The Orion Assignment (3 page)

“That would be fine. I'll be back tomorrow at four.”

“No,” she cried when Sean reached for the doorknob. “Please. Come up and stay at my place.”

“I have accommodations, thank you. And I'd like to see some of your lovely city while I'm here.”

“You stubborn old…” she began, then regained control. “All right. Just tell me where you're staying. We could meet for dinner or something. I'll pick you up tomorrow evening. We'll sit in my apartment, we'll make our business arrangements and then maybe we can talk a little. Please? Okay?” She ended her plea with a hug and a peck on his cheek. The older man put his arm around her slim waist. He smelled of tweed and leather.

“All right, child. I'll come to your home tomorrow if you really insist.”

“Uncle,” she grinned, giving him a squeeze, “I really insist.”

Felicity O'Brien was a connoisseur of fine cars. She had driven all the Italian greats: Maserati, Ferrari, Lamborghini. She owned a Lotus Elan Coupe, a Datsun 350 ZX Turbo, a Mazda RX-7, a vintage Jaguar XKE and the latest edition Corvette ZR-1. As a driver of some of the slickest sports cars ever designed, she hated the borrowed Jeep she was driving. The clutch was hard, the gear box stiff, the steering unresponsive. The seat was a spring loaded granite slab. Her teeth rattled with each bump. Lord, she hated cross country driving.

But that dusty old Jeep was all the blinking sod of a rancher had. He was reluctant to lend it to her, but Felicity was persuasive and even convinced the man to point in the direction Morgan had gone just hours before.

It had been a short flight to the sheep ranch. Ms. Fox had given her Morgan's location. She said he had spent the last three days on that ranch and that he had gone there to do some hunting. Felicity knew that he liked to go off by himself every so often, to live off the land and perhaps experiment with some new field equipment. This time it was labeled a business trip, for which it appeared he would receive some small fee.

Armed with that information she had rushed home and changed into jeans and leather boots. Then she hurried to a small airstrip, hired a private plane and charged off to that remote locale.

Ten minutes of desolation bumped past before she started feeling a subtle mental tug to her left. A slow smile spread over her face as she wrestled the wheel over. She was becoming accustomed to the peculiar psychic link she and Morgan shared.

She had been able to sense when danger threatened her since she was very young. But then, just months before had she met Morgan, and found that he had the same bizarre warning instinct. It didn't take long to discover that they were on the same “wavelength” somehow. Not only could she sense his distress, but if she relaxed enough, she could feel his very location. Even now, the weird tingle in her scalp guided her to her partner and best friend.

As she rattled on over rolling grassy land, her mind flashed back over the last year. They met in a South American jungle. She had stolen a rare piece of jewelry for a man named Seagrave. He double-crossed her and ordered his men to leave her stranded in that tropical forest. As it turned out, Seagrave had done the same to Morgan. In the days that followed, Felicity and Morgan saved each other's lives, fought and bled together, and became closer than either of them had ever been to anyone.

It was in those first few days, long before either of them considered going straight, that they learned about their mental link. At moments of intense emotional reaction they could somehow feel each other's sensations. This, as it turned out, made sex impossible. But as their relationship evolved that fact became irrelevant. Felicity supposed that she loved Morgan as much as she would a brother if she had one. But she trusted him much more.

Dragging her mind back to the present she stopped about fifty yards away from him, pulling the Jeep up beside a motorcycle parked among the dunes. The ground there was like a calm but rolling sea somehow frozen solid. Morgan lay prone against a sandy swell, his head and rifle stretched over the crest. A desert camouflage uniform covered his muscular, brown-skinned body. His kinky hair was cut short. A large tumbleweed lay to the left of his head, and a wide, squat cactus bush stood on his right. His six foot two
inch frame was frozen in absolute stillness.

She could feel the tranquility of the scene, just as she could smell the sweet cactus blossoms and fresh crisp air. The total silence gave her the feeling of a diorama, set up in a museum for the viewer's amusement. Perhaps Morgan was staring, fixed on some faraway target. If his concentration was strong enough, maybe she could even sneak up on him.

When she wanted to, Felicity could move with absolute silence. It was a cat burglar prerequisite. Not even a professional mercenary of Morgan's experience could hear her approach.

Of course, he did not need to hear her.

“Freeze, Red.” Morgan's sharp voice snapped out, low but intense, when she got within twelve feet of him. His right arm swung back, his index finger jabbing right at her face. He remained still except for that one arm. When his finger returned to its original position, curled around a trigger, his stillness resumed.

Seven seconds later she was startled by a crack like earthbound thunder. The echo flashed out to the horizon and back, and Morgan stopped holding his breath. He waved Felicity forward and pulled his Remington model 700 back to reload the bolt action weapon. In a moment she stretched out beside him, feeling the comforting warmth of the sand and the annoying scratch of the short, sparse grass. She didn't bother with a greeting beyond her smile and a brief nod.

“So, what are you shooting at?”

“Coyotes,” Morgan said. “The sheep rancher's having a problem with coyotes. I saw an opportunity to test this new round I'm experimenting with.”

“He's paying you for this?”

Morgan waved the question away. “Every one of those pelts is worth a good hundred dollars. The coyotes will pay for the trip.”

“A new round? I thought you told me that rifle fired twenty-twos.”

“Sure,” Morgan replied, settling behind his Leopold variable power scope. “Twenty-two two-fifty caliber. I reamed the chamber out to take a larger case. I use the six millimeter Remington case and neck it down to take the twenty-two cartridge.”

“Of course,” Felicity said with a smirk. “That's just what I'd do. So much better for, well, must be better for something.”

“Sniper work,” Morgan said. “Coyote hunting is a lot like sniper work. I don't know if you pay that much attention to my side of the business, but I've got a couple of subcontractors working as counter-snipers in Iraq.”

“Counter snipers?”

“When some insurgent takes a shot at our civilian contract force, we hit back, but with precision. For them, I wanted a cartridge that would shoot a bullet fast and flat. It's got to have a lot of power. And it shouldn't make a big mess of the target or in this case, damage the pelt. Here, take a look.” He handed her a pair of binoculars. “Today I'm using forty-six grains of powder behind a fifty-two grain hollow point bullet.”

“Right.” From her viewpoint, Morgan was speaking meaningless gibberish now. He was in his own world, a world of soldiers and hunters. All she could see through the binoculars were two…well, dogs, maybe two feet high or so, with beautiful fur in a light brown, almost yellow color. The Steiner glasses brought her face to face with these animals across the plains. They were looking around in confusion, sometimes looking down at their fallen comrade.

A loud crack on her left made her jump again. In her binoculars, she saw the larger coyote stiffen and fall onto its side. His partner's ears perked and he backed away.

“Right through the lungs,” Morgan said, grinning and cocking his fist back, “at three hundred fifty yards.” He could judge distances with incredible accuracy, as she
well knew. Silence returned and she went back to viewing the distant coyote, pacing back and forth with that light tread that made some animals appear to float across the ground. She knew this beast was raiding some rancher's sheep. Yet, this whole scenario bothered her. No, the truth was, it was Morgan who bothered her. Rifles, she thought, were a way to make killing impersonal and remote. Yet he made it as personal as possible. He modified his rifle, hand loaded and even designed the ammunition to bring these animals down.

“Morgan, I need to talk to you.”

“In a minute, Red,” Morgan said, getting a good sight picture on the third coyote.

“I'm looking at a job I'm not sure we should take.”

“Not now, Red,” Morgan hissed through clenched teeth, tightening his cheek weld to the walnut butt stock.

“Morgan, please don't shoot him.”

“What?” Morgan stared at Felicity as if he doubted his hearing.

“He's so pretty. And you've already proven twice that you can do it. And my uncle who I haven't seen in seven years wants to hire us.”

“What?” Morgan asked again, sounding like an eavesdropper, falling behind the conversation.

“I want to hug him and ask him how things are back home, not do business with him.”

“You might have to do business with him as an excuse to visit home,” Morgan offered.

“And why do you hunt, anyway?”

“Huh?” Morgan was kneeling up now, as if maybe reading her lips would aid his comprehension.

“I mean, you don't need it for food, like those poor beasts.”

He seemed to seize on that point, as if finally she had asked a question he could answer. “Red, hunting is the best way to improve your hearing. To sharpen your eyesight. To acquire stealth.” He paused to think.
“Besides, it's fun.”

“You should try being the hunted. It does all the same things for you. Nothing could match the rush of walking through a crowd of police with a pocket full of hot diamonds. Uncle Sean is meeting me tomorrow evening. Please come back tonight. I can't deal with him alone.”

Morgan sat up, laid his rifle down and rested a hand on her shoulder. “This thing's really got you shook up, hasn't it? Of course I'll come back. We'll work out your family problems together.” He gave her a hug, and felt her gratitude as she returned it.

Morgan saluted the lone coyote who howled, perhaps in return. As the animal trotted off, Morgan headed for his bike. His partner needed him, and that was enough reason to leave right away. He would send the farmer back for the two valuable pelts.

While Felicity settled into the Jeep, he slung his rifle across his back and straddled the five hundred cc Yamaha waiting for him. His bike was not over-chromed but it was a pure off road racer built for speed. From his saddlebag he pulled leather gloves. The black helmet he lifted from the ground had a one way visor. When he slid it over his face, he was unidentifiable. He kicked the bike into life, circled Felicity's Jeep once and moved out next to her.

His mind was reeling. He couldn't begin to understand why a visiting uncle with a business proposition would be such a traumatic event. So much about this girl, his partner and best friend, was still a mystery to him. He knew she had left her homeland before she reached twenty and never looked back. He believed she sent money home during her impressive career as a most daring and successful jewel and art thief. He knew her parents died when she was a child, but she never talked about what she had done between then and her appearance on the continental crime scene. And he would never ask. She always came
across as a total loner. Was it possible she missed this uncle, or felt guilty about leaving? Maybe they parted on bad terms.

His front tire hit a clump of dirt that almost toppled him. He realized it bounced him much harder than it should have. A glance at his speedometer told him he had pushed his machine over ninety miles per hour in his reverie. An unconscious lapse back to his bike racing days, he thought, as he doubled back to rejoin the Jeep.

Father Sean Sullivan left his motel room, easing down the steps from the landing outside. It certainly was not like any hostelry he ever stayed at in Eire. He found these rooms cold and impersonal. The management was standoffish, the blankets scratchy and thin, and if you wanted breakfast you could very well walk out and find it yourself.

The priest wore rich brown wool trousers and big brown shoes with laces. He held a big bowled briar pipe clenched tight in his teeth. The sleeves of his hand knit turtleneck sweater were pushed up over muscular, hairy forearms.

He didn't need a sweater against the rain here. It came down hard enough, but it seemed to turn to steam as soon as it touched the pavement. The mist, as thick here as at home, had an entirely different texture. It seemed dirty, as if it was mixed with factory smoke and car exhaust.

Sean stood with hands thrust deep in his pockets, staring into the rain, just under the porch-like covering outside the manager's office. Would his ride come in a big limousine to impress his guest? Or worse, in one of those dangerous little sports cars? What kind of man would his little Felicity be sending round for him? These days she was living in a world of big fancy offices and thousand dollar suits of clothes, showing off her body, like a real American. How far she had wandered from her roots.

Sean pulled his hat brim low over his weathered face, hiding his long eyebrows. A vehicle approached through the shimmering sheer curtain of the rain. It screeched to a halt in front of the priest. He did not know it was for him until the plastic windowed door of the Jeep CJ-7
popped open and a deep voice with no detectable accent sprang out.

“Father Sullivan?”

After a beat of hesitation he answered, “Yes,” and stooped to see into the Jeep.

“Get in. It's wet out there.”

Within a second of Sean getting under the cloth top, Morgan popped the clutch and the small sport Jeep dived forward into the night.