by Rob Cornell
Art sidled up next to Earl and leaned close. “What’s going on?”
Roddy was halfway down now. Earl could see the top of that damned crooked green ball cap, the bill sticking out off the back of Roddy’s head.
He contemplated Art’s question, decided to give him the best truth he knew. “Think we’re making a sacrifice to allow us the privilege of entering.”
“Sacrifice?” Even at a whisper, Art’s voice rumbled like a tractor trailer bumping over gravel.
Roddy was two-thirds down the ladder.
“Mr. Dolan ain’t gonna let just anybody in.”
“You think it’s booby trapped?”
Earl didn’t have to answer. He just waited for Roddy to reach the floor and put one foot down on the tiles.
The golden flash blinded Earl. He dropped the flashlight. Heard it clatter and knock its way down the hole. He staggered backward covering his eyes with his forearm, cussing at the pain shooting from his eyeballs straight through to the back of his skull.
Art said something in another language. Spanish maybe—the man had never talked about where he was from. But Earl didn’t need a translator to tell him what it meant. Art grinded out the words the same way he would any string of curses.
The rest of the crew shouted out too. Earl couldn’t tell if the light had affected them as badly as him and Art. Couldn’t imagine it had, considering the two of them had been staring straight down at it when it burst. From the grunts and gasps it sounded like it still got them pretty good.
The pain only lasted a handful of seconds. Earl lowered his arm and blinked away the ghost of the light left behind across his vision.
Art rubbed his eyes with his hands, then blinked as well. A tear sliced down his pockmarked face. He wiped it away with a knuckle and squinted at Earl. “What the fuck?”
What the fuck was right. But Earl knew. It was why he wanted Roddy to go down first.
He bent to peer down the hole. Saw nothing but the dark.
“Someone hand me their flashlight.”
Tony pulled a mini Mag-Lite out of a pocket on his cargo pants. He was squinting too, a big ugly grimace pinching his face. He handed over the Mag-Lite. “What in hell’s going on?”
Earl ignored the question. He thumbed on the flashlight and aimed it down the hole.
No sign of Roddy.
Just a two-foot wide mound of ash on the tiled floor.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
ELKA HAD TO ADMIT, THIS underground network of tunnels and rooms was pretty impressive. It felt like something straight out of a James Bond movie—the villain’s lair. Only she wasn’t the villain. She was the hero, out to avenge the death of her family.
When she first came down the entrance and had a look at the long tunnel with the tiled walls and the periodic caged lightbulb down the center of the ceiling, she thought—a sewer? Granted, there was no sludge on the floor, the walls would probably shine after a simple dusting, and the air smelled a little musty, but dry. The lights even came on without a flicker when Earl pulled down the lever at the tunnel’s mouth. Still, she had never seen anything like this, so she couldn’t imagine the tunnel as anything more than part of a sewage system.
Then she had cleared that first hallway and entered the larger part of the facility.
The tunnel opened to a large, rectangular room with about as much square-footage as a basketball court. Six other tunnels fed off of the room. The ceiling was only about nine feet high, with a network of long fluorescent lights hanging from chains illuminating every corner. Unlike the tunnel they entered through, the room carried a clean, chemical smell and tasted faintly of bleach.
Rows of bunks took up a large section on the right-hand end of the space, each one neatly made with a wool blanket and bright white pillow. The mattresses were nothing like the plush memory foam one Elka had slept on growing up, but they looked functional enough.
The opposite end of the room had stacks of metal crates lining a portion of both walls in the far corner. A half-dozen long folding tables sat in a row as neat as the bunks. Each table had six metal folding chairs on either side and one on each end.
Eight seats times six equaled forty-eight. And a quick count of the bunks came to twenty-four, with two beds per bunk, matching as many beds as seats.
Forty-eight men (and possibly women) had occupied this facility at one time. Maybe more. They had six more tunnels to explore, and who knew how many more beyond those?
It was chilly down here. Not at all comfortable for the short-sleeved blouse and khaki shorts that came from the small wardrobe Earl had provided her as a “perk” of her membership to his crew. Goose bumps rippled up her legs and down her arms. She tried to rub some warmth into her upper arms, but it didn’t accomplish much. After dealing with the August humidity outside, she never would have thought a room could feel too cold.
“Hot damn,” the man named Tony said as they entered.
All of the men looked around the room like poor kids seeing a toy store for the first time, and each of them clutching a hundred-dollar bill.
“Didn’t I tell ya’ll?” Earl said with a toothy grin. “We are home.”
The crew whooped and hollered and clapped. Whisper raised a hand to the guy with the stringy hair, Lazarus, for a high five. Lazarus raised one of his wire brush eyebrows and shook his head.
“Come on,” Whisper said, still holding his hand up. “Don’t leave a brother hanging.”
“You,” Lazarus said in a tone that sounded like he was performing Shakespeare, “are not my brother.” Then he turned away and sidled up to Art, clapped him on the back. “At last, I’ve put my faith in the proper place.”
“Damn right you did,” Art said. He smiled like the others, but his eyes carried a cold stoicism. Elka got the feeling he wasn’t a hundred percent convinced of this place’s merits.
“I got the bed farthest from Whisper,” Tony said. “Won’t have to listen to that motherfucker beating off no more.”
“Complain, complain,” Whisper said as he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “I’ll make sure to cry out in ecstasy loud enough to make it across the room.”
“Then I’ll rip your cock off and shove it up your ass.”
Whisper bobbled his head and pursed his lips. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, honey.”
All the while, Kit stood beside Elka, silent, hip cocked and her arms crossed. She chomped on her gum as if she wanted to pulverize it.
Kind of like that Roddy guy, huh? That pile of dust you had to step over when you came in?
Elka tried not to think about that. Then she’d have to consider the fact that if Earl was willing to let one of his crew disintegrate and barely bat an eye, he would have even less trouble sending an outsider like her to her death.
“Sure as all heck hope this here rabbit hole’s got itself a heater,” Kit said, evoking the accent she saved for Earl. Elka realized it sounded a lot like a parody of her uncle, even though he claimed she sounded like her mother.
Elka smirked. Couldn’t help herself.
Earl didn’t scowl like Elka expected. He was too enamored by his secret lair to let Kit ruin his mood. “I’m sure we got a thermostat ’round here somewhere.” He turned to Whisper. “Make yourself useful and find it.”
Whisper bowed and pretended to tip a hat. “As you wish.” He wandered off, scanning the surroundings, spotted something at the far end of the room and headed over.
Elka watched him while Earl started giving orders out to the rest of the crew. She tuned him out while she looked ahead of Whisper’s path and saw the panel on the wall. He reached it, fiddled with it, and a few seconds later a deep sigh filled the room. Elka looked up, saw the wide vents high on the walls on both narrow sides of the room.
“Let there be heat,” Whisper shouted. His voice echoed in the large space.
“Hey.” A hand reached into Elka’s line of sight and snapped its fingers.
She flinched, turned.
“Sorry. Daydreaming, I guess.”
“I want you to take Kit around and find some other sleeping arrangements. I ain’t going to have her out here with these pigs.”
“Especially Mr. Freako,” Kit said, lip curled.
“Sure,” Elka said. “What about me?”
Earl raised his eyebrows in question, basically saying What about you? without actually saying it.
“You’re going to make me sleep with these pigs?”
Earl grinned. “Naw. I suppose you can bunk with Kit.” He scratched his chin, his gaze contemplative. “You know, it’s nice to have a lady around for her. I think it’ll be good for her.”
Elka wasn’t sure what to say to that, but Kit was.
“Oh yeah. We can do each other’s hair, swap outfits, and talk about boys.” She rolled her eyes and made a disgusted sound from the back of her throat, a cross between a gag and a cough.
Earl refused to let Kit get to him. He patted her on the head, scrunching her spray-stiffened hair, smiling away. “Maybe you’ll have a better time teaching her some respect too.”
Kit swatted at his hand and ducked away from his touch.
Was that what he needed Elka for? As a surrogate mother for his niece? Couldn’t be. All that talk about his dreams guiding him to her—there had to be more to it. But when the hell was he going to share his real need for her? She was getting a little impatient. The urge to kill trickled down the back of her brain like the blood she craved to shed. She wanted the girl, this so-called Chosen One. They knew where she was. Why didn’t they go out and get her already?
If they didn’t get her soon, Elka would have to find someone else to tide her over. She wanted—needed—the feel of flesh breaking open against her horn.
And she didn’t care who it was.
Chapter Thirty
JESSIE WOKE TO THE SOUND of chopping air.
As she came out of sleep, the last gluey strands of a dream came with her. Mostly images of her father. And a panicked sensation that had her heart racing.
But the memory of the dream broke apart when she heard the chopping sound.
Then shook off enough sleep to recognize the sound.
Helicopter.
“Shit.”
She scrambled to her feet. Cold mud caked the side of her jeans and her sweatshirt sleeve. She felt a dry mud crust on her cheek and a matching crust on a couple fingers of one hand. She must have stuck the hand in the dirt then wiped her face in her sleep.
Her heart rate picked up speed again.
She looked up, searching the strip of sky left visible from the river’s cut through the woods. The copter’s sound grew louder, but she still didn’t have a visual.
Didn’t have a visual. You sound like Craig.
Well, she could sure use his mindset right now. He would know what to do.
She did have enough sense to grab her backpack and move away from the river, into the cover of the trees. Her breathing ran out of her control, rushing in and out of her lungs in trembling gulps. She felt light-headed. Was this what it felt like to hyperventilate?
Rushing while trying to keep from tripping on rocks or fallen branches, Jessie moved deeper into the forest until the river disappeared from view. The whole while, breathing came harder and harder.
She stopped to lean against a tree, closed her eyes, and focused on taking back control of her breathing. The swelling sound of the helicopter kept distracting her like one of those fucking mosquitoes buzzing in her ear. Only she couldn’t swat away the helicopter.
I don’t have time to breathe.
She wasn’t dumb enough to think they only had the helicopter out looking for her. They would have agents on the ground, picking their way through the trees, eyes peeled for a stupid teenager who thought she could escape one of the most powerful institutions in the world.
Quit feeling sorry for yourself. Breathe like a normal human being and then haul ass.
She clapped her hands over her ears. In her mind she recited lines from the movie Reservoir Dogs. One of her favorites. She had every line memorized. Used to drive Ryan crazy when she would act out the entire scene where Harvey Keitel explains how to force a bank manager to cooperate during a heist by cutting off his fingers, then ends it by saying—
“I’m hungry,” Jessie said aloud. “Let’s go get a taco.”
She had absorbed herself so fully in her memories of Ryan, she hadn’t noticed when her breathing calmed.
She uncovered her ears. The copter sounded like it was right above her.
Damn it, they had to have a tracker on her somehow. Or a spell.
No, you idiot. The shitstorm you caused back at the landfill was clue enough.
She knew how they operated. They could easily narrow down the distance she could travel from the landfill on foot. And if any of the workers she left alive saw what direction she had headed in, that made it all the easier for them.
Jessie looked around her at all the trees. Some of them were maple trees. She could recognize that much from the shape of their leaves. The others she couldn’t name even if she had a gun pressed against her head.
She didn’t have to know what kind of trees surrounded her, though. She needed to know if she could get through them and to some safe hiding place before the Agency goons caught up to her.
Either that or she would have to give herself up.
Between her muddy clothes, the mixed stench of soil, garbage, and sweat clinging to her, and the aches in her back and neck from sleeping on the ground with a backpack for a pillow, the idea of giving up right now and getting a lift back to her comfy bed at headquarters didn’t sound so bad.
But after this stunt, Kinga and her beloved general would tighten the screws on Jessie’s cage—maybe literally; wouldn’t be the first time her Agency boss locked her in a cage. If she gave in now, she would never have another chance at getting away.
A prisoner for life.
A tool to eliminate the supernaturals round the world.
A weapon.
They would treat her as even less human than some had when she was a vampire.
Aren’t you being a little melodramatic?
Did she want to chance finding out she wasn’t?
She took inventory of herself. Backpack with a change of clothes and a gun. The gun wouldn’t do her much good against a squad of special agents. Besides, she didn’t want to kill them, she just wanted to get the fuck away from them.
She looked down at her dirty, stinky self.
The mud.
Still soft.
And then she thought of a scene from First Blood with Stallone.
Could she?
Why the fuck not? What was a little more mud?
She ran back to the riverbank, somehow skipping over any obstacles without falling on her face. She walked along the bank, looking for the perfect spot, the spot with the thickest mud.
The helicopter chattered overhead.
Her nervous stomach kicked up an acidic taste that made her tongue curl.
But she found a suitable, extra steep slope of mud on the side of the river.
She had to step into the river to get to it.
If they have a tracker on you, this won’t work.
She had no choice. There were no other options.
Because she refused to give up.
Jessie sunk her hands into the mud and started digging.
Chapter Thirty-One
JESSIE HAD MAYBE A SIX-inch deep by six-inch wide hole dug into the river bank when they found her.
Her biceps and triceps burned. Dirt had packed so hard under her nails a couple felt ready to pop off. Sweat oozed in every crevice on her body. Water had poured in over the tops of her boots and soaked through her socks. Her feet probably looked all wrinkly from standing in the river for so long.
She must have been standing there, clawing at the mud for thirty minutes at least. And he
r little hole was all she had to show for the effort. After the upper layer of mud, the soil underneath was dryer, harder, and less willing to give way to her scrabbling fingers.
What the hell had she been thinking?
Desperation had blinded her to common sense. Sure, Stallone could bury himself in mud with only his eyes showing to hide from the bad guys…in a movie. Not so much in real life.
Fuck you, Rambo.
It was actually Ree who found her. He carried a funny-looking rifle she’d never seen before, and she figured out it was probably loaded with tranquilizer darts. The Agency wouldn’t want to kill their precious Chosen One.
Ree stood on the riverbank about twenty feet down on a more even incline than the one Jessie had been digging in. He cocked his head and furled his brow. The only reason Jessie knew he was there was because he had cleared his throat.
They stared at each other for a minute, the rippling sound of the river and the thwumping of the helicopter overhead the only sounds between them.
Ree broke the silence first.
“What in hell are you doing?”
Jessie looked down at her muddy hands, sighed, and let them drop to her sides. “Pretending to be John Rambo.”
Ree drew his head back. “Who?”
“Never mind.” She noticed he hadn’t lowered his rifle. She nodded at it. “You going to use that on me now?”
He looked down at the rifle as if he had forgotten he was holding it. When he looked up again a red tinge blushed his latte-colored face. “Not if I don’t have to.” He swallowed visibly. “Do I have to?”
“Seriously? You would shoot me just because General Horseradish says so?”
He set his jaw. “It’s Borscht. And this is only a tranquilizer gun.”
“I gathered that, asswipe. And I’ll stick with Horseradish, thank you much.”
Ree bent his head down and shook it. “Always the attitude,” he muttered.
Jessie had never felt so sticky and gross in her life. She could only imagine what she looked like to Ree. And here he was bitching about her attitude? “Are you not seeing me? Didn’t you notice I look like Katniss Everdeen with fortune most definitely not in her favor?”