“It’s the forwarding number for the new deputy of the security team we hired, Ha—”
“Don't fucking lie to me!” Lake shouted. “What in hell did you do? Who did you call, Ted?” Fell appeared as if he were going to try his story one more time, but Lake grabbed his shirt collar in both hands and shouted, “Answer me!n
“Hardcastle,” Fell said in a weak voice. “National Security Council… the guy on TV, in charge of the air defense stuff…”
“Oh, shit, tell me you’re fucking kidding… oh, shit, oh shit,” Lake said. He unplugged the PBX cable from the phone, dumping the phone log memory from the unit, then left it unplugged. “You asshole — you didn’t use the secure exchange. Cazaux is bound to find_out.”
“I am out of this, Harold,” Fell said. “I am out of this entire operation. I’m getting the hell away from butchers like Cazaux and psychos like Ysidro, and if you had any brains you’d get out too.”
“But what did you say? What did you do?”
“I was going to leave a message on the NSC’s voice mail,” Fell said. “Hardcastle himself answered it. I told him the location of Cazaux’s mansion in Bedminster, and I told him about the hostage he’s got in there.”
“What hostage? What in hell are you talking about?” “He’s holding a woman in a third-floor apartment, Harold. He’s beating the hell out of her.”
‘ “Dark hair, exotic-looking, kind of spacey?” Fell’s expression told Lake that he had guessed correctly. “That’s Cazaux’s astrologer, you idiot. Varga, or Vega — I don’t know the bitch’s fucking name. She’s no hostage, Ted— she likes getting beat up. She gets off on it. You called the authorities to try to rescue her? She’s the one who’s probably been telling Cazaux to do all this in the first place! She’s as weird as he is. They’re like both out of a fuckin’ horror movie.”
“Oh, God…” It made sense now — he thought he was helping her, while all along the woman was going to get her kicks watching Cazaux slice him up into little pieces. Shit, Fell thought, what in the hell am I doing here? “Well, that doesn’t matter,” Fell said, thinking hard and fast. “I’m not doing this for her — I’m doing it for me. I’m tired of standing by and watching Cazaux rip this country apart.”
“So you ratted him out,” Lake said. “Jesus, Fell, our lives aren’t worth spit anymore.”
“We’ve got an escape plan worked out, Harold. Let’s do it. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“I’ve got forty million dollars in options contracts being executed in the next six to ten hours, Ted. I can’t leave. I’ll have to sign a proxy, pay someone to execute the contracts, sign for the cash. I can’t risk this operation with any of that.”
“Harold, I’m out of here,” Fell said. He told him about the woman, about how she had tried to get him to pull a gun on Henri Cazaux and then watch Cazaux kill him. “I told the authorities about Cazaux and how they can find him. If anyone escapes the raid, they’ll try to hunt us down. I want to be safely hidden long before that. I’ll help you get out, too, but if you want to stay I can’t help you.”,
Lake thought about it, but only for a moment — he knew that Fell was right. Cazaux and his cronies were completely out of control, and the slightest screwup would mean instant, deadly retaliation. Even if Fell hadn’t already made the decision for them, Lake knew it was time to get out. “All right, Ted, you’re right,” Lake decided. “Notify the flight crew and the security detail — we leave immediately. I’ll execute the contracts and the cancel orders and have the funds sent by the bank to Townsend at the mansion — he’ll know what to do with the cashier’s check. Jesus, I hope the FBI nails Cazaux, because he will hunt us down for sure.”
Bedminster, New Jersey
Three Hours Later
The first guard heard it while it was still a long way off, a heavy, slow rhythmic beating against the sky. He raised his left hand to his ear until the cuff of his left sleeve was even with his lips and said, “Station three, chopper, south, big one.”.
“Copy,” the security shift officer responded. Everyone knew that Tomas Ysidro, the chief of security, would be listening in to the guard’s channel, so responses were quick.
The first guard withdrew a Russian-made monocular nightvision scope from a case at his side and scanned the sky. His line-of-sight visibility was extremely limited, but his job wasn’t to scan the sky, but the treeline, about seventy yards away, and the long gravel driveway leading to the main dirt road. The rain had stopped, but the clouds were thick, scuttling across the sky on strong low-level winds as the summer night storm passed. He could see the glowing yellow eyes of a small animal, a raccoon or possum, scurrying from tree to tree, doing some nocturnal hunting. The night-vision scope always revealed all sorts of animals — deer, foxes, rabbits by the bamful…
… and men. The guard chuckled as he watched one of the other guards emerge from the trees, about a hundred and fifty yards away, zipping up his fly after taking a piss in the trees. He saw a puff of smoke trickle from his mouth — the asshole was smoking on duty with the brass in the house. He was using a light shield around his cigarette so Ysidro or Cazaux wouldn’t see his glowing cig, but the night-vision equipment clearly showed the smoke. If Ysidro saw that, he’d kick his ass. It was a hell of a chance to take just for a lousy cigarette.
He lowered his night-vision binoculars and listened for the helicopter — nothing. “Station three, clear,” he reported.
“Copy.”
The guard relaxed a bit, letting the scope dangle on its neck strap and crossing the Colt AR-15 assault rifle, the semiautomatic version of the standard Army M-16, in his arms. Bedminster had very little air traffic at night, but the estate was just a few miles from Interstate 78 and State Route 206, so they got visitors once in a while. Interstate 78 was the main drag between Newark and Allentown, and choppers and light planes often followed the interstate at night when—
A sudden sound made the guard alert. He put the AR-15 in his hands and dropped to one knee, scanning the treeline for any hint of motion. He knew from Army training that at night the edges of the eye picked up motion better, so he carefully scanned the treeline. He was fully exposed where he was standing — too far away from the house, but close enough to be illuminated by the light from a few windows and too far from the trees to take cover. He reached for the scope…
“What the hell are you doing out in the open like this, asshole?” The guard was so startled he nearly fell over into the wet grass. Tomas Ysidro had succeeded in stepping out of the front door of the house right up beside him, and he didn’t hear a thing. The guard shot to his feet, swinging the AR-15’s muzzle around at Ysidro, who caught the barrel of the rifle and yanked it out of his hands. “Jesus, Vaccarro, what’s with you?” Ysidro asked, giving the rifle back- '
“Thought I heard a noise, sir.”
“Yeah, it was me, burping and farting all the way from the house,” Ysidro said. Cazaux’s third-in-command was carrying a sidearm holstered in a quick-draw shoulder rig, but his hands were full with a burger and a mug of coffee. “Now get the hell out of the light.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What about that chopper?”
“Heard it for about thirty seconds, well to the south,” the guard said. “Didn’t hear it approach. Big one.”.
“Good call — it helps to keep the whole detail on their toes,” Ysidro said. “I’ll send one of the new guys out to spell you in about—”