Douglas Preston - The Obsidian Chamber

“Bingo.”

“Zero in with the telephoto. Smile, you’re on candid camera.”

And right on schedule, the black maria turned in at Pearl Street, driving nice and slow. The man, still strolling along, looked up as it approached, trying to appear casual, trying to keep his movement to just a glance, but failing. He stared.

Oh, yeah. He saw his man: Spann could see it in his expression. It was like a gift from the gods.

The transport van passed the guy and made a slow and easy turn into the underground ramp leading to the security courtyard, then waited while the driver was checked; the big gates opened and the van disappeared.

Perfect.

And now he saw his own two guys go into action. One, who’d been sitting on a bench eating a shish kebab from a nearby food cart, tossed the stick in the trash and sauntered down the street. “Dog One following,” the man murmured into his invisible wire.

On the near corner, as the perp went by, his second man, who’d been pretending to have trouble parallel parking his car, got out. “Dog Two following,” he said.

The man took a right into St. Andrews Plaza, walking past the courthouse, and disappeared from Spann’s field of view. Soon the two guys tailing him disappeared as well. The channel remained open.

“Perp crossing Foley Square, heading for Duane,” came the voice of Dog One.

A moment later: “Left on Elk.”

This was an odd route. What was going on?

A moment later: “Left on Reade. He’s got a phone out. Looks like he’s texting.”

The guy was walking around the block. Son of a bitch. “Dog One?” Spann said into the headset. “He might have made you. Keep walking down Elk. Dog Two, take a left on Centre in front of him, going in his direction.”

“Shit. He’s running south on Centre toward Chambers.”

Fuck. Somehow, he’d made the tail. “Take him down,” Spann yelled into the headset. “ Take him down! All units converge!”

The whole area was suddenly crawling with cops and in less than fifteen seconds it was over, the man was on his face, cuffed, on the pavement in front of Police Plaza.

“Hold him there, I’m coming down,” Spann said. The tail had screwed up, but maybe this was better. In fact, it was better. This was exactly the outcome he’d wanted all along. They had their man and now he, personally, would break the son of a bitch. By the time Longstreet showed up, they’d have the info they needed and would already be planning the hostage rescue.

Filipov heard the whine of the Zodiac and came out on deck in time to see Smith come tearing into Bailey’s Hole. It was five in the evening, not even sunset.

Smith came in too fast, didn’t throttle back in time, and the Zodiac smacked up against the transom door.

“What the fuck?” Filipov said. “It’s still daylight!”

“They picked up Dalca,” Smith said, fumbling with the painter, cleating it and climbing across the slippery gunwale. Filipov opened the transom door and grabbed his hand, pulling him in.

“Dalca? How do you know?”

The rest of the crew was now crowding onto the aft deck.

Smith gasped for breath. “They grabbed him. It was a setup. He went down to make sure Arsenault was being transferred, but they’d staked out the street. They got him.”

“ How do you know ?”

“He texted me — said he was being tailed.”

“ Texted you? He had his cell phone on him?”

“Yeah, one of the burner phones. I destroyed the phone he texted me on — I’m pretty sure it was within the twenty-second limit.”

Filipov’s head reeled. What a clusterfuck. It was over.

He mustered a calmness of voice that he did not feel. “I don’t understand. What do you mean: a setup?”

“You told us not to trust the FBI — right? That’s what you said. Not to take their word. So Dalca went down to witness the transfer. That FBI agent, Longstreet, said Arsenault was being transferred to the Metropolitan Correction Center to get him ready for the flight to Venezuela. I got the exact time of the transfer from Longstreet and passed it on to Dalca.”

“And?”

“So Dalca went downtown, dressed like a Wall Street guy, to walk past on the sidewalk when the van arrived. To make sure Arsenault was in it.” Smith spread his hands. “That’s all.”

Filipov stared at Smith as silence fell. For the first time, he realized what a terrible mistake it had been to rely on people like Smith and Dalca for something as risky as this. They were dumbass smugglers. They had fallen into a blindingly obvious trap. Dalca would eventually talk— of course he would. Maybe not right away, but soon enough. And with Dalca, they could get Arsenault to talk, too, pitting one against the other, doing the usual whoever-rats-first-gets-a-plea routine.

They were now fucked. He took a deep breath, doing his level best to quell his rising rage: there was no point, the damage was done, and he would need these men for what was to come. The only hope now was to get out of the country — fast.

He looked around at the crew. From the expression on their faces he could see that they all, in varying degrees, understood the situation. And he could also see they were starting to think about who was to blame.

“It’s over,” he said, making a supreme effort to keep his voice low and reassuring and waiting for the news to sink in. “We need to stick together and clean this up.”

“This is fucked up,” said DeJesus. “You promised us this would work.” There was a chorus of low murmurs.

“We’re no worse off than we were before,” said Filipov calmly. “Arsenault was going to talk eventually anyway. Let’s focus on what we need to do, going forward.”

“Yeah, but whose idea was it to kidnap a federal agent? I mean, we are fucked !”

“Canada’s right there. We’ve got money and passports. In twenty-four hours we’ll be on a plane to wherever.” He looked around. “The weather’s clear. It’s almost dark. We’ll head across the Gulf of Maine. I know a secure cove near Yarmouth where we can ditch the boat. Yarmouth’s got an international airport. We’ll be out of the country tomorrow.”

“I can’t believe this,” said DeJesus, stepping forward and jabbing a finger at Filipov. He spat on the deck. “ You wanted to haul in the body. You came up with this scheme. You talked us into it! Well, I for one am not listening to your shit anymore.”

“And your plan is—?”

“I’m taking the Zodiac. I’m outta here. And anyone who wants to come with me can do it.” He began to turn.

“The Zodiac stays with the boat,” said Filipov. He could hear in the tones of their voices, see in the looks in their eyes, that the crew was reaching a turning point. If he didn’t do something fast, he might lose them.

Filipov reached out, grasped DeJesus by the shoulder. DeJesus spun around, furious, opening his mouth to spout some more bullshit, which was what Filipov anticipated. He already had his right hand on the butt of his .45, and he now yanked it out and shoved it into DeJesus’s mouth.

The man struggled but Filipov pulled him closer. “You going to argue with this?”

DeJesus made an angry, inarticulate reply.

“Just nod your head yes or no. Don’t think I’m bluffing.” Filipov tightened his finger on the trigger. He would do it if he had to.

DeJesus saw the look in Filipov’s eyes and stopped struggling. After a moment he gave a faint nod. Filipov relaxed his grip and drew back the gun.

Filipov looked around. “Anyone else want to sound off?”

Nobody did.

“What’s done is done and we’re balls to the wall. If we break up now, we’re screwed. Understand, DeJesus?”