Jack Coughlin - Kill Zone

It took him no more than a minute to come around a boulder and be within reach of the sniper’s position. The Gurkha flipped a grenade into the secluded hole, ducked away to avoid the explosion, and was immediately up and charging, giving a chilling attack scream and slashing with his khukuri . There were no bodies, just the ruins of a long rifle and a backpack that had been shredded by shrapnel. The Gurkha realized his mistake just as Kyle Swanson came over the top, through the smoke, firing his M-16 at point-blank range.

Swanson was exposed during the attack for only a moment, but in that second, Victor Logan fired a quick burst at the shadow he saw moving through the dust of the explosion. Kyle felt bullets punch him in the stomach, and he was spun around, knocked over atop the dead Ghurka.

“ Hoo -ah!” shouted Logan. “I got you, you bastard! I’m better than you!”

The mercenary felt cold steel at the back of his head. Before he could react, Brad Middleton pulled the trigger of the big pistol, and three shots pulverized the skull and the brains of Victor Logan. “No. You’re not,” said the general. “You’re not even close to being as good as Shake.”

Behind him, the sky seemed alive with approaching helicopters.

CRISP FLIGHT ATTENDANTSwelcomed Gerald Buchanan aboard the American Airlines passenger jet at Miami International and escorted him to a first-class seat aboard Flight 107 to Puerto Rico. After the dankness of Washington, he had been pleasantly blinded by the brilliant sun and the blue Florida skies. Get used to it. There were a lot of islands in the Caribbean and he planned to settle on one. He already had a new identity and a list of officials to bribe to avoid arrest and extradition. Marge and the kids would come down in a few months, and they would reestablish a home on a beach somewhere.

He was leaving behind his dream of being the behind-the-scenes king of New America, but felt excitement at moving toward a new dream, one of a long and comfortable life with plenty of money and a big sailboat on the Italian Riviera. He thanked the attendant, gave her a drink request, settled into the soft blue aisle seat, and buckled in. Another attendant was there immediately with an Absolut on ice with a twist of lime.

He looked over at the passenger in the next seat. His luck was already changing for the better, for next to him was an attractive woman in jeans and a loose T-shirt that showed a band of skin around her waist. Dark brown hair was pulled back in a ponytail, and she had kicked off her tennis sneakers to curl up in the spacious seat, working on a laptop computer balanced on the tray table. Graphs and charts and multipage reports danced on the screen as she clicked through whatever her project was. She was drinking a glass of white wine.

“Hi there,” he said, taking a sip of his drink. Delicious. “May I ask what you’re working on? It seems complicated.”

“Oh, just some stuff about fish,” she responded with a shy look. Not much makeup, and big wire-rimmed glasses. Intelligent blue eyes looked at him curiously. “Do I know you from somewhere? I mean, aren’t you somebody famous on TV?”

Buchanan wanted to tell her everything, to impress her with his name and his title and his extraordinary reach and power. But that was all gone. According to his new passport, he was somebody else, moving toward a tomorrow to find new challenges to test his intellect. “No. Sorry.” He extended his hand. “My name is Bob Walsh. I do oil exploration. And who are you?”

“Irish Campbell. Nice to meet you.” She sipped her wine and pointed to the computer screen. “I’m a marine biologist up at Woods Hole in Massachusetts, and I’ve got to get out to the islands to tag some fish we believe are about ready to come off the endangered species list.”

He noticed the huge wristwatch, a diver’s chronograph with all sorts of dials. “Do you actually go swimming to find them?”

“All the time,” she said and brought out a little tube of lotion, rubbing a dab on her cheeks. “That salt water and hot sun does a job on a girl’s skin.”

The doors closed, the pilot made his announcements, and she put away her laptop and removed the earplugs to the iPod that hung around her neck and dangled between her full breasts. The diving would explain the tightness of her body. He had no trouble imagining her in a clinging wetsuit with a scuba tank. Flight AA 107 was in the clouds a few minutes later. The seatmates chatted through the first drink, and Buchanan ordered another round.

“Are you going to hunt for oil down here?” asked Trish Campbell.

“No. Just burning off some accumulated holiday time, then I’m off to some other dismal place in the oil patch, possibly up in the North Sea to freeze my ass off,” he said. “My family can’t be with me for a while. Could I persuade you to have dinner with me tonight?”

She let the question hang as she studied his face, then she gave a warm smile and said, “Maybe.”

Buchanan was regaining his confidence, which had been sorely tried by the setbacks of recent days. That damned Sniper! I hope Gordon takes care of him in a most horrible way. Of course Trish Campbell would dine with him. By the end of the evening, she would do anything he wanted. They always did.

The announcement came over the loudspeaker that it was permissible to use electronic equipment again, and Trish dug out her laptop and plugged in the iPod. A few clicks of the keyboard and she had MTV rocking, but only she could hear it. On the screen, a sexy girl was humping a boy wearing an oversize basketball jersey and a baseball cap turned to the side.

“What kind of fish are you going to tag?” he asked.

She glanced over and turned down the volume. “What?”

“Sorry. I asked about your job. What kind of fish will you be tagging?”

“Wrong question to ask a marine biologist,” Trish laughed. She clicked off MTV and called up a program of big fish swimming slowly to and fro. “Sharks,” she replied. “I’m into sharks. I don’t want to bore you, but would you like to see something really hot?”

“Sure. I’m really interested.” It was always a good play to pretend to be fascinated by a woman’s work.

Trish slid the laptop onto his tray table and leaned across to insert the iPod buttons in his ears. He felt the weight of her breast against his forearm, and the clean smell of her perfume. He would gladly put up with MTV and fish for a roll in the hay with her.

“This is really good. You ready? Can you hear it okay?” When he nodded, she said, “Okay, watch and listen very closely,” punched in a five-digit sequence, and clicked ENTER.

The fish dissolved slowly into a slide show. Buchanan was stunned as the pictures flipped past. The first was a full view of himself in the front yard of his home. Then came that picture of Marge that they always kept on the baby grand, and a photo of her playing with their dog, Rio. An action photo of fourteen-year-old Lester playing soccer. One of Missy studying in the library at Princeton, followed by a semi-nude picture of Missy on a bed, smiling sleepily at the camera. Photos of his cousin Florence and her kids, his brother and his family, and his bedridden mother in the assisted living facility.

The last picture was a live camera shot. Gordon Gates sitting at his desk, looking directly at Buchanan.

“Hello, Gerald,” he said. “Going somewhere? Don’t say anything out loud, just type your replies and look into the little camera button on the side of the computer screen. We will make this quick.”

“Gordon? What is this!” he said aloud, but was pinched painfully under the arm by Trish, who pointed at the keyboard. “Type!” she said, and he did. WHAT IS THIS?