“I would have made an excellent game show host,” Asher mused. “I have the rakish good looks, telegenic hair, and I dress in the same nice suits as Mr. Trebek.”
She sent over a you-can’t-be-serious eyeroll.
“What?” he replied. “You don’t think I can pull it off?”
“I do not,” Misha said dryly.
“You don’t get a vote,” Asher snapped. “Besides, you hardly qualify as knowing how to dress well.”
In prior meetings, Misha had always been wearing a black suit with a TKM-blue tie, as if he wanted to dress to kill, but when he showed up in the drainage ditch, his casual blue shirt was torn and dirty, as if he’d been robbed on the street. He’d taken off his blue uniform top, leaving only his undershirt. However, since he’d been in the filthy wet pipe, the white shirt was still covered with earthy smears.
“Bah. Maybe on American television. In Russia, we—” Misha cut himself off and pointed ahead. The two-lane road traveled very near the train tracks, as if there was one agreed-upon route across Wyoming. “There. That’s where we need to stop.”
She slowed. “Why there?”
“I will show you.”
They’d been driving long enough that the scenery was finally a bit different than the usual endless expanse of shamrock green. Now it was drier, with more hills, and a few exposed rock faces dotted with trees. There was still a lot of tall prairie grass, but the combination of trees and hills meant there were a lot of places to hide. Misha had pointed to a small hill next to the tracks, which was also close to the highway.
The prominent point was about fifty feet high and covered in saplings and high weeds almost to the top. When they got to the base of the hill, Misha directed her to park near a clump of trees and underbrush. He jumped out and started up without waiting for them.
“I guess we’re going up,” she remarked to Asher, who remained with her in the front seat.
“Or we could drive away,” he joked.
She thought about it, but was resigned that they didn’t have much choice. If they ditched him, there was no telling how he’d react. He might end up working with Nerio to attack the train anyway. It was better to have him on their side.
“Let’s see what his plan is.” She got out and followed the tall assassin.
They climbed to the summit of the rise. It appeared as if they were looking out at a postcard for Ireland, rather than Wyoming. The vibrant grass dressed up the gentle hills around them, and the two-lane highway and railroad tracks were the only two man-made objects in sight. Far out on the flat lands, the diesel engine chugged its way toward them.
“We have gotten in front of train, as I explained. From here, we watch to see if Nerio set up ambush.” He turned away from the train toward a more rugged section of hills behind them. “This spot would have given her an advantage to spot us coming for long way.”
“You expected to find her here?” Grace asked, gripping her rifle.
“Maybe,” he admitted. “I more expected her to fly away when she saw us arriving on road. But we did not flush her out.”
“Wait,” Asher interrupted.
She froze, as Asher was doing. It appeared like he was listening.
“Do you hear it?” Asher said, still straining to listen.
“A chopper,” Misha drawled.
As she concentrated, the wind brought in echoes of the thumping sounds of a helicopter’s rotors. In the context of where they were, she was positive it was Nerio.
“There!” Misha pointed far to the west. It was low to the ground, and almost at the edge of being audible, but she’d seen it appear for two or three seconds before it dipped below a distant hill.
“Was this a victory?” she asked, not sure if Misha had saved them.
The hitman remained stoic as he watched for the helicopter. “We must get back in truck. I will tell train what we saw.”
Misha pulled out the little radio he’d salvaged from his truck’s backpack. He’d given its partner to Robert the engineer, so they could communicate without needing the train to stop.
Grace pulled Asher away from Misha while he worked the radio. “Nothing about this feels right. I know the woman was trying to kill him and all, but Misha doesn’t act like he’s scared of walking into an attack and getting killed. He told us this could have been an ambush point after we were already here. Does that seem normal to you?”
Asher checked to make sure Misha couldn’t hear him. “I hate to say it, but you and I might be so far out of our element we might not recognize danger if it came up and bit us. This hill didn’t even register as a threat when I first saw it.”
It was even worse than she’d imagined. They were going into the hillier and rockier terrain of central Wyoming, much of which they saw from their perch. The woman in the helicopter could be waiting for them behind any of those outcroppings.
“We’re totally dependent on this guy to get us through, aren’t we?” she whispered.
Glasgow, MO
Ezra thought the men on the bridge were going to shoot at him, despite the presence of Officer Curtis and his flashing lights. He drove Susan’s Grace at idle speed, barely enough to make headway upriver. His thinking was that he wanted to give the policeman enough time to see the men and to be ready if they pulled out guns.
Two of the TKM guys hung over the edge and looked down. While he couldn’t see if they had weapons, he did recognize the handlebar mustache of one of them.
“It’s him,” Ezra whispered, while holding his rifle next to his seat. “From Bass Pro. It’s the guy who was pushing the cart of guns when we took them off his hands. He chased us over the highway…”
Butch and Haley held their weapons as well, though none of them pointed it up at the man, for fear of provoking a retaliatory strike.
“Are you sure? I thought we killed him along with his pals when we were by that smelly dumpster full of diapers.”
Ezra shuddered at the thought. There had been many TKM security guys in the gunfight, and he was fairly sure all of them were killed, but he couldn’t remember seeing the ’stache guy there. “I guess he’s the one who got away.”
The tall man casually waved and spoke down to them. “You people killed eight of my buddies. There will be a reckoning. You can’t hide under the cops’ skirts all the time.”
Ezra was sorely tempted to give him the finger or ignore him completely, but he didn’t want to risk pissing him off while the guy was in such a superior position. He flicked a curt salute toward the guy, then drove the boat under the bridge. Gradually, he gave it more gas, figuring the men weren’t going to shoot. Still, he veered left, toward the middle of the channel, so they wouldn’t be as easy to track from one side to the other.
None of the men bothered observing them as they put distance between themselves and the bridge. He sped up until he was doing fifty. However, when the river turned, and the bridge fell behind the trees, he immediately slowed Susan’s Grace down to thirty.
“What are you doing?” Haley said worriedly.
“I’m going at normal cruising speed.” He pulled out his map of Missouri and leaned to show her and Butch. “We’ve got about thirty miles to the next bridge, here, at a town called Miami. Notice how many roads are between there and the place we just left. The TKM bastards are going to beat us there no matter how fast I drive. We might even be forced to fuel up again. To save gas, we’re going to keep our speed low.”
“So, they’ll be ready for us,” Butch said seriously.
“It’s unavoidable at this point. We won’t have speed or surprise on our side.”
“Can we abandon the boat?” Haley asked.
Ezra scratched his head in thought. “I guess we could, but I’d really hate to go down that road. Unless you have a secret stash of money, I don’t think we could buy or even rent a car. This boat is our best shot at getting out west.”
The young woman seemed determined. “What about calling the police again? Call the army if we hav
e to.”
He pointed to the map. “There isn’t a major town anywhere around. I’m not sure who we’d call. Even if we did, how would we explain who we are, why we’re on the water, and why we think we’re targets? I think Officer Curtis came down to the waterfront as a favor for Josephine. You could tell he didn’t believe there’d be trouble with TKM. The company seems to have hooks in law enforcement everywhere we go.”
“Then we’re on our own,” she lamented.
“Hey,” Butch said brightly to her, “don’t let yourself get down. E-Z and I have a few tricks up our sleeves. We won’t let anything happen to you.”
She smiled weakly. “Thanks.”
They drove for half an hour, each sitting in silence, until Butch pointed to a diamond-shaped river marker on the shore to their right. “Haley!” he barked, sending her six inches out of her seat. “This is a drill. Get out your rifle and shoot that sign!”
“Really?” she asked, fumbling with her weapon.
Butch mimicked her action, taking out his own rifle and aiming it toward the shore. “Like I’m doing. Safety off, aim, exhale, shoot.”
Butch popped off a round, causing Haley to jump again.
“Sorry,” she said, “I’m still not used to the loud noises.”
Ezra knew how she felt. No matter how many times he’d shot, and been shot at, each new crack of the gun did a number on his brain. His stomach clenched at hearing Butch’s rifle, as if it knew the stark bang represented incoming danger.
Haley knelt next to Butch and got her rifle ready. Butch had already checked it, primed the first round, and ensured it was good to go. She used the side railing as a support for the barrel and lined up her target, which was about a hundred and fifty yards away. When she fired, a spurt of water almost instantly shot up near the bank.
“Missing is normal,” Butch advised. “We’re bouncing around, so your aim won’t be perfect. Try to focus on the center point of the diamond. The bullet should still hit above or below and stay inside the sign. When you get a little more practice, I’ll show you what all the minute of angle dials are for on the scope.”
She pulled the trigger, sending up a puff of dirt close to the bottom of the sign.
“Better,” Butch said in a consoling tone, tapping Haley on the shoulder.
“It was,” she said with surprise. “I’m getting the hang of this.”
“Wait. Extend your arm and hold out your thumb so it covers the diamond shape.”
She did as instructed.
“Now, close your right eye. Does your thumb come off the target?”
Haley blinked a few times. “Yes. It isn’t pointing to the sign.”
“Do the same thing again. Hold your thumb in front of the sign with both eyes open. Then close your left eye. It doesn’t appear to move, does it?”
“No!” she exclaimed. “How is that possible?”
“It means your right eye is dominant. It’s good you were already using your right eye for the scope. If your left eye were dominant, I’d have you close it.” He laughed.
The young lady shot through a few more rounds before Butch cried out. “You hit it!”
“Yes!” she exclaimed.
“Now, shoot the rest of your mag. We’ll be out of range, soon.” Ezra hadn’t slowed for them. The sign was falling behind, and it was also no longer facing them, making it a narrower target.
While Haley fired, a distinct echo came from across the river. At first, he thought it was coming from her rifle, but when a tuft of Haley’s empty seat erupted, he knew what it was.
“Down!” he shouted.
He gunned the motor to full throttle, and veered to the right, toward the bank with the river marker. A quick scan of the opposite side revealed three TKM trucks parked on a levee fronted by trees. He figured they were at least two hundred yards away, maybe three.
No other shots hit their boat. The engine’s roar masked the sounds coming from the levee and soon they were beyond the effective range of the shooters. Using his mental map, he figured they were over halfway to the bridge. The TKM men had found plenty of time to pick a road that ran close to the waterway. If he’d been driving closer to the left bank, rather than in the middle of the river, they might have made easy targets.
Haley and Butch were in a pile in the middle of the boat. As he let off the gas and returned to cruising speed, he leaned over to them. “You can both get up now.”
Butch had thrown himself on top of the young lady, but her face was visible to Ezra. She looked to Butch and smiled. “You were saying something about not letting anything happen to me?”
The big guy rolled aside. “Yeah, sorry if I hurt you. It’s habit.”
“No problem,” she replied, rubbing her arm. “Next time, let me knock you down, m’kay? Or, better yet, let’s shoot back.”
Butch got to a crouch and held out his hand to pull her up, which she accepted. “If you’re going to shoot back, we need to get you reloaded. Let me show you how.”
Ezra sat back in his seat, exhaling the tension of the last two minutes. He was happy to see the two kids cooperating, but he was afraid the shooters had figured out they could attack his boat anywhere along the river they could drive. It gave him plenty of new things to worry about.
And the bridge was only ten miles ahead.
“We need a new plan,” he said dryly.
CHAPTER 10
Somewhere in Central Wyoming
Grace stayed ahead of the train for almost an hour, and, hoping to hone her skills, she kept trying to guess where the experienced hitman was going to have her stop. She saw hills similar to the one they’d visited earlier, but Misha didn’t seem interested. They passed isolated patches of forest scattered along the grassy frontier, as if someone had planted the trees in tight groups a hundred years ago. Each seemed ideal for lying in ambush. Still, he didn’t ask her to pull over.
After a certain number of guesses, she admitted to telling herself every new thing on the horizon was where he would point them next. Eventually, she was right.
“There. We must drive there.” He gestured toward a hundred-foot-tall ridgeline covered with grass, perhaps two miles long, and a hundred yards to the left of the roadway. The train tracks went into a tunnel on one end of the rise. The location seemed windswept and isolated, not very good for hiding, at least compared to the clumps of trees they’d passed. As they neared, she wondered why dozens of sections of tall wooden fences had been set in parallel rows outside the train tunnel.
“Why there?” she asked, truly interested in his reasoning.
“We can climb to top. It will let us look ahead as well as see how far back train is. We do not want to get too far ahead of engine, or Nerio could swing around and attack without us knowing about it.”
Asher spoke up. “Ah, that’s why we haven’t been speeding ahead.”
She’d been thinking the same thing. Whenever she started going too fast, Misha would ask her to slow down. She’d assumed it was so he could look at the terrain as they moved, but waiting for the train made sense, too.
“You are correct, Alex Trebek.”
She laughed out loud, despite her deep-seated fear of Misha. “Correct-Trabek? Did you intentionally make a rhyme?”
“Did I?” he asked with surprise. “English is not first language, in case you did not know.”
Asher chuckled. “And I think he just made a joke.”
She parked the truck on a gravel service road leading to the train tunnel. As soon as she exited her door, a gust of wind nearly stole her ranger hat. “Whoa!”
Asher left his hat on the front seat, so she did the same. There was no sense fighting the wind in addition to being wary about the helicopter. It went without saying they took their rifles, as they had to be prepared to fight. However, she also reached behind her seat and grabbed Misha’s backpack. He’d put a few of the remaining bottled waters inside, and she figured they might need them.
As she caught up to the two men, s
he realized it might have been better to hold the hat on her head, if it’s what it took to keep it on. The wind blew constantly from the west, smacking her blonde locks in and out of her eyes like annoying bugs.
“This is crazy!” she yelled into the gusts.
Asher’s curly hair shifted back and forth, like kelp grass in turbulent seas.
Misha had cropped hair. The wind didn’t seem to affect him at all.
Asher spoke when she got close. “The wooden barriers spaced everywhere out there are snow fences. They keep snow off the tracks during the winter. It must be brutal on this hill if this summertime wind is any indication.”
They walked up the hill until they were above the tunnel where the double set of train tracks entered. She thought it might be neat to sit there and watch the train approach and go into the tunnel, at least until a stout gust nearly pushed her over the edge.
“Okay! Let’s take a few steps back!”
Misha was already higher on the hill, so it was only her and Asher moving from the edge. When they got up to his position, his radio surprised them all by warbling.
“The engine must be close,” she reasoned.
Misha seemed conflicted. “This was not his ring. This is someone else.”
Everyone glanced around, searching for who it might be. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to find other travelers on the same channel, though not as many people were out on vacations these days.
“I will answer,” Misha declared.
“Be careful,” she said, knowing it sounded trite, given where they were.
“Hello?” he said into the radio.
“Delighted to hear your voice, my dear Misha. You know who this is.” She spoke with flair, even through the tinny-sounding speaker.
“Nerio,” he said with an even tone.
“Oh, I’m so happy you remember my name. I’m sure you’ve told your new chums all about me. But I wonder if I should tell them all about you?”
Impact (Book 5): Black Page 8