“Run,” Taylor said to Kara as the men saw them.
She accelerated along the hall, Taylor sidestepping as quickly as he could behind her as he methodically pulled the trigger, shattering the glass panes outward. One of the two men got caught high in the chest and fell back through the gate, but the other tried to jig to the left, and a bullet found him in the thigh, causing him to tumble into the pool. The guard wasn’t dead, but as he thrashed to get out, the black sheeting covering the pool, pulled more and more around the man. It slowly encased tighter around him, dragging him through the thin layer of ice and into the pool. When Taylor made it to the end of the hall, where Kara had stopped, pushed against the outside frame of the door, the guard had stopped thrashing completely.
“His room is through here,” Kara said, pointing at the closed door.
“Stay behind me and keep an eye on that door and the pool area. If you see anyone, yell out and push yourself as flat on the floor as you can,” Taylor said, pushing her to one side of the wall, away from both the row of windows and doorway in front of them.
He didn’t wait to see her response, knowing whoever was on the other side of the door had already been alerted to their presence on the other side. For the moment, surprise and momentum was on his side, and probably the only thing that had kept him alive so far and Taylor didn’t want to give that up. Lifting a foot, he kicked hard, cracking the door frame, and exploding the door into the room. Instead of immediately following through the door, Taylor pulled back, out of the doorway, almost smashing Kara into the wall.
That had been a good move, as gunshots rang out, with impacts along the floor down the hallway suggesting that Taylor would have been much worse for wear had he stayed put after kicking the door in. Taylor waited a beat and leaned in quickly, taking a peek inside the room, and pulled back quickly as more bullets ripped passed him. The room was a mess. One corner of the room had been ripped out, with bricks and debris littering the room. Taylor had seen outside that hole to the smoking ruin of one section of the compound.
The place where the fuel tanks and guard house had been located was now just a smoking black smudge and pitted concrete from the foundation. Part of the wall and the tower on that side of the wall had also been obliterated. The guard house was far enough from this corner of the main building that, if he had to guess, Taylor thought it was likely flying debris had caused the damage and opened the hole, rather than the explosion itself.
Taylor had, however, only allowed a small fraction of his attention to take in the damage from the explosion, the three people in the room being much more important at the moment. On the bed was a frazzled looking teenager holding onto the arms of a terrified looking Mary Jane, who was struggling against his grip.
To one side of the room, almost diagonal from where Taylor stood, was a guard, gun drawn and the source of the bullets still splintering the wall and door frame. The guard’s position wasn’t like Taylor’s, out of the doorway, ready to react to danger, which would have been OK if he hadn’t been assigned to protecting the kid. Unfortunately for him, he was supposed to be protecting the kid, and where he chose to take a stand, put him away from the one place in the room where Taylor would have actively avoided shooting. Taylor took advantage of that mistake.
He still had a two-thirds full magazine, and while he normally would opt for direct, target fire, this was one of those circumstances when blind ‘spray-and-prey’ was the preferred option. Taylor held the gun out away from his body in the direction of the guard and began pulling the trigger. The odds of hitting anything specific were low of course, this type of fire not being at all accurate, but the corner of the room the guard was in wasn’t very large, and Taylor let enough bullets fly to make his odds of hitting at least reasonable. Taylor let ten bullets fly and paused, being rewarded by a loud thud as the man’s body hit the ground. A quick glance in the room confirmed the guard was down, along with a bunch of bullet holes scattered across the wall the guard had been standing in front of.
Taylor reached over and pulled Kara into the room, keeping his rifle on the kid on the bed, whose eyes had started darting around the room.
“Don’t,” Taylor said, as the kid’s eyes fell on the guard's dropped pistol.
Ignoring Taylor’s warning, he made a lunge for the weapon. Taylor’s finger began to squeeze the trigger then stopped. This was the son of a kidnapper and arch-pimp, and he’d planned on raping Mary Jane, but he was still just a teenager, and Taylor couldn’t bring himself to gun the kid down.
“Shit,” Taylor said and stepped forward.
As the kid's hand closed around the pistol, Taylor brought the butt of his rifle crashing on his head. He tried to pull the hit and hoped it hadn’t been fatal as the boy’s body went limp, but it was the best he could have done. He wasn’t going to let the kid get his hands on a pistol, and he had a better chance with a cracked skull than a bullet.
Turning, he saw Mary Jane glancing at Kara then over at Taylor, her face masked with fear, apprehension, and confusion.
“Your mother sent me,” Taylor said in English, going to stand next to the large gap in the corner, looking out. “I’m here to bring you home.”
“Rea—” she started to say, her expression becoming hopeful when Kara’s voice cut in.
“Hallway!”
Taylor turned, rifle lifting, looking along the hallway, to see two more men coming toward him from the door at the other end. As soon as his brain recognized the threat, his finger was already pressing on the trigger, sending four shots toward them, crumpling both men.
No sooner had they fallen than Mary Jane screamed, the sound of bullets smacking into the outside wall and whipping through the room cutting through her terror. Taylor turned again, seeing her crouched on the floor, hands over her head. As Taylor moved to the open space on the wall, he also noticed Kara still standing tall, by the door to the hallway, peering out.
Four men were coming toward the corner of the building, flame leaping from the ends of their rifles as they took shots at the corner of the building. They had probably gotten word that the intruder had headed this way, same as the two men coming along the hallway. It seemed a ballsy move shooting blindly at the room where the boss’ son had last been seen, but guys paid to guard scumbags weren’t known for quick reasoning and discretion.
Taylor was well protected by the stone wall, and took his time, picking off each man with a shot each, aware of how much he needed to husband his ammunition. Even as he was shooting the last of the four men, his eyes were scanning the courtyard in front of the house, or at least the parts he could see, for an escape plan. Thankfully, one was readily apparent. The car they’d borrowed from Timor sat in front of the house still, and its keys were still in Taylor’s pocket.
“Hallway!” Kara yelled out again, pulling Taylor out of his head.
“Get her up, and get ready to make a break for it,” Taylor said as he passed Kara.
As he got into position by the door, ready to address the new threat, the first bullet found him. Taylor was just bracing the weapon, leaning out into the doorway, when a bullet ripped through his side, staggering him back as pain seared up.
A small part of his brain told him the shot was low and far to one side, not far above his hip, which meant damage to the intestines, and not the kidneys or lungs. The mental triage told him it wasn’t immediately life threatening, which was good because a second man appeared in the hallway behind the one who shot him.
Taylor pushed the pain down and focused, as he’d been trained to do, maintaining a methodical pull on the trigger, dropping each man in turn. He was just starting to turn back and collect the girls, with a grunt of pain forcing its way through his lips when a gunshot rang out behind him.
Taylor whipped around. More fiery pain from the bullet wound warned him that quick movements were a bad idea. He was pulling up the rifle when he paused.
Kara stood above Mary Jane, the fallen weapon Malik’s son had been going for
in her hand, barrel smoking, the body of another guard, collapsed through the hole in the wall.
Taylor shook off the momentary surprise and said, “Stay behind me.”
As he got to the hole in the wall, another man stepped through, inches from Taylor. He was carrying his weapon across his chest, not expecting to see another man follow through the hole after seeing a body drop moments before. Taylor rammed the barrel into the man’s arm, pushing it up just as it fired, a bullet punching a hole in the ceiling, and followed through with a swing from the wooden butt of the rifle, slamming it into the man’s jaw. Blood and teeth sprayed across the wall as he fell back out of the gap.
Taylor followed him through, rifle at the ready this time, just in time to see another man coming to the breach. Taylor didn’t hesitate, putting two bullets into the man as he slid down the ramp of rubble that had once been the wall.
A head poked out from the front entryway, and Taylor put three more shots in that direction. The angle was such it seemed unlikely he actually hit anyone, but his main goal was to keep their heads down.
Taylor continued running forward, twisting to put two more bullets toward the front gate, trying to push back the guards who were coming from that direction, when the slide of the rifle locked back. Taylor dropped the rifle and pulled his pistol, turning in jog step to put two more bullets into the front door.
Taylor reached the car and heard two more pops behind him. Turning he found Mary Jane almost to him with Kara a few steps behind, firing the recovered gun roughly in the direction of the front gate. He had a moment of puritanical worry at a teenager with no training, firing a weapon. He shut it down knowing that if it had been him, he would have one hundred percent wanted a gun in his hands, regardless of training.
“Get in,” Taylor shouted to the girls, as he put more rounds into the front door.
Mary Jane jerked the rear door open and slid in, followed by Kara after she had taken another two shots at the men by the front gate. It was anyone’s guess if she was actually coming close to anyone, but it was causing the men to duck back, which is all Taylor was doing at this moment.
Just as he opened the driver's side door, the man who’d been at the front door tried to make a run for it, to get to closer cover. Taylor dropped him with another two, more accurate, shots. This weapon also clicked dry, and Taylor tossed it on the passenger seat as he slid in and started the car, throwing it into reverse.
Tires squealed as Taylor whipped the car around in a tight arc, just missing the rear bumper of the car that had been parked next to them. The back window shattered as a bullet tore through, smacking into the passenger side headrest.
“Down!” Taylor yelled at the girls, seeing two more men coming out of the house, firing at the car even as Taylor threw it into drive.
More squealing could be heard from the tires as Taylor mashed the gas, urging the Mercedes forward as the sound of bullets impacting against metal could be heard. Smoke poured from the tires as rubber burned, the car leaping forward, engine roaring.
The front gate was mostly closed, just enough open to allow the guards by the front gate to come to help their comrades. Taylor turned the wheel sharply to the right, taking the vehicle over the snow-covered yard, crossing the charred and blackened patch around what used to be the guard barracks.
Gunning it, Taylor took the car over the rubble that made a huge breach in the outer wall caused by the explosion. For a moment, the engine revved violently as the tires left the ground and it no longer had to fight against friction. Then all three of them let out a collective ‘oof’ as they crashed back to the ground, the wheels tearing into the frozen field outside the compound.
Taylor didn’t let the impact distract him, throwing the wheel to the left, tearing deep ruts into the earth as he headed back for the roadway by the front gate. As he neared the asphalt, he had to duck sideways, putting his head almost below the line of the dashboard as a guard standing near the road began firing at the car, punching bullets through the front window.
Taylor whipped the wheel over, fishtailing as he lost traction of the wheels briefly while transitioning from hard, frozen ground and the icy road surface. As the car skidded, the trunk caught the guard who had fired at them at hip level as the man tried to dive out of the way, sending him flying off the road and into the field on the other side.
“Buckle up, both of you! Kara, hand me that gun,” Taylor said in English.
Taylor partially wanted it because his gun had slid onto the floor when the car started whipping around, and retrieving it and reloading it while still driving at high speed would have been a little dangerous. Of course, he also wanted it because the idea of a weapon in the hands of someone who didn’t know how to use it behind him also seemed like a bad idea.
As he reached the outskirts of the town, Taylor reached back and took the gun from her, holding it in his right hand as the left gripped the steering wheel.
“Mom sent you?” Mary Jane said, the sound of panic in her voice barely suppressed.
“Yes, since the day after you were grabbed. I’ve been tracking you since you were taking out of DC.”
“But we’re in the middle of Russia,” she said through tears.
“Belarus, actually. We are near the border, and I have some friends on the Russian side of the border waiting for us,” Taylor replied, keeping the ‘I hope’ off the end of his statement.
“Cars are being behind us,” Kara said in broken English.
“I see them,” Taylor said as they tore through the streets of the small town, sending people jumping off the streets and a car horn blaring as he barely missed sideswiping a vehicle pulling from a side street.
It wasn’t just cars, it was two jeeps and two motorcycles he could see. The Mercedes was fast, and he was keeping his distance from the cars, enough that, at the moment, they were at too long a range for their guns to be accurate. The bikes, however, were another story and they were closing ground fast.
As Taylor passed through the town, swerving back and forth in the lane to keep the bikes from coming alongside him, which was a tactic that wouldn’t work for long. He had to drop speed to do it, and it was letting the jeeps close up.
“Hold on,” Taylor said as a bike managed to dodge his swerve and started to come up next to the rear driver side of the car.
Taylor pushed the driver's side door open and smashed the brake. The biker realized what was happening as soon as Taylor threw the door open, but he was too near the car and didn’t have time to react. He slammed into the door at almost sixty miles an hour, ripping it off the frame and smashing ahead of the car, flipping end over end in a mangle of metal and flesh.
Debris whipped through the opened door of the car, something cut across Taylor’s neck, causing a searing pain and the feeling of wetness running down his neck into his shirt. He also heard the girls cry out, but couldn’t turn and check on them. Even as he released the brake, he was already accelerating again, being forced to dodge the tumbling wreck that soared over the roof of the car as he passed.
There was also the problem of the other bike, whose driver had taken the opportunity of Taylor’s move to get ahead of him. While still driving at a rapid speed, the bike driver began firing. A few of the bullets smacked into the hood and one into the windshield, but the rest passed harmlessly. Taylor knew that despite what Hollywood portrayed, shooting over your shoulder from one moving vehicle at another moving vehicle is a nearly impossible task.
The biker’s move might have seemed like a good plan, but Taylor’s turn was coming up, something the man couldn’t have known. Taylor slowed and skidded into the turn, letting the car slide across the roadway as it made the turn. He lost a lot of speed in the process, however, and the jeeps behind him had closed a lot of the room. Rifle fire started peppering the car from behind as Taylor accelerated again, somewhat recklessly considering the turns he was coming into. But he ignored it, and hurtled toward the hillside road, knowing his only real chance was to
use the twisting curves to limit how easy a target he was.
As he neared the first turn, he had to slow rapidly, and one of the jeeps made an even more reckless move, holding its acceleration until it was almost at the turn, allowing it to come alongside the rear of Taylor’s car. Its front bumper smacked against the rear passenger door, forcing Taylor into the cliff-side, wheels skidding on the icy road. Had he not been pressed against the rocky cliff face, there was a good chance he would have lost traction on the slick road and gone off the side. As it was, sparks leapt off the metal side, and Taylor had to lean in to keep from being smashed against the rocks poking in through the open driver's side, where the door used to be.
As they came to the next turn, Taylor let off the gas, turned, hoping the press of the jeep kept the car going straight and fired twice. Two bullets crashed through the passenger window above Kara’s head as she ducked flat against Mary Jane, smashing into the driver of the jeep. Taylor turned quickly and grabbed the wheel when the pressure of the jeep against the side of his vehicle disappeared. As he began making the turn, the Jeep continued its forward progress, the passenger having given up firing at Taylor and trying to grab the steering wheel as the vehicle careened off the side of the road and smashed down the hillside end over end.
The Wrong Girl (John Taylor Book 3) Page 25