The Protector (2003) (4 page)

The man aimed a Colt .45 semiautomatic pistol at him. Its barrel wavered.

Cavanaugh had no doubt that if he had still been holding his pistol when he'd entered, the man would have fired. Doing his best to keep his breathing steady, he raised his hands in reassuring submission. Despite the big gun that was nervously aimed at him, the uneasiness Cavanaugh had felt coming up the stairs seemed of no importance compared to what this man must be feeling, for, outside of combat, Prescott was the most frightened man Cavanaugh had ever seen.

Chapter 5.

"Please remember you sent for me," Cavanaugh said. "I'm here to help you."

As Prescott continued to aim the Colt, his pupils got larger. The room became more sour with fear.

"I knew your one-time-only phone number and the recognition code," Cavanaugh said. "Only someone from Protective Services could have had that information."

"You could have forced those details from the person they were sending," Prescott said. As on the phone, his voice was unsteady, but now Cavanaugh understood that it wasn't an electronic effect--Prescott's voice shook because he was afraid.

The door behind Cavanaugh swung shut, its lock ramming electronically home. He managed not to flinch. "I don't know who or what you feel threatened by, but I hardly think one man coming here would be the smartest way to get at you, not the way you've got this place set up. Logic should tell you I'm not a threat."

"The unexpected is the most brilliant tactic." Prescott's grip on the .45 was as unsteady as his voice. "Besides, your logic works against you. If one man isn't much of a threat, how can one man provide adequate protection?"

"You didn't say you wanted protection. You said you wanted to
disappear."

Sweat marks spreading under his arms, Prescott studied Cavanaugh warily.

"My initial interviews are
always
one-on-one," Cavanaugh said. "I have to ask questions to assess the threat level. Then I decide how much help the job requires."

"I was told you used to be in Delta Force." Prescott licked his dry, fleshy lips.

"That's right."

The classic special-operations physique involved muscular shoulders that trimmed down to solid, compact hips, upper-body strength being one of the goals of the arduous training.

"Lots of exercise," Prescott said. "Is that what you think qualifies you to protect somebody?"

Trying to put Prescott at ease, Cavanaugh chuckled. "You want my job stats?"

"If you want to convince me you're here to help. If you want to work for me."

"You've got this turned around. When I interview potential clients, it's not because I want to work for them. Sometimes, I
don't
want to work for them."

"You mean you have to
like
them?" Prescott asked with distaste.

"Sometimes, I don't like them, either," Cavanaugh said. "But that doesn't mean they don't have a right to live. I'm a protector, not a judge. With exceptions. No drug traffickers. No child abusers. Nobody who's an obvious monster. Are you a monster?"

Prescott had a look of incredulity. "Of course not."

"Then there's only one other standard that'll help me decide if I want to protect you."

"Which is?"

"Are you willing to be compliant?"

Prescott blinked sweat from his eyes. "What?"

"I can't protect someone who won't take orders," Cavanaugh said. "That's the paradox of being a protector. Someone hires me. In theory, that person's the boss. But when it comes to protection, I'm the one who gives the orders. The employer has to react to me as if I'm the boss. Are you willing to be compliant?"

"Anything to keep me alive."

"You'll do what I say?"

Prescott thought and then fearfully nodded.

"So, okay, here's your first order: Put that damned gun away before I ram it down your throat."

Prescott blinked several times, stepping back as if Cavanaugh had slapped him. He held the gun steadier, frowned, and slowly lowered it.

"An excellent start," Cavanaugh said.

"If you're not who you say you are, do it right now," Prescott said. "Kill me. I can't stand living this way."

"Relax. Whoever your enemies are, I'm not one of them."

Cavanaugh surveyed the room. To the right, in a corner, past the electronics and the monitors, he saw a cot, a minifridge, a sink, and a small stove. Beyond was a toilet, a showerhead, and a drain. The type of food on the shelves made clear that Prescott didn't worry about being overweight: boxes of macaroni and cheese, cans of ravioli and lasagna, bags of chocolates, candy bars, and potato chips, cases of classic Coke. "How long have you been here?"

"Three weeks."

Cavanaugh noticed books on a shelf below the food. Most were nonfiction, on subjects as various as geology and photography. One had a photo of a naked woman on the cover and seemed to be a sex book. In contrast, another volume was The
Collected Poems of Robinson Jeffers,
with a few books about Jeffers next to it. "You like poetry?" Cavanaugh asked.

"Soothes the soul." Prescott's tone was slightly defensive, as if he suspected that Cavanaugh might be mocking him.

Cavanaugh picked up the book and opened it, reading the first lines he came to. " 'I built her a tower when I was young-- Sometime she will die.'"

Prescott looked more defensive.

"Knows how to grab my attention." Cavanaugh set down the book and continued scanning the place. Videotapes sat next to a small television. Prescott's taste had no consistency: a Clint Eastwood thriller, an old Troy Donahue-Sandra Dee teenage-romance tearjerker. . . .

"I've seen worse places to go to ground." Cavanaugh thought about it. "Homeless people and crack addicts as your cover. Smart. How'd you know about this warehouse? How'd you set up this room?"

"I did it a year ago," Prescott said. "Whatever your trouble is, you saw it coming?" "Not this particular trouble." "Then why did you ..." "I always take precautions," Prescott said. "You're not making sense." "In case," Prescott told him.

"In case of what?" Movement on a TV monitor abruptly caught Cavanaugh's attention. "Wait a second."

Chapter 6.

"What's wrong?" Prescott spun toward the monitor.

On the screen, a gray image showed a dozen ragged men plodding through the rain, converging on the Taurus.

"Jesus," Prescott said.

"Crack addicts are amazing," Cavanaugh said. "No matter what it is, if it's left alone, they'll try to steal it. I once knew a guy who stole forty pounds of dog food from his father so he could buy crack. What's
more
amazing, his drug dealer took the dog food, rather than demanding money. For all I know, the drug dealer ate it."

On the screen, the ragged men, drenched with rain, tugged at the side-view mirrors or used chunks of metal to pry at the hubcaps.

"Have you got a way to hear what's going on outside?" Cavanaugh asked.

Prescott flipped a switch on a console. Immediately, the sound of rain came through an audio speaker.

Cavanaugh heard the distant scrape of metal as the ragged men worked in the downpour to try to disassemble his car. "Get a job, guys."

He took the car's remote control from his jacket pocket. It was more elaborate than usual, equipped with half a dozen buttons.

Prescott looked puzzled as Cavanaugh pressed one of the buttons.

Suddenly, the audio speaker filled the room with an ear-torturing siren that came from the Taurus and made the men drop their makeshift burglary tools, fleeing like drenched versions of the scarecrow in
The Wizard of Oz.

Cavanaugh pressed the button again, and the siren stopped.

"Are you ready to get out of here?" he asked Prescott.

"To?" Prescott looked apprehensive.

"Somewhere safer than this, although, Lord knows, this place is safe enough. After my team arrives, after we get organized, we'll give you a new identity and relocate you. But first I need to know what kind of risk level we're talking about. Why are you so frightened?"

Prescott opened his mouth to answer, then frowned at the monitor.

Four of the men were back, heading for the Taurus.

"At least they get points for persistence," Cavanaugh said.

He pressed another button on the remote control.

Gray vapor spewed from under the wheel wells. Despite the rain, it blossomed, enveloping the crack addicts. Coughing and cursing, they stumbled back. Bent over as if they were going to be sick, they pawed at their eyes and staggered away.

Cavanaugh pressed the button again, and the vapor stopped spewing from the wheel wells.

"What on earth was that?" Prescott asked.

"Tear gas."

"What?"

"The car's modified the way the best Secret Service vehicles are. It's armor-plated and--" A new image on the monitor made him stop. "Amazing. With their ambition, if these guys were in politics, they could run the world."

On the screen, two more crack addicts approached the Taurus.

"Turn down the volume on that speaker," Cavanaugh told Prescott.

Confused, Prescott did what he was told.

As the men came closer to the Taurus, Cavanaugh pressed another button on the remote control.

Small black canisters catapulted from under the wheel wells. Shaped like miniature soup cans, they exploded with numerous roars that shook the speaker, even though its volume had been reduced. The multiple flashes of the explosions were so bright that the camera had trouble maintaining its contrast level.

When the smoke cleared, the two crack addicts lay on the concrete.

"My God, you killed them," Prescott said.

"No."

"But they were so close to the grenades."

"Those weren't grenades."

On the screen, the two men began to squirm.

"I used flash-bangs," Cavanaugh said.

"Flash-bangs?"

"Sort of like grenades, except they don't throw shrapnel. But they blind and deafen for a while. Those guys are going to have a whale of a headache."

On the screen, the two crack addicts struggled upright, holding their ears.

"But this car
can
be equipped to launch grenades if the mission calls for it," Cavanaugh said. "And it can be modified for machine guns under the headlights. All the best dictators and drug lords have those extras. In a more luxurious car than a Taurus, of course. Believe me, Mr. Prescott, we can take care of you."

Cavanaugh looked back at the row of monitors, where one of the images showed the Taurus at ground level. Able to see partway under the car, he frowned, noticing what appeared to be a shadow under the vehicle. He pointed. "Does that camera have a zoom lens?"

"All of them do." Prescott twisted a dial, enlarging the image on the monitor. The shadow under the Taurus took the shape of a small box. Jesus, Cavanaugh thought, one of the crack addicts must have put it under there.

He blinked as the Taurus exploded.

Chapter 7.

The roar from the speaker was so loud that the entire room shook. On the screen, chunks of the Taurus crashed onto the concrete, smoke and fire swelling.

Prescott gaped.

A second explosion rocked the room. On a different monitor, the door through which Cavanaugh had entered the building blasted inward, smoke and flames filling the area at the bottom of the stairs. Three men rushed in, but although their hair was matted and their faces were beard-stubbled and filthy, their eyes had neither the blankness of the homeless nor the desperation of drug addicts. These men had eyes as alert as any gunfighter Cavanaugh had ever encountered.

"Is there another way out of here?"

Prescott kept staring at the screen, which showed one of the men aiming a pistol at the elevator door while the other two aimed pistols upward and stormed the stairs.

"Prescott?" Cavanaugh repeated, drawing his weapon.