Direct Fire Read online

  CHAPTER 9

  ZAKIR STOOD FROM HIS CHAIR AS HE RECEIVED AN AUTOMATED ALERT from the security camera that indicated the vehicle carrying the chairman and his wife was arriving from northern Virginia.

  His kidnap team had made a brief stop on the outskirts of Asheville, where they had switched cars in the designated scenic overlook. There, they had stripped their Army blue uniforms, donned their black pants and shirts, and had done a final strip search of General Bagwell and his wife.

  They had found an interesting anomaly, which he had immediately messaged to his superior. Behind General Bagwell’s left ear had been a device that looked like a bandage. Perhaps it was. Their metal-detecting security wand had discovered the device, giving off the slightest beep. Then, upon searching Mrs. Bagwell, they had found the exact same microdevice behind her ear. In the soft padded portion of the “bandage” was a nano-transmitter. It was a tracking device that he assumed their security teams made them wear. He was proud of how his kidnap team had neutralized their weak security very quickly but was concerned that their footprint could be followed to Asheville.

  If someone was monitoring these small transmitters behind their ears, they would be able to identify the last known location at a rest stop on I-40. He had instructed his men to tape the devices to another vehicle. They had done so and reported that the vehicle was heading west through the mountains. This was good. The car could be on its way to California and would provide sufficient misdirection for the next twenty-four hours.

  On the camera in his command center at the camp, he watched the nondescript sedan park across the river near the security cameras he had installed several months ago. The headlights flashed twice; a “friendly” vehicle. The sun was nosing over the horizon, but the deep valley in which they had burrowed was still dark, awaiting the morning glow.

  He also knew it was one of his teams because he had installed a satellite GPS tracker on the link-up car prior to the mission. Looking at his screen, he confirmed that the blinking blue dot was the car he was viewing on the grainy black-and-white camera feed. The trail upon which the car had traveled was an unimproved dirt road that paralleled a fifty-yard-wide creek. He had positioned a small, flat-bottomed duck hunting boat on the far side, where the vehicle was parked. Per his instructions, one of his team members opened the door and lifted a woman and then a man out of the trunk of the car. He could see that they were bound and gagged. The woman stumbled as her husband attempted to help her. His team member led them to the boat. Once they were in the boat, the car departed and would exit out the far side of the trail onto an asphalt road.

  On the near side of the creek, two other team members helped the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and his wife out of the boat. Zakir switched security cameras and saw them enter the cabin, which had two cages inside. The man was locked in one cage, while his wife was locked in a cage across from him.

  Zakir had taken the time to install prison-grade bars inside the cabin, along with extra soundproofing. He was glad that the first delivery had been made. Others might still arrive, but the biggest prize had been snared. Bagwell had killed many of his Syrian brothers and sisters. He also was close friends and West Point classmates with General Bob Savage, the American general who had killed the most Arabs over the past fifteen years. Both generals were intimately involved in Operation Groomsman, as well.

  Zakir had already made his move against General Savage and his off-the-books team of commandos. The only one not in his control was Jake Mahegan, but he knew where Mahegan was and when he would be near Asheville. With Savage and Bagwell in his control, this devastating deep strike against the Americans had a chance of taking hold.

  He walked the one hundred yards from his command post to the cabin to greet his fresh prisoners. The small bungalow was set back in a copse of pine trees toward the eastern end of the valley. The morning air was cool, alerting him to the excitement of the day. He was about to meet a general and then hijack a Mack truck. It was going to be a great day. He walked up the steps of the cabin and entered.

  “General,” he said. The general was tall and lanky. He was wearing khakis and a denim dress shirt. His face was haggard and unshaven, with white whiskers around his jawline. Zakir noticed he wore a large ring atop his wedding band—his West Point ring, no doubt. General Bart Bagwell had risen rapidly through the ranks after repeated tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Ambitious to a fault, Bagwell had stayed overseas rotating between theaters, leaving his family behind in the United States while he lobbied for the top job in the military. He had been the three-star general in charge of all operations in Iraq and Syria in 2011 when the Arab Spring had unleashed evil like a cyclone throughout the Middle East.

  Zakir’s kidnap team had flex-cuffed Bagwell and his wife, who was lying on her side with a distant look on her face, as if perhaps she was not surprised by their predicament. She was an attractive blond woman with disheveled hair and was wearing gray slacks and a white blouse. They had been traveling from Fort Hood, Texas, for a speech and returning to their Fort Myer mansion.

  Looking at Bagwell made Zakir think of his boss, Jackknife, who was none too happy with the general. Bagwell had secrets and Jackknife wanted answers. Thinking of Jackknife led to thoughts of Operation Groomsman.

  Zakir was supposed to be in the convoy that had been bombed—what the Americans had called Operation Groomsman—but his Ford Explorer SUV transmission seized up from the desert grime prior to making the final turn into the compound. Zakir recalled watching with horror as the bombs rained down upon his friends and family, slaughtering them all. And he had refrained from calling Jackknife, even though he should have.

  Zakir had run toward the charred wreckage when suddenly two American helicopters flew into the area. The men disembarked and began clawing through the debris. Zakir remembered seeing a large man clearly in charge of the team on the ground. They were wearing helmets and body armor as they held their rifles at eye level. Later, Zakir learned that the air assault mission commander had been a man named Jake Mahegan.

  Today, almost four years later, Jackknife’s revenge was coming to fruition. As Zakir stared at the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and his wife, he felt satisfaction that he was able to help Jackknife pull this plan together. Here was tangible evidence that things were working. He would know precisely at nine a.m. if the auto repair worm had worked across many of the different car manufacturer service shops and DMVs nationwide.

  To his knowledge, General Savage, Sean O’Malley, Patch Owens, and Jake Mahegan would all be dead or also captured by the end of the day, if they weren’t already.

  “Lock them in their cages,” Zakir said to his kidnap team.

  CHAPTER 10

  SPECIAL AGENT TOMMY OXENDINE LISTENED TO THE TROY POLICE chief’s report over the radio. He was standing in the glassed-in conference room of the Concord Airport, looking at the jets of many of the NASCAR racing drivers, such as Dale Earnhardt, Jr. and Jeff Gordon. They were painted with the drivers’ car number on the fuselage. Oxendine was a NASCAR fan and thought it was pretty cool to be staring at those airplanes.

  “We’ve got one dead body and one severely wounded. Got an anonymous tip from an untraceable phone that pinged the tower near the town of Badin. Gave us the exact location of these two individuals. They are dressed as military police officers, but the one who is alive is unconscious right now. Might be a few hours. They don’t have any credentials on them, and their weapons are missing. I got a call from Sheriff Williams over in Moore County, and his guys found the car they were probably in. They’re fingerprinting it right now, but they’ve already got one hit on a guy named Chayton Mahegan.”

  “Stop right there, Sheriff. That’s all I need to know. Keep building evidence on Mahegan. His pistol was used in the murder of that family here in Charlotte. His boss’s ex-wife was murdered right next to her new husband. In fact, she was the first one murdered of the three. We’re looking at a love triangle thing with Mahegan. I’m sending a t
eam to Badin right now.”

  “I’m not far if you need me to head that way,” the police chief said.

  “He’ll be gone by then if he’s not already. Focus on the evidence there. I want this case rock solid.”

  “Roger that.”

  Oxendine clicked off and looked at the jets, then saw the helicopter land. Six men in black suits poured out of the doors. They were carrying their helmets and AR-15 rifles.

  “Better turn around, boys,” Oxendine whispered. But truthfully he wanted to look the men in the eyes and make them understand the importance of this mission. He was going to push his finger into the chest of the team leader and emphasize that he could not under any circumstances screw this up.

  He turned to his aide, a young sergeant with a blond crew cut and chiseled face of an Icelandic boxer.

  “Get me Sheriff Bubba Wilson of Stanly County, now.”

  In less than a minute, the aide handed him the phone and backed away. Oxendine continued to look at the SWAT team striding into the small VIP terminal, where he would brief them.

  “Sheriff, this is Special Agent Tommy Oxendine. I know it’s early, but I’m chasing this gruesome murder down in Charlotte and we’ve got evidence that a person of interest named Chayton Mahegan, goes by Jake, made a call within the last hour that used a cell phone tower near your town. He’s about six and a half feet tall, big, strong, armed and dangerous with possible ties to terrorists.”

  “Roger that. Finishing up breakfast now,” Sheriff Wilson said.

  “Breakfast?” Oxendine barked. “We’ve got a cold-blooded murderer on the loose in your county!”

  “You may be some big, badass special agent, Oxendine, but you damn sure ain’t my boss,” Sheriff Wilson said.

  After a pause, Oxendine said, “You’re right. My apologies. I’ve been up all night on this case, and I saw three dead bodies, one of them a fourteen-year-old boy.”

  “Now that’s all I need to hear. I’ll call you when and if I find out something,” the sheriff said.

  Oxendine hung up and looked across the room as the SWAT team poured in.

  “What we got, boss man?” Lieutenant Chuck McQueary asked. Known as “Q,” McQueary was the leader of the Charlotte–Mecklenburg Police Department SWAT team, called CharMeck. After a lengthy argument that Oxendine wanted nothing to do with, the director of the SBI, secretary of public safety, sheriff of Mecklenburg County, Police Chief of Charlotte, and the governor of North Carolina had all agreed that regardless of where they would find Mahegan, they needed a mobile response force that could move quickly to the location. And while the governor had put every county’s SWAT teams on standby, the CharMeck SWAT team would be the main effort with Special Agent Tommy Oxendine in charge of all decision making on the ground.

  Oxendine was fine with that. The CharMeck guys had a great reputation, and he liked having the men briefed and ready to go. Mahegan was making mistakes, and Oxendine would find him and kill him. Oxendine preferred that. No questions asked. The evidence already indicated that Mahegan was guilty. Why waste the time and effort to capture, detain, try, and imprison a man for murdering the Sledge family in cold blood.

  “Hey, Q,” Oxendine said as the men laid their helmets on the table. There was considerable noise as they removed their ballistic vests, leaned their rifles against the wall, and pulled out chairs to sit in.

  “Understand we’ve got a lead?” McQueary prompted again.

  “Yes, don’t get too comfortable. We think Mahegan pinged off a cell tower near Badin about an hour ago. I’ve got a definite on the murder weapon. Ballistics match the bullets to the weapon. That just came in. We’ve got a fingerprint on a military police vehicle, one dead MP, and one wounded MP who can’t talk yet. All roads lead to Mahegan.”

  “This guy must be pretty stupid to use his own pistol and then toss it in a lake,” McQueary said.

  “Well, I thought of that. Not saying Mahegan’s stupid. He was Delta or whatever they’re calling those special mission units nowadays. But I’ll say he may not be thinking right and not give a damn if he’s caught. As I’m time lining this thing, he kills the Sledges about eleven p.m., makes it back to Moore County, maybe gets pulled over by the military police, runs them off the road, shoots both, dumps them in Uwharrie, and now he’s near Badin. So we need to load up and be ready to pounce.”

  “He on foot or in a car?”

  “Don’t know. We checked with DMV and there’s no vehicle registered to Mahegan. Military records don’t show anything, either. Word is he does off-the-books stuff for JSOC, or at least that’s what he brags about in the bars.”

  “Which bars? Do we know where he hangs?” McQueary asked

  “We don’t know much about him, Q. I’ve given you what I’ve got. Want this guy more than I’ve wanted anyone in a long time,” Oxendine said.

  “You know the saying, right, boss? You want it bad, you get it bad,” McQueary warned.

  “I want it good.” Oxendine smiled. “Here’s his picture.” He passed around a photo he had pulled from the Department of Homeland Security files from the gray list. “It’s about four years old. He may have changed his hair color, don’t know. But for right now, we’re hunting a big guy, skin the color of mine, light brown or blond hair, and dangerous as hell. Now let’s saddle up, get in the air, establish comms with Stanly County, and find us a murderer.”

  Oxendine looked at McQueary, who squinted as he stared back. Oxendine just nodded, as if to say, Get your ass moving.

  CHAPTER 11

  MAHEGAN CLIMBED INTO THE SUBARU’S PASSENGER SIDE, RACKING back the bucket seat as far as it could go with all of the gear haphazardly thrown in the back. Cassie simultaneously slid into the driver’s seat. He would have stopped her to reorganize everything, but she shot out of the gas station parking lot as the sirens grew louder.

  “Damnit,” she said again.

  “Running from the law?”

  She looked at him and shook her head. Her thin hands tightly gripped the steering wheel as she raced the Subaru to seventy miles an hour.

  “Just going camping,” she said.

  Mahegan doubted that. The shotgun, the mention of a pistol and her expert marksmanship, her Army background, and the fact that she was speeding away from sirens gave Mahegan the impression that perhaps she was more concerned about law enforcement than he was.

  After an hour of sharp turns and rapid accelerations to over one hundred miles per hour, Cassie turned to him and said, “So what’s your deal, Jake? Not that I really give a shit.”

  “Ex-soldier. Just going camping,” he replied. “Not that you give a shit.”

  They merged onto I-40 headed west after cutting through the town of Salisbury. It was approaching nine a.m. They had another ninety minutes or so until they reached Asheville. From there, Mahegan wasn’t sure what his plan might be. Without Alex Russell and her magic override phone, which he continued to find suspect, he had no idea where Savage, Owens, and O’Malley might be.

  Cassie ran her hand through her clipped blond hair. Just above the collar, military regulation.

  “Where are you camping?” she asked.

  “Mountains.”

  “Just trying to narrow down where I’m supposed to drop you off. You helped me. I’m returning the favor.”

  “I think if you get me to Asheville, I can figure it out from there.”

  She nodded, as if that would do the trick and she would be free of her obligation.

  “I’m sure you get this quite a bit, but you look familiar to me. Were you in Iraq? Afghanistan? Both?” Mahegan asked.

  “Both. Multiple times. Intel.”

  He said nothing, nodded, and looked over his shoulder.

  “Tennis? Really?” Mahegan asked, recalling the rackets in the back of the car.

  “Played at West Point. Force of habit to bring them.”

  Mahegan had been processing her face since he first saw her at the gas station. He didn’t believe he knew her from combat.
It was something more remote, like he might recognize a movie star or public figure. Mahegan recalled when Prince Harry from Great Britain had served as an Apache copilot and gunner. He wasn’t sure, but Henry, Prince of Wales, might have saved his ass a few times with some covering rockets and missiles.

  Mahegan latched on to what he was seeking when he thought of the long version of Cassie: Cassandra. He knew of one notorious Cassandra, and that was Cassandra Bagwell, the renowned daughter of the chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff, General Bart Bagwell. As one of the first women to graduate Ranger school without recycling, “Cassie” Bagwell was a rising star in the military. Mahegan had not seen many pictures of her but knew the name and had followed with interest her graduation from West Point, trek through Ranger school, assignment to military intelligence at Fort Bragg, and then some of the news of her redeployments. Like Prince Harry, Cassie Bagwell’s deployments were off the radar, but the media usually caught wind when she and her unit returned from a combat zone. With a reputation for selfless but aggressive service, Cassie Bagwell was known mostly for trying to shake the notion that she was sailing along on her father’s following winds. That and the fact that her father had publicly and solidly opposed her attending Ranger school.

  “You?” she asked.

  “Both theaters. Other places. Pretty much combat or prepping for combat twenty-four/seven,” Mahegan said.

  “Unit?”

  “Yes,” he replied.

  “I meant, which . . .”

  She caught herself. Often Delta Force was referred to simply as “The Unit.”

  “I know what you meant.”

  Her countenance shifted, perhaps a new measure of respect or envy.

  “Why’d you get out?”

  “Didn’t really have a choice. Killed somebody I shouldn’t have.”

  That gave her pause. She eyed the pistol she kept in a holster sewn into the front of her seat. He had seen it earlier, a Beretta 9 mm with a magazine in the well. It was perfectly positioned between her legs, where she could rapidly draw down on a passenger or someone approaching her vehicle.