These men were a rare tribe, baptized in blood, bonded by their loyalty to each other. Felk glanced at them with pride as they drank from their coffee mugs. They were the best of the best; fighting machines with their shaved heads and goatees, each with hardened biceps sleeved with swirling tattoos. As with Ramapo, each man was betting his life on the next mission. They’d committed every point of the San Francisco job to memory.
Felk continued.
“According to our intel—and this came at a very high price—on the sixteenth, the bank will process an order of ten million dollars to be shipped to federally insured banks in Hawaii. A three-man crew from Ironclad Armored Courier will transport the cash to its cargo terminal at Oakland International Airport.”
Felk positioned his laptop on the table and consulted it.
“In addition to GPS, Ironclad’s truck has an engine kill switch, which can be activated remotely via satellite by Ironclad’s dispatcher. The dispatcher can override the driver and stop any truck in their fleet at any time, to counter hijackings, thefts, robberies.”
Felk had photos of Ironclad’s depot in Millbrae.
“As some of you know, we have an ex-contractor friend, Dante. After his tour of Iraq, he worked with classified nuclear national security systems at the Livermore lab before the economy took his job. It left him bitter and in debt. We hired him.
“Dante has demonstrated to us that from his laptop, he can bypass Ironclad’s online security, seize control of the truck and shut it down at any point. He killed the engine on an Ironclad truck making deliveries in San Bruno. The company thought it was a stall-throttle issue.”
“We could’ve used him at Ramapo,” Unger said.
“He wasn’t available for that stage.” Felk tapped the map. “Let’s review assignments. We have a cache of equipment in a storage locker in Daly City, with new bikes. We had help purchasing them. On the sixteenth, Unger and I will surveil the Ironclad truck. We’ll follow it when it exits the reserve, over the Bay Bridge and into Alameda County. The rest of you will join us when the truck leaves the eight-eighty for the airport.
“At that point Dante will remotely detonate two small IEDs we’ll set up in safe areas at a school and a mall near the airport. That will create enough fear and chaos to occupy emergency services. Within minutes after the IEDs go, the truck will be on a clear strip of Air Cargo Road. Dante kills the truck’s engine. It stops and we move in fast.
“In California we’ll obtain a new frequency device through Dante that jams all cell phones and radio messages in a half-mile radius. The crew and any wireless user witnessing our operation will be rendered incommunicado.
“Rytter and Unger will first affix C4 to the truck’s driver and passenger doors. Dillon and I cover up front. Rytter and Unger then affix C4 to the rear doors. Northcutt covers. We detonate, toss flash bangs into the truck, immobilize the crew, offload and haul ass on the bikes to the vehicle switch point in San Leandro. Then we drive to our meeting point in Sacramento where we courier the cash to our contact in Kuwait City, just like we’ll do with this cash tomorrow. Dillon will ship it to Kuwait from couriers in Kingston, Ottawa, Toronto and Montreal.”
Felk glanced at the Ramapo cash, neatly arranged beside other bags of items in a far corner. The cash was wrapped with bands stamped Imitation Studio Prop Supplies—Movie Prop Notes Not Legal Tender.
“We had considered shipping the money by air transport in steel coffins—a repatriation of human remains—but that method is subject to greater Customs scrutiny, including X-ray screening, so we decided to be obvious.
“Shipping by movie prop money courier is a huge risk, but this is the fastest way to move our cash, under the circumstances. We’re shotgunning the delivery in several small packages through different courier companies to reduce chances of the entire load getting tripped up in Customs somewhere. Our Kuwait City contact will arrange to ship the cash to Karachi. After San Francisco, we all meet in Karachi, pick up the cash and equipment. We then go to Quetta, contact the go-between and use the money to lead us to our guys and lay waste to the fuckers who took them.”
Felk paused to take a hit of coffee from his mug.
“Tomorrow we’ll disperse and all move out. We must meet by the twelfth at the hotel in San Francisco to give us plenty of time for a few dry runs. You all have cash and credit cards. Travel any way you like to get there. I think it should be less risky entering the United States—they’re not expecting us to be entering the States. Besides, they’ve got no description of us. They have nothing. No one knows what to look for.”
“But the news reports say they have an eyewitness,” Northcutt said.
“I think that’s bullshit. We were careful. We took steps. We left nothing to ID us, no DNA, no casings, nothing.”
“What about the reward?” Dillon said. “What if someone gives us up?”
“No one will give us up. Everybody helping us is in some way tied to the people we’re going to rescue. They’re all part of this.”
Felk went to his laptop and activated the latest video of his members being tormented by the insurgents holding them. He turned the screen to Rytter, Unger, Dillon and Northcutt and looked them in the eye.
“This could be any one of you. We will not leave our men behind. We are at war. If the guards in California resist, kill them all.”
The meeting ended with each man retreating into his thoughts.
As they prepared for travel, they contended with the horrors that haunted them. They were ghosts of what they once were. It was an unspoken truth they’d recognized about themselves in the shadows of their darkened eyes. They were chained to their comrades taken hostage and the sword of Damocles hung over all of them.
We are the dead, the dying and the damned, Felk thought. We have nothing to lose.
Watching Dillon pack the Ramapo cash for shipping, Felk took interest in one of the small bags Dillon had repositioned. It contained various items Rytter had scooped up with the cash that had spilled onto the service center’s floor. Rytter had kept them because he figured they might hold potential use for the squad.
Felk examined the FBI agent’s badge and his ID.
Special Agent Gregory Scott Dutton stared at Felk from his laminated ID photo. All-American pumped with righteousness from Bridgeport, Connecticut. Felk looked through Dutton’s wallet. It held about a hundred in cash, credit cards, bank card, loyalty cards; a receipt for a headlight set from a Newburgh, New York, dealer. A woman’s face beamed at Felk from a snapshot.
That would be the wife.
Felk looked back at Dutton’s bureau ID. The agent’s eyes were burning bright, duty-bound; fated to make a stupid move. Yet some of the news reports portrayed him as a hero who’d sacrificed his life. Probably get some sort of hero’s full-color honor-guard funeral at Arlington. Felk sneered.
What did his men get for their sacrifice?
They were dragged through a backwater street like animals, their bodies desecrated.
And what about his men held captive and tortured?
What awaited them if Felk’s squad failed to deliver the ransom?
Decapitation.
There’d be no honoring of their work; the risks they took, the price they paid, the blood they’d given, the toll exacted. No memorials. They were throwaway heroes, every one of them.
Including his younger brother.
Clayton.
“Don’t leave me!”
Staring out the window to the lake, Felk suddenly saw himself at ten in Ohio during winter.
Just him and Clay, getting set to play hockey on the frozen pond near the house. The Felk brothers are the first of the boys to arrive for the game. No one else is in sight and Clay’s practice pass bounces over Ivan’s stick and the puck glides far over the ice.