Wrecking Crew

SEVENTEEN

When Norris Halpin arrived at the Wrecking Crew’s base, it was almost 11pm. He was the last to arrive. Given the nature of the service they provided, it was normal for The Fixer to summon the crew in the middle of the night. Norris suspected that they had been contracted to do some rush job, and he mentally prepared himself for another long night of searching his data banks for the required information. It was inconvenient and sometimes morally questionable work, but he had to admit that the money he received, was more than adequate compensation. Climbing out of his car, he noticed that all of the other team member’s cars were already there.

“Must be a big job,” he whispered under his breath.

As usual, Kitten was waiting outside the front door. Halpin walked over and stood obediently with his arms outstretched, while the huge Russian wrestler patted him down for concealed weapons. Although there was a decently stocked weapons locker in the basement, none of the staff was permitted to carry a gun, unless otherwise instructed, so pat-downs were commonplace.

“The Boss says to wait in the conference room,” Kitten said in his unusually girlish voice.

“What’s going on?” Halpin asked.

“Dunno — just do as he says.”

Inside the conference room, Halpin found Peter White, Becka, and Gordon McIntosh. They were in a conspiratorial huddle around the coffee machine. Halpin helped himself to a mug of coffee and a Danish pastry.

“What gives?” he asked directing his question to nobody in particular, “Some rush job again?”

“We don’t think so,” Peter White whispered.

Halpin raised a questioning eyebrow.

“We were at The Oracle in Reading earlier, chasing after this Eric Stone guy. Something went very wrong,” Peter White said gravely. “One of my guys is dead, two are in the hospital, and Helen is missing.”

“I heard a news report in the car,” Halpin whispered. “They said there’d been a shooting at some shopping center in Reading. They said a woman was dead.”

Becka put her hand to her mouth in shock.

“Stone must have killed her!”

Peter White gestured towards The Fixer’s office with his coffee mug.

“Bunny said The Boss captured some woman. She’s in the office now — I think its Linda Smart.”

Halpin grimaced.

“So why are we all here?”

“Becka thinks we are going to get paid off,” Gordon McIntosh said gruffly.

“What?”

Becka leaned in close and whispered.

“I saw some data flags yesterday,” she pointed a thumb towards The Fixer’s office, “he’s moving his money overseas. I think the Wrecking Crew’s closing.”

“For real?” Halpin asked, secretly delighted at the prospect of having his life back.

Becka nodded.

“Finished, over — kaput!”

“And there’s something else,” Gordon added, “he had me rig this place to burn, so we don’t leave any evidence.”

“Wow! So what’s going to happen now?” Halpin asked.

“I suspect it’ll be like last Christmas,” Peter White offered, “He’ll call us in and hand over an envelope, ‘Thank you for all your hard work… bla… bla,’ except this time we won’t be coming back in January.”

“Do you think we’ll get Helen’s share?”

“Fuck’s sake, Gordon!” Becka snapped.

“I was just thinking out loud.”

He shrugged ruefully.

“I bet you were thinking the same.”

Nobody tried to disagree.

Carter and Stone were parked less than a mile from Huggermugger, the building that they had identified as the Wrecking Crew’s base of operations. With Megan’s help, Stone had used her laptop to do some careful reconnaissance of the target area, before they had left the hospital.

Simon Cartwright’s house had been built in the center of a five-acre field, bordered on three sides by thick woodland. Stone had quickly decided that it was a horrible location for a frontal assault. Formally, the site of a Second World War airfield, there was nothing but flat open ground for miles. A car or pedestrian, approaching the building along the access road from the east, would be an easy target to any waiting gunman.

The only possibility was for Stone to approach from the west, accessing the rear of the property through the woods. From there he would need to leave the protection of the trees and somehow remain undetected, while he traversed the remaining one-hundred yards of open ground to the house. Using the cover of darkness and a lot of luck, Stone thought he had a slightly better than 60 % chance of making it unseen and alive. It was a tall order, but he could see no other option, if he was going to save Linda.

With the benefit of a clear satellite image, they had been able to identify the point where the road passed closest to the woods. Using the GPS in his car, Carter had driven directly to a small lay-by that was one-hundred yards west of the tree line. The earlier cloud and fog had dissipated, and the moon was high in the sky, clearly illuminating the frosty grass. Carter pointed to the sky.

“That’s a ‘Hunter’s Moon’. Take it as an omen of good luck.”

“Good for hunting, bad for trying to sneak up on someone,” Stone replied sternly.

Carter pointed to a farm track bordered with a line of bushes and a ditch.

“That track will lead you directly into the woods. When you get there, keep going straight. After around fifty yards you should reach the clearing at the back of the house.”

Stone nodded once and they climbed out of the car. Carter opened the trunk and handed Eric the crossbow with its quiver of four arrows, then a hunting knife, and the two-way radio.

“I’ve changed to channel eight. It’s unlikely that they’re still monitoring Linda’s radio, but we can’t be too careful.”

“Channel eight it is.”

The tension in his voice was obvious to hear. Stone reached into the trunk of the car for Anton Stephens’ handgun. He carefully checked the load, and then tucked it under his belt in the small of his back. Stone looked at his friend one last time.

“Listen out, but don’t expect to hear from me until I need a diversion — or a ride home.”

“I’ll be waiting — good luck.”

Without further comment, Stone turned and jogged away into the distance. Carter waited until he was out of sight before he climbed into his car and slowly drove away.

As Simon Cartwright stared longingly at his latest possession, he felt the soft warmth of anticipation spreading through his loins. His eyes slowly travelled up her shapely legs, and across her flat stomach, until they reached the gentle peak of her breasts, just visible under her white blouse. He paused there to savor the way they subtly rose and fell in time with her short hard breaths.

“Relax, Linda — you’re hyperventilating.”

She complied with his order, and gradually her breathing slowed. Even so, when his eyes reached the soft curve of her neck, he could clearly see a vein jumping in time with the wild beating of her heart. He brought his eyes a little higher, around the firm line of her chin, to the softness of her lips. He thought they looked a little dry.

“Lick your lips.”

She obliged instantly.

“Good girl. I can see we’re going to get along just fine.”

He looked away from her beautiful face, partly to check the time on his watch, but also to avoid looking into the slack dullness of her eyes. He hoped that in time those eyes would come to life, particularly as she came to accept his mastery over her. For now, he preferred to avoid ruining his view. Anyway, he thought, it was almost midnight and his plan to disassemble the Wrecking Crew was under way. Simon Cartwright smiled. Soon he and Linda would be able to leave for the airport.

It had taken fifteen minutes for Stone to work his way carefully through the woods. The crossbow was cocked and ready for use, but with the safety on. He held it over his shoulder, to avoid it accidentally snagging on a branch. He had gambled that the woods would not be patrolled or alarmed, and it seemed that he was right.

Initially his progress through the thick undergrowth had been painfully slow, particularly without the aid of a flashlight. After a while, he had spotted a path in the dappled moonlight, and his pace improved. The path was really just a track, a slight gap pushed through the bramble and bushes. Stone imagined it had been created by the regular passage of some medium sized animal, perhaps a badger, or a fox. In any event, it cut a useful swathe through the undergrowth that led him directly to the clearing.

Peering through the last row of trees, Stone could clearly see Simon Cartwright’s house in the distance. From his position, he could see the rear of the main building, and some sort of barn or garage. At the front there was a graveled parking area containing six vehicles. He recognized two of the cars from the earlier altercation at The Oracle. He could see the dented Toyota that Kitten and Bunny had driven, and a black BMW — the same car that had abducted Linda. Any doubts that Stone may have had about the validity of the operation were now gone.

The house was a large brick built bungalow with a wide tiled roof. Between the barn and the rear of the house, there was a cylindrical tank for storing heating oil. Towards the left, mounted on a metal post in the ground was a huge satellite dish, perhaps eight feet wide — the source of the Wrecking Crew’s broadband. There were three windows and a French door facing the rear, all were showing that the lights inside were on.

He watched the house for a full two minutes, but could see no obvious signs of movement outside. Using the sights on the crossbow, he studied the building and its surroundings more closely. Towards the front of the house, there was the occasional hint of a frosty breath, or perhaps some cigarette smoke. Looking to the rear, he twice saw someone’s shadow briefly pass across one of the lighted windows. Although there was no obvious sign of any external security cameras, Stone knew that modern cameras could be small and difficult to spot. He would just have to take a risk. It was time to move.

Brightly illuminated in the moonlight, the field ahead looked like one-hundred yards of soft rolling waves of snow. A person standing in that field would be as obvious as a muddy footprint on a white carpet. The only obvious break in the gently waving grass was the continuation of the animal track that Stone had followed through the wood. His dark clothes would help to make him less visible, but he would need some camouflage for when he got nearer to the house. Assuming he lived that long. Using the hunting knife, Stone cut a large branch off a leafy bush and dropped it over the fence. Then he picked up the crossbow, climbed through a gap in the railing and silently slid into the long grass.

Laying prone on the animal track, Stone held the branch in his left hand so that the foliage was directly in front of his face, and partially draped across his back. He hoped that anyone casually looking towards the field might have thought they were seeing a bush gently waving in the breeze, but they would not notice the man lying prone in the grass behind. At least that was the theory.

Holding the crossbow in his right hand, low to the ground, but ready to use, Stone began to silently belly-crawl forward. He began with his left arm out straight, holding the bush upright. As he moved forward, he kept the bush still by gradually bending his left elbow. When his left hand touched his shoulder, he slowly extended the arm, moving the bush forward again. Each time he crawled to the bush, he moved forward half a yard. He repeated the bush/arm/crawl maneuver, repeatedly, slowly following the track towards the house.

Bunny checked his watch. It was time to begin. He had his orders, and as always, The Fixer was very specific about what he had to do. He’d been looking forward to this all afternoon, particularly because he knew that he was going to get a special bonus. He opened the door to the conference room. Gordon, Peter, and Norris were huddled around the coffee machine. Becka was sitting with her feet up on the conference table.

“The Boss wants you three boys downstairs. There’s a job needs doing.”

He stared at Becka.

“You need to stay here.”

She slowly stood and gave Bunny the finger. Ignoring the insult, he spun on his heel and left the room. Gordon McIntosh followed immediately, Peter White and Norris Halpin exchanged a glance and a shrug, and then trotted on behind. They knew that you obeyed Bunny, unless you liked pain. Becka casually turned her back on the door and selected another pastry.

They followed the bodyguard down into the basement. Sharing nervous glances, they waited alongside the weight training equipment, and coloured tea chests, while he opened the gun locker. Bunny carefully selected a handgun; it was a Colt .38 super automatic. He expertly checked the mechanism, loaded the clip, made the gun safe, and then handed it to Gordon.

“The Boss says you’re to wait out the front with Kitten. Watch out in case someone comes.”

“Got it.”

Gordon took the gun and left without another word. He had learned not to argue. Bunny reached back into the gun locker and withdrew his favourite gun. It was a Sig Sauer P226. He slowly and deliberately attached a silencer, and checked that the gun was loaded with a full clip of 9mm Hydra-shok explosive bullets. He looked over his shoulder and smiled reassuringly.

“Right, you two come here.”

Halpin and White moved a little closer, and as they did, Bunny turned and shot them both in the head. The gun coughed twice in under two seconds, making a sound no louder than a dropped phone book. The two men barely had enough time to register what was about to happen, before the bullets struck and they slumped to the concrete floor. Bunny came forward and nudged them experimentally to check they were dead. There was no doubt. The hydra-shok is a devastating bullet, and the spreading pools of blood and brain matter told its own story about the ruthless efficiency of Bunny’s work. Taking care not to dirty his shoes, he walked around the bodies and up the stairs to the conference room. Becka was still waiting.

As soon as the big bodyguard opened the door, Becka realized that she was in a world of trouble. The silenced pistol was still in his hand and his face spoke clearly of his intentions. He walked purposely forward. As he drew near, Becka snatched the coffee pot and threw it as hard as she could. It was a poor throw, with more hatred than accuracy, and Bunny easily sidestepped the attack. Desperate to escape, Becka ran, side-stepping to the left to try to slip by, but Bunny was too fast. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her close, jamming the gun under her chin so hard that she almost fainted from the pain.

“If you struggle or scream I will kill you,” he hissed in her ear.

“You can’t do this — he’ll punish you when he finds out.”

“You’re wrong you little bitch,” Bunny said with sickening finality, “he… said I could have you.”

Realizing that she really was facing a fate worse than death, Becka started to struggle and kick as hard as she could. Laughing at her ineffectual efforts to fight him off, Bunny lifted her up by her hair until her feet were clear of the ground. He reached back with his other hand and slapped Becka across the face with his pistol, as hard as he could. Then he did it again, and again.

Stone was about fifty yards from the rear of the house when he heard two dull thumps in short succession. To him it sounded like someone slamming a door or bursting a balloon under a blanket. He stopped moving and cautiously raised his head. A moment later, he saw the silhouette of a skinny looking man walk from the front of the house. Stone watched carefully as the man put a handgun into his pocket, before lighting a cigarette and then casually strolling along the road to the east. Confident that the man was of no immediate threat, Stone continued to crawl towards the house.

Five minutes later a second, much larger man, came out of the building and turned towards the rear of the property. From a distance of thirty yards, he could quite clearly see that the man had the inert body of a small female slung over his shoulder. The man walked quickly around the back of the property and into the outbuilding. As he passed, he didn’t look towards the field were Stone was lying, or take any notice of the bush where he was hiding.

Although the gun was chafing his back and his knees were sore, Stone quietly continued the bush/arm/crawl maneuver along the track. When he was twenty yards away from the house, he saw two shadows passing fleetingly in front of the French doors. One was a man of medium build and the other was a petite female. Although the image was fleeting and distorted by the curtain, Stone was positive that he had just seen Linda. He pressed the transmit button and whispered into his radio.

“I have eyes on Linda. Begin in five.”

There was a double click of static in his ear as Carter acknowledged.

He continued his forward belly crawl until he was just ten yards from the back of the house. Then he draped the bush across his back and slowly brought the crossbow to his shoulder.

A minute later Eric heard a car approaching fast, its engine revving enthusiastically. Bright headlights swept across the front of the house and there was a screech as Carter brought his car to a sudden stop on the loose gravel. He gave the horn a long blast and then performed a wild turn. The tires could be heard scrabbling for grip as he sped away.

Stone rolled his neck to relax his muscles, took a deep breath, and brought the sniper scope to his eye. He flicked the safety switch to ‘fire’ and checked that the laser-sighting device was disabled. Ten second later the large man came out of the outbuilding, gun in hand. He jogged to the corner of the house to investigate the source of the noise.

“Fuck’n kids!” he whispered.

The man stood very still staring towards the road with his back facing the field. He was just eight yards away from where Stone was lying. From such a close range, the back of Bunny’s thick neck entirely filled the view through the telescopic scope. Stone centered the scope’s cross hairs at the very top of the big man’s neck, level with his hairline, and he waited. When Carter sounded the car’s horn again, Stone breathed out and squeezed the trigger.

With a sound no louder than a single handclap, the string of the Ghost 410 crossbow released. The high tensile reinforced string completed its fifteen-inch power stroke in one millisecond. Propelled by one-hundred-forty-nine foot/pounds of energy, the twenty-two inch bolt left the crossbow at four-hundred-ten feet per second and covered the 26.4 feet to its target in 0.06 seconds.

For a horrible moment, Stone thought that he had missed, but then he saw that he hadn’t. He stared in amazement as the giant bodyguard remained standing, apparently unaffected by the crossbow bolt embedded at the base of his skull. Then, like some huge tree uprooted by a storm, he slowly tipped forward and fell flat onto his face. Drawing his knife and staying low, Stone cautiously scrambled across to the recumbent form, but his vigilance proved unnecessary. The crossbow bolt had instantly severed the bodyguard’s spine. Bunny was dead.

Stone considered trying to drag the corpse into the cover of the field, but a quick tug on Bunny’s legs convinced him that the bodyguard was too heavy. The best that he could do was to roll the body out of the moonlight and into the shadow of the house. Panting from the effort of manhandling such a dead weight, he crouched low at the corner of the house and reloaded the crossbow. After carefully scanning the immediate area and deciding that he was still unobserved, Stone silently moved to the outbuilding where Bunny had taken the girl. Keeping his right eye tightly shut to preserve his night vision, with knife in hand, he cautiously stepped through the door.

It was an ordinary garage and workshop, lit by a single strip light. Inside there were two cars, a white Porsche and a red Ferrari. Between the cars, naked and spread-eagled on the hard concrete floor, the girl lay in a pool of blood. Stone gently placed his fingers to the side of her chin so he could check for a pulse. There was none. He thought that in life, she may have been a pretty girl, but it was hard to be sure, because her death had been caused by a violent and sustained beating. He reached over and gently closed her one remaining eye, silently praying that she had died before the final ignominy that the big bodyguard had inflicted, with the screwdriver that was still embedded between her legs.

Now fearing for Linda’s safety more than ever, Stone strode across to the exit. As he reached for the door, it was suddenly pulled open. He recoiled in shock and surprise. There before him was the identical twin brother of the man he had just killed with the crossbow. Kitten was equally surprised to find a stranger standing in the garage doorway. Both men involuntarily took half a step backwards, before realizing the danger. Stone reacted quickly, but Kitten reacted first.

The huge Russian’s fist whipped around and landed a mighty punch to the left side of Eric’s head. It was an ill-timed and glancing blow, but it still landed with devastating force. Stone’s legs went stiff and his vision blurred as he staggered away. He would have been easy meat for a follow-on attack, had one come immediately — but it didn’t. Perhaps it was because he was facing what he perceived to be an inferior opponent, or because he was distracted by the body of the naked girl, but Kitten hesitated. Stone knew that he had been badly shaken by the punch, but he also had experience, and a fighter’s survival instinct.

Shaking his head and blinking to try to clear his vision, he staggered away to his left, placing the Ferrari between himself and his attacker. The bodyguard quickly assessed the situation. With a forbidding sneer, he reached under his jacket and pulled out a gun.

“Put your hands up.”

Stone knew that surrender would undoubtedly lead to death — both his and Linda’s. He had no option but to fight. With a shrug of defeat, he began to raise his arms, and as soon as the crossbow cleared the back of the Ferrari, he pulled the trigger. It was a snap shot, driven by desperation and poorly aimed — but he got lucky. The bolt barely missed the low hood of the sports car, struck the floor with a puff of concrete, ricocheted upwards, and stuck firmly into Kittens shin. The bodyguard winced in pain and hobbled backwards, slightly lowering his aim. Knowing that he had just this one chance, Stone threw the crossbow with all of his might, and charged.

It should have been the last thing he ever did. Eric should have died there, writhing on the cold concrete floor with a bullet in his head — but he didn’t. For some reason Kitten did not see the attack as a threat from a dangerous and desperate man, rather he treated it as an affront to his ego and manhood. His steroid twisted brain seemed enraged by this outrageous show of disrespectful aggression, and after he had batted Stone away, Kitten made a big show of putting his gun onto the workbench.

“I’m gonna beat you to a pulp you little shit!” the bodyguard said.

Even with the crossbow bolt sticking out of his shin, Stone had no doubt that Kitten would deliver on his promise. The man was a mountain of muscle. His biceps’ were thicker than Eric’s thigh, his fists were like bowling balls, and his neck was broader than his shaven head.

Stone had fought big men before, and he had fought muscular men. He had always won by using space, stamina, and time, to his advantage. Usually he could dance around a bigger, but slower assailant, keeping his distance, and taking his shots whenever he saw a gap in the defenses. Over time, his superior fitness and speed would always give him the upper hand, but this confrontation was different. With no room for maneuver in the confined space of the garage, and under pressure to rescue Linda quickly, Stone did the only thing he could. He stepped out from behind the car, took up a fighting stance, and waited for the other man to make a move.

With a smile of delight, the bodyguard began to inch forward threateningly. Stone edged to his right and as he did, Kitten mirrored the move, inching to his left, away from the workbench and his gun. Eric sidestepped again, and Kitten followed with a smile, blocking any possibility of him rushing for the door. As soon as there was a separation of two-yards between Kitten and the weapon on the workbench, Stone reached behind his back, pulled out Anton Stephens’ gun, and without any formalities, shot the huge Russian in the face.

The sound of the shot echoed with a flat bang in the confines of the garage, but it was probably no more audible outside than if he had slammed a car door. Even so, Eric figured that it would not be long before someone came to look for the missing bodyguards. Kitten was not dead, but he was obviously severely wounded. The bullet had struck the bridge of his nose and embedded in his skull. His face was a mess. He was bleeding heavily from the mouth and writhing on the floor in pain. Stone grabbed a washcloth from a box of automotive cleaning materials, and wrapped it tightly around the gun to act as a sound suppressor. Then he took two quick steps forwards, jammed the gun against Kitten’s sternum, and fired again. The Russian heaved once and then lay still.

Before dumping the washcloth onto Kitten’s chest, Stone used it to wipe the blood from his hand. Something on his crossbow had broken when he had thrown it, so with a grimace of regret, he left it on the floor and took Kitten’s gun from the workbench instead. After switching off the strip light, Eric waited at the door for thirty seconds with his eyes wide open, trying to recover some of his night vision. He cautiously pushed the door open and stepped into the glare of the moonlight. No one was waiting to kill him, but the French door at the back of the house was now standing open, beckoning him to enter.

Taking slow, careful steps, Eric moved to his left until he reached the back wall of the house. He waited there, consciously calming his breathing, while he sensed his surroundings. He could hear no voices or suspicious noises, just the distant sound of Carter’s car, randomly accelerating and braking. Except for the wedge of light from the open French door, nothing attracted his attention. Because the air was sharp and cold, Stone could still detect the residual smell of exhaust fumes from Ed’s wildly revving engine. The faint but acrid smell of fresh tobacco smoke, suggested that the skinny man was still at the front of the house.

With his back flat against the wall, Stone sidestepped along the building until he was level with the open door. With the guns ready, he leaned forward and cautiously peeked inside. Although the curtain was partially open, all he could see was a wall and part of a desk. It was when he risked moving a little farther to improve his field of view, that he saw Linda. His heart jumped — she was alive. Linda was sitting on a hard wooden chair, staring blankly at the wall to his left. As Stone prepared himself to charge in through the door, a confident voice spoke loudly.

“Do come in, Mr. Stone. You must be getting cold out there.”

Eric raised both guns and stepped through the curtain.