One Rough Man (19 page)

I had seen stranger things and let it go. I checked my watch and wallet and saw that I still had both, so they had failed in their attempts. I picked up my backpack and looked through it. All appeared to be there. I honed in on the small outside pocket, torn open by the assault. A shock went through me. The MP3 player was gone. I ripped through the rest of the knapsack looking for the device. It wasn’t there. I searched the ground around me, seeing nothing. I ran back the way I had come, scanning left and right, but still came up empty. I stopped searching.
What the hell am I going to tell Jennifer? How are we going to make an exchange? How on God’s green earth have I managed to lose the device?

I flagged down a taxi, gave him directions, and sat back for the ride. Before I knew it, I was back at the hotel. I exited the cab and dragged myself up to our room, not wanting to tell Jennifer what had happened, knowing she would hate me for the incompetence that would cost her uncle his life.

I unlocked the door. She wasn’t in sight, so I checked the bathroom. It was also empty. I was surprised, and felt the anger rise. I remembered I had said not to leave, but I could see her going out just to spite me. I was working myself into a fine, justifiable rage, building up an argument to counter the sting of losing the MP3 player, when I noticed a piece of paper on the bed. I picked it up and got the second shock of the day.

You said you would call when you arrived. If you would like to see the girl in one piece, please call immediately
.

I
stared at the note for a heartbeat and then sat heavily on the bed, holding my head in my hands. I had failed all the way around. I had misjudged the opposition and misjudged my own capabilities.
I’m a fucking fraud. I should’ve never come down here.
Nothing good was going to come out of continuing now. I ran through my options and settled on the best course of action:
Get the fuck out of here, right now. Get back to the United States.
I could fly back and relocate to another part of the country, starting over again. I wasn’t without skills, although they had proven worthless here. I could hire on with a security firm. I had the credentials. They were hiring twenty-five-year-olds with only basic training on their résumé. I could go overseas and make some money, let this entire fiasco blow over, and build a nest egg at the same time.

I stood up and began packing my things. I wouldn’t even check out. Let Jennifer’s credit card handle the bill. She wouldn’t need it anymore anyway. After packing my rucksack, I looked around the room to see if I could use anything of Jennifer’s before I left. I dug through her purse, searching for cash. I pulled out her passport, seeing her face inside. I paused. From out of nowhere I thought about my family. Heather and Angie.

I squeezed my eyes shut, rubbing them hard with my hands.
This isn’t the same. I didn’t ask to be here. I failed Heather by omission. There’s nothing I can do here.
Staying was stupid. Trying to do anything about Jennifer was dumber still. All it would do was cause more death, most notably my own.
What the hell can I do? I have no money, no equipment, no men, no support, no nothing. The man on the phone has everything.

I opened my eyes and found myself looking into the mirror across the wall, a hollow, empty soul staring back.
What the fuck have I become?

I was sickened by my own reflection, ashamed of my previous thoughts.
Heather would have left the man in the mirror.
I sat still, thinking of my family, then thinking of Jennifer. I had no doubt that she would have tried to help if the roles had been reversed, no matter the risk to herself. The thought caused a wave of disgust at what I had planned.
I can’t go back like this. I have to do something. If I die, I die. Better than dying in an IED attack guarding a shipment of Baskin-Robbins ice cream in a war zone somewhere.

I felt better right away. Even though the odds almost guaranteed my failure, I felt at ease.

 

 

I LEFT THE LUGGAGE, taking only the small backpack. I left the room as I had found it, with the note lying on the bed. I was surprised that I hadn’t been attacked yet, since Machete clearly knew where we were staying. I took it as a good sign. I ran to our Jeep.

I merged onto 2 Calle and headed in the direction of the man’s house, wondering just what the hell I was going to do. Thinking through my courses of action, I decided to simply continue with the plan. While the end state had changed, not much in the plan had been altered.

My original idea had been to find a place that would facilitate multiple exits, forcing Machete to spread out in an attempt to cover all bases. Since I was now about to attempt an assault on his house, I needed to get as many men out as possible to even up the odds. Plaza Mayor worked either way. The only difference was that I had to keep Jennifer in the house while the hired guns came to find me. I hoped I would accomplish that through a phone call.
I’m hoping for a lot to happen. Not a great way to plan.

My first order of business was to get a weapon, and I was pretty sure I knew where to get one that was top of the line. Stopping the Jeep at the same pullout I had used earlier for my recce, I exited and raced through the woods to the chain-link fence surrounding the compound. I sat still for a few minutes to make sure I was alone, then pulled out the cell phone I had taken off the dead man in Charleston. I dialed Machete’s number, using the lighted keypad to see in the darkening gloom.

He answered the phone on the first ring. “Hello, Mr. Pike. I’m so glad you decided to call. I was beginning to wonder what to do with Jennifer.”

I fought to control my anger, needing to play a role. “Look, let’s skip the small talk. I’m sorry I ever came down here. I want to give you the package right away. I’m located at the Plaza Mayor. I’ll meet you at the peace monument with the flame. I’ll be in the crowd. One man, and one man alone, should stand at the monument every half hour starting at eight P.M. You got that so far?”

“Yes. I understand. We’ll meet you then?”

“No. The man should light a cigarette with his right hand. When I see that, I’ll throw the MP3 player to him sometime between eight and ten. I won’t come close enough for anyone to identify where the MP3 player came from. If I suspect that you’re more intent on getting me than the device, I’ll disappear and you won’t hear from me again.”

“And the girl?”

I paused, knowing that I was about to put Jennifer into extreme danger, but also knowing that I had to ensure she remained behind.

“I don’t care about the girl. I just want to get you off my back. I thought about leaving the package in the hotel and hauling ass, but I want to make damn sure you get it. Once you get the player, we’re through.”

“Smart man. I’m good with that. We’ll be at the monument. If I don’t get the player, I’m going to find you. Don’t fuck with me.”

I gritted my teeth at the threat, thinking I would enjoy killing this asshole. “Understood. You only have about forty-five minutes, so you’d better get moving.”

 

 

JENNIFER, lying on the floor shackled and gagged, saw Miguel hang up and waited to hear what he said to Jake.

“He’s pretty smart. He has a good plan to keep himself in one piece, although I’m sure you’ll find a way to defeat it.” Miguel then relayed Pike’s demands.

Jake said, “That makes it harder, but not impossible. The Plaza Mayor will be jammed with a thousand locals. I’m going to need everyone for this, or he’ll get away. Security here will be a little light while we’re gone.”

“Take whoever you need. I want him almost as much as the package.”

Jennifer saw Jake glance her way. “What about the girl? Are we taking her?”

She perked up, waiting to hear the exchange plan.

“No. He’s a man after my own heart. He doesn’t give a shit about her. He only wants out. I’ll give her to the remaining guard force as compensation for missing out on tonight’s fun.”

What?
Jennifer’s brain refused to compute what she had just heard. She watched in a daze as Jake left the room, barking out orders as he went. Her mind finally clicked.
Jesus Christ. I’m going to die.
It failed to register that death was the least of her concerns.

She heard Miguel talking to the remaining guard. “Take her to the interrogation room. Pick four men who deserve a reward and give her to them.”

Her predicament began to sink in. She tried to talk through the gag in her mouth, to get Miguel to understand there was some mistake. She was ignored. The guard grabbed the manacles around her wrists without even giving her a chance to stand up.
No, no, no. This isn’t happening
. She was dragged kicking from the room.

A
fter hanging up, I vaulted the fence and raced to the vantage point I had found earlier. Crouching in the woods, I waited, trying to see one of the guards patrolling the exterior grounds. I focused my eyes on the brick wall surrounding the compound, vaguely lit up enough to allow me to make it out. I used my peripheral vision to pick out movement, knowing that it was better in the night than my primary eyesight. Soon, I spotted a guard moving down the wall.

I moved in a crouch on a path to intersect the guard, covering the terrain as rapidly as I could without making enough noise to alert him. I closed within fifteen meters of his back and began stalking my prey. When I was five feet away, I closed the distance at a sprint. I wrapped my right arm around the guard’s neck and pressed my shoulder into the back of his head, forcing it down. Kicking the back of his knee, I flung myself backward, pulling him horizontally toward the ground. Our bodies separated like a pair of scissors. We both hit the earth at the same time, the guard on his back and me on my stomach. The force of the fall generated enormous leverage applied through my shoulder directly into the man’s neck, snapping it cleanly. I sat up, grabbed the dead man by his equipment vest, and dragged him thirty feet into the darkness. I began stripping the body, ripping away all of the junk to get to the ammunition for the 416.

 

 

JENNIFER LAY ON HER STOMACH inside the warehouse. She was still clothed, but her shoes had been removed to hamper any escape attempt. She could see the implements of torture in the gloom, along with dark brown stains at irregular intervals along the walls. In the corner she saw a pile of clothes and recognized her uncle’s shirt. She began shaking uncontrollably.
What the fuck am I going to do? Something . . . there’s got to be something.
Up until now, she had managed to maintain a semblance of self-control because she felt certain that the police or Pike would be arriving to help. People like her didn’t end up shackled in a drug lord’s house. At least not for long. Pike’s comments to Miguel had popped that bubble; she now knew she was on her own.
Think . . . Think . . . Think. Gotta be a way out....
The door opened, and she saw five Guatemalan men enter the room, all staring at her and smiling.
Oh, my God
.

 

 

THE THUMB DRIVE WORKED PERFECTLY, surprising Bakr. In his heart, he hadn’t thought they would actually get the data, and in their rush to get to the hotel, he hadn’t planned a next step.

As soon as they had arrived, they had seen a red Jeep driven by a man matching the description given by Jake. They watched him and a woman enter the hotel and had barely begun to discuss their options when the man exited alone less than five minutes later, giving them an opportunity they couldn’t ignore.

Now they had the GPS location to the temple, but they didn’t have a GPS. Bakr didn’t want to return with the data to Miguel’s house, but somehow they needed to get one of the GPSs inside their test package, along with the 3M respirators. While mulling the options over dinner, Bakr decided he would be the only one who went back. Sayyidd would remain in the restaurant with the data, waiting for him to return.

 

 

I FINISHED KITTING UP and conducted a functions check on the weapon, relieved when it appeared to work fine. I had stripped the man of his assault vest, then stripped the vest of the clutter it held. To my surprise, the guard had a plate-hanger underneath his vest, complete with front and back Level III armor plates, rated to stop everything up to 7.62 x 51mm, the primary round used in NATO sniper rifles and light machine guns.
What the hell is he wearing this for?
I wasn’t going to question it. I was fairly sure I would need the protection.

I ditched just about everything the man had, throwing away a ton of bullshit accessories that might be useful on Batman’s utility belt but would do me no good. The one thing I wanted that the guy didn’t have was a radio, but that in itself gave me some relief about Machete’s security posture.
Body armor and no radio? He’s wearing the kit as a costume
. I kept only the three magazine pouches, each holding two magazines loaded with thirty rounds of Hornady match grade 5.56mm boat-tail hollow points.

For weapons I took the H&K 416 and a Cold Steel push knife, a nasty instrument with a three-and-three-quarter-inch double-sided cutting edge and a “T” handle perpendicular to the blade.

Satisfied that I had all I wanted from the dead guard, I began to move toward the front gate, using the wall as cover, all the while scanning for cameras or other early warning devices. So far, no alarm had been raised, but it was only a matter of time before the guard I had killed was missed.

I held no illusions of what I was about to attempt. The standard operating procedure of my last unit prohibited entering a room as an individual. Two people could enter for extreme situations, otherwise three was the minimum, with four or five preferred. I was now going to assault the
entire fortress
on my own, using a weapon I had never fired, that might not even be zeroed, and certainly wasn’t zeroed for me. I would be lucky if the wannabe I had killed had bothered to sight-in the weapon at all. I had no idea if the weapon had been properly maintained. Should it fail at any time, I would be a dead man.