Peter Kirsanow - Second Strike

Every single body lying in a sleeping bag in the relative coolness of the barn flinched.

SUGAR LAND, TEXAS,

AUGUST 14, 9:30 P.M. CDT

Luci Saldana stood next to Austin Danzig outside a small cinder-block building off the southeastern end of the runway at Sugar Land Regional Airport watching the Gulfstream taxi to within about a hundred feet.

Mike Garin had instructed her to follow Danzig’s directions to the letter and do the same with Congo Knox when he arrived. Then, after assuring her she was in the best of hands, the enigma formerly known to her as Tom Lofton disappeared into the night.

Danzig was tall and wiry, with short, prematurely gray hair brushed back from his forehead. He looked to Luci like someone who kept his pens and notepads in neat rows on his desk and could recite the precise number of paper clips stored in the top drawer.

The whine of the Gulfstream’s engines slowed, grew mournful, and stopped. A minute later the front hatch opened to the steps. A six-foot-four, 220-pound bolt of muscle, bone, and sinew dressed in black cargo pants and a dark gray T-shirt appeared at the door. His ebony head was shaved and he wore a goatee that descended into a sharp point beneath his chin. Although it was nighttime, a pair of Oakley sunglasses sat atop his head.

Luci watched as Danzig went to greet Robert “Congo” Knox with the sort of deference she’d seen privates accord superior officers on TV. Danzig had much more seniority than Knox, who’d joined DGT barely a month ago, but Knox’s reputation preceded him. A former sniper for the First Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, Knox had more than eighty confirmed kills, including one at nineteen hundred yards using a fifty-caliber McMillan TAC-50 while adjusting for an eight-to-ten-mile-per-hour crosswind. He was known to his superiors as a problem solver: Whenever removal of a bad guy proved particularly nettlesome, they’d deploy Knox. One shot, problem solved. He retired as one of the deadliest snipers in American military history.

Danzig shook his hand and escorted him toward Luci.

“Mr. Knox, this is Ms. Saldana. Mr. Garin left her with me a short time ago and asked me to put her in your custody.”

Luci extended her hand. “Nice to meet you, Mr. Knox.”

He shook her hand. “Please call me Congo,” he said, his voice a low rumble that resonated deep in his chest like the prelude to a volcanic eruption.

Luci’s face betrayed unease, a reaction Knox had seen before.

“Political correctness offends me, Ms. Saldana; my name doesn’t. Call me Congo.”

“Okay,” Luci said sheepishly, suspecting more than a few administrators on her campus would faint before doing so.

“You’re welcome to sit in my office and have some coffee while you wait for the pilots to do whatever they need to do,” Danzig said, gesturing toward the cinder-block cube. “I expect it should be a short turnaround.”

The inside of the building was neat, almost severely so. One wall was covered with multicolor maps, another with time zone clocks, underneath which was a cot where, Luci surmised, Danzig slept when working long nights such as this. Atop Danzig’s desk was a computer and short-wave radio. On a metal table next to the desk was a coffee machine with a full pot of steaming coffee, a stack of paper cups, and a pile of MREs. Two gray metal folding chairs were on either side of the table.

“The coffee tastes like paint thinner but it’s got a kick like crystal meth—so I’m told.”

Danzig poured two cups and handed one each to Luci and Knox. “Help yourself to the cream and sugar,” he said, pointing next to the pot. “I run our petroleum-related operations for the Western Hemisphere out of this little place. We share a warehouse space out back with an aircraft fractional company. They use their portion as a hangar. We use ours mainly to store supplies. From here I can move everything from clothing to RBIs onto the drilling platforms off the coast of Colombia in just five hours and fifteen minutes from time of requisition to receipt.”

“And make twice as much as your counterpart at FedEx doing so,” Knox added between sips of coffee.

Danzig winked. “Yes, sir. DGT’s the place to be.”

“You should be in recruitment.”

Danzig grinned and left to check on the Gulfstream.

Luci blew the steam off her coffee. “What’s next?”

“We fly back to D.C. and I take you to Mr. Dwyer’s house, where I’m to watch over you until further notice,” Knox replied.

“Who’s Mr. Dwyer?”

“He’s the man who owns DGT, which owns this place, the Gulfstream outside, and at least one billion dollars in other assets.”

“Sounds important. Why’s he doing all of this for me?”

“Mike didn’t tell you?” Knox asked.

“He’s not big on explanations. He only told me his name a couple of hours ago.”

“He and Dan Dwyer started the company. They go back.”

Luci sensed an opportunity. “I see. So what’s Mike’s deal?”

“What do you mean?”

“Come on.” Luci chuckled. “There’s something about you guys. You, Danzig, Garin. Especially Garin. What’s he all about?”

Knox hesitated, then shrugged. “Dude’s different. First you got that whole Russian fatalism thing going. Imperturbable. Implacable. Then there’s the fact that he doesn’t know limits. At least physical limits.”

Luci’s brow knotted in concern. “I noticed. One day he’s going to push a little too hard.”

“Everyone has a wall,” Knox continued. “Marathon runners, extreme athletes. He doesn’t. At least none that I’ve seen yet. Hard to figure. Must be some kind of chemistry or biology experiment. Seriously.”

“Well, he’s in amazing shape,” Luci explained.

“No, it’s more than that. And then there’s his patriotism. Duty, honor, country. They stopped making the prototype around 1990. Maybe 1890. Believes in good and evil. Dwyer calls him a Boy Scout.”

“Do you agree?”

I once saw him pray the Rosary after killing four people, Knox said to himself. “Yeah, I think that fits. But he’s still cool. I’ve seen him be… almost suave, even.”

“What do you mean by ‘Russian fatalism’?”

“You know those characters in Russian literature who are always resigned to a miserable fate? Mike sometimes seems like that. I think it rubbed off from his grandfather.”

“His grandfather’s from Russia, then?” Luci asked, intrigued.

“Somebody told me he escaped from the NKVD. Supposed to be a remarkable story. Like right out of a movie or something. I haven’t had a chance to ask Mike about it yet.”

“What’s the NKVD?”

“Soviet secret police around World War II. Seriously nasty dudes,” Knox explained. “Predecessor to the KGB.”

“I’ve heard of the KGB,” Luci acknowledged. “So Mike’s still with DGT too?”

“He left years ago.”

Luci sensed she was finally getting somewhere. “To do what?”

“Can’t say.”

Another roadblock. “Can’t say or won’t say?”

Knox took a sip of coffee. “A little of both, I guess.”

Luci shifted tactics. “Well, then, what do you do?”

Knox smiled. “I work for DGT.”

“C’mon,” Luci pled, laughing. “It’s like pulling teeth with you guys. What does DGT do?”

“We provide security, soup to nuts. Executive security, cybersecurity, infrastructure security, diplomatic security—you name it. And we provide gap support to the military and intelligence services.”

“How long have you worked for DGT?”

“You’d make a good trial lawyer, Luci,” Knox observed. “Pretty good at cross-examination.”