Dead Six Read Online Free PDF Page A

it takes to protect your family. Plans are in place so that if I do not return, or if you are not observed attempting to complete this assignment, then your family will pay the price. You may try to warn them, you may try to protect them, you may even attempt to locate our organization. If anyone is capable enough to try, it is you. But you cannot save all of them. You know how great our employer’s reach is, and there is no place in this world where you can hide them all. At the first sign of a failure to fully cooperate, a terrible bloodbath will be on your head.”
    He wasn’t bluffing. Eddie was more powerful than most governments, a shadowy figure involved in every criminal enterprise on the planet. I had never met him, and like many who had done his bidding, I suspected he wasn’t a lone individual at all, rather a very ruthless organization. Either way, if Eddie wanted somebody dead, it was only a matter of time. I withdrew the Benchmade, wiped the blood on the fat man’s shirt, folded the blade, and put it back in my pocket.
    I lived under an assumed name. We all did. In this world, anything that was precious to you became a liability, potential leverage against you. How had Eddie found them? Where had I screwed up? I knew that if I tried to warn them, even if they believed me, there was no way I could protect them all. I slowly sat back down. My crew followed my example.
    “That’s better. Here is your mission packet. There are three phases. As you can see from the deadline, time is of the essence.”
    I opened the proffered folder, read a few lines, then laughed out loud. “You’ve got to be kidding. This is impossible.”
    “The clock is ticking, Mr. Lorenzo. Complete this mission or we will kill everyone you have ever loved.” He gestured at the mushroom dish. “Are you going to finish that?”

    “Shoulda just shot him,” Carl muttered before downing the last of his beer. He crushed the can in his fist and tossed it out the fourth-floor window of our seedy Bangkok hotel room. Odds were that the can hit a tourist or a prostitute. “Suicide, this job, I tell you that. Better to run.”
    Train rubbed one callused hand across his face. Haggard, he looked like he’d aged ten years in the last hour. “And then what? Hide? Where are we gonna go?”
    “ We aren’t the problem,” I stated. Each of us was fully capable of going to ground and totally disappearing. The four of us exchanged knowing glances. If we thwarted Big Eddie, we were going to be knee-deep in dead babies. I hadn’t even spoken to my family in years. They thought I was some sort of international businessman. I sent them a Christmas card once in a while, that kind of thing, but it wasn’t like we were close. I’d checked out of the normal world. But I couldn’t let my brothers and sisters pay for my sins. They weren’t like me. They were good people. They were the only people who had ever shown me any kindness in my miserable youth.
    We were quiet for a long time as my crew mulled over our predicament. Finally, I broke the silence. “Eddie’s men will be randomly watching these people. As soon as any one of them is contacted, they’ll kill all the others. We could maybe save some, but I don’t want to take that chance. I’m in. If any of you want out, I understand. Take your share and go. If Eddie sees that I’m on my way to the Mideast, he’ll know I’m working the job. It might buy you some time to get to your people.”
    Reaper immediately raised one bony hand. “I’m with you, boss.” He was the youngest member of my crew. I had hired him in Singapore, where he’d been avoiding extradition to the US for a host of felony charges, and put him to work as our technical geek. I was the closest thing he had to a father figure, and that was just sad.
    “This is going to be the toughest thing we’ve ever done,” I warned. “There’s no shame in backing out. We’re probably going to get killed if we’re lucky or thrown