End Game by David Hagberg Page B

Okie?”
    Foreman tilted his head back and laughed from the bottom of his boots. “Dumb Okie—I gotta remember that one.”
    Knight had been calling him a dumb Okie since shortly after Knight had come to work here ten years ago.
    â€œWe’re supposed work in pairs,” Foreman said.
    The order had come down two days ago after the murders.
    â€œWhoever’s doing it wants the spooks, not us,” Knight said. “But if you’re so goddamned worried, get your ass in gear and come on down.”
    Foreman laughed again. “Be down in a hog’s fart,” he said, and took off up the hill.
    Whatever the hell that meant. Knight engaged the drive and started down the gently sloping hill, still a half hour or so before the early birds began showing up.
    Barely one hundred yards down the hill, the engine began acting up, running rough, sputtering nearly to a stop, and then revving up as if the carburetor float were sticking.
    Knight shut down the mowing blades, put the engine in neutral, locked the brakes, and dismounted, but before he could check the problem, the mower suddenly steadied out.
    The equipment wasn’t exactly new, but it was in good shape. Their two mechanics made sure of it.
    All of a sudden the engine revved up to its maximum rpm, the mower blades suddenly engaged, and the machine lurched backward.
    Knight tried to step away, but his left foot caught under the traction wheel and he was pulled off balance, falling backward.
    The base of the machine climbed up over his lower legs and then knees, the pain impossible. He pulled out his walkie-talkie and keyed the push-to-talk switch. “Karl, you copy?” he shouted.
    But then the edge of the mower blades bit into his feet, and he screamed.
    He tried to push the heavy mower away, but the machine kept coming, the incredible, impossible pain climbing up his thighs.
    When the three-feet-in-diameter blades reached his abdomen, he passed out, and when they reached his face, mangling it, he was already dead. Still the mower continued up the hill, blood and gore splashing down the slope and across the trunks of the trees.

 
    EIGHTEEN
    The NIS cleanup crew had come at once to remove the body and sanitize the boat. Searching for the shell casing would have to wait until first light, but it was obvious to McGarvey that Coffin had been shot with a high-power rifle and probably from a distance of a thousand yards or more. Something like the American-made .50 caliber Barrett sniper rifle could have done the job from as far as a mile out.
    He and Pete rode with Moshonas back into the city and to their hotel at two in the morning.
    â€œIf the killer was sloppy, which I don’t think he was, he would have left a shell casing lying around,” McGarvey told the Greek intelligence officer.
    â€œYou’re probably right, but it’ll give our people something to do. Something to put in their report.”
    â€œWhat about us?” Pete asked. She was shook up, but she held her feelings close.
    â€œI don’t know,” Moshonas said after a thoughtful hesitation. “What are we supposed to do with you? You’ll have to at least come in for questioning.”
    â€œTell me about Joseph Carnes’s death,” McGarvey said.
    Moshonas gave McGarvey an odd look. “I don’t know. He was killed in a car crash.”
    â€œHis body crushed? Maybe burned in a fire?”
    Moshonas shrugged. “What’s your point?”
    â€œHow was the body identified? Was there a match with his passport photo?”
    â€œAs I recall, his face had been totally destroyed.”
    They were sitting in the car in the hotel’s driveway, one piece of the puzzle dropping into place for McGarvey. Carnes, Wager, Fabry, and now Coffin had all been killed by the same person, who had left them some bizarre message by wiping out their faces, erasing their identities.
    Moshonas got the connection. “Whoever shot Coffin