Free Day of Reckoning by Stephen England Page A

Keys?”
    She shot a frightened look from his face to Carol’s and back again. “They’re in the ignition.”
    “Good. Now, you can go with emergency services when they arrive. In the mean time, please stand back.” He gestured to Carol. “Go ahead and get in.”
    “Where are you going?” he heard Carol’s voice ask. Harry pulled a thin metal cylinder from the pocket of his jacket and screwed it into the threaded muzzle of the Colt. “Unfinished business.”
     
    9:02 A.M. Central Time
    Dan Ryan Expressway
    Chicago, Illinois
     
    Sometimes the hardest thing to remember about America was that the police actually needed a reason to stop you.
    Tarik Abdul Muhammad folded his hands, staring intently out the backseat window of the SUV at the flowing mass of traffic. It was in the interests of not giving them such a reason that he had requested a local driver.
    Even a black man was better for this task than the men he had brought with him across the U.S.-Mexico border. His own Pakistanis, though they were fierce fighters and willing to die for the cause of God, viewed driving as the ultimate test of their virility. A no-holds barred competition.
    It might have served them well in Peshawar, but in the more “civilized” driving environment of the United States, they wouldn’t have lasted five minutes.
    America . He leaned back in his seat, the memories flooding through his mind. The closest he had ever come to this country was Cuba. The imperialist military base overlooking the Bay of Guantanamo. Gazing out from behind the wire.
    He reached forward and tapped the negro on the shoulder. “How long before we reach Dearborn?”
    He had learned his English there on that desolate rock in Cuba. It was good but not fluent.
    “Hey, man, it all depends on the traffic,” the black man responded. “You want to be at the mosque by afternoon, right?”
    Tarik nodded. “That would be best.”
    “Then I’ll get you there, brother.”
    Brother . Tarik returned his focus to the traffic outside the window. Perhaps…
     
    10:03 A.M.
    The highway
    Virginia
     
    The shooter was dead, his neck snapped by the force of the impact. He’d probably never seen it coming.
    Harry rose from where the assassin lay like a broken doll on the asphalt and turned toward his partner.
    The driver had been thrown clear of the Suzuki and lay roughly fifteen feet away. He was moaning, his helmet ripped half off to reveal a distinctly Slavic face. His right leg was twisted below the knee, sticking out at right angles from his body.
    “Who sent you?” Harry asked in Russian, dropping to one knee beside the driver.
    The man’s cough was the only response, blood flecking the pavement. Defiance glinted in his eyes. Harry sighed, looking around him. Traffic was stopping. The police would arrive within minutes.
    And he was a wanted man himself. After a moment’s pause he reached down, applying pressure to the Russian’s injured leg and twisting it sideways.
    “I want a name,” Harry whispered, his lips only inches away from the prostrate man’s ear. “Just a name and the pain will stop.”
    Sweat streamed down the Russian’s face, drops of perspiration crystallizing in the cold winter’s air. His face was twisted in agony, but his mouth never opened, teeth grinding together.
    “A name, that’s all. Who sent you to kill me?”
    Still silence, not even a moan escaping the driver’s lips. Another moment passed, then Harry released his pressure on the leg and stood.
    “Have it your way,” Harry announced, checking the chamber of his 1911 as if to make sure it was loaded. “I’ll have you deliver a message to Sergei Ivanovich.”
    And he saw it, there in the final moment just before he put the suppressor of the Colt between the Russian’s eyes and squeezed the trigger. The recognition. The realization of having died for nothing.
    Korsakov was behind the hits.
     
    10:06 A.M.
    CIA Headquarters
    Langley, Virginia
     
    “We’re moving strike teams