Christine Feehan - Street Game

James Bradley Jefferson cleaned up the glasses, carrying them carefully through to his kitchen, where he washed them thoroughly and put them away. The small recorder he’d secreted in the book was removed and taken with him to his bedroom. One by one the lights in the house went out until only a single lamp shone in the bedroom.

Mack waited until the moon moved across the sky and the sounds of the night had resumed a loud chorus. The slightest thing could alert a pro, including the sounds of insects. As he descended he made certain his energy was suppressed, that he moved with the night itself, keeping the natural rhythm.

Gideon’s sole job was to protect him, and Mack couldn’t imagine a better backup. Gideon never missed. Javier waited by the house. “He’s got two cameras in the back. That’s our best bet, boss,” Javier said. “Both are on five-second sweeps. You should be able to move through the two of them if you watch each lens, and use that weirdass teleportation thing you’ve got. No one will ever know you were in the house.”

Mack scowled at him. “I told you, it isn’t exactly teleportation.”

“Whatever. Just do it and watch where you position yourself.” Javier glanced at his watch. “Counting down now.”

Mack crouched low, leapt over the high back fence-probably the reason there were only two cameras. He landed just to the right of the house and moved with blurring speed, his body looking to the naked eyes like a shadow made of dust, a blur, and then forming from one spot after another until he crossed the open yard to the back door. He couldn’t teleport anywhere he wanted, he could only use short bursts of speed, moving his mass small distances, rather than one long one. He’d found a few uses for his particular talent, but not many, and it took a lot out of him. It wasn’t difficult to bypass the alarm on the door. The box was located on the roof and easy enough to access. Mack slipped into Jefferson’s house and padded silently through the kitchen, down the hall, to the bedroom. The door was ajar. A fireplace cast a small glow over the room, illuminating the man reading in bed. Jefferson wore a pair of glasses and lounged with his robe tied loosely over a striped pajama shirt. The covers were pulled up to his waist. Beside his bed was a cigar in an ashtray and a drink. Mack moved with his blurring speed, looking like a dark shadow materializing beside the bed.

Jefferson dropped his book, his hand sliding toward his pillow.

“Don’t,” Mack said softly as he removed one glove. “I just wanted to give you a chance to realize you’ve already accomplished what you set out to do.”

Jefferson relaxed. “And what would that be?”

“You wanted to create an assassin who could go into an enemy camp undetected, kill the general, and walk out with no one the wiser.”

“You’re a GhostWalker.”

“How else could I have gotten in without detection?” Mack leaned down and laid his palm very gently over Jefferson’s heart. He moved without aggression, utterly calm, almost tranquil, so Jefferson was without alarm.

“You overheard my conversation.” He winced. Looked up at Mack. “Oh, fuck.”

“No,” Mack corrected softly. “You’re fucked. You shouldn’t have been so stupid as to come after us. What did you think would happen?”

Jefferson slumped back on the pillow, his mouth open, his eyes wide and staring, one arm flung out as if toward the phone, reaching for help.

Mack waited until he was certain the man was dead before he pulled on his glove and exited, turning on the alarm and once more moving undetected through the cameras.

The moment Mack made his way up to the second floor, he felt the instant tension and knew something was wrong. His team-Ethan included-was assembled around a table, an obvious makeshift war room. His beeper had gone off in the plane, so he wasn’t at all surprised that there was trouble.

Jaimie looked up, her face a little pale and strained, but she leapt up, a smile blocking out the worry. That look alone was worth everything to him. Uncaring that Sergeant Major was watching, or that his team had grins on their faces, he swept her into his arms and kissed her thoroughly. He took his time, feeling her cling to him, the slight trembling in her body.

He framed her face with his hands. “Are you all right?”

Jaimie nodded. “I’m glad you’re back. We have a bad situation here, Mack.”

“I can see that, honey.” He reluctantly let his arms drop, stripping off his jacket.

“Sergeant Major, you’re cleared. The mission was a success.”

Griffen nodded his head just once in understanding. The old, faded eyes smiled at Mack briefly in acknowledgment before he indicated the computer screens above their heads. “You’re looking at the reason for World War Three, Mack.”

He looked up and studied the two unlikely faces. A small girl of about ten looked back at him, her shiny black hair framing her face. Beside her was a serious young teenager, perhaps seventeen, with razor-straight, gleaming black hair and dark eyes hidden behind black-rimmed glasses. “And they are?”

“Dae-sub Chun is seventeen. A nice young man, far ahead of his age. The girl is a niece of an old friend. Her name is Mi-cha Song. Dae-sub Chun’s father is General Kwang-sub Chun. He just happens to be the ambassador to D.P.R.K. Permanent mission to the UN.”

Javier lowered his gear to the floor. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” Sergeant Major reiterated.

“No,” Javier said. “I’m guessing anything to do with North Korea right now isn’t going to be good, not when our countries are posturing at each other.”

“It gets worse,” Griffen said. “The girl is the sister of one of our agents. Both children have been kidnapped.”

“Was the girl’s abduction deliberate?” Mack asked. “Is our agent compromised?”

Griffen shook his head. “No, she was with the boy at a museum. She had been visiting General Chun’s family. We don’t believe she was the target so much as Daesub. Educated guesses by Chun leaned toward blackmail at first. It seems one of their leading scientists accidentally stumbled upon a particularly unstable and highly explosive compound. Somehow Doomsday was able to infiltrate the lab and obtain the information. The general was certain he would be contacted very soon with a demand for the formula and compound. We all know the general’s wife was killed last year, and that he loved her very much. It nearly broke him. He isn’t a young man and now, with his son in grave danger, well, this is a desperate situation any way you look at it.”

“Then you’ve been in touch with General Chun?”

“Yes, very quietly. He can’t be seen talking with us, of course.”

Mack found a chair and gratefully accepted the cup of coffee Kane pushed into his hands. He’d been up all night and traveling all day and needed rest. But the room was tense, Jaimie looked stressed, and Sergeant Major Griffen was as grim as he’d ever seen him.

“Lay it out for us,” Mack said and waved Gideon and Javier into chairs.

“We took the weapons in the warehouse,” Kane said. “The mission went like clockwork, boss. When Shepherd and Estes tried to break in, we killed two of their men. We managed to tag both of them with a tracking device. We couldn’t have asked for a smoother operation.”

Griffen took up the story. “We traced them all the way to China. Beijing to be exact.”

Mack sat up straighter. “China? What the hell would Shepherd and Estes want in China?” He sank back. “Never mind. If you want to go to North Korea, you have to go to Beijing, right?”

Kane nodded his head. “They met with Frank Koit and Holeander Armstice, both known members of Doomsday. The four traveled together to North Korea. The next day, these two children were snatched from the museum and their bodyguards were slain. The kidnappers left behind an American assault rifle.”