Full Throttle (Black Knights Inc. #7)(78)
“Could be,” he murmured, putting his hand behind his waist to grab the butt of his Ruger P90. It sat nestled at the small of his back, so familiar he sometimes forgot it was there and fell asleep wearing it. “This guy coming has the same face-shape. The same tall, skinny build. Same black hair and skin tone. Then again, that describes the majority of the population.”
As the man ambled closer, a little spurt of adrenaline zipped through Dan’s veins, heightening his senses, coaxing to life the hard-hitting Navy SEAL who still lived inside him even though he’d spent a year doing his best to drown the f*cker. Suddenly the sound of the hen’s gentle clucks were amplified, and the humid air pressing against the exposed skin along his arms and face was like a wet, silken sheet.
Jesus, he’d missed this feeling when he’d been nose-first in a bottle. This feeling of awareness. Of anticipation. Of…readiness.
“That’s him for sure,” Penni whispered at the exact same moment he came to a similar conclusion.
“Rajen Musa!” he called the man’s name.
Startled, Rajen skidded to a stop in the middle of the rutted street. And then—holy f*ck!—he dropped his bags, turned on his heels, and straight-up bolted.
“Christ!” Penni hissed as that spurt of adrenaline turned into a full-on fireman’s hose.
His weapon was out in an instant, aimed, and ready to fire. “Stop!” he yelled as he beat feet after the scumbag with Penni hot on his heels. The soles of her flat dress shoes slapped against the pavement with a rhythmic thwack, thwack. “Stop! Or I’ll shoot you dead!”
Not really. He needed to ask the asswipe some questions first. But a round to the knee wasn’t out of the question. His finger tightened on his trigger as he poured more effort into eating up the distance Rajen was trying to put between them. Too bad for Rajen that once he’d gotten through the hell of detox, he’d stuck himself on a treadmill, working his way up from a slow, one-mile jog to a fast, five-mile sprint. There were still some things he was struggling to get back after his year of drunken self-destruction, but speed and agility weren’t on the list.
“I’ll do it!” he warned again, pulling away from Penni and halving the distance to his target. “And I know you understand me, motherf*cker! Your boss told me you speak English!” But it was obvious the bastard wasn’t going to heed his threat, and up ahead the city grew dense, a rabbit’s warren of alleyways and cramped buildings vying for space. Taking aim, his legs still pumping and closing the gap, he pulled the trigger. Bam! The Ruger belched out a .45 caliber bullet at over a thousand feet per second. And down went the security director.
From the bloom of blood Dan glimpsed on the lower half of the guy’s khaki-colored trousers, he’d missed Rajen’s knee by two or three inches, nicking the side of his calf. But it was enough. The dude wasn’t going anywhere.
Five more thundering steps brought him to the man’s side. Rajen was now sitting in the middle of the street, grabbing his injured leg and wailing. Like, seriously, wailing. He could give Irdina some stiff competition in terms of tear production and loud, hiccupping cries. “Rajen Musa,” he said, his chest rising and falling with the effort to suck in the dense, wet air. The smoky smell of spent gunpowder filled his nose and mouth, its taste tart on his tongue. Pointing the Ruger at the security director’s head, he continued, “You shoulda left the country when you had the chance.”
“No!” Rajen cried, rocking slightly. Deep crimson blood coated his hands as he squeezed his leg. “No! I know nothing! I am innocent!”
“Innocent men don’t…” Penni—who’d just caught up to them—bent at the waist, blowing hard. “Run,” she finished.
“No, no, no.” Rajen shook his head, his face shiny with tears. “Whatever they did, I had no part. I-I just gave them room numbers th-they ask for and…and access key to s-s-stairwell. Nothing more. Nothing more!” he wailed, his accent so thick it was difficult to make out his words. “I swear.”
Dan glanced at Penni as she straightened, still trying to catch her breath. “You believe him?” he asked.
He could tell by her expression that she wasn’t sure, but she was a bright bulb. And she’d read his intention correctly. “Not for an instant.” She shook her head vehemently.
“I swear,” Rajen insisted again, grabbing the leg of Dan’s jeans with a bloody hand. “They found me and—”
“Who found you?” he demanded, not allowing the barrel of his weapon to waiver from its position an inch from the man’s temple.
“I do not know name,” Rajen insisted, and Dan tilted his head, making sure his expression hardened further. Rajen’s voice fell to a terrified, pain-filled whimper. “I promise I do not know. I only know he Jemaah Islamiyah. He offer me much money to give him room numbers of Americans coming to…uh…uh”—Dan watched the man’s desperate expression edge toward panic as he searched for the correct word—“flower assembly.” Flower assembly? Oh, horticultural convention. Yeah, close enough. “He no tell me his plans. Just tell me find room numbers and give access key.” He shook Dan’s pant leg as a small puddle of blood formed on the ground beneath his injured calf. “Please, I speak truth.”
“How did this man, this Jemaah Islamiyah militant,” he snarled the words, “know where to find the agents on duty? The one on the balcony and the one across the street on the roof of the shopping mall? That had nothing to do with room numbers or—”