Susan Johnson - Hot Streak

“The rest is a piece of cake,” Ant jubilantly declared. “Look at all the damn chimneys. Now watch this cowboy technique.” As good as his word, he lassoed a chimney easily, and they pulled themselves onto the roof without mishap. They were all silently congratulating themselves when the first shots rang out, narrowly missing Luger, who was closest to the edge of the roof.

They scrambled up the roof and over the ridge peak, followed by a barrage of bullets and flying pieces of tile. Out of sight of the courtyard now, they ran, dashing over the rough roof surface as though it were a flat track.

Their rappelling line was two hundred yards away when the first guard came out of the dormer window they'd used for entrance into the villa. He reached the roof peak just as Luger began hooking his harness to the wire. The burst of bullets raked the parapet above their heads, and they dove out of sight behind a chimney.

“Ant and I'll keep them down on the other side of that ridge. You go over first, Luger.”

Discussion was unnecessary; they'd performed this procedure so many times as a team, their roles had become automatic. Luger moved out first because he was a flawless shot at long-range.

Ant went next because he couldn't sprint as fast as Carey. And when Ant and Luger were both away, Carey would race for cover. It had developed into such a routine maneuver, they'd begun calling it their football play, as if the game of battle were stylized and amusing.

But the roof ridge presented a formidable bunker for Rifat's guards, and no jungle or underbrush existed to conceal one's retreat. There was no cover at all until they dropped below the parapet and hung from the rappelling wire.

Carey and Ant tore up the roof ridge while Luger made a dash for the wire, and both breathed a small sigh of relief when they heard the added sound of his fire power behind them. He was over and in position.

Once Luger was adding to their defense, Ant ran for the wire. Reinforcements were continually coming up-Carey could tell from the additional rounds bombarding them and the increasing number of shouting voices. He hoped there weren't any zealots in Rifat's troops; they'd be hard to keep down. Mercenaries were a different matter. Trained and skilled and deadly, they still preferred collecting next week's paycheck. Zealots alarmed him, their mad eyes reflecting the chaos in their minds.

A man screamed and then another. He knew that sound. Good. Two less-whatever their persuasion. And he glanced toward the parapet, gauging the time it would take Ant to cross. He wasn't staying on this side a second longer than necessary. Emptying his magazine in a spraying sweep across the roof peak, he was crouched behind the chimney in the process of reloading when his instinct for self-preservation screamed, Go! Without hesitation he dropped his rifle and ran. He never, never ignored that voice.

They hadn't expected him to break cover without firing, and he had a few scant seconds of reprieve before they began sighting in on him. He was up on the parapet and then on the wire before the first guards rose in pursuit. He heard Luger's shouted warning, but didn't slow down as the first rush was almost immediately followed by a full-scale charge. Ant and Luger were doing their best to stop them, but it was possible several might make it to the parapet. Carey was halfway across the thirty feet in a light run when a stream of bullets flashed by him so closely he felt the heat on his face. “Cut the wire,” he shouted, “cut it.” His additional directive erased the first shocked look from Ant's face, and he was reaching for the wire with his cutters when Carey leaped the last eight feet for the roof. In midair he heard the snap as the taut wire split apart and saw the welcoming grin on Ant's face.

An enormous explosion erupted behind him. He rolled to his feet and he saw Luger with a missile launcher balanced on his shoulder, a look of infinite satisfaction on his face.

“Where the hell did that come from?” Carey inquired, breathless and astonished.

“Brooks Air Force Base.”

“I didn't mean that.”

“Helluva nice hole over there,” Luger remarked, and Carey turned to see the entire roof, half Rifat's villa, and the pursuing guards disappear in a blaze of fire.

On the ride back to the airport, Luger explained: He'd brought the TOW missile to the antique shop earlier in the day and had hidden it in the stack of empty boxes outside the back door. Making sure he was the first one to arrive at their rendezvous that night, he'd carried it up to the roof before Carey and Ant arrived.

“Fucking pyromaniac,” Carey grumbled, though his grin belied his words. “You should be committed.”

“Stopped 'em, didn't it?”

“Stopped the entire operation of the villa, not to mention calling out half the fire trucks in the city.”

“Any problem there?” Luger replied angelically.

Carey's grin widened. “Hell no. That was one big mother of a blast, though.”

“Yeah… it was a beauty,” Luger replied with the fondness parents reserved for compliments on their children. “Although it's small in relation to other missiles.”

“How do you get your hands on those?”

Luger smiled. “Privileged information.”

“That means he stole it,” Ant interjected, sprawled in one corner of the backseat, a Mexican beer in his hand.

“I didn't steal it. I purchased it,” Luger explained as if the distinction were important.

“I think we're all aware of the occasional lapses in integrity in the Defense Department and its agencies,” Carey noted, wiping the camouflage black off his face. “So what do you have from your supermarket for Miami?” Carey had briefed them on the memo on Rifat's desk and their need for haste, since they had no way of knowing if Rifat had set the operation in motion yet or not. But they were safest assuming the mission to kidnap Sylvie had been initiated. They had to proceed as though the danger to Sylvie existed. If it did not, they would all breathe a collective sigh of relief.

In the meantime, Carey called Sylvie and, without alarming her into panic, explained she should hire extra guards and stay in the hospital until he arrived.

T he wing was bristling with off-duty police officers when they returned to Miami. Sylvie had taken Carey's order to heart. But essentially she was calm. Everything was fine, she told him. She had hired a great number of security and there was nothing more to worry about. Although Carey was slightly more cautious than she, he did have to agree they seemed protected behind the barricades of police officers. No one was allowed in or out of the wing unless they were personally approved by Sylvie or himself.

Egon was still on the critical list, but not worse, the doctors' prognosis one of guarded optimism. “He may live,” they said.

“Great,” Carey replied. “What about the paralysis?”

Their faces became more somber at that point and none dared offer hope.

“Surely someone can try operating. What the hell does he have to lose?”

His condition was too critical, they replied. He would never survive the surgery.

Carey dropped the discussion. Clearly some research was necessary, other specialists had to be called in. All avenues would be pursued later when the threat to Sylvie was resolved.

After stopping by to visit Egon and Mariel, Carey called Molly.

Rifat was dead, he said.

And she asked quickly if he was all right, her voice concerned and warm.

He was fine, he replied.

Could she go home then? she asked, her tone more controlled and less vital.

He wanted her to wait a few more days, he politely mentioned, until he reconciled the threat to Sylvie.

“Are you with Sylvie?” she inquired, and the brittleness in her voice was unmistakably cool.

He wished he didn't have to say yes. “Just for a few more days,” he said.

“Your father's waiting to speak to you,” she declared. “Thank you very much for calling.”

He swore under his breath, but when his father came on the phone he merely related the pertinent events, explained the necessity for a delay in Miami to stave off a possible threat to Sylvie, and ended by telling his father he would be home as soon as possible.

“I'm very glad you're safe,” Bernadotte replied, “now let the security earn their keep and stay out of the way.”

“No one can get through this phalanx of guards, Papa. Rest easy.”

He'd stopped by Sylvie's sitting room to discuss the new doctors they should call in for Egon. When the cleaning woman walked in, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Looking over at her, he told himself he'd been without sleep too long and was overreacting to every stimuli. She was just a plain young woman with black hair pulled back carelessly in a net cap, a dark complexion, and a strange way of holding a mop.

He'd spoken perhaps a half-dozen more sentences to Sylvie when her odd grasp on the mop handle registered in his mind. Continuing to speak to Sylvie, he turned his head a minute degree and glanced once again at her hands.

She had long red nails and a fifty dollar manicure, and if he didn't miss his guess, she'd probably never held a mop in her life.

“So if you agree,” he went on, his heart rate accelerating, “I'll have Allen get a team to research the best specialists in spinal surgery, and we'll have someone out here in a couple of days.” It wouldn't do any good to take this woman and leave the rest of her colleagues untouched.

“I'm fully in agreement,” Sylvie said, waving the woman away from her side of the room. “And Egon is, as well. The young girl he finds so entrancing is afraid of everything, but she hardly matters. I say get the best and tell them we want the bullet out.”

The woman had mopped the same area of floor for quite some time. The sooner Carey alerted Ant and Luger the better. He moved toward the door, watching her out of the corner of his eyes. She was intent on his progress.

At the doorway, he paused. “Do you have that phone number of the clinic in Denver?”

Sylvie nodded, sorting through several sheets of paper on the table near her chair.

“Do you mind giving it to me?” He held out his hand. “And I'll call after I talk to Egon.”

She thought it odd he didn't move, only stood with his hand out waiting for her to bring it to him.

Walking over to him, Sylvie handed the paper to him.

And when he said, “Thank you, darling,” and pulled her into his arms for a kiss, she knew something was wrong. She'd been trying to get Carey to kiss her for three years, and he'd avoided her every advance. “Do whatever she says,” he murmured into her ear. “The cleaning woman… I'll be right behind you.” Relinquishing his grip, Carey patted her on the shoulder and, in a bolstering voice, said, “Keep up your spirits now, sweet. Egon needs you cheerful.”

Shutting the door behind him, Carey signaled Ant and Luger, who joined him as he walked away down the hall. “The cleaning woman is one of them,” he said. “We'll follow her out when she takes Sylvie and get the rest of them. Or as many as we can.”

He preferred not involving the hired security guards. They'd been only told the Countess von Mansfeld was being protected from unwanted publicity. In addition to not completely trusting outsiders, some of them could be in Rifat's hire. Ant and Luger were the best. He felt secure.

“Are we taking prisoners?” Luger asked.

“No,” Carey briefly replied, and turned into a small shower room three doors down from Sylvie's suite. “We'll wait here.”

In only a few minutes, Sylvie and the cleaning woman walked out of Sylvie's room, apparently in friendly conversation, although Carey knew the woman was holding a gun under the stack of towels in her arms. As they reached the doors exiting the wing, Sylvie asked the guard on duty if he would go to her room to get her purse she'd forgotten. “And if you don't mind, you could escort me to dinner. I can't tolerate another meal of hospital food.” Her smile was relaxed and flirtatious.

Thrilled by the prospect of accompanying Sylvie von Mansfeld to dinner, he readily responded and swiftly left to do her bidding, leaving Sylvie and the cleaning woman alone at the exit to the west wing.

They were out the door and halfway down the hall when Carey, Ant, and Luger slipped through the doors behind them, staying far enough back to remain out of sight. The woman took Sylvie down the service stairs. After a judicious interval, the men followed, Luger carrying his small canvas bag of weapons. She took Sylvie all the way down to the basement and, without a glance backward, proceeded briskly out into the underground lot.