“Why didn’t he?” she asked.
“No way to know. He put me in custody of strange woman. Another of his hitmen. I assumed he subcontracted the dirty deed to her. That is the Petteri way. But she did not kill. After bragging she was going to finish my job for me, she left to go to her targets.” He pointed between her and Asher. “You two.”
When they didn’t respond, he added. “I am Russian. I know many tricks. I escaped from simple cell to follow her.”
“Lucky for us,” Asher commented, sounding equally grateful and wary.
The fire at the truck was almost completely subdued. Robert and his white foam had made short work of it. Misha looked over her shoulder to his truck. “I had many weapons stolen, ready to help you, but they were in bed of truck. Now, I only have this…” He pointed to the rifle on sleds. “With a few rounds. And the pistol you took from me.”
Asher pulled at her elbow. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
She let him guide her onto the roadway, out of earshot of the Russian agent.
He made sure they were far enough before talking quietly. “What are we going to do with him? I don’t trust any of this. TKM is sneaky. They sent actual hitmen to kill me in your park. That’s not normal, Grace.”
Normal was a word long buried under the rubble and ash of the fallen asteroid. Misha the assassin was the last person on earth she expected to pull from the drainage tube, but…
Grace shifted her weight to one hip, giving her a better view of her captive. Misha stood with his arms folded across his chest, but he also had a foot on the Finnish rifle, standing proud, as if he’d shot a lion on safari with it.
“Maybe he’s the guy we need to survive. Whatever his game, there’s no way he could have faked shooting at the helicopter and getting shot at in return. If he’d meant to see us dead, he could have let the woman—Nerio, I think he called her—kill us with her machine gun.”
“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Asher said dryly, though not with much conviction.
She reached for his hand and held it for a second. “I don’t trust him, but he’s here. If the woman comes back, I’d rather we have someone who can help defend the train. You’ve seen Shawn. He’s not going to be much use. Logan has heart, but he’s got to keep an eye on his dad. Even you are going to be distracted by Diedre.”
“Where do you think Robert will take us?”
She gave him a funny look. “You don’t think he’ll take us east? I just assumed…” She’d been so focused on her own problems, she’d forgotten Robert had brought along a boxcar full of family and coworkers who’d escaped from Denver. They had as much right, if not more, to decide where they went. Their objectives aligned with the engineer’s while they fled north to get out of Denver, but now?
She sighed as if the whole train was on her back.
Asher reached out and held her hand. “We’ll get through this. All we have to do is explain to Robert why we need to get where you want. If he says no, we still have your truck. It isn’t a big deal.”
Her mood came out of the clouds. “Wouldn’t it be funny if we got stuck transporting Misha in the Chevy he shot up? I’d make him sit in the cargo bed. Behind the partition.” Shawn’s brother had made the nice wooden bulkhead to keep out the wind created by all her broken rear windows. By putting the Russian behind it, he’d effectively be out of sight.
They both glanced toward the rail cars and the shed. From where they stood, the NPS truck was prominent on the flatcar. Diedre, Shawn, and Logan stood close to it, watching her and Asher gawk at the wrecked truck. Asher waved; Diedre waved back.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” she suggested. “Get the train moving. We’ll try to convince Robert to head east…”
Misha’s feet crunched on the gravel, announcing his approach. “You will not care to go east. We have to go to the rock at Yellowstone. I have friends there.” He carried the big rifle with two arms, but he couldn’t fire it without setting it on the ground. It was simply too long.
“Yellowstone?” she groaned. “Why in the hell would we go back? We’ve spent the past week getting away from there.”
Misha chuckled. “I thought I just said you must go to Yellowstone if you want to live through this. Me and my friends are the only ones who can help you.”
Boonsville, MO
“Stay down!” he yelled to Haley.
The men on the deck of the bridge had divided into two groups. Three had lined up along the front to shoot as they approached. The other three crossed the lanes of traffic and waited for them to emerge from underneath. The cracks of three rifles were answered by pings of metal and splitting of wood. They’d hit the boat.
Ezra’s heart seemed to stop inside his chest, and he feared he’d be frozen with panic, unable to move. To counter the grip of doom, he spun the wheel, changing his course violently to the left. It bled off lots of the speed, as he’d anticipated, but it also made them a more difficult target to hit. Splashes erupted off to his side, where the boat was originally headed. He kept going toward the left shore once he was aimed in that direction.
Butch readjusted as fast as possible. More shots came in, some hitting the boat, some splashing into the water, while he aimed upward and in reverse. When he squeezed off his first shot, his rifle was held awkwardly in front of him as he lay on the deck. There was nothing to balance it on.
Haley seemed to curl up into a smaller ball, hugging Liam against her chest.
The engine struggled to build up speed again, but once he heard the familiar roar of maximum RPMs, he cut the wheel to the right, trying to zig and zag. Each second took them farther from the shooters. Each change in direction caused Butch to lose his balance while firing from his back.
Two more shots hit the boat, splitting a seat cushion and puncturing the wooden deck. The back of his head felt huge and exposed. At any second, he could get split open by rifle rounds fired by the bastards in blue shirts. However, he kept his eyes forward, his mind focused, and put all his energy into planning escape maneuvers on the open water.
“Holy crap!” Butch shouted. “I almost hit one of them!”
“Keep it up!” he called back.
Another volley of shots zipped toward the boat. Most of those went into the water, some twenty or thirty feet away.
“We’re getting there,” he said to himself before making another course correction. When he checked over his shoulder, the entire span of the bridge was in his field of view. His swerving propeller wash painted an uneven brown trail back under the deck. Looking up, the two men from the front side arrived to join their mates.
Butch saw the same thing. Instead of carefully aiming his rifle, he put out as many rounds as possible in an effort to get the five men to stay low. His intense attack continued for ten or fifteen seconds until he got through his entire mag. “I’m out!”
They had thousands of rounds of ammo, but there was no time to reload. He reached for his rifle and chucked it toward Butch.
“Thanks!” the big man said, catching it.
A bullet struck the wooden deck in between Butch’s legs.
Ezra jerked left before another one found its target.
Butch rolled sideways with the change in momentum.
They went another few seconds before he yanked the wheel to the right. Soon after, he didn’t hear or see any bullet impacts.
His friend finally got his bearings, lined up the borrowed rifle, but didn’t fire. He studied them through the little 4X scope for a short time. “They’re going back to their trucks,” Butch said over the engine’s roar.
Ezra kept the throttle wide open for another few minutes before finally letting off. The bridge wasn’t quite out of view, but it was miles behind them, well beyond rifle range. The first thing he checked was the fuel gauge. “I hate to be the one to say this, but we have to find a place to stop.”
“Gas?” Butch asked.
Haley let herself unwind, careful to release Liam. The puggle didn’t
have any appreciation for the larger situation. He came out of his cocoon and immediately pawed at her blowing blonde hair like it was a chew toy. “Down, boy!”
Ezra was pleased to see her happy. It meant no one had been shot.
“Haley, can you pass the map over to me? Butch, I need you to look around to see if we’ve been hit in the pontoons. I can’t stop us yet, but I will if we’ve sprung a leak. We can tape it up now and add epoxy later.”
“Are we sinking?” Haley asked, repeating almost the exact words Butch had once said to him.
Butch replied instantly. “Naw. The pontoons are like compartments. You can pierce one, but the others compensate for it. We’re fine.” He leaned over the side rails, checking the aluminum floats, but it didn’t get past Ezra how he held on to the rails and seats with crushing strength. For a guy who was terrified of the water, he put on a tremendous show of not being afraid. Haley was having an effect on him.
Ezra breathed out, remembering he’d been terrified a few minutes ago, too. Being shot at wasn’t a new thing for him, he was sad to admit, but it was never going to become commonplace. Any of those bullets could end his quest to reach Grace. If the shooters had a bit more skill, or his engine were a bit smaller, or if any number of random factors came out a slight bit differently, he wouldn’t be around to appreciate surviving another attack.
Haley gave him the paper map of Missouri. It was already open to their segment of river, but he had to spread it wider to see what was ahead. They were a little farther than halfway across the state, with three remote bridges between them and the more populated sprawl of Kansas City. Plenty of chances for the TKM goons to catch up to them. Plenty of time to get revenge for killing one of their men.
“Here. Arrow Rock. It looks big enough to have a filling station. We’ll have to get out and walk into town, but it’s only ten miles upriver. The trucks will have to take the long way around. There’s no direct road because of the way the river bends to the north. We should have time.”
“Should?” Haley asked, catching the word and the way he’d said it.
“We have no choice. We either risk getting gas, or we give up the boat.” He wasn’t ready to part ways with Susan’s Grace. It was his last meaningful link back to his wife.
“E-Z can do it,” Butch said to Haley. “I need to show you how to operate one of these, however.” He held up the black Bushmaster AR-15.
“Show me,” she replied.
Chapter 6
Sidney, NE
“What does Yellowstone have to do with keeping us alive?” Grace asked Misha.
They chose to walk back to the train shed, giving her and Asher a chance to talk to the man who’d saved their lives. They did not, however, give him a weapon. His Lahti was in the truck, and they’d kept his pistol. She and Asher walked ten paces behind the weary-looking man.
“The dig site is not in Yellowstone, but is close. It is the rock that almost killed us when you left me to die on gravel roadway.” He held up his hand. “I do not blame you. Very clever of you to use bear spray with fire, by the way. I only point out fact.”
“Fine. We’ve established an asteroid came down to the south of the park. But why us? Why there?”
“I told you. I have friends who will come to our side when I explain what their boss did to my family. The more friends you have, easier it is to fight back. Petteri was very upset you killed his beloved assistant, Howard. I think he will send many more assassins after you if Nerio fails. You must be ready. You must have base of defense, not this…” He glanced at the train. “This broken-down machine.”
“For the record, we didn’t kill Howard. Some woman did it. Her name was Dorothy, I think. She arrived with Petteri, but didn’t seem to like the other man. When the shooting started, Howard wrestled me to the ground; I thought I was dead. When Dorothy shot him, I was happy about it.”
Misha studied her over his shoulder while walking toward the first coal car in the line. “He was betrayed by one of his own? You must tell me whole story sometime. I would also like to meet this woman, if she is not already dead. Petteri has eyes everywhere. Even out here.”
Grace didn’t let herself get absorbed in his conspiracies. “All I need to know is whether you’re going to betray us. I know you saved us and all, but it isn’t easy to forget our earlier meetings.”
“I know,” the Russian replied, before dropping into silence for several minutes.
The train engines on the farthest track remained where they were. The engineers now stood next to their machines, but seemed uninterested in getting any closer to her and the action. She waved to them, getting a smattering of waves back.
A few minutes later, after walking along the strings of coal hoppers, they reached the flatbed. The others were shocked to learn Misha’s identity and background, but they seemed satisfied by her acceptance of him. Instead of prodding for explanations about his past with TKM, they asked about his plan for taking them to the Yellowstone dig site.
Shawn rose to the call right away. “It isn’t enough to lay claim to the rock which fell on Crow lands. We need to tell the owners of the properties beneath all the asteroid pieces. It belongs to them.” He smiled mischievously.
Grace knew why. “You want to stick it to Petteri, don’t you?”
He gestured to his injured leg. “His company tried to steal what belongs to our nation. Then he tried to snuff out me and my boy. The only break I’ll give that guy is when I snap his spine in two. Stick it to him? You better believe it.”
In a weird way, it mirrored what Misha had said. Going there would help stick it to Mr. Tikkanen and it would help her and Asher find protection with Misha and his friends. On the flip side, the place would be crawling with TKM security. What if Misha failed to sway those people? Then they’d all be walking into a trap.
Misha brightened. “If it helps, I know who owns land.”
“Really?” Asher said dryly. “That’s incredible. And damned convenient.”
The Russian man smiled, revealing his one missing tooth. “You misunderstand my English. I do not know the exact name, but I have seen the files. TKM absolutely knows who owns land at fallen fragments. They need the information so they can pay for rights to collect the ore and take it back to their properties.”
Shawn harrumphed in the affirmative. TKM had indeed tried to buy him off.
Grace had to take a stab at staying on her mission. “My dad is to the east, though…” She hated sounding like an injured bird, but all of her plans had been centered around reaching Dad and his boat. If she turned around and headed back west, it would make his journey even longer. Still, if he knew all the facts, her father might counsel her to stick with a strong group rather than venturing out alone, or with Asher by himself. And, she reasoned, she already knew the area around Yellowstone Park.
Misha seemed to take the lead on talking reason, which confused her. He focused on Grace again. “You said kind words about my family. Let me prove to your father I can make right after what I did. I protect you with my team. I keep you safe from Nerio and her husband. I keep you all protected from chaos happening in many cities and states of your America. But I cannot do it alone. I have to take you to dig site up north.”
Robert the engineer walked up mid-conversation. He handed Grace a backpack that had been slightly burned in several places. “This was blown clear of the wreckage.”
“Is mine,” Misha declared.
Robert acknowledged him but kept talking. “You want to go up north?”
They all looked to him. Misha appeared as if he was about to reply, but he deferred to Grace. She then spoke to Robert. “I wanted to go east, but now we’re talking about traveling to the west and north. Toward Yellowstone. It’s where this man has friends; men with lots of guns. Guys who can fight off that helicopter if it comes back.”
The man wiped his hands down the sides of his greasy overalls as if it was a nervous habit. “You’ll be happy to know most of my people in the b
oxcar have gotten rides with the workers here at the rail shed. Their homes are back in Denver. As for me and my crew…”
She braced for disappointment.
Robert cracked a smile. “Would it surprise you to learn this engine has been contracted by TKM to haul a load of these repaired coal hoppers to Kansas City?”
Her heart fluttered, then sank. He was supposed to go east, toward her father. It was the way she desperately wanted to go, but it was suddenly not the way she needed to go.
The engineer continued. “But I don’t think we’d make it if the helicopter came back. Not alone.” He gave Misha a serious look. “Can you get your friends to come here? We could all ride the train to the east. I have an entire boxcar ready for passengers. I’d love to have the protection.”
Misha immediately shook his head. “They are willing to help me, but there are, um, certain financial incentives to stay where they are.”
Grace chuckled. “They’re in it for the money.”
Diedre raised her good hand before speaking. “I vote we go to wherever we can find the biggest number of friendly soldiers. I’ve been inside Petteri’s hive for the past week. I’ve been on his island. In his flight center. In his Denver office. His company is consumed with digging up all the ore they dropped to Earth. They have a huge army of men willing to help. I can say from all my dealings with the man if he means to get something, he will. If he means to hurt someone, he most definitely will.”
“Is what I said,” Misha interrupted.
Asher’s sister continued. “If this guy can protect us, let him try. I’d like to steal some of Petteri’s money, too.”
Laughter all around.
Grace still wasn’t happy about the change in plans but saw the general merits. She rifled through Misha’s pack to ensure there were no weapons inside. It held a few grain bars, a couple of handheld radios, and other junk probably meant for camping.
Shawn grunted as he shifted weight off his bad leg. “I can call my people and see what we can do to help. The more, the merrier, right?”
Impact Series Box Set | Books 1-6 Page 85