Keller reached out and gently closed them. He dropped down and looked underneath the car, toward the other side of the clearing. He couldn’t see the shooter, but he could feel him there, feel the watching presence, waiting for him to make the wrong move. He was pinned down. He crept up to the open front passenger door and hoisted himself prone onto the seat. Patrick’s body lolled against the driver’s side door. Everything above the lower jaw was gone, the muscle and veins stretched across the back of the seat like severed cables. Keller reached over and pushed the cigarette lighter in. He popped the glove box open and rummaged through it. As the lighter popped back out, he pulled out a sheet of flimsy paper marked “Vehicle Inspection Report.” He rolled it into a loose cylinder. It caught easily when he touched it to the glowing lighter. Keller slid back out of the car and crawled to the rear of the vehicle. He took a deep breath. The paper was burning quickly, almost scorching his fingers. He tossed it into the puddle of gasoline. There was a soft whump as the gas caught. Keller sprang up and bolted for where Holley’s AK was leaning against the tree. He was halfway there when the tank exploded.
Phillips lay still, poised in a state of total alertness, waiting. Waiting was the sniper’s gift. The shot would come. The target would move. He had to. Phillips didn’t, and that unbalanced equation was why Phillips knew he’d win.
There. A sudden flurry of movement, toward the back of the car. He was going for Holley’s weapon. Phillips’s brain swiftly calculated range, elevation, target speed. His muscles, in perfect synchronization, made the minute adjustments needed to bring the bullet to its target. His finger tightened on the trigger…
A huge ball of black and red flame erupted from the wrecked vehicle. The sound of the explosion rolled like summer thunder across the clearing. Phillips’s attention was yanked toward the car just enough to jerk his hands ever so slightly to the side. But it was enough. He knew the shot would go wide even as the silenced rifle gave a soft cough. Phillips tore his eyes away from the scope.
The car was an inferno. The smoke billowed and rolled around it. Phillips could see nothing. “Clever boy,” he muttered.
“What was that?” DeGroot demanded.
Phillips keyed his mike. “I got one target,” he said. “But Keller torched the car. I can’t get a clear shot for all the smoke.”
There was a moment of silence. Then, “Okay. Concentrate on the house. Keep anyone from getting out the front. We’re in position around back.” Phillips keyed his mike once in acknowledgement.
***
“What was that?!” Marie yelled from the back bedroom.
“It was Keller,” Powell called back. “He set the car on fire. For a diversion, I guess.”
“Jack!” Marie said. “He’s here? He’s alive?”
“Yeah,” Powell answered. “I saw him.”
“I knew it!” Ben called from the bedroom. “I knew he’d be here!”
“Ben!” Marie yelled. “Get back where I told you!”
“It’s okay, Mom,” Ben said. “Jack’s here.”
“Ben!”
“Okay, Mom.” Ben sounded exasperated.
“Any sign of Lisa?” Marie asked.
Powell didn’t know what to say. He had seen Lisa fall. But he didn’t want the boy to know. “Yeah,” he said finally.
“And?” Marie insisted. Powell hesitated. “There’s a sniper somewhere in the front,” he said finally.
“Okay,” Marie said. “I get it.” After a moment, she said, “I’ve got movement around back.” Powell heard the bark of her rifle.
There was a brief rattle of answering gunfire and the sound of breaking glass. “Jones?” Powell called back.
“Mom?” Ben cried with an edge of panic in his voice. “Mom?”
***
“Okay,” Caldwell said. “We’ve got them bottled up. Now what?”
DeGroot fired a three-round burst at the window where the shot had come from. “Now,” he said, “while I keep their heads down, I need you to take your grenade launcher and put a WP round on the roof of that cabin.”
Caldwell stared at him. “Why? Just order them to come out with the key. They know by now they’re surrounded. We let them walk if they give up the key.”
DeGroot’s grin was like a death’s head. “I think we’ll be in a stronger negotiating position if the house is on fire, hey?”
Caldwell shrugged. He reached into his bandolier and pulled out a fat, stubby grenade. It looked like an exaggerated cartoon version of a bullet. Caldwell cracked the grenade launcher open at the breech and slid the round in.
He snapped it closed and nodded to DeGroot. DeGroot began firing short, precise bursts, first at one window, then another. Caldwell sat the butt of the launcher on the ground and pointed the barrel toward the house at a steep angle. He squinted at the house and adjusted the barrel. He pressed down on the trigger.
The round arced up in a long parabola. It came down on the roof of the house and burst in a ball of brilliant white smoke. The smoke arced up in long spider-leg trails. At the end of each leg, a flame burned like a tiny sun. In a moment, the roof was aflame.
***
“I’m okay,” Marie said. She picked herself up off the floor of the back bedroom where she had thrown herself to avoid the hail of bullets. She heard a hollow thunk from outside. She dared to peek up over the windowsill.
One of the men was picking a familiar-looking weapon off the ground. Marie heard something land on the roof, then the flash of the explosion drove her back down to the floor. “Grenade!” she yelled. The room was filling with white, choking smoke. She had to get to Ben. She began to crawl toward the front of the house.
***
Keller hadn’t heard the sound since the desert, but he recognized it immediately. Thumper. He looked toward the house. Through the pall of black smoke that surrounded him, he saw the bright star of the white phosphorus round arcing high above. He bent back to his task with grim determination. Sweat poured down his face from the heat of the blaze only a few yards away. He pulled harder. Holley was a big man, and hard to move. Keller grunted with the effort as he pulled the Kevlar vest free. A stray breeze blew a gust of smoke into his face and eyes. The smoke was thick with the stench of burning meat from the body in the car. Keller coughed and gagged as he slipped the vest on over his head, trying to ignore the bloodstains on the front. He picked up the AK and thumbed the selector level to full auto. He glanced up at the opposite tree line. He tried to keep the pall of smoke between him and whoever was up there as he faded back into the trees. The brush was thick, with clinging vines that clutched and dragged at his ankles as he moved from tree to tree. He caught a glimpse of the house through the trunks of the trees. The roof was burning, the smoke white in contrast to the black oily smoke of the car. He could hear shouting from inside the house.
Smoke and fire and screaming…
White fire from the sky, out of the night…
Burning, they’re burning…
Darkness rose in him like a tide. He had fought it for so long, the black rage that had pulled at him like an undertow. He had spent so much of the last fifteen years fighting it, trying to keep the rage at bay. Now he opened himself to it, letting it take him. He had always thought of it as an ocean trying to drown him, to drag him away from himself.
But this was like a homecoming. And home was a yawning abyss of dark fire. He knew the fire would consume him, leaving nothing behind. But that was all right.
The noise of voices was closer now. He could make out DeGroot’s voice, shouting what sounded like orders. And he could hear the sound of a child crying.
***
They could hear the crackling of the cedar shingles from inside the house. In one corner of the main room, the ceiling was beginning to crack and char from the flames working their way down. The inside began to fill with smoke. Marie had Ben clutched to her. Powell was soaking towels in the sink. He brought one over to them and wrapped it around Ben’s nose and mouth.
<
br /> “Breathe through this,” he said. “It’ll help with the smoke.” He handed another soaked towel to Marie. She wrapped it over her own face.
“What now?” she asked, her voice muffled by the towel.
“Inside the house!” DeGroot’s voice came from outside. “Come out. Hands up. Throw the key out first.” There was a pause. “Or stay in there and burn.”
Powell picked up his rifle. He stood beside the window, his back to the wall. “You can have the key!” he shouted back. “I’ll bring it out! But you let the woman and the boy go.”
“You’re not in much a position to deal, bru,” DeGroot called. He sounded amused.
“Oh yeah?” Powell said. “How about I run into one of the rooms and hide the key? Think you can find it after the house burns down around it? Or it’ll be any good to you then?”
There was a pause. “All right,” DeGroot said. “Throw the weapons out. Yours and the woman’s. Then they come out, hands up.”
“You let them go,” Powell yelled. “When I see they’re leaving, I come out. Anything happens to them, I toss the key into the fire.”
“Agreed. Now the weapons.”
Powell picked up his rifle by the barrel and shoved it, stock first, out the window. Marie hesitated, then followed suit.
“I don’t want to go out there,” Ben whimpered. “That mean guy is out there. That’s the guy that shot Dad. The guy that hurt me up on that mountain.” He started to cry. “Mommy, please. I don’t want to. Please. Please.”
Tears were running down Marie’s face. “We don’t have a choice, Ben. The house is on fire. We have to get out.” As if to confirm her words, there was a crash as a section of ceiling fell in the main room. She bent down and gave Ben a short, fierce hug. “It’ll be all right, baby,” she whispered. “I promise.” She took a deep breath, then turned to stand in the window. Nothing happened. She crawled out, dropping to the rocky ground behind the cabin, before turning and holding out her arms. Ben was already on the windowsill. Powell helped hand him into her arms.
“Hands up,” DeGroot ordered. “Above your heads. Now.”
They turned slowly. DeGroot and a man Marie didn’t recognize were lying prone in the grass, about forty feet away. She could see the barrels of their weapons. They looked as big as the mouths of caves.
“March,” DeGroot said. “Toward me.”
“You said you’d let us go,” Marie said.
“And I will,” DeGroot said. “In good time. Now walk to me, or I cut you both down where you stand.”
“Mom?” Ben said, his voice quivering.
“Do what he says, baby,” Marie whispered. They began to walk together.
You son of a bitch,” Caldwell hissed viciously.
“What are you on about?” DeGroot whispered back. He had laid his rifle down beside him. He reached down and drew his sidearm.
“You didn’t say anything about any kids,” Caldwell said.
“What’s the difference?”
“I don’t kill children,” Caldwell said.
“Is that so?” DeGroot said. “You’ve been lucky up to now, then.”
“I mean it,” Caldwell insisted. “I don’t kill children, DeGroot.”
The woman and the boy were only few feet away. “That’s no problem,” DeGroot said. “Because I don’t mind it.” He leaped to his feet. He took one quick step to where Marie and Ben had come to a surprised halt. He grabbed Ben and pulled the boy to him. Ben cried out. DeGroot held the barrel of the gun against Ben’s head.
“No,” Marie cried out.
“I think I like this deal better,” DeGroot called. “With that Keller fellow running around the woods somewhere, I think I’ll need a little more insurance.” Holding Ben so tightly by the shoulder that he cried out in pain, he lowered the gun so it was pressed against the middle of the boy’s back.
“Now,” he called. “Come on out, Bobby. And bring the key with you. Any more tricks and I blow the boy’s spine in two.” There was no answer. “You want that, Bobby?” DeGroot asked. “You want him to be a cripple, if he lives at all? You know I’ll do it, Bobby. You know what I’ll do. He’ll live in a chair and shit in a bag for the rest of his life.”
“Okay,” Caldwell said as he stood up. “That is fucking enough.” He dropped the grenade launcher and reached for his own sidearm. Before he could draw it, DeGroot raised his own gun and shot Caldwell in the face.
Caldwell was knocked off his feet by the impact of the bullet. Marie and Ben screamed at once. Caldwell made no sound. His body twitched and spasmed. DeGroot returned his weapon to Ben. He raised his voice again. “I’m counting to three, Bobby. One…”
“I’ll kill you,” Marie said, her voice choked with tears. “So help me God, I’ll kill you if it’s the last thing I do.”
“No,” DeGroot said. “No, you won’t. Two…”
Powell appeared at the window. He slowly climbed out.
“The key, Bobby,” DeGroot said. “Let me see the key.”
Powell raised one hand. The silver cylinder gleamed briefly in the sunlight.
“Good,” DeGroot said. “Now walk to the point halfway between me and the house. Slowly.” Moving like a sleepwalker, Powell complied.
“Put the key on the ground.” Powell bent over slowly. As he straightened up, his face lost its blank expression and twisted in a snarl of rage. He sprang at DeGroot, his arms in front of him. DeGroot raised the gun and fired. The bullet took Powell in the throat. A fine pink mist blew out of the back of his neck. His charge became a stumble, then a limp collapse, facedown.
“Good,” DeGroot said with satisfaction. “I was beginning to think he wasn’t going to try. I would have been disappointed if he hadn’t tried.”
Marie was beyond screaming. Ben, likewise, was catatonic with fear and shock.
“Please,” Marie said, “Don’t hurt my son. I’ll…I’ll do anything you want.”
“Here’s the thing, cherry,” DeGroot said. “When I get done with you, you’ll do anything I want whether I hurt him or not. But I want your friend Keller to join the party. He’s tuned me a bit of grief, and I owe him.” He reached up and switched on his headset microphone. “Mr. Keller,” he said into the mike. “I’m sure you’ve got poor Markey’s headset. You know what’s happening. And what’s going to happen. So if you’d like to…”
“You don’t need that,” Keller spoke. “I’m right here.”
DeGroot turned, Ben still clutched in front of him. Keller was standing a few feet away, the AK-47 at his shoulder pointed at DeGroot.
DeGroot used his grip on Ben’s shoulder to shake him like a dog with a toy. “I’ll shoot,” he said. “I’ll kill the boy.” To emphasize the point, he pressed the gun into Ben’s back until the boy cried out.
“And then I’ll kill you,” Keller said. “I know you don’t want to die. You value your own skin, I know that.”
“True enough,” DeGroot said genially. “It’s a matter of who values what the most, hey?”
“We don’t have to play chicken to figure that out,”
Keller said. “I know what you really want. Marie,” he said, “go get the key.”
She walked on shaky legs to where the silver computer device lay gleaming in the grass. Her path took her between the bodies of Caldwell and Powell. She didn’t look at either body as she bent down to pick it up.
“Your choice, DeGroot,” Keller said. “The boy for the key. Everybody walks away. No one else has to die.”
“You’ve forgotten one thing,” DeGroot said. He smiled. “The remaining player on the board. Are you in firing position?” he said.
Keller realized he was speaking into his headset mike.
The whispered voice that replied in Keller’s own headset had a trace of British accent. “Roger that.”
“Take the shot, then.”
***
Phillips had begun to move his firing position as soon as he saw the flames engulfing the front of the house. Nothing wa
s coming out that way, and it sounded like the action was moving to the rear anyway.
He was in the vee of a huge oak, sighted in on the group below. A tree wasn’t the ideal firing position, but he had elevation and a clear line of sight. Keller had his back to Phillips, with DeGroot slightly to his left, holding the boy. Phillips adjusted his aim slightly for the range, the slight drop of the bullet, and the light wind and prepared to shoot.
Thunder split the sky open.
All four of the people on the ground reflexively looked up at the blast of noise that filled the air, drowning out even the crackle of the flames. An enormous double-rotored helicopter roared overhead. A huge bag hung from cables suspended beneath the chopper. The aircraft made a slow turn directly above the burning building. They saw a logo printed on the side, a stylized fir tree inside a badge-shaped outline. A cable moved, the bag seemed to tip slightly, and an avalanche of water poured down like an airborne Niagara. The deluge hit the burning building dead center. Some flashed into steam that leapt toward the sky. The falling water blew out the remaining windows and rolled out of the house in all directions like a tsunami. It rolled over them, knocking all three of them from their feet like ten-pins. When the flood passed, Keller was the first one on his feet. He had lost the AK-47, so he launched himself at DeGroot bare-handed.
DeGroot had lost his grip on Ben, but he had managed to hold on to the pistol. He tried to bring it to bear on Keller, but Keller was inside his reach in an instant. He locked DeGroot’s elbow with his left arm and brought the heel of his right hand up under the man’s chin as hard as he could. The force of the blow snapped DeGroot’s head back. He sagged. Keller’s armlock kept him from falling. Keller drove his fist up under DeGroot’s sternum as hard as he could. DeGroot grunted and his body tried to double over, tried to curl around the pain. Keller prevented that by slamming his hand up under the chin again. Only when he heard the thud of the pistol landing on the ground did he release his hold. DeGroot sagged to his knees, retching. Keller stood over him, guarding against any further attempt the man might make to stand. He was dimly aware of the sound of the helicopter receding.
Safe and Sound Page 23
