Patterson, James - Alex Cross 8 - Four Blind Mice

What was it Martin Sheen's commanding officer had told him in Apocalypse Now? “Remember this, Captain. There if no mission. There never was a mission.” Starkey couldn't help thinking that this job had been like that for them a long haul, a relentless nightmare. Each of the murders had been complicated. This was Starkey's fourth trip to New York in the past two months. He still didn't even know who he was working for; he'd never met the bastard.

In spite of everything, he felt confident as the Delta flight took off that evening. He talked to the flight attendant, but avoided the kind of innocent flirting he might do under other circumstances. He didn't want to be remembered, so he stuck his face in a Tom Clancy thriller he'd picked up at the airport. Starkey identified with Clancy characters like Jack Clark and John Patrick Ryan.

Once the jet leveled off and drinks were served, Starkey went over his plan for the final murders. It was all in his head; nothing ever written down. It was in Harris's and Griffin's heads, too. He hoped they didn't get in any trouble before he got to the Point tonight. There was a raunchy strip club in nearby New Windsor called The Bed Room, but they'd promised to stay at the hotel.

Finally, Starkey sat back, closed his eyes and started doing 'the math' again. It was a comforting ritual, especially now that they were close to the end.

$100,000 apiece for the first three hits.

$150,000 for the fourth.

$200,000 for the fifth.

$250,000 for West Point.

$500,000 bonus when the entire job was done.

It was almost over.

And Starkey still didn't know who was paying for the murders, or why.

Alex Cross 8 - Four Blind Mice

Chapter Sixty-One

Sharp, steep cliffs of granite overlooked the Hudson River at West Point. Starkey knew the area well. Later that night he drove down the main drag in Highland Falls, passing cheesy-looking motels, pizza shops, souvenir stands. He went through Thayer Gate with its turreted sentry tower and stone-faced MP on guard. Murder at West Point, he thought. Man oh man.

Starkey put the job out of his mind for another few moments. He let impressions of West Point wash over him. Impressions and memories. Starkey had been a cadet here, been a first-year plebe like the two youngsters he saw jogging back to barracks now. In his day he'd shouted the cadet motto' Always the hard way, sirl'over a thousand times if he'd shouted it once.

God, he loved it here: the attitude, the discipline, the whole physical plant.

The Cadet Chapel stood high on a hillside overlooking the Plains. A cross between a medieval cathedral and a fortress, it still dominated the entire landscape. The campus was filled with mammoth gray-stone buildings and emphasized the fortress effect. An overwhelming sense of solidarity and permanence. Soon to be shaken badly.

Harris and Griffin were waiting for him on the grounds. For the next hour, they took turns watching the Bennett house on Bartlett Loop, an area of West Point reserved for officers and their families. The house was redbrick with white trim and plenty of ivy creeping the walls. Smoke curled lazily from the stone chimney. It was a four-bedroom, two-bath unit. On the housing map it was designated as Quarters 130.

Around nine-thirty the three killers reconnoitered on the seventeenth fairway of the West Point golf course. They didn't see anyone on the hilly course that formed one of the boundaries of the military academy. Route 9-W was just to the west.

“This might be easier than we thought, ”Warren Griffin said. “They're both home. Relaxing. Guard down.”

Starkey looked at Griffin disapprovingly. “I don't think so. There's a saying here, ”Always the hard way, sir“. Don't forget it. And don't forget that Robert Bennett was Special Forces. This isn't some big city architect having a sleep-over on the Appalachian Trail.”

Griffin snapped to attention. “Sorry, sir. Won't happen again.”

Just before ten o'clock, the three of them made their way through the bramble and woods that bordered the backyard of Quarters 130. Starkey pushed back a stubborn branch of a pine tree and saw the house.

Then he spotted Colonel Robert Bennett in the kitchen. War-hero, father of five, husband for twenty-six years, former Special Forces in Vietnam.

Bennett was holding a goblet of red wine and seemed to be supervising the preparation of a meal. Barbara Bennett stepped into view. She was doing the real work. Now she too took a sip of his wine. Robert Bennett kissed the back of her neck. They seemed loving for a couple married well over twenty years. That's too bad, Starkey thought, but kept it to himself.

“Let's do it,”he said. “The last piece in the puzzle.”

And it truly was a puzzle even to the killers.

Alex Cross 8 - Four Blind Mice

Chapter Sixty-Two

Robert and Barbara Bennett were just sitting down to dinner when the three heavily armed men burst through the back door into the kitchen. Colonel Bennett saw their guns, camouflage dress, and also noted that none of the men wore masks. He saw all of the faces and knew this couldn't be worse.

“Who are you? Robert, who are they?” Barbara stuttered out a few words. “What's the meaning of this?”

Unfortunately, Colonel Bennett was afraid that he knew exactly who they were, and maybe even who had sent them. He wasn't sure, but he thought he recognized one of them from a long time ago. He even remembered a name Starkey. Yes, Thomas Starkey. Good God, why now? After all these years?

One of the intruders pulled shut the colorful curtains on the two kitchen windows. He used a free arm to sweep the dinner plates, chicken, salad and wine glasses onto the kitchen floor. Bennett understood this was for dramatic effect.

Another man held an automatic weapon pressed to Barbara Bennett's forehead.

The kitchen was totally silent.

Colonel Bennett looked at his wife and his heart nearly broke. Her blue eyes were stretched wide and she was trembling. “It's going to be all right,” Bennett said in the calmest voice he could manage.

“Oh, is it, Colonel?” Starkey spoke for the first time. He signaled the third intruder, and the man grabbed the front of Barbara's white peasant blouse and tore it off. Barbara gasped and tried to cover herself. The bastard then yanked off her bra. It was for effect, again, but then the man stared at Barbara's breasts.

“Leave her alone! Don't hurt her! ”Bennett yelled, and it sounded like a command, as if he were in a position to give them.

The one he knew to be Starkey hit him with the butt of his handgun. Bennett went down and thought that his jaw was broken. He almost blacked out, but managed to stay conscious. His cheek was pressed into the cold tile of the kitchen floor. He needed a plan even a desperate one would do.

Starkey stood directly over him. And now it got insane. He spoke in Vietnamese.

Colonel Bennett understood some of the words. He'd done enough interrogations during the war, when he'd run several Kit Carson scouts in Vietnam and Laos.

Then Starkey spoke in English. “Be afraid, Colonel. You'll suffer tonight. So will your wife. You have sins to pay for. You know what they are. Tonight your wife will know about your past, too.”

Colonel Bennett pretended to pass out. When one of the gunmen leaned over him, he pushed off the floor and grabbed at his handgun. Getting the gun was the only thought in Bennett's brain. He had it!

But then he was struck viciously on the head. Then on the shoulders and back. He was being screamed at in Vietnamese as the severe beating continued. He saw one of the bastards punch his wife right in the face. For no reason at all.

“Stop it. Don't hurt her for Christ sakes.”