“This is Yak, the owner of this estate,” the scene commander said.
“As well as one of my informants,” Preithat added.
“Was he also an assassin for hire?” Kulawnit asked, staring down at the pistol that looked identical to the one lying out in the garden.
“Yak, an assassin?” The scene commander chuckled. “No, I would not call him that. A crook, con man, thief, drug dealer, child abuser, and consummate liar, yes; and I’m sure, as Major Preithat said, an informer many times over; but not an assassin. Mr. Yak did not like to get his hands soiled, in any manner. I have no doubt that he hired Boon-Nam many times to do his dirty work; but I would not be surprised if this was the first time he had ever fired that pistol — and, as you saw outside, did so poorly. Fourteen or fifteen rounds fired, and only five hit the target — three barely.”
“Do you have a sense of what happened here?” Preithat asked the scene commander.
“Not a clear one yet,” the scene commander said, “but we believe Boon-Nam was the one who secured Captain Choonhavan to the chair — only because Yak was not physically capable of doing so — and probably executed him and the chef. We’ll be able to confirm that when we conduct the ballistic examinations on the two pistols and the bullets from the bodies.”
“Do we have any idea why he would do this?” Preithat pressed.
“At this point, we’re assuming there was an argument which resulted in Boon-Nam shooting Yak in the stomach, perhaps accidentally, perhaps not. He goes outside. Yak gets to his gun, shoots back through the screen door — possibly hitting Boon-Nam, possibly not. Boon-Nam runs out to the garden, Yak staggers outside, empties his weapon at Boon-Nam, hitting him a few times, but none of the wounds immediately fatal. Then Boon-Nam fires his pistol one last time, striking Yak in the forehead and flinging him backwards into the den.”
The scene commander then stared at Bulatt thoughtfully for a long moment. “There are some difficulties with this theory, as you undoubtedly realize, Agent Bulatt; the apparent lack of blood spattering around the doorway to the garden being one. But, as you might imagine, the rain always makes such determinations difficult.”
“I don’t envy you your job here, commander,” Bulatt said honestly.
“Do you think it’s possible that — ?” Preithat started to ask when the cell phone on his belt began to ring.
“Excuse me,” he said as he brought the phone up to his ear. “Yes?” He listened for about twenty seconds. “Where, exactly?” He listened for a few more seconds. “Thank you, we’ll be there as soon as possible,” he said, then closed the cell phone and looked at Colonel Kulawnit. “The foreign guide’s fishing yacht — the Avatar. It’s been located.”
“Where?” Kulawnit demanded.
“Anchored off Ko Tanga. Our resident Ranger remembered seeing it earlier this afternoon when he received our alert. There are at least two Caucasian males on board, both matching the descriptions we obtained from the Shining Wind hotel staff: in their mid-to-late thirties, tanned, muscular and fit.”
“What are they doing there?” Bulatt asked.
“Fishing and diving, acting like normal vacationers.”
“Why would they anchor themselves in Thai waters?” Kulawnit demanded, his eyes flashing. “If they were involved in my son’s death, why wouldn’t they be trying to escape — presumably into Malaysia?”
“I think they’re going to see Kai, Khun Prathun,” Preithat said, smiling in pleasant anticipation. “Perhaps now we will finally understand what happened, and why.”
CHAPTER 14
Tanga Island Cove, Malacca Strait, Thailand
“Can you see him?” Quince Lanyard whispered to his throat mike.
The three low-riding outboard motorboats had been moving in slowly for the past hour; each one in turn accelerating for a few seconds, and then coasting to a stop in the dark water off Tanga Island. Lanyard and Gavin had been monitoring their progress with night-vision-scoped rifles from two separate positions — Lanyard from the Kevlar-and-titanium-armored bridge deck of the Avatar anchored two hundred yards off the Tanga Island Cove, along with four other similar yachts, and Gavin from a rock-lined promontory on Tanga Island overlooking the cove where the meet was supposed to take place.
“I count twelve unfriendlies — all armed with AKs and extra mags, but no armor — and maybe half of them equipped with one those old hand-held single-lens night-scopes. Looks like two scopes for each boat, driver and team leader. None of the twelve look like Kai.” Gavin’s whispered reply was clearly audible in Lanyard’s tactical earphones. “Maybe he decided to stay home, let his minions do all the dirty work.”
“And miss all the fun? Not bloody likely,” Lanyard muttered. “My guess is — wait. There’s something moving out there — your two o’clock position, out past the second buoy. Can’t make it out; too much fog down here.”
“Hold one.” Gavin readjusted his position, centered the cross-hairs of his modern night-scope on the second buoy that was barely visible in the low-lying greenish fog, and then brought the cross-hairs up slightly. As he did so, an indistinct and blurry dark-spot almost hidden by the fog slowly resolved into a recognizable shape. “Got it. Looks like a fast boat, mini-cig, heading your way from the east. Coming in slow; two passengers, one of whom… is definitely Kai. Got you, you sneaky bastard!” Gavin chuckled.
“Okay, time to mess with their little pirate minds,” Lanyard said, “Turn on the first flasher.”
Moments later, a bright green light began flashing on and off at a point close to the rocky shoreline and almost a hundred feet below and to the left of Gavin’s barricaded position.
As Lanyard and Gavin watched through their night-scopes, confused activity erupted in the three low-lying surveillance boats as the men without the hand-held night-scopes began pointing frantically at the blinking light that the men with the hand-scopes were obviously having trouble seeing.
“Bright green on bright green. Ah, Quince, me lad, you’re a devious bastard indeed.” Gavin chuckled again as the most of the men with the hand-held scopes set them aside and began gesturing at the blinking light. Finally, two of the boats began to move cautiously toward shore in the direction of the light flashes while the third turned sharply and began accelerating in the direction of the Avatar.
“Stand by, mate,” Gavin whispered into his throat mike, “it looks like you’re about to be boarded, bow and stern.”
Over the Malacca Strait, Thailand
The Blackhawk helicopter — on loan from the Thai Army, and carrying five heavily armed Forestry Division Rangers and a Ranger Sergeant Fire-Team Leader, in addition to Bulatt, Kulawnit, Preithat, the two bodyguards, and a pair of Army crew chiefs manning the two M60 machineguns mounted at the open cabin doors, all wearing camouflaged and inflatable life vests over their heavy armored vests — was flying low over the Malacca Strait, heading south, halfway to Tanga Island, the pilots eyeing the storm clouds that threatened to disgorge their liquid contents at any moment, when Major Preithat turned to Bulatt and motioned that they should put their helmets together.
The physical connection between the two helmets caused the output from their throat mikes to be picked up by both sets of embedded earphones.
“You said you thought the scene at Yak’s house was rigged,” Preithat reminded. “What did you see that made you suspicious?”
“A couple of things,” Bulatt replied. “First of all, the shoulder holster Boon-Nam was wearing. It wasn’t his; or, at least, I don’t think it was.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I could see a deeply indented buckle mark near the end of the shoulder strap, where the strap would have been buckled for a man with a much bigger chest; but no indentation at all on the strap where it was buckled for Boon-Nam. It was as if the strap had never been buckled in that location before.”
“Will that show up in the lieutenant’s crime scene photo?”