Extinction Machine

Chapter One Hundred Seven

VanMeer Castle

Near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Monday, October 21, 7:32 a.m.

Burke stepped back and held out an arm to indicate an electric golf cart. I got in the passenger side, Ghost jumped on the back. Burke hesitated for a moment before climbing behind the wheel. I saw him make brief eye contact with the other men and one of them snapped a glance toward my Explorer and back. It was clear that Burke was telling them to search my car. I smiled. Let them look. They’ll have a certain kind of fun. Or not.

Burke climbed in and we drove away.

Neither of us spoke. It wasn’t really a bonding experience. Ghost sat up and stared at the back of Burke’s neck. Every once in a while he licked his lips with a big, juicy glup.

It was full dark now but there were enough lights on the grounds and on the exterior of the house to film a movie. We passed several guard patrols, fixed and walking. Two of the guards had dogs. Dobermans. They gave Ghost the evil eye but Ghost sneered at them. Ghost is well over a hundred pounds of solid muscle, and he was trained by the best military dog trainers in the business. The DMS trainer, Zan Rosin, put him through a few extra courses, and I’d worked with Ghost for a year and a half, teaching him every dirty trick I could think of. Ghost loved a good tussle, and if he couldn’t kick the asses of a couple of p-ssy Dobermans I’d trade him in for a hamster.

At the back of the castle was a ramp hidden by decorative shrubs. We rolled past them and into an arched entrance that was probably built for horses and wagons once upon a time. Beyond the arch was a large concrete room built to look like the mead hall of a Viking longhouse. Shields and crossed axes on the walls, half an authentic-looking dragon-headed longship thrust out from one wall. Rich tapestries depicting Viking raids on small villages, complete with slaughter and rapine. At the far end was a row of rough tables fashioned from dark wood, and set into the walls were doorways that I guess would probably lead to staff quarters. Almost certainly where the guards—Shelton’s Viking horde—bivouacked.

I’m a manly man and all that, but I felt like I was going to drown in a river of testosterone.

Burke parked the golf cart in a slot that had his name stenciled on it. As I got out I made sure to look completely around the room knowing that whatever I saw was being seen by my team and Bug. The mirrored glasses I wore had a superb high-def spycam built into one of the temple pieces. You could already buy this year’s version of that camera, but we had next year’s. A gift from one of Church’s friends in the industry.

I had a whole bunch of toys with me. As I followed Burke across the mess hall, I kept my hands in my pockets, unobtrusively peeling back the film on a sticky little bug. As Burke led me through a doorway into the east wing of the castle, I paused with my hand briefly on the frame, planting the little doodad. It was small and designed to gradually absorb the colors of whatever it touched. Within five seconds it would invisible. Nice.

As I followed Burke, I continued to record the layout with my glasses. We already had a schematic of the place based on the original design of the castle—which was a matter of public record from when the Sheltons bought it from a bankrupted Austrian count—but we didn’t know what modifications had been made since. The video feeds would be used to create a 3-D model for every part of the building I visited. Sure, this was still a castle and I wasn’t going to see much of it, but intel was intel. Every little bit helps.

This wing was clearly dedicated for servants and operations. There were small brass plaques on doors marked: ELECTRICAL, SECURITY, GROUNDSKEEPING, and others. One really caught my eye: WRANGLERS. When my gaze lingered on it for an extra second, Bug explained it.

“Shelton collects animals,” he said. “He has a zoo somewhere on the grounds, and he buys rare critters for a game ranch he keeps in Texas. Brings in stuff from all over and lets his rich buddies shoot them. Axis bucks, scimitar bulls, waterbucks, Ibex, Russian boar hogs, rams—who needs to stalk a sheep? I mean, I’m cool with hunting and all … but sheep? Seriously? How’s that a sport unless you like … I don’t know … kickbox it to death or something.”

I flexed my jaw muscles to send a tiny burst of squelch. One flex for “yes,” though right now it was a general acknowledgment. I don’t have any serious objection to hunting, and I don’t mind entertaining the trout every once in a while, but somehow a bunch of rich a*sholes in camouflage with high-power scopes and state-of-the-art rifles didn’t exactly fit my image of “sportsmen.”

Bug said, “I’ll find out what else he has on-site. Wouldn’t want you to walk into a jaguar, right?”

Two flexes. No.

We went through a series of winding halls, sharp turns, staircases, crossed an entrance hallway that you could have parked a line of F-15s in, and finally entered a wing that was clearly the domain of the master of this feudal estate. I was mildly surprised not to see the staff here dressed in doublets. Every once in a while I touched a wall, a doorframe, a bannister rail, and each time I left another of the chameleon devices. Burke never saw a thing.

I was pretty sure that there was a more direct route to Shelton’s office, but this was probably Burke’s passive-aggressive way of screwing with me. As a bit of revenge it walked with a limp. Burke was a weasel.

Bug came on and whispered to me again. “Hey, I’ve been doing more background checks on Shelton’s security team. Holy moly, these are some bad mamba-jambas. Some serious mixed martial arts competitors. That guy Burke? He was tied to an illegal cage-fight circuit in Central and South America. Crazy stuff like you see in the movies. People actually getting killed.”

I flexed my jaw once to acknowledge that I understood.

“Don’t let Burke get on your blindside. Shelton’s bought his way out of a lot of charges that should have put him in jail. His psych profile reads like Stephen King wrote it.”

Another flex.

“Last thing,” said Bug, “see if you can get to Shelton’s laptop. Not sure if he’ll have anything useful, but it’s our best shot. If nothing else, we might be able to hack his e-mails.”

A flex. The line went quiet after that.

We stopped at a secretary’s desk behind which was an almost completely artificial woman. Poufy hair that was too perfect a shade of honey blond, blue-within-blue contact lenses, Botox lips, a severe nose job that could not have been the best choice in the catalog, and huge boobs that had no parallel in human genetics. She stared at me from under a battery of stiff black lashes.

“Mr. Shelton will see you now,” she said in a Paris accent that was as real as the “French” in French fries. “However, your dog must wait outside.”

I said, “Je ne quitterai jamais mon chien ici avec vous. Il a peur des robots.”

She gave me a blank stare. No clue what I’d just said.

I breezed past her with Ghost at my heels.

Beyond her desk was a set of massive oak doors that stood ajar, allowing us peons to enter. Like everything else in this place, the message was simple: I’m rich, you’re not; learn your place.

Beyond the doors was the largest office I’d ever seen. It was absurd. I mean, truly absurd. A full-scale replica of the Kitty Hawk hung from the ceiling and it didn’t begin to crowd the room. High ceilings, tall stained-glass windows, ranks of suits of armor, framed art with a bent toward portraits of pinched-faced scowling men who I assumed were ancient Sheltons, and a desk that you could cut down to make the deck of an aircraft carrier. The tall bank of windows behind the desk were all in ornate stained glass. If you looked up the word “ostentatious” in the dictionary, there would be a note directing you to the special signed-and-numbered limited edition, and Shelton’s picture would be in that.

Howard Shelton sat behind the desk on—I kid you not—a hand-carved wooden throne. Inlaid with gold and silver. He rose as I approached and I wondered if I was supposed to shake his hand, bow, or knuckle my forelock.

Burke followed me in, but there were already two similarly dressed guards in the office. They stood to either side of Shelton’s desk, glowering like Visigoths. Their faces were lumpy, with broken noses and cauliflower ears. Brawlers for sure. The smallest of the three was maybe two-twenty, all of it in his arms and shoulders.

At a nod from Burke, the two guards walked around the desk, each of them sizing me up the way a Brooklyn butcher sizes up a side of beef. They and Burke formed a semicircle around me.

Ghost fidgeted. He wanted me to let him out to play. It was a tempting thought, but that wasn’t why we were here.

Shelton was even better looking in person. He radiated warmth and health.

“Good evening,” he said. “Special Agent Leonhard is it?”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “Thank you for seeing me on such short notice.”

Shelton’s eyes twinkled. “Should I call you Special Agent?” he asked.

“I—”

“Or would you prefer ‘Captain Ledger’?”

Nobody was smiling except Shelton.

I said, “Ah, crap.”