He kept a pistol in a drawer in his desk, but there was enough security in this row house to where he had little worry of being surprised bysomeone making it all the way from the street up to the third floor without him at least hearing about it.
“Come in.”
Big Mike stepped in. J.W. expected a smile on the man’s face; he knew that five of the twenty-one targets had been successfully taken out in the first two hours of the operation, and it sounded like the police heading to Washington Circle meant he was about to learn about the sixth successful job now.
But Mike’s eyes were wide, a little unfixed.
This did not look good.
“What’s happened?”
Scardino crossed the office, sat at a chair in front of the desk, and leaned forward, his forearms on the desk’s edge.
“It’s Spiral.”
“What about him?”
Scardino seemed confused. Slowly, he said, “Apparently…our professional assassin was professionally assassinated.”
“What?”
“Spiral’s dead. His entire fucking team is dead.”
J.W.’s ebullient mood of five seconds earlier went up in smoke.
“What…the…fuck? Your guys, too?”
“All five.”
“They weren’t supposed to be involved with the hit.”
“They were standing watch outside Ortega’s building. They were in two vehicles; one was a couple blocks away. Witnesses report a single person stepped up to each vehicle. Two gunfights broke out. This was while Spiral was upstairs. Something happened up there, Spiral blew his way into the condo, then was riddled with gunfire.”
“By Ortega?” J.W. asked.
“It wasn’t Ortega,” Scardino muttered softly. “No…there’s a professional outfit out there. And they’re onto us somehow.
“Any way you slice it, J.W., this was a fucking shit show.”
“You have a way of tying off the compromise of losing the Gauntlet men?”
Scardino shrugged his shoulders and nodded. “Yeah. American heroes. Came across a bad actor about to assassinate someone. They tried to help. Fell in the line of duty, or some bullshit like that. We can sell it.”
Westwood said, “What if it happens again?”
“Gauntlet is everywhere. It stands to reason that they would be near the scene of another hit around here. We need Gauntlet in this fight. Gracie and the Chinese don’t have the assets to support our five hit men.” Quickly he corrected himself. “Four hit men.”
J.W. said, “Any idea who protected Ortega tonight?”
“No, but we’re going to be looking at cameras in the area. We didn’t feel the need to bug Ortega’s condo…she was considered a low-threat target, which obviously was a mistake. But there are other cams in the area, and even a team that good will leave some footprints. Whoever rescued her tonight, whether they were government agents or private forces…we’ll find them.”
J.W. did not hide his concern. “If they have Ortega now, and she’s talking, what does she know?”
“She knows that Lewis Shaw used her credentials to obtain intelligence regarding the operation in Nicaragua, and then someone used that intelligence to affect the outcome in Nicaragua. She suspects Shaw used her credentials on the other breaches.”
J.W. rose from behind his desk. “He passed that intelligence tome, Mike.I’mthe one who passed that intel to the Chinese!”
“Ortega can’t possibly know that. She doesn’t know who he disseminated it to, that’s why she was trying to spy on Shaw herself.”
