The Prince of Risk (35 page)

I
t was his last run.

Sandy “Skinner” Beaufoy hurried up Tenth Avenue, carrying a tray of coffee and doughnuts. It was nine, and the storms that had pounded the city all night had stopped. Here in Chelsea, the sidewalks teemed with pedestrians. The sight was a relief. The more people out and about, the better. Police were trained never to shoot into a crowd. He suffered from no such reluctance.

Beaufoy turned into one of the commuter lots near the Holland Tunnel. The excursion onto the city streets wasn’t just for refreshments but to monitor for heightened police activity. He sought out police at several street corners and lingered nearby long enough to pick up an indication that they were on alert. He noted nothing out of the ordinary.

Beaufoy hurried up the ramp to the second level. He was forty going on sixty, with a decent patch in the South African Army behind him, followed by less decent patches chasing a paycheck in hellholes across Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. There was always work to be had if you were handy with a gun, knew how to take orders, and kept your cool under fire. But Beaufoy had escaped too many times. Even a cat only has nine lives, and he reckoned he’d used up a fair number more than that. He’d taken a bullet in the lung in Liberia and escaped an IED by a whisker in Baghdad, though he still suffered migraines from the explosion. The capper was the six-month stint in Black Beach prison, a cold, damp pit that had robbed him of his teeth and left him shivering even when it was 90 degrees outside. There were no two ways about it. He was played out.

The two hundred grand he’d been paid up front was tucked away in a numbered account in Vanuatu, which was the last truly safe banking haven, even if he couldn’t spell it correctly, or for that matter find it on a map. It was an island somewhere in the South Pacific, and that was good enough for him. After this, he planned on going somewhere warmer, where he could bake in the sun until his skin was tanned as black as that of the Kaffirs in the Transvaal and the last bit of cold was burned out of his bones.

As for his nickname, it wasn’t what people thought. He wasn’t some savage who enjoyed skinning his enemies alive. It came from his first posting in the army, as a mule skinner with the 10th Mountain Cavalry. No one knew animals like he did. So it would have to be an island with plenty of grass for his horses to eat, and of course with no extradition treaties to the U.S. or Britain or wherever the hell he might end up behind bars. He’d made himself one promise going in: no more prison.

Beaufoy spotted the van at the rear of the lot. He climbed in and distributed the coffee and doughnuts to his team. Because of the rushed departure, there hadn’t been time for a last hot meal. The six men and two women seated behind him were dressed in civilian clothes. Loose, slightly oversized shirts covered their Kevlar vests and communications equipment. Athletic bags at their feet concealed their automatic weapons. They looked like a young, healthy, clean-cut bunch.

Beaufoy placed a call on one of the operational phones. “Checking for any last-minute details,” he said.

“There have been no compromises,” replied Septimus Reventlow. “Everything is a go.”

Beaufoy hung up and checked his watch again.

“If anyone needs a little pick-me-up, now’s the time.” Beaufoy popped a go pill. At his age, he needed everything he could get to maintain his edge. He looked from person to person, receiving a committed nod from each.

Beaufoy started the engine.
“Gott mit uns.”

M
agnus Lee studied his collection of neckties. He needed something elegant yet modest. A tie that would suit a future member of the Standing Committee of the People’s Republic of China. Blue, not black. God forbid red. He took a step to his right and ran a thumb across his navy ties. He selected a midnight-blue Dior and held it against his white shirt. Perfect.

Lee finished dressing and walked into his bedroom. His manservant waited on his knees, ready to apply a coat of polish to his shoes. John Lobb. Custom made in London. A future vice premier had to look the part. The Chinese people did not want their leaders dressed like peasants.

Lee took the elevator to the lobby. His chauffeur held open the door to the Mercedes and Lee slipped into the back seat. Traffic on Dongguan Avenue was light, and he arrived at the Peninsula Beijing, 3 miles from his home, in forty minutes. In the Huang Ting Restaurant, he was shown to a favored table. The premier arrived soon after. The men ate an expansive dinner of dim sum, shark’s fin soup, fresh grouper, and Peking duck, followed by a plate of fresh fruit and snifters of Hennessy cognac.

“Word from New York?” the premier asked finally, his cheeks reddened by the spirits.

“Any minute,” said Lee.

“If all goes well, you will be on the Standing Committee tomorrow, Vice Premier Lee.”

“I have every confidence that Troy will succeed.”

The premier wiped his mouth, suppressing a mean smile. “It’s not enough that we succeed,” he whispered. “The West must fail.”

Lee nodded.

The premier held his arm as the men descended the stairs to their separate automobiles. A photographer from the
Beijing Times
took their picture. In a few hours, it would be posted on the newspaper’s website. Tomorrow morning it would appear on the front page of every paper across the land. Word would spread that his election was assured. Magnus Lee, vice premier of finance. The yuan would drop like a stone. His investment with Bobby Astor would bear fruit and he would repay Elder Chen.

It was all so close now.

Lee checked his watch.

Any minute.

T
hirty minutes before the opening, the floor of the New York Stock Exchange was a scene of ordered pandemonium. The floor was spread over three cavernous high-ceilinged rooms covering a total of 40,000 square feet, with electronic trading posts situated in a rambling fashion like bumpers on a pinball machine. A balcony encircling the floor provided tight quarters for media outlets such as CNN, Fox News, CNBC, and others that maintained mini broadcast studios and kept reporters on call from dawn to dusk. Overlooking it all was the terrace where dignitaries stood to ring the opening bell.

Alex stood restlessly at one of the two main entries to the floor, from which she could see outside the building to Exchange Place and the old headquarters of J. P. Morgan across the street. “Mintz,” she said into her lapel microphone. “Come back.”

To protect against the bad guys listening in, she’d demanded access to a military bandwidth reserved for national emergencies. It wasn’t foolproof, but it was the best they could do at a moment’s notice.

“All clear,” said Mintz, his voice plumped with pride at his newfound status. He was no longer Deadeye in jest. He was the real thing.

Alex checked in with her agents who were patrolling the streets surrounding the Exchange. None had sighted any of the mercenaries whose dossiers she had found in James Salt’s home, or numbers 1 to 23, as she thought of them.

She’d read Palantir’s report and passed it on to Janet McVeigh, along with all she’d learned from Michael Grillo. From there the information had traveled to the police commissioner, the mayor’s office, and of course FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C. There was no question that the New York Stock Exchange was the target. The mayor was adamant in his wish that the Exchange remain open for business as usual. The law enforcement authorities agreed, though their reasons had nothing to do with pride, and everything to do with tactics.

It was also decided not to publicly broadcast the nature of the threat. A plan was fielded to block off all vehicular traffic in a 1-square-mile radius of the Exchange building. That, too, was vetoed. Alex pointed out that it was probable that a secondary target had been chosen and mapped out. The idea of an attack against a department store, a government building, or, God forbid, a school by so many heavily armed, battle-hardened mercenaries was too terrible to contemplate.

There was really only one choice, and that was to capture the terrorists. To achieve this, two hundred policemen and FBI agents, most from the local Joint Terrorism Task Force, had been called in, briefed, and assigned a sector to patrol. All wore plain clothes. They were dressed as Wall Street traders, secretaries, tourists, and city workers. All had been provided with photographs of the mercenaries. The last order was the most important: no one was to engage a suspect until being given the green light from Alex. The only visible sign of the beefed-up security was an additional Hercules brigade positioned at the corner of Wall and Broad, but this was hardly out of the ordinary. The New York Stock Exchange was a hard target in the best of times.

As Alex peered out to the street, it appeared to be a normal midweek summer morning.

What could go wrong?

S
andy Beaufoy drove the van down Broadway. Traffic was moving nicely. There was a police scanner on the center console. As he neared the drop-off zone, he listened to the usual litany of petty crime, larceny, and traffic mishaps that filled a big-city policeman’s day, be it in Jo’burg or the Big Apple. There was no hint that the police were gearing up for something out of the ordinary. Even so, he was wary, and listened carefully for any euphemism or nuanced turn of phrase. He was almost disappointed that the police were so clueless. There was, after all, no question that the FBI and NYPD knew they were here. Not after the bomb in Darien.

There hadn’t been time to remove all the weapons and munitions from the safe house, so he’d made the decision to booby-trap the place and blow it to kingdom come. The less evidence, the better. The morning radio buzzed with reports of the explosion in the Connecticut town and the death of an FBI agent. If he hadn’t heard from James Salt in over twelve hours, it was to be expected. At this point, it was impossible to communicate without compromising one another. Salt’s master had given him the green light. That was all that mattered. Sandy Beaufoy was a soldier. He followed orders.

The signal turned red at Zuccotti Park. Without prompting, the passenger door slid open and three men jumped out. They separated immediately. Wearing baseball caps and sunglasses, two of them carrying athletic bags, they looked like any other unthreatening Caucasian males. For all intents and purposes, they were invisible.

Beaufoy stopped again a block further on. A second three-man squad alighted in front of Trinity Church. Wall Street began to his left. Barricades prevented cars from entering. The Exchange was 200 feet down the narrow road. As such, there was always a police presence. His eye searched for reinforcements. Several uniformed policemen manned the vehicle barricades across the street. They appeared at ease—jovial, even.

If they only knew what was going to hit them, thought Beaufoy.

He had divided his remaining men into two teams, one infiltrating the target by the Number 5 line of the subway, Wall Street Station. It was common for Transit Police to search rucksacks and bags, no reason needed, so he’d ordered the team to strap their compact H&K submachine guns to their backs and tape their spare cartridges to their calves.

The other team came by car, but from the south. The plan called for the three teams to converge on the Exchange and to open fire only when they reached a distance of 20 feet from the building. From there it was a lightning strike through the entry. A hail of automatic-weapons fire, grenades, and, for the team entering on Exchange Place, a hearty hello from their TOW antitank weapon to see themselves in.

Beaufoy stopped the van a third time at the corner of Morris Street, allowing the final two mercenaries to get out. He turned right at the light and drove 200 yards, then parked illegally. He threw the keys in the sewer. He would not be back. Approaching Broadway, he made a commo check with every member of his team.

“Alpha comeback?”

“Alpha clear.”

“Beta?”

Twenty-two were called. Twenty-two answered.

Beaufoy reached Broadway. He spotted three of his men fanned out along the sidewalk, crossing the street and closing on the target. If he had a shred of sanity remaining, he would be scared out of his wits. It was a suicide mission. No one paid a merc $1 million with $200,000 up front. And yet he wasn’t. He was battle-bright and battle-ready. If this was to be his last day, so be it. He would have it no other way.

Gott mit uns.

Beaufoy ran across the street.

T
he yuan was dying a quick and ugly death.

“You watching the rates?” Marv Shank stood in the doorway, smiling broadly. “We’re up five hundred mil. You were right all along. The Chinese are depreciating. If the yuan keeps dropping, we’re going to have our best quarter ever.”

Astor looked at the screen. The yuan was trading at 6.5 and rising, well above the rate at which he’d purchased his contracts. The dramatic shift had occurred an hour ago, after a picture of Magnus Lee and the Chinese premier exiting a popular restaurant in Beijing was splashed across the Web. The heir apparent had been officially anointed. Lee was outspoken in his support of an export-driven economy. It was simply a matter of putting two and two together.

“Not bad.”

“‘Not bad’? What, are you kidding me? We’re already up a couple hundred mil. It’s stellar. You da man, Bobby.”

“Sure, but, it’s not ours.”

Shank’s smile evaporated. “What do you mean, ‘not ours’?”

“I informed our lenders that the wire transfers they received yesterday to cover our margin call was made in error. I asked that they wire the money back to the originating bank.”

“To Septimus Reventlow’s account?”

“Exactly. Technically, we stand in default of our agreements at the close yesterday. All our positions were frozen at the prevailing rate.”

“The rate at which we go under?”

“That’s correct.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“It’s done. We don’t do business with terrorists.”

“But…” Shank shook his head, searching for words. Finally, he sighed and gave up. Even he couldn’t disagree with Astor.

“Sell at the open to cover what we owe. Talk to Mandy Price. See what she thinks.”

“What’s going to happen to Reventlow’s money?”

“Nothing for the moment. First the government needs to get proof against him. So far, there’s only my word he’s involved in this whole thing.”

“Show ’em your hand,” said Shank, incensed.

“I don’t think that will count for much a year from now when this thing finally gets to a court of law. And anyway, Reventlow’s gone. He probably hopped a jet as soon as he figured out that his brother didn’t make it. I give you even money no one sees him again.”

“So tomorrow the yuan falls through the floor, we should be up two billion, we should be the toast of the town, but instead Comstock is broke, I lose my shirt, and Septimus Reventlow just gets to walk away.”

“Pretty much. Unless the government presses charges against him or his family office, and we both know that isn’t going to happen.”

Early that morning, Astor, Alex, and Shank had been ushered into an office at 26 Federal Plaza and given a sharp talking-to by the director of the FBI himself. No word of Magnus Lee’s or Septimus Reventlow’s involvement in the affair could be allowed to get out, now or ever. Palantir’s report was on the president’s desk. A special meeting of the National Security Council was scheduled for later in the day. Were word of China’s involvement in Charles Hughes’s and Martin Gelman’s deaths to leak, the diplomatic repercussions could be unthinkable. The assassination of government officials counted as a
casus belli
. The hawks on Capitol Hill would be calling for war.

“Fuck me,” said Shank, throwing up his arms, turning and leaving the office.

Astor watched through his window as his friend moved up and down the trading floor, screaming out sell orders, scowling, berating anyone who dared ask him a single question. He was a creature of the Street. Marv Shank would live and die on the floor.

Astor called Alex. “Anything?”

“Nada.”

“You think they gave up?”

“Not a chance.”

“But Reventlow knows we’re on to them.”

“Does he? I’m not sure. And if he does, I don’t know if it matters.”

Astor turned and walked to the east-facing window, looking down toward Broadway and Wall Street. “So did you think about it?”

“What?”

“You know…
us.
”

“I don’t go out with men who chew their nails,” said Alex.

“Very funny.”

“Hold on for a sec.” Alex’s voice hardened, and her worried tone sent a chill down Astor’s spine.

“What is it?” he asked.

There was no answer, and Astor asked again.

“They’re here,” said Alex.

The line went dead.

Astor put his hand to the window, his eyes finding the Exchange building.

It was happening now.