Page 1 of Broken Wheels

Prologue

The door to his office opened, and he glanced up from his task.

One look at her face as she crossed his lush carpet told him he wasn’t going to like whatever was heading right at him.

She came to a halt in front of his large solid oak desk, her cheeks flushed. “Sir, I?—”

He held up a hand. “Let me guess. They failed.”

“Yes, sir.”

He scowled. “All they had to do was take out one man. Tell Peters to cut them loose.” Incompetency made his blood boil. He paid for results, and he expected them.

“They’re already dead. They were killed in the attack.”

It took a lot to derail him. This amounted to nothing more than a bump in the road, and a small bump at that. He shrugged. “Well, that’s a thousand dollars I won’t have to pay out. And it also saves me the task of killing them later.”

But it still left him with a problem.

And only one solution.

He gave a deep sigh. “I guess I should have known better than to try to handle this myself. One should always rely on professionals.” He paused. “Call him. Tell him his assignment is on hold and this one takes top priority.” He hated doing this, but the present situation called for the best man he had.

She nodded. “What are his instructions?”

He got up from his desk and walked over to the window. He stared at the outside world.

This is getting serious.

“I need him to track down these fucking nerds and get rid of them.” He glanced at her over his shoulder. “Let him know there’s a bonus if he can link that fucking ginger genius in this and make sure he’s taken care of too.”

“That might prove more difficult. CrossBow has just been under attack. Surely they’ll be on their guard now?”

He snorted. “Possibly, but they don’t know who the target was. They certainly won’t connect it to Dr. Josh Malone.” He smiled. “And they won’t figure that out until it’s too late.”

Chapter 1

March, 2024

Who in their right mind would want to live in a place like this? The March weather in Milwaukee was terrible, especially with eddies of snow swirling around the overgrown lot, and then the snow vanished as if it had never been there.

Lord, it’s cold. Bitterly cold. He should have worn the leather jacket instead of the nylon one he’d grabbed when they called to tell him his quarry had gone to ground.

He’d left his home in Chicago and rushed to Midway to catch a Learjet to Milwaukee’s Mitchell International Airport. Now that he was here, he wished they’d sent someone else. Sure, the weather in Chicago was pretty similar to Milwaukee, but at least there he could sit in front of the fireplace and sip the Yamazaki 55 scotch he’d gotten as a bonus for his last mission. But no, he had to answer the phone, and now he was freezing his private parts off.

He hunkered down, doing his best to stay out of the biting wind. His target was still there, so that was good. He didn’t like the idea of having to chase him all over hell and back. He smirked. Hell seemed appropriate, all things considered. Starting with the garish edifice his quarry had chosen as his stronghold.

The dilapidated building with gang tags that covered the walls should have been condemned years ago. Broken windows and mortar missing from half the bricks had left the place open to both inclement weather and temperature extremes. But for anyone who cared to look closely, there were signs the place hadn’t been abandoned completely. Someone had cleared the brush away from the doors, leaving the entrance easily accessible. Lights were visible all day and night. And if one were patient enough, a lone, furtive figure could be seen inside.

They’d been keeping close tabs on Cliff Tanner. Well, on all the basement-dwellers, if truth be told, ever since the project was shut down eight years ago. Most of the men involved had gone on to other gigs, but a few of them had still felt the need to dig around in places they had no business being.

Not that they were digging anymore. He’d seen to that.

Tanner was the last of them. He’d hacked into a server—no mean feat, considering the layers of security—through a backdoor he’d implanted before he left, and from what they could tell, he’d been making use of it to steal documents, including a particular one he definitely wasn’t meant to see.

No one was.

Damn. That is such a pity.