mean McCrory?’
She looked at him. ‘So you know what this is about. You didn’t just appear out of nowhere.’
‘I have an interest in McCrory,’ he said. ‘Him, and his men. They kill people.’
She nodded. ‘That pretty much sums it up.’
‘What’s your connection with him? Do you work for the mayor’s office?’
‘His wife runs a charity here in Tulsa. I work for her. She and I are kind of friends. That’s why I was there at the McCrorys’ cabin that night when they …’ She paused, looking at him through narrowed eyes as a thought came to her. ‘This isn’t about Kirk Blaylock, is it? Some kind of revenge thing?’
‘I’ve never heard of Kirk Blaylock,’ he replied, with a look of sincerity that convinced her he was telling the truth. ‘Who is he?’
‘Was. The man I saw them shoot to pieces that night. He was about to betray McCrory to the Feds.’
‘I’m not here because of him. I’m here because of someone called Kristen, Kristen Hall. She was murdered.’
She scrutinised him carefully. ‘Then are you a cop? A detective?’
‘I’m just a concerned individual,’ he said. ‘I was there when they killed her. I’m responsible for putting things right. She suffered. McCrory has to be answerable for that.’
‘Was she—?’
Ben shook his head before she finished. ‘No relation. Just a friend.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Me too.’
‘Why did they kill her?’
‘All I know for the moment is that she was a threat to them. I’d like to know more, and I get the feeling you have more information than I do. I think we can help each other. Who was the man you were with? The one they shot?’
Erin hesitated before replying. ‘He was a police detective. His name was Topher Morrell. He was helping the FBI. They’re investigating McCrory because they believe …’ She paused again, and glanced anxiously across the coffee shop.
‘Nobody’s listening,’ Ben said. ‘The FBI believe what?’
Erin leaned forward and said in a low voice, ‘Morrell said that McCrory deals arms to a Mexican drugs cartel called Los Locos. It means “the Crazy Ones”.’
‘I know what it means,’ Ben said. He wasn’t even that surprised at what he was hearing.
‘McCrory supplies them with all kinds of military hardware. It’s a big-time operation. If he becomes governor, it’s going to get even bigger.’
After all, Ben thought, the higher you rose in US politics, the more illegal arms you could trade into Mexico. The efforts of a small privateer could never compete with the government’s own Fast and Furious programme, which had deliberately and secretly introduced tens of thousands of firearms into the Mexican criminal underworld in order to create instability and justification for US paramilitary expansionism.
‘McCrory was a lawyer. He’s never been remotely connected to the military. Where’s he getting the stuff?’
‘The Feds think it comes through Ritter and Moon. They’re his henchmen, or lieutenants, or whatever the hell is the right word.’
Ben’s eyes narrowed. ‘Ritter and Moon?’
‘Billy Bob Moon, he’s the one with the ponytail. Chews gum all the time. Matt Ritter is the other one. Morrell said they were both ex-Special Forces.’
Ben was silent for a few moments as he pictured the two men in his mind. ‘It’s what I thought,’ he said quietly.
‘About the arms dealing?’
‘No, but I might have guessed about that too. Every time I meet up with those two, there are fireworks.’
‘You’ve met them before?’
‘The first time it was just sticks and blades. But the second time they were using automatic rifles and an awful lot of fancy munitions. Today they were using KRISS Vectors. Pretty newfangled hardware, and full military spec too. Not easy to get hold of.’
‘Morrell said that Ritter’s the one with the connections,’ Erin said. ‘They have a whole warehouse full of weapons, somewhere in Tulsa County. And crews of drivers trucking it down through Texas, over the border. This one cartel, Los Locos? They’re getting ready to fight a whole war against federal firearms and drugs agencies who’ve been trying to clamp down on them. Scum like McCrory are only too happy to supply all the military hardware they can get. Like those things – what did you call them?’
‘KRISS Vectors. Forty-five
calibre submachine gun. Like a radical update on a Tommy gun. All polymer. Very advanced delayed recoil system, cyclic rate of over a thousand rounds a minute. I’d never even seen one before. I can imagine drug gangs would pay a pretty penny for a few crates of those.’
‘How come you know all this stuff?’ she asked, looking at him hard.
‘Because I was a soldier too,’ he said.
‘Well, it doesn’t matter who you were. You can’t go against these people. It’s not just Moon and Ritter. McCrory has about thirty men working for him. A small army.’
‘That should even the odds a little in their favour,’ Ben said with a grim smile.
‘They’ll kill anyone who stands in their way,’ she insisted. ‘Like Kirk Blaylock. He was ready to tip all the information over to the authorities. Your friend, Kristen, she must have known something too. That’s why they got to her.’
Ben was silent for a moment as he considered what he’d only just that afternoon discovered in Elizabeth Stamford’s journal. He thought about Kristen obtaining McCrory’s personal number from Chris Ingram. Remembered her telling him with excitement that if her plan worked, she could give up work forever. ‘I think Kristen was shaking McCrory down for money,’ he said. ‘A lot of money.’
‘There, see?’
He shook his head. ‘She didn’t know anything about this. It’s something else.’
‘There’s more you need to know,’ Erin said. ‘The police chief, O’Rourke – McCrory owns him.’
‘Naturally.’ No great surprises there either.
‘Morrell was spying on him for the Feds. So we can forget about going to the cops.’
‘That was never my intention,’ Ben said.
‘But we have to do something.’
‘We?’
‘I have evidence,’ she said. ‘Evidence that could put McCrory away forever. The murder at the cabin – I videoed the whole thing on my cellphone.’
‘Where’s the phone now?’
‘I gave it to O’Rourke, along with a copy I burned on disc. That was before I knew he was one of them, and it’s what made me a target the moment I told him what I knew. But there’s another disc they don’t know about. A second copy.’