Death Echo

Too much alcohol makes even the smartest of them a fool.
    Easy.
    Demidov had planned to question the target, but experience told him that even intense pain couldn’t cut through some alcohol stupors. He set the kerosene can aside, picked up Tommy’s gun, and frowned.
    A man would have to put this .22 caliber toy up a target’s ass to make any impression.
    Worse, my silencer won’t fit this barrel.
    Damp salt air magnified sound like a megaphone. Demidov wanted to be off the reservation and out of sight before any alarmwent out. He put the little pistol out of reach without bothering to wipe it. There was no chance of fingerprints; his thin, black driving gloves covered all manner of problems.
    Demidov reached into his long leather coat and pulled out one of his own guns, an SR-1 Vektor. Eighteen rounds, quite reliable as long as the safety was put out of commission with thin tape. With the correct ammunition, the Vektor was capable of penetrating body armor, cars, walls, and light armor plate.
    But tonight he was loaded for a much more fragile target. Swiftly, silently, Demidov walked forward. Habit, not necessity. The target’s snores were louder than the wind. With his gloved left hand, he reached between Tommy’s legs, found his testicles, and squeezed hard. Sometimes a sudden, brutal shock of pain could wake up even the most sodden drunk.
    Tommy made a sound rather like that of the back-door lock giving way, but his eyelids didn’t open.
    Demidov gave another crank, twisting as he squeezed.
    With another whine, Tommy tried to curl protectively around himself. His body didn’t respond. He was under too deep.
    His eyelids quivered and stayed closed.
    I don’t have time for this drunken shit-eater.
    With a word of disgust, Demidov released the other man’s slack flesh. He knew men who would have enjoyed trying to wake Tommy up, but Demidov wasn’t one of them. To him, torture was a means to an end, like kerosene or a silencer. A tool, not a pleasure.
    If he had been worried about misleading the authorities, he would have simply poured kerosene and let them decide if it was accident, suicide, or murder. But all he was concerned about was making sure the job got done. Once, such a weapon as his had been rare outside of Russia, too distinctive to use overseas. The modern weapons trade had changed that. Using a Vektor was no longer like leaving his name written on a corpse.
    Demidov took out his 9 mm pistol, pulled a sofa pillow over thetarget to limit the back splash of gore, and shot Tommy twice in the head.
    Moving quickly, Demidov poured kerosene on and around the body. He lit it with matches the dead man had dropped. When he was sure that the fire would take hold, he went out the same way he had come in, a dark dancer moving through the forest.

19
    DAY THREE
ROSARIO
2:37 A.M .
    T he sirens had already awakened Emma. She was just getting back to sleep when her cell phone vibrated and warbled on the motel’s end table. With an impatient movement she snagged the phone.
    â€œWhat,” she snarled.
    â€œI’m out front in your Jeep,” Mac said. “In three minutes I leave without you.”
    â€œI have the keys.”
    â€œI don’t need them.”
    The line went dead.
    Emma had slept fully clothed—shoes, socks, jeans, and a black pullover—too exhausted after her turn watching Blackbird to care about undressing. She grabbed her purse and a jacket and ran out.
    Twenty seconds after Mac had hung up on her, she was in the parking lot of the motel.
    Sure enough, he was sitting at the wheel of her Jeep. Wires dangled from the console. She got in the passenger seat, threw him the keys, and shut the door very quietly when she really wanted to slam it.
    â€œIs it Blackbird ?” she asked as he drove out of the parking lot without benefit of headlights.
    â€œNot directly.”
    He went down a side street, turned onto an eastbound feeder street, and flipped on the lights.
    â€œWhere’s your truck?” she asked.
    â€œCrapped out, waiting for a new water pump.”
    Silence.
    Emma turned toward him. “You have about ten seconds to tell me what the hell is going on. If I don’t like what I hear, I’m going to reach into my girly purse, pull out a Glock, and turn you into splatter patterns.”
    Mac gave her a sideways look and started talking. “I have a police scanner at my house. There was a fire on the rez.