But he had transportation. And it was his left foot that was hurt, so he could still drive. He’d have managed to drive anyway, but it made things a little easier. The only thing left, was figuring out where to drive.
As he crawled into the cab, he made the decision that the only logical thing to do, was to head for Washington. It wasn’t likely that Gabrielle had been snatched by human traffickers or anyone like that. What made sense, was that Alex had had someone else following them, someone whom Max hadn’t noticed, and that that someone had waited until he could catch Max with his pants down—literally—before grabbing Gabrielle and taking off with her. Their logical destination was DC.
As he cranked the engine over with one hand, he dialed Gus with the other. “It’s Max. I’ve lost Gabrielle.”
“How the hell—?” Gus began, and then changed it to, “Yes, sir. How did that happen, lieutenant?”
Max told him how it happened while he navigated across the rutted parking lot and onto the road, back in the direction of the interstate. His left foot still hurt, but a little less now that he wasn’t standing on it. “Fucker emptied a clip into the bathroom. I’m lucky he only caught me in the foot.”
Those dividers between the stalls in the bathroom must be a lot stronger than he’d thought. Either that, or the shooter had seriously bad aim.
There was a second’s pause. “You OK?” Gus asked.
“There’s a bullet in my foot,” Max said. “I’m gonna need Rusty to take it out the next time I see him. My head hurts. I think I cracked it on something, going down.” Probably the side of the toilet. “And I’m fucking angry. But other than that, yeah. I’m in much better shape than this asshole will be once I catch up with him.”
The entrance to the interstate came up on the right, and he zoomed down the ramp, bumping across the grassy side when he couldn’t keep the car on the blacktop. Then he was on the interstate, and picking up speed going north.
“What do you want us to do?” Gus asked.
“Provide me some kind of backup.” Max mashed his uninjured foot on the gas pedal, and the truck leaped forward. “I don’t think there’s much point in you going to Trent Engelhart’s apartment now.”
“You don’t think they’re taking her there?”
“I figure whoever’s driving is taking her to wherever Alex Volkov is. Probably the club.”
“Unless it’s Alex Volkov driving,” Gus said.
Max considered that for a moment as he wove the truck in and out between the cars on the interstate. “You think it’s Alex himself?”
“It could be Alex. If Sergei and Yuri called him last night, after you went to the base, and told him what was happening, he might have driven down and made it to JB’s place in time to see his men get arrested. And then he might have hung around to see what would happen next.”
He might have done that. And this morning, he might have followed them north and seized his chance when they stopped.
“So let’s say it’s Alex,” Max said. “If it’s one of Alex’s men, he’s probably taking Gabrielle to Alex. But if it’s Alex himself, what’s he planning to do?”
Gus didn’t say anything.
“It won’t be good, will it?”
Gus agreed that it wasn’t likely to be.
“If you think of anything, let me know. I’ll see if I can catch up.”
“We’re on our way,” Gus said. “Boarding the helo in five. Keep us updated.”
Max said he would, dropped the phone in the console, and peered out the front window.
* * *
Gabrielle found it hard to catch her breath. Not only were they flying up the road at a death-defying speed, weaving in and out of the other cars while Alex kept glancing in the rearview mirror instead of looking ahead at the road, but he had a gun in his lap that was pointed in her direction, and every so often he’d drop a hand down there to caress it, and to remind her that she was at his mercy and he could choose to end her life at any moment.
The way he had ended—might have ended—Max’s life back at the rest stop.
When that gun had gone off, riddling the bathroom with bullets, she’d had just enough time to scream. The scream had gotten stuck in her throat when Alex grabbed her and dragged her across the parking lot behind him, and she felt like it was still stuck. Her ears were buzzing and she couldn’t draw a deep breath. Her diaphragm wouldn’t expand enough to let her get air in. After Alex had shoved her into the passenger seat of the sedan and told her to stay there, or else, she had looked over her shoulder, hoping—expecting, wishing—to see Max burst out of the bathroom in pursuit. But the door had stayed closed. And stayed closed. He hadn’t come. And as Alex had thrown himself into the driver’s seat and sped off up the road, and the men’s room door had stayed shut, Gabrielle had had to face the fact—possibility; it was only a possibility!—that Max was bleeding to death on the floor inside.
If he was, nobody would get there in time to save him. Nobody knew where he was, and nobody else was likely to drive into the same closed and shuttered gas station in the next few minutes.
He’d die alone on the floor of a restroom in the middle of Virginia. And all because she hadn’t been observant enough. All because she’d allowed Alex to sneak up on them.
“I hate you,” she told him.
He showed teeth in her direction for a second before he went back to checking the rearview mirror. “I’m not real happy with you right now either, Gabby.”
She could well imagine that. “Did you think I’d just keep quiet while you killed a federal judge and his wife?”
“You had what you wanted,” Alex said, his hands tightening on the wheel as if he were squeezing something soft. Like her throat. “A nice apartment, a nice car, and enough nice things to keep you happy. What was it to you?”
“You can’t just go around killing people, for God’s sake!”
Alex didn’t answer that, which probably meant that he didn’t see any reason why he couldn’t, because he’d done it up until now. He kept glancing in the rearview mirror and driving like a bat out of hell up the highway, but he didn’t look any more frantic or frightened than he had a minute ago.
“No sign of Max yet?” Gabrielle said, willing herself to sound calm.
Alex snorted. “Max won’t be coming. He has enough bullets in him that he’s never getting up from that bathroom floor. If he’s lucky, in a week or so, someone might stumble over the body.”
Gabrielle’s heart started beating faster. “You realize he has a whole squad of Navy SEALs backing him up, right? When they don’t hear from him, they’ll know something’s wrong. If he is dead—” And dear God, don’t let him be dead! “—they’ll find him. Probably later today.”
Alex didn’t look worried, even if he glanced in the rearview mirror again.
“That might be them now,” Gabrielle said. There was the sound of flapping rotors outside. A helicopter some distance off. It was probably just the weather and traffic chopper for the local radio station, but until she saw it, she could keep hoping.
And it might not hurt to keep Alex off balance, either.
Or maybe it would. He shot her a scowl, before he pushed down on the gas and made the car go a little faster. The needle crept up toward 100, as if he thought there was a chance he could outrun a helicopter.
Gabrielle braced her feet and wrapped her hands around the bottom of the seat.
* * *
“We’ve got her,” Gus’s voice said in Max’s ear.
“What d’you mean, you’ve got her? She’s safe?”
If so, that was good news. But somehow he didn’t think it was going to be that easy.
“Not that kind of got,” Gus said, sounding apologetic. “We see the car. Andy pinged her cell, and we followed that. We see the car she’s in. Or at least the car her phone’s in.”
If the phone was there, chances were Gabrielle was there, too. She’d tucked it in her back pocket when they left the truck earlier. Max had
seen the outline through her jeans when she walked into the men’s room. And it wasn’t likely that whoever was up there had managed to get Gabrielle’s phone into a different car. A more logical thing to do would have been to throw it out the window, but that didn’t seem to have occurred to him.
“Where are they?”
Gus told him which exit the car up ahead was closest to, and Max peered out the window for a mile marker as he kept the truck zigging and zagging between the other cars on the road. “That’s about ten miles ahead.”
But ten miles might as well be a hundred when they were both driving hell for leather. If they were going ninety and he was going a hundred, it would take him another thirty minutes to catch up. By then, they’d be hitting traffic around Washington, which would make things worse.
“We’ll stay on them from up here,” Gus said, “and let you know if they turn off. How’s the foot, lieutenant?”
It hurt like hell, but Max wasn’t about to admit it. “Is Rusty up there with you?”
“Ready to extricate the bullet as soon as we set down,” Gus said.
Good. “Keep me updated.”
“Will do,” Gus said.
Max dropped the phone did what he could to coax the truck to pick up just a little more speed so he could close the gap between him and the car Gabrielle was in.
* * *
The helicopter stayed on her side of the car for a while. High above and off to the side, of course, but there.
It wasn’t a weather helicopter. It wasn’t a police helicopter, either. It was long and pale gray, and looked utilitarian; not like the round glass bubbles the TV stations used.
And it kept pace with them, or at least it seemed that way. Gabrielle put her face close to the window and mouthed “Help me!” just in case someone up there was watching, although they were probably too far away for that.
After a few minutes, the helicopter changed course and moved across the sky to the other side of the interstate, where it kept pace on Alex’s side of the car for a while. He didn’t seem to like that. His jaw jumped, and his hands were so tight on the steering wheel that his knuckles were white.
“Where are we headed?” Gabrielle asked, to take his mind off the helicopter. On the one hand, it was tempting to point out that it might look military—in fact, she was pretty sure she’d seen something similar at the Navy base the other day… or yesterday. Was it really only yesterday?
On the other hand, if she pushed him too far, Alex might just decide to kill her now, and she’d rather stay alive as long as she could. So drawing his attention off the helicopter and onto her seemed a more prudent action.
He gave her a snarl. His upper lip literally lifted, showing off his incisors. They were long and sharp.
“Sheesh.” Gabrielle rolled her eyes. “I was just asking.”
“DC,” Alex said. “We’re going back to DC. We’re going to Engelhart’s apartment. The one you shared with him. And once we get there, I’m going to strangle you and make it look like Engelhart did it.”
Gabrielle’s heart made a hard thud in her chest.
It wasn’t anything she hadn’t already thought about, nothing she hadn’t already discussed with Max and the other SEALs. But it was different to hear him spell it out.
He wanted her alive until they got to Washington, so he could use her against Trent. He’d kill her and make it look like Trent did it. And then he’d pin her murder and the botched attempt in Idaho on Trent, too. And finally he’d kill Trent, probably make it look like suicide, and walk away clean.
But what he didn’t know, was that Trent’s apartment would be crawling with Navy SEALs by the time they got there.
Unless that was Max’s squad in the helicopter that kept pacing them.
Hard to say whether that was a positive or negative.
If they were up there instead of getting set up in Trent’s apartment, they wouldn’t be there to save her. But it meant they knew that the mission had been aborted. They knew that she and Max were no longer on their way to Washington to confront Alex. And if they knew that, then Max must have told them. He and she were the only two people, save for Alex, who knew what had happened.
And if Max had told them, then Alex hadn’t killed Max.
The half-assed plan she’d considered on and off during the last forty or forty-five minutes, of opening the passenger door and taking her chances in the roadway—it would be suicide, but if Max was dead, what did she care?—went on the back burner in favor of determination to hang in here and stay alive as long as she could. If that was Alpha Squad in the helicopter—the helo—to their left, that meant Max was somewhere behind them, trying to catch up.
“I have to use the bathroom,” Gabrielle said.
Alex gave her another snarl. “Nice try. But you went back there.”
“I’m nervous,” Gabrielle said. “It makes me need to go more.”
“I’ll let you go before I kill you. How about that?”
He shot another harassed look out the window as the helicopter crossed over their heads again, and fell back to Gabrielle’s side of the car.
* * *
”I’m five miles back,” Max told Gus. He had pushed the truck as hard as he’d been able to for as long as he could, and had made up some time. He was pretty sure he had a couple of highway patrol cars on his tail by now—there were faint sounds of sirens behind him—but he wasn’t too worried about it. They weren’t anywhere close, and anyway, they might come in handy soon. “If you can stop them, I can be there in a couple of minutes.”
There was a moment of silence, with voices in the background on the other end of the line. Gus talking to the helicopter pilot about his willingness to set his bird down in the middle of I-95, probably. Then Gus came back. “Yes, sir.”
“You’re coming down?”
“Yes, sir. We’ll put down in front of them. They’re in the left lane, so we’ll leave some room on the right for the other cars to go by. We’ll do our best so that nobody gets hurt.”
“Thank you,” Max said sincerely.
“You know that if something goes wrong, this could blow up in your face—in all our faces—in a big way.”
It didn’t sound like a question. Max answered it anyway. “I know.”
“We could just let them keep driving. They have to stop eventually. For gas, if nothing else.”
“Every second she’s in that car,” Max said, “he can hurt her, or kill her. I don’t want to give him any more time than I have to. I’ll take responsibility for it. Set the bird down.”
“Yes, sir.” Gus relayed the order to the pilot. “Good luck, Max. Drive fast.”
“I already am,” Max said, and dropped the phone in his lap.
* * *
The helicopter picked up speed and zoomed forward, streaking up the highway. Gabrielle watched, disappointed. Having them there, up in the sky, had made her feel a little less alone. She knew they may not have anything to do with her, but the fact that the helicopter had been there, keeping pace with the car, had allowed her to believe that maybe Max was OK. That maybe there would be a happy ending to her story.
But now they were leaving. Except—
She watched, open-mouthed, as they stopped in mid-air, no bigger than a dragonfly now, and began to descend. Directly toward the roadway.
Alex said a bad word. She didn’t know what it meant, it was in Russian, but she knew it was a curse. As drivers slammed on their brakes and red taillights flashed all around them, Alex fought to keep the sedan in its lane. He had to slow down, too, and was fighting the skid. Gabrielle saw her chance. As quickly as she could, before it fell to the floor, she reached over and snatched the pistol out of Alex’s lap.
He hissed something—in Russian again—and tried to grab for it, but with the way the car was shimmying, immediate self-preservation took the upper hand, and he went back to focusing on trying to keep the car going straight. Up ahead, the helicopter—much bigger now, since they’d traveled qui
te a few yards in just a few seconds—came to a smooth landing on the road, straddling the two left lanes. On its right, a funnel of cars crawled by.
The bottleneck had slowed them way down, and Gabrielle decided to risk making her escape. She undid her seatbelt while Alex fought with the car, and unlocked her door. And clutching the pistol in one hand and opening the door with the other, she rolled and tucked the best she could as she dropped out of the passenger seat and onto the unforgiving roadway.
14
Shit!
Max watched the door of the sedan open and Gabrielle’s body come tumbling out, and for a second his heart stopped. He knew—he just knew—that whoever was in the car had shot her and was ditching the body, and even if he could get to her within a couple of seconds—which he could, given the speed he was going, although now he had to worry about slowing down—it would be too late because she was already dead, because why would anyone sane willingly open the door of a moving car and throw themselves out… and then he watched as she picked herself up while the sedan kept going. And she stood there, in the middle of the interstate, with cars going by on both sides… and was that a gun in her hand?
He hit the brakes at the last moment, and while he tried to stop next to her, he went past with a shriek of tires, and she jumped. And then she realized that it was him, and she came running. “Max! Oh, Max, I was so afraid you were dead!”
He barely got the door open before she threw herself at him. He wrapped his arms around her for a second, and closed his eyes and just breathed her in, before he reluctantly let her go. “Are you all right?”
“I’m bleeding,” Gabrielle said, and Max’s head went light for a second before he saw that she had scraped her bare arm when she landed on the road and rolled.
He nodded. “Yeah. Me, too. Rusty’s coming. He’ll fix it.”
Her brows drew together. “Why are you bleeding?”
The Stripper and the SEAL Page 13