The Payback Assignment (2 page)

“I told you not to post anyone, Stone.
 
You put an armed man out front.
 
May as well put up a sign saying there’s some kind of clandestine business going on in here.
 
I took him out before I came in.
 
You’re lucky I didn’t kill him.”

           
“Standard procedure.”
 
Stone’s voice was so controlled.
 
“I hope you didn’t hurt him too badly.”

           
“He’s okay, but he’ll have a hell of a headache when he wakes up.
 
Now, why am I here?”

           
“Coffee?”
 
Stone reached for the pot.

           
“No.
 
You got work for me or what?”

           
Stone poured the thick, dark brew into his small cup as if he had nothing else to do that day.
 
“Yes,” he said, adding a sugar cube to his cup with no greater haste.
 
“A brief job in Belize.
 
You know the place?”

           
“An American ally on the Caribbean,” Morgan said.
 
“Good game preserves.
 
Great scuba spots.
 
Nothing going on down there right now.”

           
“So it would appear.
 
Someone doesn’t like the direction in which that little nation is going.”
 
Stone’s voice was almost hypnotic, and Morgan made a serious effort to stay alert while listening to him.

           
“Someone.
 
Your principal.
 
Who shall remain nameless?”

           
“Of course, for your protection as well as his.
 
There is a man named Carlos Abrigo.
 
I won’t bore you with the details, but he is a very influential man in the Belize national assembly, the head of their committee controlling exports.
 
And he is leaning heavily to the left.”

           
Morgan nodded.
 
The target was a commie and that was all he needed to know.
 
Cuba was sufficient proof that communism was not a dead philosophy, or a defeated enemy in the Western Hemisphere.

           
“So?
 
You want this guy to disappear?
 
Not my thing.
 
I’m a soldier.”

           
“What I need is a professional who can carry out a raid on a well defended compound,” Stone replied, unruffled.
 
“Abrigo lives in a rural area, some distance east of Belmopan, the capital city, in a veritable fortress of a forgotten mission.
 
He maintains a staff that includes some thirty armed guards.
 
They are labeled law enforcement, but are in fact military personnel.”

           
“So you want me to kill him?”

           
“We need his influence terminated permanently.”

           
Morgan almost laughed at Stone’s subtlety.
 
“Fine.
 
Sounds like a simple enough assignment.
 
I won’t know how simple until I’ve had a chance to do a thorough recon.”

           
“I can provide you with maps and details of the target’s defenses.
 
You see, this must take place within the next thirty days.
 
My research tells me you’re the best professional available for the job.
 
Will you take it?”

           
“I’d have to assemble a team.
 
Equip and train them.
 
Plan for identity concealment afterward.
 
And of course I’d have to see the defenses before I gave you a firm estimate.
 
Based on what you’ve said, I figure I can handle what you require for a total cost of, say, two hundred fifty thousand American dollars.
 
Plus expenses.”

           
Stone picked up the telephone.
 
He pushed one button and waited for the speed dial to go through its motions.
 
After a few seconds it was clear that a connection was made, but Stone didn’t say hello or begin a conversation.
 
He simply said Morgan’s last name and the amount he had mentioned.
 
He listened for a moment, his face impassive, and nodded once before resting the telephone in its cradle.
 
Stone had an excellent poker face, and Morgan could not predict the answer.

           
“This amount is acceptable,” Stone said, his words falling like ice crystals.
 
“My client will supply advance intelligence and transportation to and from the site.
 
You will of course deal only with me in this matter.”
           
“Naturally.”

-3-

           
That business had brought Morgan to this frozen moment in the Belize jungle.
 
While he watched, a big hand reached out of the darkness behind the uniformed guard and clamped across his face.
 
That would be Smitty, the point man.
 
Morgan heard a thump as the guard’s head arced back and his body jerked forward, as if something had hit the small of his back.

           
Nerveless fingers dropped the harness leash, and the huge dog leaped forward.
 
Morgan’s right hand reached to the back of his belt.
 
When he brought it forward, it was filled with the handle of his fighting knife.
 
He held the knife in a reverse grip, its spine pressed along his forearm.

           
In less than a second the dog was on him, close enough to smell its breath.
 
The beast hung in midair, its jaws set to snap over Morgan’s face.
 
His arm swung in front of him, the edge of the blade slashing across the dog’s throat.
 
Momentum carried the beast forward, its bulk smashing into his chest.
 
Slammed to his back, Morgan felt hot gore pumping onto him from the animal’s slashed throat.
 
Even above the natural stench of the jungle, the odor made him gag.
 
Revolted, he thrust the body away, watching the dog’s final death throes before rolling to his knees and looking over the mound again.

           
He saw another flash of light, then two more.
 
All clear.
 
Shaking off the picture of the huge dog charging him, he signaled his men to continue.

           
Swinging machetes, the small group of professional soldiers moved through the brush at an aggressive pace.
 
His point man aside, Morgan led the way, feeling sweat pooling in his boots and sliding down his back beneath his belt and other carry straps.
 
He wished he could stop someplace and wash the blood off his uniform, but he knew the mission needed to proceed as planned.
 
As he trudged on, Crazy Mike drew up beside him.

           
“The other outer ring guards will find the bodies,” Mike said.

           
“We’re less than ten minutes from the target,” Morgan replied in hushed tones.
 
“By the time they get back to the compound they’ll find us there.”

           
“We might move a little faster if you weren’t so...”

           
“What?
 
Paranoid?”
 
Morgan asked.

           
“Over prepared.”
 
While Mike had a machine gun slung across his back, Morgan carried a greater variety of tools.
 
He liked to travel with everything he might need.
 
In addition to the machete he used to carve his path through the brush, he wore a shoulder holstered pistol, a fighting knife at his back, a submachine gun at his side, a pair of boot knives, and several extra fully loaded magazines.

           
“You know my attitude,” Morgan said.
 
“Better to be over prepared than dead.”

           
“Yeah, well there’s no sense killing yourself before...”

           
“Freeze!”
 
Morgan snapped with unexpected urgency.
 
Behind them, the rest of the team dropped to one knee, their rifles thrust forward.

           
For a full minute, no one moved while Morgan looked around in all directions.
 
When Mike started to ask “What?” Morgan silenced him with an upraised palm.
 
Having checked everywhere else, Morgan looked toward the damp ground.
 

           
“Mike.
 
Don’t panic or anything, but your left boot is pressed against a wire.
 
It’s pretty taut and I’m afraid whatever it’s attached to might go off if you back off.
 
See anything?”

           
“I can’t even see the damned wire,” Mike answered.
 
“I don’t remember any mines or snares on that map Stone gave us.”

           
“That’s because there weren’t any.
 
This is probably new since his recon.
 
Now you just hold real still and I’ll try to keep you in one piece, okay?”

-4-

           
Morgan pressed two fingers against Crazy Mike’s shin and found the thin wire.
 
Sidestepping, he slid his fingers gently across the wire, moving by feel more than sight.
 
His breathing was slow and deep as he moved, bent over almost double, gently pushing fronds and branches away with his left hand.

           
He found what he expected just a few feet away.
 
Its convex face toward him, the familiar olive green device stood there on a pair of thin steel blade legs which were jammed into the ground.

           
“Claymore mine,” he said, not daring to speak loudly enough for anyone else to hear.
 
A hand detonator was strapped to a tree trunk with green duct tape, the stuff Morgan had learned to call hundred mile an hour tape in the Army.
 
The stiff wire pressed the detonator lever in.
 
If the wire were pulled any farther, the lever would move enough for contacts to connect, sending an electric spark down a wire to the blasting cap screwed into the top of the mine.
 
The resulting explosion would scatter eight hundred BB sized steel pellets in his direction, turning him and Crazy Mike into bloody fragments.

           
Even if Mike tried to back off, the hook-shaped grommets of his speed-laced boot might pull the wire or press it enough to set the mine off.
 
Kneeling, Morgan pulled his Gerber Multiplier survival tool from his pocket.
 
He folded the handles together, exposing the jaws of its pliers.
 
The first inch of the jaws was sharpened to be wire cutters.
 

           
“Over prepared,” he muttered to himself, kneeling.
 
His BDU pants soaked in dampness from the ground, but he wasn’t concerned with his knees being wet.
 
He did wipe his left hand down his pants leg, rubbing it free of sweat.
 
He took three deep breaths, holding the last, because he knew that the slightest shaking of his hand could kill them.
 
Guiding on his outstretched fingers, he gently wrapped the tool’s wire cutters around the thin strand.
 
Tightly holding the wire on the side toward the mine, he slowly closed his left hand.

           
A quiet “snik” told him the wire was cut.
 
After releasing his breath, he slowly released the held wire.

           
A moment later he was beside Mike again, whispering, “All clear.”