Contract to Kill (23 page)

The descending thuds got louder.

Mason quickly changed weapons, pointed to himself, then to the door.

Darla and Chip nodded and backed up a few steps.

Standing off to the side, Mason waited like a predatory eel.

The door swung outward, in Chip’s direction.

When the man stepped into the hall, Mason used the same technique as he had on the delivery boy. He clamped his left hand over the man’s mouth, only this time he didn’t pin an arm. He drove his knife into the man’s torso just under the rib cage and perforated the guy’s lung.

Keeping his hand in place, Mason lowered his victim to the floor. He reached out with a foot, nudged Darla, and mouthed:
Three in the head
.

Without hesitating, Darla took careful aim to avoid hitting his hand. Mason turned away as Darla’s suppressed pistol flashed. The sound was so faint no one upstairs could have heard it over the music.

Without being prompted, Chip positioned himself just inside the door, where he could watch the staircase leading up to the office.

“I’ll take point,” he whispered. “Darla, you’re down here watching our six.”

“You got it.”

He liked that about her—she didn’t question orders. “Chip, when we make our move up there, I’ll take left side of the room, you take the right.” Mason wiped the wet knife on the dying man’s shirt and sheathed it. With his .22 in hand again, he started up the stairs and sensed Hahn’s presence two steps behind. The same music emanated from the office, but not as loud.

Halfway up, he stopped and put Hahn on hold. He looked behind to see what his backdrop was. Good, a dark wall and ceiling.

Moving slowly, he came out of his crouch and looked over the top of the last step.

Flanked by two beautiful young women, a black man in a dark lavender suit, white tie, and some kind of fancy top hat sat on a couch. The guy’s hands were occupied between the women’s nylon-clad legs. In the mirrored wall behind the couch, Mason saw two doors; both closed. Two other well-dressed men were sitting on a sofa that was positioned at a right angle to Top Hat’s couch. In front of them, a glass table awaited their drugs. Complacent, one of the men flanking Top Hat looked bored and the other had his head tilted back with his eyes closed.
Bodyguards, and poor excuses at that
.

He turned to Chip, made a two-finger gesture, and pointed in the direction he’d seen the two men on the couch. He then pointed to his eyes and made an opening-door movement, followed by two fingers. When Mason issued a sweeping motion to the right, Chip offered a nod of understanding.

Mason felt a hand on his back, the signal Chip was ready to go. He reached into his waist pack and grabbed a second gun with his left hand.

With Chip right behind him, Mason bounded up the stairs and sprinted straight toward Top Hat.

The man’s shocked expression told all.

Before Top Hat could do more than yank his hands free, Mason fired the Taser and kept his finger on the trigger, giving the guy the full duration of fifty thousand volts.

In the mirror, he saw Chip dispatch the bodyguards with precise forehead shots. The expended .22 casings flipped over the couch and clinked off the wall. In less than three seconds Chip had neutralized both of them.

The women froze but, surprisingly, didn’t scream. Perhaps the Taser and Hahn’s near-silent pistol reports temporarily confused them.

Their puzzlement ended when Top Hat flopped into the brunette’s lap. She flinched as some of the electricity flowed into her body. Top Hat’s lips moved, but no sound emerged.

With blank expressions, the bodyguards slumped toward each other, their heads colliding.

Mason pointed the .22 at the blonde’s head, made eye contact, and then saw his reflection in the mirror. It made him feel heartless and cruel, and he didn’t pull the trigger. These women weren’t rabid dogs, and they didn’t deserve that kind of end.

He tracked Chip’s movements in the mirror as his second-in-command cleared the office and bathroom. Disguising his voice by making it raspy, he told Chip to drag Top Hat away from the couch and secure his hands, feet, and mouth.

The women cringed and covered their chests as Chip stepped forward and yanked Top Hat to the floor.

Mason activated his radio. “We’re secure up here, fall back to the gate at the street. Verbal copies from here on.” He wasn’t sure he’d hear Darla’s acknowledgment clicks over the music.

“Copy, on my way out.”

He looked at Hahn. “Kill the music.”

Hahn walked over to a cabinet behind Top Hat’s desk and cranked the receiver’s volume down to zero.

Mason locked eyes with the blonde and asked, “What did you just see?”

Despite staring death in the face, her blue eyes radiated intelligence and resolve. “Nothing,” she said with a soft voice. “We were in the bathroom.”

“Cameras?”

She shook her head. “He hates them.”

Mason took a look around, confirming her answer. It made sense; why record illegal activity? Mason didn’t discount the possibility of hidden surveillance, but nothing obvious was visible.

He nodded to the dead bodyguards and said, “Mark them.”

The women remained motionless as Chip tacked 10,000-peso bills to each of their foreheads.

Mason made eye contact with both women. “I’ll be very unhappy if you take those. They’ve been demonetized since 1996, so they’re practically worthless. You can buy them for ten bucks.”

The blonde squinted in thought.

Mason reached down and grabbed the blonde’s purse. He removed her wallet, pulled her driver’s license, and took a picture with his cell phone. He also photographed the brunette’s ID.

“Here’s the deal: I’m offering a onetime, take-it-or-leave-it proposal. If you two keep what you saw to yourselves and never tell anyone, you’ll never see me again and you won’t have to worry about looking over your shoulders for the rest of your lives. Trust me: you’ll never see me coming anyway. Do we have a deal?”

They both nodded.

“Verbally, please, like this.” Mason put his hand up, imitating an oath-of-office pose. “I give you my word I’ll never tell anyone about this.”

After they repeated what he said, word for word, he pulled the wad of hundreds from his pocket. “A grand each, as a show of sincerity on my part.” He tossed the money onto the couch. “The downstairs cameras recorded you earlier, and they’re likely time-stamped, so make sure you get your stories straight in the event the police question you. Don’t make your stories exactly the same. If you cave under police questioning and tell them you saw us, bad things will happen.” Mason paused to let that sink in. “Use the rear door to leave, the gate at the street will be unlocked. Stay right here until we’re gone. Give us five minutes before you leave, not a second sooner.”

The blonde said, “Thank you.”

“Don’t make me regret this.”

“You won’t.”

Top Hat was fully conscious now, and his eyes reflected rage, not fear. That would change soon enough.

Mason grabbed him by the collar and dragged him down the stairs. The guy grunted with each step, sounding like slow-motion laughter.

Mason knew Chip would be uneasy about leaving the women alive, but he’d never protest. Chip respected his command decisions, and Mason’s actions weren’t out of character with their ops in Afghanistan. There’d been many times when Mason could’ve killed innocents, but let them live.

Downstairs, Mason dragged Top Hat across the dance floor into the stockroom. Hahn returned the set of keys to the dead man’s pocket.

He radioed Darla. “Hahn’s coming out. He’ll watch the alley while you bring the SUV.” Mason locked eyes with Top Hat. “If our guest offers any resistance, I’ll knock him cold and drag his ass down the alley. Give me a ten-second arrival call.”

“Copy.”

Before stepping out the door, Chip put a bullet into the exterior camera.

Mason glanced at his watch. From entry to exit, less than five minutes had elapsed. Without a hitch, they’d just kidnapped one of Alisio’s most important lieutenants.

When Top Hat made eye contact, Mason winked at him.

CHAPTER 22

Standing with Harv in the parking lot, Nathan glanced toward the sedan to verify the windows were still rolled up. He didn’t want Karen to hear any part of this call.

“Well I guess we’re about to find out how well my dad knows George Beaumont. You ready?”

“Go easy, Nate.”

His father answered on the third ring.

“Hi, Nathan. You’re calling awfully early. I always enjoy hearing from you, even at . . . oh, five thirty in the morning.”

“I hope I didn’t wake you.”

“My alarm beat you. I’m prepping for a long day of lobbyists, activists, campaigners, and petitioners. They all want their feel-good programs as long as someone else pays for them.”

“Sounds like business as usual.”

“It is.”

“I have you on speaker. Harv’s with me.”

“Good morning, Senator.”

“Harv, I’ve been trying to get you to call me Stone for over twenty years.”

“Sorry, sir, I’m old-school.”

“How’re Candace and your boys Dillon and Lucas?”

“Very well, sir, thank you. How’s Martha?”

“Nathan’s mother has the constitution of a dreadnought.”

“I’ve always wondered where Nathan got his mettle.”

“What can I do for my fellow Marines?”

“We’ve got a situation out here,” Nathan said. “How soon can you call us back from a secure landline?”

“A situation. What’s the problem?”

“It’s best if we don’t discuss it over open airwaves. Can you head into your office early today?”

“I was already planning to. Something tells me my hectic day’s about to get worse. Can you give me something, at least?”

“Beaumont Specialists, Incorporated.”

Silence on the other end.

“I can be in my office in about twenty-five minutes. What number should I call?”

Harv gave Stone his private line at First Security.

“Got it. Let’s make it more like thirty in case there’s any kind of traffic or road construction.”

“We’ll talk then.” Nathan ended the call.

Stone shook his head. Could Nathan’s timing be any worse? He was tempted to wake George Beaumont up and find out what the heck was going on but thought better of it. He should hear what Nathan had to say first. Could it be a coincidence that Beaumont was in town and scheduled to speak at today’s weekly meeting of the CDT?

Although Nathan hadn’t been confrontational, Stone heard the tightness in his son’s voice. He wished Nathan wasn’t so short-tempered, but after what he went through at the hands of that sadistic madman in Nicaragua, it was completely understandable. Stone had learned years ago that absorbing his son’s anger, rather than reflecting it, worked best.

Martha McBride, Stone’s best friend for sixty-four years, entered the kitchen. She was four years younger, but at their current ages, the difference seemed minimal. At eighty-five, Stone had the dubious honor of being the oldest federal legislator currently holding office. He knew the running joke around Capitol Hill was that he got his nickname because his birth certificate was carved on a stone tablet. In reality he’d earned the name during a heroic, perhaps reckless, display of bravery during the Korean War. The men under his command said he’d acted like Stonewall Jackson, the Confederate general who’d rallied his men under heavy Union fire at the First Battle of Manassas. It hadn’t been bravery, just blind rage at being shelled by mortars for two straight hours.

Like father, like son.

He liked that Martha didn’t dye her hair. At five foot eleven inches, she was taller than 90 percent of the men on the planet. But not Stone. He was six foot four, an inch shorter than Nathan, but no less ornery. Butting heads was a common occurrence in the McBride family. Martha had once referred to them as a couple of bighorn sheep fighting for a crag on a mountaintop.

For his part, he kept his white hair cropped short in the classic Marine cut. Although gravity and the sun had taken a toll on both of them, he’d gladly test his and Martha’s stamina against people half their age, because they’d win most of the contests.

“What’s wrong, Stone? You’ve got that look.”

“That was Nathan. He wants me to call him back from my office.”

“It sounds serious.”

Stone’s tone was shorter than he intended. “Isn’t it always?”

“He’d been calling a lot more, until lately.”

Stone didn’t respond.

“The phone works in both directions.”

Again, Stone said nothing.

“You’re going to call him back, aren’t you?”

“Just as soon as I get to the office. I’m afraid we’ll have to skip our breakfast time together.”

“What’s your day look like? I can meet you for lunch.”

He already knew, but he opened his weekly calendar booklet anyway. Good grief, he was already overbooked and needed to reschedule several appointments. There just weren’t enough hours in a workday. If he allowed them, the energy vampires would quite literally drain all of his free time. Not just some of it,
all
of it. He fought a constant battle between the unrelenting weight of political pressure—seemingly from every direction—and maintaining a private life. There were times when his job felt like a gravitational black hole.