Any Minute Now (20 page)

“Oh, hullo.”

“Get in, Paulus.”

Leaning across, she opened the passenger's side door. He nodded, and like an obedient boy, trudged around the front of the car and slid in beside her.

“Close the door, Paulus.” Did she have to tell him everything? This thought disturbed her. It made her realize that the rising tension of the situation was causing her to lose her patience with him. Taking a step back, she slowed her breathing, working to clear her mind and start over with him. Something was terribly wrong; she could see it written on his face as if he had printed it there.

She was about to reengage him in the manner she knew would get through to him when her gaze passed across her rearview mirror. A quick flash of reflected light came from a car three rows behind her. A figure was sitting behind the wheel, binoculars trained directly forward. Valerie was visible, as was the figure, through the windshields and rear windows of the intervening vehicles.

Lindstrom, whose antennae were always up even when he was seemingly calm, said, “What's the matter? What's going on?” He saw Valerie's eyes flick down from the rearview mirror to the mobile in her lap.

“Don't turn around, Paulus,” she said.

“Is someone watching us?”

“Tell me about Lizzy,” she said as she began a text to Preach. Lizzy was the boxer Lindstrom's parents had had when he was a boy. He had loved that creature more than life itself.

Lindstrom closed his eyes. “I don't want to talk about Lizzy.”

“Sure you do. You love talking about Lizzy.”

“Not now,” he insisted weakly.

“Remember the time you taught her how to sit up and shake hands?”

Lindstrom smiled. Valerie finished her text to Preach and sent it off. Ten minutes was all the time it would take, but at the moment that seemed like a lifetime away.

“How did you do it, Paulus?”

“With treats I made especially for her. She wouldn't eat the store-bought treats my mom would buy her. She was a picky eater.”

“Just like you, Paulus.”

The smile that had faded on his lips arose again. “Just like me,” he sighed.

His eyes were still closed. He did this when he was remembering his childhood or when he was really frightened in the present. Valerie kept one eye on the rearview mirror and the other on her mobile's screen. Having received the text, Preach had established an open line, which now consisted of a digital clock counting down the seconds.

Paulus continued with his memory of a boy and his boxer.

But now the figure in the car had put down the binoculars. Valerie could see that it was a man, but his features were indistinguishable at this distance. He turned off his engine, and her heart rose into her throat. He bent over, as if he were drawing something out of the glove box. Then he opened the door. Valerie's nerves were shrieking.

The man got out of his car and strode directly toward them. He was holding his right arm by his side. In his hand was a gun with a noise suppressor screwed to the muzzle. She could make out his features—regular, craggy, like an ex-wrestler or an ex-Marine.

He was more than halfway to where she and Lindstrom sat when, as if from out of nowhere, a gray Range Rover crept up behind him. Two of Preach's men got silently out and approached him. He must have sensed them at the last moment, but it was already too late. The man on his left slammed something hard just above his left ear, the other man caught him as he slumped over. The first man bent, scooped up the silenced gun, and together they hustled him into the back of the Range Rover, which now disgorged a third man, who got behind the wheel of the gunman's car and, following the Range Rover, drove off. None of the men looked at Valerie as their vehicles passed hers.

Lindstrom's eyes opened. Valerie sat very still in her seat.

“What was that?” Lindstrom asked.

“Just a passing car.”

“And the danger?”

“Also passed.”

Her mobile buzzed, and she looked down. The open line had been disconnected. In its place was a text from Preach:
GET GONE. KEEP L W/U. FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS TO FOLLOW
.

She fired the ignition and did what she was told, thinking, Now it's outright war, plain and simple.

 

18

“Fuck-damn!” Flix exclaimed as they came up to where he crouched at the crest of the hill. “Looka there,
compadre
. It sure feels good to be back.”

Charlie shot Whitman a look he couldn't—or, more likely, didn't want to—decipher.

The familiar crescent glow rising up from the far side of the hilltop floodlit the villa in orange light. So far, Flix told them, he had found no other communication than the normal chatter between guards posted at intervals inside the perimeter of the villa. As they closed in on their target, Whitman discovered why there were no longer patrols outside the walls: repairs had been made to the crumbling sections. The wall was now thicker and seemed reinforced. Of course, they hadn't had the benefit of drone overflight photos to let them know in advance of these enhancements. Never mind, Whitman told himself. The trade-off of total secrecy was more than an equal trade-off. Besides, he didn't view the new features as anything more than a slight inconvenience. In fact, having all the guards inside the villa was a distinct benefit. They would not get ambushed again on their way to the extraction point, where the jet was waiting, refueled from reserve tanks onboard.

“Payback's gonna be such a fuckin' bitch for those motherfuckers, Sandy,” Flix said, addressing their dead compatriot. Hunkered down low, he fiddled with his equipment, which seemed to include a lot more items than the last time. Clearly, he was taking no chances. “By the time we go in I'll have jammed every fucking piece of their comm net. They'll be deaf, dumb, and blind.”

“Just the way we like 'em,” Whitman said.

Charlie snorted. “You two sound like you're playing a video sim.”

Flix lifted his head, glared at her. “What d'you know about it,
nene
?”

“Call me a baby again,” she said, “and you'll be eating out of your throat.”

“Back off, you two,” Whitman said. A fight was the last thing they needed at this juncture. “You're both professionals. Make me believe.”

Flix made a face, but said, “You can count on me,
compadre
.”

Whitman nodded, turned to Charlie. “No more talk, got it? I want you focused on the mission.”

“Don't worry about me,” Charlie said. “I'm your gunslinger.”

She handed Whit an assault rifle whose configuration he'd never seen before. It was as light as a feather.

“What's this thing made of?” he asked.

“Titanium, mostly.” She slapped the side gently. “It uses 5.56mm ammo I made myself. The copper tips are soft enough to flower open on impact. Trust me, you don't ever want to get shot with one of those babies.”

She brought out a fully automatic FN Herstal gas-powered F2000 assault rifle. It was configured with a 40mm FN EGLM grenade launcher. “This is a fucking cannon. Apart from the grenade, it's loaded with custom incendiary ammo. Anyone who gets in its way, they'll be scraping pieces of him off what's left of the wall behind him.”

Whitman had been taking infrared photos through the Bluetooth connection in his night goggles. They took off, circumnavigating the compound. When they returned to the place where they had started, they looked at all the photos together.

Flix's forefinger stabbed out, pointing to a spot on one of the high-angle photos taken from their hilltop perch. The shot was grainy, due to the long lens on the night goggles, but the black rectangle was clear enough. “The generator junction is right there. They haven't moved it since the last time.”

“Get me to within a hundred twenty yards of it,” Charlie said, patting the side of her F2000, “and it's history.”

“Right.” Whitman considered a moment, shuffling the photos. “Infiltration begins here.”

“At the front gate?” Flix said. “Are you nuts?”

“It's the last place they'll be expecting an assault,” Whitman said. “Besides, it's the best egress within sight of the generator complex. I can take out the iron gate, giving Charlie a clear shot.”

Flix eyed their weapons. “I want a cannon like…” He broke off, looked at her. “Like you have.”

“Stick to what you know best,” she said. “Your AR-15 will be more than adequate.” She turned to Whitman, handed him two small black squares. “Incendiary phosphoric compound of my own design. That white fire will melt any and every metal up to titanium. Just make sure you're at least fifty yards away when you set them off with this.” She held out a wireless ignition no bigger than his thumbnail. “So you're up first.”

As they headed down the far side of the hill, Whitman held Charlie back for a moment. “Listen, I'm not a bad man,” he said.

She stared at him, unblinking.

“I just meet bad men.”

Charlie pushed past him without giving any sign that she had heard him.

*   *   *

Luther St. Vincent, on his way to visit Lucy at Mary Immaculate, drove his own car, even though one of his many perks was an armored government vehicle and driver of his choice. St. Vincent loved to drive; he did not like to be driven. When he was behind the wheel, he was reminded of the low, watery tracks in Louisiana, when he drove his daddy's beloved battered pickup. He started when he was ten, tall for his age, so he could see over the steering wheel, and stringy as a field dog. He was tasked with running errands for his mother—a well-known preacher woman who worked out of a waterproof muslin tent with colossal red crosses stitched to its four corners. The tent was erected and struck by his mother's crew of acolytes—her inner circle, as she called them—brawny men with flexed muscles and concrete jaws who believed in God. Luther was convinced they believed in her more. She was a striking woman with dark eyes and long hair like living flames. When she preached no one sat. Everyone was on their feet, clapping, stomping, and praising God at her command. Afterward, in the darkness of her trailer with the curtains drawn, she gave other commands to the men of her inner circle—all seven of them—in ones and twos. As insatiable as she was in her proselytizing, she was just as insatiable in her frantic fucking. You couldn't call it lovemaking—not from the glimpses the young and impressionable Luther saw.

Until he was older, he didn't know if his father knew and, if he did, couldn't understand how he allowed her this unbridled freedom. There came a time, however, when he got the grasp of economics, and realized that the products of his father's farm did not come near enough to paying the family's fare in life. His father needed his mother for her income, just as she needed him for the legitimacy of a husband and children.

It was a simple, hateful equation—one from which Luther removed himself as soon as he was of age to join the Marines. There, he prospered the moment he transferred into intelligence, rising in rank more quickly than his fellow recruits. But in time he came to realize that the Marines had too narrow a focus for his ambitions. Declining to re-up, he set sail for wider horizons and came ashore at the NSA, where the flag he raised was both recognized and greatly valued. His freedom, in turn, allowed him to pursue personal agendas with a minimum of questions and no interference.

He pulled up at Mary Immaculate in hazy sunlight, got out, and went through the main entrance. He spoke for a few moments with Sister Margaret, who updated him on Lucy's condition. Astoundingly, she had not backslid one iota. This was so astonishing for a recovering addict that he wouldn't believe Sister Margaret until she showed him the doctor's chart. The blood work confirmed the sister's report.

“We're dealing with a remarkable young lady,” Sister Margaret said, struggling to keep up with him as he strode along the corridor. “She must have superlative willpower. It's a crime that she wasted years on drugs and sinful degradation.” Just before they stopped in front of Lucy's door, she said, “What will happen to her now? There's really no earthly reason for her to remain here; the doctor's given her a clean bill of health.”

“That will be up to her, I imagine,” St. Vincent said. “She'll need to find a line of work.”

“Which you could help her with, yes?”

He smiled thinly. “I try to follow your suggestions at all times, Sister.”

The nun made the sign of the cross. “Bless you, my son.”

St. Vincent rapped on Lucy's door, then stepped into the room, as usual leaving the door open.

“Hello, Lucy,” he said amiably. “How are we feeling today?”

“I don't know about you, Luther, but I'm feeling fine.” She shrugged. “But I imagine Sister Margaret told you as much.”

“I'd prefer to hear from you.”

“
De boca del propio interesado
.”

He laughed. “Yes, from the horse's mouth.”

She liked to make him laugh, knowing it was not an easy thing to do, that not everyone could manage it. Today she was dressed in jeans and a red-and-white-checked cotton shirt. Very patriotic. It seemed to her that he liked her outfit, especially the way she had left open the top three buttons of her shirt, allowing her cleavage to peek through. She was justifiably proud of her breasts, high and firm. The nipples were sensitive and so almost always erect. She wore no bra, not needing one.

“Shall we sit?”

He lifted an arm. “It's such a beautiful day, why don't we go for a walk?” Sister Margaret wouldn't like that, but today it was necessary to speak with the girl in absolute privacy, and St. Vincent knew that in his world there was hardly a wall that didn't have electronic ears.

She grabbed a light jacket and they went out the back, down the wide lawn toward the copse of murmuring pines where once the pond had beckoned the most deeply ill of the patients into its depths. Lucy had much to think about on that short stroll. When St. Vincent had lifted his arm, she had caught a glimpse of the tattoo on the inside of his wrist, and now she was more interested in him than ever.