Vengeance: A Derek Stillwater Novel (Derek Stillwater Thrillers Book 8) (4 page)

The pain in his skull
was immense. It kept him awake as much as fear of a missed opportunity to escape. Every so often Hammond would stumble to his feet and shuffle around the room, leaning against the wall. With a minor head wound and a fairly significant abdominal wound, it was quite impressive.

On the other hand, Derek was concerned because it was going to be hell to escape with Hammond in this kind of condition. Glancing over at him, the
CIA
agent seemed to know what he was thinking. “First opportunity, get the hell out of here. Leave me.”

Propped on the pillows, nibbling on dates, Derek said, “That what they taught you Delta pussies? Every man for himself?”

“And you Green Berets never left a man behind, right?” One hobbling step, then another. Hammond looked like a man coming up on the ninety-ninth mile of a hundred-mile ultramarathon.

Through the desert.

“Never. Even if I have to carry him back in pieces.”

Hammond grunted, winced, sat on the floor holding his ribs. In Russian he said, “I don’t see anything like a listening device.”

“Me neither. But since we can talk in Russian, I’m not leaving anything to chance.”

“Unless one of them speaks Russian.”

Derek’s vision suddenly doubled, tripled, and a wave of nausea swept through him. He rolled to his side and threw up on the floor. Panting, he pressed his hands to his head, which felt as if someone had detonated a grenade inside his skull. When the pain momentarily subsided, he swallowed some water and contemplated the mess on the floor.

“Great.”

“And I thought the piss bucket made it stink in here.”

“It did.”

“We should complain to management.”

Leaning back against the wall, Derek muttered, “I’ve found them oddly unresponsive to my complaints.”

Hammond grinned. “I assume that wasn’t intentional. You okay?”

“It’s not a good sign, but I think I’m okay.”

“I think we should bring this mess to their attention.”

Raising an eyebrow, Derek considered his partner. He pointed to the rubber tubing. “Sure. Take advantage of a situation.”

Hammond picked up the tubing and knotted it in his fists. The effort looked like it was killing him.

Standing, Derek swayed, the world shifted. He took a deep breath and steadied himself. He pounded on the door. “Hey,” he shouted. “Hey! I need a mop! Hey!” Pound, pound, pound.

He stepped back from the door. Suddenly it burst open. Red Scarf and Black Scarf, both armed, the kid, Abdul, standing behind them. Abdul looked sleepy, but also a little eager. He’d gotten a little taste of sadistic power, Derek guessed.

“I threw up. You need to clean this place,” he said, pointing to the vomit.

Red Scarf’s face twisted and he took a step into the room. “I should make you lick—”

From behind him, Hammond pulled the rubber hose around his throat, twisted his arms and spun around, bringing the length of rubber hose over his shoulder. Red Scarf tried to shout, but the
IV
tubing dug into the skin around his throat, biting into his carotid artery. His face turned almost instantly purple.

Derek snatched the
AK
from his hands, turned and fired it into Black Scarf. It was on semi-automatic feed and nine rounds tore into his chest. The two men collapsed to the floor, both dead. Groaning, Hammond fell next to them, clutching his side.

Abdul, eyes wide in shock, tried to bring his assault rifle over his shoulder, but he was no match for Derek, who yanked the rifle away from him and in one step caught his forearm up under the kid’s neck and spun him so he was holding him against his chest.

Hammond, gasping for air, crawled over and picked up Black Scarf’s
AK
. Staggering to his feet, he swayed, barely able to stand. “What are we going to do with him?”

Derek didn’t know. He basically had one good arm and he needed it for the rifle. He spun the kid around and gave him a swift kick in the ass. “Stay here.”

He turned and slid under Hammond’s armpit. The pressure on his own shoulder was bad, but he needed his left arm free for the
AK
. Hammond held his purloined rifle in his right.

“Oh, wait,” Derek said, and bent down to quickly search his two victims. The kid cowered in the corner. From the hallway came shouts. Shit.

He found a cigarette lighter and a handgun. Tucking the Beretta in the back of his pants, he grabbed Hammond and they stepped out of the room, pulling the door shut and locked behind them. Two men were running down the hallway. They both wore camo and carried AKs.

Hammond cut them down. His face was gray and he looked a dozen years older than he had twenty-four hours earlier. “Which way is the exit?”

Derek guessed
away
from the direction they had led him for interrogation. Instead of turning right, he turned left. They started hobbling down the hallway. But a door burst open and two men raced out in their underwear. Derek shot the one on the left. The other got off a shot that tore into the wall near his head. Hammond took him out with a burst of gunfire.

And it sounded like more were coming.

Glancing back, he saw there were people on either end of the hallway. “This way,” he gasped, doubled-back and pushed through the doorway across from the room where they had been held captive. The entire room was filled with chemical containers. The room he had been in before must have been for show. This room held enough chemicals to manufacture a significant amount of sarin gas.

“Out the window,” he said. “Go.”

As Hammond shuffled toward the window, Derek pulled aside a barrel labeled
DMMP
. He unscrewed the cap and looked at the window. Hammond was clambering awkwardly out. Suddenly Nazif appeared in the doorway. He held a handgun and aimed it at Derek. “Where is my son?” he shouted. “Where is Abdul?”

Derek kicked over the barrel. Clear fluid spilled from the barrel, filling the room with a strong, distinct odor. “Across the hallway,” he shouted, and flung himself at the window, tumbling out after Hammond. He managed to land in a crouch. Hammond leaned against the building, watching up and down the street. It was deserted, quiet.

It was about to get a lot noisier.

Derek clicked the cigarette lighter. A flame popped up. Dialing it to maximum, he tossed it through the window. With a whoosh the
DMMP
went up in flames.

Grabbing Hammond, the two of them lumbered down the street, moving as fast as they could, which was only slighter faster than a moderate walk.
We look like a couple shambling old men,
Derek thought.

He thought he heard shouts from the house. And gunfire.

Then there was a bigger whoosh followed by an explosion loud enough to rattle windows. Looking back, they saw the entire building engulfed in flames.

Hammond urged him on. “There’s a car up there about a block.”

“Let’s go.”

Turning from the flames, heart
hammering in his chest, Nazif rushed out of the room and across the hall to where Abdul must be. “Where are the keys?” he screamed. There was a bolt, but also a key lock. “Where are the keys?”

The flames behind him roared as they engulfed the room. One of his men, Mohammed Senbi, sprinted into the hallway. “What’s going on? What’s going on?”

“Who’s got the keys to this room?” He pounded on the door. On the other side, he heard Abdul shout.

“Musa and Okpara.”

Musa had been with Abdul. He shouted, “Abdul, is Musa in there with you?”

“He’s dead, papa! Musa is dead!”

To Mohammed he shouted, “Where is Okpara?”

“He’s dead, too, papa!” Abdul screamed. “He’s dead, too!”

“Help me break down this door!” To Abdul, he shouted, “Stand back! Away from the door!”

And then the chemicals in the storeroom went up with a roar.

It wasn’t a car, it
was a
VW
microbus and it had four flat tires and looked like everything remotely usable from it had already been scavenged. Glancing around in the dim light, Derek said, “Aleppo, I think.”

“This city’s seen better days.”

“Yeah.” Demolished buildings, victims of mortar fire and bombings, potholed roads, debris and rubble.

“Let’s go.” Propping Hammond under his shoulder, they stumbled onward, sliding periodically into the shadows when people ran by.

Nearby, two men shouted at each other in Arabic.

Hammond muttered, “They’re looking for us.”

A nearby building appeared to be empty. All the windows were gone, it looked like it had been bombed, piles of cinder block cluttered the walkway and into the street. Derek led him in, picking their way around the rubble and in through an opening in what was left of the wall. It once had been a three-story building.

“Here,” he said. “Take a load off.” Hammond sagged to the floor.

Derek did a quick recon and returned to Hammond. “Come on. There’s a place back here we can hole up for a while.”

“I would advocate getting some distance.”

“Yeah, but we’re crawling here. Let’s regroup.”

Inside the building, which Derek guessed was as structurally sound as a house of cards, they collapsed into a small room that had once been a bathroom. A small, glassless window faced the outside. There was a toilet, although there didn’t appear to be any water in it. There was a sink. He turned the spigot and to his surprise a stream of water came out. Derek quickly pulled on the knob to close off the sink. The water ran for a minute, then petered out.

They had a sink full of water, though.

Hammond said, “That’s the best damned thing that’s happened on this trip so far.”

“I know.” He helped himself to a mouthful of water before moving aside so Hammond could take a drink.

“No food, though I don’t plan on staying here long enough to get too hungry. You have a plan, Stillwater?”

“I’m thinking of going out and coming back with a car. But I don’t like the idea of leaving you here alone. And we need transportation.”

“I have a feeling they’re going to be hard to come by, Derek. Sit your ass down for a minute.”

Derek did. He leaned his head back against the wall and let out a groan. It felt like an electrical storm was raging between his ears.

“Yeah,” Hammond said. “I thought so. I think we hole up here for a day and regain our strength. If someone comes in looking for us, we shoot them. But you’ve got a concussion and a possible skull fracture. I feel like my guts are falling out through my belly button and I’m pissing blood.”

“That could be an argument for putting as much distance between Aleppo and ourselves as soon as possible, too.”

“It could be, but looking either way down the street we came up, did you see a single car besides that VW?”

He didn’t bother shaking his head. He hadn’t. And, given the cloud cover, he wasn’t sure what direction was north. North, toward Turkey, was the only way to go. In a couple hours the sun would rise and they’d get a sense of direction, but until then, with heavy cloud cover, it would take time just to figure out
which was north.

“You win. We rest.”

“That easy? I thought you’d argue with me.”

In answer, Derek lunged toward the toilet and vomited into it. He tried to focus his eyes, but dropped to his hands and knees, lungs and throat burning, the world spinning around him. A minute later he realized he was curled on his side on the floor.

He looked up at Hammond who said, “There’s no damned light in here, but if there were, I’d really like to take a look at your eyes. You took a hell of a hit to the head, didn’t you?”

“Several,” he panted. “I guess we rest.”

Derek awoke with
a start, a hand over his mouth. In his ear, Hammond whispered, “Company.”

When he nodded, Hammond lifted his hand. Derek silently rolled, gripping the rifle with his left hand. His right shoulder and arm were stiff and felt like he was being jabbed with an ice pick if he moved wrong. Gray light streamed through the window. Straining his ears, he heard voices and footsteps, someone picking their way through the building.

Quietly, quietly, quietly, Derek shifted his position, bringing the AK47 around, aimed at the doorway.

The footsteps grew closer. A high-pitched voice said something in Arabic. The footsteps receded. After a few minutes of silence, Derek glanced at Hammond. “What did they say?”

“Just scavengers, I think,” the
CIA
operator said. “Looking for scrap metal or anything else they might be able to sell.”

“And they didn’t check in here?”

Hammond shrugged.

They sat in silence for a while. Derek didn’t know what time it was–he had been relieved of his watch, his knife, basically anything useful. He had an AK47 with a half-empty magazine. Reflexively he took it out and checked it. “Half-empty,” he said.

“Or half-full,” Hammond replied.

“Ever the optimist.” Counting, Derek said, “Eleven rounds. You?”

“Nine.”

“Well,” Derek said. “I guess that solves all our problems. Any idea how long I was out?”

“Couple hours. I think it’s mid-morning, 9:30 or 10:00. How are you feeling?”

“Headache, but no nausea or double-vision, although that comes and goes. You?”

“Piss is pink instead of red and I’m moving a little better, although that’s a pretty relative thing. I’m no jackrabbit. I think I’ve progressed from snail to turtle.”

Derek took a handful of water and stood to peer out their window. “Well, at least I know which direction to head now. I’m going to scope out the building. I’ll be back in a couple minutes.”

Face still white, Hammond nodded. Derek wasn’t convinced of Hammond’s recovery, but he was tough and they had their backs to the wall. Gun in hand, he crept out of the bathroom and scouted the rest of the building. It had probably been an apartment building, but a mortar or two had landed on it, destroying the entire top floor and much of the second floor and back half of the building. There wasn’t much left. It looked like anything with metal—electrical wires and copper plumbing—had been stripped. There were only shards of glass in the remaining windows. Everything was covered in a thick coating of dust. And there had apparently been enough people in and out of the building that his and Hammond’s footprints didn’t stand out unless you were specifically looking for them.

Peering through windows, he saw that there were people on the streets surrounding their location, but not many. He knew that even during civil wars people continued with their daily lives as best they could, going to jobs if they still existed, looking for food at local groceries or wherever they could find it, to schools if they remained open or tried to continue teaching their children. Even in wartime, people tried to keep the remnants of civilization in place.

Unless things totally broke down. Derek had been in a few of those places. His parents had been missionary physicians and he had grown up in some of them—Sri Lanka, Sierra Leone, just to name two. And he had worked in others—Iraq, the Czech
republics, Kuwait.

Returning to Hammond, he said, “I want to check your wound.”

“We don’t have anything to bandage it with. Leave it alone.” His words were flat and unemotional.

“Problem?”

Hammond said, “There’s nothing we can do, Derek. Let it go.”

Crawling over, he said, “Let me take a look.” He reached for Hammond’s shirt, but the man caught his wrist.

“There’s nothing you can do.”

Derek looked down. Blood soaked the shirt. “You tear it open moving around?”

“Probably. The bleeding’s not too bad, but it’s been bleeding for a couple hours.”

“It’s not clotting?”

“I think it’s infected.”

“Let me take a look.” He smirked. “I’m a doctor.”

“You’ve got a PhD. That’s not helpful.”

“Lie still, dumbass.”

Derek peeled back the shirt. The dressings were soaked with blood and it was red and recent. Leaning close, he sniffed. There was a strong, distinctive stench. The wound was infected, and badly.

He reached out and laid his hand on Hammond’s forehead.

“Am I running a temperature, Mom?”

“You know damn well what’s going on,” Derek said. Hammond was burning up. This changed the equation.

“My suggestion is you get your ass out of here.”

“My suggestion is you shut your fucking mouth,” Derek said. He was wearing black and gray camo fatigues and boots. Both he and Hammond, normally clean-shaven, had given up shaving before the mission, so both of them now sported ragged beards.

They were both distinctly Western-looking, although both had tans from spending a lot of time outdoors. But Derek didn’t think he could pass for a Syrian or even an Iranian, Iraqi, Saudi, Jordanian or Egyptian. “Don’t suppose you’ve got a keffiyah on you?”

“Use your undershirt. You won’t be the only one.”

Hammond had a point. It wasn’t easy taking off the outer camo shirt with his shoulder wound. The undershirt was black. He decided to just wear that. Tearing the camo shirt wasn’t easy. He used the gun site on the AK47 to tear a hole in it, and with Hammond’s help, tore it down the middle. Awkwardly he wrapped it around his head and neck. It wasn’t unheard of for the rebels to wear a scarf around their neck or even the lower part of their face.

“How do I look?”

“Everything the fashionable urban guerilla could ask for.”

“Fashion Week, here I come.”

Derek tore the remains of the shirt in half. Half he wadded up and pressed against Hammond’s wound. Hammond groaned, but didn’t comment. The other half Derek dipped into the sink and rested on his partner’s forehead.

“Here’s the deal,” Derek said. “If it gets dark and I’m not back, try to get the hell out of here.” He hesitated. “That would probably mean I’m dead or captured again. I’ve got a kid, a little boy, his name is Lev.”

Hammond said, “The one you have with that Russian spy.”

“She’s not a spy.” Her name was Irina Khournikova and she was Russian and she used to be with the
FSB
, although now she was a part-time security consultant married to a Russian
FSB
agent named Konstantin Nikitinov.

“Whatever you say. You’ll come back. Come back and get me. Find a Mercedes or a
BMW
, would ya? I want a luxury ride back to Turkey.”

“If I don’t make it back, tell Lev I love him.”

“You’re sentimental.”

Derek stood up. “I’m coming back for you. But if there’s anything we’ve learned so far, it’s that shit happens.”

“Derek.”

Looking down at Hammond, he waited.

Hammond said, “A pleasure to serve with you. If you get a chance to get out of here, take it.”

“I’m coming back for you.”

“I have a wife. Elaine. She’s pregnant. Tell her … ”

“Tell her yourself. I’ll be back.”

He turned and walked away.