Assassin (24 page)

A
LEX
H
AWKE AND
C
HIEF
J
ACK
P
ATTERSON STOOD IN THE
sunshine on the bow of
Blackhawke,
some thirty feet above the choppy waters of Nantucket Harbor. It was just before seven o’clock on a fine, clear Saturday morning, little more than twenty-four hours after the barely averted attack on the yacht. There were few signs of life aboard the many craft moored along the docks and out at the buoys. Summer sailors traditionally liked to party on Friday nights, and most of them were sleeping in this morning, having closed down the Straight Wharf, the Summer House, or even the notoriously rowdy Chicken Box in the wee small hours.

The air was full of snapping ensigns and diving seagulls and terns. The brisk wind and sharp iodine bite of the sea air made Hawke keenly aware of all his senses. He could feel it. He could feel everything. He was coming back. The recent episode on board
Running Tide
had cleared out a lot of cobwebs; more importantly, it had revealed a number of serious chinks in his well-worn armor.

Numb with grief and anger, his defenses down both literally and figuratively, Hawke had managed to stumble into one very nasty trap. Despite warnings from the man he’d entrusted with his security, he had underestimated the level of terrorist threat by a stupidly wide margin. As it happened, the incident was providential. He’d prevented a disaster that could have cost the lives of many of his friends and crew. Had the Arab simply locked down all the hatches leading to the deck, trapping Hawke below, the terrorist attack might have succeeded. But cheap luck like that ran out quickly.

After a year of bliss that had ended in tragedy, Alex Hawke was once again in the thick of it. Congreve had announced over after-dinner coffee that it was officially cloak and dagger time again.

DSS Chief Patterson had arrived from Maine via Coast Guard chopper just at twilight. Alex had watched the approach of the big red-and-white helicopter from
Blackhawke
’s launch. The helicopter flared up for a landing on the waters just beyond the breakwater. Alex leaned on the twin stainless steel throttles and the launch sped out to the chopper, bobbing on its pontoons, where the head of the State Department’s security forces stood waiting with a small duffel bag. On the short trip back to the yacht, he’d brought Patterson up to speed on the latest events. The near-disastrous flight he and Ambrose had experienced returning to the island from Maine. And the narrowly averted terrorist attack on
Blackhawke
itself.

“Father and son act,” Hawke said. “They almost pulled it off.”

“Yup. Babysitter’s father and her brother the rookie cop,” Patterson said, in his slow Texas drawl. “Makes sense. Father’d been a mechanic over at the airport since he’d moved his charming little sleeper cell family up from New York City. This kid Kerim. You say he tagged the Dog?”

“Yeah. It’s the Dog, all right. But some guy called the Emir is apparently pulling everybody’s strings. Has been for a long time, too. Ever heard of him?”

“I got emirs and sheiks coming out the wazoo, Hawkeye. You gotta do a lot better than that.”

“I plan to. At any rate, no doubt you, too, are on this particular Emir’s hit list.”

“Hell, Alex, ain’t a shit list or hit list I ain’t on—for so long I can’t hardly remember when I wasn’t. Sometimes I feel like the entire radical Islamic world’s got a
fatwa
on my head. But you, now that’s a different story. Why in hell would they go after you? You poke your stick in any hives lately?”

“Let’s just say I don’t have a lot of close friends in the worldwide terrorist community,” Alex said.

“Show me your boat and we’ll talk all about it.”

Hawke, listening intently to the latest intel from the DSS team as they walked, had already shown Patterson far more than most visitors ever got to see. He’d seen things inconceivable on anything less than one of the U.S. Navy’s own Spruance class destroyers.
Blackhawke
featured a balanced combat systems suite with towed array and active sonars, medium-range surface-to-air missile systems mounted inside the ship’s hull on both the port and starboard sides, and two long-range 7.6mm guns, also concealed, mounted both fore and aft. This integrated combat system centered on the Aegis weapon system, now up and running again, and the SPY-1 multi-function, phased array radar. All located on the very lowest deck in what was known as the War Room.

“Hell, Hawkeye,” Patterson said, looking around the massive bridge deck, “This ain’t no yacht. It’s a goddamn battleship disguised as a yacht.”

Alex smiled. “I wouldn’t go quite that far, Tex,” he said, “light destroyer, perhaps, but not battleship.”

Tommy Quick now approached the two men quietly talking at the bow. He stopped a respectful distance away and caught Alex’s eye by saluting.

“Morning, Skipper,” Quick said, “Sorry to disturb you.”

“Not at all, Sarge,” Alex replied. “Mr. Patterson and I are just standing up here trying to figure out how to save the goddamn world.”

“Yes, sir,” Quick said. “Call for you, Skipper. Mr. Congreve down in the War Room. He says it’s important. Some kinda press conference being televised in about five minutes.”

Hawke said, “Tell him we’re on our way.”

“Christ, what time is it?” Patterson asked. “Alex, I clean forgot about this.”

“Exactly six-fifty-five Eastern, Chief.”

“Which makes it almost noon in Paris,” Jack Patterson said, as he and Alex entered an elevator. “Unfortunately, I think I know exactly what this is about, Alex. Our ambassador in Paris has gone completely off the doggone rails.”

“After what happened up in Dark Harbor, I should be surprised if all of your ambassadors weren’t all a little shaky, Tex.”

“Yeah, you bet.”

They rode down six decks in silence, emerged and turned left into a long corridor lit with red domed lights every four feet or so. Hawke paused at a massive steel door and punched a seven-digit pass code into a small black box mounted on the wall. A cover in the center of the door slid back, and behind it was a fingerprint identification pad. Hawke pressed his thumb to it and the thick door slid silently into the bulkhead, revealing the War Room.

It was surprisingly small, packed with computer screens, radar screens, and TV monitors. Two young crewmen wearing earphones sat before a bewildering array of switches and controls, monitoring the integrated search, track, and weapons systems. The information displayed above them was an electronic visualization of the world out to some one hundred miles or more from the ship. The blue lighting inside the War Room was designed to enhance the video displays. At the far end of a conference table, a seated figure was wreathed in smoke.

“Some setup, Hawkeye,” Tex said, whistling softly.

“Thanks. We like it.”

“Who the heck is that in the velvet jacket?”

“That? That would be Chief Constable Ambrose Congreve, WMD.”

“WMD?”

“Weapon of Mass Deduction.”

H
ALF AN HOUR LATER,
S
TOKE WAS SHIVERING IN THE FRONT
seat, busily pulling all the small gold studs out of his shirtfront. The pleated shirt with the gold doodads down the front had to go. A man doesn’t feel so damn resplendent when he is all wet and cold and shit, soaked to the bone.

They had made a run for the car the same moment as the furious storm finally unloaded over Miami Beach. Stoke and Ross raced out of the hotel and made a mad dash down the drive, looking for Preacher’s Lincoln. Torrential rain and wind lashed them, and the near-hurricane-force winds of the tropical squall were strong enough to rock the cars parked along the drive. Even though Trevor was flashing the high beams, man, you couldn’t see a goddamn thing.

“What’d I tell you ’bout the tropics, Ross?” Stoke asked as they jumped inside the Town Car and pulled the doors shut, straining against heavy winds.

“I can’t remember,” Ross said, jumping in the rear.

“Three little words is all I got to say,” Stoke said, fumbling with the AC controls. “Humidity, humidity, humidity.”

“Call this humidity?” Ross said.

“Wet, ain’t it? What the hell else would you call it?”

Preacher’s cell phone started playing the
William Tell
Overture. Have to talk to him ’bout that. So nineties.

“Yes?” Trevor said, flipping it open. “Okay. Good.”

“What?” Stokely said.

“She’s coming out now, Cholo says.”

“Move up, Preacher,” Ross said. “What you waiting for?”

The headlights were practically useless it was raining so hard, but Trevor managed to negotiate the curving drive without sideswiping any limos. Preacher edged forward, trying to get his nose under the covered entrance.

“Okay, let’s wait here,” Ross said.

They could see Fancha standing at the valet desk. She was flanked by two double extra large Cubanos in tuxedos. One look at them, Stokely knew they were all carrying. Suddenly, a midnight blue Bentley Azure convertible raced up out of the rain and screeched to a halt at the curb. The passenger side door swung open and some hombre in a white
guayabera
jumped out and helped the two tuxedos hustle the singer into the back seat.

The tires chirped as the big Bentley swept away from the curb and disappeared into the rain.

“Move it,” Stoke said to Trevor.

The Bentley’s large and distinctive red taillights made tailing it a good deal easier in the blinding rainstorm. It hooked a left onto Collins Avenue, heading south, the storm-whipped breakers of the Atlantic and Hotel Row on their left. Trevor did as he was told, always at least one or two cars between the Lincoln and the Bentley, keeping the Bentley in sight.

“Where are they headed, Trevor?” Ross asked after they’d passed a number of intersections.

“All you can do is go west ’cross Biscayne Bay to downtown on the MacArthur Causeway.”

Which is exactly what the big Bentley did, turn right on 5th and head across the causeway connecting South Beach to the mainland. Five minutes later, at the intersection of Brickell Avenue, in the heart of downtown Miami, the car took another left, heading south on South Miami Avenue.

“He’s headed for Coconut Grove,” Trevor said, excited, accelerating.

“Easy. Easy. You get any closer, he’s going to make us, Preacher,” Stoke said, “Man looks like he slowing down, fixing to turn in somewhere.”

Trevor hit the brakes seconds before the Bentley’s taillights flashed red and the car swerved into a wide drive, coming to a stop at a massive, ornate set of iron gates.

“This not making no sense, mon. No sense a’tall.”

“Don’t stop, Trevor, don’t slow down, keep going,” Ross said from the backseat. “It’s a residence, is it?”

“Was a residence built by some millionaire back in de twenties,” Trevor said. “Now, de house got to be de biggest tourist attraction in South Florida. Called Vizcaya. A beautiful museum, mon! Sitting on a huge piece of land sticking right out into de bay. Tell you one thing for sure. It’s not open this time of night.”

“Hang a right here, and turn around,” Stokely said, craning his head around to keep the Bentley in sight. “Let’s go back and see what the hell he’s up to.”

Trevor backtracked to Vizcaya, slowed, turned right into the drive and pulled to a stop before the gate. The Azure had disappeared inside. On the right was a three-story stucco guardhouse, and a huge man wearing a black poncho came out into the downpour. He sloshed through the puddles at the front of the car and rapped his knuckles on Trevor’s window. Hard rain was beating down on the man’s clean-shaven head but it didn’t seem to bother him much. Trevor cracked his window down about a foot and looked up at the guy.

“What can I do for you, bud?” the guy asked Trevor. Stoke leaned across Trevor’s chest and favored the big bald guy with one of his biggest smiles.

“How you doing tonight? We just want to drive in and take a look around, that’s all.”

“Sorry. It ain’t open,” the guy said, heavy New York bad-ass accent. One look at the guy and two words popped into Stoke’s brain. Mobbed up. Yeah, this was one seriously mobbed-up individual.

“Funny, we just saw somebody go in there,” Stoke said. “It’s a tourist attraction, right? A museum? Open to the public, is what I’m saying.”

“You got a hearing problem, asshole? I said it ain’t open.”

“You want to watch who you call an asshole, asshole,” Stoke said, still smiling.

“Listen close, asshole. This is private property. A private residence.”

“You work for the man, right? You got any ID? Rap sheet, maybe? All them prison tats on your wrists? Look to me like some jive-ass con fresh out of the joint. Guy who’s done more time than a clock, you know what I’m sayin’?”

“You wanna fuck with me?”

“Maybe later. I swear I know this jailbird, Preacher. I think maybe I even sent him up once. Aggravated stupidity. Hey! This is the Vizcaya Museum, isn’t that right, hard case?”

“Right. But it ain’t no museum no more. Guy who owns it now shoots trespassers and apologizes later. You’re trespassing. Now, you two get your black asses out of here or I’m going to fuck you up.”

“Oh. Oh, I see. It’s a racial thing. Hey, there’s another guy in the back. He white. Can he go in?”

“Fuck are you, wiseguy, or somethin’?”

“Stokely Jones, NYPD,” Stoke said, flashing his old shield and forgetting to add the “retired” part as he sometimes did in situations of stress.

“Yeah? Is that right? A plainclothes cop, huh? Tailing the boss’s Bentley looks like. Maybe you better come in after all,” the guy said, pulling a double-barreled sawed-off shotgun out from under his poncho and pressing the muzzle against Trevor’s temple. To his credit, the Preacher didn’t even flinch.

The big black gates swung inward.

“Bada-boom, bada-bing!” Stoke said, getting right up in the guy’s grill, trying not to smile too much when he said it.

The guy, pissed, pulled the shotgun away from Trevor’s head. Stoke saw Preacher’s lips moving, guessed he was praying.

Stoke looked past Preacher and smiled at the mob guy. “Now, you listnin’ to reason, see? I knew you come around eventually.”

“Fuck you,” the guy said.

“Your place or mine?” Stoke said.

He was showing him a lot of pearly whites as Trevor accelerated the big Lincoln away and up the curving drive. Stokely swung his massive arm over the back of the seat and looked at Ross, seeing a big smile on his face.

“What you smiling at?”

“You, mate,” Ross said. “Just you, Stoke.”

“Shit,” Stoke said. “A guy like that? Kind of guy can’t make it as a real person, so he trying to make it as a character.”