“Are those drop zones?” Sean asked, pointing at the maps.
“That file contains everything you’ll need to get a team in and out of North Korea, including your best options for point of entry and preferred extraction zones. Feel free to double check our work, but it’s thorough.”
Sean sifted through the file. “How did you guys pull these satellite images?”
Baldwin crossed his arms. “We have our resources, Sean. An operation like ours doesn’t exist without considerable… support.”
Adriana still had something on her mind. She’d been holding it back during the course of the discussion. “What about the North Koreans that are here looking for the sword? Are you going to stop them?”
“We are monitoring their movement now. It appears they are lying low. When they pop their heads up to take a look around, we’ll take care of them.”
“You going to offer them a deal, too?” Tommy asked. He didn’t try to hide his cynicism.
“The only deal we have for them is death,” Baldwin answered. “Do not mistake our mercy toward you as weakness. We are soldiers, Tommy. We do what soldiers do. Sometimes that means doing what is necessary.”
An awkward silence slipped back into the room. For a moment, the only noise came from the humming machines running their processes.
Tommy looked over the information in the folder as Sean passed piece after piece to him. When he was done, he looked up into Baldwin’s steel-blue eyes. “Okay. We’ll get out of your way. Just make sure you take care of those North Koreans.”
“That’s what we do,” Baldwin said. “Karl will take you back to the cars.” He motioned to the bandaged man, who still had an irritated look on his face. “The cars will take you wherever you need to go. I would suggest leaving Cologne immediately.”
“I think we can both agree on that,” Tommy said.
Chapter 16
Han-Jae looked out the window of their room. Most of the buildings within view were old, showing off the rich history of the city. Dramatic church spires and domes sprang up in the distance, contrasted by intermittent modern buildings made mostly of glass and steel.
Belgium was a center of culture and diversity, which made it an easy place for Han-Jae and his crew to blend in.
They’d managed to escape the German police, though at great cost. He didn’t care about the cops they’d killed to get away. The real cost to Han-Jae was that now Interpol would be watching for them.
He’d spent a good amount of time putting this operation together. Getting their false papers and identifications was no easy task, not originally anyway. Now Han-Jae had a network throughout the criminal underground. Brussels was one such place where his connections thrived.
Going to Prague had been a consideration. He had plenty of reach there as well. Something in his gut told him to stay closer to the United Kingdom. That meant Brussels.
A knock came at the door and startled the four men in the room. Kin Pak — the one who’d injured his head previously — was sitting on the chair next to the door with a pistol across his lap.
Their weapons had been taken by the German police. The gun Kin held was the one he’d taken from the German cop he’d killed during their escape.
Han-Jae motioned to one of the other men to open the door while Kin stood back with his weapon pointed at the doorway. When Han-Jae was happy with Kin’s position, he gave a nod to the man holding the doorknob.
The guy twisted it and eased it open.
A skinny, pale figure stood in the doorway wearing a hoodie and torn blue jeans.
“What’s with the gun?” the man asked in a scratchy voice. “You know I don’t like guns.”
“Excuse our caution,” Han-Jae said. “We had some trouble in Germany.”
“Yeah, no kidding.” The figure stepped into the room and pulled back his hood, revealing his stubbly face. “I saw you killed some cops over there. They tend not to like it when you do things like that.” His sharp English accent belied the part of London where he’d grown up.
Two large-gauge earrings dangled from sagging lobes. A miniature black spike stuck through his nose. Matching dagger tattoos ran up either side of his neck, pointing toward his ears.
The guy at the door closed it quickly behind him and remained at full attention.
Kin lowered his weapon but kept a ready finger on the trigger.
The guy with the tattoos went by the name Raven. Han-Jae didn’t know his real name, and that didn’t matter. All that mattered was that the guy delivered.
Raven stepped over to the bed and plopped a duffel bag down on the edge. He unzipped it and reached inside.
“Four 9mm pistols,” he said, setting the weapons on the bed next to the bag. Then he placed several passports down by the guns. “Passports, driver’s licenses, visas, etc. Brought you some spare magazines, too. You’ll probably be needing them. They’re in the bag.”
“Rounds?”
“Boxes of them in the bag. Check for yourself. You’ve got enough ammo in there to start a small revolution, though if that’s what you’re looking to do you might want bigger guns.”
Han-Jae shook his head. “This will work.”
Raven drew in a breath and sighed. “Good. I thought it might. I also brought you some silencers for the pistols, as requested.”
Han-Jae rummaged through the bag and found the sound suppressors. He did a quick eyeball test, making sure the cylinders were clean and free from damage. Underworld types like Raven were often guilty of delivering faulty product. It wasn’t necessarily intentional. Sometimes they had to deal with what they received. In this case, the weapons and their accessories were high quality.
Raven stood by a few feet away as his buyer finished going through the goods. He patted his palms against the outside of his thighs, clearly anxious about the whole deal. He knew better than to ask too many questions, especially from guys like the ones in the room. He had a partner at one point, a guy who had a nervous habit of talking way too much, asking more questions than he should have, and all in all just being annoying.
During a deal with some Russians for some microchips and AK-47s, he ended up getting shot in the back of the head and dumped in a river.
Killed selling Russian guns to a Russian crime syndicate. The irony wasn’t lost on Raven, and he constantly reminded himself to keep his mouth shut during a deal.
Han-Jae flicked his head up at one of his men. “Give him the money.”
Raven didn’t dare breathe a sigh of relief. His motto was: Act like things are always going according to plan. That kept him calm, or at least made him appear calm on the outside.
The man closest to the door walked over to a duffel bag on the floor near the bathroom. He picked it up and tossed it to Raven, who caught it with a grunt. It was heavier than he’d expected.
“Thank you,” Raven said.
He pulled back the zipper and thumbed through a few stacks of tightly packed euros.
“Ten thousand,” Han-Jae said.
Raven gave a nod and clutched the money bag tight. “Thank you for your business. Please let me know if you ever need anything else in the future. I’ll be happy to—”
“We know where to find you,” Han-Jae cut him off. “Leave us.”
Raven nodded emphatically, even bowed a few times as he backed toward the door. “Right.”
He reached the door and spun around to find one of the other men blocking his path.
“Excuse me, sorry,” he said.
The man wouldn’t budge.
“I’ll just slip by you and be on my way,” Raven said, his voice becoming more insistent.
He heard the sound of metal threads squeaking against another metal adapter. Raven swallowed and twisted his head to look over his shoulder. Han-Jae was standing there with one of the pistols he’d just bought, now with a suppressor attached to the muzzle.