Plausible Denial (39 page)

“And
who would that be? Who are they working for now, if not for the CIA?”

“I’m
sorry, but I haven’t a clue about that. We did not discuss that when we met in
Chiang Rai, and Mac would never tell me if I did ask him.”

Ung
Chea was clearly taken aback by her revelations. He needed to report back to
Khun Ut immediately, before he shot down that CIA plane and caused more
problems for them. And they needed to get rid of these two prisoners. He did
not want to compound their problems by bringing the wrath of the CIA down on
their heads unnecessarily.

Ung
Chea turned to Paiboon. “We will check out her information. If she is telling
the truth, well, her treatment will improve. If we find that she is lying…
Anyway, take her back to her cell. Let her take a shower and give her something
to eat. And get her clothes washed.”

He
turned to Charly. “I hope you are not lying to me. That would not be good.
Things will get very bad for you if you are.”

What
a mess this is turning out to be
, he thought.

Chapter One
Hundred-Twenty-One

A
t
that precise moment, Santos and MacMurphy were sitting cross-legged on the edge
of the ledge. The spotter scope and Lapua were set up, aimed and ready, a few
feet behind them. Mac was observing the lodge through binoculars.

Santos
briefed Mac on the observations he had made earlier. “The whole front part of
the second floor appears to be offices. The biggest office appears to be the
one on the far right because all the lights came on at the same time there at
about eight-thirty. It looks like it runs from the corner almost to the center
of the building probably about thirty feet. The bedrooms are probably in the
rear. I didn’t see any evidence of bedrooms in the front. All the lights were
out at by about six and they didn’t come on again until this morning. I’d keep
my eye on the office on the far right. I’ll bet money that one belongs to Khun
Ut himself.”

“Here
comes the Porter again,” said Mac. “It’ll pass right over the roof of the lodge
in a few moments. That’s got to piss off Khun Ut big time.”

“I
see it.  Those guys won’t let up, will they? Back and forth, back and
forth over the lodge. Must be driving the sonofabitch crazy.”

“That’s
part of the plan, you can be sure of that...”

Now
the plane was close enough that Mac could make out the two pilots in the
cockpit. It whined its way over Ban Hin Taek and began a long, slow turn to the
south.

“It’s
following the same flight pattern over and over,” said Mac, “not a very good
idea in my opinion.”

The
words were hardly out of his mouth when something streaked up into the sky from
the woods below the mountain lodge and struck the Porter amidships. The little
single engine plane exploded in the air and broke in half, falling straight
down to the earth like two rocks. Another explosion lit up the mountainside
when the main section of the plane hit the ground on the side of the mountain
below them.

“Holy
shit! Did you see that?” said Mac.

“Son…of…a…bitch,”
said Culler. “That was a stinger.”

“Sure
looked like it. Those guys are nuts. Now there’s definitely going to be hell to
pay…”

“We’ve
got to report this back to Headquarters right away,” said Santos. “Have you got
any bars on that phone of yours?”

Mac
pulled his cell phone from his pocket and turned it on. “One bar. Doesn’t look good.
Let me try.” He hit the speed dial for Maggie and listened while the call was
routed to the other side of the earth. Finally a wobbly ring could be heard and
then the sound of someone picking up. “Hello. Maggie. Can you hear me?”

He
could make out her voice at the other end but the transmission was breaking up
badly. He shouted into the phone, “Maggie, I’ll call you later. Stay close to
your phone.”

He
could hear Maggie trying to respond on the other end, but the transmission was
too garbled to make anything out, so he hung up.

“Shit,”
he said, “I’m going to have to get higher on the mountain to get any decent
reception. Hold the fort, Culler, I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Mac
stripped down to his tee-shirt and jeans, and looked up the side of the mountain
and said, “Well, here goes,” He took off at a fast pace, climbing directly up
the side of the mountain.

Santos
watched until he was out of sight and then turned his attention back to the
burning Porter in the jungle below him. He focused through the binoculars and
tried to find some sign of life, but he knew there would be none. No one could
survive that fiery crash.

Mac
returned almost two hours later. He was breathing heavily and drenched in
sweat. He drank heavily from his Camelbak and tried to control his breathing
before speaking.

“I
got her,” he said between gasps. “She’ll pass the message on to Ed Rothmann.
We’ll call her again after dark when the reception is better. I hope I won’t
have to climb up that damn mountain again.”

He
fought to control his breathing. “I was thinking. Maybe this’ll do it. Maybe
the DDO will get approval to pull out all the stops now. They’re going to have
to investigate the crash, right? That means there’ll be Americans on the side
of the mountain looking at the crash site. It’s an American aircraft that has
been shot down. What will that mean for us? For this operation?”

Culler
picked up the binoculars and watched several firemen climb up the side of the
mountain toward the wreckage. A Thai police helicopter had arrived and was
hovering over the crash site.

“With
all this attention we’re going to have to take extra precautions to make sure
we’re not spotted. I don’t want us to be blamed for this.”

Mac
looked up in surprise as the realization hit him. “You’re right. This changes
everything. There’s gonna be all kinds of investigations going on down there.
And they’re going to include Khun Ut and his mountain villa. They’ll have to.
Surely others saw the direction that missile came from. He’s going to deny any
involvement, sure, and he’ll probably never be implicated due to his influence
and power, but there’s still gonna be investigations going on.”

“So?
So what do you mean?”

“I
mean he won’t want cops poking around his house and asking all sorts of
questions while he’s holding an American CIA officer there. That’s what I mean.
This is an opportunity for us. This is manna from heaven…”

Chapter One
Hundred-Twenty-Two

K
hun
Ut sat behind his desk, head in his hands. His cheroot burned in the ashtray
beside him. Things were unraveling rapidly. Ung Chea was convinced the CIA
woman was telling the truth…and he agreed. Santos and MacMurphy were ex-CIA
mercenaries. He had thought from the start that this did not smell like a CIA
operation, and he was right.

But
who were they working for? If not the CIA, then surely it had to be one of his
competitors. But he couldn’t imagine it could be anyone local. He simply didn’t
have any local competitors. He controlled the region and had excellent
intelligence on who was doing what to whom. There were no indications that
anyone here was trying to wrest control of his operation from him. Sure, there
were guys would would like to step into his shoes, but they couldn’t pull off
anything like this without him knowing about it.

So
it had to be one of his foreign competitors. The Arabs who controlled the opium
and heroin trade in Afghanistan maybe, or perhaps the drug cartels in Colombia
– someone wanting a bigger slice of the action. These were the most likely
candidates.

And
now he realized that shooting down the CIA’s Porter had been a huge mistake. He
had acted rashly. If only that CIA bitch had talked sooner, it could have been
prevented. Now he actually would have the CIA on his case – the CIA and the two
farang
mercenaries.

His
men had found Colonel Sunthonwet’s black Range Rover parked high on the other
side of Doi Tung Mountain near the temple, so they had to be close by. What
were they up to this time?

He
had made a calculated risk when he attacked the consulate in Chiang Mai. He had
believed the combined efforts of the CIA, DEA and State Department would be
pushed back by his aggressive action. He thought they would back off in their
attempts to restrict the cultivation of poppy in the region around the Golden
Triangle. And by all appearances his gamble had worked – efforts by the U.S.
State Department and the DEA to purchase and destroy poppy fields had come to a
screeching halt, and the farmers who had cooperated in these efforts were once
again returning to his camp.

But
now this…  

He
pushed back from his desk, grabbed his cheroot and limped slowly across the
room to the window. He stood and looked out across Ban Hin Taek to Doi Tung
Mountain and the smoldering wreckage of the Porter at its base.

The
power of the massive mountain gave him strength. He would survive. This was
just a minor setback. He had experienced other setbacks during his path to the
top and had always emerged stronger than before. He had learned from each
mistake and from each attempt to wrest control of his empire away from him.

Right
now he had to think about damage control. His mind spun with ideas…

Chapter One
Hundred-Twenty-Three

“M
ac,
look at this. Check out the far right window on the second floor near the end
of the building.” Culler had the spotter scope turned up to forty-power and the
window filled his vision.

Mac
adjusted the scope on the Lapua. “Son of a bitch. I think that’s him.”

“I
think we just decided on a plan, Culler.” Mac clicked off the safety. “Whatever
happens now, taking that bastard out is not going to make it worse.” His heart
pumped and his hands shook 

Buck
fever
, he thought,
don’t do this to me now. Settle down.
He could
see the man clearly, just standing there looking out of the window, smoking.
This had to be Khun Ut. He set the crosshairs on the middle of his chest, let
out half a breath and squeezed the trigger.

The
target’s arm came up as he brought the cigar to his mouth and the Lapua
recoiled into Mac’s shoulder. The Sierra Match 250 grain .338 bullet left the
muzzle at 2,900 feet per second with barely a sound.

After
what seemed like an eternity, the bullet hit the double pane thermal glass,
deflected downward slightly and slammed into Khun Ut’s lower left rib. The rib
shattered and the .338 bullet contined to plough at a downward angle through
muscle and stomach and intestines until it exited his back just under the left
lung.

The
force of the impact spun Khun Ut around and threw him back into the office. He
hit the floor with a thud in the middle of the room, oozing blood and life onto
the polished teakwood floor.

“Holy
shit,” said Culler. “That thing sure packs a wallop.”

“Where’d
I hit him?” asked Mac, still sighting through the scope of the Lapua.

“I
think you were a little low and right but you hit him square enough to spin him
around and knock him back into the room. It was a solid hit.”

“But
not a kill shot,” Mac replied, matter of factly. “Damn…”

“Maybe,
maybe not, depends… you got him good, though. Nice shot.”  

They
remained in position, Santos observing the villa through the spotter scope and
MacMurphy through the rifle scope. Moments later the room filled with people.
One of them walked up to the window, inspected the bullet hole in the glass and
looked out toward them…

Chapter One
Hundred-Twenty-Four

K
hun
Ut could feel the life draining from his body. He rolled up into the fetal
position and grabbed his side where the bullet had entered his body, trying to
stem the flow of blood.

He
called out for help. He felt like he had been kicked in the side by a mule, but
he could feel no pain. Only a dull ache. He knew he had been shot, but how?
From where? He was confused and panicky. He fought the feeling. He couldn’t
panic. But he could feel the rush of blood going to his head. His vision was
blurred. He realized he was going into shock. He called out again and again and
then everything went black.

Was
he dreaming? He sensed people around him, moving him, lifting him up off of the
floor. He was still in no pain but he was slipping in and out of consiousness.
His eyes would not focus and dark spots danced in front of them. He could hear
voices in the distance. He struggled to stay awake, fearing that if he drifted
off and succumbed to the urge to sleep, he would never awaken.

He
could feel himself being moved. People were shouting and hurrying around him.
He was being carried on a stretcher, jostled around, down the stairs, out the
door. People surrounded him. Someone was trying to talk to him. The face very
close. He recognized the face as Ung Chea’s. Ung Chea’s lips were moving but
all he could hear was the blood rushing in his ears and faint voices far away.

He
struggled to concentrate and finally, with great effort, he reached for Ung
Chea’s shirt and pulled him close. He whispered, “Who did this?”

“You
were shot, Khun Ut, from somewhere outside. You will be alright. An ambulance
is on its way. We will get you to the hospital right away. Do not try to speak.
You will be okay. Save your strength.”

Khun
Ut struggled to speak. His words came out in whispery gasps. “The
farangs.
They
did this. Get the woman and the Hmong out of here. Quickly. Take them into the
jungle across the border, far away from here. And find those two. Kill them.”