Thriller: Code Name: Camelot - An Action Thriller Novel (A Noah Wolf Novel, Thriller, Action, Mystery Book 1) (20 page)

“Well, we knew it was coming,” Moose said. “It’s just like anything else; sooner or later, you have to pay the piper.”

Sarah nodded. “Yeah,” she said. “Jefferson had me driving around Hollywood in a Chrysler. He said it’s identical to the one I’ll have down there. I can drive anything, but it’s nice to be familiar with your vehicle.”

“I’m taking my own computer,” Neil said. “I might be able to use a different one, but mine already knows me. That’d be like cheating on a girlfriend.”

Moose laughed at him. “Neil, did you honestly just compare your computer to a girlfriend? Dude, we’ve really got to get you out more often. Have you ever even been laid?”

Neil rolled his eyes and sunk down into his chair. “Of course, you idiot,” he said. “Didn’t your mom tell you about us?”

Noah held up a hand. “Okay, that’s enough. Let’s try to have a good time tonight, just relax. I think if we all meet here around noon, we can be at Denver International in plenty of time to check in and go through security. That sound okay to everyone?”

“Fine by me,” Moose said. “I’m probably the only one that’ll have to drive over here anyway.”

Sarah grinned, and kicked him under the table, and Neil just rolled his eyes again. “I don’t have to drive anywhere, I just walk across the yard. On the other hand, since I have the biggest vehicle and plenty of room for all the luggage, why don’t we all ride to the airport together in mine?”

Moose looked at him for a moment, then shrugged. “Why not? Maybe you’ll kill us on the way; then we won’t have to put up with this mission after all.”

They talked about little things until the chicken was done, then Neil and Sarah brought everything else out from the house and set the table. It was a nice afternoon, and they decided to enjoy the weather. From everything they knew, it was likely to be hot in Juárez.

When dinner was over, they sat and visited for a little while, but then Moose said he wanted to go and spend some time with Elaine, and Neil decided to go to his trailer and make sure his computer and gear were properly packed. That left Noah and Sarah alone, so they cleaned everything up and loaded the dishes into the dishwasher, then sat down to watch some TV until they felt like going to bed.

TWENTY-ONE

T
heir flight was
uneventful, and landed in El Paso at just after six. They had all been sitting together, so they all came off the plane in single file and found Jefferson waiting for them inside the terminal.

“Noah, good to see you,” he said, shaking Noah’s hand. “Good flight, everyone?”

They all smiled and nodded, agreeing that it was an easy flight. Jefferson led them toward baggage claim to pick up their luggage. “I brought a van with me,” he said, “since I didn’t know how much baggage you might have. I got vehicles for each of you back at the hotel, but I just thought the van would be easier for right now.”

“No problem,” Noah said.

It took them about twenty minutes to gather up all of their luggage, and Moose snagged a cart and loaded it all up. “Lead the way,” he said to Jefferson, and pushed the cart as he followed along. The van was in short-term parking, and the walk took about five minutes.

Everything was loaded, and they were all inside and headed for the hotel. “I put you at the Holiday Inn, it’s pretty decent. Has a nice restaurant, too. I thought you guys would like that. Pool, weight room, all the goodies.”

“That’ll be fine,” Noah said. “I understand you’ve got everything else we need?”

Jefferson smiled. “It’s all at the hotel. If you guys are hungry, we’ll get you checked in and put your things in your rooms, then meet at the restaurant and have dinner. After that, we can go to my room and you can start looking it all over.”

Noah glanced at the other three, who nodded. “Yeah, I think we’re all hungry. We ate lunch early, so we could get going to the airport.”

They pulled up in front of the hotel about fifteen minutes later, and were quickly checked in. Once again, Moose grabbed the luggage cart and loaded everyone’s bags onto it. They were all on the third floor, and their rooms were close together, so it worked out well. Once everything was put away, they all met in the hallway and rode down the elevator together to go to the restaurant.

Dinner was pleasant, and when it was over, Jefferson pointed out that the restaurant had a very nice bar, then ordered a bottle of wine. He poured a glass for each of them, and held his own high. “To success,” he said, and the others all joined in the toast.

They rode up together again, and this time, they all went to Jefferson’s room. It was also on the third floor, just down the hall from theirs, a slightly bigger room. That was good, since it gave them all room to find a place to sit.

Jefferson picked up what looked like a shoebox, glanced at it, and then passed it to Noah. “Open it up,” he said. “Inside, you’ll find a wallet containing your ID, passport and credit cards for this mission, in the name of John Baker. Mr. Baker is from Chicago, and the wallet trash would lead you to believe that he’s single and probably self-employed. He’s got health insurance with Blue Cross, he’s a member of two different country clubs near Chicago, and he has a couple of pictures of a teenage boy, both of which are marked as being to Uncle John from Bobby. There’s also a Beretta nine millimeter automatic, but you might not want to try carrying that into Mexico. Oh, and you’ll find about five thousand in cash. That’s flash money, you’ll need it.”

Noah was busy examining the wallet, and simply nodded. Jefferson picked up another box and passed it to Sarah. “Your name is Kathy Stratton. There’s a purse inside with all your ID, passports, credit cards, etc., and lots of normal purse-type stuff. Makeup, aspirins, couple different kinds of candy floating around in there, I don’t know what all. However, if you take a look at this end of it, you see this ring?” He pointed at the one he meant. “If anything goes wrong, you pull that ring and a device inside the purse starts transmitting its location, as well as audio so Neil can hear what’s going on. He’ll have the receiver, and a way to pinpoint your location. If at all possible, we’ll get you out of whatever happened.”

Sarah looked at the ring, then up at Jefferson. “You won’t get upset if I prefer to get myself out of jams, will you?” She swung the purse by its strap, feeling its weight. “I could beat four men to death with this thing in the time it would take to pull that ring and yell for help, and I’ll be driving a car with a Hemi engine. I don’t think I’m likely to need much rescuing.”

Jefferson smiled and nodded. “I knew you were likely to feel that way, but our administrator being a lady who doesn’t happen to possess those skills herself, she insists that we always offer a panic alarm like that to our female operatives. Besides, you might run into a situation where there’s more than four men you have to beat to death. Pull that ring, and one of us will try to come and help.”

Sarah gave him a sarcastic smile, and he turned to pick up another box. This one he handed to Moose. “Moose, your name is Billy Scott. ID, passport, everything, just like the others. There’s a Glock forty in your box, I understand that’s one of your favorite weapons. Keep it on you at all times. It’s been specially treated with a film that will keep metal detectors and even gun-sniffing dogs from spotting it, at least until it’s been fired the first time. If you have to carry it across the border, you should be able to do so without being caught.”

Moose looked the weapon over, but didn’t remove it from the holster it was in. It was a clip-on, one that he could snap onto his belt so that it would be covered by a loose shirt. He nodded, and put it back in the box.

The next box went to Neil. “Mr. Blessing,” Jefferson said, “in reading your file, I learned that you were a very active participant in your high school’s drama club, and have a knack for accents. Your name, as you will see you on the ID and passports and credit cards in that box, is Henri Batiste. Mr. Batiste is a French-Canadian who is now a US citizen, but has never shaken his accent.”

“
Oui, oui, monsieur
,” Neil said with a grin.

“You don’t have to worry about maintaining the accent around the hotel, but make sure you don’t forget when you’re on the phone. Speaking of which…”

Jefferson picked up another box, and opened it. Inside were four cell phones, the latest models of smartphones. He passed one to each of them, glancing at each before deciding whom to give it to. “These are your phones,” he said. “You will leave your regular phones with me for now, and use these exclusively. Each of these has the numbers for the others programmed into it already, under the names they’re using for the mission. You’ve also got numbers for me, under Jim Thorpe, and for the administrator, under the name Barbara Davis, and you’ll see a lot of other numbers programmed in. If anyone gets hold of your phone and calls those numbers, we have people who will answer and act like they’re old friends of yours.”

The four of them took a few moments to familiarize themselves with the phones, and then Jefferson produced another box. “Noah, this is the special shopping list you gave me. I got everything you asked for, it’s all there.”

Noah opened the box, glanced inside and then smiled grimly. “That’s perfect,” he said. “Ortiz literally won’t know what hit him.” He closed the box and set it aside.

There was one box left, and Jefferson picked it up gingerly. He handed it to Neil, who suddenly began to smile. “Neil, that’s the special shopping list that
you
gave me, and let me tell you some of that stuff is very hard to come by. If you hadn’t been able to get me part numbers, I might not have found some of it.”

Noah looked at Neil, and indicated the box with a flip of his chin. “What kind of goodies you got there, Neil?”

Neil opened the box, and began rummaging through its contents. “Some absolutely amazing things,” he said. He pulled out what looked like a sheet of paper covered with blue dots. “See this? Each of those dots is a microphone capable of transmitting an encrypted audio signal through a piggybacked cell tower. The cellular service won’t ever know the signal is there, but it can reach my decryption equipment anywhere in the world. If anyone else were to pick up the signal, it would only sound like static.” He put the sheet back in the box, then lifted a small box from inside. Opening it, he showed them all what appeared to be a wad of chewing gum, such as might be stuck under a table. “This little jewel is a well-camouflaged, high-definition video camera. Like the microphones, it can send its signal right through cellular data signals, like using Skype on your phone. It has a super adhesive on the back, so when you peel off the paper and stick it somewhere, I’ll get a clear color video signal for the next two weeks, unless somebody goes to scraping off the gum. You stick this up under the bar, or under a table, and I’m betting no one in that establishment will ever get around to it.”

Noah nodded appreciatively. “Excellent, that’s great. We’ll know what’s going on there, even when I’m not in the place.”

“Exactamundo,” Neil said. “I’m supposed to keep you supplied with Intel, and that’s what I’m going to do. Besides, once you stick a few of these around that bar, we’ll know instantly if anything starts to go wrong for you. That way, Blondie could drop off Muscles to help get you out of it.”

Noah shook his head. “No, I’m going in alone,” he said. “Moose will stay back with you; he’s got his own wheels and ID if he has to come into town for any reason, but I don’t want anyone getting a look at him if we can possibly avoid it. Same goes for you, Sarah; you’ll drop me off some distance away from the bar, and I’ll walk in. I don’t want them getting a look at you, not at all.”

“People might wonder how you get in and out of the city,” Jefferson said. “What do you plan to tell them?”

“I don’t,” Noah said. “In a city like that, I don’t think too many people advertise where they sleep, especially people who are involved in illegal activities. If anybody gets so nosy that they want to know where I go when I leave, they can follow me, but that means they’re taking the risks that go along with it. I’m supposed to be a bad guy, if I have to, I’ll act the part.” He shrugged. “Besides, I think it would make sense for me to get a room in Juárez, let myself be seen in other places around the city. If I’m in that bar every single day, that’s going to look pretty suspicious, wouldn’t you think?”

Jefferson looked at him for a moment, then nodded. “Okay,” he said. “There are a few hotels with some decent security, places where an apparently wealthy businessman like John Baker might stay. What about a vehicle? Or do you want Sarah to drive in each day to chauffeur you around?”

“No, of course not. I’ll let her drive me in tomorrow, so that I can get a room in one of those hotels, but I’ll use taxis to get around the city. Sarah, I’ll let you know when I need you to come and pick me up.”

Moose grunted. “I want to go on record right now that I do not like this plan. How am I supposed to cover your back, when most of the time I won’t even know where you are?”

Noah shook his head. “Calm down, Moose,” he said. “I’ve got to play the part convincingly, and this John Baker wouldn’t be trusted if he was sleeping in El Paso every night. On top of that, if I come back to this hotel each night, we run the risk of someone managing to successfully tail me. That could expose all of you and compromise the mission. I’ll be needing you, don’t worry; I’m quite certain there will be flaws in the plan that will require quick improvisation. That’s where you guys come in. I’m not all that scared of being in Ciudad Juárez, I genuinely believe that the reason I’m not afraid to walk through the valley of the shadow of death is because I am the meanest son of a bitch in the valley.”

“Well, isn’t that special,” Neil said. “And all this time I thought it was because you didn’t know how to be afraid of anything? Isn’t that what makes you so valuable to us all, the fact that you don’t have emotions like fear inside you?”

“I’m with Moose and Neil on this one,” Sarah said. “Look, Noah, there’s no doubt you’re a tough bastard, but you’re not Superman. Bullets don’t bounce off of you, remember? We’re supposed to be your support team, but you’re leaving us behind.”

Jefferson grinned at Noah. “They do have a point,” he said, “but of course, the final decision on the plan is always yours. If this is the way you want to play it, then so be it. To be honest, I agree with you for the most part, but if you go out there and get yourself killed on your first mission, Allison is never going to forgive any of us. She has staked an awful lot on you, so you need to do your best to make sure she collects on that investment.”

Noah nodded. “Point taken, and guys, I do understand your concerns and I do appreciate them. We’re still going to do it my way. And right now, what we’re going to do is go get some sleep. We’ll meet tomorrow morning for breakfast at seven, and then we’ll start putting this plan into operation. Any questions?”

There weren’t any, so they each got up and went to their own rooms, taking with them the things that Jefferson had given them, and leaving their usual phones with him. Noah got inside his room, set the boxes down on the table, and went straight to the shower. Twenty minutes later, he was in bed, and a few minutes past that, he was asleep.

He woke at five thirty, his internal alarm clock working the way it always did, and began thinking over the things he would be doing that day. He had to choose a hotel to stay in, but he didn’t think that would be difficult. Jefferson would know which ones were best, and he would get his advice at breakfast. He didn’t plan to take a gun with him, because it would be out of character. Smalltime drug dealers carry guns; the big ones don’t, not because they’re so tough, but because they’re worth so much money that even their enemies are reluctant to see anything happen to them. After all, you never know when you might have something your enemy wants to buy. Things like that happened all the time.

There was a small coffee maker in the room, so he made a pot, but the stuff reminded him of what he had been given on death row. He took a single sip from the first cup, then dumped the whole pot down the toilet. Since his appetite for coffee was now whetted, however, he decided to go on down to the restaurant and get a decent cup there.

He stepped out of his room and turned to go to the elevator, but he heard his name and knew it was Sarah’s voice. He stopped and turned to her, waiting so that she could catch up.