“She’s okay, Arnie. She took off like a bat out of hell.”
I ducked into the building, glimpsing Kane’s back as he disappeared into the kitchen. By the time I arrived he had already laid Nichele on a blanket and was heading for the nearest boiler with a bucket.
“Are ya sure?” Hellhound demanded. “Cats crawl away an’ hide when they’re hurt bad. When I found Hooker he was hidin’ in a garbage can, just about dead.”
I dropped to my knees beside Nichele as Kane returned with the bucket and a couple of cloths. He handed me one and I tucked the phone between my chin and shoulder and went to work. Trying not to think about what I was wringing out of the cloth, I returned my attention to Hellhound.
“I really think Peaches is fine, Arnie. She sure as hell wasn’t crawling. I think she broke the sound barrier heading for the forest.”
Hellhound began to reply as Skidmark spoke in my other ear. “Terrorists are on the move. One truck is pulling out; the other’s stopped just over the bridge. They’re sending a party to check out that gunshot because Ratboy is missing.”
“Shit!”
Kane’s head jerked up. “What?”
Cover blown. I had to tell Kane and Hellhound about the incoming terrorists. And I’d have to reveal how I knew.
I stared at Kane, my mind rocketing through possibilities even while I spoke. “The terrorists are sending a party this way. They’re investigating the gunshot…”
Skidmark spoke again. “Eight hostiles incoming. Eight more with the truck by the bridge. The other truck is bugging out. Clearing the gate now.”
“Shit! At least eight coming, maybe up to sixteen,” I snapped, then shut up as Skidmark spoke again.
“Relay from Moonbeam; hostiles are not to reach the main building. Take no prisoners. I say again; intercept hostiles and kill them all.”
“Roger that,” I said faintly.
Kane and Hellhound spoke at the same time, their aggregated questions translating approximately to ‘Aydan, what the hell?’
“Sorry,” I said, sorting and editing facts as I spoke. “Orion is an MI6 agent. Five Eyes posted him here to infiltrate the terrorist training camp.” I couldn’t quite bring myself to lie to them outright, so I added, “I have radio contact. Our orders are to eliminate the terrorists before they reach the main building. No prisoners. But Orion’s out there, too, so we can’t just shoot at any old thermal signature.” And I couldn’t warn them about Moonbeam and Karma out in the woods…
Hellhound sounded affronted. “I never shot anybody I couldn’t identify before an’ I ain’t plannin’ to start now.”
“I’m sorry, I know, I’m just…” I trailed off at the sight of Kane’s face. “What? What is it, John?”
“Children.” He stared at me with haunted eyes. “There are children in the next room...”
He was already lunging to his feet.
“John!” I seized his wrist. “John, stop!”
He froze, his eyes burning with frightening intensity in brittle skull-like features. Tension vibrated in his arm, sizzling through my grip like an electrical current.
“John,” I said, holding my voice calm and even. “We won’t let anything happen to them. Okay? We won’t.”
He nodded once, a short sharp motion that looked as though it might shatter his neck.
I had to keep him away from the woods. Eyes glazed, body vibrating with the need to annihilate, he looked as though he would steamroll over every living thing without a thought for his own safety until a bullet ended his rampage permanently.
He might recognize Moonbeam and Karma and Orion.
Or he might not.
“John,” I repeated. “Look at me.”
He drew a deep breath and focused on my face. The terrifying blankness in his eyes dissipated, but the hollow horror remained.
I put all the authority I could muster into my voice. “You’re going to guard the children. Hellhound and Orion and I will deal with the terrorists in the woods. You’ll be the last defence in case we fail. The concrete walls are bulletproof so stay low. Your orders are to hold the meditation room. Clear?”
He gave another sharp nod, looking like himself again except for those eyes. “Understood. Stay in phone contact so I know what’s happening. Go.”
I went, heart hammering.
“Kane okay?” Hellhound asked worriedly as I reached the door.
“I think so. For now. But if we let any of those guys through it’ll be a bloodbath.”
“That ain’t gonna happen,” he rasped. “Tell Orion he can engage ‘em in the woods if he wants. We’ll take ‘em out if they try to cross the open space. I got it all covered ‘cept for part a’ the west side. Can ya find a high place where ya can cover the west?”
“I can get on the roof.” I hurried toward the playground climbing frame.
“Too exposed, darlin’,” he objected. “Can’t ya find a spot with more cover?”
“No time. I have to hang up now so I can update John, and I’ll call you back when I’m in place.” I punched the off button without waiting for his reply and rapped out an update to Skidmark. Then I stuffed the hands-free earbud in my ear and pressed Kane’s speed dial with trembling fingers.
“Kane,” he snapped.
I held my voice as steady as I could. “Arnie is covering the north, south, and east sides of the building. I’ll cover the west from the roof. I’m going up now, so don’t worry if you hear me moving around up there. I’ll keep this connection open so you know what’s happening.”
I pulled on my night-vision headset again, manoeuvring it around Skidmark’s earpiece on one side and the phone’s earbud on the other. Then I drew a deep breath and clambered up the climbing frame.
Balanced on top, my entire body rocked with tremors. When I reached up to grab the branch my arms felt like limp noodles. The roof looked very far away.
So did the ground.
Fireworks were still exploding intermittently and my guts twisted at the sound of an echoing crack. Was that a rifle shot or a firecracker?
I’d be an easy target while I made my sloth-like way along the branch.
If I could even hold on that long…
Shut up.
I clenched my teeth to prevent my heart from escaping and swung my legs up.
I barely made it. My hands gave out just after I reached the roof and for a heart-stopping moment I slid toward the edge. Scrabbling and flailing, I managed to stop inches away.
I lay plastered to the roof for a couple of long moments, my too-rapid panting whistling in my throat. Then I mustered the last of the strength in my shaking legs to creep up the pitch of the roof.
I knew Hellhound would be watching me in his scope, and I didn’t care. Abandoning dignity, I gained the roof peak and inch-wormed along it as fast as my trembling body would allow. The chimney loomed like a bastion of safety.
Skidmark’s sudden voice in my ear nearly flung me off the roof with the force of my twitch. Hyperventilating, I sprawled belly-down across the peak.
“Missed that,” I gasped. “Say again.”
“I say again; four hostiles down, twelve incoming.”
The whole damn truckload.
“Shit! Shit-shit-shit…” I bit off my swearing and redoubled my efforts toward the chimney. “Do they have night-vision?” I panted.
“Negative. Flashlights only.”
“Twelve hostiles incoming,” I repeated for Kane’s benefit. “But they only have flashlights, not night-vision.”
Thank God.
Not that it would matter out here. The damn moon was like a spotlight. Hellhound was right; I’d be almost as visible if it was daylight.
As if summoned by my thought, his rifle spat its deadly report. My overloaded adrenal system surpassed terror in a single bound and I scrambled mindlessly into the shadow of the chimney. Arms flung wide, fingertips locked in its mortar joints, I pressed my cheek against the rough fieldstone.
Below, one dark f
igure lay crumpled and unmoving at the edge of the forest.
“One more hostile down,” I croaked for Skidmark’s and Kane’s benefit.
Five down. Maybe more if Moonbeam and Karma and Orion were still picking them off in the forest…
My pocket vibrated.
It took a couple of tries to convince my fingers to loosen their hold on the chimney. I crouched in as stable a position as I could manage and withdrew the phone, clutching it in both shaking hands. If I dropped it…
Wishing I had a second hands-free earbud and a third ear, I managed to punch the button and whisper, “What?”
“That’s a good spot, darlin’,” Hellhound muttered. “Ya can back me up if they all come at once, but leave ‘em to me otherwise. I got a suppressor so they won’t see my muzzle flash.”
Great, that was something else I’d forgotten. With my first shot, I might as well send up a flare announcing my presence.
Fabulous. Fan-fucking-tastic.
But hell, the way my hands were shaking, I’d probably fumble my gun and drop it over the edge of the roof before I could fire it anyway.
“Okay,” I whispered.
I didn’t bother to add that I’d be lucky to hit anything at all.
“I love ya, darlin’.” The connection clicked off and a moment later his rifle cracked again. Another dark figure toppled out of the woods, and a fusillade of shots and muzzle flashes erupted from where it had come.
Paralyzed, I held my breath waiting for the sound of Hellhound’s rifle again. Had they hit him?
My mind refused to accept the thought.
“Another hostile down,” I whispered.
I had a job to do.
Do it.
Jamming my back against the chimney in the deepest part of its shadow, I drew my Glock. Its familiar grip comforted my palm, and I touched the spare magazine in the holster for reassurance. Twenty shots. Only eleven possible targets. Hellhound would take most of them.
If he was still alive.
I banished the thought. Concentrate on the job.
Summoning every mental tactic I’d learned in target-shooting tournaments, I drew a deep breath and let it out slowly.
Visualize the calm flowing along my arms; steadying my hands…
The men in the woods had stopped shooting. Hellhound hadn’t fired again, either. Nothing moved.
The fireworks had stopped. They must have run out. The silence sent a shiver down my spine.
The indifferent moon sailed high above, riding a bright ribbon of cloud. I stared wide-eyed at the west side of the forest, the trees unmoving in the moonlight as though cast in silver.
Still as death.
Another long breath. In. Out.
My hands still trembled finely, but as long as I didn’t go for a long-range shot I’d be accurate enough to hit a body-sized target…
A man’s scream tore the air, a raw animal-like shriek. Icy-hot talons of primal fear plunged into my guts and wrenched them tight.
The sound cut off mid-scream.
“Seven down,” Skidmark said.
Heavy silence fell again.
They must have realized their losses by now. Surely they’d retreat to the truck and pull out. Their objective was bigger than a few hippies in the middle of the woods…
I recalled Orion’s words with a shiver. ‘…they view the commune members as depraved sinners worthy of death.’
The moon sliced the clouds like a bright blade.
More long minutes of silence.
Then a nightmare of gunfire exploded from the woods.
Chapter 36
The shots seemed to come from all directions. Adrenaline searing my veins, I snapped a look around. Muzzle flashes from all four sides. I couldn’t see any shooters.
Bullets thumped into the walls of the building but they didn’t seem to be aiming for me.
Laying down covering fire, maybe?
A moment later it stopped. Behind me Hellhound’s rifle cracked once, then again. And again. They must be charging.
A man dashed out of the west woods toward the building, firing toward the door.
Years of trapshooting instinct took over my hands.
Lead the target.
Smooth pull.
My Glock spat fire and I steadied the recoil, looking for my next shot. The man was down and motionless but I put another round into him just to be safe.
Answering fire spewed from the woods. A bullet thudded into the roof beside me and the crack-whine of a ricochet off the chimney made me yelp and duck.
My foot slipped.
Flailing for balance, I fell hard on my hip, jolting out a cry. More bullets battered the roof.
The slope claimed me.
Tumbling helplessly…
Kane’s voice shouted in my earpiece, his words lost in the hellish din of gunfire.
I flung out frantic arms and legs, halting my tumble but not the deadly slide.
More bullets struck the roof above me.
My mind served up one last pointless thought with slow-motion clarity: Lucky the gunman wasn’t a trapshooter.
I slid over the edge.
A desperate grab as the building sailed by. My left hand clamped onto the rain gutter only to be wrenched loose by my momentum.
I crashed onto the pea gravel of the playground and the world exploded in noise and bright flashes.
My lungs wouldn’t work.
Drowning in pain…
Kane dashed from the door, firing over and over into the woods.
A long moment later I managed to drag in a breath, my lungs wailing with effort.
My brain caught up. Not shot. Just the wind knocked out of me.
Kane clamped an iron hand on my collar and dragged me backward. The earsplitting reports of his pistol above me dulled to heavy impacts in my overtaxed hearing.
Another wailing breath.
Through the doorway.
A crack and whine as a bullet ricocheted from the concrete beside us. Behind us came a thump and clatter as the bullet spent itself in the stack of stove wood.
Then we were behind the protection of the concrete wall.
Kane crouched beside the doorway, gun at the ready, gaze riveted outside. The muscles of his arms stood out in hills and valleys of stone.
I drew an easier breath. Pain subsiding.
Another breath.
Kane lunged forward and snapped off two shots.
“Got him,” he said as though discussing an annoying mosquito. “Aydan, talk to me!” His voice sounded muffled and distant in my ringing ears.
“Two more down,” I croaked for Skidmark’s benefit.
Kane spared me a glance from the doorway, his taut face easing. “Thank God,” he muttered. Then he spoke again, and I saw the phone earbud in his ear for the first time. “She’s conscious,” he said. “I don’t know how badly hurt yet.”
“I’m okay.” I rolled over slowly, wincing. Miraculously, my Glock was still clutched in my hand, my fingers aching in a death-grip. The phone’s earbud trailed from my pocket, and I reached in to hang up on my redundant connection with Kane. “Thank God I landed in the pea gravel,” I mumbled. “How many did Arnie get?”
“How many down?” Kane relayed the question before replying, “Three.”
“Three more down,” I told Skidmark.
“Moonbeam took another out, but he got a piece of her,” he replied. “One hostile still at large, likely retreating to the truck. Rand is hit. Karma is working on him. If there are any bodies by the west door, clear them now. I’ll take the members out through that route in about five minutes. Tell Kane and Helmand to hunt down that last hostile and then start collecting bodies and dumping them in the truck. You stay there. Moonbeam’s incoming; needs first aid.”
I hauled myself to my feet, discovering I’d twisted my ankle in my fall. I limped over to prop myself against the wall while I relayed the message to Kane, blurting, “Orion’s hit…” before remembering I was purported
ly getting radio instructions from Orion himself. “…uh, but he’s still conscious,” I added, hoping that was the truth. “He says there’s only one guy still alive, probably heading for the truck. He needs you and Hellhound to get the last guy, and then start moving bodies to the truck. We’d better move the ones outside the door right away. Who knows how much longer they’ll meditate in there and we don’t want…”
I trailed off, thinking better of mentioning the children, but fortunately Kane was already barking instructions to Hellhound. He finished speaking and turned to me. “You’re hurt. Stay here. Guard the members. I’ll drag these two bodies into the woods so they’re out of sight until we can move them to the truck. Where’s Orion? We’ll check on him before we do anything else.”
Skidmark must have either overheard or anticipated the conversation. He was already speaking in my ear. “Rand’s hidden under the south end of the bridge. Shot in the leg, probably a broken bone. He can’t walk. Karma’s stabilizing him. Tell Kane and Helmand to concentrate on the last hostile and the bodies.”
“He’s hiding under the south end of the bridge,” I relayed, editing as I spoke. “He’s shot in the leg but he says he’s stable and he wants you to concentrate on getting that last guy and then cleaning up the bodies.”
Kane nodded, kissed me once hard, and lunged out the door in a crouch.
I held my breath, but no gunfire greeted him. In a few moments he had dragged the bodies out of sight and kicked fresh gravel over the dark stains they’d left behind. Then he vanished into the forest without a backward glance.
I drew a deep breath, visualizing a shield of protection around him and Hellhound.
Let them be safe.
Please let them be safe.
“West door is clear,” I muttered to Skidmark.
“Signalling them to come out now,” he replied. “Cover their six.”
I limped to the door and slipped outside, flinching with the expectation of muzzle flashes and bullets.
All was silent, and I hurried across the open space to hide in the undergrowth facing the door. My ankle protested mightily for the first few steps before settling down to a sullen throbbing, and I drew a breath of relief. Probably not too serious.
Spy High Page 29