Ballistic Read online

  Feng made his way past three sets of guards to reach Chou’s fourth-floor office. The secretary who had telephoned him greeted Feng without a smile and checked his name off on a list, then led him past her desk and through a leather-padded door into Chou’s private office. As she left him there and closed the door behind her, Chou turned from his window, smiling primly as he waved Feng toward a nearby chair.

  When both of them were seated, Chou said, “I’ve identified the woman.”

  Momentarily confused, Feng echoed, “Woman?”

  “In Malaysia. Well, now in Jakarta. From the ministry.”

  The commodore remembered now, felt foolish for his lapse. “Of course,” he said. “So she was one of yours.”

  “Still is, apparently,” Chou said. “Our comrades with the Flying Ax have been unable to locate her.”

  “And the man?” Feng asked.

  “Still unidentified. Survivors who have seen him claim he is American, perhaps British.”

  “Your agency collaborates with the United States and England?” Feng inquired, surprised.

  “On rare occasions,” Chou admitted. “Not this time, I can assure you. Any interaction on this matter is unauthorized.”

  “About this woman...”

  “Maia Lee. She holds a rank equivalent to a sergeant in the army.”

  From the rank, Feng knew that she wasn’t an upstart rookie with the ministry.

  “She’s chosen to deceive you, then,” he said.

  “It would appear so,” Chou acknowledged. “In the circumstances, I believe it may be best for all concerned if others deal with her. A trial for insubordination in this case might only highlight certain...lapses, shall we say?”

  “You mean the Flying Ax.”

  “If they can manage it,” Chou said. “If not, there are covert alternatives within the ministry itself.”

  Feng cleared his throat. “This incident with the Dutch freighter—”

  “Goes unmentioned in Zhongnanhai,” Chou said, referring to the sector of central Beijing, adjacent to the Forbidden City, where China’s president and State Council conducted their daily business. “There is no proof of a link to us, and there will be none.”

  “Ah.” The commodore knew that he should have felt relieved, but apprehension nagged at him. “Still,” he persisted, “there have been demands.”

  “With no specific reference to any weapon,” Chou replied. “As we demanded in advance.”

  “You place your trust in these fanatics?”

  “To the point where they desire cooperation in the future,” Chou explained. “And fear retaliation if they break their promises.”

  Feng thought that he would rather try hand-feeding a mad dog, but kept it to himself. The small, silent recorder in his pocket captured Chou’s words for posterity. Another weapon he could use in self-defense—or, at the very least, to make sure that he didn’t die alone.

  Rawamangun, East Jakarta

  “DO YOU TRUST HIM?” Maia asked, when they were half a mile beyond the counterfeiting plant, smoke showing in the sky behind them.

  “What else do we have?” Bolan asked.

  In the middle distance, sirens. Probably police, maybe the first fire trucks arriving.

  “It could be a trap,” Maia said.

  “Sure it could,” he answered. “But it’s still the first lead that we’ve had on an address for Jin Au-Yo. Blowing it off without a look feels wrong to me.”

  “I understand,” she said. “But if it is a trap?”

  “We fight on through it,” Bolan told her. “Try to grab one of the shooters. See if we can squeeze fresh information out of him.”

  She nodded, kept whatever she was thinking to herself. Bolan could see she wasn’t sold on the idea. There were two ways to play it: win her over to the plan or cut her loose. In either case, when Bolan hit the door at the address they had been given, he had no use for a distracted backup second-guessing every move he made.

  “All right,” he said into the silence filling the Toyota. “It can only play two ways. Either the guy back there was lying to us or he played it straight. If he was lying, then we have two other options to consider. One, he fed us anything that he could think of, hoping it would save his life.”

  “Which didn’t work,” Maia said.

  “No. We couldn’t bring him with us, and we couldn’t trust him not to warn his boss. His time was up, regardless.”

  “And the second option?” Maia asked.

  “If he lied deliberately, knowing there’s a trap in place, Jin must have put him up to it. That mean’s he’s thinking two, three moves ahead of us and knew that we’d be going to the factory instead of any other target we might pick. I’d hate to think that he’s that smart—or we’re that dumb.”

  “You’re right,” she said. “We have no choice.”

  “I have no choice,” Bolan corrected her. “You’re not obliged to tag along.”

  She shot a sidelong glare at him. “How do you say it in America? You’re dumping me?”

  “Your choice,” he said, then asked, “What did you tell your people when you checked in with the ministry?”

  She hesitated for a moment, then replied, “I did not mention you. It seemed...too awkward. Why risk being summoned home for an interrogation, when we have a chance to finish the assignment?”

  “And you haven’t called since then?” Bolan asked.

  “No. Same reason, and we’ve been too busy.”

  “That’s better,” he suggested, “if you want to drop out now. Just tell them that your leads played out. You can’t find Jin.”

  “While you go on to find the missiles by yourself?” she challenged him.

  “It’s not a competition,” Bolan told her.

  “They belong to China!”

  “One’s already up in smoke,” he said. “Smart money says the other one will have to go the same way, if and when we find it.”

  “I must be there,” she insisted.

  “Fine,” he answered. “Just make sure your head is in the game.”

  Pondok Indah, South Jakarta

  JIN AU-YO SNAPPED his cell phone shut and shouted through the open office door for Ma Mingxia. His bodyguard appeared as if he had been waiting just outside the door, expecting to be summoned.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “We’re leaving,” Jin informed him. “Now. Have Dewei bring the car around at once.”

  “What shall I pack, sir?” his faithful servant asked.

  “Nothing. We have no time to waste.”

  Ma left without another word, as Jin turned toward his wall safe, tucked behind a fifteenth-century painting. Setting the piece of art aside, Jin opened the safe and removed all he needed to flee in a rush. Passports in three names, none of them his own, all with supporting ID documents and credit cards. Traveler’s checks. And a Norinco QSW-06 semiautomatic pistol with factory standard suppressor, chambered for 5.8 mm DAP92 armor-piercing ammunition. Its box magazine held twenty rounds, and Jin put three spares in his pockets.

  He was ready—and beside himself with fury that he had to leave.

  A contact from the Indonesian National Police had tipped him to the raid in Pulo Gadung. Goh Chok Swee and his three guards were dead, the workers scattered who knew where. That call had come mere seconds after Chou Hua Tian had phoned him from Beijing to speak a woman’s name.

  Jin’s mortal enemy, although they’d never met.

  He meant to keep it that way, until he could lay a trap for this infernal Maia Lee and her companion, seemingly American, who still remained anonymous.

  And that meant running while he had the chance.

  It went against the grain with Jin, but he wasn’t foolhardy. While his enemies were scouring Jakarta for him, he coul
d regroup at his secret place and lay the groundwork necessary to destroy them. If it happened that they fell into his hands alive, so much the better, but he wouldn’t miss the opportunity to kill them outright if it came to him.

  No, make that when it came. He had too much at stake to contemplate defeat.

  “The car is waiting, sir,” Ma Mingxia told him, from the doorway.

  Jin followed him out and through the suite that he had occupied for eighteen months, as much a home to him as any other place he’d known. He had no way of knowing whether he would ever see those rooms again, but they held nothing that couldn’t be easily replaced. That was the simple part.

  Survival might require a bit more ingenuity.

  Four soldiers waited in the hallway outside Jin’s apartment. They surrounded him, with Ma Mingxia leading, on the short walk to the elevator, waiting with their hands on holstered weapons as the empty car arrived. Downstairs, his driver waited with the Humvee, armor plating hidden underneath its jet-black paint.

  When they were all inside the vehicle, Dewei turned in the driver’s seat to ask, “Where shall we go, sir?”

  “Banten,” he said. “The country place.”

  No more description was required. Dewei faced forward, put the Humvee into gear and headed west.

  * * *

  MAIA LEE KEPT TRACK of urban landmarks as they rolled through sunbaked streets toward Pondok Indah, on the south side of Jakarta. Cooper made good time along Jalan Sultan Iskandar Muda, rolling past large auto dealerships and Club Aquarius. On Jalan Metro Pondok Indah, traffic flowed around them, some of it diverting to the giant Pondok Indah Mall, more to the sprawling Padang Golf Club on their left.

  The man they sought might be a member of that club, but he didn’t reside upon its grounds—at least, if they could trust the information gained at gunpoint from his lackey at the factory. Both that man and the building would be smoking ruins now, and they were forced to take his dying word or leave it, gambling their own lives on a hope that he’d been truthful.

  If he had, Jin Au-Yo would be found beyond the golf links, in a high-rise condominium on Jalan Metro Kencana 4. It stood to reason that he would be guarded, doubly so in light of their recent attacks on his turf, and that he wouldn’t yield without a fight.

  So be it.

  Maia yearned to finish her assignment and go home. She had worn out her welcome in Malaysia and Jakarta, saw no entertainment value in remaining and had scratched both off her short list of potential holiday retreats. In fact, if she could make it through the next few hours, she would be happy with a desk job. Even with dismissal from her ministry position, if it came to that.

  She had assumed the mission with a sense of pride at being chosen to defend her homeland. If, as she’d suspected, there were traitors to be rooted out along the way, so much the better. Maia recognized the problems China faced in dealing with the world at large and thought those difficulties were best mended from within, by people like herself, who placed the country’s welfare first, above their own.

  But was that true?

  Why had she really kept the secret of her unexpected meeting with Matt Cooper, and their collaboration toward a common goal? Was she afraid of being called back to Beijing and chastised, even slated for “reeducation” by the ministry? Or had she hoped to find the missiles, save the day and claim all of the credit for herself?

  A small voice in her head asked Maia why it mattered, if she got results. She knew the answer to that question, but had difficulty trying to articulate it. Something about duty, honor, sublimation of her own desires to China’s greater need.

  Which sounded like a steaming pile of crap when she spelled it out that way. Why should she not advance herself whenever possible, while following her orders from the ministry?

  And if it all went wrong somehow—if she should fail, yet manage to survive against all odds, what then?

  Blame the American, she thought, feeling a twinge of guilt. But just a twinge.

  As far as Maia knew, Beijing had no idea that he existed, much less that they had joined forces to pursue the stolen Brave Wind missiles. If anything went wrong, who would contest her version of the facts, whatever that might be?

  Maia focused on success, willing the gangster Jin Au-Yo to be at home when they came calling, trusting they could find a way to make him spill his secret knowledge of the madmen who had bought the missiles from him. Where they might be found, perhaps. Whatever Jin might wish to share.

  Before they sent him to the hell that he deserved.

  Beiheyan Street, Beijing

  FANN LIEU EXAMINED his reflection in the men’s-room mirror, wishing he had time to leave the ministry and have his hair trimmed. As it was, the urgent summons from the Deputy Assistant Minister for State Security had barely left him time enough to use the lavatory, wash his hands and now—an afterthought, but still important—straighten the knot of his necktie.

  On his desk, two floors below the men’s room, in the office space he shared with half a dozen other analysts, Fann had a tall stack of reports pertaining to recent guerrilla attacks on Chinese arms shipments to Sudan. He had been wading through the documents for two days now, with no end in sight, and Fann was no closer to identifying the persons responsible than he had been on day one.

  Was that why he’d been summoned to the fourth floor? Was a reprimand—or worse—awaiting him?

  Fann swallowed the lump of apprehension in his throat and left the restroom, moving briskly along the corridor to Chou Hua Tian’s office. If there was trouble to be had, best face it quickly and be done with it.

  Chou’s secretary took Fann’s name while barely glancing at his face, buzzed through on her desk intercom, then led him through a door behind her desk to meet the deputy assistant minister. Chou didn’t rise from where he sat behind a spacious desk, much less offer to shake Fann’s hand. As Chou’s subordinate, Fann took the cue and did not extend his own hand, but ducked into the chair Chou indicated with a careless wave.

  “You have been with the ministry for nine years,” Chou announced, not making it a question.

  Fann nearly answered, Almost ten, but swallowed the reply. He would gain nothing from correcting his superior. Instead he nodded, waiting.

  “In that time,” Chou continued, “you have done no active fieldwork.”

  Did that call for a response? An explanation or apology? Fann split the difference and answered, “No, sir.”

  “We have decided it is time for you to broaden your horizons,” Chou announced. “There is a matter that requires attention in Jakarta, and we feel you are well suited to perform the task.”

  Fann caught his eyebrows on the rise and reeled them back. “Jakarta, sir?”

  “Indonesia,” Chou replied, as if addressing a slow-witted child.

  “Yes, sir,” Fann responded, careful not to snap at his superior. “If I may ask, what is the task?”

  “You are acquainted with a field agent named Maia Lee,” Chou said. Again, not asking.

  “Yes, sir.” Feeling the need to elaborate cautiously, Fann said, “We trained together at the University of International Relations.”

  “Where both of you excelled,” Chou said. “Are you aware of the events surrounding an attack on the guided missile destroyer Shenyang?”

  “In broad terms, sir. Only what has been reported in the media.” Or whispered in the halls, Fann could have said, but rather added, “Nothing classified, of course.”

  “Your friend has been assigned to the investigation of those behind the attack,” Chou revealed. “The area of her assignment was Malaysia and Jakarta.”

  Was? Fann felt a knot of apprehension forming in his stomach. Had something happened to her? He bit his tongue, waiting.

  “It pains me,” Chou said, pressing on, “to inform you that Maia Lee has become...
unreliable. She has broken off communication with the ministry, and she’s begun to act erratically. There have been incidents. Fatalities. We now have reason to believe that she’s collaborating with an American agent toward some unknown end that may be detrimental to the PRC.”

  “An American agent, sir?” Fann was uncertain whether he could trust his ears.

  “According to the information we’ve received,” Chou said. “Your mission for the ministry is to locate your one-time friend and issue a direct order for her to contact headquarters at once.”

  “Of course, sir,” Fann said, before the sheer enormity of it sank in. “But in Jakarta there must be, how many people?”

  “Approximately 9.5 million,” Chou replied. “Do not allow that fact to daunt you, Agent Fann. We have a plan. The first thing you must do is...”

  Pondok Indah, South Jakarta

  “IT’S CLEAR,” Maia Lee said, hissing a curse between clenched teeth. “There’s no one here.”

  Bolan emerged from one of three large bedrooms, carrying his Pinda SS2 with its twin muzzles pointed toward the deep shag carpet underfoot.

  “Jin bailed,” he said. “And from the looks of things, it wasn’t long ago.”

  “You think someone alerted him?” Maia asked.

  The soldier frowned, then answered, “I don’t see how they could. We left nobody at the factory to make a call.”

  Maia moved toward the nearest window, peering through rain-speckled glass as if the answer to the riddle lay somewhere outside. It likely did, in fact, but Bolan knew they wouldn’t pick it out by staring at the city skyline.

  They could toss the place, but Bolan didn’t think they’d find a note from Jin Au-Yo directing them to wherever he’d gone. And there was passing time to be considered. Someone might have seen them entering the building, possibly a triad lookout, though their quarry had left no one in the condo to secure it.

  “Well, at least we know it is Jin’s place,” Maia said, turning from the window now and staring at a wall of photographs depicting Jin Au-Yo with people Bolan didn’t recognize. Some of them wore sports gear, others looked like celebrities, though none he knew by sight. Some of the backdrops were Jakartan, others looked Chinese.