Serpent nf-1 Page 31

"I had help. After the wreck I decided I never wanted to set foot on a boat again." He chuckled. "There is nothing like the unholy terror of being caught in the hold of a sinking ship to take the romance out of the sea. The woman I tried to help unfortunately died of her injuries. When I went to the funeral her husband thanked me again and said he wanted to do something in return. I said it was my dream to have a small restaurant. He gave me some money for a place in New York on the condition that I take business and English courses which he would also pay for. I named the restaurant Myra, after Mr. Carey's wife. I have opened six more restaurants in large cities across the country. They've made me a millionaire and allowed me to live like this. I married a wonderful woman. She gave me four sons and a daughter, all in the business, and many, marry grandchildren." He sipped the last of his grappa and put the glass down on a table. "I built this paradise here for my family, but also I think because it is near to where the ship went down. On foggy nights like this it brings back memories. You see, Mr. Austin, the accident was bad for many people, like Mr. Carry. But it changed my life for the better:"

  "Why are you telling me this now? You could have just sent me on my way."

  "My wife died last year.' After I survived the Andrea Doria I thought I would live forever: I saw in her death a reminder that I am mortal like all men. I am not a religious man, but I began to think more about making things right. Those men who were killed in the ship's hold. Maybe the others you told me of, They need somebody to speak for them." His jaw hardened. "I will be the spokesman for the dead." Donatelli looked at the wall clock. "It is getting late, Mr. Austin. Do you have a place to stay?"

  "I thought I'd get a room at a bed-and-breakfast."

  "Not necessary. You will have your bed here tonight as my guest, and breakfast tomorrow. For dinner I will prepare a special pasta. Tomatoes and zucchini fresh from the garden."

  An invitation like that would be impossible to refuse."

  "Good." He poured them more grappa and hoisted his glass high. "Then when we have eaten and drunk our wine, we will find a way to show these people what it means to mess with a Sicilian."

  San Antonio, Texas

  32 AS A MEXICAN AMERICAN, ZAVALA had mixed feelings about Texas's holiest shrine. He admired the courage of the Alamo's defenders, men like Buck Travis, Jim Bowie, and Davy Crockett, whose names were listed on the cenotaph on Alamo Plaza. At the same time he felt sorry for the 1,550 Mexican troops who died in the siege under the inept command of Santa Anna. The Texans lost 183 men. The Mexicans lost Texas.

  He wandered around the chapel that was all that was left of the once-sprawling fort, checked out the museum, and used up the nest of the afternoon watching people at a coffee bar. By six-thirty he was parking his rented car in the garage below the Time-Quest building. He located the parking area marked off for Halcon Industries. Nothing was reserved for the CEO. Zavala's guess was that everybody in the company was well aware the space was forbidden territory and Halcon didn't want to advertise himself.

  Zavala parked as near to the Halcon spaces as he could, then walked past two elevators, the public one and another door marked Private, and took up a post nearby in the shadows behind a thick concrete pillar. At five past seven Melody exited the main elevator and walked to her car. Zavala again felt a twinge of regret at not being able to go on a date with the lovely woman, but he had to put those thoughts aside. He wanted a clear head for his first meeting with Senor Halcon.

  Zavala's vigil in the underground garage was about to pay off. Shortly after Melody left, a black Lincoln limousine quietly pulled up in front of the elevator door marked Private. Almost on cue the elevator door opened and a man stepped out.

  Zavala brought his Nikon to his eye and focused on the tall dark man who exited the elevator and walked with an easy grace to the waiting vehicle. Halcon. He snapped off several shots before Halcon got into the limo, then focused on the driver who was holding the door open for him. The man was wearing a dark suit, and, his white hair was cut military short. He was tall and broad-shouldered, his physique muscularly athletic even though he could have been in his sixties at least. Zavala got off a single shot before the white-haired man swept the garage with his eyes as if he had heard the quiet whirr of the motor drive. Zavala melted into the shadows and didn't dare breathe until the car door slammed and the limo moved off.

  In the fleeting second he had framed the white-haired man in the viewfinder Zavala had frozen his likeness on his retinas. He leaned against the cold concrete, still not believing the evidence of his eyes. He had just seen the same' man in Arizona. He was sure of it, despite the clean.shaven face and the tailored suit. Only then the man with Halcon was wearing work clothes and had long hair and a thick white beard. He had a wife, since deceased. And he went by the name of George Wingate.

  Quickly regaining his composure, Zavala dashed for his rental car. He followed the limo onto the street, keeping one or two cars between him and his objective. They headed out of the city on the expressway in a northwest direction. In time the suburbs and shopping malls thinned out. The flat terrain gave way to rolling hills and more forested areas.

  Zavala pushed the rental car just to stay in sight of the limo, which flew along well above the speed limit once they were beyond the more heavily congested neighborhoods. They traveled for about an hour, leaving the main highway around dusk to follow a sparsely populated two-lane road. Zavala stayed far back. Before long he saw the flash of brake lights, and the limo disappeared. Zavala slowed until his headlights caught a small plastic reflector nailed to a tree, marking an unpaved road. He kept going to create the illusion he was bound elsewhere, then after a few hundred yards he did a quick U-turn and came back to the reflector.

  He switched the car's headlights off as a test and found that he was able to follow the dirt road as long as he kept speed down to a fast walk. He wondered what a big shot like Halcon was doing in the sticks. Maybe he had a hunting lodge. The thick woods quickly enveloped him. Where the trees opened up he could see low craggy hills on either side. He saw no lights ahead, but this didn't surprise him because the road twisted and turned. Not wanting to run into an unpleasant surprise, Zavala stopped every few minutes, got out of the car, and walked ahead, like the point on an infantry patrol; to watch and listen.

  On one stop he saw a light ahead. Cautiously he walked toward the glow until he could see that it was a lone spotlight on the gate of a high wiremesh fence. He pulled the car off the road and made his way toward the fence under the cover of the woods, stopping at the edge of a swath cleared from the perimeter. The fence was about twice the height of a man and topped by coils of razor wire. A white sign with black lettering was attached to the gate warning trespassers to Keep Out. Guard Dogs Trained to Attack. His instincts had served him, well. Above the sign was a small box which could serve no other purpose than as a security camera.

  The fence was too high to climb, and he had no protection against the wire, or the dogs, but his guess was that the barricade was attached to an alarm. Remembering a low hill a short distance back, he returned to his car and headed away from the fence in reverse so the backup lights wouldn't be seen, then pulled off the road into the bushes. He made his way toward the hill then up its side, no easy task because he had nothing to light his way. He tripped and had to back out of briars a few times but made it to the copse at the hilltop without mishap. He selected a clean-!imbed tree and climbed to the highest branch that would support his weight.

  The elevation gave him a view over the top of the fence. Except for the lone floodlight on the gate, the area was not illuminated. His eyes had become used to the darkness, and soon several shapes began to materialize. He realized he was looking at a vast complex of buildings, some rectangular, others cylindrical, all dominated by a massive pyramid with a flat top. The structures were built of a whitish stone and seemed to glow in the faint light of the moon.

  Some hunting lodge, he muttered. This was crazy! An ancient city in the wilds of the Texa
s countryside. He tried to call Austin but his cell phone failed to pick up a signal. After several minutes during which he squinted into the darkness in a vain attempt to make out details, he decided he had seen all he was going to see. He was about to climb down the tree when a light flicked on and he saw a strange sight. He got a new grip on the branch and watched, fascinated, as a remarkable scene began to unfold.

  33 RAUL GONZALEZ SHIVERED IN THE darkness and waited for the bullet to smash into his spine, wishing it would happen before he froze to death in the cool night air. Again he cursed that American woman. By thwarting his Moroccan assignment, she was responsible for him being in this place. His angry ruminations were cut short. A spotlight blinked on, and Gonzalez saw before him a fantastic creature, part human, part beast.

  From the neck down the figure was a bronzeskinned man of muscular physique. Around his waist was a loincloth of rich green, yellow, and vermilion. The hard growths on either hip proved to be, on closer look, leather padding. The face was hidden behind a mask created in a madman's nightmare. The jade-colored snout was long and scaly, the eyes hungry-looking, and the grinning mouth full of jagged, razorsharp teeth. Long quetzal plumes streamed from the back of the head. The monster stood as still as a statue, brawny arms folded across a broad hairless chest.

  "Madre mia." The pitiful whimper came from off to Gonzalez's left.

  "Silencio," Gonzalez growled at the hydrofoil captain.

  They'd been ordered to remain silent or be shot. Gonzalez wasn't about to be killed because a sniveling coward couldn't keep his mouth shut. The man standing quietly on his right was more to his liking. Lean and snake-like in his movements, an assassin like himself. At another time Gonzalez would have talked shop with the man about the murderous skills he learned as a skinny sore-plagued orphan in the squalid alleys of Buenos Aires, where he'd dodged death squads hired by local businessmen. The businessmen considered the street boys as vermin. Gonzalez was barely a teenager when he approached the shopkeepers and offered to infiltrate the packs he knew so well and quietly dispatch his sleeping peers with knife or garrote. As he grew older he obtained bigger jobs. Competitors. Politicians. Unfaithful spouses. All sent to an early grave. Gun. Knife. Torture. Gonzalez earned a reputation for delivering exactly what his employer wanted.

  Blink.

  A second circle of light revealed another muscular figure with a different mask, the snarling mouth and blood-red tongue of a jaguar.

  Gonzalez again swore under his breath. Standing in the cold while some idiot puts on a costume pageant! It wasn't fair. All because he'd botched a few jobs. Business had been going to younger killers when the Brotherhood's emissary approached him. He didn't know the group even existed, but they knew everything about him. They wanted him for special assignments, and the aging hit man signed on eagerly. The money was good. The work wasn't difficult. Just like his street days. Wait for a call. Infiltrate and kill. Easy assignments. Like the one in Morocco.

  Morocco. He wished he'd never heard the name.

  A simple job, said the caller from Madrid. Unarmed, unsuspecting scientists. Infiltrate the expedition. Set up the ambush. Roust the victims from their beds, slaughter them like sheep, and quickly bury the bodies without a trace. If it hadn't been for that bitch with the Russian name! Jesus Mary, he'd had sweet plans for her. He would study that slim body hungrily watching as she sat in front of her tent combing hair the color of golden wheat in the afternoon sun. When they talked she was politely rude. Brushing hits off as if he were an ant crawling up one of those slender legs. He was going to enjoy making her beg for her life with the only thing she could offer, that gorgeous body.

  But she hadn't been sleeping when he burst into her tent, and when he and the others gave chase she ran like the wind. Three times the Brotherhood had her in its grasp only to fail in its attempts to bring her down. The hovercraft failed to drown her. The hit squad sent to finish the job on the NUMA ship was either shot or incinerated, its only survivor the lone commando by his side.

  The order to come to Texas wasn't a total surprise. Gonzalez assumed he'd get a sharp reprimand; have his pay docked, and be reassigned. Instead men with machine pistols had herded him with the others. After dark they were escorted out into the night and told to stand at attention. Warned they would be shot if they made a move or uttered a peep. So they had waited, listening to the howl of coyotes in the desert night air. Until now.

  Blink A third figure stood in relief. He wore the death's head with its staring empty eyes and dead grin.

  A voice came out of the night, amplified by loudspeakers. "Greetings, my brothers," it said in aristocratic Castilian Spanish.

  "Greetings, Lord Halcon," echoed the murmured response from unseen voices.

  "We know why we are here. Three of our number were given tasks to further our noble cause, and they have failed us." The voice paused. "The punishment for failure is death."

  Here comes the bullet, Gonzalez thought. Oh, hell, it's been a good life. He braced himself for the hail of lead that must soon come smashing into his body, hoping that it would be quick. His feet hurt from the unaccustomed standing. He was surprised by a round object that flew out of the darkness and hit the ground with a bounce. Gonzalez thought the black-and-white sphere was a soccer ball until it rolled to a stop about midway between the two facing lines of men and he saw that its markings were images of skulls.

  The voice again. "You will be given a chance to win your lives. The ball game will determine whether you live or die."

  The spotlights blinked off. The three figures vanished. But only for a moment. A battery of bright lights came on, and Gonzalez saw that he and the others were standing between two parallel stone walls. The three costumed men had removed. their masks and stood at the far end of. the alley. Halfway down from the top of each wall was a ring carved with the face of what looked like a macaw. In the semidarkness on top of the wall he sensed people moving, hundreds from the sound of their voices.

  "The ball represents fate," boomed the loudspeaker. "The court is the cosmos. The alligator, the jaguar, and the death's head symbolize the lords of the underworld, your opponents. The rules are as they have been for two thousand years. The lords will use their feet. You may use your hands and feet. Your goal will be to move the ball to the other end of the playing field. If any team moves the ball through a ring, that side wins. The losers will be vanquished."

  Gonzalez was dumbfounded. Soccer, for Godsakes. They were going to play a game of kickball for their lives! Gonzalez had played as a street youth and later in an organized amateur team, and he had not been bad at it. He was dreadfully out of, shape from the excesses of booze, drugs, and women. His swarthy body was still powerful, but he'd grown flabby around the gut and short of wind.

  "You've played before?" he said out of the comer of his mouth.

  A little," said the assassin. 'Forward."

  "I was a goalie," the hovercraft operator said tentatively.

  "We're playing for our lives," Gonzalez warned. "There will be no rules. Anything goes. Do you understand?"

  Both men nodded.

  The trio at the far end of the court awaited their move.

  "I'll kick off," Gonzalez. said. His eyes focused entirely on the ball, he got a running start, brought his foot back, then swung it forward. The ball was heavier than he expected. Probably solid rubber. The kick sent a painful shock up his leg. He got the full power of his body behind the blow, but his aim was off, and the ball skittered along the wall and back into the court in front of their opponents.

  The point man was on the ball like lightning, quickly moving it forward to halfcourt with short skillful steps. His teammates, flanked him on either side. The three men could have been triplets, all with the same bronze-hard bodies, the black hair cut in bowl-like bangs just above dark, uncaring eyes.

  The ball handler saw Gonzalez loping in his direction and snapped the ball off to the man at his left. Gonzalez was unwavering. He had no interest in the ba
ll; he wanted to maim. He had done the simple arithmetic in his head. Injure only one man, and his opponents would lose thirty percent of their team. He lowered his head and charged the man who had passed off the ball. His target coolly waited until Gonzalez was a hair's breadth away, then deftly sidestepped and stuck his foot out. Gonzalez tried to stop, couldn't, tripped over the extended leg, and slammed against the ground so hard it rattled his teeth.

  Ignoring the pain in his cracked ribs, he scrambled to his feet and tried vainly to catch up with the fast-moving play. His teammate, the assassin, lunged in an unsuccessful attempt to steal the ball, but he jabbed his elbow into the ball handler's sternum, eliciting a satisfactory grunt of pain.

  Gonzalez followed up, slamming into the man with a body block from behind. The player went forward onto his knees, which is where most men would have stayed, but he was up again in an instant, hurrying to run interference with the teammate, who was moving the ball toward the end zone. Gonzalez looked on in dismay.

  So soon.

  Three-on-one.

  Only the hovercraft man stood in the way of a goal.

  The ball handler saw his opponent, underestimated him, and decided to take the ball through instead of passing it off to the side for an easy kick goal. He was moving too fast to take a sharp turn without losing the ball, so he feinted with the eyes to his left but moved to his right.

  The hovercraft man saw the ploy and moved forward with his forearm lifted His elbow drove into the man's jaw with the force of their combined speed and lifted him off the ground. There was a resounding crack as the ball handler's jaw broke, and he crumpled to the ground with blood gushing from his mouth. Gonzalez gasped for air with every breath he took, but his teammate's skillful move gave him new strength.

  Gonzalez got the ball under his heel and kicked it between the two opponents who were double teaming him without a glance at their fallen comrade. With a hoarse yell of triumph he followed up on his kick and barreled into the pair like a bowling ball; intent on knocking them to either side, One man straight-armed Gonzalez and might have broken his neck if the palm hadn't been absorbed by the fleshy jowls. Gonzalez realized that the rule was no hands for moving the bail, not for defending it..