“The SAS were informed of Riley’s re-emergence days after it happened, but didn’t actually encounter him until 1997, some twelve years later. I was thirty five then and no longer a new recruit. I was a captain. Riley popped back up our radar simply because he’d gotten himself into a fix by meeting a client in a hotel lobby in India. This client was a notorious bomb maker, a known killer, and we were already on the scene, having no knowledge that Riley would be there. Seeing an opportunity I walked into the lobby, alone, to reason with them…”
Crouch felt himself growing distant, remembering the events of that day with a memory too clear, a conscience too bruised. It had been more than an awakening; beyond even a grueling rite of passage. As he entered a lobby packed with unwitting bystanders he thought about all that the reports said Riley had done. The murders. The tortures. The kidnappings. Deals with the Devil. It couldn’t be true, not totally. Riley had to have some ulterior motive. Perhaps he was working for one of the more covert government agencies. Undercover. Perhaps Crouch could now find out the truth.
The first person he saw was the bomb maker — tall, wrapped in silk, and sporting a thick beard. Beady little flashing eyes that could have belonged to either a rodent or one of Dante’s demons. Crouch knew instantly that this man’s slaying days would end today. Then, almost against their will his eyes found Riley. Was it really him? Would he be recognizable? What if—
But Riley had already seen him. It was as if an arrow shot between them — its trail a burning streak lined with old memories, old promises and a thousand unanswered questions. The intensity was so strong it stopped Crouch in his tracks and made Riley lose concentration, suddenly ignoring his client. The bomb maker caught on and turned, more prone to jumpiness than a kangaroo in mating season.
Riley rose quickly, surveying the entire scene as Crouch watched. In the next second he reacted in contradiction of Crouch’s expectations and smiled widely, waving the Captain over.
“Michael! Michael! So good to see you. How long’s it been? Ten years?”
“More.” Crouch, caught in the spotlight, walked over, now even more conscious of the many people milling all about. The bomb maker in particular would have a contingency plan and might even now have a finger close to the proverbial trigger.
“I wondered when we would meet again,” Riley said, in a tone implying absolute truth.
“I thought you might be dead. Buried in a ditch. Abducted and never found. I searched for you for many years.”
Riley clearly read and understood the pain and outrage in Crouch’s voice. “I never asked anyone to mourn me.”
“And what? You’re a terrorist now?”
Riley laughed, turning toward the bomb maker. “You’ll have to forgive my friend here. He’s a member of the SAS and not quite the stylish diplomat.”
The bomb maker took that as a sign to flee, hopping over the back of the chair and showing Crouch, for the first time, that he held a number of small tubes in his right hand. Crouch stared first at them and then back at Riley.
“What have you done? Can you not see all these people?”
“You just cost me fifteen mill, asswipe. Now you’ll be shoveling the remains of tourists up whilst I escape in my plane.”
Crouch lunged, shocked but unable to let it pass. “Did you sell him those bombs?”
“The mixing ingredients, yes.” Riley laughed, not an ounce of morality evident. “Now get the fuck outta—”
Crouch smashed him on the bridge of the nose, breaking it, then caught him under the chin. Riley flinched and grunted, shocked and reeling aside. Seeing that Riley left a small disc-like object on the low table, Crouch swept it out of reach. Riley stared at it.
“You don’t know what you’re doing, Michael.”
“I know you let the Regiment down. Let the Army down. I trusted you. Believed in you. And this… this!” Crouch attacked again, unable to help himself, dealing a blow that audibly snapped Riley’s jawbone. The ex-soldier buckled.
“Let… let them down?” he babbled, wincing from the new pain. “Get down on the floor, man, because I really want you to live through this. Live and prosper. Because one day… one day I’m going to make you pay.”
Crouch took Riley’s advice immediately, surprised as he reacted without thought. The explosion shook the lobby, sending chunks of debris through the air. The first noise Crouch heard an instant after the explosion was the bump next to him and then he set eyes on the first casualty.
A flight attendant, stopping in the city for the night, living and breathing and feeling but a moment ago, rendered a lifeless carcass through Riley’s actions.
Crouch turned away from the blank stare and the blood flow, saw Riley standing at the far end of the devastated room.
“One day,” Riley mouthed, making a gun of his hand and pulling the trigger. “One… fucking… day.”
THIRTEEN
Alicia listened as Crouch told his tale, at first surprised to find Crouch had such a horrific nemesis in his past, but then remembering that in the end they were all just soldiers. Could any man who had seen combat say any different? Nemeses came in many different forms and for every person who lived their lives.
Riley, it seemed, had bided his time and remembered his promise to Crouch on finding out he’d left the Army. Anyone who held a grudge for that amount of time should be taken seriously, no matter their proclivities, but in the case of Riley the threat was a thousand times worse.
Caitlyn spoke into a sudden silence. “I’ll start some research. If we can find out what Riley’s been doing since ’97 it might give us some kind of an advantage.”
Crouch agreed. “Start with Interpol. Riley’s base of operations has always been Eastern Europe.”
Alicia considered Crouch’s story carefully. It was an event she knew fleetingly through past chatter. “Seven civilians and three soldiers were killed that day.”
Crouch nodded. “Three SAS soldiers. But Riley, he is the master of disappearance. We never got near him again.”
“I have to ask.” Healey looked like he was about to burst. “What’s next? Do we abandon our search for the Hercules to concentrate on Riley? Is that what you’re saying?”
Crouch blew out a long gust of air. “Ahhh, I don’t know. Riley has to be dealt with. If we allow him to operate I guarantee you he will end us all, publicly, with the highest amount of civilian casualties he can accomplish. But as for the fate of the Hercules…”
“It can wait?” Alicia said.
“It has waited all these years. But when a particular ball gets rolling so, usually, does another. Take Kenzie for example, and anyone she might have told. There may well be others. Rolland Sadler has to seek various permissions from local authorities to allow us to seek these treasures out — special access and the like. Criminals get wind that something is afoot, or they pay to hear from those in the know. I can guarantee you now that from our actions so far at least a dozen outsiders know what we’re up to.”
“And it’s what some of them might do to the Hercules that worries us,” Caitlyn put in.
“So we swing both ways.” Alicia cracked a smile. “I can handle that.”
Russo shook his head. “It’s a bit of an alien concept for the rest of us,” he said. “How can we juggle two such erratic variables?”
“It’s this simple,” Crouch said. “Riley will find us wherever we go. So let’s do what we have to do and make sure we’re ready for him.”
Russo accepted this logic by clamping his mouth shut. Alicia slapped his broad shoulders. “C’mon, Robster. Is it true that men can’t multitask? Or can even a slow, witless old Neanderthal like you make it work?”