Halon-Seven (34 page)

“I’m famished. Are you hungry?” Reese asked, as she sank into the sofa before the fireplace. She pulled a blanket over herself. Her eyes looked heavy.

“Absolutely,” he answered without hesitation. “Have a taste for anything special?”

She thought for a moment before she smiled. “Yeah, actually. How do you feel about Chinese?”

“That works for me.”

“I’m thinking takeout. Pick something up and bring it back here?”

He nodded.

In a matter of minutes they decided on their order. Reese pulled out her cell and phoned in the order. Cyrus would run out and pick it up.

“Give me your phone,” Reese said. “I’ll pin the location of the restaurant on the map so you don’t get lost.”

“Get lost? Where did you order from?”

Her coy smile hinted at an unlikely answer. “This little place I haven’t had in years. But it’s the best Chinese food I’ve ever had.”

Cyrus waited for the other shoe to drop.

“It’s in Manhattan.”

He couldn’t help it. He burst out laughing. The absurdity of sitting in front of a roaring fire in Colorado ordering takeout from a place in New York struck him as comical. This would take some getting use to.

Reese laughed, more at his response than anything. “It’s not as bad as it sounds. The restaurant’s only a few blocks from the transport site!”

“No problem,” he smiled and handed over his phone. With a few taps on the screen she tagged his destination on the map.

“If you don’t mind, I’m going to take a bath while you’re gone. I’m wrecked. If I stay on the couch I’ll be asleep by the time you get back.”

He crawled away from the fire and leaned over her on the couch. A mischievous grin crept across his face. “I’ll make you a deal. You think of me while you’re scrubbing all your naughty bits, and I won’t mind at all.”

She pulled him closer and kissed him deeply. “On second thought, why don’t you stay? You can take that bath with me?”

Her kiss and hungry eyes were making his heart beat faster. The temptation was exhilarating. “Why Miss Knoland, I like the way you think,” he said quietly and kissed her again. “Unfortunately, you’ve already placed the order. But hold that thought. I’ll be back before you know it. Then it’s you, me, and a roaring fire.”

That brought a girlish giggle from Reese that surprised them both. Her hand covered her mouth in embarrassment. They both roared with laughter.

“It’s a date,” she said in a low whisper in his ear. “Maybe I can find a nice bottle of wine?”

“You’re on!” He gave her another quick kiss and headed for the spare bedroom. Manhattan was only a few steps away.

Manhattan, New York

Thursday, 9:49 pm (7:49 pm Colorado Time)

Cyrus stepped off the teleportation platform. His movement activated the motion-sensing trigger for the lights of the room. He was standing in the small living room of a studio apartment. There were no furnishings, except for the pair of small tables that held lamps. They were the only source of light in the small open space. A thick set of old drapes were drawn against the windows.

Checking the display of his phone, Cyrus confirmed he was actually in New York before heading for the front door. As he stepped into the hallway, he took note of the number on the door. It was apartment 812. He pulled the door shut, ensuring the lock latched firmly behind him, and headed down the hall following the sign toward the elevator.

The elevator ride to the lobby was brief. The elevator car was old but well maintained. When he reached the lobby, his suspicion regarding his location was confirmed. The building was neither high-class nor low-rent. Strictly middle of the road—nothing attention grabbing. He found it interesting that Professor Meade chose to keep the platforms in apartments around the country. It made a certain amount of sense. People frequently coming and going wouldn’t draw attention the way they would at a location like the storage locker. The negative side was the paper trail. Payments would be made on these properties. There were utility and tax records. Cyrus made a mental note to contact Allan Underwood. He needed to know how the properties were sheltered. Public records were a potential loose thread that could be used to identify the locations of the platforms.

Passing through the double doors of the lobby, Cyrus stepped onto a busy Manhattan street. Traffic was heavy and moving slowly in both directions. The sidewalk buzzed with the constant bustle of pedestrians, even at nearly ten o’clock at night.
The city that never sleeps, was that New York?
It seemed appropriate. The townspeople of Berton Springs, Colorado were likely safely ensconced in their beds come ten o’clock.

Double-checking his location on his phone’s map, he turned right and started down the street. He was only a few blocks from The Happy Taste of China.

When he turned right at the next corner, he experienced a curious sensation. There, in the bustle of at least a hundred people, he felt he was being watched. Surreptitiously, he glanced around. There were any number of possible prying eyes, but no observer stood out. He kept walking. Foot traffic was heavy. Maybe that was all he was experiencing. It was unlikely anyone knew he was here. His trip to New York had literally been a spur of the moment decision.

But by the end of the next block, the tingling sense in the back of his skull had become a force he couldn’t ignore. As he reached the next intersection, the crosswalk to his left received a walk indication light, allowing pedestrian traffic to move across the busy boulevard. Without hesitation, he turned and crossed the street.

A glance to his left made him nothing more than a New Yorker ensuring he wasn’t about to be run down while crossing a busy street, but Cyrus capitalized on the look and picked out two men in his peripheral vision. They broke cover, sprinting to make the crossing before traffic routed them. A two-man tail. And where there were two, there could be more. Who were they? How had they found him so quickly?

Cyrus had already given a great deal of thought to the Bola Alvares issue. The more he considered it, the more confident he was that these men where not a part of Alvares’s crew. Based on the prints he’d lifted from the team at his apartment and the information Nathan had run down for him, Cyrus knew those men were Europeans, not Mexican. Two of the three in his apartment hailed from the Baltic Rim, and one was from Russia. If he were to wager, he was betting the men following him now were a part of a second force interested in Meridian. But who they were and why they were interested was still unclear. It seemed unlikely that Chad Brewster would’ve sold Meridian to a drug lord and the Europeans as well.

On a whim, Cyrus turned down a dark deserted alley. He maintained a consistent pace. He wanted to appear as though he knew exactly where he was going. He also wanted to draw his tail to a secluded location where he could find out what they knew.

Thirty yards down the murky alley, he could hear the sounds of footsteps keeping pace with him. Two men. They were going for his ploy. He continued on.

About a hundred and fifty yards in, a figure stepped from the shadows and blocked his way. The man was maybe six foot two with wide shoulders and dressed in dark clothes.
Crap,
Cyrus thought. He should’ve expected this. The team at his apartment had three men. With two men behind him, he should’ve expected the appearance of a third. The goons behind him must’ve been in radio contact with the third, for him to route Cyrus like this. It spoke to their organization. They were professionals, not street thugs, like the drug runners.

“That’s far enough,” the man in front of Cyrus said, holding up a gloved hand. In his grip was a semi-automatic with a suppressor attached. The gun was not unexpected, but the silencer increased the odds that he intended to use it.

“Marco,” the man ordered. “Take his weapon!”

The man’s voice was deep and accented. Slavic…
Russian
, Cyrus was fairly certain. One of the men behind Cyrus approached. A quick pat down and the man found and confiscated Cyrus’s Springfield. The man who searched him took the gun and quickly stepped out of reach.
Yep, they’re pros.
They knew the importance of staying out of arm’s reach, even when a man was unarmed.

“You’ve caused a great deal of embarrassment for my team,” said the man with the gun.

Cyrus was watching the man’s weapon hand. It was steady. There was no waver in his aim. It was difficult to keep a gun leveled on a target for an extended period of time. Far more trying than people realized. This man was doing it without any drift of the barrel.

“I assume you’re referring to my apartment in Chicago?” Cyrus didn’t know where this was headed, but he wanted answers. If the guy with the gun—Boris, he named him for the moment—was feeling chatty, he would gather as much information as possible.

Cyrus looked over his shoulder. Behind him, the two men had spread out. He was now standing in the center of a triangle. All three men now had guns pointed in his direction. But it seemed to be the man in front of him who was calling the shots. Boris had his gun leveled and he was ready to use it. The two men in the rear held their guns more casually. They didn’t expect to need them.

“Da,” the man in front said. Yeah, Russian was a solid bet. “We were warned that you were skilled. But our men did not take this information to heart. You made quite a mess.”

Cyrus shrugged. His eyes were now fully adjusted to the low light of the alley. He could make out vague details of the man before him as well as the surrounding alley. Nothing within reach could be used as a weapon. “I had no choice,” Cyrus said calmly. “One of them wanted to stick me with a needle! I don’t like needles. They scare me to death.”

This brought a chuckle from Boris. The laugh sounded familiar. Cyrus’s eyes strained in the darkness. He tried to pull more details from the man’s face but it was no use. He was cloaked in shadow.

“Do I know you?” Cyrus asked.

“Nyet,” the man said with confidence. “We have never met. But I know
of
you. I know a great deal about you. Cyrus Cooper, formerly Coalition. Supposedly retired. But I no longer believe this.” The man was silent for a few moments, as if contemplating something. “You and I must have a conversation, Cyrus Cooper.”

“I’m a lot more conformable talking when I don’t have a gun pointed at me.”

Again the man chuckled. “I am sure that is true. But the information I require is not the type you are likely to give willingly. So, you see, the gun is necessary.”

“Alright. Tell me what you want to know. Let’s get this over with.”

“Just like that?” the man asked with surprise. “Let us be realistic. You have no intention of being forthcoming.”

Cyrus put on his most winning smile. “You won’t know until you try. Ask away. What have you got to lose?”

The man was silent. He seemed off balance by Cyrus’s willingness to have a conversation. He was trying to decipher the ploy Cyrus was playing at. For his part, Cyrus was working something out. It was a fairly solid bet these men were here for Meridian, but it was also possible, though less likely, they were here on another matter entirely. While Cyrus had a plan to close the loop on the Alvares Cartel, he needed to know for certain whether Meridian had suffered another exposure.

“Very well,” the man concluded. “I want you to tell me everything you know about Project Meridian. We know you have hidden the research team. You will give us access to these people and all of their research.”

Damn.
The Russian
was
after Meridian. Taking care of Alvares would plug one leak, but there was another exposure. He’d have to sort that out, too.

Something more nagged at Cyrus. The man before him sounded oddly familiar. But the few features he could make out in the darkness didn’t match with the voice he was hearing.

An easy glance over his shoulder told him what he needed to know. The two armed men behind him were still out of arm’s reach, but they had settled into easy stances holding their guns in relaxed positions.

Cyrus directed his attention to the man before him. “Look man, I know you, don’t I? Your voice is very—” Cyrus stopped mid-sentence and shifted his gaze past the gunman and into the distance slightly to the left.

The gunman, being on alert, noticed Cyrus’s shifting eye movement and instantly reacted. The man shifted to his right as he shot a glance over his left shoulder. But the dark alley was empty.

As soon as the man’s attention began to shift, Cyrus was in motion. With a minimum of body movement, he dropped a telescoping baton from the sleeve of his jacket and into his right hand. A barely perceptible snap of his wrist and the device extended to its full two-and-a-half-foot length. His movements were so minor that they did little to draw the lax attention of the two armed men behind him.

Just as Boris was returning his attention to his quarry, Cyrus swung his arm and brought the end of the baton down across the man’s gun hand with devastating force. The sound of shattering bone was unmistakable. With a flick of his wrist, he brought the baton back across the side of the man’s head on the return swing. Boris dropped to the pavement and remained there.

Cyrus turned with a swing that knocked the gun from the hand of one of the men at his rear. He knew he didn’t have time to take a swing at the remaining man before he got a shot off. Changing his tactic, Cyrus simply dove at the third man, catching him with a shoulder to the chest. Together they crashed to the alley floor. Cyrus rolled and came up just as the second gunman tackled him, driving him back to the ground. As Cyrus’s head bounced off the pavement, he reasoned that the man on top of him had lost his gun in the darkness and was now simply attacking hand-to-hand. Although his vision swirled from the impact with the pavement, he was happy with hand-to-hand.

The second attacker pummeled Cyrus with a right and left hook to the head. Cyrus’s vision was a mess. He couldn’t tell which way was up. He finally managed to raise his arms to deflect the blows. Grabbing the man by the wrist, he twisted with everything he had. The man would have to give up his position on top or suffer a broken wrist. As Cyrus hoped, the man gave in to the pressure and rolled away.