The Khmer Kill: A Dox Short Story (Kindle Single)

rather from behind, a direction that wouldn’t be expected. Maybe he was being paranoid, but the fact that Gant had tried to bullshit him had him spooked. He stood and circled back toward the bike, slowly, toe-heel, sighting through the night scope as he moved, scanning left and right.
    He came around one of the dirt mounds twenty yards from the bike. There were three young Khmer guys skulking in the shadows under the tree, all in dark pants and dark tee shirts.
    Each of them held a blade.
    His heart rate kicked up a notch and he felt a welcome surge of adrenalin spread out from his trunk to his limbs. He breathed in and out, slowly and silently, watching them through the scope. No sign they’d detected him. He checked his flanks and his back. No other problems. He looked back at the Khmers. Had he been followed here? He’d been damned careful on the way. He glanced at the rifle. Gant. He must have put some kind of tracking device in it. The adjustable butt stock. Of course. And here he’d thought the man was just doing his job, providing him top equipment. He felt his face flush with anger.
    All right. One problem at a time. He moved in until he was only thirty feet away. “Hey,” he called out softly, watching them through the scope. “Did Gant not tell you I had night vision?”
    They all jumped at the sound of his voice and started glancing left and right, squinting into the darkness.
    “No,” Dox said. “It seems he was remiss.” He shot each of them in the forehead, the SR-25 kicking just slightly with each round, the crack of each shot no louder than the clack of a sewing machine. In the dark, they seemed unaware of what was happening, and it was all over in just a few seconds regardless.
    For two minutes, he listened and scanned. Nothing. All right, then.
    He returned to his position atop the dirt mound, adjusted to five hundred yards, and sighted in on the restaurant. Gant and the Khmer were still there. Dox was pleasantly surprised. If he’d been Gant, he would have gotten the hell out of Dodge the moment their conversation turned sour. The man just didn’t have any sense. Well, on the other hand and to be fair, he did expect Dox to be dead about now.
    Somebody should have told him that in these matters, it paid not to assume too much.
    He put the earpiece back in and called Gant. This time, when Gant took out the phone and glanced at the number, he paled. Instinctively, and uselessly, he scanned the far bank of the river again. Dox smiled.
    Gant got up and excused himself. He walked quickly to the front of the restaurant. He peered at the street, then back at his ringing phone, then back to the street.
    Finally, he raised the phone to his ear. “Yes,” he said.
    “Well, hello there, Mr. Gant. It’s been too long.”
    Gant swallowed. “Did you change your mind? There’s still time.”
    It was a hell of a bluff and Dox had to admire the man’s coolness. “As it happens, I have changed my mind, in a manner of speaking. You see, before I was prepared to just walk away. But I’m afraid we now find ourselves in a different set of circumstances.”
    “What the hell are you talking about?”
    “I’m talking about your three Khmer friends, who I’m sorry to report are no longer among what are commonly referred to as ‘the living.’ Also, you forget how well I can see you through this scope. When you saw my number on your caller ID, you looked like a man in sudden need of an adult diaper. Why would that be?”
    Gant glanced at the street again. Damn, but it was satisfying to see him finally losing his cool. A man just wouldn’t be human if he didn’t find at least some small pleasure in taking a fucked-up attitude and un-fucking it.
    “Hey,” Dox said, “like Clint Eastwood said in his fine film Dirty Harry, I can read your mind, punk. You’re wondering whether you should run for it. Well, there’s something I think you should know before you try.”
    Gant said nothing. That was all right. In the end, it was all about communication. Like his daddy liked to say, sometimes you just have to explain things to people in terms they understand.
    “Which is,” Dox continued, “you can’t move directly into a run from the way you’re standing. You have to tense first, plant one foot, load your body, and launch yourself. Some people’s movements are subtler than others, but the physics are always the same. And we former jarhead snipers are trained to see that sort of thing as it’s