Hard Case VII - Red Waves (John Harding Series Book 7) (45 page)

“I’ve seen the Starlight’s top towers,” Nick said. “If I get into a sniper’s nest position amongst the towers, there won’t be any boarding of the Starlight by pirates. I heard what you said about Khan and Mannan, Cheese. Do you have any plan to flush them out?”

I smiled at him. “How do you feel about an interlude in the sand, brother?”

“If we can get those two confirmed dead, count me in,” Nick replied. “I didn’t think anything could get me in the sandbox again, but those two plotting Isis bullshit from what they count on as their Iranian safe zone pisses me off. I’d like to make it into the Dead Zone for them.”

We enjoyed that interpretation. “That’s how we feel too. We’re getting a piece this time in pirate land… a big piece. It’s a kill mission from beginning to end. There will be collateral damage at the port.”

“Hell, I’d nuke it if I were in charge,” Nick said. “I’d give the world a post card about Islamic terrorism they would never forget. I-”

There was a strident knock on the door. I saw Jean and Sonny emerge from the bedroom with Al. She glanced at Nick immediately. Nick shook his head in the negative. Jean corralled Sonny and Al back into the bedroom and shut the door. I grinned.

“I see Jean hasn’t forgotten the trip across country.”

“Or anything else.” Nick stood. “Excuse me. If I don’t get this before the babies wake, I’m going to have to kill something.”

Clint and Lynn fell in behind him on the way to the door. In our community when you finish a kill mission, you don’t assume facts not in evidence. The rest of us loosened weapons and Jafar went to position himself in front of the cribs. I heard a raised voice very familiar followed by laughter from Lynn.

“Hey, Cheese. You better come see this,” Lynn said.

I looked longingly at my Beam and Bud brothers I had only refilled once. I was a guest. My Penthouse was in a different location. I walked toward the door at ease because I knew three of the deadliest killers in existence were already at the door. The chances of a danger there was so small as to be nonexistent. When I reached the door, Nick had his Colt .45 jammed under the chin of a very stunned Rock Costigan. Lynn was doing knife tricks and Clint was aiming his Colt at the half dozen morons stupid enough to face my crew for a second time.

“Is this who I think it is,” Nick asked.

“Yep. It’s Rock Costigan, the UFC Heavyweight Champion of the world. I’m very sorry for the interruption to our small celebration in your Penthouse, Nick.”

“No problem.” Nick put his Colt away in a split second casual spin. “Mr. Costigan began shoving into my doorway making demands. I could tell Dr. Deville was going to do major surgery so I intercepted him.”

Nick brushed Rock off. “I have three babies sleeping inside, Mr. Costigan. If you raise your voice again, I’m going to pistol whip you out of my Penthouse. Do you understand? Just nod.”

Rock nodded while feeling his throat where the Colt barrel had been. “I…I would like to speak with Harding, preferably outside your place.”

Nick looked at me. “We have a complete kitchen, John. Why not take Mr. Costigan there with his friends. I have no objection. You gentlemen in the rear with Mr. Costigan can come in too. Please don’t ignore the fact you are guests in my place. Would you like any objective third party friends with you, John?”

“Only Tommy, Nick. He’s my manager. I’ll be fine. Thank you for your hospitality.”

“I’ll bring you the brothers Beam and Bud.”

“God bless you, Sir. C’mon Rock, right this way.” Tommy fell in next to me from where he had been waiting without speaking. I led my unexpected visitors into Nick’s Penthouse plush kitchen. “Serve yourselves of anything you would like for refreshments. I don’t plan on playing host. Tell me how you know I was here. Do it convincingly, Rock. I won’t ask twice.”

“I don’t take shit from-”

I slipped behind Rock in a split second, my hands in a position on his neck before he could think, leading to death, and a major disposal problem. Like I said, I’m sick of being hunted. Tommy had his Glock out covering the already unhappy entourage. Clint and Lynn slipped in quietly at the rear.

“This isn’t a game, Rock. Spit it out. Make the whole story a Reader’s Digest version with nothing but truth. Otherwise, we’re all going to have a problem you won’t ever be able to solve where I send you.”

Rock felt the power. I’m a killer. It became instantly apparent I didn’t give a shit whether he lived or died. Lucky for him he changed the paradigm.

“I was in New York for a meeting, staying here at the Trump Soho! One of my men caught a glimpse of you. We bribed the desk to let us know if you were staying here. We…we found out all of you rented Penthouse suites. I bought us in from the hotel people, telling them we were having a business meeting concerning an upcoming fight. We tried the different places. This was the second one after yours, Harding.”

I smiled. Rock’s body tensed as he felt the kill. The hell with this… all of it.

“Recon!” I froze and a split second later I had Lucas’s face a millimeter away from me as if I stood in the damn barracks at Paris Island again. “You let this pussy go or you will deal with me!”

I let Rock go. I pointed to a chair. “Sit down, Rock. The rest of you idiots join him without any noise. The first one to wake a baby gets a .45 Caliber hole right between his horns.”

I sat down with a sigh and Tommy sat next to me. We had the company of killers. No one liked how close they sensed a life adjustment. Nick placed a Bud and Beam in front of me and the Beam brother was a glass. I chuckled, meeting my friend’s interested glance with a nod that I was okay. It was a rough time in Cheeseburger land.

“Okay, Rock. We’re all friends here now.” I emptied my Beam brother and sipped from my Bud brother. It should have been the other way around but I felt the need for speed. “I get it. You’re upset about the handshake video. Light a candle and get over it. If you ever face me anywhere without a call first I will kill you. You only think you know me. If you knew me, you would have drowned yourself in the harbor before coming here. Please take over, T.”

“Bad move coming here, Rock,” Tommy said, taking over. “It’s over and done. Tell me what it is you had in mind. Stay on point and don’t make threats you couldn’t possibly follow up on. If we keep this as a business meeting, you and your crew will survive. Choose your words carefully.”

I could tell this incident had rocked Rock’s world. He wanted me in a cage with thousands in attendance and rules. Rock had delusions of grandeur but felt slighted because he looked bad in Jafar’s video. Boo hoo. I’m certain he felt like he could beat me without breaking a sweat with rules. Nope. I owned his ass. I enjoyed the whole contemplating silence. If Rock gave me a shot at the title I would kick the living shit out of him.

“I made a mistake coming here,” Rock stated. “I came here pissed off, ready to get you into the cage and destroy you. I see now that can never happen.”

Rats! I heard Tommy sigh as Rock paused for a moment.

“May we leave now? No shot, no how, no way… ever, Harding.”

“Understood. Yep. C’mon. I’ll walk you guys to the door.” I stood and led the way. I opened the room door and stood aside. Rock left with his entourage of very confused but relieved bodyguard contingent. Lynn coughed, muttering ‘pussy’. Rock didn’t look back. I closed the door.

“That was interesting,” Nick said. “It seems bad business to duck a huge money making fight. I think you frightened him, Cheese.”

“No question about that,” Tommy said. “Rock’s not getting into the cage with the Dark Lord under any circumstances. The only thing that could change that is the UFC threatening to strip Rock of his title because of fan pressure. That’s a long shot. It could be ‘Berserker’ will win the rematch. He might give DL a shot because of the money.”

“We have a mission. Until it’s over, and we’re back, none of the UFC shit means anything,” I said. “If I were Rock, I’d stay out of the cage with me too. Thanks, Pappy. That would have been a mess in there at a bad time. I’ll be glad when we get the hell out to sea.”

“Let’s sit down,” Nick urged. “We didn’t get a chance to discuss whether Sopa’s name meant anything to your guys from Red Dragon.”

Jafar, who had joined us, answered for me. “Chuck and Sal are on it. They will shadow the guy until the cruise begins. They’ve tapped into his phone already since I contacted them. We’ll know if he’s signed on with the other infiltrators soon.”

“Hey, Dad,” Jean called out. “Are we good?”

“All clear. If you’re hungry I’ll order room service. Pick out anything you like on the room menu and I’ll call it in. It’s on the table in the kitchen.”

“Even pizza?”

“If that’s what you want… sure. You can have lobster, steak, hamburgers… you name it, they have it.”

“Okay… we’ll take a look.” Jean led the way to the kitchen.

The rest of us relaxed in the spacious viewing room with our refilled refreshments. Lucas pointed at me.

“You need to get your head in the game, Recon. You won’t be at Pain Central ripping hearts out in our holding cells. You’ll be on board the ship. We can’t have you doing your monster antics on the cruise. I’ll be captaining the Sea Wolf. Don’t make me put Lora on your butt to keep you in check.”

I nodded, enduring the amusement of my Lucas dressing down, and monster ways. I deserved it. “If I lose control on the ship, I’ll have Dr. Deville do a podiatry exam. That reminds me. We’ll have to make sure the portable kit gets on board with us, Lynn.”

“On our plane we won’t have any trouble, but we’re flying commercial overseas, right?”

“Yeah, Laredo has our jet for transporting gear along with the Sea Wolf and Valkyrie crews. Our families are going first class commercial,” I said. “Nick arranged a military flight for the rest of us with our gear, no questions asked. The CIA Director, Paul Gilbrech, has all arrangements made. If you want to fly with the baby, Lynn, we’ll make sure all your gear gets there. I bought a couple extra seats on the commercial jet just in case.”

“I’d like that. I’d rather be with Clint Jr. on the flight overseas,” Lynn replied. “How’s the coordination on the ground for boarding the Starlight?”

“Chuck and Sal will be meeting us personally for our boarding. We’ll be going on board an hour before regular passenger boarding. We won’t cause undue attention either because it’s keyed into the fact Nick will be doing book signings. He plays the famous author with us as his entourage.”

“I can’t wait for the book signing deal,” Lynn said. “I’ve never been to one. Do the fans all go nuts like you’re Mick Jagger or something?”

“No, but I’ve never been on a cruise doing a book signing before,” Nick answered. “Gus and John can tell you – some of the patrons can be really entertaining. We get ‘Book Killers’, Grammar Nazi’s, and some people there just to rip me for even writing my pulp.”

“Payaso and I are in Nick’s books as characters,” El Kabong explained. “We take questions too. Nick has the most fun with the Grammar Nazi’s.”

“Sounds like fun,” Lynn replied. “With all those people aboard with nothing better to do, you should get a broad spectrum of people stopping by.”

“They’re doing it in the largest entertainment space on the ship,” Nick said. “They will have live music while the signing goes on. On one hand, that many people at a book signing will be a real treat, especially with entertainment. On the other hand, there will be a much larger number of people to draw out the BK’s. They’re the phenomena on Amazon, where reviewers write one and two star hit pieces on a book to kill sales. We’ve had a good time with them at other signings.”

“Nick killed a few of them,” Gus said. “The latest one turned out to be a serial killer. He followed us around Boston on a family outing, plotting what, we don’t know.”

We Monsters listened with rapt attention, especially Lynn who appeared unable to get enough of the writer/assassin adventures. “What happened to him? Did you ever find out why he was stalking all of you?”

“No,” John Groves answered. “Nick caught him outside the famous ‘Cheers’ bar in the park across from the entrance. He slit his throat before we found out what he was doing.”

“How did you know he was a serial killer, Nick?”

Nick shrugged. “I didn’t, Lynn.”

Oh man did we get a laugh out of that admission. Kabong explained further a moment later.

“I found out on the news the guy’s name was Lupe Pintor,” John said. “Muerto posed Pintor’s Glock in his hand to make it look like a drug deal gone bad. Ballistics matched Pintor’s Glock to a dozen killings in four states.”

“Did you get the latest Dark Lord holding cell adjustment, Muerto?”

Nick’s face brightened. Yep. He was a Monster. “Oh God, Lynn… thank you. That was the best. That Bluto guy telling you he’d make you beg for Cheese’s body after they maimed and killed him was so good. Thank God you folks have great audio. I want to subscribe to your 24/7 holding cell live video when you get it in.”

Lynn made shushing motions and sounds at Nick with everyone laughing. Nick realized the holding cell 24/7 surveillance idea had not been shared with me.

“Are you nuts, Crue!”

“Oh calm down, Cheeseburger.” Lynn gave me the wave off. “We’ll put your face into one of those blurry geek masks, right Achmed?”