Т Паркер - Swift Vengeance

After more talk and knife-handling, Hector decided on two janbiyas . The clerk rang him up. One knife came in a silk scabbard, decorated with leaping lions. The other scabbard looked like heavy sand-colored cotton with subtle stripes and triangles woven in. The saleswoman accepted his sheaf of bills with unsubtle disgust, counted them quickly down to the glass countertop, gave Hector his change. Then wrapped the knives in red tissue, set them in a twine-handled Gallerie Monfil shopping bag, dangling it out to Hector on the farthest possible tip of one forefinger.

Hector O. Padilla, owner of two janbiyas and a stone to sharpen them on. Janbiyas — possibly the type of weapon used to decapitate Kenny Bryce.

Hector O. Padilla, reader of Rumiyah , recently broken up with, interested in Muslim women.

Hector O. Padilla, owner of Lindsey’s current address, professionally provided by my old partner, Jason Bayless.

I followed Hector from the knives, to the swords, to the spears and lances. He didn’t seem to have serious interest in any of them. Standing under the ceiling-mounted “Mihr Killing a Lion” tapestry, Hector set down his treasures of Araby to consult his phone again. This time it took longer than it had before. He read, thumbed in a reply, then slipped the phone back into his rear pocket and took a deep breath. He headed for the salon exit. Hustled back a few seconds later to get the shopping bag he’d left behind.

Following him was easy. Plenty of people out on Cedros that night. Not that he seemed to practice universal awareness all that often. He walked past my truck with a relaxed air, tapping his terrorist magazine against his leg. I climbed in a few moments later, watching from two hundred feet away as he got into his gleaming black Cube. I set up my smartphone with the tracker codes, keeping an eye on Hector.

He U-turned and came toward me. I did a full PI Slouch, watching his headlights pass across the headliner until they were gone. Started her up, gave Hector a few seconds while I confirmed his location on my phone, then cranked a U-turn of my own. The tracker GPS updated its location every second on my screen — street, address, city, state. Best hundred and ninety-nine bucks I’d ever spent. Bought two.

He made a series of right turns, which brought us back to where we started. I couldn’t figure why, other than some kind of evasive maneuver he’d been told would work. I thought of him forgetting his bag of treasures of Araby. Separated by ten seconds, I tracked him north to Lomas Santa Fe, east to Stevens, south to La Colonia Park, where he circled a parking lot and came back out. This could have outed me if I hadn’t been trailing far back. I parked, shut down, and slouched again while his headlights slid over me.

Then another U-turn and a low-speed tour through residential Solana Beach. I fell far back, lost sight of him, let the tracker do its job.

At last Hector broke out and took a mile-long straightaway on Villa de la Valle. Past the racetrack and the fairgrounds, both dark. His taillights, way up ahead. A left turn on San Andres and a right on Flower Hill. Then he stopped. I pulled over. Five seconds. Ten. Twenty. I drove slowly toward his current location, spotted his Cube parked far out in the Flower Hill Promenade lot. Just a few other cars there, this far from the retail stores on a cool, dark night.

I parked in the lot, on higher ground, a full hundred yards away. Killed the engine, got my night binoculars from under the seat. Rolled my window down. Hector got out and started toward a Toyota 4Runner parked one space over from the Cube. It was a dark, older vehicle and I wrote the plate numbers in my notebook.

The Toyota driver’s window was halfway down. A stand of eucalyptus trees bordering the lot blocked the moonlight. As Hector approached I could just make out the shape of someone behind the wheel. A pale face in a dark interior.

They talked, Hector saying little, nodding. The window rose and Hector went to the rear, opened the 4Runner’s lift gate, and let it rise. Then back to his Cube, where he swung open the rear cargo door.

He looked around briefly, reached in and hefted out by its handle a green metal canister. I knew what it was instantly. I knew it to be rectangular, just under twelve inches long, six inches across, and seven high. With a fold-down metal handle, heavy lid, hard-to-open latch plates that lock tight to defeat sand, moisture, time itself. I’d seen more than a few of those during my days as a Marine. I glassed the yellow print:

42 °CARTRIDGES

5.56MM

M16

LOT WRA 22416

Hector lugged it with both hands to the 4Runner, set it in the cargo area, pushed it forward. The driver, still locked in darkness, didn’t appear to move. Hector clap-dusted his hands on his way back to the Cube.

Repeated the activity.

Four trips.

Which meant sixteen hundred and eighty rounds.

Or, accounted another way, two and a half minutes of fully automatic fire through an M16. Although M16 barrels melt at around two hundred straight rounds.

Rumiyah says to rest your gun. Which is fine, because you need to reload anyway. You have to stop firing to step over bodies. Which is good, because it lets the barrel cool. Why not post some video? Show the world what a badass you are, and what you’re doing to make it a better place? By then, you’re good to go again.

If you kill only one person with every ten rounds, you’ve taken one hundred and sixty-eight lives in your two and a half minutes of fully automatic glory.

Add an accomplice and the numbers can double.

A case of four hundred and twenty M16 rounds will cost you about what I paid for my GPU vehicle tracker — around two hundred dollars. Best deals are online. Shipping is sometimes free.

I glassed the SUV driver again, sitting very still in the dark interior. Him or her? Young or old? Something in the vague shape of the face said young and male. My night-vision binoculars couldn’t illuminate, but they enhanced my eerie phantom and his surroundings in counter-natural green.

Hector wasn’t finished. From the front passenger side of the Cube he pulled out his fashionable Gallerie Monfil shopping bag, rummaged through the red tissue paper, and removed one of the knives. Walked it over to the 4Runner and held it up to the half-open window. Nodded, said something, shrugged, returned to the Cube. Standing by the open door, he drew out the blade and slashed the air around him, his free hand out for balance, which he nearly lost.

Then back to work.

Four more trips, four more ammunition canisters. I saw that these contained nine-millimeter cartridges, usually used in handguns. Smaller shells. One thousand rounds per canister. Hector was breathing deeply by the time he shoved in the fourth case and slammed the 4Runner’s lift gate shut.

Dusting off his hands again, he approached the driver’s window. The driver turned. And in the moment before Hector blocked my view, I saw that he was indeed a lean-faced young man, wearing a dark watch cap and a dark plaid shirt buttoned to his chin. It looked heavy, maybe flannel, against the cold. A tremor of recognition rattled through me as I pictured the Kenny Bryce surveillance video. Surfer. Boarder. In the brief moment I saw him, he gave Hector a blank stare. Splinters of light for eyes.

A moment later Hector backed away from the 4Runner. The driver’s window was already up and white exhaust coughed from the muffler. No interior lights, but the headlights came on and the 4Runner pulled out. Hector tried to follow, realized his rear doors were still open, got out and slammed them shut, then hustled back behind the wheel.

I watched them go. In the shopping center lights I could see that the 4Runner was dark gray. Fell in behind them as Hector’s location registered on my phone. Backtracked to Via de la Valle, to Interstate 5. The Toyota hit the southbound on-ramp fast, blowing past the one-car-per-green light, heading for traffic. Hector chugged along behind him and of course stopped at the red light. My heart sinking and racing at the same time. An eternal red light. The Cube rolled away, my turn next. I ran the light, swept around Hector’s left and barreled past him, taking the middle lane and hitting the gas. I knew my chances were poor: too fast and he’d know something was wrong, too slow and I’d never catch up with him.