The Warrior Code (9 page)

Zeb was watching the twins from the corner of his eye. They exchanged glances. Beth’s face went pale, and then her chin thrust out, and she disappeared in his bathroom and reappeared wearing the vest.

‘Nope. But he’s behind the curve, so maybe he will once they catch up.’ Zeb wasn’t surprised at Broker’s find. It was one of the possible moves by a group that was getting just a little desperate and had resources to deploy.

Broker changed the topic. ‘Have you worked out how those guys evaded your radar? I’ve never known you to not sense someone’s presence.’ Zeb had told Broker how the two shooters had caught him unawares at the RV.

‘Nope. Still figuring it out.’

‘You’re sure there’s no tracking device they’ve planted on you?’

‘First thing I checked. Came clean. They didn’t have opportunity in any case. They still don’t know where we are.’

‘You need to get back to the RV and check it out.’

‘Was planning to.’

‘Boston is no longer an option for us, is it?’ Beth asked him when Broker had hung up. ‘If they cast the net wider for us, then they’ll find us no matter where we are.’

He held their gaze, two pairs of green eyes showing fear as well as determination.

‘Nothing will happen to you,’ he said simply and meant it; he saw green eyes glow and the sun shine in them for the first time since he’d met them.

‘What do we expect to find there, Wise One?’ Beth yelled at him from the rear of the SUV, the spark back in her voice.

He looked at them in the mirror. Beth was looking back at him while Meghan was playing with her Ray-Ban Aviators; he had handed a pair to each of them.

They looked like just another pair of expensive shades, but Broker had worked on them and transformed them into a high-tech countersurveillance toy.

The glasses were coated with a special paint that didn’t reflect light, however direct the glare was. The ear stems had been drilled out and fitted with nano cameras, incredibly small cameras that projected images on the inside of the shades, giving the wearer a clear view of his blind spots. The camera could be turned on or off with a small switch on the hinge.

He ignored her question and asked one of his own.

‘How come neither of you has a boyfriend? I would think women your age would be dating someone, busy on the phone texting them or calling them.’

‘Ha! Shows how little you know us, Wise One. How come
you
don’t have a wife or a girlfriend? Or a
guy
friend?’ Beth challenged him.

Zeb didn’t answer, and they didn’t push him when they realized they wouldn’t get a reply. The soft humming of tires filled the silence, broken just once when Meghan pushed the shades over her eyes. ‘If these are the kind of goodies you have, Zeb, I hope we take a long time in finding these guys.’

An hour later, he turned the SUV in the spot he’d parked previously.

In the daylight the clearing was just big enough for his SUV, the trees around it several meters high with gnarled branches seeking sky and sunlight. He killed the engine and glanced once at the twins in the mirror. They met his eyes, waiting for his cue.

They kept quiet when it was needed, and their presence didn’t grate. He felt as comfortable around them as he felt around his team. Something churned deep inside him.

He crushed that thought, motioned for them to stay in the vehicle, and stepped out.

He was dressed in dark fatigues, a darker jacket around him, a combination that blended in the play of sunlight and shadows in the clearing. He donned his shades, swept the area, and motioned for the twins to step out.

They exited the SUV separately from different doors and fell behind him, not close.
Good tradecraft. Quick learners. Bud Petersen would’ve been proud.

He circled the RV and approached it from the rear, ducked under the police tape, and scanned its top.

He found nothing at the back, sidled to the front, hugging the side of the RV, waited for the women to appear from the opposite end, and when they did, he pointed at the entrance.

It was tiny, gray, and, at first sight, looked just like another fitting on the RV.

It was a wireless security camera. The cops had left it in place.

‘The Wise One wants to know if you can track down its receiving station,’ Meghan shouted at Broker once she’d read the camera’s details. They were back on the road, heading to Jackson.

They had turned off the power supply in the RV, detached the camera without showing themselves, and the twins had taken it apart as they were heading back. They had worn thin gloves and had handled the equipment delicately to avoid contaminating any prints on it.

‘Who?’ Broker shouted back.

Their voices were clear –
they should be, those are highly classified toys
, he snorted to himself – but he was more than happy to match the decibel level. It was a long time since he’d shouted. That was one drawback of being around Zeb. The guy never raised his voice, and therefore those around him followed suit. Broker shook his head mournfully.

Meghan smirked. ‘Zeb. That’s our name for him. He has that air around him, you know, as if he has all the answers.’

Broker chortled. ‘I’ve heard him called several things, but not that name. Can’t wait to tell the others.’

‘Well, can you?’ she reminded him impatiently.

‘If I can’t, no one can,’ Broker replied grandly. ‘But it’s not that simple. It’s best done when the camera is transmitting.’ He cut himself some slack, and when he heard a rude noise from Meghan, he added, ‘I’ll see what can be done and, at the very least try to track where the camera was purchased and who bought it.’

Kelly greeted them when they arrived at the Jackson P.D. ‘We tracked the RV's camera’s origins. It’s a high-end one bought at a store in Cheyenne, for cash. The store had security cameras, but the guy buying it was wearing a hoodie and had his head bent low.’ 

Zeb acknowledged him without replying.
Broker should be able to dig deeper and maybe get a handle on who was receiving those images.

‘We got two sets of prints on the phone. One of them was Perez’s and the other belongs to a guy from the same gang. There are smudges on the camera, no clear prints – gloves obviously.’

He clapped a beefy hand on Zeb’s shoulder. Zeb nearly stumbled.

‘Go wherever you have to. Don’t worry about the girls. My kids are back; they both work in Salt Lake City and are dying to meet these two hellions.’

Zeb had called him on the way back and had asked Kelly if the twins could stay with him for a couple of days. Kelly had been delighted.

‘You’re sure about this? The twins’ connection to you is so obvious that these guys could just mount an attack on your home.’

Kelly laughed grimly. ‘I hope they do. Liz, my wife, is an ace shooter. My girls, Doreen and Emily, grew up handling guns. Bud trained all of them in self-defense, attack, defensive lines, all that shit. Peregrine and the Chief of Police will be stepping up the patrol around my home. Those guys won’t know what hit them if they try anything.’

Zeb looked at Beth and Meghan. ‘You’ll call the rest of the team?’

Broker’s computers were running searches on Petersen’s old cases and on recent news and incidents in the town to see if anything jumped out with a link to the attack on the women.

The twins would focus on talking to the remaining members of Petersen’s SWAT team… in all probability that line of pursuit would yield nothing, but they had to try.

Zeb donned his shades when the women nodded, and stepped out in the sunlight.

Meghan and Beth watched him glide across the street to his SUV, saw the way passersby looked at him and gave way.

Meghan shivered in the sunlight and stepped closer to Beth.

‘If I was Cargill, I would turn myself in.’

Chapter 10

Cheyenne was named after the American Indian tribe by General Grenville M. Dodge in 1867. Dodge was tasked with finding a railroad route over the Laramie Mountains and established the terminal town at Cheyenne.

The arrival of the railroad brought real estate speculators, gamblers, and tradesmen. The railroad construction project turned into a town in 1867 when Cheyenne was incorporated. Cheyenne was like any other Wild West town then, with violence being a part of everyday life, the saloon and the graveyard were the most frequently attended places in the city.

The town became calmer when the railroad moved on, and it became wealthy with the rise of ranching and the brief discovery of gold in the Black Hills. At the peak of the Black Hills Gold Fields rush in 1882, Cheyenne was the wealthiest city in the world per capita.

Zeb drove into the town, which was still sporting signs of Cheyenne Frontier Days, the largest annual outdoor rodeo and Western celebration in the country.

It was hot and windy, and Zeb drove with his windows down, in a gray SUV with darkened windows that he’d rented in Jackson using one of his several fake identities. He’d kept his head down when hiring it, just in case the agency had security cameras.

He detoured to look over the south side of the town, where Cargill had been previously renting. He took his time rolling through a neighborhood that had rutted gravel roads, single-family homes dotting either side. He nudged the gas as he realized an unknown car would attract attention.

Cargill’s previous abode was unremarkable in any way – it stood apart from the surrounding homes, had a dilapidated fence running around it, and a broken-down car drooped sadly in the drive. It was a house that didn’t offer too many exits and escape routes.
Not the best place for a gang boss to hole up in, but I guess this guy isn’t the brightest spark.

The pile of junk, local newspapers, flyers, and realtors’ brochures piled up at the door told him its story. He drove out of the neighborhood to the central part of the town and passed the apartment block, Cargill’s current lodgings, a couple of times before turning into a drive-in café. He helped himself to his caffeine fix, nosed into a vacant parking slot he found facing the apartment block, moved to the rear, and settled himself for a long vigil.

The town had a population of about sixty thousand, which meant traffic at that time of the day, the end of the work day, was what those in larger cities like New York would scoff at. He wasn’t worried about Cargill spotting his vehicle.

It was an apartment block rented by transients, unfamiliar vehicles were the norm. The block didn’t have basement parking; residents had to park in nearby parking lots and approach the entrance on foot. The choice of apartment was the second mistake Cargill made.

The first one was picking on the women.

It was late night when he spotted Cargill walking toward the apartment block, a cap pulled low over his head. Cargill walked swiftly, looking neither to the left or the right, pushed into the entrance, and through the glass door. Zeb saw him thumb an elevator and disappear.

Zeb maintained a vigil throughout the night, but the man didn’t make any other appearance, and it was midday, the following day, when he left the block. Walking.

Zeb waited for the right opportunity.

Right opportunity came a couple of hours later.

A middle-aged woman approached the apartment block, juggling several shopping bags in one hand, holding on to a young girl with her other. She struggled to get the door open and gave a thankful smile to Zeb when he pushed the door open for her.

He followed her to the elevator, helped her inside, and thumbed four, Cargill’s floor.

The floor was laid out like a hotel corridor, but with fewer rooms on either side of the corridor than in a hotel. One set of rooms looked over the rear of the block; the other set overlooked the street.

Cargill’s apartment had a street view.

Broker had sent the layout of the apartment to Zeb. He had also described the lock on the apartment. Cheyenne was a low-crime city, the purpose of the lock on the apartment was to give assurance to owners and tenants and to provide a minimal level of safety. The apartment’s developer hadn’t splurged on the lock.

It took Zeb less than a minute to pick the deadbolt.

He slipped inside the apartment noiselessly.

And stopped in amazement.

The apartment was neatly laid out, a penthouse that had good views over the city, but that’s not what had Zeb staring.

It was immaculate, gleaming, as if it was a show home.

Not the kind of residence one associated with a gangbanger.

The entrance led into the living room, but was shielded from direct view by a simple partition.

The living room was dominated by the glass ceiling-to-floor windows and had a large-screen TV at one end and a comfortable couch that ran the width of the room at the other. There were a couple of chairs placed on either side of the couch.

In front of the couch was a table that had a couple of books, the kind that owners left around for visitors to browse through. One book was an enormous collection of landscape photography; another was a book of recipes.

Zeb checked out the rest of the apartment. It was similarly kept. All gleaming wood and light, a faint floral scent hanging in the air.

He went to the books, leafed through them idly, and beneath the last one he saw a leaflet and then understood.

It was a serviced apartment, meant for transients, especially transient professionals, like software salesmen, surgeons, company board directors.

Cargill’s not stupid. He’s deliberately picked an apartment that would not be associated with gangs.

Cargill came in at ten at night. He fumbled with his key, cursed a couple of times, pushed the door open, and snapped an interior light on with an elbow. He came past the partition, struggling with his jacket, when he sensed the presence and spun around.

He squinted as he saw the masked shadow on the chair.

‘Who the fuck…?’ he shouted as he reached under his jacket.

Zeb threw the photography book at him.

The heavy book crashed into his mouth and split his lips, and he staggered back as a stream of blood ran swiftly down his chin.