Black Scorpion (46 page)

“It addresses one of your primary concerns, specifically the Forbidden City.”

“More excuses and explanations, Mr. Tiranno?”

“No, quite the opposite,” Michael replied, speaking as much to the crowd squeezed into the hearing chamber behind him as Kern, “I'm happy to report that the Forbidden City will officially open in three months time.”

Now it was Kern who leaned forward, looking more dismayed than surprised. “And what happened to the tour we were promised?”

“I'm prepared to schedule it at your convenience, as early as tomorrow, and have brought in some of the Forbidden City's primary props to provide you as full an experience as possible.”

“Props, Mr. Tiranno?”

“I'm afraid I can't elaborate further,” Michael said, smiling. “That would ruin the surprise.”

“So as long as you don't expect these props to turn this committee's attention away from the recent death that forced you to close your so-called Daring Sea suites. This legendary vision of yours is killing people, isn't it? And let's not that forget that it further weakened your financial position and is certain to cause even more untold losses, only adding to your exposure in the marketplace and making your company a prime target for takeover. Especially given your increasingly weak liquid position.”

“That's about to change. We're expecting a cash infusion in the coming days.”

“Please be specific.”

“All I can say at this time is that a substantial investment fund is about to put all its strength behind my company.”

Kern's spine straightened, his bluster returning. “This committee will not accept such vague assurances.”

Naomi stole a glance toward Michael and watched him nod ever so slightly. “In that case,” she said, sliding the microphone before her, “I have a few questions for you, if you don't mind, Mr. Chairman.”

B
EIJING,
C
HINA

The gunfight began ferociously but quickly grew sporadic before fading altogether as the Chinese Ministry of Public Security forces overwhelmed the building's meager defenses. Of course, security around this abandoned factory, located in a decrepit slum Chinese and Beijing officials referred to as an “inner-city village,” was understandably light given that the proper officials had been paid off.

That had not stopped the waves of trucks and troops from descending on the area and bulldozing their way into the factory where tons and tons of weapons were held for planned shipment all over the world. The factory functioned as a kind of clearinghouse, a fulfillment center from which orders were packaged to extremist, paramilitary and criminal organizations on every continent.

Colonel Yan Ling, his blue police uniform encased in body armor, entered to find the last of the surviving guards being rounded up and the bodies of those guards killed in the gunfight hastily covered with sheets his men had brought along for just that task. Around him, stacked on shelves that stretched the entire three-story height to the ceiling, was an assortment of military grade ordnance far beyond even that of the MPS supply depots. Light and heavy weapons alike, in addition to a lifetime's supply of ammunition for all of them, explosive devices, hand grenades, state-of-the-art shoulder-held rocket launchers, even some smaller artillery pieces.

Ling stood stiffly, having seen enough to end his inspection here, unable to calculate the potential cost to human life held within this abandoned factory.

“Captain,” he called to his second-in-command, “you have your orders.”

“Destroy the building and leave nothing behind.”

Ling nodded and turned to the “official” from the American embassy who'd accompanied him inside in the raid's aftermath. “I imagine the results please you?”

“Very much,” the man said.

He lifted a phone from his pocket and stepped aside, dialing a number that would be answered without benefit of a ring.

“China is down,” he reported.

*   *   *

“That is highly irregular, Ms. Burns,” Kern said, tapping the frame of his reading glasses against the table.

“Humor me, sir, if you don't mind. But I'd recommend we move to a closed session.”

“Why?” Kern smirked. “Mr. Tiranno may have plenty to hide, but I don't.”

“Then you won't mind explaining this picture,” Naomi told him, as a photograph suddenly claimed the screen dangling behind the commission members, picturing Kern greeting a man on an airport tarmac before a private jet.

“Not at all. The man's name is Aldridge Sterling. I was meeting him as a courtesy when Mr. Sterling came to explore expanding his considerable interests into gaming here in Nevada.”

“Came here?”

“Yes.”

“But this picture was taken at a Long Island airport where Mr. Sterling flew you in on his private jet to enjoy a weekend at his mansion in the Hamptons last summer.”

A quiet murmur sifted through the crowd.

“That wasn't for pleasure,” Kern tried to insist, putting his glasses back on and taking them off again. “It was more a trip to ascertain the true boundaries of Mr. Sterling's intention to invest heavily in our state's gaming industry.”

“Then I assume you reported this trip and meeting to the proper ethics officials.”

Kern stiffened, just enough to show his discomfort. “This hearing is not about me, Ms. Burns.”

“Then perhaps it should be. Would you like to explain, for the record, your relationship with Aldridge Sterling?”

“That's irrelevant to the purpose of this hearing.”

“Is it, Mr. Kern? In spite of the fact that this is the same Aldridge Sterling who's been buying up King Midas World and Tyrant Global bonds at less than fifty cents on the dollar after the recent ordeal at the Seven Sins and the publicity stemming from last week's hearing before this board. Wouldn't you call that a bit coincidental?”

“Not at all.”

“What about this?”

Naomi touched the proper icon on her phone app that functioned as a remote control. Instantly the picture of Kern and Sterling together was replaced by six pages arranged side-by-side in two rows across the wide screen.

“These are recent brokerage statements showing a position with Sterling Capital Partners, modest by Sterling Capital's usual standards but still amounting to over five hundred and eighty thousand dollars. Recognize them, Mr. Kern?”

“I can't say I do.”

“You should, because the brokerage account numbers linked back to a woman with the same name as your wife.”

Kern didn't turn around to look. “Since when is making a wise investment a crime?”

“When it's a potential ethics violation definitely worthy of an investigation. Why else would you hide it by having your wife use her maiden name? At the very least,” Naomi continued over the murmur that had intensified through the crowded chamber, “You cannot expect to keep overseeing this particular investigation as a fair and impartial arbiter. Unless you'd like to further explain your relationship with Aldridge Sterling and your association with his attempt to buy the Seven Sins on the cheap.”

“This insolence has gone far enough,” Kern said. He slammed his gavel down on the desktop and started to rise. “And this hearing is adjourned.”

“Mr. Chairman!” Naomi shouted loud enough to freeze Kern in his tracks. “Before we formally adjourn, I respectfully request that Mr. Tiranno's gaming license and access to his own properties be restored. Otherwise, you leave me no choice but to seek an injunction in—”

“Mr. Tiranno,” Kern blared without the microphone, interrupting her, “provisional access is hereby granted to you for the Seven Sins property until such time that this commission can reach a final resolution.” He rapped the gavel again. “We are adjourned.”

At that, members of the press gathered in the chamber stormed the dais, surrounding Kern before he could exit and battering him with questions. Michael actually had to dodge a pair of television reporters when he stepped into the aisle himself, looking up toward the back row where FBI special agent Del Slocumb was just pocketing his phone. He nodded Michael's way, smiling almost imperceptibly. The man with the Mont Blanc pen, though, was gone and Michael thought he recognized him from his ridiculous comb-over exiting the chamber just as his Samsung Galaxy buzzed with an incoming text from Scarlett.

WATCHING YOU ON TV RIGHT NOW.

Michael turned toward the camera following him and smiled.

 

ONE HUNDRED THREE

V
ADJA,
R
OMANIA

“My god, it's incredible,” Raven said, shaking her head while continuing to study the thermal imagery of the mountain the old man had indicated, courtesy of a satellite feed arranged by GS-Ultra.

“Looks like the old man was right,” Alexander nodded, his eyes flashing like the lights of a computer.

“Not bad, eh, mate?” Paddy asked Alexander.

“How much you say this is costing my boss again?”

The big Brit winked. “I didn't.”

“My God,” Raven said, continuing to focus on the prints papering the walls, “these big patches of red show the largest concentration of men, right?”

“The bigger blips are more likely machines,” Paddy explained, “but you're right as rain for the most part. Thing looks to be a dozen stories high and you can even see from the scoring where Black Scorpion added the top seven or eight levels.”

“And this must be the Soviet command and control bunker,” Alexander noted, pointing to what looked to be an underground level where the heat signatures recorded by the satellite imagery were pink, instead of red.

“But what do you make of this, mate?” Paddy asked him, gesturing toward what looked to several more heat signatures also underground, but above and to the right of the command and control bunker.

“Where I expect to find Black Scorpion himself once we're in,” Alexander told him. “Exactly where his private quarters should be given the schematics.”

“Then it's a good thing I'm coming along to take charge of the rest of the men and make sure we get the door open for the babe here.”

“Babe?” Raven raised.

“Spoken with the utmost respect, my lady,” Paddy said, feigning a bow.

“Speaking of which,” started Alexander, “you're a bit long in the tooth for a mission like this, Sergeant-Major, don't you think?”

“Bollocks, mate! Why should you young blokes have all the fun? Experience is what it's gonna take to pull this off and I got that coming out my arse. And know what else I got? Enough arthritis to tell the weather better than any damn weatherman, and right now my knees say there's a bloody storm brewing for tonight that'll make for ideal cover.”

“He's right,” Raven told Alexander, checking the latest weather forecast on her phone.

“Lucky for us, then.”

“And we'll need plenty of it, mate,” Paddy added, “to take down all these bastards.”

 

ONE HUNDRED FOUR

L
AS
V
EGAS,
N
EVADA

“Del Slocumb?” Naomi repeated, having trouble believing his role in what was transpiring all over the world, as Black Scorpion's cells were being taken down in a series of near-simultaneous strikes.

“With a little help, actually a lot of help, from Homeland Security,” Michael told her. “Homeland handled the bulk of the international coordination in conjunction, I'm guessing, with the CIA. But Slocumb was smart, and ambitious, enough to make the call to them himself once the chief of the Las Vegas police confirmed Victor Argos's story. I'm sure that pissed off his superiors no end but he was actually following protocol. Homeland saw it as a national security issue and pushed the red button all over the world.”

“How many sites was this coordinated effort able to hit?”

“A dozen at last count, with many more reports yet to come in,” Michael said, as the Tyrant Class Gulfstream streaked toward McCarran. “But those are just the primary sites, and they don't include the strikes stateside which are being kept under tight seal, including Las Vegas itself. Thanks to the intelligence provided by Raven Khan, there are hundreds of others that need to be dealt with fast, before those cells have a chance to close up shop once word of the international effort gets out. Our advantage right now is the disparate cells have no knowledge of each other to prevent one from giving up another.”

“Meaning we're using one of Black Scorpion's greatest strengths against them. And the cells that are alerted will end up on the run, flushed into the light. You're destroying Black Scorpion, Michael.”

“I haven't destroyed anything, not so long as my half brother is still out there.”

“There's something else. It's about Hans Wolff,” Naomi continued, handing Michael her phone after jogging the screen to an e-mail that had come in during the hearing. “Prepare yourself, because you're not going to believe this.…”

*   *   *

And he hadn't, just one more incredible piece of information piled atop all the others in the past week.

Stepping through the entrance to the Seven Sins felt like the first time for Michael, bringing him back not to the gala opening but to the official completion of construction when he entered the lobby alone without fanfare or paparazzi. The smell of fresh granite, polish, lacquer, wood, wax, and cleaning solvent had dominated the air. Only a portion of the electricity had been switched on, so the lobby was lit only by the meager spill of work lights leaving the bulk of it bathed in shadows. But that didn't stop Michael from seeing
everything
, all the fruits of his labor realized. He had to pinch himself to make sure he wasn't still dreaming, since it had been his dreams that had brought him to that moment.