Clearly, Bruce Danforth loved running the biggest oil corporation in America and would stay in charge until they carried him out in a coffin. Long enough time for Doug Case to develop a lasting relationship with the man. Particularly if Buddha, not Helms, was his private mentor, The Voice.
Case put his phone down and drove his wheelchair between Bruce Danforth and Kingsman Helms.
“Poe’s people are putting up a hell of a fight at the prison. Iboga’s advance party is falling back.”
The Buddha’s old, yellowish eyes fixed unpleasantly on Case. Nearby executives and reporters pretended not to be trying to hear, which they could not, as the CEO of American Synergy Corporation was an expertly quiet mutterer and his words did not carry. “You did not predict this, Douglas.”
“No, Mr. Danforth,” Case admitted with a sinking heart. Acting President Poe’s hotly fought defense of the prison was not in the plan. At this moment Iboga’s freed officers were supposed to be welcoming him at the airport for a triumphal march to the Presidential Palace.
“Nor did you, Kingsman.”
“No, sir.”
Buddha’s dry, cracked lips barely moved. “What the fuck are you going to do about it?”
Kingsman Helms looked stricken. As well he should, thought Doug Case. The oil executive had never been in a gunfight. Case had. He took charge.
“I had hoped that Iboga’s advance party would wrap things up before he landed, Mr. Danforth. But I guarantee that the moment Iboga himself steps off that plane with fresh men and weapons, he will turn the tide.”
FORTY-THREE
Iboga, who had purchased every seat in the Business Class section of the TAAG 224 from Luanda, spread out a topo map of Porto Clarence and rehearsed the run from the airport to Black Sand Prison. Nine mercenary commandos sat nearby, paying close attention to the returning dictator. Victory, the release of Iboga’s officers, would depend on disciplined adherence to his bold plan. None of this small force doubted it would work. Regardless of rumors of drug-addled cannibalism and his almost comical rolls of neck fat bulging from his yellow kaffiyeh, it was immediately apparent that Iboga was first and foremost a soldier who knew his business.
The snipers were first off the plane when they landed.
Their mission was to break up checkpoints and ambushes with long-range fire. While the rest of the assault force bullied the ground crew into quickly unloading their rocket launchers from the cargo hold, a waiting taxi raced the marksmen through the empty streets, dropping one at a key intersection with the beach road and delivering the other to Parliament House, a neoclassical building with a tall, spindly clock tower. The clock read ten minutes until midnight. An Iboga loyalist pointed the way to circular stairs. From the open belfry the sniper could cover the last mile of the beach road that Iboga would travel to Black Sand Prison.
The tower was a hundred feet tall, the stairs steep. The sniper was sweating in the humid night air and his weapon case was growing heavy when he reached the four-sided clock. One more story to the bell. He dragged himself up that last flight and stepped into the open. It was pitch-black. In the distance he could see the front of Black Sand Prison harshly bathed in floodlights. He scoped it through binoculars. Dead soldiers were scattered on the ground in front of the walls. The walls themselves were pocked by hundreds of rounds of assault rifle fire and scorched by grenade explosions. But the gates were still closed.
The defenders, who were sure to be spooked and bloodied from repelling the first attack, were in for a shock when Iboga’s force attacked with rockets. The sniper pulled down his night goggles and knelt to open his gun case.
“This seat is taken.”
He whirled toward the sound of a woman’s voice and pawed his pistol from its thigh holster.
“Don’t,” she said.
He had missed her in the dark before he donned his night gear. She was crouched like an elf, close enough to touch, an eerie vision tinted phosphorus green. She had light-enhancing glasses, too. Panoramics that covered most of her face. She had a pistol with a noise and flash suppressor in her hand and a Knight’s M110 SASS on a bipod. The semiautomatic sniper rifle was pointed at the prison.
Stupid woman. What the hell did she think she could hit at a thousand meters? Excellent gun, though, better than his; excellent night glasses, too, far better than his. An unexpected opportunity to upgrade. He faked a clumsy lunge at her to force her off-balance and sprang sideways, drawing his pistol. His last sight on earth was a flash from hers.
* * *
JESSICA KINCAID LISTENED until she was sure no one else was coming up the stairs. Then she lay prone on the stone floor of the bell tower and zeroed her rifle in on the prison’s iron doors. In five minutes she heard a car on the beach road moving at high speed. Headlights flicked through the palm trees that lined the road. A second vehicle was right behind it. And then a third. They passed her position and kept going.
“Let them get close,” she muttered, but Freddy and his boys were pumped by the first fight to defend the prison. They opened fire too soon on the lead car.
Sure enough, the car stopped in time. Three guys with guns piled out, unscathed, and dove for cover in the trees. The second car stopped behind the first, the third behind that. Three more men tumbled out of each, professionals moving fast and low.
Iboga appeared brighter in the thermal-enhanced panoramics than the commandos around him. The fat man emitted more heat. His kaffiyeh headdress showed up darker than his skull, as did the rocket launcher that he was waving like a drum major’s mace to rally his men and coordinate their attack.
Using the first car for cover, two aimed rocket launchers at the gates. Others flitted through the trees to fire from flanking positions. Kincaid could see Iboga’s plan clearly in her mind. It was neat, clean, and ballsy. Freddy and four operators and Poe’s old men were now trapped between a potent assault force outside the prison and a mob of army officers inside who were primed to attack their jailors at the sound of rocket fire.
FORTY-FOUR
Doug Case’s phone vibrated. He checked the screen: Paul Janson, enabling his phone to prompt caller ID—the sort of thing you would do if you were calling for help from an Italian jail.
“I better answer this,” Case said.
“Don’t roll off,” said the Buddha. “Stay right here.”
“Hello, Paul. How is sunny Italy?”
“Bring the reporters up to the bridge to meet President Poe.”
“What bridge— What?Are you on this ship?”
“Bring the press up here to meet President Poe or I will disable the dynamic positioning units. Both of them. Do you understand what that means?”
Case had trouble catching his breath. “Yes.”
“Do you also understand what a blood-soaked catastrophe it would be if you brought your shooters?”
“Yes.”
“Do you understand that I feel betrayed?”
Case steadied himself. This situation could be dealt with. “Yeah,” he said. “I understand you feel betrayed, but you don’t know by whom.”
“No witness, no crime?”
“I’m not the villain.”
“Is Helms there?”
“Right here.”
“Put him on.”
Doug Case did not bother covering the phone as he whispered, “It’s Paul Janson. He’s here! On the Vulcan Queen, demanding we bring the press up to the bridge— of this ship—to meet Ferdinand Poe.”
“The bridge? The DP is up there.”
“He figured that out. Here!” He offered the phone. “Try not to piss him off.”
“Janson,” Helms said smoothly. “I hope you are in your right mind and not about to do anything rash.”