Ghost Sniper

85

Vaught waited for his moment and then fired a 40 mm high-explosive grenade into the doorway at the bottom of the stairs. He charged down and machine-gunned the survivors, stomping a crawling man’s neck on the way out the door.

“Jackasses,” he sneered contemptuously.

Stepping into the street, Vaught could hear the fighting on the east side of town reaching a gut-wrenching crescendo — sustained bursts of automatic fire and multiple explosions — and he was hit with the dreadful realization that Diego and his men were being slaughtered.

Down the block, he heard Crosswhite and Hancock harangue each other a last time. Vaught immediately zeroed the sniper’s position and dashed across. “Got you now, motherfucker!”

Hancock had been hit straight across the back by one of Vaught’s NATO rounds. Both shoulder blades were grazed, and his infraspinatus muscles spasmed painfully every time he attempted to lift and aim the rifle. His fingers were tingling, and he was going into shock.

“Time to go,” he groaned, dragging himself and the Barrett into the stairwell. Hancock trotted down to the ground floor, ducking into the street, where the narcos were gunning it out at almost point-blank range with the policemen in the shoe store.

He knew from the ferocity of fighting on the east side that the city was about to fall. “My work here is done!” He ran off up the sidewalk through the dark until he made it to the corner where his bodyguards stood waiting impatiently beside the midnight-blue Dodge Charger.

“Let’s get the hell out of here. I need a medic.”

The other two men gladly loaded up, and the car sped off.

Crosswhite very nearly shot Vaught when he appeared on the rooftop across the street. But Vaught gave him a wave and fired an HE grenade into the narcos below, killing four men and opening up and full automatic.

With apparently no sniper to worry about, Crosswhite stood up and opened fire as well.

The narcos were now caught in a murderous cross fire with nowhere to run. Within ten seconds, fifteen men lay dead in the street.

“Is the son of a bitch dead?” Crosswhite shouted over.

Vaught took a small flashlight from his harness, flashing it around. “I don’t see him!”

“He’s gotta be there! Look for a blood trail — he’s hit!”

Vaught found the trail of blood and followed it down to ground level, where Crosswhite and five other police officers met him in the middle of the street, all of them looking at one another in dismay.

“He can’t have disappeared!” Crosswhite said. “He’s hit — I hit him!” He turned toward the bodies. “Check these assholes!”

Everyone took out a flashlight and checked the corpses for the face of a gringo, but Hancock was not among the dead.

“Goddamnit!” Vaught shouted. “How did you lose him?”

“What the fuck are you talkin’ about?” Crosswhite retorted. “He was on your side of the fucking street!”

“Fuck!” Vaught kicked a body. “We had him, Dan! We fucking had him!”

The fighting on the east side suddenly fell off to nothing, and everyone knew the city had fallen.

“Well, shit!” Crosswhite said in disgust. “There’s no time to worry about it now. We gotta get the wounded outta here. We’ll escape across the west side.”

A pair of trucks came roaring around the corner, and everyone brought their weapons to bear.

“Hold fire!” Vaught shouted, seeing that the trucks were loaded with federal troops.

Chief Diego jumped down from the running board of the lead truck, his left arm in a sling and blood dripping from his fingers. “Thank God some of you are still alive!”

Lieutenant R. Felix got out on the driver’s side, his troops already dismounting to form a defensive perimeter around the shoe store, spreading out up the street. The officers led the medics inside, shining their lights on the wounded men who were covered with the dust and debris of battle.

Vaught recognized Lieutenant Felix from the morning after the quake. “We didn’t lose the city?”

Felix shook his head. “Toluca still belongs to the people. Where is Sergeant Cuevas?”

“He’s over there.” Vaught gestured at the body. “The sniper got him. I’m sorry. He was a damn good man.”

“Yes, he was,” Felix said, going to the body and making the sign of the cross upon seeing the face of his dead friend.

Crosswhite led Diego into the shoe store so that he could see his wounded men. “How many did we lose?”

“Half, I think,” Diego said, kneeling down to take the hand of a young officer who was obviously dying. “Yes, I think half.”

“Who sent the army?”

Diego had already begun to say the last rights over the young officer. When he finished, he kissed the man’s forehead and rose to his feet, thumbing the tears from his eyes. “I’m sorry. What did you ask me?”

Confused, Crosswhite looked down at the dead young man and then back at Diego. “You’re a priest?”

“No. I am not ordained, but I hope that God will accept this man into his Holy Kingdom long enough for me to become so.”

“I don’t understand. We just won! You’re going back to the seminary?”

“I promised God that if he saved the city, I would return to the priesthood. He sent the soldiers, and the city was saved. I will keep my promise.”

Crosswhite opened his mouth, but seeing the look in Diego’s eyes, he knew there would be no point in trying to dissuade him. “Well… well, good job, then!” He bumped Diego briskly on the shoulder with a bloody hand. “You’re a brave man, Diego. You kept your men together, and you saved the city. Juan would be proud of you.”

“The Holy Father saved the city, and my brother sits at his right hand. Thank you for shedding your blood with us. I am forever in your debt.” Diego shook Crosswhite’s hand, turning for the door and stepping out just as Vaught was striding in.

“Who sent the army?” Crosswhite asked him quietly.

Vaught glanced outside. “That lieutenant out there, Felix, he was good friends with Cuevas. Cuevas got through to him just before the attack, and Felix talked a battalion of men into acting without orders. The federal government doesn’t even know they’re here yet.”

“Well, you can bet your ass they’ll be taking credit for the victory by sunrise. Come on, let’s get these men loaded up. I wanna get home to my wife.”

“Hey, ya know,” Vaught said, following his lead, “I’ve been meaning to ask you something.”

“What?” Crosswhite positioned himself to lift one of the wounded men by the shoulders.

Vaught took the man’s ankles. “Does Paolina have a sister?”

“Yeah, she does,” Crosswhite said, grunting as they lifted the man from the floor. “She’s about four years old. Want her number?”

Vaught laughed, backing out the door. “You’re such an asshole.”

“Pull over,” Hancock said, seeing an army truck flash through an intersection up ahead. “Stop the car!”

The driver stopped in the center of the road. “What’s wrong? We have to go. The army is here!”

“I can see that. Put the car in park.”

The driver shifted into park. “What are we doing, cabrón? We don’t have time for this!”

“That’s no shit.” Hancock raised his .357 Sig and shot him through the face. Then he quickly shot the passenger in the back of the head, blowing out his teeth.

He took off his US Army dog tags and slipped them around the passenger’s neck before getting out of the car and jamming the Barrett into the front seat butt-first, leaving the barrel sticking out the window. Stripping his battle gear and extra magazines, Hancock dumped it all in the passenger’s lap and pulled the pin from a grenade, tossing it into the backseat and ducking away down an alley. The grenade exploded, engulfing the car quickly in flames.