End Game (31 page)

“The enemy of our enemy is our friend, is he not?” Leonid asked.

Datsik had learned years ago that all surprises were inherently bad. If the US was sending a team here for action, Philip Baxter should have told him. And if the shooters were not American agents, then who else would want to kill the Chechens? “We need to enter carefully,” he said. “We don’t know—”

“Look!” Leonid said. “To the right!”

Snatching his Kalashnikov to his shoulder, Datsik turned and saw what appeared to be two American Special Forces operators, one huge and one of average height and girth, moving slowly away from the factory with two other people, a lady and a boy. Beyond them, Datsik saw the glow of an infrared marker on the ground near the woods line.

His team assumed shooting positions and prepared to engage.

T
o run would mean turning their backs on their enemy. Jonathan had no choice but to engage. “We’re made,” Jonathan said. “Graham and Jolaine, on the ground, now.”

Graham yelled as Jonathan pushed him to the deck face-first, but Jonathan didn’t care. He didn’t have time to. Jolaine likewise dropped to the ground, but she assumed a prone shooter’s position. Jonathan and Boxers both dropped to a knee, weapons up and ready.

“Everybody hold your fire,” Jonathan snapped.

“Are you friggin’ kidding me?” Boxers said.

“Hold your fire,” Jonathan said again. They were out in the open, with zero cover, and they were outnumbered by professional shooters. “We don’t know who they are.”

“I know they’re pointing a goddamn gun at me.”

“As we are them, but you’ll notice they haven’t fired, either. For all we know, they’re good guys.”

“That would explain the pigs I saw flying over frozen Hell this morning,” Boxers said.

A voice called from the other side, “Put your weapons down or we will open fire.” The thick Russian accent did nothing to soothe Jonathan’s doubts.

“Who are you?” Jonathan shouted.

“Does not matter,” the Russian said. “You are outgunned.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake, Boss,” Boxers growled. “It’s Ivan. Are we really doing this?” Ivan was their generic term for any Russian. Any Eastern European, for that matter.

“Full-auto,” Jonathan said, softly enough to be heard only through his microphone. “If it comes to it, I’ll rake ’em left to right, and you rake right to left.” If this went hot, the best they could hope for was to be hit in their body armor.

“Drop your weapons!” the Russian shouted again. One of the operators on the Russian’s right started to pull away from their skirmish line to move on Jonathan’s left flank.

“Don’t move!” Jonathan yelled. “Get down now or I will open fire!”

The commander on the other side barked something in Russian and the flanker pulled back in.

“This is some weird shit,” Boxers said. “Who are these guys?”

“We are not putting our weapons down,” Jonathan said to the other commander. “For the same reason that you are not. If you shoot, we’ll shoot. If you don’t, we won’t.”

“You can trust us,” the Russian said.

“Easy words for a Russian who just parachuted into the middle of my operation,” Jonathan said.

“Would you like me to make some friggin’ tea?” Boxers said.

In the distance, Jonathan could just hear the first tone of approaching sirens.

“Leash is getting short, Boss.”

“Tell you what,” Jonathan called to the other side. “If you’re here for what I think you are, everything’s fine. Your enemies are dead, and your codes were not revealed. You can go home and sleep well. Meanwhile, my friends and I are going to walk away from you.” Under his breath, he said to his team, “Nobody move till I tell you.”

“Do you have boy?” the Russian yelled.

“Twenty bucks says this does not end well,” Boxers mumbled.

Jonathan ran the options through his head. The approach of sirens made quick action essential, and he couldn’t very well lie about something Ivan was about to see with his own eyes. “I do,” he said.

The Russian paused. “Okay,” he said. “You leave, but go slowly. Give me no reason to shoot you.”

“He wants the kid,” Jonathan whispered.

Graham groaned. “Please, no,” he begged. “I want this to stop.”

“Wanting’s not the same as getting,” Jonathan said.

Boxers said, “They’re waiting till we stand up, and then they’re going to take their shot. I think we should go first.”

“Not yet,” Jonathan said. The two forces were separated by maybe seventy-five yards of open field. Napoleonic face-to-face battlefield tactics had faded away a long, long time ago.

Jonathan saw movement in the night, beyond the Russians. Seconds later, the motion revealed itself to be a dark panel truck, and it was moving way too fast. It skidded a turn into the long driveway, blasted through the chain-link gate, and raced toward them.

Two of the OpFor turned to face the new threat while the others kept their weapons trained on Jonathan and his team.

“Odds will never be better, Boss.”

“Not yet.”

“Shit.”

The truck skidded to a halt a good sixty to seventy feet before hitting the assembled Russians, therefore no doubt preventing the driver from getting seriously ventilated. The driver’s door flew open, and a female voice yelled, “Don’t shoot! Nobody shoot.”

As the driver emerged, Jonathan recognized her right away as Maryanne Rhoades.

“Oh, man,” Boxers said with a laugh. “Ain’t this some shit?”

“Oh, my God,” Jolaine said. “That’s Agent Rhoades.”

Maryanne approached the Russians at a run, her arms extended from her sides, and her hands exposed. “Nobody shoot!” she called. “This is over. This is
over.
No one needs to shoot anyone.”

Jonathan could vaguely hear the Russian commander speaking to his troops, presumably translating her words.

Maryanne passed through the Russian skirmish line to take a position between both parties. She extended her hands like a traffic cop stopping traffic in both directions. “Please,” she said. “Put your weapons down. The police are coming, and we need to be out of here.”

Jonathan broke his aim, but kept his M27 at low-ready as he stood. The Russian commander said something to his troops, and they likewise lowered their muzzles.

“So, this is what brinksmanship feels like,” Jonathan muttered. He moved casually to his left so that he could see the entire enemy line, without Maryanne being in the way.

“Don’t trust them,” Boxers warned. He, too, had broken his aim, but he maintained a stable shooting platform, up on one knee, his hand still wrapped around the grip of his 417.

“What’s going on, Maryanne?” Jonathan asked. “Why are you here?”

“To interrupt the bloodshed,” she said. “To make sure that Graham is safe.”

“And why are they here?”

“To stop the Chechens,” she said.

“I already did that,” Jonathan said. “You already gave me that job.”

“Can we talk about this later?” Maryanne pressed. “The police are on the way.”

“Hey, Ivan,” Jonathan yelled. “What are your plans now?”

One of them stepped forward. “If we are done, then we are done,” he said. “We will leave.”

“Good,” Jonathan said. “Then we’re done, too. Jolaine?”

“Right here.”

“Help Graham to his feet, will you?”

The Russian said something to his troops.

“Remember the plan, Big Guy,” Jonathan said.

“Uh-huh.”

Jonathan listened to the boy’s moans as Jolaine got him to his feet, but he never took his eyes off the bad guys, just as they never took their eyes off him. He slipped his finger into the trigger guard.

“I’m ready,” Graham said. His voice was weak with pain. And he was posed in the open for a clear shot.

“Good,” Jonathan said. “I’ll be right—”

The Russian leader jerked his rifle up, but before he could bring it to his shoulder, Jonathan fired a five-round burst into his neck and his ear. At the same instant, Boxers opened up on the skirmish line. Jonathan raked the line from left to right. In less than two seconds the Russians were all dead.

Maryanne had dropped to the ground, her arms covering her head.

Jonathan walked over to her and patted the top of her head with a gloved hand. “Are you okay?” he asked.

When she looked up, she was confused at first, and then she went right to anger. “What the hell did you just do?”

“Can we talk about this later?” Jonathan said. He keyed the mike on the Radio Shack radio and said, “Thanks, guys, for the heads-up on the parachutes. The Expedition is yours if you want it. The toy airplane, too, but I’d be careful not to show that off too much.” Not wanting to engage in a conversation with LeBron and Dawn, he switched the handset off before they had a chance to answer.

Jonathan looked to Maryanne. “The police are on the way. And I could use a ride.”

As she rose to her feet, Maryanne surveyed the carnage. “Oh, my God,” she said. “You have no idea what you’ve done.”

“Probably not,” Jonathan said. “Now, about that ride.”

Boxers drove the panel truck over Maryanne’s objections, but he let her ride shotgun. There was a row of seats behind, and Jonathan sat there. Graham tried his best to find comfort on the floor, and Jolaine tried her best to help him.

“So,” Jonathan said. “How big an international incident did we cause back there?”

“You’ll never know,” she said. “I just don’t believe it went down that way.”

“How was it supposed to go down?” Jonathan asked.

“Never mind,” she said. Jonathan read discomfort in her body language.

“Yeah, okay.” A beat. “You know what I don’t get is why you were there in the first place.”

She shifted in her seat. “There are some things you just don’t have a right to know,” she said.

Jonathan smiled. “Hey, Big Guy, do me a favor, will you, and pull over.”

Boxers had hit the turn signal even before the question was out.

Maryanne shot Jonathan a panicked look. “What are you doing?”

As the vehicle slowed, gravel crunched under the tires. When they were stopped, Jonathan said, “Get out.”

Maryanne looked appalled. “What? Why?”

“Because I can’t stand the sight of anyone who betrayed me.”

“What are you
talking
about? I just saved you.”

“I confess there are holes in what I’ve figured out, but the one thing I know for certain is that you were there to exfil the Russian team, and that the Russian team was there to kill my PC—the very PC that you hired me to protect. I don’t understand why, and frankly, I don’t much care.”

“You’re wrong,” she said. “It’s not like that.”

Jonathan shrugged. “I’ve been wrong before,” he said. “Get out.”

“But we’re in the middle of nowhere.”

“All the better,” Jonathan said. “Please don’t make me ask again.”

Boxers drew his pistol and rested it against her head. “Think of it as a safety thing,” he said. “The longer you’re here, the stronger my desire to use this.”

Tears came to her eyes. “I didn’t know,” she said. “I mean, I tried to—”

“I deeply don’t care,” Jonathan said. “Out.”

Boxers pulled the hammer back on his Beretta. It now had a two-pound trigger pull. In trigger terms, that’s a tickle.

Finally, she got it. The door handle clicked and she shouldered it open. It was still open, in fact, when Boxers stepped on the gas the instant her ass was clear of the seat. Jonathan climbed over the engine cowling that separated the two seats and settled into shotgun, reaching out to pull the door shut.

Boxers rumbled out a laugh. “Mother Hen is going to love this part of the story,” he said.

J
onathan pulled another beer out of the fridge for Father Dom and poured himself another two fingers of Lagavulin. June had arrived, and the Washington Nationals were about to mix it up with the Baltimore Orioles. Neither team sucked yet—though there was plenty of time left in the season for that—so Jonathan’s team loyalty was still up for grabs. The Orioles had been the de facto Washington home team for so many years that he couldn’t turn his back on them quite yet. The Nats could make it a lot easier, though, if they could figure out a way to stitch a whole season together. “May they not humiliate themselves,” he said as he delivered the drink.

“To coping with reduced expectations,” Dom toasted. “I can’t help but notice that you haven’t yet turned on the television. That usually means you’ve got something on your mind.”

Jonathan sipped the liquid smoke that was Lagavulin scotch. “A couple of things, actually. First, how is Graham Mitchell adjusting?”

“You mean Vincent Malone?”

Jonathan made a face. Under the circumstances, the new name was a lifesaver. Literally. “Yes,” he said. “How’s Vincent Malone?”

“Physically or mentally?”

“Yes.”

Dom scowled as he considered his answer. “Physically, I think he’s fine. He’s out of the cast, and the restrictions have been lifted from his physical activities. He’s cleared to perform to the
limits of his capabilities.
” He did finger quotes with his free hand.

“Why the emphasis?”

“That’s the segue to his psychology,” Dom said. “He’s by no means stretching his capabilities. He’s been through a lot, and as much as I and Mama Alexander and the rest of the staff try to be supportive, we’ll never get his parents back for him. Every time he looks at that scar on his elbow, he’s going to be reminded of some pretty awful stuff. Think about it. He doesn’t even live under the same name anymore.”

Jonathan inhaled deeply to prepare for his next question. “Every kid in Resurrection House is damaged goods. How is . . . Vincent on that scale?”

Dom’s scowl deepened. “Well, I’m not sure how much I like the characterization of the kids in Rez House being damaged—”

“You know what I mean.”

“—but I know what you mean. And I don’t know how to answer you. There’s no paradigmatic Rez House resident. Do they all come with baggage? Hell yes, their parents are criminals. Are some more damaged than others? Of course. But I have no way of comparing Vincent’s damage against that of another student. Do I think that Vincent will come out of this experience as a functional adult? Yes, I do. But some damage will be permanent.”

Jonathan took his time considering the answer. He supposed that would be okay. Jonathan felt a personal responsibility for Graham that he didn’t feel for many others in Rez House.

“You said there were a couple of things bothering you,” Dom said. Once he fell into psychologist mode, he could be tenacious. Especially so when Jonathan was his patient.

“Yeah,” Jonathan said. “And they’re related. How much do you know about this Maryanne Rhoades chick?”

“The FBI agent?”

“Right.”

“The one you threw out of her own truck?”

Jonathan smiled. “That’s the one. I had a chat with Wolverine today. It was about Maryanne. In fact, it was about that entire mess that landed Graham here in the first place.”

“What did she say?”

“After a lot of ducking and dodging and denials, Maryanne confessed that she, Maryanne, was the information vector for the Russians. She was the one directing the Russians on how to kill him.”

Dom recoiled as he test-drove the thought. “Why would she do that?”

“Apparently, she had a gambling problem,” Jonathan said. “And a big one, at that. To the tune of something like eighty grand. And she was upside down with the Russian mob.”

“Yikes.”

“Exactly. I don’t know all the ins and outs but the bottom line was, if she could deliver the codes and the code-keepers to the mob, they’d let her off the hook.”

Dom shook his head. “Good Lord. So, she sold out a kid?”

“No, not initially,” Jonathan said. “At first, the targets were his parents, via their rebel friends. Somehow, she talked herself into believing that it would be bad guy versus bad guy. No harm, no foul. But when things went wrong, and Graham’s mom passed along the code to him, he became the target.”

“You mean Vincent’s mom.”

“Goddammit. Yes, right. Vincent’s mom. I mean, think about that—she knows he’s got this photographic memory, and she gives him this death sentence on purpose. While his dad was working with the FBI, his mom never had any intention of doing so.”

“So, either way, he was doomed.”

“Right. So Maryanne hired Security Solutions because she genuinely felt for the kid. She launched a footrace between the Russians and me to see who would get there first. That’s a lot of gaming with people’s lives.”

Dom took another pull of beer and leaned in closer. “I’m sensing something out of you that I don’t often see,” he said. “You’ve seen the world as a dark place for a long time, yet this incident seems to have surprised you.”

Jonathan waved that off. “No,” he said. “Not surprised. Disgusted.”

“So, why share this with me?”

“You’re a priest and a shrink.”

“Which I’ve been for a long time, and we don’t often have conversations like this.”

Jonathan sipped the Lagavulin. “I thought you should know,” he said. “You make the call whether or not to share the details with Gr—Vincent. I thought you should know.”

Dom nodded. “Okay.”

Jonathan checked the clock and thumbed the remote.

As the picture arrived from the ether, Dom said, “Is it true what I hear about Boxers? He’s got a girlfriend now?”

Jonathan smirked and made a rocking motion with his hand. “I’m not sure the G-word is appropriate, but Jolaine certainly has the hots for him.”