Текст книги "Hidden Order: A Thriller"

Автор книги: Brad Thor

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Текущая страница: 17 (всего у книги 26 страниц)

CHAPTER 45

Samuel did an inconspicuous drive-by of Bill Wise’s property. It was an older building that appeared to have been a warehouse at some point. This was both good and bad.

It was good in that Wise didn’t have neighbors right on top of him that would see or hear things, but it was bad in that commercial buildings presented their own special challenges for surreptitious entry.

Whenever possible, Samuel liked to surveil his own targets. Tonight, though, this wasn’t possible. The job needed to be taken care of right away.

The building had a front entrance, a side roll-up garage door, and an alley entrance. The alley looked like it was going to be his best bet. Getting in wouldn’t be a problem, as long as Wise cooperated.

Samuel noted that Wise had a security system. That was going to need to be turned off. He felt confident he could get the man to do that for him. With a plan beginning to form in his mind, he set off in search of the items he would need to accomplish his mission. Forty-five minutes later, everything was ready to launch.

 • • •

When the weather was nice, Bill Wise liked to sleep with his skylights vented. Staggered sensors were one of the easiest and smartest inventions alarm companies had ever come up with. The breeze was free to come in, but if anyone tried to raise the skylight beyond where it was right now, the alarm immediately sounded.

Living in the city, he’d learned to sleep through a lot. Helicopters, emergency vehicles, rap music thumping out of passing cars, none of it bothered him. He knew physiologically that all of those sound waves were penetrating his ear canals. For its part, his brain didn’t process any of those things as a threat, and therefore allowed him to continue sleeping. The sound of a breaking bottle right outside, though, was something different.

While you could walk down any street on any given day and see shards of broken glass, it was rare for most people to ever hear bottles being broken. That sound normally meant alcohol had been consumed in excess. It also meant that violence to persons or property might be imminent. Wise’s brain passed along the message: Bottle broken. Outside. Close.

He went from being fully asleep to fully awake in a fraction of a second. As he lay in bed, eyes open, he wasn’t waiting for confirmation. He knew what he had heard. He was attempting to gather additional information. Had the bottle been thrown out of a car? Had it come from the front of the building, or in the alley? Had the person or persons moved on?

Almost instantly, he had his answer as another bottle broke and voices were raised. There was at least one adult male, in front, and he was arguing with someone else. Once the neighborhood was fully gentrified and real estate prices went even higher, Wise was going to make a fortune from selling his property. Until then, he had to put up with crap like this.

Grabbing the remote, he flipped on his TV and clicked over to his security camera feeds. He was greeted by the sight of two local crackheads, one male and one female, engaged in urban couple’s counseling only a few feet in front of his building. He watched as the woman reached into the plastic bag at her feet, pulled out a third bottle, and launched it at the man. As it sailed past its intended target and shattered against the front door, Wise had had enough. It was time for the crackheads to pack it in and move their party someplace else.

He quickly pulled on jeans and a T-shirt and slipped his large feet into a pair of boots. After tucking the Beretta from the nightstand in his waistband, he grabbed his SureFire flashlight and headed for the front door.

From a closet off the reception area, he retrieved an aluminum baseball bat and deactivated the alarm system. He left the lights off so as not to silhouette himself when he opened the front door. By the time he got it unlocked, two more bottles had smashed against the front of the building and Bill Wise was fit to be tied.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you?” he roared, as he threw the door open and stepped outside.

“This ain’t none of your damn business!” the woman yelled as she fished in her bag for another bottle.

“Like hell it isn’t. There’s broken glass all over my fucking property.”

“She’s crazy, man,” the male crackhead replied as he tried to hide behind Wise.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Wise replied, extending the bat like a traffic control arm at a border crossing. “You stay right in front of me where I can keep my eye on you.”

“You don’t want to mind your own business?” the woman challenged. “Then you gonna get some pain, too!”

Wise thought about pulling his Beretta, but instead whipped out his SureFire and aimed the bright beam in the woman’s eyes. “Put that bottle down right now,” he ordered.

“Fuck you!”

“Put it down, or you’re both going to jail. Do it now.”

“You heard the man,” the male crackhead said. “Put the damn bottle down.”

“You zip it,” Wise commanded. “I’m the one giving orders.”

“Whatever you say.”

“Last chance,” Wise said to the woman. “Put the bottle down, right now.”

Slowly, the woman lowered the bottle and set it on the ground. Wise released the tailcap switch on his flashlight and the beam extinguished.

“Man, I can’t see shit now. I oughtta sue your ass for giving me blindness,” she spat.

“Yeah, I gave you blindness,” Wise replied. “And the next thing I’m going to give you is a taste of old school. I’m getting a broom and a dustpan and then you two are going to sweep up all of this glass.”

“I ain’t sweeping up shit.”

“You bet your ass you’re sweeping, honey,” Wise replied. “If you don’t, I’m having you two arrested. I know you live in the neighborhood and I’m guessing several of my cop friends know who you are. The choice is up to you.”

The woman relented. She exhaled a drawn-out and dejected “Shit.”

Wise shook his head. Careful not to turn his back on the pair, he retreated inside for a broom, a dustpan, and a small garbage can. Stepping outside, he half expected them to be gone, but they were still there and had even begun to argue again.

“Pipe down,” he barked. “You two lovebirds can coo all you want once this is all cleaned up and you’ve flown off someplace else.”

As they were going to be cleaning up around his entrance, the last thing Wise wanted was for them to be able to have a clear look inside. Not that his foyer area was all that fancy, but the less these two pillars of the community knew about his domicile, the better, and so he closed the door behind him.

Wise stood on the sidewalk and watched. It was pathetic. You’d have thought neither had ever handled a broom or a dustpan before. They were completely useless. He let it go on for about five minutes before finally throwing in the towel. They were so drug– or alcohol-addled that they could barely stand up straight, much less bend over to sweep and pick up broken glass. At some point, one of them was going to get hurt and that wasn’t something he wanted.

“That’s enough,” he said, taking the broom and dustpan away from them. “Go on. Get out of here. Get lost.”

Wise watched as they looked at each other, then looked at him and began to walk away. The woman stopped to pick up her plastic bag until Wise shook his head and clucked his tongue. It was bad enough they had woken him up. The least he could do was make sure they didn’t roust anyone else in the neighborhood.

The one-man community watch strikes again. He half laughed and half sighed as he picked up the woman’s bag, dropped it in the trash can, and then made quick work of the broken glass.

He had no idea whether being forced to clean up some of the mess would have any impact on the pair. It likely wouldn’t, but Wise felt he had done the right thing. Too many people didn’t stand up for what was right anymore.

Picking up the trash can, he stepped back inside and set it down along with the broom, the bat, and the dustpan.

He sensed the man’s presence just before the figure stepped from the darkness and with his gun pointed right at him said, “Good evening, Dr. Wise.”

Wise knew better than to go for his Beretta. He’d be dead before he could pull it from his waistband. Instead he calmly and politely replied, “It’s good to see you again, Samuel.”

CHAPTER 46

“All the way down to my shorts? Seriously?” Wise asked after he had carefully, albeit reluctantly, already surrendered his firearm, as well as his flashlight.

“Please see it as a token of my respect,” Samuel replied as he stood still partially concealed and a safe distance away.

“If you intend to show me proper respect, Samuel, why don’t you tell me why you are here.”

“We’ll have plenty of time to talk, Dr. Wise. Right now, I’d appreciate your cooperation.”

Wise did as his captor asked. After removing his boots, jeans, and T-shirt, he did a 360-degree turn for Samuel with his hands above his head. The hit man then had him face away from him, sweep his arms behind him like a sandpiper with his palms up. Samuel told him to look up at the ceiling as he bent over at the waist. He instructed him to spread his legs so far apart that Wise was forced up onto the balls of his feet and having trouble keeping his balance. That was when Samuel struck.

The first handcuff was on him so fast and was converted into a steel wristlock so quickly, that even if Wise had wanted to react, he couldn’t have. The pain was exquisite. Samuel delivered so much precise and practiced pressure that Wise’s knees simply buckled and he dropped to the ground. Even the most veteran of street cops would have been blown away with how rapidly Samuel had subdued his prisoner and applied the handcuffs.

Wise was told which knee to bend and then on the count of three, used momentum to bring him back up to standing. An amateur would have simply grabbed him by the chain of the cuffs and lifted, risking tearing the prisoner’s shoulders out. Samuel was no amateur.

He took great care in guiding Wise back to the building’s living area. He knew all too well that a man like Wise would have all sorts of weapons hidden all around. Near the machinist’s bay where Wise worked on his cars and motorcycles, Samuel had placed a chair. He asked Wise to sit there now. Wise complied.

“Now we talk?”

Samuel nodded. “Yes, doctor. Now we talk.”

“I assume that you have a list of specific questions you would like answered?”

“I do.”

Wise pursed his lips. “And what will I get in return?”

“Out of respect and professional courtesy,” he said, unrolling a suede tool bag with multiple stainless steel instruments and a handful of zip ties that had been rubber-banded together, “I will not cause you any pain.”

“That is very thoughtful, Samuel. Pain is something neither of us likes, is it?”

“No, doctor. It is not.”

“Will I be free to go afterward?” Wise asked.

The CIA operative shook his head as he pulled the rubber band from around the zip ties. “I’m sorry.”

“So am I.”

Samuel stepped forward and in a move that belied his thick, lumbering appearance, grabbed a handful of Wise’s hair and snapped his head backward, banging it against the back of the chair.

It was a move meant to stun and disorient, which was exactly what it did. Before Wise knew what had happened, Samuel had attached his handcuffs to the chair with several of the zip ties. His legs would be next.

Samuel came around front and looked at Wise. The man’s eyelids fluttered like a pair of shades that had just been drawn too tight and his head lolled to one side. Grabbing his left ankle, he slammed it up against the left leg of the chair and had just gotten the first zip tie halfway around both when a shot rang out and piercing and painful darkness overtook him.

For a moment, he had no idea what had happened. Then the excruciating pain came rushing in and he realized that Wise had head-butted him. Then, still cuffed to the chair, he had run.

Samuel reached up and touched the bridge of his nose. It was broken and bleeding. “I understand why you had to do that, Dr. Wise,” he called out as he stood and pulled his pistol. “I even forgive you for it, as I hope you will forgive me for what I have to do.”

The CIA operative looked around as his mind whirled through multiple calculations. It was a large space, but not so large that a man Wise’s size could disappear, especially not when attached to a chair. He would try to find concealment first and then he would avail himself of a weapon. That was, of course, only if he could free his hands.

Samuel settled on Wise’s library and its rows of metal bookcases. They provided the closest and most logical place to hide. He approached the stacks with caution, pausing every couple of steps to listen. All he needed was the squeak of the chair beneath Wise’s weight or the scrape of its legs on the floor to give the man away. Step. Step. Pause. Step. Step. Pause. Suddenly, he heard something else.

At the end of the next aisle, a book had been knocked from its place and lay on the floor. He had him now.

Samuel rushed along the row of books and no sooner had he made it to the halfway point than he heard the groan of metal on metal and a wall of books began to rain down on him. Wise was trying to tip the bookcase over from the other side and crush him!

The bald-headed man ran for all he was worth as the tidal wave of books poured over him. With the case only centimeters from his head, he dove to get out of the way.

He landed hard, his chin slamming into the ground and his pistol clattering out of his hand. He saw stars once more, but he also saw something else, Wise.

The man was doing everything he could to break the chair and free himself. Their eyes locked and then both men’s gaze snapped to the gun. Wise was closer and though he was still attached to the chair, it had splintered and he was close to being free.

Samuel pushed himself up to standing and put his head down, his shoulder forward, and ran for all he was worth. This wasn’t about getting to the gun first; this was about stopping Wise from getting to it at all.

The CIA operative built up such an amazing head of steam that when he collided with Wise, it was like a locomotive hitting a fruit truck stalled at the crossing.

As the thick-necked bull of a man barreled into him, Wise’s chair shattered and he was sent tumbling backward. His head cracked against the floor and his vision dimmed. The pain was off the charts and he teetered on the verge of unconsciousness. He couldn’t allow himself to slip into that dark, cold void. He had to fight. He wouldn’t get another chance.

Flipping onto his left side, he planned to lash out with a kick, either to push the gun farther away or to incapacitate his attacker. As he looked up, though, he saw he was too late. Samuel had already retrieved the weapon. He had also wisely taken two steps back, once he was able to stand. He was too far away for Wise to make contact. He had had one chance and he had blown it. Samuel was back in control.

Neither man spoke. Both stood or lay where they were catching their breaths and trying to overcome the pain of their injuries. Wise could see that he had opened up a pretty good gash at the top of Samuel’s nose. It was going to require stitches. At least there was that.

Out of habit, Wise started analyzing his own injuries and then almost laughed at the absurdity of it all. He wasn’t going to live to see another hour, much less anyone who could give him medical attention.

Samuel, who must have sensed something in his expression, said, “What’s so funny?”

Just then a man stepped from behind Samuel, pressed a Taser against his jugular, and said, “This.”

CHAPTER 47

BOSTON

MASSACHUSETTS

Harvath and the Old Man spoke for more than two hours. He had gone through everything that had happened since he had arrived in Boston and then the Old Man had asked him to repeat it, twice. He asked question after question and expected Harvath to drill down to even the minutest details.

When they were done talking, Harvath not only needed aspirin, he also needed a drink, and he helped himself to a glass, some ice, and two bottles of bourbon from the minibar.

Even that, though, wasn’t enough to help him unwind. He thought about turning on the TV, but he knew it would only keep him up for hours. He also knew that pouring another drink wasn’t the right path. He might get a couple of hours of sleep, but it wouldn’t be quality sleep. Instead, he fished out one of the books Bill Wise had given to him and which he had tossed in his overnight bag on the way out of his house yesterday.

The reading did the trick and he soon found his eyes growing heavy. As soon as he couldn’t keep them open any longer, he tossed the book aside, turned out the light, and fell asleep.

Much like the night before, he felt like he had just drifted off when his cell phone rang. He snatched his Kobold off the nightstand and looked at the time. It was just after 3 A.M.

It was Cordero. “The killer struck again,” she said.

“Wait. What?” Harvath replied, as he tried to shake off the cobwebs. “Where? Boston?”

“North End. Close to where we ate dinner. I’m already in the car. Be downstairs in fifteen minutes.”

Harvath was downstairs in ten and Cordero showed up a minute and a half later.

“Tell me what happened,” he said as he got into the car and Cordero sped away from the hotel.

“Apparently, another elaborate scene like the Liberty Tree Building.”

“Who was it?”

“We don’t have an ID on the victim yet,” said Cordero as she weaved through the sparse traffic, her lights blazing and Klaxon blaring. “They’re saying it could take a while.”

“Why?”

“A lot of his flesh is missing. It sounds like he was boiled to death.”

“Boiled to death?” Harvath replied.

“That’s what Sal said. He told me I’d see for myself once I got there.”

“Who found him?”

“Fire department, apparently. The killer used a timer of some sort to start a controlled fire with lots of smoke. It didn’t do any real damage, but it scared a lot of folks. The guy lit a tire in the bathtub or something.”

If you want to get someone’s attention, that is the way to do it. Tires burned with thick, acrid black smoke. Harvath had seen more than his share of tire fires across third-world countries. It was a smell you never forgot and one he absolutely hated.

“The ME is going to need dental records from the two males on your missing persons list,” said Cordero.

“Being boiled to death is pretty unusual, so is a timed tire fire, but how can you be sure this is our killer?”

“Because,” she replied as she swerved and narrowly missed a car that had slammed on its brakes, rather than pulling over to allow her to pass, “the killer left a note, along with a picture.”

“Of a skull and bones with the crown floating above.”

“Yup.”

“Do you know anything about the address we’re going to? Any reason why it might be significant?”

Cordero shook her head. “No. It’s not one of the ones we passed last night, I know that.”

“Do you know anything about the area at all?”

“It’s near the intersection of Fleet Street and Garden Court. I think that’s the neighborhood where JFK’s mother was born or grew up or something.”

Or something . . . If that was the case, it didn’t make any sense. What would Rose Kennedy have to do with a vendetta against the Fed? And why would the killer switch tactics like that all of a sudden? It had to be something else.

When they arrived, narrow Garden Court was blocked off at each end by police cruisers and all of the buildings up and down the street were awash in the glow of emergency vehicle lights.

“We’ll end up getting blocked in if I try to get any closer,” Cordero said. “Let’s park here.”

Harvath agreed and after parking her car, they got out to walk the rest of the way.

“Did you get any sleep?” he asked as they made their way to the scene.

“A little. How about you?”

“Not nearly enough, but I’ll be okay.”

“We’ll get coffee after,” she promised.

Because it was a one-way street with parking only on one side, most of the responding vehicles had parked on the west side, many of them all the way up on the sidewalks so as not to block through traffic for the fire trucks.

Harvath and Cordero walked on the opposite side. As they drew parallel with their destination, Harvath noticed a plastic plaque on the building next to Cordero.

“You were right,” he said. “Look.”

The female detective skimmed the historical marker. “How about that? I know some Boston history after all. Four Garden Court Street. Home of John J. ‘Honey Fitz’ Fitzgerald, Boston mayor, and birthplace of daughter Rose Fitzgerald, mother of American president John F. Kennedy.”

As they slipped between two parked cars and around a fire truck idling in the middle of the street, Harvath tried to process what the Kennedy connection could be.

That train of thought, though, came to an immediate halt when they arrived in front of 5 Garden Court Street, which had an even more dramatic plaque, this one from weathered bronze, announcing the building’s, or more appropriately the site’s, historical significance.

“Here stood the mansion of Governor Thomas Hutchinson,” Harvath read aloud as he typed the man’s name into the web browser on his phone.

“Who was he?” Cordero asked.

“Apparently, one of Boston’s most hated citizens. Brother-in-law to Andrew Oliver, the man they hung in effigy from the Liberty Tree. Hutchinson was also the last royal governor of Massachusetts before the Revolutionary War. It says here that Sam Adams couldn’t stand him. For many of the colonists, Hutchinson represented everything that that they believed was wrong with Britain. He was greedy, arrogant, and a pretty big snob. A couple weeks after the Liberty Tree incident, angry Bostonians looted and tore Hutchinson’s house apart.”

“Didn’t Hutchinson have something to do with the Boston Tea Party?”

Harvath scrolled further down on his screen and nodded. “When the colonists wanted to send a large shipment of tea back to England to protest the tea tax, Hutchinson intervened. When word leaked that he was the secret distributor for the tea, people went berserk. There were city-wide protests, which grew in scope and anger until culminating in—”

“The Boston Tea Party.”

“Bingo,” said Harvath. “He left not long after and died in exile in England.”

“So he wasn’t killed in Boston? Never boiled to death?”

“No, not according to this,” he said, as he slid the phone back into his pocket. “But that doesn’t mean there isn’t some sort of connection to whatever it is we’re about to see.”

“Are you ready to go in?” she asked.

Harvath wasn’t even near the front door and already he could smell the horrible odor of burnt tire. Taking a last breath of semi-fresh air, he nodded and followed her inside.