The Contractors Read online

  Advance Praise for

  THE CONTRACTORS

  Hunsicker’s latest book imagines a frightening scenario: private military contractors—the corporate soldiers usually found roaming the deserts of Iraq and Afghanistan—are operating within the borders of the United States. With a relentless pace and doses of black humor, Hunsicker creates a thrilling combination of What-If with an altogether plausible What-Actually-Might-Be, giving the reader a remarkable post-9/11, War-on-Drugs novel.

  —David Morrell, best-selling author of First Blood and The Brotherhood of the Rose, co-founder of the International Thriller Writers

  The Contractors is the fully loaded model with all the options. With streetwise and wisecracking Jon Cantrell and Piper at the wheel, they take the reader for one hell of a ride through the drug- and crime-ravaged parts of Texas that don’t appear on picture postcards or tourist brochures. Hunsicker’s eye for detail, sense of place, and his snappy dialogue shine through.

  —Reed Farrel Coleman, three-time Shamus Award–winning author of Hurt Machine

  The Contractors is film noir without the film, cyberpunk without the cyber. It’s a world to lose yourself in, a fascinating tale that lives in shades of grey. The prose is muscular, the images vivid, and the pace relentless. Simply put, Hunsicker kills it.

  —Marcus Sakey, author of Good People and host of the Travel Channel’s Hidden City

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Text copyright © 2014 Harry Hunsicker

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced,

  or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  ISBN-13: 9781477808726

  ISBN-10: 1477808728

  LCCN: 2013906585

  To Alison

  CONTENTS

  PART I

  “It is clearly…

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  PART II

  “America will never…

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  PART III

  “The global war…

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  PART IV

  “It is with…

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

  EPILOGUE

  “The chief business…

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PART I

  "It is clearly cost-effective to have contractors for a variety of things that military people need not do.… There are a lot of contractors, a growing number."

  —Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Interview, Johns Hopkins University, December 2005

  “The border region between Mexico and the US is a war zone right now, virtual anarchy. And war is not pretty, not for anybody. War is an ugly mess, compromises and Faustian pacts for everybody involved.”

  —US Senator Stephen McNally, Meet the Press, April 2010

  - CHAPTER ONE -

  The muzzle of the gun is everything. My entire existence, the alpha and omega.

  A black circle of emptiness pointing at my chest.

  I shiver, skin clammy. My vision tunnels. Sounds become muted.

  My memory is brittle, fragments of what used to be, bright images I now recognize as illusions, a reality that never was.

  I don’t want to die, of course, but I am ready for this to be over.

  The lies and deceptions, the running.

  They will find us; that’s what they do. The grid is too vast, the databases and electronic tentacles reach too far. They’ll wave the national security flag, and the pit bulls at Homeland Security will take over.

  An image of an Aztec warrior shimmers in my peripheral vision. He stares at me but offers no comment. The room smells of blood and liquor.

  I wonder if the warrior is real or if I’ve been drugged somehow. Perhaps he’s more real than I am.

  The muzzle of the gun seems to grow larger, and I imagine what the heat from the blast will feel like, a welcome if all-too-brief respite from the cold.

  Piper, my lover, is radiant, happy-looking like the day we met. She appears well rested, at peace. Her hair is the color of sunshine, and her skin glows.

  “Hello, Jon.” She raises the gun a notch higher, aims at my face. “How’s it hanging?”

  “W-w-where is it?” My voice sounds hollow, far away.

  She tilts her head toward the Aztec warrior, her eyes never leaving mine. The shoe box rests on the floor by the warrior’s sandaled feet.

  Eva Ramirez, her beauty transcending the circumstances, stands by my side, hands raised. She gasps when she sees the cardboard container. Her dark eyes sparkle, unable to hide her hunger for the contents of the box.

  Piper aims the gun at her and says, “You want it, don’t you, Eva?”

  Eva doesn’t speak.

  “Go ahead and take it.” Piper smiles. A long pause. “Just like you took Jon.”

  No one says anything. Her words swirl between the three of us like smoke from a condemned man’s cigarette. The Aztec warrior glistens with sweat.

  “They will come for us, yes?” Eva says. “Because of what has happe
ned in the desert and what is in the box, they will never let us rest.”

  Stress has made her accent more pronounced. She sounds like what she is: a scared young woman from Mexico who finds her days numbered, collateral damage in the wars between the narcotraffickers and the governments on either side of the border.

  Piper nods. After a moment, I do the same.

  The men in the helicopters will come after whoever has the box. What’s inside represents too many loose ends, an icon of a corrupted system marked with the innocuous words “Property of the US Government.”

  The dead DEA agent lies a few feet in front of the Aztec warrior. Blood pools beneath his body, spills out from his blue windbreaker.

  He is my colleague. We have identical badges.

  But are we the same? Will we meet similar fates?

  “Piper.” I hold out one hand. “Give me the gun.”

  My arm shakes, teeth chatter.

  “Choices have been made, Jon.” Piper tightens her grip on the weapon. “Every action has a consequence.”

  “Please.” I ease a step closer.

  She swings the muzzle toward me. Her trigger finger whitens, and the Aztec warrior smiles.

  - CHAPTER TWO -

  (One Week Earlier)

  I was not an honest man, but I was not evil either.

  Or so I liked to tell myself, especially when the lies jabbed at me like an aching tooth that couldn’t be pulled or sedated away.

  No matter.

  Introspection was for wussies and Oprah fans.

  I locked the dead bolt on the front door of the karaoke bar and shut the blinds.

  Almost midnight. The interior was dim, lit only by an exit sign and the fragmented neon glow from the Hispanic nightclub across the parking lot.

  Piper, blond hair back in a ponytail, kicked the Korean guy in the ass with one of her pointy-toed boots. The place was empty except for the three of us.

  The Korean groaned. He was lying on the floor near an overturned barstool and a couple of his teeth.

  “She’s only fourteen.” Piper stuck the muzzle of her Glock in the guy’s ear. “Lisa. That’s her name.”

  Chung Hee was the Korean. He owned the sing-along bar and another business on the back end of the dingy strip center.

  He craned his neck around Piper’s knee and stared at me, his expression pleading, a little cultural chauvinism that was probably not in his best short-term interest.

  “What are you looking at him for?” Piper rapped him on the head with her gun. “I’m the one asking the questions.”

  Chung Hee’s face reddened. He sputtered something in his native tongue.

  “You haven’t asked him anything yet.” I peered between the slats of the blinds.

  Nobody outside except for a bouncer in front of the place across the parking lot. Maybe a half dozen vehicles outside the club, all of them speckled with rain from the late summer thunderstorm that had passed by a few minutes earlier.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Piper said.

  No squad cars visible, the only worry at this point. Vice, in their unmarked units, didn’t work Sunday nights.

  “All you’ve done is pop this guy a couple of times and tell him a name.” I let the blinds drop. “You haven’t actually asked him a question.”

  Piper swore and marched across the room to me. “Every time I run a job lately”—she jabbed an index finger at my chest—“you nitpick me to death.”

  “Hey, don’t get pissy.” I held up my hands. “I’m just saying.”

  A shuffling noise behind us.

  Chung Hee was crawling toward his cell phone a few feet away.

  Piper strode toward the man. I followed. She grabbed the back of his head and jammed the gun under his nose.

  “Where is Lisa?” She glanced at me, smirked.

  “N-no problems with girls. I pay for protection already, yes.” Chung Hee held up his hands. “Much, much money. You go now, please.”

  “You sunuvabitch.” Piper reared back the gun for another blow.

  I caught her wrist. “We’re not interested in anybody else. Just Lisa.”

  Chung Hee cowered, forearm shielding his face.

  Piper struggled against my grip. I held fast, pulled her away. Shoved her toward the bar.

  Chung Hee spat some blood on the floor. Maybe another tooth, too.

  I knelt beside him and held up the picture of Lisa Sanders, an eighth-grader who the week before had told her stepfather to stick a Miller Lite tallboy where the sun don’t shine and stormed out of the family’s house in Mesquite, Texas, a blue-collar suburb of Dallas.

  “Word is she works for you.” I nodded toward the rear of the bar. “Out back, in the modeling studio.”

  Piper snorted at the phrase. In Korea Town, “modeling studio” was the term du jour for whorehouse.

  “You turn over Lisa,” I said, “and we’ll go away.”

  Chung Hee was a tough bird. He gave me a gap-toothed smile, blood dribbling down his chin. “Screw you.” He shook his head. “I pay for protection. You not get any girl from me.”

  I sighed.

  “Police come.” He puffed up. “Mess you up bad. You see.”

  And then—like he was a Korean Harry Potter who could call down reinforcements from the dark side—a beam of light splintered through the blinds, twitching across the empty bar.

  Piper ducked, stared at me.

  Outside, a two-way radio blared. Cop talk. Call signs, numbered commands.

  The front door rattled. Shoe leather scraped on concrete.

  Chung Hee grinned. Scooted backwards.

  On the other side of the door, the meaty sound of a palm slapping glass.

  “Police.” A man’s voice. “Anybody in there?”

  Chung Hee fought his way to his feet, opened his mouth.

  I shoved the barrel of my Glock between his lips. My free hand grabbed his throat. I back-walked him to a tiny alcove on the far side of the bar where the sound equipment was kept.

  “I suppose you want me to handle this?” Piper whispered.

  “Yeah, that’d be nice.” I pressed the Korean into the corner of the narrow space, both of us completely out of view of the front door. “I’m a little busy right now.”

  By the ambient light from the power buttons on the PA system, I could just see Chung Hee’s eyes grow wide as he realized we weren’t afraid of the police.

  From beyond the alcove, a metallic clank as the dead bolt unlocked.

  The blinds on the door rattled. Then, humid air and the muted noise of a city late at night filtered through the empty bar. Tires on rain-slicked asphalt, engines humming on the interstate a few blocks away.

  “Hey, guys. How y’all doing?” Piper’s cheerful but muffled voice followed by the door shutting behind her as she went outside to talk to the police.

  Chung Hee struggled, made a huffing noise.

  I stuck the gun in his mouth a little deeper.

  He tried to spit it out.

  “Suck, don’t blow.” I winked. “That’s just an expression.”

  He quit fighting. His nostrils flared with each breath.

  I stared into his eyes while straining to hear anything from the front.

  Piper was good at this sort of thing. She was ex–law enforcement like myself and could talk the cop talk, put them at ease. Didn’t hurt either that she was a hottie. Tall and lean, a body built for Commandment-breaking, she looked like a C-list TV star whose name you couldn’t remember, or maybe that porn actress who used to date Charlie Sheen back in the nineties.

  We’d be okay. Probably.

  The air-conditioner kicked on. A bead of perspiration trickled down the small of my back. A sour onion smell wafted off of Chung Hee, the sharp tang of fear.

  I started counting in my head.

  One Mississippi.

  Two Mississippi.

  At thirty-seven the blinds rattled again and the door opened. Piper, laughing, told an officer to have a nice
night.

  Footsteps toward the alcove.

  “We’re good.” She stuck her head in.

  I pulled the gun from Chung Hee’s mouth. He slumped against the wall.

  “Back to the matter at hand.” Piper flicked on a tiny overhead light and held up another photo of the missing teen. “Are we gonna do this the hard way or the harder way?”

  “I pay good money,” Chung Hee said. “Sinclair take every month.”

  I shook my head, cursed softly.

  “Oh, swell,” Piper groaned.

  Sinclair. The guy who hired us to find Lisa.

  - CHAPTER THREE -

  Piper and I stood on either side of Chung Hee as he entered a code into the keypad by the front door of the modeling studio.

  We were outside, at the rear of the karaoke bar. A light rain continued to fall, coating the city in an oily sheen that hid the decay. This section of the strip center was not visible from the street. The heavy metal barrier clicked open, and the three of us stepped into the foyer.

  One way to describe a whorehouse in the Korean part of Dallas would be to talk about the visuals.

  The garish red drapes against milk-white, cheaply textured Sheetrock walls. The purple neon that served as molding. Behind the battered Office Depot desk hung a black velvet painting of a naked, apparently Hispanic, Pamela Anderson embracing a tiger.

  But the things you could see didn’t quite capture the essence of the place as well as what you could smell. This strange combination of tobacco smoke, incense, bleach, and what must have been gallons of cheap perfume, all layered over the faint stench of a locker room.

  The pungent aroma of a working brothel.

  An Asian woman about forty, a manager/madam type, sat behind the desk. Obviously, we’d encountered each other in the past because she jumped up and called my name.

  “Jon Cantrell.” She threw an ashtray at my face. “You motherflocker.”

  The ashtray sailed past me and hit Chung Hee in the nose. He fell to the floor.

  “Hello, Sunshine.” I aimed my pistol at her. “We’ve met before, right?”

  The woman reached toward an open drawer.

  Piper, gun up, flanked to one side and moved in fast. She kicked the drawer shut.

  “Easy there, Miss Kitty.” She pulled a set of handcuffs from her belt. “Hands on top of your head.”