Pursuit Of Honor (20 page)

RAPP figured he had five minutes to get in and out before things got heated. Maybe as much as fifteen, but that was pushing it. Shutting down the phones and radios would certainly delay things, but the cops had to patrol this neighborhood on a pretty regular basis. Rapp could handle the cops if he had to, but he didn’t feel like spending the night calling in favors and then having to explain himself for the next two days. The whole point of tonight’s exercise was to take this particular problem off the burner and put it behind him.

Life would be a lot easier if he simply marched in, grabbed Johnson by the scruff of his neck, and dragged his lame ass out of the joint. Simple and direct. Rapp knew all about momentum. In a situation like this, the best thing was to keep moving. More often than not, if you had the right bearing and you acted as if you were in charge, people followed your lead.

Rapp looked at the first bouncer and flicked his wrist in a hard downward motion. The two extendable sections of the baton snapped out and into a locked position with a hard click. Rapp pointed the stick at the big bouncer and said, “I gave him three choices. You only get two.”

The bouncer looked down at the big bald Russian. He was writhing on the cement, swearing in his native tongue and staring in shock at his knee.

Rapp said, “You either take me to Peter Sidorov or you spend the next three days in the D.C. lockup with every other shithead and drug addict in the city. You’re a big guy, but they’re like hyenas in there. They attack in packs. They might not be able to rape you, but they’ll probably cut you and then you can spend the next year wondering if you have AIDS.”

The bouncer hesitated for maybe a half second and then undid the velvet rope and gestured for Rapp to follow him. Rapp looked at Coleman and said, “You stay here and keep an eye on things. Mick,” Rapp said, looking at Reavers, “come with me.”

The big bouncer led them through the front door. Rapp followed two paces behind, and then Reavers. A long bar with a galvanized top ran for a good hundred feet along the left side of the old warehouse. Exposed metal trusses ran from left to right. Rapp paused for half a step to scope out the high ground. Old warehouses like this one often had a catwalk, but this one didn’t. With one sweep of the place Rapp noted four more bouncers dressed like the four guys out front. To the right was a dance floor with an elevated DJ booth. The place was packed and their pace slowed as they threaded their way through the crowd.

Rapp saw where they were headed a few steps later. There was a VIP section at the far end. A set of stairs on the left and another one on the right led up maybe six feet to a big area that was probably eighty feet wide by twenty feet deep. There was a steel column every ten feet that acted as a divider between the individual VIP seating areas. Red velvet curtains hung in front of each area, swooping down from the rafters to where they were tied off around the columns. Through the openings in the drapes Rapp could see couches and chairs, revelers standing and sitting and in far dark corners, probably doing things that could get them arrested.

The music was loud, so loud that Rapp figured he wouldn’t need to bother with the silencer if he had to start shooting people. They reached the base of the stairs for the VIP area and the big black bouncer slowly climbed four treads and he and another monster began screaming into each other’s ears. Rapp noted the tattoos on the man’s neck and wondered if his theory was flawed. This guy was a lot like the other Russian he’d just crippled except he had hair. The world of the Russian Mafia and their tattoos was a strange one. Over there, you could get killed for wearing a tattoo that you hadn’t earned, but here in the States Rapp wasn’t so sure. Were these guys the real thing or a couple o’ wannabes trying to intimidate, by putting some ink on their skin?

The new guy finished listening to the big black guy, gave Rapp the universal stop motion with his hand, then disappeared into the dim recesses of the VIP area. Rapp immediately worried there was a back door up there somewhere. If Johnson had half a brain and he found out a federal agent was in the building he would bolt. Momentum, he reminded himself. Keep moving forward. Basic battlefield doctrine. Never give your opponent a chance to get his shit together.

Rapp did a quick 360 of the area. He noted two bouncers within sight, but they weren’t looking his way. Rapp smiled as he saw them fiddling with their radios. That alone would cause a diversion. With them focused on trying to fix their radios Rapp saw his opening. Looking over his shoulder at Reavers, Rapp waited for the big guy to lean in. Reavers stepped forward and placed his ear near Rapp’s mouth.

“I don’t want him sneaking out the back door. I’m going to tase this big fella here. Step around to my right and shield me. When I hit him, help me lower him nice and slow.”

Reavers nodded.

Rapp looked up at the big black bouncer and started to move his lips. The bouncer couldn’t hear so he leaned forward and turned his head away from Rapp, offering his right ear. Rapp’s left hand slid inside his jacket and around his waist. He grabbed the taser and kept it close to his body. As he started to ask the bouncer about a back door, he turned his body a shade to the left and with his right hand grabbed the tip of the taser and removed the cartridge. With the two contacts exposed he leaned in real close and placed the contacts on the man’s lower back, only a few inches from his spinal column. Rapp squeezed the trigger and instantly fifty thousand volts passed from the plastic gun into the big guy’s body. While he went rigid Rapp kept the prongs pressed into him and was careful to make sure their bodies didn’t touch. He counted to three in his head and then withdrew the taser.

Reavers was right there. As the big guy started to go down Reavers grabbed him by the shoulders and slowly lowered him so that he was lying on the steps. Rapp snapped the cartridge back into the taser and slid it back into his belt at the small of his back. At this point he didn’t bother to look left or right to check on the other bouncers. He went up the stairs. When he hit the landing at the top his eyes swept the area. They were drawn to a space midway down on the left. The Russian bouncer who had gestured for him to wait was talking to two guys in suits. They were both bigger than Rapp but smaller than the mammoth bouncers. These would be the real professionals. Probably former Special Forces, but not necessarily Russian. They might even be local guys, which Rapp would welcome. Beyond the three men Rapp caught a glimpse of Max Johnson sitting on the couch with two women draped over him.

The big Russian saw Rapp, said something to the man in the suit, and marched off with a really pissed-off look on his face to intercept the two unwelcome visitors. Rapp showed his hands, palms out and up, in an effort to sucker the guy into continuing his headlong march toward him. Rapp kept moving as well, closing the distance at a deceptive pace. Rapp lowered his left hand a notch, making his right hand the more presentable target. He watched the six-and-a-half-foot-tall brown-haired Russian take the bait and begin reaching for his target.

Now was the moment of decision for Rapp. At this juncture he had several options. The solar plexus was out because of the guy’s girth. There were too many layers of fat to get through to deliver an incapacitating blow. The second option was the chin, but as Rapp took a final good look he noticed the guy had some pretty decent traps. Traps, short for trapeziuses, were the muscles that anchored a guy’s head to the rest of the body and the more developed they were the harder it was to knock a guy out.

The last and best option carried a risk with it, but Rapp wasn’t too worried. This wasn’t exactly some innocent bystander out on the street. At the exact moment the bouncer’s beefy fingertips were about to grab Rapp’s right wrist, Rapp uncoiled. He sprang off his left foot and transferred about 90 percent of his weight onto his right foot as his hips rotated. The big man never saw it coming. For a move like this, both the closed fist and the open palm were too big to make the precise strike, so Rapp had to use a knuckle strike.

Rapp’s first set of knuckles on his left hand folded under so the tips of his fingers were touching the pads of his palm. His left arm formed a battering ram from the elbow down to the jagged second set of knuckles. The target was one of the weakest points on the human body-the Adam’s apple. Lots of cartilage and soft tissue. It didn’t matter how good or tough you were, if you got hit with a direct strike to the Adam’s apple you were going down. There was only one problem with the move. If it was delivered too forcefully you could kill a man. Just as Rapp was throwing the blow an image flashed before his eyes. It was of the big Russian rolling around on the carpet clutching his throat and dying from a crushed windpipe. It was that image that caused Rapp to lay off a touch, and that was his first mistake.

HAKIM took a bit of comfort in the fact that the old woman had died in her sleep. He wasn’t in the room when it had happened, but he’d heard the mechanical clank of the slide jerk back and then forward and the spit of the 9mm round as the gases were vented through the silencer. He’d watched the old man die on the porch first. He didn’t know why, but he wanted to see it with his own eyes. With his broken and bruised body he pulled himself out of bed and hobbled his way to the front of the RV. He watched his friend raise the gun and shoot the old man from a distance of no more than a few feet. There was another brief flash from the muzzle and the body convulsed one last time.

Hakim had killed before, in the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan, but never so close-so personal. They were just silhouettes in the distance. He considered how difficult it must be to see every wrinkle and misplaced hair. To know the exact eye color of the person whose life you were extinguishing. Would those eyes come back to haunt your dreams? For Hakim the answer was yes, but for his friend he wondered. Did anything really get to him? Was there a line he would not cross?

Hakim stared through the windscreen and then watched with increasing concern as his friend climbed the porch steps and moved into the house. With great effort, Hakim climbed down the RV steps and moved as quickly as his broken and battered body would allow. He climbed the porch steps no more than five seconds behind Karim. He looked down at the lifeless carcass of the dog and the old man, who had been literally shot between the eyes. He moved with increasing alarm. He didn’t know why but he was convinced there were children in the house. No matter what the maniacal clerics said, Allah would never condone the killing of children.

In the foyer Hakim paused. There was a staircase straight ahead and a hallway just to the left. Farther to the left there was a TV room. There was a big leather chair and a matching footstool. A blanket was in a pile on the floor. That must have been where the old man was when they pulled in. That would explain why he was up so fast and was able to intercept Karim outside. He hobbled over to the chair to confirm his theory. He touched the leather chair. It was still warm from the body heat of the man.

That was when he heard the faint yet distinctly mechanical clank and spit of the suppressed Glock firing a round. The sound did not come from the second floor. The headlights of the RV were still spilling through the big picture window on his left. As he looked in the direction of the sound he saw Karim come through a doorway at the back of the house. He raised his weapon and pointed it directly at Hakim. And then something very strange happened. Hakim had thought of death before, but he had never welcomed it. Now it felt like a warm blanket against a cold biting wind. He was ready to wrap himself in it and fade away. Face whatever judgment waited for him in the afterlife. Based on what he had allowed to happen the last few days, he doubted he would see paradise.

“You idiot,” Karim’s voice cut like a knife through the dark, still house. “I nearly shot you.” He moved across the room quickly, his footfalls silent on the carpet. “Stay put while I check upstairs.”

As he walked past, Hakim reached out and grabbed his arm. “We do not have to kill every person we encounter.”

His friend angrily shook himself free and moved swiftly upstairs. After he had disappeared, Hakim walked to the back of the house. He stood at the bedroom door and hesitated. It was dark inside, but he could easily discern the shape of the bed and the nightstands and lamps. The near side of the bed was flat and undisturbed. The far side had a lump. Hakim sighed and without making a conscious decision his feet were moving. They carried him across the room to the side of the bed where he guessed the man’s wife had been lying, doing what billions of people do every night-sleep. How had she offended Islam? Could someone be an infidel if she was asleep in her own house thousands of miles from the heart of Islam, in a largely Christian country?

Hakim stood over the shape and willed himself to look closer, to confront yet another evil perpetrated by his best friend. At first he could only make out a silhouette under the covers and a head on a white pillowcase. He bent farther and the features of the woman’s face became clearer. Then he saw it. A dark circle at the woman’s temple no bigger than a small coin. Hakim reached out and turned on the bedside lamp. The red pucker mark was surrounded by a circle of gray. Karim had shot her point-blank, the tip of the muzzle no more than a few inches from her skin. He had expected to see an elderly woman, but instead saw someone who looked to be in her early sixties with many years left to live. Until they picked her house.

Hakim felt sickened by the whole thing. He turned off the lamp and walked back into the TV room. He stopped at the fireplace and looked at the photos arrayed on the mantel. Lots of kids. School photos, sports photos, and photos of family vacations. Hakim guessed they were grandchildren. He could barely breathe. He closed his eyes and prayed and listened. Listened for the clank and the spit of Karim’s gun. He prayed that the kids were not here. He could not take any more senseless killing. Not tonight. Maybe never again. He asked Allah for guidance, asked him if this was truly what he wanted, and when he didn’t hear from him he made a promise to Allah. It was a bargain. He would follow through on his end of the deal, and he hoped that Allah would keep up his end of the bargain.

Shortly after that Karim came downstairs and announced that the upstairs was empty. Then he radioed Ahmed and told him to make a quick sweep of the perimeter before coming in. Hakim breathed a sigh of relief, but he didn’t have much time to enjoy it. He felt a slight tickle in his throat and then he began to cough. At first it didn’t seem unusual, but then he felt the coppery taste of blood in his mouth. He moved to the chair where the man had been sitting and managed to fall into it just as he blacked out.