Noble Intentions: Season Three (11 page)

“Just a thought, that’s all.”

“OK.”

“OK, so I’m getting on a train for
Paris in the morning?”

“Yes, but call me before you board,
in case something changes.”

Clarissa said OK and goodbye and
hung up. She didn’t like it, but she knew she had little say in the matter.
They’d worked hard to get her into this position, and ruining her cover was not
an option.

She walked up the blossom stained driveway,
returned to the house, to her room, hid the cell phone in the false bottom of
her bag. Then she went to the dining room for dinner. She found the room empty,
which suited her fine.

Halfway through her meal, Samir
entered.

“Naseer wanted me to make sure you
are all set for tomorrow. You have your ticket for Paris?”

Clarissa nodded.

“What time?”

She swallowed her food and managed
to say, “The train leaves at eight a.m.”

“Check with me before you leave. I
may be accompanying you.”

Clarissa smiled and nodded,
portraying the image of calm to Samir. On the inside, panic took over. Her
heart raced, her palms dampened, her lungs tightened. Why would he travel with
her? Had Naseer found her cell phone and bugged it? Did he have parabolic
microphones in use? She might have been in range of them while speaking with
Sinclair. Could that be the reason he skipped dinner tonight? If that was the
case, and this is how they planned on taking care of the matter, she felt
confident she’d have the upper hand against Samir. Nothing about him
intimidated her.

“OK,” she said.

Clarissa waited until Samir left
the room. She finished her dinner and retired to her quarters for the night.

Jack awoke to a knock at his door.
It hadn’t startled him or caused him to jolt upright. He simply opened his
eyes. His hand slid out from under his head and down his side until it found
the handle of the Beretta. He waited for another knock if for no other reason
than to verify there was someone at his door. Why expend energy if he didn’t
need to?

He heard the second knock, looked
at his watch. Thirty minutes had passed since he spoke with Leon.

Right on time.

He swung his legs over the bed and
took his time getting up. Another sharp knock. He reached for the door knob
with his left hand. Lifted the Beretta to chest level. An awkward set up for
sure. The door opened from left to right. He jarred it a crack. Leon stood on
the landing carrying a black duffel bag and a cardboard cup holder containing
two paper cups filled with coffee. Steam escaping through the thin sliver in
the lids. Jack took a step back to his right and opened the door.

A minute later the men sat across
from each other at the small round table on the opposite side of the room next
to the wide window. A slice of yellow light from a street lamp split the table
in half. Jack on one side, Leon on the other.

“Everything you need is in that
bag,” Leon said.

“Show me,” Jack said. He reached
over and pulled the blinds open. The windows were mirrored on the outside, so
he had no concern over being watched.

Leon rose, took two steps to his
right toward the bed and unzipped the bag. He pulled out an M40 sniper rifle,
held it out for Jack to inspect.

Jack waved him off with a flick of
his left hand.

Leon placed the rifle on the bed,
reached back into the bag and retrieved an HK MP7 with a suppressor affixed to
the barrel. Once again, he held the weapon out. This time Jack reached out and
took the submachine gun from Leon. He set it down on the table, to his right.

“What else?” Jack said.

Leon smiled, reached in the bag a
third time. He pulled out a Beretta M9.

“How’d you know?” Jack asked.

“I’ve got my ways.” He placed the
9mm on the table and sat down. “No lethal pens or any nonsense like that.
You’ll have to do this like a man.”

Jack rolled his eyes. The SAS prick
had no idea how to handle a job the way Jack did. “Already figured I wouldn’t
be able to pull off a covert job like that.”

Leon nodded, turned toward the
window. Jack watched the guy’s eyes reflected in the window. They darted left
and right. The man wore a concerned look on his face.

“What?” Jack asked.

“Nothing,” Leon replied.

“You sure? Doesn’t look like
nothing.”

Leon’s eyes shifted to the right,
stopped when they met the reflection of Jack’s in the window. “You should let
me partner with you.”

Jack’s stomach tightened. He had
already discounted Leon as a potential partner. He had no idea of the man’s
skill set other than that he used to be SAS. And used to be’s didn’t mean
anything to Jack. Leon wouldn’t have done Jack a lot of good even when the guy
was active duty special forces. Then again, given the circumstances he would
likely be facing, having a man with Leon’s knowledge there might be helpful.
There was no way to know if the skill set remained though.

“What d’ya say, Jack?”

“What’s your motive?”

“Pardon?”

“Your motive,” Jack repeated. “Why
do you want to do this?”

The guy shifted in his seat,
brought his head around slowly. He interlaced the fingers of his right hand
with his left. There was silence between the men for a minute. Their eyes were
locked. Neither blinked.

“I want to see his life end. You
don’t know the things that man has done, Jack. You just don’t. Dottie doesn’t
know the half of it. Before I was her bodyguard, I was his. I went everywhere
with him. Saw the things he did. He’s a real son of a bitch, Jack.”

“Then you are definitely out.”

“Why?”

“It’s too personal.”

“It’s personal for you too.”

“But I know how to control myself.”

“You think I don’t know how to
control myself? I’m SAS, man.”

“No, I don’t think you can. And you
were
SAS.”

“I’ve worked privately ever since.”

“You’re a glorified personal
assistant.”

Leon’s cheeks turned red, a thin
film of sweat coated his forehead. He clenched his fists and slammed them on
the table.

“See,” Jack said. “You can’t
control your temper. What happens if we get into position and you see Thornton
and you decide that you want to do more than just put a bullet in between his
eyes? That rage starts building. You move in. You blow our cover. Next thing
you know, you’re dead. Or worse, we both are. Or even worse than that,
captured. See, a guy like you is gonna want to make a point. You want to show
Thornton that you’re the boss, not him. You want to come down on him and make
him pay with pain for the things he’s done.”

Leon said nothing.

“I could care less about all that
stuff. I just want him dead, and then I want to move on with my life. I knew
coming out here was a damn mistake. But bringing you along would compound that
mistake by a thousand. So stay home. Stay with Dottie. Do your damn job so I
can do mine.”

Leon lowered his head. He brought
his hand to his face and rubbed his cheek. “You’re right, Jack. I want
revenge.”

“Then let me take care of Thornton.
Alone.”

A moment passed, the men said
nothing. The silence stretched on for five long minutes. Finally, Leon rose and
walked to the door.

“Make him suffer,” he said.

Jack nodded, said nothing. He
waited for Leon to leave the room, then he engaged the security lock and
returned to bed. As he reached for the TV remote, his cell phone vibrated on
the nightstand.

“What now?”

He grabbed the phone, didn’t
recognize the number.

“Hello?”

“Jack, it’s Mason.”

“What?”

“Nice to talk to you too, mate.”

“Piss off, Mason. What do you
want?”

“There’s a meeting tomorrow morning.
All the principal parties will be there. It’s in an old warehouse, abandoned.
We need to get you in there tonight.”

Jack took a deep breath, exhaled.
“OK, tell me where.”

“I’ll send a guy out to get you.”

Jack didn’t like that idea, but he
had little choice in the matter. “OK, I’m at the—”

“I know where you are. He’ll be
there at two a.m.”

“Great.” Jack pulled the phone away
from his head.

“And Jack…”

He didn’t bother to listen. He
pressed the red end call button and tossed the phone to the foot of the bed.

A muscular man with a shaved head
arrived at two a.m. He did not introduce himself. Simply asked if Jack was
ready. He had been ready since quarter after one, so naturally he replied yes.
They left in the man’s car, a vehicle so small their shoulders touched. He
mentioned that the vehicle was more economical since it ran on battery power.

Five minutes into the drive the guy
said, “Hungry?”

Jack said, “Nah.”

The guy said, “OK, we’ll stop.”

They pulled behind a twenty-four
hour Italian restaurant in Soho. Despite the hour, the place was packed. The
guy ordered meatball marinara. Jack ordered coffee and two slices of
cheesecake. He figured pasta would be just as heavy in his stomach, so why not
get his favorite dessert instead. They were in the restaurant for thirty-five
minutes, during which time neither man spoke. Jack glanced at the guy
occasionally, only to find the man staring right at him. It made him a little
uncomfortable.

At three in the morning the guy
drove past the warehouse.

“That’s it,” he said.

Jack turned his head, focused on
the warehouse as they drove by. “Big place.”

The guy nodded. “That it is, my
friend.”

The car rolled to a stop two blocks
away. The guy got out and started walking toward the warehouse. Jack waited a
second, then joined him.

Wide-spaced street lamps cast hazy
orange pools of light. The wet street glistened. Their muted footsteps echoed
off the buildings that made up the industrial corridor. A dull mechanical roar
persisted.

They stopped in front of the warehouse’s
main entrance. The guy reached into his pocket and produced a key. He inserted
it into the lock, winked at Jack, turned the key.

“How’d you get a key to the place?”

“After we heard where the meeting
was to be, we sent a guy.”

Fair enough, Jack figured.

The man pulled the door open,
stepped inside. Jack followed. Heavy, musty air enveloped him. Every step they
took resulted in dust kicking up two feet into the air. Jack thought he could
feel the mold spores entering his respiratory system, anchoring themselves to
the lining of his lungs. If the place was still in use, the men and women that
worked there probably had one hell of a lawsuit to file in the future.

Jack stopped in the middle of the
room. Something scurried across the floor, a few feet away. He shifted his
duffel bag from his right hand to his left. Wrapped his arm around his back and
took hold of his Beretta.

“Just rats, mate.” The guy closed
the door, switched on a flashlight equipped with a red filter. The diffused
light was less likely to be noticed from the outside should someone be watching
the dilapidated old building.

Jack followed the light, committed
the room to memory.

“Figure they’ll be gathering over
there.” The guy panned the light to his right, Jack’s left, the north end. The
space was bare. Beyond it a bunch of trash and wooden pallets.

“Why?” Jack said.

“Why not?”

“It’s out in the open.”

“No one gonna be in here, mate.”

“Why not the office?”

The guy shone his light along the
floor and brought it up at the south end of the room. Aimed it at the office.
“Take a look.”

Jack walked toward the office. The
door had been boarded shut. The glass pane covering the front was cracked, but
still intact. Unless these guys wanted to spend precious minutes deconstructing
the barrier, they’d meet on the warehouse floor.

The man raised his arm, pointed a
bloody beam of light to the corner of the ceiling. “Up there.”

“What about it?”

“That’s where you should set up.”

Jack wasn’t keen on being told by
the guy where he should wait and later carry out his job. “What about the other
corner?”

“Well, for one, you won’t have the
same kind of cover. Look up there.”

Jack did. He saw a solid metal box,
maybe six by nine feet, about six feet tall, a slit that looked to be six or
seven inches high spanning the width of the front.

“Now,” the guy said as he swung his
arm toward the other corner. “Look up there.”

Jack saw a platform wrapped with
steel railings. A good spot to shoot from, but no cover. He’d be spotted the
moment they entered the warehouse. Up in the box he had protection. And if
something happened, and they decided to investigate, he could pick them off one
by one.

“See my point?”

Jack nodded, aware that the man
might not see the gesture in the dark. He thought about asking about the other
end of the room, but figured he’d have to investigate on his own after the guy
left.

“What you got in that bag, mate?”

“Rifle, spare pistol, sandwich.”

“Mind if I take a look?”

“Yeah, I do mind.”

The guy shrugged. “Whatever. Here.”
He held out a spare flashlight.

Jack grabbed the solid handle, felt
the weight of it in his hand. If necessary, he could use it as a weapon. Of
course, things would have to be pretty dire to do so. He switched it on,
focused the beam toward the corner of the room, started toward the ladder.

“Wait,” the guy said.

“What?”

The guy reached into his pocket,
pulled out a small cell phone. “Press and hold five and it’ll connect you with
us.”

“Will you answer?”

“No.”

“OK. Who?”

“Someone.”