Manhunt on Tau Ceti 4 (Nick Walker, U.F. Marshal Book 6)

by John Bowers

  She settled on a third option. She turned on the hot water, but the plumbing was old—it must have been installed when the castle was first built—and the pipes vibrated like a machine gun. Startled, she quickly turned it off and stood panting, listening, hoping no one had been close enough to hear it. After a moment she calmed enough to realize that anyone who heard the pipes might assume it was Brandy and not an escaped prisoner.

  Except…Brandy hadn’t seemed to be a fan of hot showers.

  She closed her eyes and stripped off her blouse. Turning the water on barely enough to get a trickle, she began washing the blouse to get rid of the worst of the blood. She scrubbed it briskly until pink water swirled around the drain, squeezed water out of the blouse, and scrubbed it again. After three or four turns, the white blouse was merely pink; she soaked it with clean water and began scrubbing her head, her hair, her face, neck, shoulders, stomach, and breasts. Again, it took several tries to get the job done, rinsing the blouse in the shower after each pass.

  Unable to dry herself, shivering from cold, she pulled the blouse over her head and gritted her teeth until her body heat began to warm the wet cloth. It wasn’t ideal, but she had little choice.

  Fortunately, very little blood had splashed onto her pants, but she must have stepped in the blood pool because one of her boots was leaving a small crimson signature with every step. She tugged the boot off and washed the sole under the water, then put it back on.

  The entire operation took about fifteen minutes. Panting from fear and stress, she checked the gun she’d taken from Brandy; it was a .38 calibre six-round revolver with a four-inch barrel. Deadly, but not terribly accurate over fifteen or twenty yards. She glanced at herself in the mirror, slicked her hair back out of her eyes, and turned toward the bathroom door. She had no idea what came next, but Saracen was still out there, and she had to do something before Brandy’s body was discovered.

  She turned out the light, pushed open the door, and stepped into the corridor.

  Chapter 33

  Nick changed his mind about sending Trevor home. If the towers were manned and anyone saw him leaving ahead of schedule, it might trigger suspicion that something was wrong. Nick needed the people inside the castle to remain ignorant of his presence for as long as possible.

  Instead, he E-cuffed Trevor to one of the seats, but turned off the battery so the boy wouldn’t shock himself.

  “Just sit tight until I come back for you,” he said.

  “When will that be?”

  “I have no idea. I have to catch your boss first.”

  “What if…”

  “Hm?”

  “What if he…kills you first?”

  Nick walked over to the desk ten feet from Trevor’s seat; he held the E-cuff key up for Trevor to see, then laid it on the desk.

  “Then someone will find you and turn you loose.”

  “What if I need the bathroom?”

  “Just pee on the carpet. Tell them I said it was okay.”

  Trevor scowled and tugged at the E-cuff.

  “You don’t have to leave me here like this. Just unlock me and I won’t cause any trouble. I promise.”

  Nick shook his head.

  “I’d like to. You seem like a decent kid, but I don’t really know you and I can’t take the chance.”

  To avoid any further argument, Nick tugged his hat low over his face and stepped out of the rail car, lowering his face against the rain. With a quick look in all directions to make sure he wasn’t being observed, he backtracked twenty yards to the trapdoor where he had exited the tunnel. When closed, it was all but invisible; he tugged it open and hurried down the ladder, closing the door above him. To his consternation, Mijo was waiting for him.

  “What are you doing here? I told you to go back to the other end of the tunnel.”

  Mijo grinned.

  “I thought you might need the light. Anyway, nobody can find me here.”

  Nick grunted. “You’re starting to get on my nerves, muchacho.”

  He took the light from Mijo and shined it down the tunnel segment that ran under the castle wall. It ended no more than fifty feet away.

  “Is that as far as it goes?”

  “Yeah. It comes up inside the courtyard.”

  “I thought it came up inside the castle.”

  “No, to get in the castle, you have to use the door.”

  “There’s a door?”

  “Yeah. You can see it once you get past the wall.”

  “Is it locked?”

  “I don’t think so. I don’t think it even has a lock.”

  “You’ve been inside?”

  “Sure. A bunch of times.”

  “All right, here’s what we’re going to do. We’ll crawl to the end and I’ll get out of the tunnel. I’ll close the lid and you crawl back to the other end. You got that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “When you get there, just stay inside the tunnel. You’ll be out of the weather and no one will find you.”

  “Why can’t I just come back here, to the train, and wait? It’s all the same.”

  “No it isn’t. If anything happens to me, they’re going to figure out how I got inside, and they’ll probably check the tunnel to see if anyone was with me. They’ll find you and they’ll probably shoot you.”

  “Really?” Mijo’s eyes grew wide and he crossed himself.

  “Really. These are dangerous people, Mijo. You have to believe me about that.”

  “Okay. I believe you. But if they check the tunnel and I’m at the other end, then what?”

  “If you hear them coming, you get the hell out of Dodge in a hurry.”

  “Huh? What’s a dodge?’

  Nick groaned his exasperation.

  “Get out of the tunnel and run. I mean, really run. Get back to Lago as fast as you can and find Sheriff Buono. He’ll protect you.”

  Mijo looked unhappy, but nodded.

  “Okay, Nick.”

  “Promise me?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You do not leave the tunnel under any other circumstances, you got that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do. Not. Leave. The tunnel.”

  “I got it, I got it.”

  “Okay. If you disobey, we won’t be friends anymore.”

  Nick stared at him a moment, then tousled his hair, which was still wet from the rain outside.

  “All right. Let’s go.”

  ***

  Victoria moved as quietly as she could down the corridor, but no matter how hard she tried, her boots tended to ring on the stone floor. She tried walking on the balls of her feet, but the sound still carried; finally she sat down and tugged the boots off, leaving only her socks. She carried the boots until she found a dark alcove, where she stashed them. Her passage was now almost silent, but the floor was so cold her feet were starting to numb. She would have to take care not to trip.

  When Brandy first brought her into the castle, they had traveled quite a distance from the front entrance before she was locked in the closet. She wasn’t sure how deep into the building she was, but suspected she was closer to the west end than the east where she had entered. That meant she was closing in on Saracen’s location—the trick now was to find him without being seen.

  The corridor ran along the north side of the castle; as she made her way along, the left wall gave way to stone arches. Looking through the arches, she saw what looked like a huge ballroom on the floor below. A quick peek over the railing revealed lots of antique furniture, carpets, paintings, chandeliers—but no people. The ballroom—if that’s what it was—was clear. She hugged the wall on her right and, gun in hand, kept moving.

  She trotted up a short flight of stairs, no more than five steps; fifty feet farther on, an arched passageway appeared on her right. She slowed her pace and peered inside, but it was dark. All she could see was a flight of stone steps leading upward in a spiral; they disappeared into darkness. She guessed they led to one of the upper-fl
oor bedrooms. No doubt Saracen lived in kingly luxury in a royal bedroom. She debated taking the stairs, but without a light, and no way of knowing what lay above, decided against it. Better to stick to the slightly known than the totally unknown.

  She kept moving.

  Another fifty feet. She reached the wall at the west end of the ballroom. The corridor was blocked by another arch with a wooden door. The door had a grate at eye level, and she peered through it. She couldn’t see much—the corridor behind the door was dimly illuminated. She tried the door, turning the handle gingerly, and it opened with very little noise. Relieved, she squeezed through and pulled the door shut behind her. Heart pounding, she crouched and waited, listening.

  For a full minute.

  Nothing.

  She stood up and surveyed her surroundings. This corridor also had arches on the left, and a quick glance over the side revealed the room where she’d had breakfast.

  Kenneth Saracen’s office.

  The forty-foot window overlooking the lake.

  She heard voices.

  Saracen was at his desk, talking on a handheld transmitter. He was alone.

  She closed her eyes and gripped the gun. God help her, she had to do this. It was cold-blooded murder, but she didn’t care. It might save Nick’s life.

  ***

  Nick heaved upward on the last trapdoor but it barely moved. He pushed harder and it lifted a couple of inches, but the narrow ladder didn’t give him much leverage and he let it drop again. Panting, he looked down at Mijo, who stood below him holding the light.

  “This thing feels like it’s covered with rocks.”

  “It is. They put cobblestone over the door to make it hard to find.”

  “It must weigh a ton! How did you get it open?”

  Mijo pointed. “Use the spring.”

  “What?”

  Mijo directed the light to the edge of the door. Nick saw the hinges, but nothing that looked like a spring.

  “I don’t see a spring.”

  “See that rod across the door? It has a button on it.”

  Nick had noticed the rod—it looked like a brace to keep the door from sagging, but next to it, invisible without the light, was a cylinder from which the rod protruded. Now he recognized it as a simple piston-rod and cylinder. Peering at it, he spied a small metal button.

  “What does it do?”

  “Just push it.”

  Heaving a breath to replenish his oxygen, Nick did as instructed. Immediately, he heard a hiss of air pressure from the cylinder; the rod began to move, pushing on the door, and within fifteen seconds the heavy trapdoor swung upward. Rain pelted Nick’s face as he peeked over the side. He looked down at Mijo.

  “How do you close it?”

  “When you get outside, just push the door down and it will close by itself.”

  “What if I want to open it from the outside?”

  “Pull on it. It activates the rod.”

  Nick shook his head in wonder. From the mouths of babes.

  “Okay, remember our deal. You get moving.”

  Mijo nodded.

  “Okay, Nick. Be careful. Buena suerte.”

  After another quick look in all directions, Nick hauled himself out of the hole and gave the door a shove downward. Instead of slamming shut, the mechanism lowered the door in a controlled manner. A moment later, the door settled into its groove and blended into the rest of the courtyard, making it virtually invisible. Nick felt around the top of the trapdoor and found a metal grip embedded in a gap in the cobblestone. He mentally marked the spot in case he had to use it again.

  He rose to a crouch and moved up against the castle wall. Six feet to his right he saw the door Mijo had told him about. Moving in front of it, he found the wrought-iron handle and gave it a tug. To his relief, it opened a few inches. The door was heavy and he had to tug harder to open it wide enough to squeeze through. Just as he was about to step inside…

  He heard gunfire.

  ***

  Sheriff Kirk Thomas shoved his car door open and rolled out onto the ground, landing in two inches of near-freezing rainwater. He gasped in shock as the standing water soaked his skin, but didn’t let that stop him—he scrambled toward the rear of his car where he had the most cover from the castle tower. Looking up, he saw another flash; whoever was in the tower was using a rifle and had them dead to rights. He drew his sidearm and tried to take aim, but all he could see was the dark, looming shape of the stone tower, which rose fifty or sixty feet above him. He had no target.

  The rifle fired again; Thomas squeezed off two rounds in the direction of the flash, but couldn’t tell if they had any effect. Officer Williams of Orosi had rolled out the passenger side of the car and now crawled around the back of the vehicle to join him, but in the backseat, Officer Dickens was slumped against the door.

  Thomas saw blood on the rear window.

  The rifle fired again and one of the bubble lights on the car’s roof shattered. He heard shouts as Barnes, Blankenship, and Connie Ventura bailed out of their car and took cover. Thomas wiped rain out of his eyes and ground his teeth—it looked like Walker had been right about Tinker-Smith—or Saracen—or whatever the hell his name was.

  He wondered what Hugo Barnes was thinking right now.

  ***

  Nick hesitated only briefly. In spite of the rain and gusting wind, he had heard several shots from what sounded like a rifle, answered by several more from small-calibre handguns. It had come from his left, the east end of the castle near the main gate. Had backup arrived? If not, then who was shooting at whom, and why?

  It didn’t matter. Whatever was happening at the front gate should serve to distract Saracen’s people at least temporarily. If Nick’s opinion was correct, Saracen was a coward and would avoid the gunfight at all costs…which meant he was probably holed up inside the castle while his followers did the dying. That suited Nick just fine.

  He gripped the rifle in his left hand, drew a .44 with his right, and headed into the castle.

  ***

  Victoria crouched in the shadow of one of the arches, her intense gaze resting on Kenneth Saracen. She wished she had her rifle. It would be an easy shot from here, an easy kill. She had narrowly missed an Expert rating in the Star Marines, and in this setting, with neither wind nor distance as mitigating factors, it would be simple murder.

  But she had left the rifle with Lard Davis with instructions to deliver it to Nick. Now all she had was Brandy’s .38 with the four-inch barrel. Victoria had never been a great pistol shot, and at this distance—fifty or sixty feet—her chance of a clean kill was, at best, fifty percent. She had no doubt she could hit Saracen, but what she wanted was a head shot. For that, she needed to get closer.

  She crawled away from the arch, out of Saracen’s sight, and began looking for a way down. There must be a stairwell somewhere…

  ***

  Sheriff Marco Buono sat in his car at the intersection of the private road with the main highway. Rain hammered his car so hard that he could barely hear the gunfight taking place just a hundred yards away. Buono was torn—the fact that someone in the castle had opened fire on the two police cars seemed to prove that Walker had been right about Tinker-Smith, or perhaps the people working for him. Innocent people didn’t shoot at law enforcement without a reason.

  But what should he do now? He had deputies in town who could help out here, but hesitated to call them. Tinker-Smith’s popularity would make some of them reluctant to rock the boat.

  Since he’d parked his car, almost no traffic had come down the highway, probably because of the weather. Now, to his surprise, he saw three pairs of headlights approaching from Lago, looking almost like a convoy. As they approached the castle road, they slowed and signaled a left turn. Buono was blocking their path and they stopped. He got out of his car and approached the lead vehicle.

  “Howdy, Sheriff.”

  Buono’s eyes narrowed as he recognized the driver and two of the passengers.
They were local high school boys.

  “What are you kids doing out here?”

  “We got a YWL call. Said there was intruders trying to break in. They said we should bring our guns.”

  Buono felt a stir of anger.

  “Who called you?”

  “Bodie Buchanan. He said it was an emergency.”

  Buono looked at the cars waiting to turn.

  “Who came with you?”

  “Bunch of guys. Eleven of us.”

  “You’re all armed?”

  “Yes, sir. Just tell us where to go.”

  “Okay, here’s what you do—turn around and go back home. We have the situation under control, so you won’t be needed. But thanks for coming out.”

  The kid driving the car frowned.

  “Are you sure, Sheriff? Bodie said—”

  “I’m afraid Bodie got himself into a jam. Turns out we have to arrest him and he called you guys for help.”

  “What kind of a jam? What did he do?”

  “Charges are still pending, but one thing he’s doing is shooting at the cops. I don’t think any of you want to get involved in something like that.”

  “No, sir, we don’t.”

  “Good. Then turn around and go back. If Bodie calls you again, tell him to surrender before he gets hurt.”

  The youthful driver stared at Buono a minute, looking unconvinced, but finally shrugged.

  “Yes, sir.”

  Buono held a similar, brief discussion with each of the other two drivers. They all seemed reluctant to believe him, but none of them was prepared to refuse a direct order. All three cars turned around and disappeared in the direction of Lago.

  ***

  Ken Saracen sat at his desk with his forehead in his left hand, his elbow resting on the desk. With his other hand he held a transmitter. He had given similar devices to all his people and they were all on the same frequency; right now he was talking to Phil Wasserman, one of his original followers.

  “How many are there? Can you see them all?”