weeks ago. He fell overboard during some heavy weather and was never seen again. Tragic.”
Only one surfer was left in the fading light, a bearded fellow with shaggy blond hair who seemed in no hurry to come back in. “Look at that lad,” said Cornwell. “Sitting out there like he doesn’t have a care in the world.”
The surfer sat easily on his board, facing sideways between the setting sun and the cliff, waiting for a set of waves. Being dead wasn’t all that bad. He could live with it. Anyway, without Shari, what was the point? He unconsciously rubbed the gnarly scars on the left side of his abdomen where the doctors had dug out the two bullets, and then had to go back in later to stop a raging infection caused by tiny threads of dirty cloth taken inside by one of the rounds. He had lost a chunk of his large intestine and his spleen, and a bullet fragment had ripped down far enough to crack a bone in his hip. That was only physical. Losing Shari was what really hurt.
His friends were waiting for him up in the little restaurant overlooking the K-54 beach, but his attention was on the patterns of the incoming waves. His recovery had been very slow, but he had recovered from wounds before. What would not heal was the part of his heart that was missing. Nothing would make that ache go away, but he knew of some medicine that would make it easier to bear.
A shadow curled below the horizon, a set coming in steep and flowing toward the beach with intense purpose. He saw them building and getting higher, and turned the board toward the beach and started to paddle. Then the first wave caught up and pulled the long board into its powerful center. He was riding with the break when he pushed up against his fifteen-year-old board, planted his feet, and stood, relaxed and perfectly balanced, and rode all the way in, wrapped in the pure essence and freedom of surfing.
The man who was no longer Kyle Swanson waded from the water and hauled the board up the worn stairs, bumping it a couple of times on the stones, as always happened at the K-54. It wore its scars with honor, just like its owner.
The following day, the
“You about ready?” Middleton asked. He and Double-Oh were on a unique shopping tour of elite units within the Navy and Marine Corps, looking to steal some hard-bodied warrior types for the general’s new command. After the congressional hearings and subsequent investigations, Middleton “went black” and took Double-Oh with him as operations chief.
It had been decided that if Kyle Swanson remained dead and buried, a special unit would be built around the sniper, just as a professional football team could build a championship around a franchise quarterback. They could surround him with support players who were similar masters of their own specialties, and they would have a unit that could go anywhere and do anything, because the people on it did not exist.
Kyle had agreed, on one condition, and his wish had been granted. Now he was at a mirror on the far side of the stateroom with a splattered towel around his shoulders, the result of dyeing his long hair black. “I look like fucking Charlie Manson,” he said.
“Naw, you don’t have that little swastika thingie on your forehead,” said Double-Oh. “You look like some heavy-metal freak.”
“You ready for this?” asked Middleton, taking a seat on the bed. “Once it starts, you’re on your own.”
“More than ready, General. Jeff wants me to field-test Excalibur II. I’ll be back in a few days and then we can get to work.”
“Okay, Shake. I’ll see you back here on the boat in five days.” Middleton walked out.
Double-Oh popped Swanson on the shoulder with a balled fist and waved as he shut the door. “Later.”
Kyle looked at the photograph on the California driver’s license of James K. Polk. A Social Security card and two credit cards in the same name were on a night table, along with a thousand dollars. The dark hair of the man in the picture was pulled back in a ponytail, and the facial hair was neatly trimmed. He picked up the scissors and began to shape the beard.
Taped to the mirror were stories he had clipped from the society pages of
EPILOGUE
ASPEN, COLORADO (UNP)- The body of missing billionaire industrialist Gordon Gates IV was found late yesterday in the rugged Rocky Mountains, police announced.
Law enforcement sources said that Gates had been killed by a single bullet to the head in an apparent hunting accident.
Gates, a decorated military veteran and avid hunter, was last seen Saturday night when he hosted his annual Christmas season fund-raising gala at his elegant home in this elite mountain resort. Some of the guests said he left about midnight in hopes of reaching a secluded canyon in which a rogue mountain lion recently killed two campers and mauled another.
“Gordon really wanted that big cat,” said his attorney, Wilford Stanton, at Gates Global headquarters in Washington, D.C. “He spent a small fortune on guides and employed military-style detection equipment to track it to this particular location. He felt the lion was a danger to everyone in the area, and wanted to be the one to bring it down.”
Sheriff Matt Randall said other hunters frequently had also been seen in the area stalking the mountain lion. “Mr. Gates was wearing a brush camouflage outfit, but not a brightly colored warning vest. Somebody apparently saw him move and took a hasty shot. The victim took a large-caliber round in the left temple and was dead by the time he hit the dirt.”
A police search for other hunters was unsuccessful. “We are asking anyone with information about this unfortunate accident to come forward.”
Gates Global, the multinational holding company, posted a reward of a million dollars leading to the arrest and conviction of the shooter.
Gates had recently been under intense government scrutiny for alleged corruption involving government contracts, and his firm sustained substantial public relations damage last year over alleged involvement in the kidnapping of Marine Brigadier General Bradley Middleton and the Syrian situation. The company insisted it had no knowledge of any involvement, and Gates invited the FBI to search its files and databases. Nothing was discovered that would link the giant corporation to the abduction.
Jack Coughlin
Donald A. Davis
