Killing Time oj-1 Read online

  She was a smart girl. She figured she’d been chosen to open this can of worms because she had the means and skills to delve into the underbelly of the defense department’s dirtiest secrets—and she had the motivation. Ramon.

  “If you were innocent of the charges, why make the deal? Why not defend yourself in court?”

  For a long moment, he wouldn’t look at her. Finally, he swiped his cheek against his shoulder… and she steeled her defenses again. She was actually relieved when he turned his head and Primetime was back—all attitude, arrogance, and defiance.

  “You’re the one with all the answers, chica. You’re telling me you haven’t figured it out?”

  “Enlighten me,” she said, her voice firm.

  He made a weary sound, then actually answered her question. “You can’t fight city hall. Or the combined might of the U.S. military.”

  She moved back toward the bed. “But if you’re innocent, as you claim you are—”

  “Oh, please. Prisons are full of innocent men. Just ask ’em. They’ll all tell you the same thing. They didn’t do it. No one buys that, either.”

  She breathed deep, fighting the urge to believe him. “So… what? Someone set you up as a scapegoat?”

  “Scapegoat, slow-moving target. Take your pick.”

  “Then who was responsible for what went wrong that night?”

  He pushed out a humorless laugh. “If I knew the answer to that question, do you honestly think we’d be having this conversation?”

  “You’ve got to have some ideas.”

  He slowly shook his head. “None. And you know what? I don’t give a shit anymore. But I do care about how you got your hands on that file.”

  He held her gaze for a long, challenging moment, making her uncomfortable for reasons she couldn’t explain. Maybe because underneath all that bluster, an unexpected hint of vulnerability bled through.

  Or maybe because she really did want Brown to be a good guy after all. Ramon had been a good guy—one of the best.

  • • •

  “It’s Jane,” she said when Stingray answered his phone. Jane Smith was one of the many aliases that protected not only her identity, but her bank accounts—many of which the man on the other end of the line had filled quite nicely. He wasn’t her only source of income but he was one of her most lucrative. He was, however, the only one who shared her bed.

  “I’d started to think you’d forgotten who signs your paychecks.”

  Even though he was thousands of miles away, his voice rang crystal clear through her earbud. Before they’d finally met face-to-face, she’d known him only as Stingray. But after doing a couple of jobs for him, she’d had more than a passing curiosity about what this particular man looked like. She’d been fairly certain he was American. Now she knew everything about him. “Yes, well, I’ve been a little busy.”

  The smell of exhaust from the busy street one story below rolled in through the open doors that led to a small, narrow terrace adjacent to the one belonging to room 203, where her assignment plus one were totally unsuspecting. The plus one both intrigued and amused her.

  Perspiration trickled between her breasts as she moved away from the doors and lay down on the bed. “Your girl’s a mover.” She stared at the languid ceiling fan that did little to cut the night’s suffocating heat. “Keeping up with her has pretty much taken all of my attention.”

  “She’s not my girl. She’s your assignment. Please tell me you haven’t lost her.”

  Because she understood he had much on the line, and because the sound of his voice tripped a lot of triggers other than anger, she let the insult slide. And because she was his business associate first, his lover second, she never forgot her professional code. Always keep the customer happy. “I’ve got her.”

  “So what’s going on?”

  “At the moment we appear to have a little hostage situation.”

  “You’re not serious.”

  She heard the laughter in his voice along with the surprise. She had always liked his laugh. Liked his no-nonsense manner. The first time they’d ever done business, she’d found herself thinking that if she ever met him, she was going to screw him. His smoke-and-whiskey voice—a pleasant departure from the guttural Arabic or Farsi contacts she so often dealt with—had that kind of effect on her.

  “Have you ever known me to joke?”

  “Point taken. So fill me in on what’s happened since you landed in Lima.”

  “She made a beeline to El Tocón Sangriento—I wouldn’t recommend the sangria, by the way—where she came on to this guy like a seasoned pepera girl.”

  “Pepera?”

  “Pepera. Brichera. Streets of Lima are full of girls who rob and drug men who can’t keep it in their pants.”

  “Consider me educated,” he said with another hint of a smile in his voice.

  Yeah. She had definitely fallen in lust with that voice.

  “So, she seduces him—he’s already drunk so it’s no big trick—lures him outside into the alley, drugs him, and hauls him to this dive of a hotel. Last time I checked, she had him cuffed to the bed.” Before setting up her audio surveillance, she’d made a foray out onto the terrace with a mirror on an extendable shaft. It hadn’t taken much to size up the situation. “She’s keeping a bead on him with his own gun. The drunken fool fell for her honeypot trap like an amateur.”

  “Who’s the guy?”

  “I’m supposed to know that? You sent me to watch her, not introduce myself to her playthings.”

  And as with all of her jobs, even for him, she made a point to limit her information to absolute need to know. She didn’t want to know motive, she didn’t want to know their history; she only needed to know what he wanted done.

  “Describe him to me. No. Wait. I have a feeling I can tell you exactly what he looks like. Big guy? Tall? Diamond stud, left ear? Silver screen material?”

  He was spot-on right. “So you know him.”

  A heavy silence passed. “Yes. I know him.”

  Despite the pulsating heat of the city sifting in through the open doors, the dangerous undercurrents in his voice shot a chill down her spine. The hair on the back of her arm stood at attention as the adrenaline rush she always craved mainlined through her bloodstream.

  “Have you been able to eavesdrop on their conversation?”

  “If you mean, did I install a bug, the answer is no. They got here before I did, so there was no opportunity to plant one. I did get a room next to theirs, however. Lucky for you I never leave home without my Stealth Gear.”

  The little black box amplified sound; the supersensitive ceramic contact microphone fed into a pair of earphones for audio monitoring and allowed her to listen through walls several inches thick. The device was reliable to a fault, unless there was an air gap in the wall that could garble the transmission and provided the batteries didn’t die. Unfortunately, there was an air gap so her intel gathering was limited.

  “I’ve only been able to pick up bits and pieces of their conversation. One thing keeps coming up. Something about Operation Slam Duck?”

  A long silence, then a correction. “Slam Dunk.”

  “Yes. That could work. Whatever it is, they’re pretty angry at each other. She’s accused him of getting a bunch of people killed in Afghanistan. For the most part, he’s telling her to go take a flying leap.”

  “Sounds like Brown.”

  Whether she liked it or not, now she knew the man’s name. “Friend of yours?”

  “I’d hoped it wouldn’t come to this,” he said, ignoring her question, which in itself was telling. He definitely knew Brown. Interestingly, the steel in his voice was heavy with regret.

  Her pulse rate kicked up again because she knew where this was heading. Most of her contracts started out as surveillance and ended up as something different entirely. Which was why she never traveled without the MP5K.

  “Change of plans,” he said abruptly. “Take them both out. Tonight.”

/>   Anticipation kicked up her heart rate. Now things got dicey. And lucrative. “It’s going to cost you.”

  “Triple the agreed-upon amount.” No hesitation. “Deposit to the same account?”

  All righty then. “That will work, yes.”

  “The money will be there within the hour.”

  She smiled. “And may I say that I not only like the way you do me, I like the way you do business.”

  “I don’t want either one of them leaving Lima alive.” The lethal edge in his voice said that friendly conversation was over. “Make it look like a lovers’ spat. A drug deal gone sideways. I don’t care. Just get it done and get out of there.”

  Abruptly, the line went dead.

  Thoughtful, she tugged off the earbud and tossed it into her duffel. She stared a little longer at the ceiling, thinking about the two occupants of the room next door. She had already been running kill scenarios through her mind in anticipation of these orders.

  The only question was, which option sounded the most enticing? Did she go in fast and hard and take them out before they knew what hit them? Or did she play with them for a while? Even a pro needed a little diversion now and then.

  She checked her watch—still early—and glanced toward the terrace doors. And decided she had time to think about it.

  5

  Mike pulled himself together, pissed that he’d let this woman get to him.

  She knew about Operation Slam Dunk. He didn’t know how, he didn’t know why; he only knew she wasn’t going to stop badgering him until she got the answers she wanted.

  But then, unexpectedly, she did stop. She stopped cold. She got a look on her face that made him think she might be second-guessing herself.

  She broke eye contact suddenly and whirled away. Shoulders tense, back rigid, she walked to a pair of multipaned glass doors that he guessed led to a balcony or terrace. The glass was coated with the grime of the city and backlit by a light haze from the cantina and restaurant signs burning up and down the street below.

  After a furtive look outside, she undid the latch and shoved both doors open onto the narrow terrace. Car exhaust, overripe fruit, and the tang of unwashed bodies bled into the hotel room, along with traffic sounds from a story below. A distant church bell chimed ten times. Ten p.m. on one of the longest days of his life. Overlaying it all was the faint scent of El Río Rimac. She breathed deep, as if preferring the foul city air to a breath tainted with his presence. Then she stared out into the night… like she was searching for something or someone, before quickly closing the doors again.

  When she finally turned around, he couldn’t decide if she looked relieved or wary. She moved away from the doors, head down, clearly uncertain, possibly scared.

  It was the first chink he’d seen in her armor, and he pounced on the opportunity like a fat man on a pile of French fries.

  “What’s your name, chica?” He’d grown tired of playing her game. He had to get out of these cuffs, and the best and only option he had now was distraction.

  She hesitated, then expelled a deep breath. “Pamela Diaz.”

  Another lie. Like a bad poker player, she had a tell that gave away her bluff. He’d noticed it when she’d denied she’d lost anyone. A little lift of her chin. An absent tap of her index finger—which happened to be resting against the barrel of his gun and reminded him to proceed with caution.

  But at this point he didn’t care if she told him she was Margarita Thatcher. She’d answered a question. It was a start.

  “Okay, Pamela Diaz… I’ll consider answering your questions if you answer mine.” He didn’t wait for her to point out the obvious—that she held the gun and the advantage. “What’s your stake in Operation Slam Dunk?” When she hesitated again, he pressed his slight opening. “You know you’re going to have to tell me sometime.”

  A humorless smile tipped up one corner of her mouth. “And why is that?”

  “Because you haven’t killed me for a reason. And I think we can rule out sex.” He lifted a brow. “Yes? No?”

  She snorted and he saw another sign of hope. She’d wanted to smile.

  “So, that’s a yes. Which means you want something else from me… and that you need me alive to get it.”

  She considered him with a long look, then finally walked back to the chair and sat down.

  Tick. Tick. Tick. He had nowhere to go and no way to get there—yet. He could wait her out.

  He knew instinctively that there was nothing he could say that would make her talk. She had to decide what happened next.

  But he knew he was right. She wanted him for something other than a whipping boy. And to get his help—good luck with that—she was smart enough to know she had to give him something, because they’d reached gridlock. If she wanted information, she needed to lay her cards on the table. Once she did, he’d let her think she’d softened him up enough to get the upper hand. Then she’d find out how tired he was of playing with a stacked deck.

  “I’m a journalist,” she said after several long moments.

  Tip of the chin. Tap of the finger.

  Liar, liar, pants on fire.

  “A journalist?” He grunted. “Give me a break.”

  “Freelance,” she insisted. “I’m writing a retrospective piece that chronicles Spec Ops military units and their deployments in Afghanistan.”

  He actually laughed. “Right. And to accomplish that, you make it a practice to seduce, drug, hold at gunpoint, and”—he lifted his arms as far as the restraints would let him—“cuff your potential sources to a bed. Try again, Pamela.”

  “You have a reputation as a loose cannon.”

  “Ah… so this was all for your protection. What a line of bullshit. You could have walked up and asked me.”

  “And you would have told me to take a flying leap.”

  She had a point. “So, rather than risk that happening, drugging me was the next logical alternative.”

  “I’m on a tight schedule. Expediency is what matters here, not your tender sensibilities.”

  She was a ball breaker, all right. New tactic. “Do we have a timetable for when these cuffs come off?” he asked point-blank.

  No answer.

  “Okay, fine. Could I at least have a drink of water while you work it out in your head? I’m bone dry here.”

  She thought for a moment, then finally stood and walked hesitantly across the room toward a door he suspected was the bathroom.

  The fact that she was willing to show him a little mercy told him reams about her. No self-respecting tango, street thug, or banger would give two rips about his poor parched throat. While it was clear she could handle herself, this particular skill was not her bailiwick—and knowing that only made him more pissed that he’d let her get the drop on him.

  As soon as she turned her back to him, he went to work on the flex cuffs, hoping that all the hours of competitions he and the guys used to stage paid off. There had been a lot of down time between missions, a lot of hurry up and wait. You could only play so many games of cards and basketball, so you got creative. Flex cuffs were plentiful and tying each other up and trying to beat each other’s escape times provided not only a diversion but a skill set that might come in handy one day.

  Looked like today was the day his uncontested speed record was going to be put to the real test. And when she closed the bathroom door behind her—a stroke of luck that the lady needed some privacy—he made full use of the window of opportunity.

  Pressing the inside of his wrists together, he wedged his right thumbnail under the edge of the first of a line of tiny teeth that locked into the plastic band on the catch on his left hand. Stretching, he tipped his head back so he could see what he was doing, then glanced toward the bathroom door when he heard a flush and then the sound of water running.

  He had to move fast. Straining to get the right angle, he repeatedly worked his nail over the first tooth until it finally gave and slipped under the catch. The left cuff loosened a frac
tion of an inch. He repeated the process. Another tooth gave. Another breath of room.

  He had the feel of it now. Like riding a bicycle. He repeatedly wedged his thumbnail under the next tooth, pressed, felt it give and immediately loosened another tooth, then another, and another…

  The bathroom door swung open. He let his wrists go limp so she wouldn’t suspect what he was up to.

  She walked to the bed, a glass of water in one hand, his gun in the other.

  Tricky, but doable.

  Eyes narrowed and wary, she hesitated.

  “Like I can do anything trussed like a chicken on a spit,” he grumbled. “Please. Give me a drink.”

  He put plenty of helplessness in his tone. Added a dose of self-pity in his eyes.

  Scowling, she finally leaned over him, extending the glass toward his mouth.

  He lifted his head and drank deeply. Because he was thirsty. And because he wanted to give her a reason to let down her guard.

  “Thanks,” he said, appearing to be clearly defenseless and so fucking appreciative he wanted to gag. “More. Please.” Oliver Twist at his humble best.

  She didn’t hesitate this time. She leaned a little closer, extended the glass. And he struck.

  He jerked his left hand free of the loosened plastic loop, knocked the gun across the room, grabbed her hair with his other hand, and jerked her down on the mattress.

  Water flew everywhere; glass shattered on the tile floor. She scrambled to get away but before she knew she’d been had, he flipped her onto her back, straddled her hips, and pinned her wrists above her head.

  She put up a good fight, and she didn’t fight like a girl. She had some serious moves but he had size, physical strength, and a big dose of pissed-off on his side.

  She bucked, jabbed with her elbows and attacked with her knees, giving him all he could handle until he finally managed to secure the cuffs around her wrists, loop them over the head rail, and jerk them tight.

  Breathing hard, he pushed himself off her and off the bed. Not fast enough to avoid her flying feet, though. She clipped his cheek good with a boot heel and damn near knocked him on his ass.