No Way to Die (24 page)

I poked my head back into the hallway—still clear. I stepped into the hallway and moved quietly forward. Doc’s office was on my right. I did my scan-and-clear routine on it. I started to step across the hall to clear the workroom, but I had to step back into Doc’s office when I heard yet another file cabinet door slam shut and a man say, “Damn. Where in fuck’s name did he put it?”I peeked quickly out the door and down the hallway toward my office. I heard nothing coming from the workroom, so I decided to focus on the last two rooms—my office and the conference room. I moved forward down the hall.

I picked my office first at the exact same moment I heard, “We need to wrap this up, mate. Somebody might come in early.” I recognized the voice immediately—it was the bald-headed son of a bitch I’d met in the parking lot.

By then, I’d reached the doorway. I peeked inside. The light on the outside balcony shown through the office windows and lit the room just enough for me to see two men with their backs toward me. Both had small LCD flashlights and wore dark clothing and leather gloves. One man was looking through the top drawer of my file cabinet while the other—Mr. Baldie—looked through a credenza drawer. Time for a little surprise. I reached inside my office and flipped on the lights. Both men spun around, surprised.

“Someone did come in early, you fucking idiots,” I announced. “Stand up and put your hands in the air, right now!” I leveled my gun at them, moving it back and forth between the two.

They were clearly stunned, both by the sudden bright lights as well as my sudden appearance. They were pros, though, and they recovered quickly.

“Hey, Yank,” Mr. Baldie said. “You going to go ahead and shoot us, then?”

I stared at him for a second. “I might,” I said, “but only if you do something completely stupid, like move even just the slightest little bit.” I dropped my left hand to my coat pocket and pulled out my cell phone. “I’m just going to hold you here until the cops come.”

I no sooner punched in “9” when I was suddenly slammed from behind. I dropped my cell phone. My gun arm was swept down hard—the gun was pointing down before I knew what hit me. Clearly, I’d missed what must have been asshole number three, who’d been in the conference room. He held me in a classic bear hug from behind.

My Krav Maga training kicked in. I immediately dropped down into a crouch—legs spread wide—so I couldn’t be easily moved. At the same time, I hit the back of his hands hard with the knuckles on my left hand—once, twice, three times before his fingers flew open. I grabbed one of the fingers and pushed it over toward his thumb as I spun out of the hold. All this happened in less than a second. He started to fall forward—the pain of having your finger dislocated is intense. As he fell, I kicked him in the groin to add to his misery.

That one dispatched, I started to turn back to the other two when suddenly, the whole right side of my head felt like it exploded. I was falling forward—falling, falling, falling. I saw bright stars shooting past for a few moments; then, just like that, all my lights went out completely.

I WAS RUNNING. Mortar rounds were landing all around me, exploding with brilliant flashes and shattering booms. I was making tracks for the dubious shelter of my fighting hole. Had to get into my hole. Had to cover up. Where was it? Panic! I knew it was right here somewhere—but it wasn’t here now. Keep running! My gear jingled loudly against my vest—somehow I could hear the jingles amid the chaos of the explosions. I could feel the rush of scorched air flying past me, the dirt and rocks shooting up and slapping me in the face.

“Danny!” someone yelled. “Danny!”

In the darkness and the confusion, I sprinted for the voice, desperate for help, desperate for cover. Noiseless explosions now, flashing everywhere as I focused on the voice.

“Danny!” I felt him shaking me, but I could not see him. “Come on, Danny!”

Suddenly, a striking pain in my head. “Oh, shit,” I groaned. “I’m fuckin’ hit. Call for a medic.”

“No, you’re not, dude. You’re here. You’re okay.”

I focused on the voice, grasping for consciousness.

I tried to open my eyes. “I’m here?” I said. “Where the fuck am I?” I tried to get up.

Strong hands held me down. “Relax, dude,” he said. “You’re okay. You’re safe.”

“Doc?” I asked, still unable to see.

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“What happened? Where am I?”Total confusion.

“You’re lying on the floor in your office, man. Somebody walloped the shit out of you with your bat.”

My Edgar Martínez–autographed Rawlings bat flashed in front of my eyes. That made no sense whatsoever.

“My bat?” I asked. I tried to open my eyes. Doc’s face danced uncertainly in the bright lights. I started to push myself up. My hands fell into a cool, sticky liquid.

“Here, stay down,” Doc said. “You got hit hard, and you lost some blood. You shouldn’t get up. You’re okay now. Just relax.”

A shooting pain fired again through my head. “Oh shit,” I said, falling backward. “My head hurts like a motherfucker.”

“I’ll bet it does,” Doc said. “You should see yourself. You’re lucky you ain’t dead, bro. You took a good thump.” He paused a moment, and then added, “You happen to see who did this?”

I thought about it—tried to, anyway—but I couldn’t figure it out. Figures and voices flashed through my mind. They were familiar—but they weren’t. “I can’t remember,” I said. “I see faces, but I can’t place them.”

“No sweat, dude,” he said. “I’ve seen this before. Your short-term memory’s gone. It’ll come back.”

“Paramedics!” a voice yelled from somewhere.

“Back here!” Doc yelled.

I remember seeing lights being flashed in my eyes. They asked me questions, but I don’t remember what they were or what I said in response. They picked me up and put me on a gurney. I fell asleep as the ambulance hit its sirens and pulled away.

* * * *

“We’re at Harborview, in the ER.” I heard the voice as I gradually awoke.

“Relax, Toni,” Doc said. “He’s good. He’s going to be okay.”

“I know, there’s a lot of blood. But I think he’s okay. They stitched him up, and now they’re getting ready to take him to X-ray. They got him all hooked up to shit, but they say he’s going to be okay. They said they want to admit him and keep him for a day or two. What’s that? Yeah, for sure.”

“What?” I asked. “What’s she saying?”

“She says you got a hard head and that you’re gonna need a new bat.”

My eyes were still closed. I tried to reach for the phone with my left arm, aiming toward the sound of Doc’s voice, but apparently, I was hooked to an IV, and it started to pull.

“Whoa, dude!” Doc said. “You’re plugged in here all over the place. Here, I’ll hold it for you.” He placed the phone to my ear.

“Danny?” Toni said, her voice nearly frantic.

“Hey,” I said groggily, relieved to hear her voice.

“Danny, oh shit, are you alright?”

“Yeah, I think so,” I said. “My head hurts fuckin’ fierce.”

“Yeah, and that’s with you pumped up on morphine or something like that, dude,” Doc said.

“I got here, and I saw blood all over the place and your cell phone on the floor and nobody around,” Toni said. “I nearly freaked.”

I smiled. “You’re a professional. You’re not supposed to freak.”

“Shut up.”

“Just saying.”

“I called Doc, but he had his phone off until just now.”

“Probably hospital rules,” I said. I was able to open my eyes enough to see Doc, and to see that I was in a hospital room, curtained in. I was hooked up to several different machines that were monitoring vitals. My pulse was forty-five—about normal for me.

“Danny,” she said, “do you know who did this? Did you see them?”

I thought about this. My mind was a little clearer now. I saw the face.
Hey Yank, you going to go ahead and shoot us, then?

“Yeah,” I said, the fog lifting. “I know who did this. It was that fuckin’ bald-headed Brit. They broke into the office early this morning. I came in early because I couldn’t sleep, and I surprised them.” I thought about what had happened.

“Shit, I thought there were just two of them. I must have walked right past the third son of a bitch. What a dumbass I was.I confronted the first two in my office—had ’em nailed. Then this other dude grabs me from behind. He must have been in the conference room.I spun out and kicked him in the nuts, but while I was doing it, Mr. fuckin’ Baldie must have grabbed my bat and clocked me. It felt like my head exploded. Then I was lights out.”

“You’re lucky,” she said. “He could have killed you.”

“Yeah, I suppose. Maybe he thought he did.”

“Could be,” she said. “There’s a lot of blood on the floor here.”

“Yeah. All mine, I’m sad to say.”

“What do you think they wanted?” she asked. “What were they looking for?”

“I think they’re looking for the key,” I said. Toni was the only person other than me who knew that the key wasn’t at the office. The Starfire Protocol box was—it was locked in the safe in the workroom. But the key was in the bottom of my guitar case in my apartment.

“Well, I’ll get things cleaned up; then, I’m coming over.”

“Toni,” I said, “wait a minute. Think about this for a second. There aren’t any more secrets now, are there? The lights are on, and these fuckin’ cockroaches are caught out in the open. They know we know what’s going on. No telling what happens next.”

“I know,” she said. “As soon as I hang up, I’m going to call Richard. I’ll get him to get some of his police buddies to go over to your dad’s and to Katherine’s. Kenny’s here with me.”

“I’ll take care of her, boss,” I heard Kenny call out.

“You better,” I said. “And I mean it.”

“I can’t tell you how safe that makes me feel,” Toni said.

“I want you two out of the office,” I said. “Just lock up and stay mobile. We’ll figure out a plan when you get here.”

“Okay,” she said. “Should I call Inez?”

“No. Let’s talk first.” A thought hit me. “Oh—have Kenny call later, will you?”

“Okay. See you in a bit.”

Doc took the phone away. “Doc,” I said. He looked at me. I raised my hand as much as I could. He grabbed it. “Thanks, man,” I said.

He smiled. “’Course, bro. Wish I’d have been there to get your back.”

* * * *

After they put a dozen stitches in my scalp to lace me back together, they took me to X-ray where they gave me a CT scan to check for skull fractures. Good news—there weren’t any. A hard head comes in handy. There was a little swelling inside my head, though, so they put me in a room on the fourth floor where they could keep an eye on me. According to the doctor, I had a mild concussion. I don’t know if they drugged me up, or if it was just the whack to the noggin making me groggy, but I ended up sleeping most of Monday and part of Tuesday as well. By Tuesday afternoon, though, the swelling was pretty much gone and I was feeling pretty good, aside from the dull throbbing in my head. Everything was pretty much normal—vision, vital signs, even my memory was all the way back.I had a nice bald spot on the side of my head, covered with a gauze bandage. This didn’t bother me too much. Chicks dig scars, right?

I talked to my dad over the phone Tuesday afternoon. He was in Ireland! I guess he took it really seriously when Toni’d called the day before and told him that he and Mom needed to bounce. I let him know what was going on and that I was all right. He sounded relieved to hear my voice.
Cool
.

“What do you think will happen next, Danny?” he asked.

“I think that as soon as I get out of this place, things are going to get nasty.”

“Just watch yourself, okay?”

“I’m good, Pop. Tell Mom I love her.”

* * * *

I called Jennifer after I hung up with Dad and told her what had happened.

After I convinced her I was all right, she said, “I was going to call you anyway later today. If you’re going to be out, we want to have a meeting tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow? I’ll be out. Who’s we?”

“A bunch of bigwigs,” she said. “I ran that name Nicholas Madoc around just like you asked. At first I came up blank. Zippo—nothing. Then, I happened to mention it to Ron Jennings. Ron’s the head of our Sensitive Property Task Force. They’re responsible for chasing down people who violate the laws relating to the sale and export of sensitive property. The name Nicholas Madoc rang a bell with him. He did some checking around with his contacts, and the upshot is they think that Nicholas Madoc is an alias for a guy whose real name is Gordon Marlowe. Marlowe is well known as a black-market procurer of sensitive technologies and weapons for the highest bidder—which usually means the bad guys. Marlowe is a really bad sort—he steals, and he’s left a trail of dead bodies around the world. If Marlowe is involved, suddenly everyone’s interested. Thus, the meeting.”

“Okay. Your office, I presume. What time?”

“Everyone’s flying in first thing in the morning. The meeting’s set for three tomorrow afternoon.”

“Consider it done. I’m supposed to get out of here in the morning. We’ll be there.”