Overfall

Thirty-two

From the airport on Taveuni Island the road continued a mile or so in both directions before it turned to dirt. It was the one well-traveled road on the island, and European and American luxury homes as well as several small resorts lined the paved section.

Anna, T.J., and Sam were staying at the Coconut Palms, Sam and Anna posing as husband and wife. The grounds featured short-clipped grass flower beds, and burres spread amongst palms, breadfruit, kava, imported banyon, and tropical ornamentals. It was three o’clock in the afternoon. A pleasant scent hung in the warm humid air. The people seemed to nap on their feet, and even the bugs appeared tranquilized.

“There’s only one bed,” Anna said when they walked into the air-conditioned room. “Are we both going to sleep in it?”

“There’s a roll-away,” Sam said.

“Even if there weren’t and I were a vestal virgin, I would sleep like a baby.” She was checking out the closet.

“Because?”

“You haven’t figured any way to touch me with anything but your brain.”

Sam took her arm and turned her around. She came close to him, letting him smell her hair.

“Sam the frustrated man,” she said. “You needn’t worry. You have both your clearly delineated principles and your roll-away bed.”

She gave him a little mocking smile, but stopped short of closing the last two inches between them.

Flower scent came through the louvered windows and became part of the seduction.

“God, I want you,” he said.

“Tell me, which version of me is it that you want to sleep with?” She turned as if distracted by her suitcase and the shirts she was pulling from it.

Sam pulled out the roll-away and lay on it with an audible sigh, the moment lost, for now. Before he realized he had fallen asleep, he woke to Anna Wade in a blue sulu, the native wraparound skirt. Atop she wore a smart white blouse of raw silk. She was handing him another blue sulu.

“Put this on. Men wear these around here.”

Sam considered it, but found still too much of his dad left in him to seriously consider a garment that was in fact a skirt.

“You go topless and I’ll wear that.”

“Okay.” She began unbuttoning the blouse. “You’ve been wanting a look for days.”

“Wait. You don’t have to prove-”

“You wanna see my chest? Let’s just get it over with.”

“I was kidding, okay? I won’t mention it anymore.”

“Promise? Now put this on. I bought it for you when you were sleeping.”

“Crapola.”

“Don’t crapola me. Put it on.”

Aussie met them for dinner. He apparently felt it incumbent to give them the pan-Australian grin and wolf whistle. Anna smiled at Sam in his skirt.

“What?”

“You’re pouting. You’re actually pouting.”

“I don’t usually cross-dress.”

They ate dinner on an outdoor veranda, and the food was exquisite. Anna and Sam asked Aussie about his life, learned that he lived on Vanua Levu, just down from Suva Suva, in a house on a little acreage overlooking the ocean and Bakabaka Island. He was planning to use the money he made from this job to build a large, covered porch.

Finally Aussie pushed away his plate. “Look, I know you both need to talk some business, so how about I retire to the burre?”

Sam nodded, slightly relieved. In view of the impending drama, a threesome wouldn’t allow him to relate to Anna and her prejob jitters.

“If you’ll excuse me a moment.” Aussie smiled at Anna and pulled Sam aside.

“You know we could really use her in this. As one element of a distraction she’d be terrific. She’s an actor, mate. Dress her up in some skimpy doodad? Get my meaning?”

“I don’t know,” Sam said.

“You’re sweet on her, I know.”

The woman sizzles. I’m not the only man to notice.”

“Well, why don’t we ask her if she wants to help? It is her brother.”

Sam paused. Without good reason he did not let anyone, any time, change a plan just prior to execution. On the other hand it would keep Anna with them, save some resources, and reduce the amount of chance in the equation.

“All right. Part of the diversion before the show starts?”

“Exactly, mate.”

“I can guess what you have in mind,” Sam said.

They returned to the table.

“I know you’re gonna hate this but we have a job for you,” Sam said.

“You do?” She appeared almost girlish in her enthusiasm. “What?” Now slightly more cautious.

“You could help with the scam if you want to. Aussie here has it worked out.”

Aussie nodded, at a rare loss for words.

“You know I’ll do it,” Anna said.

“Right,” Aussie said. “Now the locals have told me all about the resort. The island chief is big time on our payroll. He doesn’t know what we are going to do. He doesn’t want to know. But of course I had to swear that we wouldn’t hurt anybody.” Aussie looked at Anna. “Everything in Fiji is ultimately up to the chiefs.”

She nodded her understanding.

“Fortunately the chiefs like American dollars, so we white folk are pretty well received. The locals think a famous writer with a huge satellite dish just moved into this resort with a staff and armed guards. The rumor is that he wrote about certain terrorists and had to go into hiding. Locals do the cooking and maintain the grounds; word is they like the bloke but think he’s crazy.”

“That would be Jason,” Anna said.

“We’ll have to execute this flawlessly. There are two Dobermans on the grounds and at least five guards.”

“What do you mean at least?” Sam interjected.

“Recently there’s been more activity. The chief wasn’t sure, just seemed like more people, he said. But the guards aren’t visibly armed. I’m assuming they’ve got guns aplenty but they’re keeping them hidden so as not to disturb the locals. That’s a big advantage for us. Locals think they’re French.”

“So maybe Chellis for some reason had one contingent of his organization snatch Jason from another. Doesn’t quite make sense.” Sam pulled a map from a slim leather briefcase and went over the plan in detail. They had a scale drawing of the resort. After he was finished he had Anna repeat the plan.

“Now when I’m here at the gate, supposedly fallen drunk on my ass, you are holding me up and wanting to use a phone to call our resort,” Aussie said. “Sam lets you in.”

“Do I make noise before you let me in?” Anna asked.

“No,” Sam said.

“Okay, then I come just a few feet inside and carry on with Aussie here,” Anna said.

“That’s right, and when you hear the first pop, or see people running, or any kind of commotion starts, you and Aussie put on night vision, run down the road, and around to the beach just like we discussed. You better not be in that yard longer than two minutes, max.”

“And you’re sure they won’t just shoot us.”

“You in a bikini top? Not a chance.”

“We could start making out. You could maybe flash them a little,” Aussie chimed in.

She eyed Sam. “Did you put him up to this?”

Sam chuckled. “Two people gonna screw on the lawn. It would be distracting. And after all, this is a distraction.”

“You’re smoking something besides tobacco.”

Sam took her arm. “I think we’re ready to go. No flashing.”

Aussie smiled at Anna. “Peace?” he said with a cheeky grin.

She winked at him and left with Sam for their room. Sam knew something about the suggestion had bothered her. Or perhaps something about the way he handled it. And he thought that odd, because she was certainly not a prude.

“Look, I’m sorry I didn’t immediately come to your rescue.”

“You think I can’t take care of myself?”

Sam smiled and shook his head.

“Well, being chivalrous with one’s friends isn’t all that out of vogue.”

“Aussie was joking.”

“No, he wasn’t.”

“I got it. You want me to be possessive.”

That’s not so strange, is it?”

“You’re interested in me because you can’t have me.”

Silence.

“You don’t know what you feel or what to call it,” he said.

They brushed their teeth side by side.

“I haaaa newer hearrr”-she spat-“anything so ridiculous. I want what stirs my soul. And you, Sam or Robert or whatever, stir my soul.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Say something.”

“Look, you’re right. I know what you meant about possessive.”

“Now you’re patronizing me.”

“I’m trying to agree with you so we can get a little sleep.”

He adjourned to the bedroom to go over his notes. She put on light linen pajamas and emerged from the bathroom. Sam turned out the lights and they retired to their respective beds.

Sam lay in the dark, thinking, wondering if she had gone immediately to sleep.

“You could get in bed with me if you didn’t make a big deal about it.”

“Is that realistic?”

“That’s up to you.”

Sam thought for a while. “It’s always scary before a job. Especially if you’ve never done it before.” He rose and went over to her bed. He climbed in behind her and hugged her back.

She put her hand over his.

“Thanks,” she said.

Minutes later Sam heard the deep breaths begin. He crept back to the roll-away and managed to fall asleep.

They came down the beach at 1:30 A.M., running the fiberglass-bottomed inflatable at eight knots. It was nineteen feet, eleven inches long, and was powered by a pair of 250-horsepower Mercury outboards. In order to accommodate the horsepower, the transom had been beefed up and ballast added to the center of the boat. It had been a rich man’s plaything and at full throttle moved along at fifty-five to sixty miles an hour. Sam, T.J., and all eight men were on board.

They cruised slowly just outside a shallow coral reef, using a depth sounder and GPS to remain at least three hundred feet from the beach. Without night-vision goggles the massive broad-leafed trees lining the shore were shadowy billows in the dark. They were called vutu. like supplicants to the sun, they grew out over the water, then bowed up as they reached for the sky.

They were in Somosomo Strait, the place of the sharks. According to Aussie, each chief of Taveuni had to swim out into the strait in full ceremonial regalia, and if the sharks spared him it was a signal from the gods that he should be installed as chief. Apparently there were plenty of sharks in the strait, but as Aussie told it, he had speared fish there without incident, making him think the chiefs’ odds were pretty good.

The air hung heavy with moisture and was deathly still. Tropical heat lay across their shoulders like wool; the only sound was their boat churning a sudsy wake. As they drew near the landing site, Sam had them slow to a few knots until the sea stopped tracing their passage.

At four hundred yards from the compound they turned in to make a landing. As they approached the shore, all of the men shifted to the back of the boat, raising the bow high. The beach was a mix of rock, dead coral pieces, and silt, but they managed to put the V of the boat’s prow on a spot of the sand. Jumping ashore, they broke into two groups; the first group, with T.J. in the lead, moved off quickly down the beach and spread out.

The group led by Sam secured the boat. The boat’s pilot, the only one remaining aboard, backed the boat into deeper water with a pole and dropped an anchor off the stern.

The men wore camouflage from head to toe and camo paint on their skin, plus a helmet with night-vision goggles. Each carried an M4 carbine with attached grenade launcher and a Beretta M9 pistol. The M4s were fitted with massive sound suppressors; the grenades were only stun grenades, and all the rounds were rubber. Everyone had microphones and earpieces wired into their helmets, adjusted so that they worked well with whispers.

Sam’s group moved onto a trail just above the beach that followed the contours of the steep hillside. The compound sat on a high bluff perhaps 150 feet above the water on a natural bench. There were eight burres plus a two-story house and the main lodge facility. A well-maintained asphalted path ran up from the beach on the right side of the compound, snaked up the hill in switchbacks, and exited beside a large pool.

Directly to the front of the compound was a sheer, soil-covered, near-vertical embankment that could not safely be climbed in the night without ropes. To the left side of the compound, where a wealthy American had a large home, ran a less-maintained dirt trail partially overgrown with palms, breadfruit, taro plants, and creeping vines with huge leaves that lay like a carpet.

T.J.’s group came up on the left, Sam’s on the right. Halfway up the hill Sam whispered to T.J.

“In place at station one. Sanford’s up.”

“Roger that,” T.J. said.

T.J.’s group would now be pausing halfway up the hill, waiting for Sam’s forward man to locate and dispatch two Dobermans with two dart guns. The dogs were vicious, not big barkers, well trained, and would attack unknown intruders in the night. Or at least Aussie had assumed they would. Certainly they charged the fence well enough.

Sam crept up the hill after Sanford, hoping the dogs would attack without a lot of racket. At the head of the trail a locked gate stood in the six-foot fence.

Sanford used heavy sheers to clip most of the links in a two-foot-square section of the fence. He bent back a corner, creating a hole large enough to comfortably aim the dart gun. After three minutes they’d still seen no sign of the dogs.

Sanford rattled the fence. Still nothing. Sam exhaled impatiently. The first little problem. The gardens were lush enough inside the compound that his men could hide, especially by night, but not if they were going to be jumped by Dobermans.

A single long wispy cloud had draped itself across the sliver of a moon, making fewer shadows. There were no lights illuminating the gardens save two lights a hundred feet distant and mostly obscured on the main veranda dining area. Sanford rattled the fence again. Still nothing. Sam knew the others would be nervous about this development. It was imperative that the compound be alerted only when the team was ready and only by the distraction that Sam had planned.

It was impossible to know where Jason would be staying. According to Aussie, they moved him from one burre to another as a precaution. Most of the time he was kept in what had been the Honeymoon Burre near the cliff edge.

The plan was to create a distraction that would draw the guards out of the burres. Given Jason’s propensity for working without regard to his environment, especially into the wee hours, he would likely be housed in whichever burre did not immediately have its front door flung open. In order to watch every burre, the men would need to be widely dispersed. They would then have to move quickly and coordinate without a hitch. Otherwise someone might die.

It had been nearly five minutes of quiet fence rattling and no dogs. They took out the chunk of fence.

Sam sneaked up the hill and motioned Sanford forward.

“No joy yet. T.J., move to the perimeter,” Sam whispered.

Then they were through the fence and Sam’s blood started pumping. With his goggles he would see infrared beams, but not necessarily trip wires or motion sensors or night-vision-equipped cameras. Aussie believed there were none, and that would have to be good enough.

They stayed along the edge of the lawn, following the garden beds. The fear was that someone would throw a switch, blind them with light, and shoot them before they could react.

Sam’s heart pounded a few beats faster. He reminded himself that success came to the player who got more deliberate and more determined with each bit of added stress.

Fifty feet inside they stopped, and just in time. Two black shadows streaked across the lawn, no fence to slow them. Sanford took careful aim. Sam doubted he could hit both animals. There was a pop and the lead dog tumbled and began whirling and nipping at its chest. The dart itself was heavy enough to pack a wallop. The second dog came on and just before he leaped for Sam, a second pop came from the pistol.

When Sam saw the animal’s jaws open, he dropped and kicked the dog in the throat. There was a yelp and the dog went over him, but came back like a demon. Sam charged the dog with total concentration, leading with a combat knife. As he plunged the knife in to the hilt, frothy lung blood burst from the wound all over Sam’s arm. As the animal went down, Sam strangled the remaining life.

“Shit,” Sanford muttered when it was over. “I missed.”

“Yeah.” Sam hated killing dogs but would not let himself think of it again until this was over.

“We have joy,” Sam whispered into the microphone. For a few minutes they lay absolutely still, waiting to see if there would be any response. They couldn’t afford an ambush. Sam already knew the dogs had a habit of charging the fences, so it wouldn’t necessarily bring the sentries.

Everything remained quiet. They moved forward another hundred feet until they were near the main building.

There were two guards sitting on the dining veranda at the lodge, drinking something he hoped was alcoholic.

Sam and T.J. sneaked to the right of the veranda and headed toward the far right side of the lodge and the planted gardens. Once in good cover, they came back toward the sentries to a narrow pathway between a burre and the edge of the veranda. One man was large, almost fat, the other slender, not more than 160 pounds. Only one weapon in sight-leaning up against a nearby table. Their security procedure evidenced an ease and lack of concern that Sam found hopeful.

They were in some kind of conversation, speaking French, fairly animated. Sam spoke some French, but it was hard to hear them and they were talking rapidly.

One of them seemed to pick his nose incessantly. The other scratched and picked at a bald spot on his head. Sam and T.J. quickly devised a plan.

Sam removed his boots and socks. T.J. went into a planting bed next to the building and made sounds of rustling, gradually escalating in intensity. Finally one of the guards rose and walked to the end of the veranda-fortunately without the firearm.

“Okay,” Sam whispered.

The guard continued walking down the three steps off the veranda.

“Shoo am yaamil hal kalb halloa?” he called. Clearly Arabic. An unwelcome surprise.

“C’est seulement quelque genre de fidjien gaufre — probablement.”

French from the other man. Sam guessed they were speculating that the dog was chasing some kind of Fijian gopher. The fatter guard rose to watch the first.

Sam rose and sprinted alongside the lodge around to the front, and then looked back through the double-wide entry doors and beyond through a bar and sitting area and saw the large guard some hundred feet distant, still on the veranda and seemingly absorbed in his partner’s explorations. Sam drew the silenced pistol and trotted on tiptoe straight at the guard with his gun leveled at the man. As the first sentry reached the edge of the thick foliage, he leaned forward and peered through the bamboo. More rustling. The man began making a guttural sort of “shooing” sound, and then quite suddenly disappeared in the foliage.

T.J. was taking him down. Sam took two more long steps and delivered a powerful blow to the base of the other man’s skull.

“Okay,” T.J. said.

“Okay,” Sam responded, dragging the heavy man to the garden to join the first. Taking no chances, they administered hypodermics to the carotids of both men that would have them unconscious for enough time to finish their business. Sam and T.J. retreated to the initial staging point just beyond the fence.

“Team one,” Sam said. His team crept forward one at a time. As each came, Sam tapped his shoulder and sent him to his predetermined ambush point. Coming from the sea and heading inland past the lodge, four of the eight burres lay in a row along a large entry garden that was a good part lawn. At the inland edge of the entry garden was the driveway, and beyond that the public roadway. Also to the landward side of the lodge and on the left of the entry garden stood one burre and a two-story house.

Aussie had been pretty sure that management lived in the house and each of the five guards had a burre. Sam put two men to the side of the Honeymoon Burre. Six men in the garden covered the doorways of the five burres and the main house, their weapons ready. Sam did a roll call. Each man had a number corresponding to the number of a burre doorway on the map they’d studied.

Sam thought it was time for a stroke of luck. He and T.J. crept up on the Honeymoon Burre, hoping to find Jason working inside. All the windows were in the front for the ocean view as was the veranda that might have a sentry, but there was thick foliage to the side that prevented easy viewing. Aussie was not absolutely certain about the size of the staff. If they made a mistake and an alarm were sounded, every guard exiting a burre around the main garden, or for that matter the main house, would take a rubber bullet to the chest from a silenced rifle. Normally it wouldn’t kill, but it would temporarily debilitate.

They crept through the foliage. Sam had not replaced his shoes. T.J. refused combat boots and wore light sneakers. Sam was a couple of steps ahead of T.J. and to the right of him. Through a break in the foliage Sam saw the porch. Nobody. No light. He moved forward while T.J. remained still. The cabin was completely dark. Opening the door could easily set off an alarm.

Sam retreated.

Now they would have to do it the hard way.

Aussie and Anna climbed into the jeep at 1:00 A.M. Unable to think apart from nervous worry, she had paced incessantly and driven Aussie mad until he finally distracted her by insisting that they go over the plan one more time.

“I scream that you’re acting like a whore. ‘Why didn’t you just have sex with him right on the table?’ ”

“And I say, ‘Your ass is sagging and your dick is a marshmallow.’ ”

“That’s not what you say.”

“I know. I’m an actress, remember? I do this for a living. So stop trying to distract me and let me sit here and worry.”

Aussie let it lie.