Contemporary Romance: Passage of Arms - A Military Romance Novel (Romance, Contemporary Romance, Military Romance, Romance Novel Book 1) (18 page)

More Than Boats

Dave sat at a small café off the interstate weaving through downtown Nashville. A packet rested across his lap. He had already leafed through it several times. It contained images of the warehouses. They had been purchased and constructed in a legal commercial sector of the city. He wasn’t sure how they pulled that off. There had to be a lot of money backing the new line. That was the only way he could piece their movement together.

They were working across stateliness to strengthen the areas they already owned while expanding others. If they became too strong, it was just as likely that a territory war would break out, worst case scenario. Best case was that the two sides would join forces and declare war against the local armed forces. That was a pretty bad scenario too.

Whenever large groups of criminals banded together, local police lost credibility and authority within a matter of hours. Dave had the blue prints of the warehouses. He purchased the intel from Antony, his informant.

The window to scout the buildings and retrieve any useful information was slowly closing. He had already heard that their mark was back in town. That couldn’t be good. That meant that the shipment wouldn’t be far behind.

He had orders to wait until nightfall to make his move, but with so many internal parts to account for, Dave knew it would be too late by then. He had to take himself off the grid and go in while it was still light, during a shift change of guards when they were least likely to expect anything.

Guards of this type rarely stayed on the alert unless they had actually seen trouble. Until it came to their doorstep, the gunmen were nothing more than keepers of a weapon. They didn’t believe that they would see a firefight, so in their mind they were never prepared.

Dave tensed and kept himself from reaching for his own piece of steel strapped just underneath the light jacket he wore, a Glock 43 threaded barrel. His personal silencer was in his left coat pocket, just in case. He knew if he needed it, the outcome wouldn’t be nice at all—but those were exactly the thoughts he needed to fuel his adrenaline.

Standing, Dave reached for his wallet. He gripped the leather pouch with the packet of intel in his hand and fished for a ten dollar bill to pay his check. His drink wasn’t more than three dollars, but he didn’t care. The waitress looked like she needed the extra tip anyway.

Within seconds, he had pushed through the glass doors of the small shop, and started making his way towards his car. He planned everything meticulously.

Dave started the car and drove through the tired streets. He arrived ten minutes before the change off. The guards leaving a stale day would be lazy, and sluggish. The ones just starting their shirts wouldn’t even have their mindset right. By the time they were likely to get into the right mood for standing guard, he would already be in and out.

He slipped his hands into his pants pockets and began to head towards the warehouses using the street that ran along I-24. It was just over two blocks away. Walking that distance would minimize his threat appearance if anyone saw him. He planned to approach from the south, where no one would realistically think to look.

It made since why they picked this location. The warehouses ran right up to a set of tracks. Mass distribution. Having headquarters in Nashville only made sense. Intel had caught a glimpse of the mark, but his identity was still a mystery. He traveled with a fake ID that seemed to change every time he booked a flight. The names belonged to people that had already been reported deceased. That’s the only way they could track him in the system. They used departure and arrival city destinations, and then conducted a cross search for names of individuals who were reported dead or missing.

The mark is who Dave was after. He was the man who Dave had been tracking for years. His only problem was that he had to wait in Nashville, making his acquaintances, before he would even get close to him when the time came.

Dave had been hoping he could switch lines, move towards working for the guy. The information he could glean would be priceless, as it would be straight from the source. That was his goal. They needed that type of information. There were times when he didn’t think he had a chance, but he was out to prove even himself wrong.

Despite the late summer timing, the afternoon was cool and crisp with low hanging overcast clouds. Perhaps it meant a summer rain late in the afternoon; he couldn’t be too sure. The weather helped him wear his jacket without standing out. The evening was fast approaching. For every inch the sun crawled crossed the sky, the late afternoon light decreased rapidly.

Faces became less innocent and the air seemed to stand still. Dave was one building away from his target, newly constructed commercial warehouses on the edge of the lot running parallel to the train tracks. He could still smell soldered steel dancing in the late evening breeze.

Without even realizing it, his body had turned on. His senses were hyper, and he was more aware of his surroundings. It was something he couldn’t explain, but it’s what made him so well suited to this type of multifaceted position within the field.

He heard an engine start. The sound had come from behind, the direction he had walked from. He paid it no attention and focused on the sound of screeching metal against concrete. Someone was exiting the building.

Dave knew this person; he had been given their description from his informant. He couldn’t see the door that had opened though, not yet. All he heard was the shuffling of feet along the loose gravel surrounding the constructed buildings.

From the sound of the man’s gait wafting to his ears on the still air, Dave could tell that he wasn’t alert, probably distracted. The mystery man walked in an uneven gait, pausing every once in a while. His feet slid along the ground. He didn’t even pick them up.

As the man rounded the eastern side of the building, moving towards the south, he finally came into view. He had earbuds in his ear. Dave grinned. This wouldn’t be too difficult at all. He didn’t look armed either. That wasn’t wise.

Dave’s cover was a large electrical unit resting above ground and surrounded by a thinning strip of hedges. After the intel he received from his informant and Red bravo three, he knew this side of the building and this particular guard would be the weak link. Most of the security was concentrated in the front, the side facing the train tracks.

He could only assume that it was how the shipment would arrive, through trains. An 18 wheeler would have ensure prompt delivery, but with weigh stations every twenty or thirty miles on the interstate, there would be too many pockets to line to in order to keep the transfer clean and problem free. Utilizing the trains made more sense.

Dave watched the disengaged guard stalk across the gravel. He realized now the man was walking in step to whatever music he was listening to. The guard stopped and looked towards Dave, but in the next instant, he hiked a leg in the air in a classic Michael Jackson move. There was a little air guitar, and then the man kept walking, this time, it was more of a prance on the balls of his toes. Dave grinned and forced himself to keep a straight face.

This guard was every bit of vulnerable that his informant said he was. He wasn’t a threat, in fact, he was a help. He probably wouldn’t even notice if Dave stood and walked right behind him. He wasn’t going to be that bold and test his theory though. Instead, he waited until the young man had crossed his shield of cover and continued towards the large paved parking lot.

The warehouse sat at an angle on the lot. As Dave crossed along the path recently traveled by the exiting guardsman, he knew he would be most exposed from the southeastern angel. From what he knew, the side door used by the weak exiting target wasn’t even supposed to be in use.

The gravel crunched beneath his feet, a muffled sound compared to the twisting and grinding beneath the heavy feet of the man that had crossed before him. It was weird and foreign to be out and exposed under the dimming sky, but Dave knew that no one entered from the southeastern bend of the building. 

Once he made it to the large back wall of the warehouse, his senses eased. He gained cover again as he walked the length of the back wall. Perpendicular to the back of the warehouses was a short lining of trees that segregated the grouping of buildings from the other commercial spaces. It was sufficient enough to allow Dave to walk at ease. Any creeping and crawling at this hour was likely to bring too much attention.

He found the door a fourth of the way down from the edge of the south side. It was a heavy door that could only be opened from the inside. On the outside, it was nothing more than an off-colored rectangle in line with the rest of white building.

The door wasn’t flush, however. Instead, it was propped open with a flat rock that provided just enough to slip fingers through. Orchestrating that cost half a kilo, but there was no way around it. Dave slipped his fingers through and held his breath. The door was heavier than he anticipated.

Sweat began to form along his brow as he pulled and attempted to lift up at the same time, anything to keep the door from scraping like it was known to do. He still heard metal screeching, but he couldn’t let go. If the door slammed shut, he would miss his opportunity. The supplies were due any time between sundown and the next day.

When it came time to stock, there was no way anyone would be able to slip past the guards unless they were a guard themselves.

Dave continued pull, sucking in breath and holding it as necessary. He focused his concentration on minimizing the most sound that he could. His fingers were growing sweaty, the window of opportunity closing rapidly. There was only a spot big enough for an arm, but Dave couldn’t hold it any longer.

He shoved his arm into the space, up to his shoulder and clenched his teeth tightly to keep from making a sound as the heavy metal pressed weight against him.
How heavy was the door?

He wanted to swear, but remained silent.
Deep calming breaths.
He managed to slow his heart rate. His left arm was going numb. He wasn’t sure how he could pull the door out with just one hand, but he would have to give it his best shot.

He started with his left leg, shoving the tip of his shoe into the door. It took a moment, but he was finally able to push his entire foot inside. It helped relieve some of the pressure against his arm. The lessening pain eased the fog building in his mind. His breathing started to quicken again. He needed to get in within the next five minutes.

Dave had long since lost track of official time, but he knew not much had passed. His window was ten minutes to get all the way into the building. After that, he had another window of ten minutes to recon the top floor of the warehouse. After that, he needed to leave the same way he came.

It would be just thirty minutes before dusk. He needed to be long gone before complete nightfall. He knew flood lights would be coming to erase all the shadows. If he was still in the building then, he was as good as dead.

Dave continued to work with his arm and his leg. If he could get his thigh in, then he could possibly push with his arm and slip in.

With another deep breath, Dave pulled at the door with his right hand, trying to shove his left thigh in at the same time. It went through, but it still hurt all the same. He let out a breath and immediately took another one, regaining focus as he pushed against the door with the left side of his body and his right arm.

Twisting and scraping metal against concrete sounded as the door budged and eased out. Dave saw his window and after another second to get breath, he threw the rest of himself into the darkened warehouse.

He heard the sound of his footsteps on the solid ground and froze. There were heard voices coming at him from every direction, calm and deep in conversation. They were too loud to have heard the sound of his shuffling feet. In an instant, Dave turned back to the door and helped ease it shut before it slammed back against the frame of the building.

It made a sound, something deep that reverberated softly throughout the warehouse. Again, he froze and listened. There were closing doors and shuffling feet along the bottom floor. The sound had blended in nicely and no one noticed a difference.

The door he came in through was along a hallway that wrapped around the length of the building with temporary walls dissecting the inner area of the warehouse. There were two other doors located in the middle of the warehouse and another a fourth from the northeastern end. Each door opened into the same hallway, but was also located in front of another hallway that led to the front of the warehouse.

Inside, the lighting was dim. Uncomfortably dim. It would take a moment for Dave’s eyes to adjust; but, that was a moment he didn’t have. Dave did felt for his Glock and withdrew it silently. He didn’t bother with the silencer. At this point, if a commotion happened, he didn’t anticipate walking away with his life intact.

Still, depending on where he encountered trouble along the hallway, he had a good chance of escape if the trouble happened on the ground floor. The second floor was another story entirely, but he would cross that bridge as he came to it.

Placing his back along one of the temporary walls, Dave listened intently. He had the layout committed to memory. There were two sets of staircases that led to the top floor, one near the northwestern end of the building and another towards the northeastern end. The northwestern end was closest to him, but it was also the end closest to the front of the building where all the attention was concentrated as the guards changed shifts.