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I started walking down Overtoom street, thinking I would enter the park from Van Baerlestraat, the northwest side of the eastern quadrant of the park, and a good distance from Boezeman’s apartment. That would maximize my chances of seeing Hilger while he was focused on spotting Boezeman, before he had a chance to see me.
It made sense, but suddenly it felt wrong. The iceman didn’t like it, and he was trying to tell me why.
And then I knew. I’d considered the possibility that Hilger would be here. Why couldn’t he, with all his experience, have come to similar, mirror-image conclusions? Sure, by all means, jam Boezeman’s lock. But then monitor the door some other way, from somewhere else in the park-from where he could ambush me.
I thought for a moment. What about another man? I doubted he had any left. Dox had said four on that first phone call. After New York and Singapore, that left Hilger.
A camera, then? A magnetic mount, or even duct tape, on the iron fence would work. And then he could wait anywhere. He could set up at Van Baerlestraat, the direction from which he knew I would hunt him. Lie flat on the ground, the muzzle of the gun up, waiting and watching.
I changed direction and entered the park from Stadhouderskade, the eastern end. As soon as I was inside the gate, I moved off the path and into a line of trees. I dropped into a squat, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dark. There were a few people about, all with umbrellas, all hurrying through the rain, doubtless on their way home from work. I saw no one loitering anywhere.
I moved slowly along the trees at the northeastern edge of the park, knees and elbows the whole way, my face an inch from the sodden ground. It felt like coming home. I paused frequently to check my surroundings. A few bicyclists went by on the path to my left, but that was all.
A hundred yards in, I stopped. Straight ahead of me was a thick cluster of trees. It was where I would have waited for me. I crept closer. There, at the base of the thickest of them. Prone on the ground. Hilger.
I waited and watched him. He was on the eastern side of the tree, taking cover and concealment from anyone approaching from the west. It was as I’d thought: he’d anticipated me. Only I, and the iceman, had played one step further ahead.
It was hard to tell in the dim light, but it looked like he was holding a pistol in his right hand. Something glowed periodically on his left. A small monitor, maybe a mobile phone. I’d been right about the camera setup, too, which meant he had no one with him.
Slowly, painstakingly, I circled behind him, and then gradually moved in. The rain muffled sound, but I didn’t need it. If there was one thing my body had learned and would never forget, it was how to move silently through the mud. Hilger had said his conflict had been in the desert. Too bad for him.
Twelve yards. Ten. It was easy to get overeager at the moment of the kill, and I forced myself to stay slow and steady.
“Don’t move,” I heard from behind me, in a commanding tone.
It was Hilger’s voice. I froze and didn’t try to turn. The person on the ground in front of me remained still.
“Very slowly, place the gun on the ground, far from your body. Then get your hands up high, fingers spread.”
I did as he had asked, then snuck a glance back. I couldn’t see much more than a silhouette holding a pistol, ten feet away. The muzzle was abnormally long, and I realized it was a suppressor. With the gun on me, it was too far to rush him. If he shot center mass, the Dragon Skin might carry the day. But if he aimed low or high, I’d be done.
“Who’s the guy on the ground?” I asked, wanting to engage him, see if I could create an opening.
“I have no idea.”
“You just shot someone to use as a decoy?”
I heard him laugh. “It worked, didn’t it?”
I couldn’t deny it.
“Are you going to give me a hard time about it?” I heard him say. “How many people did you kill this week?”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
He laughed again, and I felt a slow-burning rage ignite deep within me. He hadn’t moved to pat me down, probably because he was wary of getting too close after our run-in in Saigon. I had the knife Boaz gave me clipped to my front pocket. If I rushed him, I could probably open him up even as he was shooting me. I might die, but I’d take him with me to hell.
Do it. Do it now.
It was the iceman talking.
No. There’s a better way.
A distraction. That’s what I needed. Something to buy myself the extra second.
“Tell me where Dox is,” I heard him say, and I realized that was my opening. He didn’t know how messed up the big sniper was. He thought he was here.
“He’s with Boezeman,” I said. “Boezeman let him into the container. He disarmed the bomb.”
There was a second of silence while his mind grappled with his new understanding of just how much I knew. Boezeman, container, bomb, disarmed…it was a lot to process. It required thought, and made it hard to focus.
“You’re lying,” he said.
This time I was the one to laugh. “You’re right. You want to know where he is? Dox. Take him out.”
Hilger had spent enough time in the military, and was sufficiently acquainted with Dox’s deadly skills, for the words take him out to have an almost Pavlovian effect. Klaxons were going off in his mind now: Rain must be wearing commo gear, Dox is close by with a scoped rifle, where’s the line of sight, get off the X-
I spun and rushed him. I was five feet away when the first slug hit my chest. I felt like I’d run into a tree, and the air was driven out of my lungs. He got off two more, both to my torso, and then I had both hands wrapped around the gun. I twisted hard to the left, forcing the muzzle out to his right. He rotated his body to keep his wrist from breaking, and two more shots went off to the side. We struggled with the gun.
I couldn’t draw breath. It felt like I’d been kicked by a horse, by three horses. Hilger snapped a knee into my groin and pain rocketed through my abdomen. I got a hand around the long suppressor and shoved back and over, toward Hilger’s right shoulder. He couldn’t get out of the way, and he couldn’t let go. His wrist snapped. He howled and I tore the gun away from him.
I took a step back, and with my last strength blasted a desperate side kick into his knee. He yelled again and collapsed. I fell to my knees a few feet away, fumbling with the pistol, trying to breathe, breathe…
I bobbled the gun and dropped it in the mud. Hilger, his face a rictus of pain, was struggling with his belt buckle with his left hand. I remembered Saigon, and thought, belt knife.
Of course, no backup pistol. That’s what I’d seen in the dead guy’s hand.
Breathe, breathe…
I groped for the gun. I couldn’t find it. The outer edges of my vision were going dark.
Hilger twisted the buckle, and suddenly there was a blade in his hand.
I gritted my teeth, and with all my strength tried to suck air into my lungs. No go. Tiny red dots danced before my eyes. My phony command to Dox had unbalanced Hilger enough to deny him the time and the focus to shoot for my head or pelvic girdle, but the rounds had reverberated through the Dragon Skin to hammer my diaphragm into spasm. The knee to my groin had made it worse. My brain wasn’t getting oxygen, and it was begi
Hilger slid toward me, the knife in his left hand, his left forearm digging into the mud, pulling himself forward like an injured reptile.
I rubbed frantically at my diaphragm. A tiny whistle of air made its way into my lungs.
Hilger slashed with the knife. I fell away from him to my back, getting my feet between us, still rubbing, trying to coax my diaphragm out of spasm. Another snatch of air stole down my throat, like a prisoner dashing across a mine field.
Another slash. The blade hit my boot. I drew a tiny, hitching breath. Hilger screamed and slashed again. Again he hit a boot.