Silent Assassin(83)

Morgan and Conley waited in Conley’s car on a small side street until they got the call. Conley spoke a few words of Portuguese.

“That was Valter,” said Conley. “He gave us the go-ahead.”

They drove up the hill the familiar way. Paulinho’s soldiers watched them suspiciously as they passed.

“Just keep looking forward,” said Conley. “Don’t stare at any of them.”

In a few minutes, they reached Paulinho’s compound. They were waved inside, then frisked. They took Morgan’s Walther from him.

“You didn’t tell me they were going to take my goddamn gun away,” said Morgan.

“I didn’t know,” said Conley. “But I didn’t expect they’d let us bring it in.”

They were taken to the main room, where they had met Paulinho before. People there seemed to be tense. There was not a smile in the room.

“Where’s Novokoff?” asked Morgan.

“Where’s Paulinho?” asked Conley. And then Morgan noticed that the drug lord was nowhere to be seen.

“No Paulinho,” said Valter. “No more. Valter now.” He spoke in Portuguese at them.

“Conley, what the hell is going on?”

“Looks like there was a coup,” said Conley. “Valter says he’s in charge now. And the men with guns seem to agree with him.”

He continued to speak, and Conley translated. “He said the cocaine is going on the boat.”

“What about Novokoff?” asked Morgan.

“He says there’s no deal anymore.”

“Behind you,” said Conley, although he didn’t have to. Morgan sensed the others moving around him, and the women quietly slinking out of the room.

“On my mark,” said Conley.

Morgan saw a reflection in the sunglasses of a man in front of him that a guard with a submachine gun had maneuvered behind him.

“Go!”

Morgan spun around and knocked the gun from the hands of the guard behind him. He grabbed it and took the man as a human shield. Beside him, Conley had grabbed a Kalashnikov. Both of them sprayed bullets, sending everyone running for cover. Conley must have activated his comm, because he was shouting in Portuguese for the airlift.

“Let’s go!” he said.

They dashed out of Paulinho’s house, Morgan providing cover fire as they ran.

“We need to find higher ground!” cried Conley. “That’s where we’re going to rendezvous with the chopper!” Then he took out his walkie-talkie and screamed into it in Portuguese.

Morgan reached a vantage point where he caught a glimpse of the view. The favela sprawled endlessly below. This was not friendly territory. But in the distance, Morgan saw their salvation: a black chopper, approaching fast.

“Up there!”

There was a two-story house with clear airspace around it and a broad flat roof. Morgan shot out the lock to the front door, and they went in. A woman in the kitchen screamed, but they just went upstairs. There were stairs up to the roof, where a recreation area had been arranged, with a barbecue pit and plastic lawn chairs.

They shot around the corner at the bottom of the stairs.

The chopper set down and two BOPE agents stepped out, giving them cover fire. Morgan and Conley got on board. The two BOPE agents got back on, and they continued to shoot as they gained altitude. Soon, they were far above the fray, safely out of range of bullets. Still, for all the sweetness of being alive, Morgan still tasted the bitter flavor of defeat.





CHAPTER 46


Rio de Janeiro, February 16





“Well, I hope you two are very happy,” said Siqueira.

Morgan and Conley sat together in an interrogation room of the BOPE headquarters. It was a dingy room, furnished with cheap chairs and a small table. It was swelteringly hot. There was a fan mounted on the wall, but it was so dusty that Morgan wondered if it worked at all.

“How the hell were we supposed to know that the bastard Valter was going to take over?” asked Conley. “We had a deal with Paulinho. He was solid and good for it. We were as blindsided by this as you were.”

“I told you not to trust this trash,” said Siqueira. “But you did. You made a deal with the drug dealers. There is no deal with those assholes, I told you. I told you they were treacherous by nature. But you didn’t listen. You went in and you made a mess of everything. Now we do things our way.”

“What do you mean, you do things your way?”

“Come see,” said Siqueira. He led them out the interrogation room and into an adjoining one. There they found Valter, bruised and bleeding, taking a beating from two members of the squad.

“How did you get him?” asked Conley.