CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

 

 

 

There were very few people in the world that Payne and Jones respected more than Nick Dial, and the feeling was quite mutual. Together they had faced a lot over the years, and during that time, they had grown from casual acquaintances to trusted friends.

The trio had met several years earlier at a pub in London that catered to Americans called Stars & Stripes. It was the type of joint where football meant helmets and shoulder pads, not yellow cards and hooligans. At the time, Payne and Jones were still in the military, and Dial was just starting his career at Interpol. The three of them had hit it off right away, and they had kept in touch ever since—occasionally bumping into each other in foreign lands.

Once at an airport in Italy.

Another time in the mountains of Greece.

It was during that particular adventure that their friendship was truly forged, watching each other’s backs while battling a vicious foe and solving an ancient riddle on Mount Athos. By the end of the trip, Dial had met a hard-drinking fisherman named Jarkko and a famous historian named Ulster, both of whom would play major roles in the story that he was about to hear.

Dial took a deep breath. “How bad is it?”

Payne surveyed the scene. “On a scale of one to a hundred, I’d rate it a six.”

“Whew!” Dial said, relieved. “I can handle a six. After that air-raid alert from your hacker friend, I was expecting a whole lot worse.”

“Unfortunately, the six stands for the number of dead bodies that—”

“Seven!” Jones shouted from across the way.

“Hold on, Nick. We’re still counting corpses here.” Payne lowered his phone and shouted back to Jones. “Who the hell is number seven?”

“They killed the security guard on their way in. And they stole our gym bags.”

“Seriously? Why the hell would they steal our gym bags?”

“Because our gym bags were awesome.”

“Any surveillance?”

“On the gym bags?”

“In the library!”

“Nope. They killed that, too. The whole system is kaput.”

“Call Randy and see if he can help with anything—including traffic cameras on the surrounding streets. And please tell Jarkko to quit touching the bodies.”

Payne got back on the phone. “Sorry about that. Kind of hectic here. We’re trying to get as much done before the police arrive. They’ll only slow us down.”

“Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!” Dial growled as blood rushed to his face. He could literally feel his body temperature rise while he listened to the update. “You need to start from the beginning, because right now I’m about to blow a fucking fuse.”

“Was it something I said?”

Dial didn’t find it funny. “Stop that shit right now, or I swear to God I’ll hang up this phone and hang you out to dry. This isn’t the time for jokes. This is when you fill me in on everything, and I decide if I need to put out an alert for your arrest.”

Because of the complex nature of their friendship, Payne often forgot that Dial had been trained to handle death in a much different way than he had. In the world of the special forces, Payne and Jones had been taught to kill and move on without looking back, mostly because the military feared they might not be able to handle it if they paused long enough to see how much destruction they had brought into the world in the name of peace. After a while, they had built up such a tolerance to violence that they were able to joke about things that others wouldn’t.

Not out of disrespect, but in order to keep their sanity.

Meanwhile, Dial viewed things quite differently.

As an investigator, he had been forced to study the moment of death, to closely examine all of the grisly details that soldiers tried to forget. He knew it was in the minutiae where murderers made mistakes, and that’s what was needed to catch a killer. Once a case was over and Dial was throwing back beers with his colleagues, the dark humor would come out—in hopes of washing away the stains that still remained—but until then, his job was to uphold the law.

Or, at the very least, keep it in view.

And that’s where things got tricky.

Dial was no longer an investigator. He was an administrator. It wasn’t his job to go to a crime scene and look for clues. His duty was to pass on as much information as possible to the police forces involved in any crimes that crossed international borders. However, as the director of the homicide division of Interpol, he realized his opinion carried a lot of weight.

With a single phone call, he could start or stop an investigation.

Which was why Payne was calling him now.

Without Dial’s help, they would be in deep shit.

And Payne knew it.

“Sorry, Nick. I truly am. I’m still amped up on adrenaline, trying to make sense of what just happened. Because I’m telling you, it doesn’t make sense.”

Dial noticed the change in Payne’s demeanor and appreciated it. Like Payne, he had been shot at multiple times in the line of duty and realized it brought a rush of emotions that were tough to contain. With that in mind, he took a deep breath and tried to calm down as well.

“First things first: are you and DJ okay?”

“Yeah, man, we’re fine. Banged up, but fine. Sorry, I should have led with that. Truth be told, my head’s still ringing from the grenade.”

So much for calming down.

“Grenade? You used a fucking grenade?”

“Not us, Nick. Them. Just a flash-bang, though. Otherwise, DJ wouldn’t be standing.”

“Who the hell is them?”

“Listen, I’ll gladly fill you in on everything, but I need you to do something for me A-SAP. Reach out to the police in Valletta and let them know there was an assault on their national library that’s been stopped. Tell them who we are, and make it clear we’re the good guys. Otherwise, they’re liable to come in here with a SWAT team, running hot.”

Dial knew Payne well enough to trust his assessment of the situation. If he said the threat had been thwarted, then Dial believed him. He immediately opened his office door and called out to Toulon, who was no longer flipping him off. “There’s been a shootout at the national library in Valletta. Seven down, but the situation is contained. Let them know we have a team inside. If the locals have any questions, they can call me direct.”

“What team?” Toulon asked as he searched his computer screen for the contact information of the National Central Bureau in Malta. It was the duty of local NCB offices to monitor their territories and report pertinent facts to Interpol’s headquarters in France.

“Payne and Jones.”

Toulon had met them when they had stopped by Lyon to check out Dial’s office and to get a better sense of Interpol’s system of operations. Despite his reputation for hating everyone, Toulon had actually hit it off with the duo, much to the surprise of Dial. “Are they okay?”

“So far, but they won’t be if tactical units storm the building with them inside.”

“On it. Give them my best. I love those guys.”

“Sorry about that,” Dial said to Payne as he closed his office door once again. “Henri says hi, by the way. Not to me, ever. Only to you.”

Payne smiled. “Thanks for doing this. I truly appreciate it.”

“No problem. I want you guys safe. That way I know you’re healthy when I kick your ass for putting me in this situation. I thought I told you the last time I couldn’t keep bailing you out, but it’s like déjà vu all over again.”

“I’m telling you, this one is different—so different that my first call was to the Pentagon. The team that attacked us was Russian.”

“Russian? What the fuck are Russians doing in Malta? Actually, what the fuck are you doing in Malta? And why the fuck am I swearing so much?” He took a deep breath before he collapsed onto his chair. “Seriously, Jon, I’m getting too old for this shit.”

“You and me both. But we had no choice. They came in firing.”

Payne did his best to summarize the events of the past forty-eight hours—when they had arrived in Malta, how they had bumped into Jarkko, why they had spoken to Ulster, and where they had met up with Marissa. The only question he couldn’t answer was, who?

Who were the Russians?

That was the element that had him baffled.

The one thing that didn’t make sense.

Thanks to their former line of work, Payne and Jones were still considered valuable assets to the U.S. Government. Not only did they work for the Pentagon as consultants on a regular basis, but their knowledge of classified missions from the past two decades made them possible marks for foreign operatives.

But the Russians didn’t treat them as assets to be potentially flipped.

They viewed them as targets.

Literal targets.

Opening fire without saying a word.

Why in the world would they do that?

Payne and Jones realized that the Cold War was heating up again, and the two superpowers were constantly probing each other for weaknesses. But this attack reeked of desperation, as if they needed to stop the duo from doing something before they got away. Otherwise, why stage an assault in a national building on foreign soil?

And yet, if their goal had been to kill them, why did the Russians show up with sidearms and flash-bangs? Why not go full tilt and bring in actual grenades and automatic weapons? Against that type of firepower, the duo wouldn’t have stood a chance.

All of which led Payne to believe that this was related to their search.

Possibly a shakedown for information that simply went wrong.

Payne didn’t have proof, but that’s what his gut was telling him.

And Dial happened to agree.

“Okay,” Dial said. “I believe you. I’m willing to put my ass on the line for you yet again in order to keep this quiet. I’m not quite sure how we’re going to do that—maybe give credit to the local cops for stopping such a horrible threat. I’m sure the media will eat that up. But dammit, Jon, you need to stop hunting for treasures. Don’t you have enough cash as it is?”

Payne laughed. “I’m not in it for the money. I’m in it for the history.”

“Bullshit!” Dial exclaimed. “You’re in it for the hunt. It’s the same thing that I’m currently missing from my life, the one thing I can’t get while I’m tied to a fucking desk.”

“You’re welcome to join us, Nick. Last time turned out all right.”

“I appreciate the offer—I really do—but I get the sense you need me here. At least until you figure out who is after you.”

Payne glanced across the room at Jones, who had just finished taking pictures of all the dead Russians and using a special program on his phone to scan their fingerprints. Thanks to the Payne Industries tech in his device, he was able to upload that information securely to Raskin, who would then go through his numerous databases until he got a hit. “Due to the slow response time of the local police—who I’m told were quite heroic in their efforts to take out the Russian horde that stormed the library—we’ll probably have some names before dinner.”

Dial smiled. “They still aren’t there yet?”

“Nope. Unless they’re setting up a perimeter. Don’t blame them, though. This entire room is lined with books. My guess is no one outside heard a thing.”

“Meaning you could have walked away from the scene. Thanks for not doing that.”

“Come on, Nick. We respect you and the law way too much for that. Plus, in this case, we were completely innocent.”

Dial grinned. “Not exactly.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Are you familiar with the gun laws in Malta? I’m guessing, no. I’m also guessing that the weapons you used to innocently kill six foreign nationals were either smuggled into Malta by your private jet or Jarkko’s sex yacht. I’m also guessing that those weapons have no serial numbers and were probably wiped clean at the scene, both of which are illegal acts. Unless, of course, you guys got really sloppy and decided to buy your weapons in country from a Russian arms dealer, who then followed you to your meeting at the library in order to steal back his merchandise, thus forcing you to kill him and his men in self-defense.”

Payne laughed. “But other than that, completely innocent.”

Dial noticed the laughter and decided to make him sweat. “Seriously, Jon. You need to be more careful. Personally, I don’t care where you got the guns, but you better have a good answer for the local cops because someone is going to ask.”

“Any suggestions?”

“Only one, but you aren’t going to like it.”

“Why not?”

“Because I think your best option is to tell them that DJ is your bodyguard.”

“Excuse me?”

“Listen. You don’t have a badge, and DJ has a private-eye license. Simply say that you hired him to provide personal protection on your business trip.”

Payne shook his head vehemently. “Listen to me, and listen to me good: I would rather go to jail for six consecutive life sentences than tell anyone that DJ was my bodyguard. He would never—and I do mean never—let me live that down. He would literally get business cards that said he was my bodyguard and hand them out to everyone at the Pentagon. Sorry, Nick, I’m willing to eat some shit, but I’m not going to eat that turd burger.”

“Hey, you asked for my opinion, and I personally think that’s your best option. But if your stupid pride won’t let you go that route, you can always fight dirty.”

“Meaning what?”

“Just blame it on the black guy.”

Payne finally caught on. “Oh my God, you’re fucking with me. I was just attacked by six angry Russians, yet you’re busting my balls for reaching out. Good for you!”

Dial couldn’t help but laugh. “Serves you right, you prick. I was having a good day until you called, now I’ll be here all night doing paperwork. Thanks a lot.”

“At least you’ll have Henri and his ponytail to keep you company.”

“Screw you.”

Payne grinned. “Tell that furry Frenchman I said hello.”

“Will do. Same to DJ and Jarkko. And Jon?”

“Yeah?”

“Lose my number.”