“Oh, no. It’s in the back of the truck.”
“Good man.”
I addressed my lock shop partner. “Tell me, Willie, now that you are back in the felony business, are you willing to pull a trigger or not?”
“Well…”
“One life sentence, two, three, what does it matter?”
“You’re suckin’ me into a life of crime, Carmellini. I’m not ready to give up pussy. I got a few good years left, dude, me and Viagra, and a couple of women who are countin’ on me to help them find a little joy in this colorless life.”
“Sarah, would you put a first aid box in each truck while I brief these guys?”
We gathered around the hood of one of the FEMA pickups. I spread out the map. “Here is where we are going to rendezvous, this bridge over the Greenbrier at Bartow. Then we’ll go to the CIA’s safe house near Greenbank. I want each of you to go to Bartow by a different route.” We traced routes with fingers in the twilight.
Then I explained the setup at Camp Dawson, how the internment compound was laid out, where the four guard towers were.
“Now, Sarah and I are going to drive in the main gate of the internment compound in a FEMA pickup. We’ll want to find out where Grafton is being held. We’ll ask to see the commandant of the camp. Meanwhile Armanti and Willie Varner, you will go through the main gate of the National Guard base and come around behind the compound. That gate was open when I went by and the Guard looked like it had moved out. Set up an M279 machine gun out back. There is undoubtedly a rear gate through the compound wire, and maybe a barracks where these FEMA dudes are bunking.
“When the shooting starts up front, the guards in the rear towers are going to be trying to see what’s happening, and from the way the camp is laid out, I don’t think they can see. They might get interested in you. If they do, open fire. If the FEMA guys stream out the back gate after the shooting starts, let them all get out. Wait until they are out, then kill them quick and fast, including anyone left in the rear towers. If the fleeing guards go into a barracks, use an AT4 on it. If they get into vehicles, use the machine gun. It is imperative that no one follow us.” I looked at Armanti and asked, “Can you do that?”
“These people aren’t soldiers?”
“Some of them might have some military experience, but now they’re civilians. FEMA paramilitary thugs, Barry Soetoro’s army. What we have going for us is surprise. We want them dead before they can figure out that they oughta shoot back. They aren’t holy warriors: being a martyr for Barry Soetoro isn’t on their bucket list.”
“You’re asking an awful lot of one man with one gun.”
“Willie will help.”
Armanti looked at Willie Varner, who for once kept his mouth shut.
I explained, “I don’t want the guards in the compound taking hostages, and I don’t want them following us. If we can’t take them down quick and fast, we’re going to have to clean that camp building by building.”
“Okay,” Hall said, and shrugged. FEMA’s reputation was going downhill fast.
“Willis and Travis, you guys are the front shooters. You are to wait one minute after Sarah and I go through the gate, exactly sixty seconds, then shoot the guys in the guard towers beside the road. They may have a machine gun in each tower, although I doubt it. But they might. Shoot each of them and toss a grenade up into the tower, then do the guys at the front gate.”
“I’ll take the south tower,” Willis said, and Travis nodded.
“Then come into the compound. Drive through the compound and kill anyone in FEMA green. Try not to shoot any of the detainees. My idea is to let the guards get out of the compound through the back gate before we lower the boom. When the shooting starts out back, go help with the rear towers and anyone in FEMA green still standing. No FEMA people are to be left alive.”
“Got it, Tommy.”
“Wish I had a better plan,” I admitted, “and I wish we had a few days to sniff this out, but we don’t have any more time. It’s tonight or never. Any questions?”
We cleaned up a few details, then mounted up.
Another half-assed plan with insufficient reconnaissance. That was a prescription to get my guys killed, as all of us knew, but it couldn’t be helped. We didn’t have days to set this up.
Sarah and I rolled up to the main gate of the compound in our brand-new stolen FEMA truck and I leaned out the window, which was down. I had my Kimber in my left hand, out of sight behind the door.
Three guys were lounging around, two sucking cigarettes and one arranging a pinch of Skoal in his mouth. One of the smokers looked inquisitive.
“The guy who runs this place?”
“Sluggo Sweatt.” He pointed. “That building on the left.”
“Thanks.”
I rolled on over and parked in front. I holstered the Kimber.
“Sluggo Sweatt is on the White House staff,” Sarah said.
“I’ve heard the name. Are you ready?”
“Let’s go in.”
We turned off the engine, left the keys in the ignition, walked up the three steps to the porch and went inside. The receptionist’s desk was empty, but the next room had a window and a desk with Sweatt seated behind it in an executive chair that he had apparently liberated from Office Depot. Sarah and I pulled our pistols and pointed them at him.
“See who else is in here,” I told Sarah. As she went down the hallway looking in offices I scanned the room.
“You have precisely ten seconds to tell me where Jake Grafton is, or I’m going to shoot you.” The words were no more out of my mouth than I heard M4s begin to fire bursts.
Sweatt looked startled. His eyes went to the windows. I fired a shot into his computer, and the bits of glass flew out. “Pay attention,” I said.
I heard a shot from down the hallway. Then another.
His eyes were frozen on the pistol in my hand now. One of the interesting things about a .45 is how big the muzzle looks when it is pointed right at your eyes. Only a half inch in diameter, the hole in the barrel looks like a howitzer at close range. I lined up the sights and shot his right ear off.
He jerked and blood flew all over the wall behind him as a fusillade of M4 fire behind me filled the room with noise. Then a hand grenade went off. And another.
Sluggo got the message. “He’s in a cell, down the hallway.”
Sarah came trotting back. I gave her the news.
“The keys?”
They were on Sluggo’s desk. Sarah grabbed them and ran. “If he isn’t there,” I told Sweatt, “I’m going to start shooting parts off.”
More M4 bursts, a cacophony. Blood ran down Sluggo’s neck and his face looked pasty.
In a moment Sarah was back. “He’s in terrible shape. A lot of broken ribs.”
“You keep Mr. Sweatt occupied. If he twitches, empty your pistol into him.”
She stood precisely in front of the desk and used both hands to steady the gun on his chest.
I ran outside, grabbed a medic’s pack from the bed of the truck, glanced at the gate and saw all three guards sprawled there. I ran back inside. If anyone shot at me they missed. Still some shooting going on. It would have been nice to know how many FEMA dudes we had strapped on, but we hadn’t had time for an extended recon.
I found Grafton lying on the floor in a cell, the door of which was standing open.
“Tommy,” he whispered. “Lots of broken ribs on both sides, I think.”
I cut his shirt off with my fighting knife. His sides were black and blue. Digging into the medic pack, I got out several rolls of gauze. “I gotta sit you up, sir.”
“Do it.”
I took his arms, which were bruised badly where he’d tried to cover up, and pulled him into a sitting position. He groaned. Working as quickly as possible, I wrapped him in gauze from his armpits down to his belly button. Needed three rolls to do it. Then I began wrapping him with surgical tape, as tightly as I could.