Marc Cameron - Act of Terror

Quinn cursed himself again for not shooting the man in the first place. He felt himself fading. Exposure to extreme altitude, cold, torture, and lack of sleep piled on in a relentless scrum of crushing fatigue.

Dark Elvis sensed the lapse of strength and reacted with instant fury. He shoved forward with powerful legs, driving Quinn backward toward the hazy light of the fire escape window.

Fighting dizziness, Quinn leaned in for a split second, remembering his jujitsu instructor’s credo: When pushed, pull. He wanted to be certain his opponent was fully committed. Without warning, he gave way, pedaling backward to bring the evil Elvis with him. Quinn’s fists shot in and upward, crossing in front of the surprised man’s throat before looping the taut wire up and over his head of slicked hair.

Quinn let his right leg collapse under his butt as he used his opponent’s momentum to drag him along. Rolling backward on his shoulders, he planted his left foot in the other man’s gut, throwing him in a forward somersault over Quinn’s head.

Glass shattered, raining down on the combatants as the force of the dark man’s momentum propelled his body through the chicken wire and out the window.

Quinn gripped the ends of the garrote, feeling the sudden heavy tug as his opponent’s weight slammed against the wire. The handles suddenly grew light in Quinn’s hands. He rolled to his side, fearing the wire had broken and expecting to continue the fight.

Instead, Dark Elvis’s head landed in the dim hallway with a sickening thud, black eyes squinting, fallen pompadour sulking across a furrowed brow. His body lay in a heap outside the broken window on the rusted fire escape grating.

Pounding footsteps brought Thibodaux bounding up the stairs, pistol extended and ready in his beefy hand. He slid to a stop, staring in slack-jawed disgust.

Quinn pushed himself up on one knee, blinking and wincing in pain from his throbbing foot. “Where’s Badeeb? You didn’t kill him, did you? We’re supposed to see what he knows.”

The Cajun sighed. “Sucker swallowed a little magic coward pill before I could even unass my bike. NYPD is sacking up the body.” He tipped his gun barrel toward the severed head. “Anyhow, you got no room to chastise me. I guess the King’s not gonna do much talking either.” He did a passable Elvis impersonation, complete with quivering upper lip. “Thank you, thank you very much.”

“No, he’s not talking.” Quinn struggled to his feet, using the wall for support. “But maybe someone else will.

A red smear followed on the wooden floor behind Li Huang where she had dragged herself to the edge of her bed. Dark, arterial blood seeped between the gaps of bony fingers clenched at her neck, ebbing and flowing in time with the weakening beat of her heart. Her lips had gone a chalky blue.

Quinn knelt beside her. “We have an ambulance en route.” He took a piece of QuikClot gauze from the black Cordura wound kit in his pocket and applied it to her neck. Even as he worked, he knew the injury was too great to save her.

“My husband… responsible… for this,” she croaked. The glistening gray white sheath of her windpipe was visible through the sagging wound, moving when she spoke. “… faithful… to that… dog… fifteen years…”

“And yet he wanted you dead,” Quinn said, slowly shaking his head. This woman had surely been a party to the deaths of untold numbers of innocents. It was difficult for him to muster much sympathy. “Why?”

“… hate him,” she gasped.

“I believe I can save you,” Quinn lied. “But you have to tell me what you know.”

“Too late…” Her voice came in ragged whispers, like the worn-out remnants of a sobbing cry.

“Your husband ordered you murdered,” Quinn said, keeping firm pressure on the old woman’s wound. “Are you going to protect him after that?”

“It is a girl,” Li Huang whispered, lapsing into Mandarin. “She will kill them all.”

Quinn shot a glance at Thibodaux, nodding. “We took the girl into custody,” he said, following the woman into her native language. “Before she could get in her airplane.”

“Not Tara…” The old woman shook her head. The move was slight, but enough to start the wound bleeding again in earnest. “Tara was… insurance…”

Her eyes fluttered, dimming.

Quinn held her chin with his free hand. “What is her name?” he asked, still in Chinese. “This other girl? Where is she?”

“Vice president’s wife… new assistant… they will kill your president…” The old woman tried to swallow. “Could… I have… water?” Dried saliva flaked white at the corners of slack lips.

“They?” Quinn asked, his face just inches from the dying woman.

“There… is a man… He… he…” She coughed, drawing a series of rattling breaths. “What time is it?”

Thibodaux looked at his watch. “Just after five,” he said.

A wan smile crossed Li Huang’s sallow face. “It does not matter anymore.” She shook her head for the last time. “You are too late-”

Quinn laid the old Chinese woman’s lifeless body on her rude wooden bed. Shaking off the hollow pit of abject fatigue, he reached in the pocket of the Transit jacket for his phone and glanced up at Thibodaux as he punched in the number for Palmer.

The big Cajun stood, staring down at the gaping wound in the old woman’s neck, jaws loose again as if he might be sick. “I don’t reckon I was ever around a people so keen on cuttin’ one another’s heads off…”

“Do me a favor,” Quinn said.

“Huh?” Thibodaux looked up as if from a trance.

“Get Smedley back on the horn. Ask him to get his Osprey here on the double. We have to get out to that wedding.”

“She said, ‘he,’ ” Thibodaux mused. “Got any notion who ‘he’ is?”

“Could be anybody,” Quinn said, waiting for his call to connect.

Thibodaux grunted his agreement and went to work.

“Dammit,” Quinn spat. He got the fast busy signal that told him something was going on with the cell tower handling his call. He pressed redial but heard the same rapid series of beeps.

“Mine’s not going through either.” The big Cajun met his gaze. “I’m gettin’ zip.”

“Then we’ll deliver the message in person.” Quinn was already trotting toward the stairs.

Thibodaux still had the cell phone pressed to his ear as he ran beside Quinn. His face suddenly brightened. “It’s ringing.” He handed Jericho the phone.

Smedley picked up on the third ring. His phone was connected via Bluetooth to his Lightspeed headset and the lawnmower thump of the V-22’s Rolls-Royce engines was barely audible in the background.

“Smeds,” Quinn said. “It’s me, Copper. Where you been? Your phone wasn’t working.”

“Just dropped off a load of Castle Guards at the venue,” the pilot said, referring to the Secret Service detail. “The place is swarming with those sunglass-wearin’ dudes-and I gotta tell you, they all look like they’re itching to shoot someone.”

“Yeah, well, me too, Jared,” Quinn said. “Me too. So where are you now?”

“Setting down at the heliport by the ferry terminal. Why?”

“The moles must have a cell phone jammer on the island,” Quinn mused, as much to himself as Smedley. “I can’t get through to Palmer and your phone was in-op while you were over there.”

“Want me to get a message on the military frequency?” the major asked. “It was working fine.”

Standing at the Ducati now, Quinn paused to sort his thoughts. He was hurt and exhausted, dead on his feet. It was moments like this when he couldn’t afford to make snap decisions. But it was one of the great paradoxes of his life that in moments like this, snap decisions were all he had time for.