White Bone (A Risk Agent Novel, Band 4) - Softcover

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Ridley Pearson is the New York Times–bestselling author of more than two dozen novels, including The Red Room, Choke Point, and The Risk Agent, as well as the Walt Fleming and Lou Boldt crime series, and many books for young readers. He lives with his wife and two daughters, dividing his time between Saint Louis, Missouri, and Hailey, Idaho.

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1

SEVEN MEN, ARMED with automatic weapons, phosphorusflares and patience, hunkered down on a craggy hilltop, training night-visionbinoculars onto a savanna etched with elephant grass, thornbush and fevertrees. They mentally mapped intersections of game trails and rutted vehicletracks that read in their optics as green-black scars. A few of the mendouble-checked their weapons.

The leader of the men, Koigi, checked his watch. Inforty-two minutes, a full moon would rise directly in front of them. It was anight ripe for killing. Poachers preferred full moons. One could nearly smellthe elephant blood on the warm breeze.

“East, southeast,” spoke Koigi. He was a big, solid manwith exceptionally large hands, a growling voice and an even temper.

Six sets of night-vision binoculars swept to the right.

Koigi breathed in deeply and exhaled slowly. MountKenya’s hilly terrain made for difficult surveillance. Twelve years of lyingbelly-down in the red, powdery dirt of his birth country, of squatting on his haunchesuntil his knees froze with pain, of enduring all the elements, from mountainblizzards to desert dust storms—all to protect the elephant. He’d been hungry.Thirsty. Sex-starved. He’d put much aside to preserve and protect God’s mostnoble creature.

The elephant was Africa. Kill an elephant and you kill apiece of the continent where all life began. To him, Africa was the heartbeatof the world, every elephant a shrine. Anyone intent on executing an elephantdeserved the noose, the spear, the bullet. This philosophy simplified hisexistence, justified his actions. And though he was as hunted by the law as thepoachers were by him, it allowed him to sleep at night.

Their binoculars revealed three adult elephants, theircurving tusks appearing dark through the lenses. The beasts walked nearly trunkto tail as they lumbered silently into the open field.

Two of Koigi’s rangers, uniformed snipers, lay prone. Oneof these was making small adjustments to his rifle scope. The other held aseventeen-thousand-dollar TrackingPoint rifle with a computerized scope. Koigiwas viewing this man’s targeting with his smartphone.

“All good, boss,” the first reported.

“On my command,” said Koigi.

2

Guuleed, whose ring finger was missing its final joint,signaled the driver to kill the engine.

The tip of his finger had been lost when caught beneath ahook-ended ladder that had shifted as he’d ascended up the hull of a containership in a rolling sea. The missing piece of finger served to remind him toexpect the unpredictable.

Along with the ladder—which had led to the deck of thecontainer ship he’d eventually commandeered—he’d also climbed through years ofblood and glory, scaling the ranks of the lawless and dispossessed to a placeof prominence in a Somali syndicate known as Badaadinta Badah, which translatedas “Savior of the Seas.”

He pressed the talk button on his walkie-talkie threetimes. Three clicks. Five minutes later, he heard three similar clicksconfirming that his team had the elephants in range. He set the radio down ontothe dash of the twelve-year-old Toyota Land Cruiser.

Guuleed quietly climbed out of the doorless vehicle andwaited for six of his men to join him. They were a somewhat sorry lot: young,greedy, hungry, foolish. Sacrificial lambs. Anything could, and did, happen inthe bush. A lion attack. A Cape buffalo stampede. Rangers.

Patting the satellite phone clipped to his left hip,Guuleed silenced its ringer. He didn’t need any interruptions, any reminder theworld was currently upside down. No matter how rich or influential, no manshould threaten another with wholesale slaughter of his extended family, wifeand children included. Certainly not a slant-eyed foreigner. It wasimata—yimeti—gloating over another’s unhappiness. It was a burden no man couldbear.

Guuleed hand-signaled three of his men to the right, twoto the left. He and his driver would hold back. Not a word was spoken as theelectric fence—currently without power—was cut. All movement was silent.Elephants had been sighted by a local tea farmer earlier in the day, headedtoward this, a known watering hole. Guuleed had spread his money around wisely.Given the heat and the water, they would be moving north-northwest. Within thehour, as soon as the moon rose, the prize would be exposed.

3

One of only a few fifty-year-old bull elephants left inKenya, Grandfather had been previously shot and wounded by poachers and wasdistinguishable by a large tear in his left ear. He was always seen in thecompany of a half-dozen females, and his arrival caused a moment of hushedreverence among Koigi’s squad. The men were prepared to lay down their livesfor the likes of Grandfather.

Koigi spoke Swahili, directing three of his best to takeup a protective position. As his men deployed, Koigi monitored them, first withhis naked eye, then through the night-vision binoculars. Good men, he admiredthem all.

“Boss?” the first of his two snipers asked.

Koigi answered flatly. “Provide cover if engaged.”

The clouds on the horizon lit up like smoke in awildfire. The moon was improbably the size of the sun.

By dividing his small squad, Koigi was taking yet anothercalculated risk. Such strategies could backfire. When the attack came—and itwould come, as his source was reliable—it would be at the hands of anassortment of misguided, greedy locals under the direction of a well-trainedSomali. Guuleed was a pus-oozing sore from across the northern border. Beforean ounce of elephant blood spilled into this beloved soil, Guuleed’s would flowfreely, his head on a pike. Koigi lived for this moment.

“Boss, why does Grandfather not wear a collar?”

“Because the KGA has its head up its ass.” The Kenya GameAgency, along with funding from private conservation groups, had beguncollaring and GPS-tracking several dozen elephants. His men chuckled softly.“But more likely he’s taken too many darts from treating his wounds.”Repeatedly tranquilizing the elephants could turn them aggressive.

When the firefight came, shots rang out, sounding likethe dull popping of firecrackers. It happened quickly—two or three minutes thatfelt like an hour. The bittersweet smell of cordite and gunpowder warmedKoigi’s nostrils. The crack of gunfire sent the elephants running. Bulletswhistled over Koigi’s head. Chips of rock sprayed around him. An elephantdropped, first to its front legs, then collapsed and tumbled in a nauseatingslow motion. Koigi, rifle in hand, screamed—an amateurish mistake. He caught abullet in his vest near his left shoulder. Fell face-first in pain.

Dragged to cover by the ankles, Koigi saw his men kill atleast two, including a driver. An engine revved.

“Retreating,” his man announced.

“Stay with them!” Koigi ordered, but he could hear it wastoo late.

The sound of the engine faded.

“They fought longer than necessary. They could haveescaped with fewer casualties.” Koigi spoke between clenched teeth. “The firstwe’ve seen of this.”

“Desperate,” said his man.

“Yes, but the...