“Agent Lilburn, please…”
Lilburn heard Lopez talking in the background. “I’m all right, thank you, I have to be.” She returned to Lilburn. “I’ll contact the cell leader, I’ll do it now. I’ll tell him… I’ll tell him just what you said before. I’ll tell him all our resources are concentrating west and that he should go the opposite direction. I’ll set a trap… but please don’t go to anyone. There’s a mole in the organization and I don’t know who. It could be anyone.”
“Where are you now?” inquired Lilburn.
“I’m still at HQ.”
“Put me back on to Dr. Crawston, please… Evangeline, this is what I want you… sorry, just one moment, I have a call coming through from Director Hall.”
Allan Hall notified his top agent of the emergency locator signal from a helicopter not far from his location. “It could be nothing — sometimes they’re set off by accident. Then again, a helicopter is a handy piece of equipment to get around the country and deliver a virus, especially when the ground is crawling with enforcement… I think you should check this one out. The signal gives the location within two miles of the chopper’s registered home. Check the address out first. If it’s not there, I’ll have the Search and Rescue Team from the Rescue Coordination Center take over and pinpoint the exact location. I’ll text you the address. Good hunting.”
Lilburn had intended to inform the director about Lopez but didn’t get the opportunity.
“Evangeline, you still there?”
“Yes.”
“Sorry about that, I had Hall on the phone, we have a possible lead close to here. A helicopter set off an emergency beacon. Evangeline, do me a favor, go to Allan Hall and explain to him what Lopez has confessed. There is no other option. I have to go now.”
“Be very careful. Please.”
Lilburn burst into the motel room. “Boys, we got a lead. So saddle up, we’re outta here.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
The headlights from the Jeep cut through the dark as it sped down the country roads. Every so often the Jeep pulled over and Lilburn studied a map by the light of his cellphone.
“It should be coming up soon,” Lilburn yelled above the noise from the open-topped Jeep. “We’re looking for Air Ag and Scenic Air.”
It took little more than thirty minutes all up for the Homeland team to find the gateway to the hangar. Lilburn instructed the driver to carry on past the gate and stop further up the road out of sight. A short call to Albany advised they were in location and they were ready.
“OK — let’s do it.”
Darkness was like a cool mist, covering everything as far as one could see. Everything was monotone, either pitch dark or a lighter shade of black. All except the night sky, which was an immense charismatic masterpiece of contrasts. Twinkling stars illuminating from a black canvas with the power to mesmerize anyone who looked up into the silent astronomical symphony. None of them did.
After a brisk, silent walk the four men crouched down. Watching, listening. The driveway entrance was some ten yards distant. From their elevated position off to the side of the road they could make out the shape of a large half-round hangar, one hundred yards away, across an open field. Light streamed from an uncovered window.
Lilburn wanted to get away from the roadside as soon as possible. “Avoid the driveway. Go through this fence, the wires are loose. Move down about ten yards to the right and wait.” Instructing one man to keep cover, he led the others through the fence, keeping low. The remaining man then followed.
Careful not to present their silhouettes, the agents scanned their objective from the side of the earth mound. Whispered speech was kept to a minimum. Lilburn instructed two men to circumnavigate the hangar, reconnaissance purposes only — one covering while the other moved. With no moon, progress was slow. A quarter of an hour later the pair returned. The hangar doors were shut, only the one window and one further, regular-sized door to one side of the large twin hangar doors were open.
“Well, I guess this isn’t going to sort itself out.” Lilburn and the men took positions closer to the hangar. Deploying one man as cover, where he could see both the window and the doors, Lilburn advanced with the other two and took up a position between two parked cars to the side of the large building.
One agent then went ahead and cautiously peered in through the window. He returned quickly. “Only part of the rear of the hangar is lit. There looks to be a sheet or some large white cloth hung up as a partition. That’s where the light is coming from, behind that sheet. Every so often I could see the silhouette of someone moving, I could make out a rifle. I’m fairly sure one or maybe two people are sitting in chairs, while two others are moving around. One of them has the gun.”
“What about a helicopter or the van we’re after?” Lilburn wanted to know.
“Just made out the rotor blades of a chopper. I couldn’t see all the hangar. It’s possible it’s there.”
Lilburn had heard enough. There was a high probability the cell was inside, with civilian hostages. “Peel back to where we left Jones. We’ll pick him up, move back and set up an OP until we get back-up. Go.”
The three men stealthily regrouped towards their covering agent’s position. The nearest man whispered, “Jones, we’re pulling back.”
No response.
“Hey, Jones.” The man reached forward and tapped the man’s shoulders. Still no reaction. Something was wrong; he gave him a harder push and felt something warm. “Ah shit.” Dropping his rifle, the agent rolled Jones over onto his back, revealing a gaping throat wound. “He’s dead!”
“Watch your ass.” Lilburn and the other two immediately surrounded the body and dropped to their knees facing out, weapons at the ready, each man watching, listening for any movement.
“What happened?” Lilburn whispered to the man who had raised the alarm.
“His throat’s been cut.”
“Hell.”
Lilburn turned and briefly laid a hand on the dead man, then shuffled back to his position. “Yeah, he’s dead.”
“Boss, the lights have gone out in the hangar.” Lilburn turned to look for himself. Shortly after one of the large hangar doors opened, clanging and rattling on its runners, the unexpected clatter of noise in an otherwise quiet night jarring their senses, already primed by the death of their colleague. It was too dark to see anyone. Suddenly the entire hangar was lit up as all the lights inside flicked on. The beams penetrated the night out towards where the agents knelt. While they were far enough away from the hangar not to be directly lit by the lights, the light had an immediate result. It back-lit them for someone even further away.
Lying prone on the other side of the narrow grassed runway, Bomani threw off the large sack he had covered himself with and tucked his phone back in his pocket. The placement of his rifle was such that all that was required was to raise it up, his cheekbone settled on the oiled wooden stock, his elbows and body acting as a steady tri-pod. He placed his forefinger lightly on the trigger and looked through the scope. As the lights came on inside the hangar and spewed out the open door, the three Homeland Security agents’ outlines stood out as inviting targets for the seasoned killer. It was only a matter of which one first.
Neither Lilburn nor the other two saw the flash of the rifle shot, its timing in perfect coordination with the distraction of the hangar lights. The laws of physics dictate that a bullet travels faster than the sound it makes, and they say that if you hear the gunshot, chances are the bullet won’t hit you. Two agents heard the gunshot.
The third was knocked off his knees and pushed violently forward as the bullet made a mockery of flesh, bones and internal organs.