by L. T. Ryan
Now or never.
Haeli sprang to her feet and bolted, releasing the phone from her chest and putting it to her ear. “Call Blake,” she said, holding the voice activation button.
A flurry of voices, yelling in Russian, crescendoed behind her. The rustling of boots crashing through the underbrush registered in her subconscious.
Her legs burned as she weaved and ducked trees and fallen limbs.
Then, he answered.
“Mick. I’m sorry. I’m sorry to bring you into this. You have to run. Now, Mick. Right now!”
She hung up the phone, shoved it down the front of her pants and into the crotch. She cut right for twenty or thirty feet and dove into the brush.
As she caught her breath, she could feel a sharp pain radiating from the inside of her left forearm. She reached down and pulled the sharp end of a thick, splintered branch from her flesh.
The cluster of flashlights slowed and broke apart, fanning out in all directions.
She touched her arm. It was slick with blood, but the wound felt superficial. She grasped the jagged branch. Felt the weight of it. If she had landed a different way, she might have been impaled. The natural spear could have easily punctured her abdomen or lungs.
It gave her an idea.
She was done being hunted.
Now, it was her turn.
20
Blake pulled the phone from his ear and looked at the screen. It had disconnected.
A chill ran down his spine. There was fear in Haeli’s voice. Not just for him, but for herself. She was in trouble. And, if he didn’t act fast, he would be too.
Blake darted to the front windows and cracked the blinds. Just enough to allow him to peek through. He scanned the street. Cars lined the curb, as usual. But it was impossible to know if any of them didn’t belong.
Rounding the corner from the living room to the foyer, Blake drove his hand under the half-table and felt for the handle of the Glock. He found nothing but an empty holster.
Haeli. What did you do?
Below the table sat the pair of gym shoes Blake kicked off when he arrived home a few hours earlier. He slipped them on and headed toward the kitchen.
Haeli’s message hadn’t contained much information. He knew there was a threat, but the nature of it remained a mystery. Someone was coming for him. But who? And why? He couldn’t begin to guess.
Was it Levi? The police? Did it have to do with the scene they caused at the Venetian in Las Vegas? Someone else from his past?
And how would Haeli know? Wasn’t she in Israel?
He wouldn’t have time to answer these questions. “Get out, now,” she had said. Whatever was coming, it was coming soon. Very soon.
At the bottom of the stairs, Blake punched in the code, pushed through the vault door, and headed straight for the closet. He opened the door, stuck his finger into the latch receptacle, and flicked the tab.
He closed the door, twisted the knob, and pulled. This time, the entire frame swung open, revealing the shelter behind.
Fingers attacking the safe’s keypad, he swung open the heavy door and pulled out one of the pistols. A Glock 43, already seated in an in-the-pants holster. He jammed the holster between his hip and his gym shorts. It sagged against the drawstring. He tightened it the best he could.
On top of the safe was a black knapsack. Blake snatched it and pinched the two unzipped sections to prevent it from flopping around. After loading several boxes of ammunition into the bag, he zipped it halfway and slung it over his shoulder.
The room had been built for this very contingency. He could close the vault door, shut himself into the shelter, and wait it out. There was a cot, a latrine, and enough food and water to last for months. Underground, behind a hidden passageway, and not documented on any plan or public document, the bunker would never be found. Especially if one didn’t know to look.
But there was a problem. Haeli was in trouble. And if he were to have any chance of finding her in time, he couldn’t be pinned in.
No, he needed to get out. It was time to abandon ship.
Blake moved back to the computer lab and pushed the closet frame until it clicked. He grabbed a laptop and charger from the shelf, dropped the bag off his shoulder, and stuffed the electronics inside. He zipped it closed and slipped both arms into the straps.
As he approached the vault door, he paused.
Just inside the room, mounted to the wall, was a large red button. Blake lifted his hand and rested his palm on it.
The likelihood that anyone would be able to breach the vault door was almost nil. But could he risk it? In the wrong hands, the classified information and software contained within the dozens of solid-state drives could have catastrophic consequences. Not to mention his own exposure.
By pressing the button, he would be setting a process in motion to wipe all of it. Strip it down to bare bones. His life’s work would be gone in a blink. Everything except the collection of tools he had installed on the laptop.
Blake closed his eyes and pressed.
The entire room seemed to come alive. Fans wound up. Lights blinked from every corner of the room. Racks of servers, all working at full capacity toward one task. Self-annihilation.
There was no time to mourn. He forced the vault door closed and engaged the actuators. The cylinders slid into place.
At the top of the stairs, Blake could see the back door beyond the kitchen. He listened for movement elsewhere in the house. It was quiet.
Back at the front living room window, he peeked through the blinds once again. Now, there was no guessing. Three men were getting out of a black Mercedes sedan, double parked beside Blake’s Dodge Challenger. The driver stayed in the car.
One of the men looked up at the window, as if locking eyes with Blake through the slit in the blinds.
Blake bolted to the back door, scooping up his wallet off the counter on the way.
Phone, Wallet, Laptop, Gun.
Everything he could possibly need.
He emerged into the garden, without bothering to shut the door behind him, and sprinted at the cinderblock wall.
Off his last stride, Blake leapt, planting his hands along the top edge and vaulting himself over the wall.
The moment his feet touched the alley, a new predicament presented itself. He had landed smack dab between two men. Two formidable—yet surprised—looking men. Each holding a pistol equipped with a suppressor.
Blake’s legs, already coiled from the landing, drove his full weight toward the man on his left. He drove his palm into the man’s face, like a giant, angry squid. He pushed, driving the man’s head into the cinder block wall on the other side of the narrow alley.
In one continuous motion, Blake drove his knee into the man’s stomach, causing him to double over.
Leaning his chest over the man’s back, Blake gripped the left-handed man’s arm and slid both hands downward, forcing the arm straight until he reached the pistol.
Out of the corner of his eye, Blake could see the other man leveling his own pistol.
Blake slid the index finger of his left hand inside the trigger guard, on top of his attacker’s finger. He hooked his calf around the man’s legs and rocked backwards.
As the two tipped over, but before hitting the ground, Blake squeezed the man’s finger on the trigger. The round hit the second man at center mass. Blake squeezed again, striking him in the neck, and dropping him to the ground.
Now on his back with the first assailant on top of him, Blake wrapped his legs around him, reached over with his right hand, and grabbed the slide. Holding tension, Blake twisted the gun until the barrel lined up with what he approximated to be the man’s nose.
Blake tried to press the trigger. This time the man resisted. His own trigger finger pushing against Blake’s with a strength conjured out of pure survival.
For several seconds they struggled, locked in a pretzel tableau—the man staring into the barrel of his own gun.
Bl
ake strained his neck forward and gnashed his teeth into the man’s ear.
The man let out a yelp.
With jaw clenched, Blake snapped his head back and pulled the trigger.
A dulled report rang out from the suppressor. The man’s muscles turned to jelly.
Blake rolled to the side, dumping the limp body.
Then he ran.
21
Haeli crouched low. She placed her foot down, shifting her weight with incremental pressure. The tip of the spear poked out into the darkness.
The slow, methodical process started over. Step. Shift. Little by little. Taking care not to rustle any dead leaves or snap any dry twigs underfoot.
The last ten minutes had been spent working her way back in amongst the men. Staying within the cover of the dense undergrowth. She would soon be in position to pick them off, one by one.
But it was Sokolov she wanted. All it would take was one well-placed blow.
And she was close. Twenty, maybe thirty more feet away. She moved. Another step closer to the shadowy outline of the monster.
“Take her alive,” she heard Sokolov say. “Whatever it takes.”
Then he turned and retreated the way he came.
Haeli froze and watched the silhouette fade into the background. He was leaving. No, he was escaping.
Nothing could be done to save her friends now. They were all dead. Nor was there anything else she could do to help Blake. He was on his own.
But did the facts resolve her of her responsibility? In her mind, they only served to solidify it.
Maybe Blake had time to escape. Maybe she would, too. But it wouldn’t matter. Sokolov would keep coming. Anywhere she went, however careful she was, he would find her. He would find them.
Haeli’s mind reeled. She knew if she let the moment pass, she might not get another. But even if she was successful in taking out Sokolov, it likely meant a death sentence.
It was a risk she’d have to take.
Gripping the makeshift spear with all her might, Haeli clenched her teeth, bent her knees, and pounced.
The wiry brush scraped and tore at her skin as she ran headlong toward the retreating figure. She raised the spear, hands spread apart.
Wham. The muscular body of a man crashed against her like a swinging bag of rocks. The world flipped upside down. By the time she got her bearings, she was flat on her back and the man was on top of her.
A punch landed, deep into her ribs. She wheezed.
Another landed, lower, in the abdomen.
Haeli reached up and clawed the man’s lips, then nose. He tipped his head to protect his eyes. She dug her nails into whatever skin she could get a hold of.
He leaned on her, one hand mushing her face, the other pressing on her chest. He called out in Russian. The others chattered in response.
Her cheek pinned to the dirt, she had no view outside of the man’s sweaty, sausage fingers.
When she landed, the sharp branch was knocked loose. But it was somewhere nearby. Haeli searched the ground by feel, raking her arm back and forth as if carving a snow angel.
By the volume of their voices, the other men were only seconds away from joining the party.
She felt the pricking point against her probing knuckles.
The spear.
Sliding her hand six inches behind the point, she burrowed four fingers under it and lifted. Her other hand ran upward, over the man’s brow and onto the top of his head. She grasped a thin tuft of hair.
Using her tactile control of the man’s head as a guide, she drove the spear toward what she hoped was his throat.
For a split second the point met resistance, then sank in with a pop.
The meaty palm released. The man fell backward, his attention consumed with the horrific wound.
With her back still toward the ground, Haeli used her hands and feet to propel herself backward in an awkward, frantic crab walk.
The men converged. The beams of their flashlights flittered all around her.
She flipped to her knees, dug her feet into the soft ground, and pushed off with her hands to bring herself upright.
But it was too late. They encircled her. All of them, except Sokolov.
There was no use trying to reach for the pistol she had tucked in the small of her back. She could already feel that it had fallen out. When she was tackled, she assumed.
She had no weapons. No options. No chance of rescue.
Unless...
As a last-ditch effort, or as she hoped it would appear, she reached into her pocket, pulled out the flip phone, cracked it open, and started dialing random digits. The hope was that if they confiscated her phone, the one they watched her try to use to call for help, it might not occur to them she would have another. Tucked into the crotch of her pants.
They would eventually find it, yes. But every moment the smartphone broadcasted her location was another breadcrumb in the trail. She had called Blake with the phone, so he would know it was powered on. And, if he was alive, he would do what he does.
The men shouted commands.
Haeli dropped back to her knees and tossed the flip-phone to the ground. She raised her hands and through rapid breaths, she said, “ты победила, ты победила—You win, you win.”
22
Blake raced along the sidewalk.
To the pedestrians, he blended in with the other joggers. Mothers pushing strollers, couples holding hands. None of them gave Blake a second look as he blazed by them.
When he started running, he had no destination. Far away from where he started was good enough for him. But as he zig-zagged through Old Town, he found himself in the vicinity of a place he knew he could go. Where he’d be able to stop for at least long enough to regroup and come up with a plan.
The men who attacked him didn’t look familiar. They didn’t appear to be well regimented men, like Levi produced. Brutal, yes. Stone cold killers, most definitely. But not military.
Blake left the sidewalk and cut through the park. Children played, people laid on blankets, reading books and sunning themselves. Blake kept moving, hopping a low stone wall, and crossing the parallel street.
Two more blocks.
He looked over his shoulder. Into the park. Down the street. There was no way they would be able to follow him. Not unless they were tracking his phone.
Damn. The phone.
Blake stopped, took his phone out, and powered it down. He looked around again. No black Mercedes. No grizzled looking thugs. Well, none that seemed to have any interest in him.
Resuming a jog, the sign, mounted above the Sumatra coffee shop storefront, caught his eye. He had visited the coffee shop on a few occasions. Iced Triple Old School Americano. Delicious. But the drink wasn’t the only thing that stood out to him about the place. The interior was narrow but long. And there was an entrance on both sides—this block, and the block behind it.
He headed for the shop.
Before reaching the glass door, he slowed and composed himself. Sauntering in, he looked up at the menu board as he moved past the counter and toward the far side of the store. The four patrons and three employees didn’t seem to notice him. He slipped through the opposite door and back onto the street. As soon as his sneakers hit the sidewalk, he was off again and into a full run.
If someone had been following, the diversion through the coffee shop might have bought him some distance. Hopefully, it was enough of a distraction to allow him to traverse the final block unobserved. If he could get off the street before they got eyes on him, he’d be home free.
As he turned the corner, he found himself under the tattered green awning that marked the entrance to Arty’s. He rushed inside.
Arty was leaning on the customer side of the empty bar, staring up at the TV. He turned to acknowledge his incoming patron.
“Whoa, you guys back already?” Arty asked.
Blake caught his breath. “No. I didn’t go anywhere. Odd man out.”
&nb
sp; Arty wasn’t exactly read in. But the team had been going there long enough for him to get the gist of the situation. They’d come in, get boozed up, and yammer about going off to kick some ass. Then they’d disappear for a week or two. It didn’t take a PhD to figure out what they did for a living. Especially not in that town. Guys like them were almost always military—ish. They sure as hell weren’t politicians.
“Where is everyone?” Blake picked out a table against the wall and sat.
At almost four o’clock in the afternoon, the place would normally be seeing some decent activity.
“Slow day,” Arty said. “Bobby and Phil just left. Second wave will be filterin’ in soon, don’t you worry.”
On cue, a man wearing a backward Phillies baseball cap walked in and headed straight for the bar.
“Hey Chuck,” Arty turned back to Blake. “See, what’d I tell ya? What can I get ya?”
“A water’s fine.”
“A water? Don’t know what that is. Is that like a Bud Light?”
Blake chuckled. “Fine, whatever you wanna bring me. I’ve just gotta do something quick for work.”
“Knock yourself out.” Arty headed toward the bar. “Chuck, I thought I told you not to wear that shit in here.”
Blake pulled the laptop from his bag and set it on the table.
“Arty, what’s the WIFI password?”
“Password. With a capital P.”
Of course it is.
Blake punched it in.
First things first. If he was going to figure out what was going on with Haeli, he would first have to find out where she was.
Luckily, he knew her cloud password, which meant it would be a trivial task to pinpoint her location.
He navigated to the cloud web portal, punched in Haeli’s email and password, and clicked on the icon of the map.
The global view shifted and zoomed itself in, dropping a graphical push pin in the center of the screen.
Germany?
It was getting stranger by the minute. As far as Blake knew, Haeli didn’t have any family or even work ties to Germany. She had booked a flight to Israel. That made sense. But how did she end up in Europe?