NIGHT DROP( A Eric the Red thriller: Book 1)

Chapter two: When you move, fall like a Thunderbolt

The name on it read Achilleion Palace, Corfu, Greece. What was so important about the invite? That a banker would need a security detail for it and that he had been killed by an unknown assailant in his room here. All these thoughts swirled in his mind, and his eyes narrowed on a burner lying inside the briefcase. Placing the invite back on the table and grabbing the burner from the briefcase, he examined it slowly.

His training through decades of fieldwork had taught him not to miss anything and to question everything. He knew the burner had been encrypted with the most sophisticated software there was. This told him one thing: the banker was no ordinary banker at all. He had laundered money through various channels for terrorist organizations, drug cartels, and governments.

He came off the chair, reaching for his IMI Desert Eagle in his hip holster as he rushed out onto the balcony. Training his pistol on her, he pulled the trigger and fired a shot. The bullet ricocheted off the wall, hitting her. 

The woman hit the ground, dashing over to the pier. She glanced sideways, seeing Eric firing shots at her. She jumped into the boat and started the motor as she sped down the harbor front, passing by boats and cruise ships that were sailing in. Her shoulder-length black hair flowed in the wind as her threatening, menacing eyes stayed focused on where she was heading. 

He ran back into the room, heading for the door, his heart racing.  He grabbed the door handle and swung it open, strolling over to the elevator, Eric waited, the doors opened, and he stepped in. Whoever she was was a professional, he guessed, which meant the burner and the invitation were vital to get. The doors slid on the main floor, and he sprinted out, gripping his semi-automatic pistol in his grip, dashing through the Scandinavian marble lobby, and rushing out through the massive doors. 

He darted over to the dock, where he had tied the motorboat.

Eric flashed onto a memory: him lying in the prone position on the sniper range, his handler Holiday pressing binoculars to his face. He dials the elevation into the scope, correcting for the ballistic arc. He exhales through pursed lips, applying steady pressure to the trigger. The stock kicks into his shoulder, and a hole appears centered in the red bull's eye six hundred meters downslope.

He leaps into the motorboat and starts the ignition, speeding down under the bridge and down the harbor. Finally, he could see the boat that she was on. It looked like she was heading into the fjords. He drew his semi-automatic 50-caliber pistol and aimed it at the boat. He fired a shot at the boat, and the bullet rushed out of the muzzle at a speed of 2600 per second as it slammed into the boat.

She gave the steering a hard turn, and the boat suddenly swerved left, waves splashing against the boat. She glanced over, saw the bullet hole, and let go of the steering wheel as she dove into the cold blue ocean. A few minutes later, the gas tank on the boat erupted into an explosion, sinking it. Out of nowhere, within seconds, a boat sped along the ocean and stopped.

She swam over to the boat as the men pulled up into it. After that, they motored off into the distance, heading to the safe house, where she would wait until she received further instructions from the organization

Eric slipped his pistol back into his hip holster, reached into his pocket, pulled out his iPhone X, and clicked on the camera, zooming in on the woman in the boat. He swiftly snapped a photo of her; he knew that he would have to run facial recognition software and the NCIC database to find out who she was. Placing the iPhone back into his pocket, he headed back to the thief as he turned the steering wheel on the boat.