Pompeii's Ghosts (A James Acton Thriller, #9) (39 page)

“Why
were you sorry?”

“Huh?”
He opened his eyes and turned to look at Laura.

“In your
message, you were cut off. You started to say you were sorry.”

Acton
had to think back on what he had said, then he suddenly remembered. “Oh!” He
turned and took her hands in his, his finger rotating her engagement ring back
and forth. “What I was going to say, was ‘I’m sorry I didn’t get to marry you’.”

A smile
spread across Laura’s face as she leaned in to kiss him. After pressing her
lips against his for several blissful seconds, her mouth migrated up his cheek
to his ear.

“Perhaps
we should take care of that sooner rather than later.”

Rijeka, Croatia
Two days later

Major Anatoly Kaminski picked up one of the large gold bars, this one
much heavier than its predecessor, the old gold being melted down and re-poured
into standard 400 Troy ounce bars, over twelve kilos each, or twelve times as
heavy as the ancient Roman bars were.

And
these were stamped with nothing indicating their true origins. They would be
spread around the world, sold at private dealers, cleaned through questionable
banks and jewelers, with the proceeds going to fund Omega Team operations aimed
at restoring the Soviet Union. A quarter was supposed to go back to the
Eritrean generals that had allowed their mission to succeed, but Kaminski had
been informed that part of the deal would never be honored, there no way the
Eritreans would dare protest lest they lose the two billion the IMF and UN had
agreed to pay.

He
slowly turned the alluring metal, his own reflection now showing in its
lustrous surface, when he paused. There was something on his chest. He dropped
his chin and looked down to find a red dot bouncing up and down in the center
of his shirt. His mouth opened wide as his head popped up to find the source.

But it
was too late.

His
chest tore open with a momentary, horrendous pain, then he dropped to the
floor, dead.

Dawson moved his sight to the next target, squeezing the trigger as
he cleared his zone of hostiles, the rest of the team doing the same. It hadn’t
been hard to find the Russians. They were able to pull the registration number
off the Russian satellite photos, and eventually trace it back to Croatia,
which wasn’t a surprise. He knew they wouldn’t take it anywhere near Russia,
they wouldn’t want it being traced back to them, but he also knew they had to
take it somewhere fairly civilized, but whose ties weren’t that strong to the West.

And
there was little doubt the Russians were involved what with the retasking of
their satellite. And once this mission was completed, a plain manila envelope
with the satellite photos would be placed in a location along with the two
uncooperative prisoners such that the Russian leadership would get the message.

We
know.

The all
clears sounded over his comm, the building lightly defended by less than a
dozen men. They clearly hadn’t been expecting company but Dawson couldn’t risk
them not having squeezed off an SOS. He activated his comm. “Open the doors,
send in the transports.”

He was
situated above the smelting plant, on the catwalk that ringed the activity
below. The gold had only arrived here earlier that day so he was hoping most of
it hadn’t been converted yet but from his vantage point there appeared to be a
fairly substantial stack of bars much larger than he remembered.

The
doc is going to be pissed.

Large
doors at the loading dock opened and several civilian trucks pulled in as he
descended the stairs to the main floor. Niner jogged up to him. “We’ve got
about eight pallet’s worth. Looks like they had to break things up into smaller
batches from the plane which is good for us. They should fit in our trucks no
problem. Five of them look like the old stuff, the other three the new stuff.”

“Anything
in the smelter itself?”

“Negative.
Looks like they were just about to start loading another batch when we hit
them.”

“Anything
too hot to handle?”

Niner
pointed to a batch of large bars on cooling racks. “Those would be the hottest.
Want me to hose ’em down?”

“Do it.”

Niner
walked over to the wall and picked up a hose off the floor, moments later
spraying the hot metal bars, a burst of steam revealing how hot they truly
were. A forklift was lowered from the back of one of the trucks and it
immediately raced toward one of the pallets, Jimmy at the controls. The first
pallet was raised and transported to the first truck. Lifted inside, the pallet
was lowered onto rollers then pushed to the rear of the truck by Atlas and
Mickey.

Red
walked up, waving his phone. “I’ve got photos of all the kills. I’ve already
sent them to Control.”

“Good,
but I’ve got little doubt it will just confirm what we already know.”

“Agreed.”

They
both watched as a second pallet was loaded into the back of the truck. Minutes
later the third pallet was loaded and the truck pulled up to the now closed
loading dock doors, Atlas and Mickey securing everything so no one could see
inside, then climbing into the cab of the truck, readying for the next leg of
the mission.

Niner
turned off the water, tentatively touching the soaked gold with his fingers
then grinning a thumbs up to Dawson as he tossed the hose aside. It took
another ten minutes for the rest of the gold to be loaded into the other two
vehicles, and in less than fifteen minutes from the first shot being fired,
they rolled out of the loading dock and into the large paved area of the quiet
industrial zone of the port city of Rijeka.

Niner
closed the doors behind them and sprinted to the third truck, jumping in the
back with a helping hand from Sweets. Dawson was in the lead truck with Atlas
and Mickey as they rolled through the empty streets toward the port. Dawson
activated his comm. “Topcat, Bravo One, ETA six minutes, over.”

“Bravo One,
Topcat, six minutes, acknowledged, out.”

A
traffic light changed to red and Atlas stopped the truck, the other two lining
up behind them. As they waited for the lights to cycle, a police vehicle pulled
up at the opposing light, facing them. Dawson activated his comm to warn the
others.

“We’ve
got local police, standby.”

The
light changed and Atlas eased out the clutch, the truck roaring forward, its
heavy cargo straining the engines. The police car pulled forward as well as
Atlas focused on changing the gears, ignoring them as Dawson laughed, ribbing
Mickey in the sides as the two pretended to be having an animated conversation.
They rolled through the intersection, now less than three minutes from the
docks when Atlas cursed.

“They’ve
turned around.”

“Keep
moving,” replied Dawson as he activated the comm. “Topcat, Bravo One, we’re
about to have local law enforcement trouble. Request some assistance, over.”

“Bravo One,
Topcat, help is on its way, over.”

“Okay
boys, just keep moving forward like we’re doing nothing wrong, rear vehicle how
about you drive like an asshole.”

“Roger
that,” came Red’s voice over the comm. Dawson looked at the passenger side
mirror and saw the rear vehicle disappear as it swung into the center of the
road, taking up both lanes as the cop car closed the gap with the small convoy.

“There’s
the docks,” said Atlas as he continued to pour on the gas, the laws of physics
fighting back as the truck barely passed 40kph on the speedometer. Flashing
lights followed immediately by a siren had them all cursing at once as they saw
the open gates of the docks start to close in response.

“Go
through them,” ordered Dawson as he pulled his Taser and activated his comm.
“Non-lethal force only, gentlemen.”

“Going
through!” yelled Atlas as he braced his arms, the bumper slamming into the
chain link gate, tearing it from its track and hurtling it to the side. He
cranked the wheel to the right as he geared down then gave it gas again as he
raced for the small cargo ship at the end of one the piers.

“They’re
still in pursuit!” informed Red over the comm.

“Bravo One,
Topcat. Heads down boys, over.”

Suddenly
two Apache gunships appeared to their left, over the water, angled down as they
raced toward their position. The first crossed their path, banking hard to the
right to face the opposite direction, the other banking on their left side, the
two helicopters taking up position on either side of the road leading to their
ship. The three transport trucks blew past the helicopters then just as Red’s
truck cleared, they threw on all of their lights, blinding the driver of the
cop car who cranked his wheel to the left and into the water.

Atlas
turned left and rushed to the end of the dock, a ramp leading into the side of
the ship already down, three forklifts already in position. Atlas hit the
brakes just after clearing the first forklift and killed the engine as they all
leapt out. Several dozen men burst from the hold of the ship, immediately
lowering the gates on the arriving trucks and climbing inside, pushing the
first pallets toward the waiting forklifts. The entire process took less than
five minutes and the ship was steaming for the Adriatic Sea and international
waters, the Apache gunships escorting them.

Dawson
walked over to one of the pallets and pulled an old Roman bar of gold from the
pile, stuffing it in his pocket.

Red
walked up beside him, surveying the gold. “Who’s that for?”

Dawson
knew Red trusted him implicitly and it would never occur to him that he had
taken it for himself. “I owe somebody.”

Red
nodded then looked up as an announcement came over the PA system.

“Mission
accomplished. We are now in international waters!”

Cheers
erupted from the throngs of soldiers that had taken part. Dawson felt the ship
roll slightly as they turned south, their final destination Italy, the gold of
Emperor Vespasian, the charge of Plinius, and the testament to the heroism of
Valerius and his men, finally returning home, to join the remains already
awaiting their arrival.

The
ghosts of Pompeii finally able to rest.

St. Paul, Maryland
Two weeks later

“Stop fidgeting!”

“Hey,
you try standing here while someone who claims they know how to tie a bowtie
fails miserably at it.”

“Sorry,
but as somebody who mastered this simple task when he was a boy, I refuse to be
belittled because I never learned how to do it facing someone else!”

Acton
slapped his best friend’s hands out of the way. Gregory Milton, Dean of Acton’s
university, winced, but not from the slap. Acton immediately became serious and
walked over to the other side of the room, grabbing Milton’s wheelchair. He
pushed it over to his friend. “Sit now before you over do it.”

Milton
dropped into the chair and sighed. “You’re right, I need to save it for the
ceremony.”

“Why
don’t you just sit in the chair? Nobody would care. I certainly wouldn’t.”

“No effin’
way. I don’t want that chair in a single wedding photo. Years from now I want
to look back on the day my best friend
finally
tied the knot and not
have to remember almost becoming a cripple.”

Acton
understood his friend’s desire, especially since when Milton had been shot the
doctors had proclaimed he’d never walk again. But here he was, standing at the
mirror trying to help his friend put on a bowtie.

“I’ve
got an idea,” said Milton, spreading his legs as wide as he could. “Sit here,”
he said, patting the tiny piece of exposed chair.

“Hey,
I’m almost a married man.”

“Don’t
flatter yourself, you’re too flat chested to be my type.”

Acton
laughed and parked it right between Milton’s legs. He leaned back and Milton
forward and watched in the mirror as the bowtie was finally done to perfection.