No Corner to Hide (The Max Masterson Series Book 2) (32 page)

NO CORNER TO HIDE

The compound appeared to be surrounded by a high wall. It enclosed approximately twenty-five acres of pristine coastal forest which served as a buffer from the nearest neighbors, a long walk down the rocky beach. Where most affluent homeowners open their homes to the sea to enjoy an unobstructed view, the wall fully enclosed the large modern mansion, its white walls set off with glass at rakish angles in a style that only appeared in
Architectural Digest
. This was no house lived in by a Civil War veteran, an impossibility that rational thought immediately dismissed. Max moved from interested to intrigued.

The next pics showed a series of images of the large mansion from the west, with three cars parked in the circular driveway, a Bentley, a black midsized sedan, and a minivan. The detail was so clear that Max could read a bumper sticker that read “Imagine Whirled Peas” on the minivan’s rear bumper. The irony was not lost on him.

The next pic showed an overhead image of the entire compound. There was an outbuilding with no windows that added to the mystery. Explaining his theory, Sinclair added, “That building appears to be the power station, but we detected no radiation which would indicate a nuclear power plant, and no heat radiation, so we concluded that this guy has his own Tesla generator. Did I catch your attention yet?”

Max leaned forward in his chair, intent on the details. It was a mystery unfolding before him, each image creating more questions in his mind.

“I assume you saved the best for last, for true theatrical effect?” “Oh yeah, just wait ’til you see what our little drone saw when it turned around and came at it from the east,” said Roger with unrestrained enthusiasm. The drone had made a pass over land from the west, and then flew out over the open ocean before turning and making a second pass. Each successive image focused on the enormous glass windows over the large central living room, lit brightly against the evening sky. There were more than thirty images of the same room, each in more detail and closer than the previous one. There were three people in the room, standing in a triangular formation. There was a dark-haired man with his back to the windows, and a balding, middle-aged man who could be seen in profile. They both faced a third, who stood in the middle of the room facing directly to the east.

He wore a short silk bathrobe adorned with a green dragon. He appeared to be in his sixties, tall and slim, with a greasy look that made his balding black frizzy hair shine. He had familiar bulging eyes, and he held a filterless cigarette in his right hand. It was almost too much detail. His fingers bore the permanent brown and yellow stains of a lifetime smoker. His bare left arm hung to his side, adorned by a fifty-cent-piece-sized mole on his forearm. A tattoo of spider legs emerged from the mole, giving the effect that a huge tarantula had perched on his arm like a repulsive pet.

“I’ll be. Adam Pryor has been right under our noses the whole time,” Max proclaimed with a disgust reserved for Pryor, and Pryor alone. He knew what he had to do, and quickly.

CHAPTER 86

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ax left the situation room without announcing his intentions to anyone. He quickly covered the distance to the Oval Office, and pulled the diary from its hidden place inside the desk. He was in need, and seeking direction. The book

glowed, as if it sensed his desperation.
“I knew you would summon me again.”
It was Jefferson, still
dressed in casual clothes, his red hair tied back.
“You seem to have
run headlong into a dilemma.”
His gaze took in the room, familiar
but changed, much like his appearance.
“Yes, sir, I need your advice and counsel now more than ever,”
Max
replied.
“I have nothing more to do in my state of repose than to sit with the
president of the United States and offer what wisdom I have retained
for posterity,”
Jefferson responded. He seemed to carry a new energy,
a new sense of purpose.
“I have been reading about you, and I need to know the truth of a
story that has survived to my time,”
Max began.
“There is a tale that you
shot a traitor and left him to die on the White House lawn.”
Max stood
and approached the departed president, but the closer he came, the more the image of Jefferson became translucent. He realized there would be no handshake, no physical contact at all. Their connection would be a mental connection only. Satisfied, he retreated behind his desk and placed both hands on the diary. Immediately, the image
of Jefferson became brighter and opaque.
“Yes, it is true,”
he replied.
“There was a man who sought to sacrifice the honor of our young nation, a Tory, who had sold his soul to the
British for a position in the aristocracy and financial reward. I served
as his firing squad; me alone. I dispatched with the decorum of a shared
execution, and after a trial by his peers, I took him out on the lawn
and shot him down like the mangy beast that he was.”
Max studied
his calm demeanor with fascination.
He describes shooting a man to
death as coldly as he might describe cleaning a fish. I need that attitude
to serve me for a while.

CHAPTER 87

T

he security force entered the mansion from every means of entry, breaking glass and ramming doors simultaneously. Wood and shards of crystal flew in an arc as they entered. A dozen armed drones hovered in a halo around the building, and

helicopters patrolled the perimeter. The team secured each room as they entered, carefully opening closed doors until they found their quarry. Pryor stood in his glass-lined living room. He was dressed in a robe, his wiry, white, hairless legs extending below the expanse of terry cloth. He held a hefty glass of scotch, and he sipped in defiance as the well-armed force broke into the room. “You’ll pay for that,” he declared.

He was surrounded, and defiant, and delusional. His megalomania made him feel invincible. “You know, the legal system will determine my fate, long after your president has left office in disgrace, and my people have the resources to post whatever bail a judge in my breast pocket will impose. I’ll die in luxury before you get your satisfaction in court.”

“What makes you think that we are going to give you a trial?” The voice came from the mask of a uniformed commando who stood at arm’s length. Unlike the others, he carried no weapons. He was identical in appearance to the other eleven, but his voice was unmistakable.

“Masterson?”
“Yes, you sick son of a bitch.”
“Well, well, aren’t you ignoring protocol? I should know, I wrote

the book on it,” Pryor sneered. “You should be cowering in a bunker somewhere. Feeling all safe and protected. Didn’t your daddy and his pretty little girlfriend teach you that? I think it’s time to talk about the terms of my presidential pardon, don’t you?”

“My father and Adrianna taught me a lot of things. One of the first lessons they taught me was to never negotiate with zealots and murderers, and you are both.”

“Oh, that. I had Darkhorse handle all of those messy details. He has been employed by us since he was old enough to kill, and that was very young. He was taught by his father, too. You remind me of him.” He downed the last of his scotch in one gulp. It was a gesture of defiance.

You tried to kill my father, but only succeeded in killing the only woman he ever loved. I don’t care if you had someone else do it for you. I’m not a cold-blooded assassin, and I am nothing like this Darkhorse.
Max gritted his teeth, fighting the urge to choke the evil out of the repulsive man.

“My employers have more power than you can imagine, and they control the money. This country, all of it, will soon be back in our control, and you will be history. It won’t matter whether I’m gone. The plan has been implemented, and there is nothing you can do to stop it,” said Pryor. Max and the cordon of commandos took a half step forward. The effect was like the tightening of a noose.

“You want me to blow his head off, Mr. President?” This time, the voice was Armstrong’s.
“No, that would be way too merciful, as much as I would like for that to happen, but it makes interrogations much more difficult,

NO CORNER TO HIDE
I hear,” Max replied through gritted teeth. He could taste the bile that rose from his detest for the man.

“Back off, or I detonate Chicago,” Pryor screeched in a shrill voice, pulling a cell phone from his pocket. He had memorized the three-digit code for each city where bombs had been concealed, and all he had to do was type in the numbers.

“Oh, we already got that one,” announced Armstrong. “We think we’ll just kill you and be done with it.” Max had previously given specific orders that Pryor was to be taken alive and detained for the intelligence they could derive from intense interrogation, with the hope that he would reveal other members of the Society. Max was also aware that only six EMP devices had been recovered or detonated, leaving another six unaccounted for. If Pryor held that knowledge, or if he chose a city that had not been scratched off the list, he held another major disaster in his hands.

“Then it’s San Francisco.”

San Francisco was not on the list. Max’s body language revealed that weakness. When Adam Pryor smiled, Max lunged. Pryor assumed that he would grab for the phone, and leaned away in a protective stance, fumbling for control. Max’s right hand went to the back of his head, and pulled it forward, while the palm of his left hand slammed against Pryor’s nose, jamming cartilage and bone into his frontal lobe. While his eyes rolled into the back of his head, Max broke his neck with a quick twist. Adam Pryor went limp and fell to the floor, his spinal cord severed at the base of his skull.

Armstrong lunged for the phone in the same motion, tossing his assault rifle to the side. Six inches from the floor, he punched the off button and cancelled the signal before he crashed to the hardwood. In one push, he brought himself back on his feet and pulled off his mask. Max did the same.

“You are a quick learner for a politician,” exclaimed Armstrong, beaming with awe and pride.
“I’m not a politician, I’m . . .”
“I know, I know, you’re just the president of the United States.” They turned at the sound of gunshots. Immediately, the assault

team ran in that direction, leaving Max and Armstrong alone with the lifeless body of Pryor at their feet. His unblinking eyes stared, his head turned at a grotesque angle. “I wasn’t sure I could do that,” Max began. “You know, I thought I would feel satisfied, or relieved, or something . . .”

“The first time is the hardest, but I hope you leave that kind of work to guys like me next time,” responded Armstrong, who was fixated on the cell phone.
Pryor held the fate of the nation in his hands. Now we have it back. What will Masterson do next
? He carefully removed the battery from the phone and placed it in an evidence bag for future analysis.
Our tech people can trace the preset numbers so we can track down the last of the bombs, but that won’t stop them for long. Max will be fighting many more battles.

CHAPTER 88

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he sound of heavy boots pounding up stairs brought Max and Armstrong out of their deep state of contemplation and back into the present. The security force filed silently into the large room and stood in a half circle at a respectable distance.

“Report! What did you find down there?” Armstrong was in total command, and his elite commandos respected his authority without question.

The chain of command required that they stand down until new orders were given, but six of them fanned out to cover the entrance doors to secure the perimeter. When they did, the telltale turquoise of their prize came into view.

“Sir, Mr. President . . . sirs,” the exasperated senior SEAL began, “We found a broadcast room that looks just like the one you see on TV. Then we opened a door and heard a scream. We entered a room that looked just like a hotel room, and found this lady tied hand and foot to a bed and there was this big fat guy on top of her with his pants down around his ankles . . . and sirs, he was about to . . . you know . . . and we reacted and took him out, and then some sleazy looking woman jumped one of my men, and she had a knife, and we took her out, too.”

“I think I can explain it in more concise terms,” Glenda Reasoner intoned.
“These brave men rescued me.”
She stood in her trademark turquoise dress, wrinkled and splattered in blood. Her hair was tousled, but she otherwise seemed unharmed. She smiled with intense relief. “I notice that you have been doing some vermin removal yourselves. Who is the man responsible for
this
act of heroism?”
“I am,” Max responded.
Glenda Reasoner’s eyebrows knitted together in amazement.
He’s the president of the United States, and he’s standing over the corpse of the most evil man in American history. He just killed Pryor with his bare hands, and he is acting like it’s a part of his job description.
“Then you are my hero, too.” She approached Max with arms outstretched, and gave him a warm hug. Max gently broke the embrace and inquired. “How long have you been here?”
“Since before the lights went out in New York, but never mind that. I have so many questions, and you wouldn’t expect me to pass up a chance for an exclusive interview with the president of the United States in his moment of crowning glory, would you? I have my commentary to do, and I can do it from here . . . there is so much to do . . . I look a mess.”

CHAPTER 89

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ax arrived at Fairlane late in the evening. A light dusting of snow glowed on the driveway under the full moon, illuminating his path toward home. It was cold and still. He chose to walk the distance from the front gate to the private

entrance to clear his head, and gave strict instructions for his Secret Service detail to remain at the gate. The events of the past eight days had weighed upon his mind, and Rachel had been under lockdown as a security measure since the attack on Manhattan. They had been apart for eight long days. The only opportunity for communication was by a secure line to the house, and their conversations had been short and tense. He longed to be with her.