Contract to Kill (6 page)

At the tree line, he paralleled the same interior road the vehicles had used and advanced deeper into the complex. The smell of eucalyptus hung in the air like fog. It reminded him of his backyard when he was a kid.

He heard something.

The clunk of a car door—from his three o’clock position.

He focused his NV in that direction and saw the Lexus and SUV sitting in the middle of a soccer field. He hopped the fence and climbed halfway up the bank. Since the trees on the opposite side of the gravel road didn’t have low-hanging branches, he stayed where he was.

Standing next to the SUV, Hahn was turning in a circle and appeared to be scanning the area with some sort of device that looked like—

A night-vision scope. Shit!

Toby ducked, praying he’d been quick enough. Hahn had been mere seconds from sweeping past his area. He waited a good ten seconds before risking a look. Hahn was just finishing a 360-degree sweep. The SUV’s passenger got out, and to Toby’s surprise, it wasn’t BSI’s chief of security. It was Darla Lyons, a compact brunette in her midthirties. He didn’t know much about her, but she worked with Hahn and was obviously part of Mason’s inner circle.

Okay, so who’s in the Lexus?
he wondered
. Maybe Hahn and Lyons have some kind of fling going.
Were they out here for sex? No, that didn’t make sense. Why go to all this trouble when a motel would suffice? One thing was certain, if they had something illegal going on behind Mason’s back, it was more than reckless. You never crossed Tanner Mason.

For half a minute nothing happened. They just stood there, looking around.

The interior of the Lexus remained dark as its driver exited the vehicle.

In a puzzling move, the sedan chirped and its parking lights flashed. Weird. The driver must’ve locked the car. Why would he do that?

When the man approached Hahn and Lyons, Toby recognized his boss’s commanding presence right away. There was no mistaking Tanner, a.k.a. Skinner, Mason. His long blond hair was always tightly secured in a ponytail. “Skinner” was reputedly a tough-guy nickname or call sign from Mason’s BSI Academy days. Toby had only met Mason a couple of times because BSI’s structure closely mirrored that of the military. Toby reported to a lieutenant who, in turn, reported up the chain of command.

When Mason reached the SUV, Hahn’s body language changed, like that of a corporal in the presence of a general. Like Hahn, Mason and Darla wore gloves and dark clothing, not the standard khaki garb they usually wore at work. They huddled for several seconds before walking over to the Lexus.

Toby took a moment to scan his perimeter with the NV. He didn’t think a security guard would be on foot out here, but it was likely a mobile unit cruised the outside every so often as part of a larger patrol loop. He’d once done something similar during his MP days at Camp Pendleton.

He kept alternating his surveillance between the vehicles, wondering what this late-night rendezvous was all about and why they needed such a dark and isolated spot.

Mason raised his hand and the Lexus flashed and chirped again.

Hahn circled to the far side, while Darla stood behind the trunk, her hand tucked inside her coat. Simultaneously, Hahn and Mason opened the rear passenger doors and backed away.

Two men had trouble getting out, and Toby saw why. Their hands were secured behind their backs. He couldn’t see a lot of detail, but it looked like they wore formal pants and golf shirts. One of them sported a dark ball cap.

Hahn escorted his man around the vehicle and shoved him into position next to the other guy. Darla closed both of the sedan’s doors and stood next to Mason.

With his arms crossed, Mason said something to them. It didn’t look like a well-received comment because the man wearing the ball cap jerked his head forward in a spitting type of motion.

Toby inwardly cringed as Mason wiped his face.

It happened fast.

Mason drove his fist into Ball Cap’s stomach hard enough to detonate organs. Before the guy could recover, Mason swept his foot and sent the guy sprawling.

The second guy turned to help his buddy, but never got there.

Darla took him down.

Mason produced a suppressed pistol and swung it like a hammer. The blow caught the second man on the side of the head. Mason grabbed the guy’s collar, dragged him away from the SUV, and kicked him in the ribs several times.

The man curled into the fetal position and held still.

Some kind of heated exchange took place between Ball Cap and Mason. Toby could only hear bits and pieces, but there was no mistaking the word
chickenshit
being yelled. Still on the ground, Ball Cap made it to his hands and knees, but no farther.

In a casual move, Mason pointed his pistol at Ball Cap’s head.

Oh man, no way
. . .

There was no sound, but Toby’s NV registered the brief flash.

When the other guy tried to get up, Hahn kicked him in the face.

Toby winced as the man’s jaw absorbed the full brunt of the energy.

Mason approached the other man and shot him in the head as well. The guy didn’t die right away. His body wrenched in violent spasms for several seconds, then went still. Hahn laughed and made some sort of comparison to a headless snake.

Toby couldn’t believe what he’d just witnessed. When he tried to swallow, his mouth was dry. He had no business being out here and cursed himself for meddling. How could he have been so stupid?

He wanted to run, but if he did that now, they might see him. The sloped bank he used for concealment didn’t extend more than fifty yards along the access road in the direction he needed to go. If he retraced his steps across the baseball field, he’d be out in the open. He should’ve anticipated Mason would have night vision.

Pinned down, he’d have to wait this out.

Another contraction from the cold raked his body.

He watched Hahn use a penlight to sweep the grass, probably looking for Mason’s spent brass. After thirty seconds, Hahn seemed to find what he was looking for. He then arranged the bodies side by side before doing something to their heads, but Toby couldn’t see what he did.

He’d never seen anyone get killed—let alone murdered—and it sure as hell wasn’t like the movies. There was nothing glamorous or exciting about it. The words “brutal” and “perverse” came to mind. Those were his
colleagues
out there. How could they simply drive to work like none of this had happened? And he wondered the same thing about himself.

Toby zeroed in on Darla. She said something to Mason, but he just shrugged as if to say,
That wasn’t so bad
.

A few seconds later, the image in his NV flashed brightly. Four times. Were they taking pictures of the bodies? He then watched Mason open the driver’s side door of the SUV, sit down, and remove his shoes. He placed them in a garbage bag and handed it to Hahn. At the sedan, Hahn did the same thing and passed the bag to Darla.

Mason and Hahn got into the sedan, while Darla climbed into the SUV. Both vehicles remained dark as they left the soccer field.

Toby scrambled down the bank and lay flat next to the outfield fence.

In thirty seconds the vehicles would be on top of him.

He’d always believed he was fairly tough, but this sickening feeling of being unarmed and helpless hammered his nerves. He considered bolting again, but knew he’d have no chance against their NV devices. He’d be spotted for sure.

It didn’t take a vivid imagination to know what would happen if they stopped. Toby could fight, but he was no match for three of BSI’s top military contractors armed with laser-sighted pistols.

The menacing hiss of tires grew louder, and he pressed his forehead into the grass. No more than ten feet away, the two vehicles reached his position. Close to vomiting, Toby clenched his teeth. If the windows of the vehicles were down, they’d hear his retching for sure. Fighting the rising bile, he forced himself to breathe through his nose.

The horrid image of Hahn kicking the downed man in the face invaded his mind. The blow must’ve destroyed the man’s nose—a cruel thing to do before killing him.

Adding to Toby’s misery, his wet uniform stuck to his body like frozen plate steel.

Keep going
. . .
please
keep going.

Then, as slowly as it had arrived, the sound of crunching tires receded to the south, back toward the fire-access gate.

Toby sucked in a lungful of air and nearly vomited.

His bladder suddenly burned. He hadn’t realized how badly he needed to pee.

When the trailing sedan was far enough away, he eased into a kneeling position and took more deep breaths. He was tempted to stick a finger down his throat and just get it over with, but the worst of his fear had passed.

He used the NV to locate the vehicles at the southern edge of the complex. They turned west along the outfield fence where he’d seen the single set of tire tracks on the way out here. In fifteen more seconds, they’d be outside the property and no longer posing a threat.

Toby couldn’t wait any longer. He unzipped and relieved himself while kneeling.

Getting up slowly, he looked at the prone forms on the soccer field.

Neither of them moved.

He’d heard of cases where people lived after being shot in the head, but how likely was that? Now wasn’t the time for heroics, in any case. For all he knew, someone could be coming to sanitize the scene.

He watched Hahn close the gate behind the two vehicles and hoped they’d turn left out of the driveway. If not, they’d cruise past his parked Sentra.

In a full sprint, he took off toward the tombstone-like structure, and sixty seconds later, he arrived at the fire-access gate. Breathing heavily, he retraced his steps across the weeds and noticed Mason had replaced the cut lock.

He illuminated his watch and saw just under thirty-five minutes remained. Should he call 911? He knew he couldn’t use his cell phone to do it. What about a pay phone? No, that wouldn’t work—all 911 calls were recorded.

He needed time to think, time to settle his nerves. What about car trouble? A dead battery. With the fog and mist, it would make a believable excuse to be late. But even late, how was he supposed to walk into BSI headquarters like none of this had happened? And he certainly couldn’t show up in a wet, disheveled uniform. The spot where he’d lain flat to avoid being seen hadn’t been solid grass. There’d been muddy patches. No way. There was no way he could go to work tonight, but it was bad form to call in sick with less than an hour’s notice.

Bad form?

He’d just witnessed a double murder, committed by his
employer
!

He stayed close to the building and ran along the landscaped grass strip. When he reached the corner of the street, there were no cars present. He got into his Sentra and drove west, away from the driveway. He didn’t want to retrace any of his route over here.

Man, this really sucks,
he told himself again. Then he remembered something . . . something from the night that had changed his life.

Feeling a new surge of hope, Toby Haynes reached for his wallet.

CHAPTER 4

Damp with sweat, Nathan awoke from the moth dream again. How many times this week? Four? Wasn’t time supposed to be the great healer?
Yeah, right
.

He didn’t hate the winged insects, but they’d once tormented him to the brink of insanity.

Two decades ago, the tail end of a CIA mission in Nicaragua had ended badly and he’d fallen into the clutches of a vicious interrogator. At least his spotter Harvey Fontana got away, but Nathan paid a high price ensuring his friend’s escape. He’d bought time for Harv with unspeakable humiliation and agony. Their extraction from Nicaragua hadn’t been scheduled for two days, and his interrogator was determined to wring the details out of him and set a trap for the other
Americano
. Nathan
held
out and Harvey
got
out, but his vindictive captor had unleashed a lifetime’s worth of fury and frustration upon his captive.

Montez de Oca had been exceptionally innovative. Bored with his daily medieval tortures, he’d tied Nathan to a tree one night and put a floodlight in his face. Nathan had thought it was just another wear-the-prisoner-down ploy—the tired, old light-in-the-face trick. The bulb was far enough away not to burn him, but damned bright.

At first nothing happened and he’d thought he might actually get a few hours of sleep. Then a single visitor arrived, drawn to the lure of an artificial sun. The yellow moth landed on his nose and stretched its black-spotted wings. Nathan actually welcomed the moth’s company and thought it was a beautiful creature. He remembered cracking a smile—literally, his lips had been scabbed over from countless impacts.

Then a second insect came, bigger than its friend.

It didn’t take long for Nathan to understand the true horror of what descended out of the darkness. Within a few minutes there were ten.

Then twenty.

Joy turned to terror as hundreds arrived. They crawled across his face and into his nose, ears, and eyes. The more he shook his head to dislodge them, the more agitated they became. Their wings whirring, they orbited like a menacing swarm of bees before settling onto his face again. The sheer numbers threatened to suffocate him, but that was only part of the terror. Three long, open gashes on his cheeks were especially inviting, and the thirsty moths lined the wounds like antelope drinking at a river. Time stretched and lost all meaning.

When his mind reached the overload point and felt like it was going to snap, the light winked out.

Half an hour later, it started over again. Nathan remembered being so exhausted he thought he might actually die from sleep deprivation, and prayed he would.

But God had other plans for him, because death hadn’t come.

Salvation had.

It took twenty-two days, but Harv finally rescued him. Thankfully, Nathan had no memory of being carried through three miles of jungle. His savaged body had been reduced to 130 pounds.