The Edge Of Justice

The Edge Of Justice Chapter 36

The hallway was dark, so I blinked my night-vision back on, and took a long look. The hall stretched out in front of us for at least fifty feet, before ending in a T. We traversed it quickly, checking both hallways. One ended in a closet, the other stretched deeper into the darkened building. We searched for close to an hour, finding no one and nothing.

"Maybe we should head outside and interrogate one of the guards," Katrina suggested, and I shot that idea down quickly.

"I doubt any of them know anything useful. It'd be a waste of time. Four days from when Malcolm told me is tonight. I suggest we wait, and see what happens."

"I have something," Stacey's voice said after a long while with no interruptions.

"What've yougot?"

"Peter Miller, real name William Miller, ex-British Intelligence, fell off the face of that planet when his wife and two sons were killed in retaliation for an op in which he took down a Malaysian drug lord. Has been spotted by facial recognition in Manila, Barcelona, Brussels, and most recently, Afghanistan and today in Russia. He is always there twenty four to fourty eight hours before Neal's people do something."

"So he's what to Neal?"

"Not sure. It seems that his background would make him a pretty good mission coordinator, and he's got training in interrogation, speaks four languages, is a pretty good marksman, and was ruthless during his time in the field."

"Great," I sighed. "Another spook." I turned to Katrina. "How many of you fuckers are there?"

"Too many, it seems," she replied thoughtfully.

"Stacey," I said, "Any idea what he's doing here?"

"None whatsoever."

I thought for a moment. "Well, it seems we don't have a choice. We'll play it by ear. Katrina find a spot where you won't be seen. I'm gonna head into the ducts and wait myself. When they get here, we'll spring whatever trap they've got for us, and hope we can out-fight or out-think them when they drop the other shoe. Maybe we'll come out on top."

Katrina nodded and wished me good luck, and disappeared into the hallways behind me, and I found my way into the ducts to settle in. Hours passed.Darkness. So deep it was almost tangible. I shifted my body in the air duct, trying to find a comfortable position, but to no avail. It had been seven hours since I entered this building, five and a half since I had entered the duct system, and four since I had chosen this spot to wait.

An alarm buzzed in my ear and Stacey's voice wove through the small earpiece."Possible target approaching. Three klicks from your position."

"Why can't we use miles instead of klicks?"

"Fine. Five miles." Close to ten minutes later I heard the faint sounds of car doors closing, and raised voices, getting closer and closer to the building. I heard the door open, and the voices spilled through the doorway, now loud enough to make out the words.

"It doesn't matter if she made us, she still didn't know who we were." The first voice said.

"Maybe, but it's still not gonna be good. He's gonna be mad." the second one answered.

The room filled with light then, and I had to close my eyes to slits, blinded from sitting in absolute darkness for so long. The light played tricks on me for a moment before I could open my eyes fully. Raising myself onto my elbows, I inched slowly forward in the duct, moving silently toward a grate less that foot from my current position. I peered through, making sure not to come all the way forward in case one of them looked toward the grating to see my eyes staring back at them. The men entered my field of vision and I scrutinized them carefully. Both men were over six feet tall, around two hundred pounds, with bulges beneath each of their jackets that just screamed gun. I had dealt with these types many times before, and knew they would not pose a problem. Men who liked big guns and talked tough were usually the easiest to take down, considering they had never fired the guns in the first place.