Outlaws, page 27
‘To contribute. To help.’
‘Did you see a truck drive in earlier tonight?’
‘To where?’
‘Cut the bullshit,’ King said. ‘I know what house you’re watching. I was there yesterday.’
‘Yeah,’ Banks said. ‘I saw it.’
‘The crew who own the house are smugglers who work the port. Half of them are dead. That was my doing. The trailer you saw attached to the truck has a container in it. Girls from Eastern Europe. Hand-picked, kidnapped, trafficked. The three men I left alive are going to deliver that container to the Baja cartel for an enormous handling fee. They take the risk of bribing port officials, they reap the benefits. I want to deal with them, and then follow the container to its final destination, and then deal with whoever’s there. But I knew someone like you would be watching. And despite the light I’ve been painted in, I’m not the enemy. So I’m not willing to kill you on sight.’
Banks said, ‘What exactly do you want from me?’
‘Let me do what I came here to do,’ King said. ‘You don’t have to involve yourself. You don’t even have to watch. Blissful ignorance, or whatever. But deep down I think you joined the military for the right reasons, and those same reasons won’t let you kill me when I’m trying to eradicate a little bit of evil in the world.’
Banks said, ‘Why should I believe you?’
‘Because there’s no point lying about any of this when I had the jump on you from the start,’ King said. ‘Why the fuck would I make this up if I had ulterior motives? You wouldn’t be around to hear me out.’
Banks thought about it.
And, as much as he hated to admit it, he couldn’t find a hole in the story.
He said, ‘After this, you disappear?’
King said, ‘Of course.’
They hadn’t agreed on anything, but King let go of Banks’s wrist. He settled back in the dirt, still flat on his stomach, now a few feet away. No longer uncomfortably close.
If Banks wanted to, he could kill the man right then and there.
It was an overwhelming display of trust.
Banks moved his knife hand, and watched King bristle. But instead of clasping at the hilt, he tilted the top of his wrist toward his own face and checked his digital watch.
‘Clock’s ticking,’ he said. ‘Get to work.’
72
Under a dark sky, Slater conducted surveillance of his own.
He didn’t face a mansion in Emerald Bay. He faced the Hooper Quadriplegic Centre, which resided in the leafy suburb of Stratford Hills to the west of the city, just over the James River. It was ordinary suburbia — brick houses with wide lots on either side, broad sidewalks, an aura of stillness. The nine-to-fivers had come home from their jobs to lounge in front of the television, and the elderly were in bed. The children were too, only involuntarily. No one was out at nine in the evening. The city centre would be busier.
Here, you could hear a pin drop.
He watched the big government building from a distance, statuesque behind the wheel of the Hyundai, parked across the street. A handful of visitors came and went over the course of the evening, but little else happened. There was no real way to conduct illicit proceedings — the building sat in the middle of an enormous lot with a neatly manicured lawn. There was no secret way in. No tunnels underground. If the shadow world had come for Beckham, they wouldn’t need to send an army. They’d send a lone man or woman with a syringe or a knife. No need for a gun — that’d be loud and messy.
The more Slater thought about it, the more he figured a needle would be the way to go. Quiet, discreet, no blood — and if the stuff inside the barrel of the syringe was advanced enough, it’d look like natural causes.
He knew, without a doubt, the government had access to those sorts of concoctions.
The question was: Did they know about Violetta?
Slater wasn’t about to wait around to find out.
He turned to Alexis in the passenger seat. ‘I’m going to do this quickly. In and out.’
‘What if there’s eyes on us right now?’
‘I have no feasible way of knowing that,’ he said. ‘But why would there be forces here in advance? To make sure he doesn’t escape? He’s a quadriplegic.’
‘If they know Violetta’s gone rogue, they’ll send men straight here.’
‘But they wouldn’t have pieced that together until a couple of hours ago at the very earliest. You think they have shadow forces right here in the city they can trust? You think they have a whole army on standby willing to execute a helpless quadriplegic in his disability home?’
‘I don’t know,’ Alexis said. ‘I don’t know anything about this world.’
Slater looked pensively out the window. ‘Nor do I.’
She didn’t respond.
He said, ‘But what’s waiting around going to accomplish?’
She shrugged.
He handed her the spare Glock and said, ‘Remember what I told you.’
She said, ‘I won’t hesitate.’
He knew.
He’d found two potential rapists in her bathroom the night he’d met her. She’d tased and subdued them both in the midst of a New York blackout.
He kissed her on the lips, then stepped out of the car and reflexively touched his own Glock in its appendix holster. He adjusted his leather jacket over the concealed weapon, shot a final look up and down the street, and then strode into the shadows, aiming for the weak entranceway light of the building.
No one followed.
There was no explosive reaction from hidden vantage points.
Just the quiet of a residential suburb.
He stepped up onto the concrete patio and stopped in front of the sliding glass doors. A sensor light blinked in recognition above his head, but the doors didn’t part. Common enough procedure. He’d need to be buzzed in after hours. He wiped all trace of hostility or tension from his face, slumped his shoulders as if in embarrassment, and rapped his knuckles lightly on the glass. A startled receptionist’s head popped up from behind the desk on the left of the sparsely furnished lobby. She was mid-fifties, slightly overweight, with deep stress lines etched into her face.
Slater offered a smile of apology.
She shook her head, but only half-heartedly.
He injected something vague into his eyes, and stared right at her.
Sadness. Urgency. Uncertainty.
This is important.
I need to see a loved one.
She buzzed him in, and the doors slid open.
He made straight for the desk. ‘I’m so sorry about the timing. I’ve driven all day.’
‘Who are you here to see?’
‘Jonathan Powell.’
‘Are you a relative?’
‘I’m from the brotherhood.’
She looked at him.
He said, ‘We were in the military together.’
Her expression softened. She said, ‘He never mentioned he was in the military.’
‘That’s something we have in common,’ he said. ‘We’re private men. Listen, I have news he needs to hear. Something personal. I’d prefer to catch him awake.’
She nodded. ‘Of course.’
She glanced at the visitor log book in front of her, contemplating whether to make him fill it out. Then she shrugged and waved him through. ‘Go on. Get to it. You look like you need rest, darling.’
‘It’s been a long day.’
‘For you and me both.’
‘What’s his room number?’
’52,’ she said. ‘Just down the hall and to the left. You’ll see the signs.’
‘Thank you.’
‘My pleasure.’
He set off at a brisk but unsuspicious pace. As if he truly did have news for the man, instead of the revelation that he was here to effectively kidnap him. He went to the end of the hall and turned left, exactly as she’d instructed, and found a door labelled “52” after a couple of minutes following signs through sterilised carpeted corridors. It was thick and pale cream in colour, also surrounded by pale cream walls. The place felt like a hospital wing.
Slater knocked three times, waited a few beats out of courtesy, and then opened the door and stepped into the room.
73
Quinn Chapman didn’t lead a good life, and he’d finally made the admission that it was his own doing.
It was a weight off his shoulders. In fact, it was the first time he’d truly been objective since he’d moved into Duke’s multi-million dollar shack. It also didn’t mean he was going to stop. Recognising you were scum and taking steps to change your ways were two very different things.
He was willing to do one, but not the other.
The money was just too damn good.
He killed the majority of overhead lights in the mansion with an app on his phone, and then finally let himself breathe out. Standing on the enormous front porch, draped in shadow, he was safe, enclosed, protected by the darkness. It was a second home to him. It had afforded him the resolve to bury Duke, Kurt and Aaron in the Cajon Pass, just as the mysterious assassin had suggested. They were now packed into a shallow grave in the lee of a boulder at the bottom of a steep slope, and no one was going to find them for months at the very least. Cops might swing by asking questions, but it’d be easy to act oblivious for a couple of days. He didn’t need to worry about who would inherit the house or its contents or Duke’s vast fortune.
As soon as he delivered Container 55E and its contents to its rightful owners, he’d be the one to receive the cash for it.
Now, there was no boss to cart the profits back to.
Just Quinn.
Cal and Vince were still badly concussed. They’d spent the whole day in their beds, tossing and turning, groaning in pain, sensitive to light. They wouldn’t be functional for days. Days was more than enough time for Quinn to disappear with a cool five hundred k in cash. That’d last him years on the road living a simple life. A decade, if he was lucky. He was on the precipice of living a simple carefree life for the rest of his existence, and all he needed to do was be blissfully oblivious for another hour, tops.
Pretend you don’t know what’s in that container.
Deliver it.
Collect the payment.
Dust your hands off, and move on.
The container in question rested within the trailer Duke owned, pulled by the tractor unit Duke owned, all resting in the driveway Duke owned. It didn’t seem out of place against the backdrop of the enormous house. An unmarked delivery truck, probably dropping off designer furniture or a hundred-inch television — at least, that’s what any nosy neighbours would assume if they peered through the gate.
Hiding in plain sight.
Quinn locked up, making sure the giant double doors were secure, and then trotted down the front steps. He liked the dark. There was room for all sorts of flexibility in the dark. For reasons he’d never know, the mystery assassin had spared him. The guy actually thought he’d turn and run, even though the real payload was still there, and all that separated Quinn from five hundred thousand was satisfactory delivery.
He could do that on his own, that’s for damn sure.
He made for the tractor unit, made to get behind the wheel.
Halfway across the driveway — firmly in no man’s land — he froze in his tracks.
The driver’s side of the tractor unit was blocked by a large silhouette.
Quinn pulled his weapon.
A shot blared, and he felt the surreal numbing sensation of a bullet passing straight through his forearm. He found himself oddly detached from the pain. All he experienced was a series of still images.
Lying on his back on the gravel, unsure when he’d fallen.
His gun kicked away, frozen in mid-air, punted by a giant boot.
Then hands on his collar, and suddenly he was off the ground, back on his feet.
He stood there, pale and bleeding and shocked.
The mystery man stood across from him.
‘What’s this truck doing here, Quinn?’ the man asked.
Looming over him.
Quinn spluttered, ‘I—’
‘You don’t know?’
‘Yeah, man,’ Quinn said. ‘I don’t know. I think … maybe Cal and Vince got it. They’re feeling much better, you know. I think they snuck out. Maybe they knew about another container or something. I sure didn’t.’
‘Cal and Vince are tucked up in bed.’
‘No they ain’t.’
‘They sure are. They’ll be there until someone finds their bodies.’
Quinn shivered. ‘Christ, man. What did they do to you?’
‘To me? Nothing.’
Quinn stared up at the silhouette. ‘You know, don’t you?’
The silhouette said, ‘Of course I know.’
‘How’d you find out?’
‘You had it written on the whiteboard.’
‘I thought you didn’t see that.’
‘I did.’
Quinn bowed his head.
The silhouette said, ‘All you had to do was show me the right container. The result would have been the same.’
‘You would have killed me.’
‘Probably not.’
Quinn shivered.
The silhouette said, ‘But now it’s a certainty.’
‘This was all Duke, man,’ Quinn said. ‘Not me.’
‘You picked it up all on your own. You’re taking it somewhere all on your own.’
Quinn tried to find the words for an explanation, but those words didn’t exist.
The silhouette said, ‘If you tell me where you’re taking them, I’ll let you live. I’ll let you walk out of here a free man.’
‘You promise?’
‘You have my word.’
Quinn gave the address — a ranch-style compound way out in the desert, with gates and walls and sicarios patrolling the perimeter. He’d been there three times previously, for three separate deliveries. But the silhouette didn’t need to know that. Quinn masked his smugness, because it wouldn’t do him any good to reveal it. Inwardly, he couldn’t believe the guy had bought his shtick for a second time.
The mystery man repeated the address back to Quinn.
Quinn nodded.
‘Thanks,’ the silhouette said, and brought its Glock up.
Quinn’s face collapsed. ‘You promised.’
‘Just like the human cargo gets promised a safe and harmless journey?’
Silence.
The silhouette said, ‘No one keeps promises in your world, Quinn.’
A trigger was pulled.
It was the last thing Quinn Chapman ever saw.
74
Beckham Lang was mentally indestructible.
Slater knew that the moment he met the man’s gaze.
There wasn’t an ounce of self-pity in his eyes. His stare was uncompromising, and he didn’t blink or waver, not even when he failed to recognise the bulky stranger who’d stepped into his room. He was across the space, sitting upright in a modified wheelchair, his thin pale arms resting on supports. His body had clearly been unresponsive for years, and most of his muscle mass had wasted away entirely, but his face was tanned from sun exposure, and he held his chin high, and his hair had been cut recently. It was brown and thick and swept back stylishly off his forehead. What little he could control he paid careful attention to, refusing to allow himself the leniency he probably deserved.
Slater admired it. This was not a man who accepted compromise. He recognised his condition, but didn’t wallow in it.
When Slater stepped through the doorway and closed the door behind him, Beckham said, ‘Who are you?’
‘Someone you need to trust.’
‘Oh, great,’ Beckham said. ‘That wasn’t cryptic at all. Are you going to give me a riddle next?’
Slater paused, allowing himself a half-smile despite the circumstances.
Then he remembered why he was here, and the smile vanished.
Beckham said, ‘Are you here to hurt me?’
Slater stared. ‘No. What makes you think that?’
‘There’s a look in your eye,’ Beckham said. ‘I’ve seen the same look before. A long time ago. On the face of the man who did this to me.’
‘Aggressive?’
‘Volatile. Unhinged.’
‘I’m here to help. But you’re in danger. That’s why you see that look on my face. Because if anyone else comes in that you don’t know, I’ll hurt them.’
‘What sort of danger?’
‘Threats have been made on your life.’
‘Why? I’m nobody.’
‘Violetta LaFleur.’
Beckham’s face became steel.
Slater said, ‘Now’s not the time for grudges.’
‘“Grudge” is putting it lightly.’
‘Drop the tough guy act,’ Slater said. ‘It doesn’t suit you.’
‘You don’t know a thing about me.’
‘No,’ Slater said. ‘You’re right. But I know Violetta. She’s a work colleague. You know what that means. You know what she was doing when you two parted ways. She’s still doing it, only at a higher level. Which means higher stakes, too.’
‘So threats have been made against her?’ Beckham said. ‘What do I have to do with it? Leave me out of this shit.’
‘Let’s say she’s in the middle of a disagreement with her superiors. They’ve threatened to kill you.’
Beckham scoffed. ‘What’s it to her?’
‘She was willing to ruin her life to keep you alive.’
Beckham stared.
‘Let me be more specific,’ Slater said. ‘I was one of her closest allies. She was willing to double-cross me and kill me to save you.’
‘Then what are you doing here?’ Beckham said. ‘Come to get your revenge?’
‘No. We made up. I trust her again. I’m on her side. I want you alive, too.’
‘That was fast.’
‘Only way to be in our world.’
‘So what is this, exactly?’
‘I’m going to need you to come with me.’
Beckham looked down at himself. ‘You think I have a choice? You can do what you want with me.’
