Yeah, that’s a good point.
42
HOTEL EPIC, LUANDA
Cyrus Vandal sat on the balcony, watching the right-to-left sweep of the S-band antenna as it siphoned the cell phone, microwave, and radio signals emanating from the city. After each pass the data was shot to the laptop, which recorded the relative location of each voice and converted the audio into a chain of ones and zeros before feeding them into the computer’s voice analysis software.
For the first few hours he’d sat enrapt before the laptop, watching the scroll of data as it passed through the voice analyzer, waiting for the ding in his ears to tell him the computer had found a lock—found Adam Hayes.
But after watching the endless blink of the NO MATCH icon across the top of the screen, Vandal found his attention beginning to wander as the frantic pace of the previous twenty-four hours finally caught up with him and he closed his eyes. He savored the gentle breeze that scampered across the balcony and the soothing hiss of the scanning S-band through the headphones pressed over his ears.
He felt himself drifting off and was almost asleep when there was an electronic ding in the headphone. In an instant he was wide awake, eyes snapping to the laptop on the table beside him and the blinking VOICE MATCH—PROBABILITY HIT 99.9%.
Hayes. I found him.
Using the trackpad, Vandal brought up the audio clip and pressed the play button, the beep in his ears replaced by the acid hiss of the recording.
“Tomorrow, eight a.m.”
“Where?”
“The Museu da Moeda, you know it?”
“Yeah,” Hayes said.
“Nice and public, just like you wanted.”
“Fine. See you there, and bring my pistol.”
He played it again, focusing on the voices. The first man had sounded Australian, maybe South African. Vandal couldn’t be sure, but there was no confusion about the second voice.
It was Hayes, no doubt about it.
He ripped the headphone from his ear and leapt to his feet, phone in his hand, dialing as he stepped into the room. He held the phone in front of his face. C’mon, c’mon, hurry the fuck up.
The instant he heard the camera shutter click, he set the phone on the table, grabbed the Bluetooth, and pressed it into his ear. He stripped out of the clothes he’d been wearing since arriving at the hotel, dressing quickly in a pair of black cargo pants, a micro-thin Kevlar vest, and a graphite shirt.
Vandal was stuffing his feet into the pair of Asolo hiking boots when a voice came on the line.
“Go ahead.”
“Do you have the lock?”
“Stand by . . . yes, we have the lock.”
“What do we have in the area?”
“Closest ISR asset is a JSOC Reaper operating out of Senegal . . .”
“Anything closer?”
“Negative.”
Shit.
“Fine, I’ll do it myself.”
Vandal ended the call, and after shoving the phone into his back pocket, grabbed one of the SIGs from the case. He clipped the holster to his belt, tugged the H&K MP7 from the case, and dropped it and two extra magazines into his assault pack.
Then he was moving to the door, heart hammering in his chest with the thought of drawing first blood.
43
RUSTED NAIL, LUANDA
Hayes stepped inside the Rusted Nail and tugged the faded ball cap down over his eyes, nodding at the group of hard-looking men gathered near the door on his way to the end of the bar. He pressed his back to the wall and lit a cigarette, pretending to smoke while taking stock of his surroundings.
Before coming inside Hayes had done his homework—marked the doors and the windows on the exterior of the building. So he knew that the door ten steps to his right would take him out to the patio and from there down to the beach.
The hall to his left matched up with the two windows on the east side of the building and he assumed they were bathrooms. But he had no idea about the door behind the bar.
Doesn’t matter. Pay attention.
He turned his attention to the woman behind the bar, watched as she poured the men standing before her a round from a bottle of Patrón.
“C’mon, Charli, take one with us,” the tallest one begged in Portuguese.
“Nito, you know I can’t afford this stuff.”
“It’s on me.”
“You sure?”
“Yeees, just have a drink with me.”
“Well, if you’re paying,” she said, grabbing the bottle and reaching below the bar for a glass.
Instead of the shot glass the man had expected, Charli came up with a tumbler, poured herself a man-sized drink, smiling as she held it up.
Before the man could recover, she downed the drink, slammed the glass facedown on the bar, and was moving toward Hayes, a huge smile on her face.
“What’ll it be?” she asked.
“Johnnie Walker. Black if you’ve got it,” he said, looking up.
The blood drained from her face, leaving her skin white as the scar on her chest. “I—I always knew they’d send you,” she said.
Hayes reached out, grabbed her wrist as it flashed toward the rear of the bar.
“Get rid of them,” he said, nodding to patrons at the end of the bar.
She tried to jerk her arm away, but Hayes held it firm, careful to use only as much pressure as necessary.
“Get rid of them, Charli, and don’t do anything stupid,” he said, letting her go.
She jerked her hand free, the fear that had clouded her eyes receding like the surf at low tide as she massaged her wrist. “And if I do? What are you going to do, shoot me in the back? Doesn’t seem like your style.”
“Do you really want to find out?” Hayes asked, hand falling to his waist.
“Fuck you, Adam,” she snarled, whirling away from him and stomping back to the far side of the bar to tell the men it was time to leave.
“Leave? But it’s not even eight,” one of the men complained, “and I haven’t finished my drink.”
“Come back tomorrow,” she said, “and I’ll make it up to you.”
The men might have been tipsy, but they weren’t stupid, and quickly figured out the reason that they were being cut off. “Is this because of him?” the tallest of the group asked.
“No, Nito, I’m just tired.”
But the man wasn’t having it.