pudgy, balding man nervously glancing left and right. He was dressed like a street bum, his clothes stained and his oversize running shoes showing holes at the toes. He stank of whiskey and boiled eggs. Keshawn felt his heart fall. Then felt a rage like never before, images of Beth’s struggle in the bathtub turning his vision red. He brought himself under control.
“Yes?”
The man wiped the sweat from his upper lip. “You get a FedEx package here yesterday?”
“What business is it of yours?”
“It’s my business because I know what’s in it. And if you don’t give me some money, I’m going to let the cops know.”
Keshawn was completely taken aback. This man wasn’t the fighter. He was something else entirely. He didn’t know how the man had knowledge of the delivery, but he did know one thing: The bum was a threat.
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Keshawn said. “Cops? For what?”
The bum was sweating profusely now, fidgeting left and right. “Just give me a hundred bucks, and I’ll leave.”
Keshawn stood back from the door, his mind running through options, none of which he could execute on the front stoop. “Come inside. I have some money in here.”
“That’s okay. I’m not stupid. Bring the money to me out here.”
Keshawn looked left and right, seeing no one in the deserted industrial area. He reached back like he was pulling out a wallet, withdrawing a four-inch folding knife instead. He flicked out the blade and whipped it straight into the man’s abdomen, blade up, stabbing deep and ripping upward toward the heart. He clamped his other hand on the man’s jacket and held him upright while he continued to cut, finally hitting the bone of the rib cage. The man shrieked, his eyes bugging out of his head. Keshawn jerked him inside, the door slamming shut on its mechanical arm. He tossed the bum on the ground, watching him writhe around in a growing pool of blood, desperately attempting to staunch the flow. He knew the man was going to die in seconds.
He grabbed the bum’s hair to get him to focus. “Who told you about the shipment?”
The homeless man gargled, holding his hands to his stomach, his eyes rolling back in his head.
“Who, motherfucker, who?”
The man was unresponsive, either dead or unconscious. Keshawn kicked him, then kicked the wall.
“Fuck!”
He heard another knock from outside.
Standing on the other side was wiry man with a hawkish nose. His complexion was swarthy, but what caught Keshawn’s attention were his eyes. Black pools that reflected something dangerous. Perhaps something irrational as well. Just as he could smell a cop from across the street, Keshawn knew this man had been inside a prison. And not an easy one.
The man spoke calmly and lightly. “I’m Rafik. You must be Keshawn. May I come in?”
Keshawn said nothing, simply holding open the door, unsure of what he should do, his mind spinning. The simple question, given the killing he’d just done, seemed surreal.
Rafik walked inside and barely glanced at the eviscerated homeless man.
“You did well. I’m sorry for the deception, but I had to be sure of who you were.”
“You sent him to me? Why? Suppose I let him go?”
“I would have killed him. And then killed you.”
The confusion wearing off, Keshawn bristled, growing angry at being played like a child at a magic show. “Really? You think so? You ain’t in raghead land now.”
Rafik smiled, completely calm. “I asked for your forgiveness. I needed to be sure of your commitment. To be sure you wouldn’t run at the first hint of trouble. We are on a path that may require sacrifice. I had to be sure you were up to the task.”
Keshawn said, “You don’t have to worry about me. I’m ready.”
Rafik narrowed his eyes and flicked his toe at the body on the floor. “This is nothing. I mean real sacrifice.”
Beth’s struggle in the bathtub flashed in Keshawn’s mind, her arms flailing around for leverage to raise her head, water splashing over the tub, the burst of bubbles as her involuntary response overcame her conscious attempt to stave off death, the tub growing cold as he held her limp body, one of her arms draped over the edge, the metronomic drips of water falling from a finger, getting farther and farther apart.
He felt Rafik’s eyes on him. “I know about sacrifice,” he said. “Believe me, I know.”
Rafik said nothing for a moment, then nodded. “The time is almost here. You had no trouble with the DHL shipment?”
Glad to talk about anything to rid him of the memories, Keshawn led him to the Pelican cases. “No issues whatsoever. I haven’t opened them, so I don’t know if anything was lost.”
“You didn’t open the cases?”
“Well, I didn’t know what was in them, so it made no sense to see if something was stolen.”
Pleased at the obedient response, Rafik opened both cases and smiled. “Nothing missing.”
Keshawn saw only metal plates and plastic buckets. “What the fuck is this?”
“You’ll find out with everyone else. You’ve done well with the warehouse. This is where we’ll build the method of destruction and train the men. One team at a time. Is the meeting set for Richmond?”
“Yeah. Carl’s got an apartment outside the airport. Everyone’s traveling down there now and should be there in a couple of days.”
Rafik clapped him on the shoulder. “Perfect. Let’s clean up this mess and continue our journey.”
The calmness of the conversation, considering the spreading pool of blood and the gutted body with its rictus grimace, sent a sliver of unease into Keshawn.
49
The room stank of stale designer coffee and fried rice. The conference table was littered with takeout cartons and Styrofoam cups, a large fruit bowl in the center holding the sad remnants of a bunch of grapes. Kurt supposed nobody wanted to be the one to eat the last bit of food.
He rested his head against the wall with his legs extended from his back-row seat behind the conference table, watching the members of the Oversight Council fidget while they waited on the arrival of the president. He had briefed them on the activities in Prague, filling in the holes from the information that had come out of the DOS and CIA’s own intelligence apparatus. The story on the street was of a large raid by the Prague police based on the intelligence of a woman “informant” on the inside of an Albanian sex-slave ring. Kurt had cracked open the truth.
As expected, the council had been incredulous. The team had completely overstepped their bounds, potentially causing an international crisis that could destroy American credibility during a time when the United States was trying to regain its footing in the world. Truth be told, Kurt half hoped they’d shut the whole project down. The pressure on him was enormous, affecting his ability to make decisions that were in the nation’s best interest. Calling his sleep fitful was being polite. His entire life had been dedicated to defending the constitution of the United States, and after 9/11 the Taskforce had seemed one more step on that road, but now things were spinning out of control.
An attack was coming, and the team was doing its best to combat it, but at what cost? When was enough truly enough? When would the council say the rule of law outweighed the death that was coming? He despised Secretary of State Brookings, thinking the weasel cared only about his own career, but he understood the reticence.
If Pike’s actions in Prague became public knowledge, it would affect innumerable security arrangements on the European continent, which would inevitably trickle into trade negotiations and every other issue. Kurt
