Plausible Denial (18 page)

“I
don’t think anyone followed us. Do you?” said Mac.

“I
can’t hear a damn thing with that siren blaring up there, but I’ll bet the
little fuckers won’t come out of there too soon.”

“But
eventually they will, so let’s haul ass out of here before they realize we’re
gone and start sending out search parties.”

“Yeah,
let’s go back to night vision. We’ll move faster that way,” said Culler,
knocking mud from the back of his Ghillie-suit.

“We
already covered more ground in one minute than we did in thirty going up. At
this rate we’ll be down at the bottom and out of range in no time.”

“Sure,
but once we get done sliding on our asses we’ll be at the bottom and the long
march begins. And they’re definitely going to be looking for us.”

Mac
saddled up and glanced back up towards the top of the ridge. The siren was
still blaring but there didn’t appear to be any other movement at the ridge’s
edge. “Okay, let’s move out as fast as we can. I’ll lead the way so try not to
tumble into me.”

“Yeah,
make a nice smooth trough in the mud with your ass, and I’ll slide down behind
you nice and easy.”

They
slipped and slid their way toward the bottom of the ravine. The sound of the
incessant wailing siren became dimmer and dimmer. Occasional bursts of AK-47
fire and shouts could be heard, an indication that the trigger-happy guards
were now outside of the building and searching the perimeter.

By
the time they reached the flat bottom, their Ghillie-suits and boots were
covered in mud. They paused for a few minutes to catch their breath and scrape
off as much of the gunk as they could. They rinsed off their hands, took long
drinks of water from their Camelbaks and munched granola bars for energy. Then
they were on their way again, moving at a fast walk with Mac in the lead.

They
moved rapidly and silently through the triple canopy jungle, pausing only to
glance at the GPS occasionally to establish their position. Twenty-six minutes
had passed since they went over the ledge. Going down was a hell of a lot
faster than going up.

Suddenly
they heard the sound of a helicopter landing in the distance behind them, and
then the wailing siren went silent.

Chapter Fifty-One

U
ng
Chea and a dozen of his men began jumping out of the Vietnam vintage Huey
helicopter before it settled onto the tarmac of the parking lot. All but the
Cambodian were dressed in boots and security uniforms. They all carried AK-47
assault rifles.

The
Cambodian wore blue jeans, tennis shoes and an untucked, short-sleeved orange
shirt. He held a 9mm pistol.

The
men spread out in front of him and advanced toward the warehouse. Ung Chea
followed closely behind, spewing out a steady stream of orders to the leader of
the group.

The
Cambodian surveyed the damage. Three men lay dead in a tangled heap amid bullet
ridden cars at the edge of the parking lot, and more men lay dead in both open
doorways to the warehouse.

Approaching
one of the guards standing at the front of the building, he asked, “Where is
Anan? What happened here?”

The
quivering guard responded in a squeaky voice, bowing deeply with his fingertips
touching his forehead in a deep
wei,
and almost dropping his AK-47 in
the process.  “I, I do not know, sir. It happened so very fast. So many
dead. Anan dead. Michai dead. Sano dead. Many dead.”

The
Cambodian’s scarred face burned red and his eyes spit hatred. “How many were
there? Where did they come from?”

The
guard continued to
wei
repeatedly and cringe in fear. “I do not know,
sir. Everything happened so fast. I think they were many. They killed so many.”

The
Cambodian brushed the slobbering guard aside and yelled, “Does anyone know what
happened here?”  Stepping over three bloody bodies, he entered the warehouse.
He glanced around the interior and, without emotion, took in the sight of the
still bodies of several guards lying sprawled on the catwalk and on the floor
of the building.

A
tall, young security guard with an AK-47 slung over his shoulder stepped
forward and addressed the Cambodian in a soft voice. “Sir, my name is Phao. I
was with Anan and the others when we were first alerted that something was
wrong. I was the one who set off the alarm.”

He
related the story of how Sano found Michai dead at his post, and two men with
silenced automatic weapons broke into the building through one of the front
doors and started shooting everyone in sight. “And then, when the alarm went
off and we began to return fire, they left through the same door they entered.”

Ung
Chea stared up at the young guard and then motioned around the room with his
9mm pistol. “Two men? You said two men did all this? What about the guys
outside? Who killed them?”

Phao
dropped his head respectfully and answered quietly. “I only saw two men, Ung
Chea, only two. And, oh yes, they were both
farangs
.”

The
remaining security guards focused their attention on the Cambodian standing
just inside the door amid three of their dead colleagues.

Ung Chea could
only remember one other time in his life when he had experienced as much anger,
fear and trepidation as he was feeling at the moment.

He
was six years old living in the northeast Cambodian border town of Anlong Veng
when the Khmer Rouge seized power and changed the country’s name to Democratic
Kampuchea. Ta Mok, the most brutal Khmer Rouge general, nicknamed “The
Butcher,” arrived to take charge of the army in the northern zone.

The
killing of intellectuals and the wealthy class began immediately after Ta Mok’s
arrival. Ung Chea’s father, a wealthy merchant engaged in trade across the
border with Thailand, was one of the first to be hacked to death with hoes by
Ta Mok’s vicious Khmer Rouge.

His
mother, an educated nurse, pretended to be a simple peasant to escape certain
death, but her family and friends knew that that it would be only a matter of
time before her secret would get out and Ta Moc’s thugs would see to it that
she would meet the same fate as her husband.

The
fear of losing his mother after witnessing the horrible death of his father was
unbearable for the young Ung Chea. Several days went by and he couldn’t keep
anything in his stomach. He spent his days and nights quivering in his bed,
unable to eat or sleep, paralyzed by fear and foreboding.

Ung
Chea felt the same squeamish pangs in his stomach today. He felt like he was
going to retch.

Fortunately,
Ung Chea’s luck changed abruptly on the day Ta Mok was carried back home on a
stretcher following a skirmish with Vietnamese forces in the surrounding
Dangrek mountains. His right leg had been blown off below the knee by a land
mine, and he was near death from loss of blood and shock.

The
call went out for anyone with medical experience to help their beloved leader,
and Ung Chea’s mother, despite her fears, stepped forward.

Ung
Chea and his mother were moved into Ta Moc’s huge three-story villa where she
nursed Ta Moc back to health with hidden medical supplies and precious
antibiotics.

By
the time Ta Mok had recovered enough to screw on a peg leg and get back to
fighting the Vietnamese, he had fallen in love with his nurse. 

Needing
the security and support Ta Moc provided, she became his mistress and the
six-year-old Ung Chea was adopted and trained to be a guerilla fighter
alongside his legendary adoptive father.

Ung Chea shook
out of his reverie and began shouting orders to his troops. “Everyone outside,”
he commanded.

When
the men had assembled at the front of the building, he addressed them. “I know
exactly who is responsible for this. They are
farangs
and we have their names
and descriptions. They appear to be American CIA agents. We have been searching
for them for days. Now everyone fan out and search the woods around us. They
are on the run and we must find them. Now get moving and shoot them on sight.”

Chapter Fifty-Two

K
hun
Ut was soundly sleeping beside his favorite mistress when he received the call
from the Cambodian. At first he was annoyed at being awakened in the middle of
the night, but as soon as he heard what the Cambodian had to report, he was
wide awake, furious and ready to take action.

He
shouted into the phone. “Get everyone on it. You have got to find the bastards.
They must be on foot so it should not be too difficult. Get more men if you
need them. Just find them and kill them. Get another helicopter if you need it.
Dogs. Get some dogs if you want. Scour the jungle and the woods. They are out
there somewhere.”

He
was out of bed pacing with the phone to his ear. His mistress was wide awake
now, sitting up and looking at him with frightened eyes, the sheet pulled up to
her chin.

In
a calmer voice he continued. “Oh, I almost forgot to tell you. The last report
from the police is that they still have not found the RAV4 they are now
driving. I’ve got everyone, including the police who want them for questioning
about the bombing of their car, scouring the area between here and Chiang Mai
for it.”

He
paused a moment, thinking about what he had just said and putting things
together in his head. “Oh my God,” he said, thinking out loud. “The car is
there. It’s got to be somewhere fairly close to the warehouse. You have got to
find the car, Ung Chea. That is where they are headed. Use the Hueys to find
the car. They must have dropped it off someplace on the edge of the jungle and
walked in. Find the car and you will find them.”

His
next call was to his police contact.

Chapter Fifty-Three

T
he
five-mile trek back down to the car was going considerably faster than the
long, cautious walk in. Santos and MacMurphy were humping it as fast as they
could, moving at slightly less than a jogger’s pace through the jungle back to
where they had left their vehicle.

Mac
stopped to check their location on his GPS, and Culler looked over his
shoulder. “Let’s keep to this side of the stream where the going is a bit easier
and keep humping it as fast as we can until it branches off to the right.
That’ll be about a mile from the car. Then we can cut off in a more easterly
direction and make a beeline for the car.”

Culler
nodded his head, sending rivulets of sweat careening down his face and off his
nose. He sucked heavily from the tube on his Camelbak. “Fast is good. Let’s put
as much distance between them and us as we can. What a goat rope this turned
out to be.”

“Can’t
argue that. Let’s get moving.”

“Wait.
Let’s toss this kilo of heroin. I don’t like carrying it around. We stole
it—that’s enough. Let’s just toss it in the stream.”

MacMurphy
thought a moment and then his face broke into a large grin. “No, let’s leave it
here on the trail where they can find it. But first empty one of those ricin
vials into it and hope they find it and keep it. It’s worth a lot of money.
That’ll help us take out a few more of those drug-dealing bastards.”

“Now
you’re thinking.” Santos took out the brick, unwrapped it and laid it on the
ground in front of them. He removed one of the vials of ricin and injected it
one cc at a time into several places around the chalky brick until the vial was
empty. Then, being careful not to get any of the ricin on his hands from the
tip of the needle, he flipped the empty vial into the stream like a disgusting
bug.

At
that moment the familiar sound of a Huey helicopter could be heard lifting off
in the distance behind them.

Mac
looked back in the direction of the noise and then up at the triple canopy
above him. “They’ll have a hell of a job seeing us from up there, and they sure
as hell can’t hear us, so let’s get a move on. If they find the RAV before we
do, we’ll really be screwed.”

Chapter Fifty-Four

T
he
Cambodian’s men scoured the perimeter of the warehouse with flashlights,
looking for tracks and other signs that would indicate the direction in which
the two
farangs
had fled. One of his men called out from the rear of the
building. “Over here. They went down the ledge over here. I can see where they
slid down the slope.”

Ung
Chea ran to the rear and looked over the ledge. “You are right,” he exclaimed.
“They went down this way.” He called to one of his team leaders. “Paiboon, take
your men down here and follow their trail. They will be moving fast, not
covering their tracks. Get going. I will leave a few behind to guard the
warehouse and take the rest in the Huey.”

“Yes
sir,” said Paiboon, saluting. He quickly selected five of the youngest and most
athletic of his men, eschewing the older, overweight guards. He led them to the
edge and commanded, “Follow me.” And over the ledge he went with the others
close behind like parachutists leaving the door of a plane.

Ung
Chea and the rest of his men ran back to the Huey, which was idling in the
parking lot. They climbed aboard and the helicopter lifted off noisily. When it
reached altitude, it banked south toward the rear of the warehouse and the
jungle beyond.

Once
they were airborne the Cambodian keyed his walkie-talkie and called Paiboon.
“This is base calling One. Come in, One.”

Paiboon
answered in a breathless voice. “Base, this is One. We have their trail. They
are moving fast. It is tough going here.” He stumbled and cursed as one of his
men slammed into him from the rear, forcing him to stop transmitting for a
moment. “Base, can I call you back when we reach the bottom? We are slipping
and sliding all over the place here.”