“I don’t know them,” O’Mara said.
“You tried to kill me with a bomb,” John said. “You released a video of me jumping from the hospital.” He knelt down, close to O’Mara’s face. “The Swiss intelligence stopped us at a border crossing. I had to murder three men. Do you understand?”
“You have the wrong man, mate! I didn’t do any of that!”
“You’re going to tell me you haven’t been hacking banks? You didn’t manipulate the oil market? Where were you going?”
“What?”
“The suitcase downstairs,” Martin said. “It’s packed and ready to go. Where were you going?”
“I wasn’t going anywhere—”
John glared at the man. “Let me tell you how this is going to go.” O’Mara was breathing hard, and sweat ran from his brow, even though their apartment was cold. “I’m going to ask you questions. You get one chance to answer. If I think you’re lying, I’m going to beat you.”
O’Mara was shaking by the time John finished. “I never meant to hurt anybody, mate. I just wanted to make the world a better place.”
“Where were you going?” John asked again. “If you lie to me, I’m going to bust out a few teeth. Do you understand?”
O’Mara nodded furiously. “I believe you, mate. I bloody well believe you.”
“Good. Don’t make me ask again.”
“I was leaving…”
“We got that,” Martin said. “You better speak faster before my man here decides to loosen you up.”
“The States,” O’Mara said. “I was going to the States. Look, I didn’t do anything.” Before John could speak, O’Mara said, “I mean, I didn’t kill those people, and I don’t know anything about oil.”
“If not you, then who?” John asked.
“We were changing the world,” O’Mara said. “I can’t believe this.”
“You say you didn’t kill anybody,” John said. “Tell me who did.”
“I… don’t know his name.”
“You don’t know his name?”
“Not his real name,” O’Mara said. “He’s too smart for that.”
“Ask him for more detail,” Deion said over his earpiece.
“This man,” John said. “How did you get involved with him?”
“He contacted me,” O’Mara said. “Look, I’ll tell you everything. It wasn’t supposed to go like this. We were going to help people. Not…”
“Bring him,” Deion said over John’s earpiece. “We’ll get this clown back to Mildenhall and interrogate him there.”
“C’mon,” John said. “Get up.”
O’Mara looked around blankly. “What? Where are we going? Are you going to… kill me?”
“We just want answers,” John said, hauling O’Mara to his feet.
Martin removed a USB thumb drive from his coat and inserted it into the first server, waited a moment, then repeated the action on the next server in the rack, continuing until the virus on the thumb drive had compromised all the servers in the rack.
“What are you doing?” O’Mara asked. “Did you just hack those machines?”
“Don’t worry about it,” John said.
“You just hacked my servers,” O’Mara said in awe. “You p0wned all my servers in less than thirty seconds.”
“I don’t even know what that means,” John said, shoving O’Mara through the door.
When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Redman was waiting, pistol drawn, watching both the front and back with his peripheral vision.
“Anything?” Martin asked.
“Quiet as a church mouse,” Redman murmured, “whatever that means.”
“Right,” John said. “We’re going outside, down the sidewalk, and into a van. If there are any surprises, now is the time to tell us.”
“What?” O’Mara asked. “No, there are no surprises.”
“Good.” He pointed to the suitcase and said to Redman, “Grab that. I’ll bet there are all kinds of electronic goodies for Kryzowski to inspect.”
Redman nodded, then grinned. “I’m grabbing the suitcase, Miz Daisy.”
“I hope you know how offensive that sounds,” Martin said.
“Don’t know,” Redman said. “Don’t care, either.” He grabbed the suitcase and following them to the front door. “How’s the street, boss man?”
“Quiet,” Deion said through their earpieces.
John holstered his M11 and motioned for Martin to do the same. “We’re going to walk now,” he said to O’Mara. “You better not try and run. If you do, I’ll have to chase you. You don’t want me to chase you.”
“Sure,” O’Mara said. “Just some blokes out for an evening stroll.”
“Right,” John said. “Just blokes out for a stroll.” He opened the door and stepped out, followed by O’Mara and Martin. They took up a position on each side of O’Mara.
They were barely five feet from the front door when John saw the flash from across the street. He dropped to his stomach and yelled, “Gun!”
A stream of gunshots echoed down the street. John drew his M11 and tried to pinpoint the source of the flashes.
The gunfire ceased, and a man in a heavy black jacket came rushing through the front door of the three-story apartment building across the street. He held an AK-47 and reloaded on the move.
John’s mind sped up as he brought his M11 to a firing position and squeezed off a pair of shots. The distance was less than twenty yards, and the shots hit the man center mass. The man crumpled to the ground and lay still.
Martin screamed at him, and Deion’s voice was a wash of noise through his earpiece, and then Deion opened the van door and pointed. “Get Redman!”
John tried to make sense of those words, and then he whirled around and saw O’Mara flat on his back with two bloody holes in his chest and his sightless eyes staring up at the darkening sky.
Behind O’Mara, Redman was struggling to sit up.
Oh, Jesus.
“I’ll get Redman,” Martin said, holstering his M11 and grabbing Redman by the arm. “Check on the shooter.”
“Hurry,” Deion yelled. “We’ve got maybe sixty seconds!”
Doors opened up and down the street as men and women peered out, trying to make sense of the war zone in their front yards.
“I’m on it,” John said, running across the street.
He approached the shooter, and then there was a flash of light from the shooter’s body and a tremendous shock that knocked John unconscious.
Chapter Thirteen
The ringing noise got louder and louder until John couldn’t take it anymore. “Stop!”
“For Christ’s sake, John, open your eyes!”
“Don’ wanna. The children…”
“What are you talking about?”
A dim part of John’s brained recognized the voice, but he was unable to place it.
“I killed those kids.”
“What are you talking about? What kids?”
The voice was closer, and there was a tension in it that set off alarm bells in his head. “Red Cross,” he mumbled. “I wasn’t… shouldn’t have…”
“Open your eyes, John!”
The alarm bells had increased to an unholy ringing, only this time it was part of a thrumming headache that threatened to split his skull open. “Let me be.”
A stinging slap to his face forced him to open his eyes. Taylor Martin was staring down at him. They were in the back of the van, which was turning hard, threatening to send Martin sprawling against the interior.
Redman leaned against the side of the van. His face was pale, and blood trickled from his arm. He held his chest and took slow, deliberate breaths, but he was staring at John as if he had seen a snake.