65
We exited the bar without any trouble, and I said, “Where’s your car?”
“I don’t have one.”
I smacked him in the back of the head and said, “That’s not what the girl at your place told me. Where is it?”
He muttered something about a traitorous bitch, and I inwardly smiled at my subterfuge. Sometimes a bluff worked. He said, “Down the street.”
I said, “Brett, with me. Retro, link up with Nung. Follow us.”
Clynne heard the words and realized there was more in play than just us in the bar. A little bit of purposeful psychology to keep him on his toes.
We walked two blocks, finding a beat-up Honda Accord. I let Brett drive, putting Clynne in the passenger seat, me directly behind him. I said, “So, where to?”
“Macroom. He’s staying in a farmhouse out there.”
We headed out of the city, and soon enough we were on the N22 going west into the Irish countryside. We traveled for about thirty minutes, going deeper into farm community, small blacktops branching left and right into the green hills. We crossed a stone bridge, an ancient defunct mill on the other side, and he said, “Stop! Too far.”
“What do you mean?”
“The road to the house is right past that mill, but it’s a one-lane dirt thing. You take it, and he’ll know you’re coming. He’ll stop us.”
“And why would you care about that?”
He held his hands up. “Hey, man, no way do I want that psycho on my ass. He’s crazy.”
We turned around and crossed the stone bridge again, then took a left, paralleling the river the bridge spanned, now on a winding strip of blacktop. About a mile in, he pointed out the window, saying, “That’s it.”
Brett slowed, and I saw a ramshackle house about two hundred meters away, in the center of a field. Made of stone, it had maybe four or five rooms, a crumbling chimney on the left side. It was surrounded by farmland, but the house itself was overgrown, with vines and bushes reclaiming what the forest had lost, as if whoever owned the land simply mowed around it. Between us and it was the river, maybe forty feet across and three feet deep.
I said, “You’re telling me Seamus is staying in that shit hole?”
He held up his hands and said, “That’s what he told me.”
I wrapped my arms around his neck from the backseat, pulling to the rear. “I’m not stupid. Nobody could have found this place without having actually been here. There is no way you could have led us here from what he told you. I want to know what the hell you’re doing with him. Right now.”
He strangled for a minute, fighting my arm, then said, “Okay, okay! I got it for him, but I swear I don’t know nothing about your friends. He told me he needed to lay low. That’s all.”
I pulled back again, and he began to cough. I let up, and he spurted, “I’m not lying!”
I said, “Okay then. I find out you are and we’ll have a talk. We understand each other?”
He nodded, visibly trembling. I waited for him to recant anything, but he remained quiet. I was satisfied.
I turned to Brett. “Get Retro up here. Get some OP kit.”
Brett said, “Me and him?”
“Yeah. Have Nung transport it. Eyes on from this point forward.”
Brett looked to the right and asked, “Who owns the hill here? I haven’t seen a house.”
Clynne said, “I don’t know. It’s all farmland, but if you want to use it, I won’t say anything, I swear.”
Brett chuckled, and he said, “I won’t!”
I said, “Yeah, I know. Mainly because you’re not going to get the chance.”
* * *
Brett watched the Wasp UAV circle overhead, Retro controlling its descent. He swooped the thing right over their hide site, then brought it straight up into the air. Brett ducked, hearing Retro laugh. Watching the monitor, he circled the UAV over three cows two hundred meters away. Brett said, “Come on. Bring it back.”
Retro loved gadgets and was a little bit of a computer geek at heart. He would tinker with any new electronic kit that came into the Taskforce arsenal for days, figuring out all the parameters. He was the one man on the planet—outside of Steve Jobs—who actually understood all the settings on an iPhone.
He said, “Negative, Ghostrider. It’s time to buzz the tower.”
Brett rolled his eyes and watched the UAV dip, skipping right above the cows. They barely moved. With a wingspan of just over two feet and an electric motor, the UAV probably didn’t even register with the animals.
He brought it around and crash-landed right next to their hide. He said, “You send the video to Pike?”
“Yeah. A video of a torn-up building. I’m sure he’s jumping up and down.”
They’d been in position trying to confirm or deny activity for over four hours and so far had seen nothing. A look through thermals had detected two heat sources, and using a directional microphone, Brett had discerned engine noise emanating from the house, meaning a generator, so someone was using the building, but there was nothing to indicate hostages or anything nefarious. It looked like a single squatter was living there.
Or another trap.
After the in-depth planning that went into the kill box in Paris, Brett had grown a little paranoid.
The sun reached the edge of the earth, and they were in that moment of twilight between using regular optics and night vision. Still no signs of anything indicating hostages.
Brett and Retro had been in situations like this before and had planned accordingly. They knew it would be a long night whether they found something or not.
Even if they’d immediately been able to confirm evidence suspicious enough for further exploration, they knew it would take Blaine the better part of the night to coordinate a response through the Taskforce. Their job was reconnaissance only, and they’d keep eyes on until relieved. Which meant a night in a hidey-hole.
The thermometer began to drop and Brett brought up the thermals again, knowing the difference in temperature would make the view much more stark. Inside, the same two heat sources showed up black against the white of the structure. Only now, one had moved.
He said, “Okay, got at least one target. Still think the other is a generator.”
Retro noted the information in his log, saying, “Wonder what the trigger is to call this a dead end?”
“With Pike, it’s usually some gunfire. Because he can’t stand a dead end.”
Retro started to respond when he saw lights bouncing down the dirt lane on the far side of the house. Two cars a half mile away.
He said, “Company,” and Brett traded the thermal for a spotting scope.
While the blacktop on their side of the river had steady traffic, they’d seen only a single truck on the dirt lane on the far side of the house the entire time they’d been there. He fully expected the vehicles to continue on, like the truck, but they turned down the rutted track that led through the fields to the house.
He sat up. “Call Pike. Tell them we’ve finally got activity.”
Both vehicles stopped outside the house, and ten or eleven men spilled out, carrying assault rifles. Brett said, “Holy shit. Call Pike. Tell him the trigger’s been met. Get the cavalry rolling.”