Choke Point (35 page)

Kyra chuckled. “Nice touch. Chricher is now hanging over the side of the boat trying to barf up the last of his dinner.”

There was another long pause before Robbie came back, his voice subdued.
Beep.
“How do we…you know…how do we know…?”
Beep.

“He’s lying right here,” Simon answered, “if that’s what you’re asking.” He began moving toward Mawl’s body. “Why don’t you think of a good question? Something that will prove I’m not feeding you a line.”

While they waited for a response, Kyra searched Mawl’s pockets. “Just this.” She held up a digital micro-recorder. “No ID.”

Simon slipped the recorder into his pocket. “Can you flip him over?”

“I knew you were going to ask that.” She grabbed the man’s belt and pulled him onto his back. “Ugh!” The front of his skull had been completely blown away, his face nothing but a mass of chunky red globules covered in sand. “I’ll never eat cherry pie again.”

Beep.
“Mr. Leonidovich?”
Beep.

“Go ahead, Robbie.”

Beep.
“He has a tattoo on the underside of his right arm. Can you describe it?”
Beep.

“Sure.” At least they didn’t ask for eye color. “Hold on.” He squatted down next to the man’s body as Kyra turned his arm and wiped away the sand. “Yeah, I see it. It’s a double-edged commando knife over a pair of wings. There’s a banner across the blade that reads ‘who dares wins.’”

Beep.
“Okay…I uh…I’ll get back to you.”
Beep.

“There’s nothing more we need to talk about, Robbie. You’ve got two men down, and another one who needs a doctor if he wants to live. It’s time to cut your losses and go home.”

Kyra nodded toward the water. “They just turned off the light.”

“Doesn’t matter. We’ll hear them if they crank up that engine.”

She cocked her head, listening to the faint drown. “You’re right. Now what?”

“Now we call in the Marines.”

“And just how are we—”

“You said they used a laptop to monitor their network of sensors. That means it’s wireless. Which means—”

“Ohmygod, the Internet!” She spun around, her feet digging into the sand. “I should have thought of that!”

He tried to keep up, but his legs were still a bit shaky, and by the time he reached the enclosure she was at the laptop, a finger tapping impatiently on the mouse pad. “It’s in hibernation.”

Naturally,
no reason for the cosmic scale-master to start making things easy. “That could be a problem.”

“Meaning a password?”

“Most likely.” He made a slow three-sixty, scanning the supplies. Everything looked neat and tidy, very military—cases of ready-to-eat meals and boxes of canned fruit; twenty-liter containers of gasoline and cans of marine motor oil—everything but the true essentials of military life: guns, ammunition, and hand grenades.

Beep.
“Mr. Leonidovich?
Beep
.

“Yes, Robbie.” He paused and took a breath, trying to sound more confident than he felt. “What can I do for you?”

Beep.
“We need to pick up the body.”
Beep.

Need,
not a good sign. “Forget it, Robbie. You set foot on this beach, and I’m not going to hesitate to use this machine gun.”

Beep.
“Nae, I don’t believe you would.”
Beep.

“Don’t test me, Robbie. I’ve been out in the rain and mud too long. I’m in a pretty grouchy mood right now.”

Beep.
“Sorry, my friends insist. We can’t leave him.”
Beep.

Kyra waved a hand. “It’s waking up.” Her green eyes glowed hopefully in the reflection of the screen, then suddenly dimmed as if someone had switched off the power. “Shit! You were right, it wants a password.” She looked up. “Unless you know some magic…”

“What operating system?”

“Vista professional. But the header on the dialog says Drivecrypt.”

“Forget it. That’s a military encryption program. We couldn’t break it if we had two lifetimes.”

Beep.
“Mr. Leonidovich?”
Beep.

“They’re calling your bluff,” Kyra said, holding out her hand. “Let’s see if I can do any better.”

He dropped into one of the canvas chairs—he couldn’t remember a chair ever feeling so good—and slid the radio across the small table. “Good luck.” But he had a bad feeling it was going to take more than luck and a bluff to get them out of the game.

She studied the keys a moment, then pressed the
TALK
button. “Robbie, it’s Kyra Rynerson.”

Beep.
“Aye,” he answered, his voice rising with a sudden vibrancy. “You okay, Ms. Rynerson?”
Beep.

“Yes, Robbie, I’m fine, but I don’t feel very good about you wanting to kill me.” She gave Simon a wink. “I thought we had a good relationship. Did I do something wrong? Did I mistreat you in some way?”

Beep.
“No, ma’am…I mean…I didn’t…I’m sorry about all this…it was—” There was a faint
whap,
the edge of a hand coming into contact with exposed flesh, and when he continued his voice had gone flat and sullen. “We need to pick up that body, ma’am. It’s…it’s important.”
Beep.

Kyra looked at Simon. “Someone else is calling the shots.”

“Absolutely, you can forget about Robbie. You need to speak as if you were talking directly to the decision maker. Let him know this isn’t a negotiation.”

She nodded and brought the two-way to her mouth. “Sorry, but that’s out of the question. You need to do the
smart
thing, Robbie. You need to get out of here while you can. We’ve already spoken to the authorities in Hong Kong. They’re on the way.”

There was another short delay—pow-wow time—before Robbie responded.
Beep.
“With all due respect, ma’am…on the way where?”
Beep.

Kyra looked at Simon and grimaced. “You need to stay firm,” he warned. “You need to convince them.”

“Robbie,” she said firmly, as if to question her word was not only ill-advised, but foolish. “I’m a pilot. I may not know the name of this island, but I know where we came down. I gave them our final coordinates.”

This time the delay was longer—long enough to suspect the men were arguing about what they should do. “I don’t understand it,” Kyra said, more in denial than confusion. “They’re willing to risk their own necks over a dead man?”

“Apparently,” Simon answered, but suspected it was more than that. “Or it’s their necks they’re worried about.”

“What do you mean?”

“They can run, but they can’t hide…not as long as we’re around to identify them.”

Beep.
“Ms. Rynerson?”
Beep.

“Go ahead, Robbie.”

Beep.
“We’re leaving.”
Beep.

“Good decision, Robbie. Good luck.”

Simon nearly choked—
Good luck!
—the kid might be polite, but that hardly excused his actions.

Beep.
“Aye. Thank you, ma’am. I…uh…I’m sorry.”
Beep.

Kyra opened her mouth, about to respond, but Simon caught her hand. “Don’t you dare tell him ‘it’s okay.’ Let it go.”

She hesitated, then nodded and laid the radio on the table. “You’re right.”

“Screw ‘right.’ I just don’t want you giving that kid a moral pass. He’s a—”

“
Shhhh.
Listen.” The low idling rumble of the engine quickly accelerated, its steady drone echoing through the darkness, then slowly began to fade. “I can hardly believe it,” she whispered, as if saying it out loud would make it less true. “They’re actually leaving.”

Simon nodded, though something about the situation felt wrong. “They gave up too easily.”

“You’re being paranoid.”

Probably.
“Why are they heading south? It’s the long away around the island. The long way to Hong Kong.”

“And what make you think they’re going to Hong Kong?”

“It’s their home base,” he answered. “The Kowloon Security Service.”

“All the more reason they wouldn’t go there. Besides, they can’t sneak up on us in that boat…you can still hear the thing, and they’ve got to half a mile away by now.”

“What about the other boat? We’d never hear it over the sound of that big outboard.”

She stared at him in bewilderment. “What other boat?”

“The one we sent them after. They must have caught it. They wouldn’t leave it out there.”

“Come on, Leonidovich, they left.” Her voice was almost pleading, not wanting to hear it. “Relax. We’ve got food…we’ve got beer. We should be celebrating.”

But he couldn’t. Everything felt wrong. Even Robbie’s final words:
I…uh…I’m sorry.
It sounded like regret, not apology. Regret for everything that happened? Or regret for what was about to happen?

C
HAPTER
F
ORTY-TWO

An Island in the South China Sea

Saturday, 14 July 23:56:16 GMT +0800

“I still think you’re being paranoid.”

Not ten yards from where he was lying, her voice barely penetrated the waterproof tarp.
Or crazy,
Simon thought, the sweat pouring off his scalp. He turned his head, peering through the tiny eye-slits to where she was sitting—in the open, a few yards beyond the enclosure—easily visible from any direction. “Don’t look at me when you talk.”

She turned, facing the water, her back to the enclosure. “I can’t believe I let you talk me into this.” She stooped forward, filling another beer bottle from the container of gasoline.

“Quit bitching, Rynerson, you wouldn’t believe how hot it is under this damn thing.”

She twisted a rag saturated with oil down the throat of the bottle, leaving a good six inches hanging out the top, then placed it in the small box next to her chair. “That’s two.”

“Six should be enough.”

She popped the top on another bottle, tipped it back and took a gusty swallow.
“Ahhhh.”

The woman had no compassion. “Just keep talking, Rynerson.” If somebody showed up, he wanted to draw them in. “I’m signing off.”

“You betcha, boss man.” She poured the rest of the beer in the sand. “This is all for nothing you know.”

He ignored the comment, adjusting his position so that he was facing into the trees, being careful to keep the weight off his broken arm, and slipped on the night-vision goggles. The world instantly turned to green and black, everything suddenly sharper and more defined. If he came—and Simon was certain it would be no more than one—he would come from the rear, out of the trees. Chricher was in no condition to do anything, and Robbie would stay with the boat, so that left Fosseler—the one they called Catman.

Kyra settled into a meaningless patter, pausing at sporadic intervals, as if listening to someone’s response, then continuing. When she started into a discussion on the “coolness” of snakes, Simon tuned out the words.
No compassion.

He had no idea how much time had passed—it felt like an hour, but he suspected much less—before the hot, muggy air had turned his tiny hollow into a steam box and he began to feel lightheaded. He reached up, about to pull off the goggles, when he saw something move in the trees. Or did he? He waited, afraid to even blink away the sweat, staring at the spot for what seemed an unbearably long time, but couldn’t have been more than seconds, before he saw it again, a shadowy silhouette, there and gone, like a panther stalking prey.
Catman Fosseler.

Not more than fifty yards, Simon estimated, too close to warn Kyra, who was now feigning a telephone conversation with her mother. Simon took a deep breath, forcing himself to breathe, and carefully scanned the area, confirming the man was alone before slipping off the goggles.
Slow and easy.
He slid his good hand along the edge of the tarp, found the trip rope connected to the canopy’s corner poles, and twisted it around his fist.

The ghost-like figure now seemed to be moving faster…
forty yards
…familiar with the ground…
thirty yards
…pausing, listening…then moving forward…
twenty yards
…obviously feeling confident…coming straight on…approaching the enclosure directly from behind. He paused again…
ten yards
…black automatic pistol in his right hand…listening to the chatter…eyes moving, sweeping the area. Satisfied, he stepped to the edge of the canopy, then stopped again, apparently wondering what happened to the table.

Simon curled the rope one more time, taking up the last bit of slack. Despite the rivers of sweat running down his face, he felt stiff with cold, a numbness that spread across his chest and arms.
Don’t lose it, Leonidovich. Wait! Wait!

Fosseler tilted back his head, nose in the air, as if trying to make sense of the heavy smell of gasoline, then, without warning—moving with the confidence of a cat that had measured the distance between the floor and counter—he silently sprang across the open space before Simon could react.
No-no-no!

Crouching behind the low wall of supplies, Fosseler paused again…listening…cautious as a wild animal…then stepped around the boxes, the gun pointing directly at Kyra’s back. “Don’t move, lady.” Though spoken in a whisper, his words sliced through the night air. “Don’t even twitch.”

Startled, a tiny tsunami rippled up Kyra’s frame before she managed to gain control, her body going stiff as a statue.

“Where’s your friend? The guy with the machine gun.”

A question, Simon knew, Kyra was asking herself at that very moment.

“I—” She faltered, her voice catching in her throat. “I’m not sure.”

“Yeah, right. Extend your arms straight out, then stand up and turn around. Slow.”

She did as instructed, a wooden cross in the moonlight.

Fosseler glanced left and right, then down at the small cardboard box. “Whatcha planning to do with the Molotov cocktails?”