State of Emergency jq-3 Read online

  State of Emergency

  ( Jericho Quinn - 3 )

  Marc Cameron

  Ripped from tomorrow's headlines, Marc Cameron who Brad Thor called "one of the hottest new authors in the genre" will rivet readers with this timely and terrifying thriller featuring Special Agent Jericho Quinn in a dangerous race against time to derail the plans of a deadly network of terror.

  Two agents, Russian and American, are brutally murdered. College students, working as drug mules, die gruesome deaths from radiation poisoning. Powerful dirty bombs explode minutes apart in San Francisco and St. Petersburg, Russia slaughtering citizens and spreading blind panic throughout the world. But this is only a warning. The next attack will be nuclear.

  Enter Air Force OSI agent Jericho Quinn and his crack team of specialists. Their mission: track down the arms dealer who masterminded the plot and dismantle them both. When the trail leads to South America, Quinn has to join the famous Dakar Rally, a 6,000-mile motorcycle run that's about to become the most dangerous race in history…

  Marc Cameron

  State of Emergency

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  For Daniel—

  A man of genuine good

  EPIGRAPH

  Ne puero gladium

  (Don’t give a sword to a boy.)

  PROLOGUE

  December 9

  11:30 PM

  Near Karakul, Uzbekistan

  Riley Cooper inhaled slowly, ignoring the metallic odor of violent death. He lay on his chest, watching, flat against a long wooden table four feet off the stone floor of the kill house. Once a fortified rest stop for man and beast on the ancient Silk Road, the dilapidated caravanserai was now a patched stone structure of cell-like rooms. Sagging sheep pens ran along the west side, forlorn and empty in the purple darkness. A toothed wind, heavy with the smell of wool, swept through the open window from the northern desert. S-shaped metal carcass hooks clanged like blood-rusted wind chimes above his head.

  Cooper pressed an eye to the night-vision monocular and wished it was attached to a rifle. Coming into Uzbekistan unofficially was dangerous enough for a man in his position. Possession of a sniper rifle could cause an international incident. Still, he wasn’t the type to be completely unprepared. Just after he’d arrived, he had haggled with a small-time gun dealer in Tashkent for a Russian GSh-18 nine-millimeter pistol. The handgun, along with eighteen armor-piercing rounds, had cost him his five-thousand-dollar Rolex Submariner. He loved the watch, but such things were often the coin of the realm and the price was well worth the comfort the pistol brought resting on his hip under the navy-blue hooded sweatshirt.

  Cooper was slender, a shade under six feet tall. His narrow waist and powerful, ostrich-like legs had shouted Olympic sprinter when he was in high school, but, on the advice of a family friend, he’d decided to go another route. That route had put him here in a freezing Uzbek desert with a night-vision scope to his eye.

  A ring of curly blond hair bristled from the edge of the black watch cap pulled tight over his head. His skin was on the pale side — making him particularly visible in the darkness. Before climbing into position in his hide, he’d taken the time to smear black paint over the high spots of his nose and cheekbones, breaking up the form of his face in the moonlight to anyone who might glance his direction.

  Nestling down against the chill of the night wind, Cooper peered through the green reticle of his night-vision scope to study the Russian less than thirty feet away. They had met two years before in a bar outside Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan. Mikhail Ivanovich Polzin had honest eyes and a no-nonsense manner. Cooper liked him as much as a man in his position could like a communist agent. They’d shared many bottles of Ak-sai Kyrgyz vodka and stories of home. Some of them were probably even true. Still, meets like this were touchy and had the Russian known he was being secretly watched from the slaughterhouse, he might very well have put a bullet in Cooper’s head on principle alone.

  Polzin stood along a ribbon of moonlit dirt track, facing the feeble twin headlights of an approaching truck, emerging from the frowning black mouth of the desert. A chilly wind wracked his body with a violent shiver and Cooper watched him snug the fleece collar of his greatcoat up around his ears. The American found it ironic that Polzin wore a coat and hat made of Astrakhan, the finely curled pelts of day-old Karakul lambs. Tens of thousands of the tiny things were slaughtered here at this very kill house and places like it every spring. The slaughter had to take place only hours after the lambs were born, before their pelts, valued for centuries because they were smooth as wet silk, lost their curl. Within a few days of birth the Golden Fleece became nothing but coarse wool.

  Cooper tried to push the stench of old death out of his mind. His thoughts drifted for a quick moment to his fiancée, Jill, back in Richmond. He couldn’t help but chuckle. As much of a meat eater as she was, had Jill seen this Russian wearing the fleece of a half dozen day-old lambs, she would have clawed his eyes out.

  Rattling in from the darkness, the rusted green hulk of a UAZ flatbed truck squeaked to a stop beside Mikhail Polzin. A plume of fine dust blossomed around the truck as the driver’s door creaked open. A stooped and bony man who looked to be in his sixties — which in the hardscrabble life of this part of the world could mean late forties — climbed from the rounded, egg-like cab. He approached the Russian agent, right hand over his heart in traditional Muslim greeting.

  A big-busted woman with a body shaped like a fuel drum sauntered around from the passenger side, rocking back and forth in a waddling walk as if she had a bad hip. The grimy belly and frayed knees of her smock and trousers suggested she was used to a life lived close to the dirt. A black headscarf pulled her jowly face into a permanent scowl. She took no time with the niceties of introduction and began to wave gnarled fingers at two boxes in the bed of their truck. One was the size of a military footlocker, the other, made of the same olive drab material, the size of a large suitcase. She ranted in a shrill mix of Uzbek and Russian, her words pulled tight as an overly wound clock. A gust of wind ripped away the bulk of her animated lecture, but the part Cooper heard caused him to lean forward, straining to hear more.

  Their small peasant farm had been cursed with sick livestock and bad water. She spit disdainfully on the ground and threw her hands into the air, clutching at her headscarf with both hands for effect. Rheumy eyes glowed through the green pixilated image of the night-vision scope.

  Cooper understood some of the words all too well. Gritting his teeth, he rolled slightly to remove the pistol from his waistband and place it on the table within quick reach. He slid the satellite phone from the cargo pocket of his pants. His position was several feet back from the window, making it impossible to get a signal, but he punched in a number anyway, entering a coded text before pressing send. The phone was programmed to continue its search and send the message in an instantaneous burst as soon as it located a satellite, even if it was turned off and on again.

  Outside, the Russian took an envelope from the breast pocket of his wool coat and handed it to the old man. The Uzbek passed it to his wife, who promptly opened it and began to count the thick stack of what looked like American bills.

  Polzin followed the old man to the bed of the truck, took something from his pocket, and played it back and forth across the boxes, nodding.

  “Many thanks, my friend,” Cooper heard the Russian say. “There will be another payment, double the one in your wife’s hands, as soon as I get these items back in safekeeping.”

  “What good is money if our sheep are dead?” The old woman took the time to stuff the envelope inside her smock before throwing up her hands again. “Take our truck, we will walk ba—”

  The desert sud
denly erupted with a swarm of blinding lights as four all-terrain vehicles roared in to surround Polzin and the Uzbeks. Clouds of dust cast crossed shadows from the headlights as they all came skidding to a stop. A tall, slender man in a puffy, lime-green ski parka and designer blue jeans dismounted his four-wheeler with a theatrical flourish. Even in the darkness, Cooper could make out the black line of a thin mustache. Striding purposefully to the ranting Uzbek woman, the newcomer raised a pistol and shot her in the face.

  The man spun, giving an exaggerated shrug. “What? Isn’t anyone going to thank me for shutting her up?” He spoke in accented Russian, slurring heavily as if he had marbles in his mouth. “I should think you of all people would be grateful,” he said, addressing the old man. “No? Well, you may as well join her then.” He pressed the muzzle of his pistol to the trembling Uzbek’s chest and pulled the trigger. He stepped back to let the old man sag, then pitch headlong into the dust beside his dead wife.

  A short female in a matching lime parka and dark green tam dismounted her own all-terrain vehicle.

  She shook her head. “Aren’t we in a mood tonight.” She laughed, indifferent to the cold-blooded murders. The tam slouched forward over her eyes and kept Cooper from getting a good look at her face. Skintight black pants hugged broad hips. White running shoes seemed to glow in the headlights. “This bores me. I go for a walk.” A moment later she had disappeared behind the dead Uzbeks’ truck.

  A third man, dark, more slightly built and jumpy, took the shooting as an indication he should get off his ATV to climb onto the bed of the truck. His face glistened with perspiration even in the cold night air. It was difficult to tell in the darkness, but he wore heavy gloves and he looked to have some sort of protective vest under his open coat.

  He spoke English, but from his accent, Cooper guessed him to be Pakistani. “Ahhh!” he said after examining the contents of both boxes with gloved hands. “Just as you suspected.”

  “You are certain?” The man with the thin mustache giggled, wide-eyed.

  “Quite,” the Pakistani answered. “No doubt.”

  “Oh, this is most excellent news!” The man in the lime-green ski parka clapped his hands, one still holding the pistol. His eyes fell on the Russian. “How rude of me,” he said. “I am Valentine Zamora.”

  He pronounced it Valenteen.

  The fourth rider, a thick-necked brute with a dark tangle of curly hair and a broad nose squashed above his bearded face, took up a position to Zamora’s left, two paces behind him. He was obviously the muscle.

  “Polzin,” the Russian said. He’d raised both hands to shoulder level without being asked.

  Good, Cooper thought. Do this on your terms, Misha. This is big… Keep ahead of the curve.

  “Mikhail Ivanovich.” The fingers of Polzin’s left hand fiddled with something as if he was nervous. The ring, Cooper thought. It was the first thing he’d noticed about the Russian agent when they’d met, a gold two-headed eagle ring that symbolized Mother Russia. It was an odd thing for a spy to be so brazen about his affiliations.

  “Oh,” Zamora said, almost yelping as he rubbed his hairless chin. He bounced on his feet as he spoke, brimming with energy. “I am well aware of who you are. People in my line of work tell frightful stories of people in your line of work. The secret group deep inside the Federal Security Service… ”

  “So…” The Russian hunched his shoulders slightly as if stricken with a chill. “What is next?”

  Zamora gave him a slow up and down, appraising, saying nothing. He suddenly spun on his heels, moving with an agitated flourish very close to dancing. He swung his arms back and forth for a time, as if walking in place, before beginning to speak. Facing away, much of what he said was impossible for Cooper to hear.

  “… must be smart… Vympel unit… selective. I assume… also a scientist?”

  Polzin shrugged, his hands dropping little by little as he spoke, fingers still toying with the ring. “I am no scientist, merely a civil servant. She is very old, you know, well past her useful life span. And there are the codes to consider. My own government does not even know what they are. You may as well let me take her home.” He nodded toward the boxes in the back of the truck.

  “Take it home?” Zamora spun. His bouncing grew more pronounced. “Oh, no, no, Mikhail Ivanovich, that is not necessary. I myself will provide her a fantastic home. She may very well be old, but Dr. Sarpara is extremely talented. He assures me he will be able to make her viable as ever. You know, there are those who would have me use such a thing against your country.” He leaned in as if with a secret. “But you should know I have other plans that involve something more… red, white, and blu—”

  The Russian’s hand flashed to his coat pocket. He rolled, snatching up a hidden pistol to fire through the cloth. At least one of his rounds hit the Pakistani man on the truck.

  Cooper reached for his own pistol, cursing the darkness. The night-vision monocular was useless for aiming and the headlights didn’t offer enough light to engage two armed opponents at that range.

  Polzin got three shots off before Zamora and his thug mowed him down.

  It was over in the span of a breath.

  The Pakistani doctor clutched at his neck. He teetered for a moment on the back of the truck before falling headlong, arm draped over the wooden rail.

  Zamora spun, running to the wounded Pakistani. Checking the man’s wrist for a pulse, he turned again, one hand clasped over his mouth, the other brandishing the pistol. He launched into a string of Spanish curses, pacing back and forth in the eerie pool of red light cast by the UAZ’s dusty tail lamps.

  “Monagas.” He turned, nodding to his thick-necked companion. “Comrade Polzin has caused me a great anxiety.”

  Unleashed, the man called Monagas smiled a crooked smile, then strode to a writhing Polzin and put two bullets through the back of his head.

  Cooper’s mind raced in the relative safety of his hiding place. He concentrated to slow his breathing. Knuckles white around the butt of his own pistol, he flinched at each shot the man put into his friend.

  Zamora’s hand still hung over his mouth, as if keeping it there helped him think. His gun hand hung loosely at his side.

  “Perhaps one of your contacts in Iran,” Monagas offered.

  “No.” Zamora waved him away. “The Americans hover over them like hawks. I have to think… ” He leaned over, hands on both knees. For a moment, it looked as if he was going to be sick; then just as quickly he bolted upright. “There is someone, but…” He tapped his forehead with the slide of his pistol as he paced back and forth, stopping every so often to kick the dead Russian and curse him in breathless Spanish. Dust from his feet puffed up in the headlights.

  At length he stopped, staring into the blackness of the Uzbek desert.

  “I need to think,” he said, muttering something Cooper couldn’t make out as he walked through the curtain of darkness.

  His boss gone, Monagas stooped in the dust to lift the dead Russian’s hand. The eagle ring, Cooper thought. This pig-eyed son of a bitch took trophies.

  Cooper lowered his handgun and grabbed the satellite phone. Intelligence was about information, not revenge. If the back of the Russian truck held what he thought it did, Cooper knew he’d eventually have to make a stand to keep this insane SOB outside from ending up with it. Until then, he had to make certain the information got back to higher — at all cost. Caught up in the drama unfolding outside his window, he’d neglected to send more texts as information became available. Such a rookie mistake.

  Thumb-typing with both hands as fast as he could, he didn’t hear the hissing scrape of shoes on concrete until it was too late.

  He froze, straining his ears in the darkness. The sound was behind him — and close.

  Too close.

  Cooper’s hand shot toward the pistol before he even understood the context of the sound. At the same instant a peculiar whoosh, like fluttering wings, came from above. Something heavy s
truck the side of his neck, the force of it rolling it half up on his side. A wave of nauseating pain sank down his spine. His right arm fell, slamming against the table, limp and useless. His fingers were still inches from the pistol. He gagged as some unknown force yanked his head back and forth like a frenzied dog. Unable to move on his own, the cold realization that he was paralyzed washed over Riley Cooper.

  A flaccid cheek pressing helplessly against the table, he could see the heavy hips of a female figure wearing tight spandex pants. The woman. He should never have let himself lose track of her. She clicked on a flashlight and tapped the toe of a white running shoe on the concrete as if annoyed that he was taking so long to die.

  Cooper found it impossible to breathe. Straining his eyes, he found the problem. An S-shaped carcass hook stuck from his neck, just below the jaw. It was a miracle that he was still conscious.

  A small hand with manicured black nails grabbed the rusted hook and gave it an impatient twist. Metal scraped bone and Cooper groaned reflexively, choking on his own blood. His eyes fluttered as he watched the woman stuff the satellite phone in the pocket of her jacket.

  That’s right, he thought. Take the phone outside with you…

  He wracked his foggy brain, trying to remember how much of the text he’d completed. He’d hit send the moment he’d heard the noise, just before the woman hit him. He hoped it was enough.

  The beam of a second flashlight played across the stone floor. A set of black boots clicked into view.

  “I have it, my darling,” Valentine Zamora said, broken, distant in Cooper’s ears, as if coming through a long pipe. “Can you believe it? It is actually mine.”

  “It means you are rich?” The woman’s voice was whiskeyed and raw, as if she’d been screaming for three hours at a rock concert.