Standoff: A Vin Cooper Novel (27 page)

His goggles were up on his helmet but I still needed a second look to make sure.

“Hey, Whelt!” I yelled at him. He turned around. “Been looking for you.”

“What?”

“You’re AWOL. Special Agent Cooper, OSI. I’ve been looking for you.”

“Are you fucking kidding?”

About what?

Whelt went for the pistol on his thigh, but I didn’t have to reach for anything, the Sig already in my hand. I shot from the hip, the round hitting above the knee and dropping him onto the space beside the engine. He wouldn’t be going anywhere in a hurry. Loose leads whipped around over the engine, one of them sparking. Diesels have no spark plugs. From the way the cylinders were firing, my guess was that the power leads were for the fuel injection system. A quick inspection confirmed it. I got them back into their sockets, my hand jumping around with all the vibrations, and the motor instantly leaped back into life.

Looking back at the trailer, I could see that cover over the framework was largely burned away, the wood decking on the tray well alight with several wrecked motorcycles smoking and smoldering on it. Down the back was where the real action was happening. The rear tires and wheels were flaming Catherine wheels spitting molten rubber in a wide spray that made the riders keep their distance. One of the tires exploded. Once they’d all blown and the back end was running on rims, the trailer would become a massive dragging weight. Movement was keeping me alive. If the rig was made to stop, I’d be surrounded and shortly thereafter I’d be in the hereafter, no doubt checking into a nice suite in hell.

I had to lose the trailer. How did that work? It rattled, clanked and bucked on top of what looked like a turntable. A heavy locating pin was locked behind steel jaws. Maybe that’s what had to be released. But how? I figured it couldn’t be done while bashing across the desert at sixty mph, give or take. Checking beneath the turntable, I saw a handle. Maybe that was how to do it. I got my hands on it and tried to shift it. Nope, too much pressure. I scanned around, looking for what I wasn’t sure. But then I saw it – a hammer. It was clipped against the back of the cabin. I leaped over Whelt and reached for it. But then something made me look down, a movement. It was Whelt at my feet, grinning against the pain, a pistol in his hand aimed upwards into my groin. This guy had real bad timing. I swung down and felt his collarbone collapse under the hammer as the weapon clattered out of his hand.

I stepped back to the turntable and struck the handle with the hammer. It budged, but only a few degrees. I hit it again – nothing. It only released when the trailer’s weight wasn’t resting on the turntable. I just had to get lucky and hit it at the right moment as the rig bucked. I struck it again and moved the handle half a turn. The jaws had opened, but not all the way. I swung the hammer again, harder this time. Maybe a little too hard. The handle snapped off, fell through the metalwork and dropped onto the ground racing away beneath the truck. Shit.

Another tire exploded.

I retraced my steps back to the cabin, the truck’s bodywork puckering around me a couple of times when random percentage shots fired by riders out wide almost got lucky. The opposition seemed to have lost heart. I opened the driver’s door and kept it open while I disengaged the dead man’s switch and threw him out. Just maybe I’d make it over the line after all.

The engine was running smoothly, all gauges that weren’t smashed either in the green or yellow. The barrier fence was only thirty miles north of Apostles’ encampment and I’d been motoring now for over thirty minutes at sixty mph. I had to be close. I peered forward. Something was out there … Whatever it was, it didn’t feel right. Mexican desert slid into Texan desert without so much as a bump or ripple on the other side of the narrow dry ditch that was the Rio Grande. And yet, there did appear to be something
on
the horizon. I leaned forward and squinted. Maybe it was the fence itself.

The Mack ate up the desert toward it and the line soon came into focus … Right. It wasn’t a bump or a ripple or a fence at all but at least five hundred motorcycle riders, shoulder to shoulder, stretched out in a line with support from those RVs with 50. caliber Brownings. Shit. Perhaps this was the end of the line. A rocket-propelled grenade arced out from the line, but there was time at this distance to turn the steering wheel a few degrees and avoid the ground burst. So now Apostles and Perez were getting serious. They didn’t want me escaping to pass along whatever they thought I might know, that a modernized Pancho Villa–style raid on Columbus was on the way. Dropping Matheson at their feet would’ve confirmed their suspicions about any holes in my story. According to Chalmers I wasn’t supposed to be the judge, jury and executioner, let alone feel good about it. But maybe Chalmers was just laying the groundwork to protect his own skin, because it was going to take plenty to stop me busting a cap in the jerk’s ass when I saw him next.

The outriders departed the area as more RPGs arced from the line, fingers of supposedly smokeless propellant leaving smoke trails in the morning sky as they blasted toward the truck. I kept coming, but made things difficult, putting in turns, some of them more aggressive as the distance closed. Small arms and .50 caliber rounds joined the crescendo of metal hurled at the Mack. Lead peppered the bodywork, grille and windshield – a thousand high-velocity steel fists. The Mack just shrugged it off. Damn, you gotta love American built. It just works, right? I turned the wheel and the truck skidded sideways. I put in another turn, evasive action required to avoid a couple of RPGs with flat trajectories fired from dead in front, and things suddenly got interesting. The truck veered to the left. I corrected. It skidded violently to the right, the amplitude of each skid more extreme with each correction. Oh shiiiit … Losing control here. More lead slammed into the truck, smashing lights and mirrors, Apostles’ men realizing that the end was near. In the last vestige of the passenger side door mirror remaining, I saw the problem: the trailer. It had almost unhitched itself and was swinging around off the back of the prime mover like a giant counterweight. So I spun the steering wheel to the opposite stop, massively over-correcting. The forces suddenly unleashed flicked the trailer around like a giant, multi-ton pendulum. The center pin must have ripped clean out of the base plate jaws because suddenly the trailer was on its own, free to tumble, rolling and burning across the sand,
smash
into the line of motorcycles and support vehicles. The launch of RPGs suddenly dried up in the panic as riders rode over each other to get the hell out of the way of the flaming steel juggernaut tumbling toward them.

The trailer flattened two of those .50 caliber RVs and at least twenty riders were swamped by it. Other riders, their clothes on fire, careened into others who caught fire, just like a bad smash at the Indy 500.

The Mack, now freed from the weight of its load, leaped forward with a burst of acceleration and punched through the pall of black smoke marking where the line had been, and shunted a burning vehicle out of the way.

With no mirrors, I had no way of knowing what was going on in my wake, but up ahead, maybe half a mile away, I could see the barrier fence. This was going to present its own problems. Like how the hell was I going to punch through it, a wall of reinforced steel eighteen feet high? The Mack was heavy and it was also powerful. Hell, just maybe I could batter my way through. I pulled the seat belt over my shoulder, buckled in and pushed the accelerator pedal to the boards. But at the last moment, I thought better of it. The damn fence was constructed to prevent exactly what I was about to attempt, fool, I reminded myself. I stood on the brakes and grabbed a handful of steering wheel. The Mack responded better without the trailer, but not good enough. The wheels all locked up, it skidded sideways and collided with the fence, throwing me savagely against the belt.

I sat there for several seconds, doing nothing except maybe groaning a little. Steam poured from the Mack’s radiator and the air reeked of hot water, scorched rubber and diesel fumes. I unclipped the belt and pushed open the door. The Mack was tall. Perhaps if I could make it up onto the roof, I could vault the fence.

My body wasn’t working so well as I climbed out onto the running board, stepped up onto the cheese grater that the mud guard over the front wheel had become, and stood on the Mack’s hood. From there it was a running jump up onto the windscreen and then onto the roof but the fence was still too high and too far away. I took a deep breath, pulled the Sig and checked the magazine. One round plus one in the chamber and two full mags in my pocket. Time to change mags. No way was I going to let Perez practice his hobby on me.

I turned to look back at Apostles’ front line, expecting the worst. The trailer had done a good job, but there were still a lot of tangos out there. No doubt they’d be regrouping and heading my way. But in fact the opposite was the case. They were retreating, heading south, kicking up those familiar rooster tails of dirt. Something had spooked them, and then I saw what it was. In fact it was two of them – a couple of Predator drones armed with Hellfire missiles flying figure eights overhead, slow and menacing.

“Hey Cooper,” a familiar voice called out behind me, on the other side of the fence. It was Ranger Gomez, a Border Patrol SUV parked behind him. “So lemme guess … the truck’s a rental, right?”

An Air Force Black Hawk turned up and landed nearby. The loadmaster hopped out and jogged toward the Mack. I hopped down off the hood and went to meet him. He gave me the thumbs up, wanting to know if I was okay. I nodded and he patted me on the shoulder, wanting to get back to the aircraft. Sure, but first there was something I had to check. I walked back past the dented, scorched, pockmarked, twisted hunk of metal that had transported me across the desert, and climbed up into the engine section. Whelt was still there, jammed between the engine housing, the cabin and sheets of gnarled metal. His right foot was bent around so that it looked like it had been attached to his leg back to front. He might have seemed dead but his wounds were bleeding, which suggested otherwise. I felt for a pulse. All things considered, it was strong. I pulled his arm and hoisted him across my shoulders.

*

“Where do you think you’re going?” said a scowling, petite nurse with a cute button nose and big brown eyes, determined to complete the examination. “Sit. I’ll be back in a minute.”

I showed her both hands palm out, capitulating, sat quietly on the gurney and waited for her to return with the X-rays. Before my eyes, a diagonal bruise began to materialize across my chest where the Mack’s seat belt had stopped me smashing into the armored windshield. The slice above my waist delivered by Daniela’s KA-BAR had already been cleaned up and sutured closed. The stab to my ribs delivered by Perez had scabbed up nicely of its own accord and needed no attention. There were quite a few small nicks, cuts and bruises, but I was surprisingly okay given the wringer I’d just been through. I didn’t need an X-ray to tell me that nothing was broken. I guess I sat there nice and peaceful because I got a thing for nurses. Who doesn’t?

Speaking of which, she came back in with the chest X-ray and stuck it up on the lightbox.

“I can’t see. Did the surgeon leave anything in there?” I asked her.

She glanced over her shoulder and grinned.

Gomez stuck his head around the door. “How’s the patient?”

“He should spend the night,” said the nurse.

“I will if you will,” I told her.

“I’m not on tonight,” she said.

“Then where are we going?”

She grinned again as she walked out. “Okay, I think you’re good to go. Just check with the desk.”

I fed my arm through the shirt sleeve and said to Gomez, “That would’ve turned out differently if you weren’t here.”

“Dream on. Had a look at yourself lately?”

I caught a glimpse of my face in a mirror over a basin in the hall as we walked out. It had been bathed in the yellow-orange disinfectant, like the one used on the KA-BAR slash, and the cuts and abrasions showed a deeper crimson. I looked like a daisy that had lost all its petals. Moving right along, I said, “Where’s Whelt? He’s here, right?”

“Upstairs. Arlen and Chalmers are with him.”

We took the elevator to the third floor. I could guess which room was his by the four uniform El Paso SWAT cops in helmets and body armor standing outside the door. They seemed serious and nervous, a reasonable state of readiness given that the Chihuahua Cartel had reached into this hospital on a couple of previous occasions. Once Apostles and Perez knew of Whelt’s fate – and I had no doubt that they’d learn of it fast – I was sure they’d come for him and they’d come armed. He would have to be moved.

Gomez and I showed IDs and one of the guards opened the door. Inside were two more armed cops as well as Colonel Arlen Wayne, CIA dipshit Bradley Chalmers and several other blue-suited flunkies I didn’t recognize. Arlen’s head was shaved above the ear, the patch mostly covered with a bandage. Chalmers I’d like to put in bandages.

“Hey, Vin,” said Arlen, beaming, coming over to shake hands. “You made it. From what I hear it was a miraculous escape.”

“I’m taking the act to Vegas. How’s your head?”

“Oh, this?” He touched the dressing. “This was stupid. Matheson took the gun right out of the security guard’s holster and shot him. The same bullet got me. But I was lucky. Can’t say the same for the security guard.”

“Cooper,” said Chalmers by way of greeting.

“I wondered if you’d show up,” I told him. “You and I need to have a little get together. I’ll let you choose the weapons.”

“Get over yourself,” Chalmers replied.

“You lost a good agent working undercover in the Chihuahua Cartel. She didn’t die well. Her name was Bambi.”

“Bambi … Bambi …” Chalmers acted like he’d never heard of her. “Cooper, if Bambi was one of ours, and I’m not saying she was, she would have known the risks. Is that what you seem so upset about?”

No, it wasn’t. I took a deep breath and let it out to keep my anger under control. The issues between us would have to be resolved, but not here. “Where’s Bobbie Macey?” The pilot who had survived Perez’s strike on Horizon Airport had been in a room down the hall, but that was weeks ago.

“WITSEC,” said Arlen.

“What about her co-pilot?”

Arlen frowned. “His family turned off his life support day before yesterday.”

All I could do was shake my head at the senselessness of it.

There was a sharp intake of air from the other side of the room. “Director, sir,” said one of the men in thin ties and navy suits to Chalmers. He was drawing his boss’ attention to the fact that Whelt had regained consciousness. Chalmers went over to the patient, whose leg was on top of the covers and in a cast with an exoskeleton of metal keeping everything straight. Like mine, much of his exposed skin was colored disinfectant orange.

“Senior Airman Angus Whelt,” said Chalmers, taking a position beside the bed.

Whelt looked at him, doped up and defiant.

“Just to let you know,” Chalmers continued, “you’re going to be charged with everything from desertion, to accessory to murder, to trafficking illegal substances, to being a member of a cartel, to driving on the wrong side of the fucking road and everything in between. At last count, there were up to a hundred and fifty separate charges. It’s likely you won’t get out of jail this side of your two-hundredth birthday. Maybe they’ll stop raping you by your sixtieth birthday, but only because by then, on the prison diet, you’ll have lost all your teeth and your mouth won’t be as loose as your ass. And that’s just a small window into your life going forward unless you cooperate.”

Whelt stared at Chalmers and said, “Who the fuck are you?”

“Someone who can help you, if you play your cards right.”

“Fuck off,” was Whelt’s reply.

Listening to the way he dealt with Chalmers made me feel that perhaps Whelt wasn’t such a bad guy after all. Seriously though, the defiance suggested he was mentally strong and that could be a problem. We needed him to give up whatever he knew because Apostles and Perez had a plan and we didn’t have all the details.

Whelt looked at me as I moved toward the bed and his agitation soared. “What’s
he
doing here?” His eyes were suddenly wide. “Get him away from me. Get him away!”

Was it the orange coloring? Whatever, perhaps it could work for us. “Actually, why don’t you clear the room?” I suggested to Arlen. “Just give us ten minutes alone.”

Whelt was horrified at the suggestion.

“Would you like that, Whelt?” asked Arlen, reading the play.

“No, don’t do that,” Whelt pleaded, his eyes searching the faces around him. He reached for Chalmers’ hand and grasped it. “Stay, okay?”

“We’ve got questions and you’ve got answers,” said Chalmers, pulling his hand out of Whelt’s grasp and wiping his palms on his jacket.

“I’ll cooperate. I’ll tell you everything,” he promised. “Just get him outta here. He’s fucking crazy.”

I glanced at Arlen and noted the barest hint of a smile at the corner of his lips. I leaned in closer to Whelt, who tried to climb backward out of the bed away from me. “If I hear you’re holding back on us, you and I are gonna go for a ride, you hear?”

Whelt nodded, tears bursting from his eyeballs, chin quivering.

I gave Gomez a shrug as I walked out past him. In the hallway I found a seat. Blood was seeping through the side of the shirt, oozing through the sutures and the dressing. 

A couple of minutes later, Gomez, Arlen, Chalmers and his followers burst out of the room and came toward me. I stood. “Well?”

“July 20; Columbus, New Mexico,” Chalmers announced.

Columbus was no surprise, but the date? It was familiar. I just couldn’t recall its significance. “Why July 20?”

“Whelt didn’t know,” said Arlen. “We threatened him with a little more of you, but that didn’t change the answer. You’ve given him a bad case of post-traumatic stress disorder. In short, we believe he told us the truth. July 20 is the date and Columbus, New Mexico, is the target. Whelt said they’ve been training to hit it.”

The elevator doors were open on our floor. We all rode it to the basement. I didn’t need to point out that it was July 15 and that the 20th was just around the corner. And then the significance hit me. “Pancho Villa died July 20, 1916.”

“What’s Pancho Villa got to do with anything?” asked Chalmers.

“Whelt didn’t mention anything about him?” I asked.

Arlen shook his head. “We just got the top line. A full debrief will begin tomorrow. We got professional army interrogators coming. The attending doctor was concerned about his mental state. And as I said, that’s your bad.”

Gomez smirked. “What the hell did you do to him?”

“Villa is a symbol,” I said.

“Of what?” Chalmers wanted to know.

“Mexico kicking American butt. On March 9, 1916, Pancho Villa crossed into the United States and attacked the army barracks at Columbus, New Mexico.” I recalled the glimpse I had of Apostles with crossed bandoliers and a sombrero, riding around the desert parade ground on a horse.
Estás cerca, ahora …
“He uses the symbolism to rev up his men.”

“Then I don’t get why he isn’t attacking Columbus on March 9.” Gomez observed. “Wouldn’t the anniversary of the original attack be a more auspicious date?”

Arlen shrugged. “Perhaps March 9 didn’t suit his overall timetable.”

Down in the basement parking lot, Chalmers’ minions flitted away on important CIA business as the asshole himself paused at his rental to give us his verdict. “It all fits together.”

Maybe and maybe not. Gomez was a long way from stupid – an attack on Columbus on a March 9 date would’ve made plenty more sense.

“What’s he trying to do?” asked Arlen. “Start that war?”

“Wars bring troops and troops bring money and buy drugs,” Gomez said.

“Maybe we just got up his nose for intercepting so many of his drug shipments. He ain’t been happy about it.”

“If he attacks a US town, every disaffected misfit spoiling for a fight will rally to whatever he says his cause is,” Arlen pointed out. “It’ll give him the kind of credibility no other cartel has had.”

Gomez rubbed his hand across the two-day growth on his cheeks. “Might just let the guy forge some kind of super cartel.”

“What about the Tears of Chihuahua, Vin? What’s his role?” asked Arlen.

“As far as I could tell it’s fear and intimidation, which he’s very good at.”

“Oh, I meant to show you this.” The colonel reached into his jacket’s inside pocket, pulled out a folded sheet of newsprint and handed it to me.

“What is it?” I asked, unfolding it.

“Welcome back. That’s tomorrow’s front page. Should stop you being accidentally arrested or shot at around here.”

I held a picture of my smiling face beneath the
El Diario
banner. Not my favorite photo. The last time I’d seen it, the headline above it had screamed, “Killer!” That was now replaced with the word, “Innocent.”

There was a blurb beneath the photo that I assumed elaborated on the headline. I folded it up and put it in my pocket.

“And meanwhile,” said Chalmers, unimpressed, “your escapade has been a waste of time and resources. You were supposed to bring back something with Perez’s DNA on it to compare with evidence collected at Horizon, were you not? So where is it, Cooper?” He smiled his oily, perfect-hair smile at me. “You got maybe a sweater with stains on it for us?”

“Has anyone noticed whether there are any surveillance cameras down here?” I asked.

Gomez looked around. “Haven’t seen any.”

Arlen shrugged. “Why do you ask?”

I turned and buried my fist deep in Chalmers’ solar plexus. His eyes popped out of his head as his sank to his knees, unable to breath.

Gomez and Arlen exchanged a glance.

I looked down on Chalmers. “I want this guy arrested on charges of … let’s see, aiding and abetting, attempted murder and conspiracy. Kirk Matheson shot his way out of lawful custody a second time. From
your
custody, Chalmers. You had one of the police guarding him slip him a gun, which he used to shoot his way out. He even killed the guy who gave him the gun. How nice and neat for you.”

“We lost you, Cooper,” said Chalmers, gasping for breath, down on all fours. “We believed Matheson would know where Apostles was and thus lead us to you, which he did. I saved your fucking life.”

Gomez and Arlen were horrified by Chalmers’ admission.

“I rest my case,” I told them.