Christmas Countdown

by Jan Hambright

  She watched Mac retrieve the field glasses and raise them to his eyes, lower them and grin.

  He handed them to her. She stared through the lenses at a deer picking its way through the underbrush toward the creek.

  “Cute.” She handed the binoculars back to Mac, fighting an overwhelming feeling of relief. She wasn’t cut out to be a spy. She preferred to get her excitement from a fast horse on an oval patch of turf, or from the man next to her.

  “Come on. We’ll cross the fence here and make our way to the road. If they’re coming in and out of here all the time, we should be able to pick up a trail that leads us straight to their operation.”

  Mac stretched the wire for her to crawl through, then she held it while he did the same. Once on the other side, he took her hand and moved them out into the open.

  Tension zapped his senses, putting him on full alert. Glancing back and forth, he watched for threats, and stopped when they reached the closed and padlocked gate.

  “Your dad put this on?”

  “Yeah. He wanted to make sure no one could drive a rig in here. It’s too dangerous.”

  Searching the hard-packed earth, he spotted the outline of a boot print and followed it, working his way along the narrow overgrown road that disappeared into the trees less than seventy-five feet ahead.

  The hairs on the back of his neck bristled as he took Emma’s hand and pulled her along, scanning the thickening foliage as he moved forward. They were sitting ducks out here. Prime targets if Rahul’s crew showed up shooting.

  Mac picked up the pace, pushing into a jog, aiming for cover as the road narrowed and funneled down into a single path.

  “There it is,” Emma pointed. “That’s the cavern my dad dynamited closed years ago.”

  Mac stared at the narrow opening at the base of a rising hill that sloped away from the creek. “It’s not closed anymore.”

  Caution jolted through him as he studied the path in front of them for confirmation and found it in the well-worn vegetation leading straight to the mouth of the cavern. “Do you remember anything about it?”

  “I’m the reason he blasted it. My friends and I would ride our horses out here to hang out. He was afraid someone would get hurt if it collapsed in on its own, so he helped it along. It’s so deep we never found the bottom.”

  Emma shuddered, remembering the first time she’d ventured into the cave and stirred up a swarm of bats. “It’s large once you’re through the small opening, then back for about fifty feet. Past that it begins to narrow until you’re on your knees crawling along. We didn’t explore beyond that point. Too creepy.”

  “The odds are Rahul and his crew like to walk upright, too, so if their operation is inside, it’ll be close to the opening.” Fear shattered her nerves as she watched him unzip his backpack, pull out a flashlight, hoist it back onto his shoulder and unholster his pistol.

  “Stay close.”

  She wouldn’t have it any other way, she decided as she followed him to the opening of the cavern with her hand on his back.

  Mac prepared for a full-on assault, turned on his flashlight and charged into the cavern.

  “Damn,” he said as he shined the beam of light around the space. “If they ever had anything set up in here, they’ve cleared it out.” He focused on the multiple sets of footprints pressed into the loose soil on the floor and tracked them with the beam, watching the cave narrow just like Emma said it would.

  Straining to hear, he tried to focus as he moved deeper inside, but the place was empty.

  They were gone and any proof of their operation had gone with them.

  “Look!” Emma stepped past him and hurried deeper into the cavern. “There’s something back here.”

  Mac reached out to stop her. To warn her he wanted to check it out first, that it might not be safe.

  He lunged forward.

  The flashlight tipped down in his hand. The beam shimmered across a copper-colored wire, but it was already too late.

  Emma tripped on it with her foot.

  The tiny click of a detonator pinged on his eardrum. It came from behind him.

  Booby-trapped.

  He dived for her.

  All hell broke loose as the cave mouth closed with a deep rumble he felt in his bones.

  Emma sucked in a mouth full of dust as Mac body-slammed her from behind and knocked her into the dirt.

  Pure darkness swallowed her up, but she came up fighting, scratching and clawing at the cave floor to get up off of her belly.

  Where was Mac? Where was the light? Where was the air?

  She choked and tried to cough out the dust.

  Reaching beside her, she touched the cold hard wall of the cavern. Using it to get her bearings, she pulled up onto her knees and sat back on her butt.

  “Mac!” she yelled, coughing and choking on the dirt and debris in the air, working to make her eyes focus in the blackness while her stomach churned.

  An explosion?

  They’d been shut in the cavern by an explosion.

  Terror clutched her throat. She fought to maintain her composure. She had to find Mac.

  He’d knocked her forward into the tunnel to protect her. He must be closer to the opening. She went onto all fours, crawling forward, shoveling back the dirt with her hands as she moved.

  “Mac! Where are you? Can you hear me? Please hear me,” she whispered, feeling the first streak of panic glide over her nerves.

  A moan followed by a deep inhale and coughing turned her attention back the way she’d come.

  At least she thought it was the way she’d come, but the depth of the black hole had turned her perception on end.

  “Emma! I’m over here.” The sound of his voice clarified it. She pivoted at the same time the flashlight beam bit into the darkness, blinding her for an instant before her eyes adjusted.

  The percussion from the blast must have propelled him right past her.

  “Are you okay?” She crawled toward him, her heart racing in her chest.

  “Nothing’s broken, but my leg’s hung up.”

  Fear strained her emotions and she wondered if she was going to die in this hole along with the man she loved.

  Shuffling to a stop beside him, she put her hand on his back. “Give me the flashlight.” Reaching out, she took it out of his hand and shined the beam along his legs until she found the problem. A couple of large rocks had landed during the blast, and caught the outside seam of his jeans below the knee. Another inch and they would have crushed his leg.

  “I can’t get enough sideways leverage to pull it loose.”

  She put the light down and grabbed Mac’s leg above and below where his pants were caught. “On three, we’ll pull. One. Two. Three.”

  Emma tugged, but nothing happened. She exerted effort again, still nothing. “Damn. You’re going to have to slip out of your pants to get them loose.”

  “For you? Anything. But it’s not going to be easy. Can you pull off my boot?”

  Moving in behind him, she grabbed his cowboy boot in both hands and pulled it off.

  Mac felt like a two-year-old tangled up on the jungle gym as he lay on his belly, fighting to unsnap and unzip his jeans. He finally accomplished the task, then took a breather.

  “You’re going to have to pull my other boot and hold on to the other side so I can crawl out of them.”

  “Okay.” She snagged his other boot and pulled it off, then pulled the hem of his right cuff.

  Mac crawled forward with his arms and felt his feet clear the hems of his jeans. In less than two seconds he was free and climbing to his feet.

  Emma picked up the flashlight and spotted him in it, shining it up and down his thighs. “Ooh. Look what I found. A just-about-naked caveman.”

  Mac snorted, more to clear his lungs than to acknowledge her silly joke, but right now a sense of humor was all they had going for them.

  Reaching down he gently pulled the light from her hand, turned and shined it on the wa
ll of rock and soil the explosion had dislodged and deposited in the mouth of the cavern.

  They were in serious trouble. No one knew where they were. He estimated there was at least five feet of debris between them and daylight.

  “Dammit, I’m sorry, Em. I never should have let you come out here with me. I should have forced you to say home.”

  She came to her feet then picked her way through the rubble to his side. “You did this to protect me, and Firehill, and because it’s right.”

  “Yeah, well, if we live through it, we can debate. Right now, we’ve got to find a way out of here.” Desperation hitched to his nerves as he scanned the cavern, searching for something besides their bare hands to dig away the soil.

  “What was it you thought you saw back there?” He pointed the light deeper into the cave.

  “Something, equipment maybe, I only caught a glimpse before the explosion.”

  “Let me go first this time.”

  “Sure, but you’ll need these.” She reached down and took hold of his jeans and started to pull. A moment later, Mac joined her and they yanked until the fabric gave, and ripped away, sending them both back on their feet.

  “Another inch and that would have been your leg, and then what would I have done?” Emma sobered, letting the reality sink in. She sucked in a raspy breath and handed him his pants with one leg shredded below the knee. “I’ll find your boots.”

  Glad for the momentary distraction, she spotted his boots lying side by side in the dirt, picked them up, emptied them and straightened, watching him pull on his pants. Her cheeks went hot watching him button up.

  “Thanks,” Mac said taking the cowboy boots from her and pulling them on. “I’ve got some water in my backpack. It’ll wash down the dirt.”

  He reached out for her and took her in his arms. “We’re going to dig out of here.”

  Cupping her head against his chest, he held her close, then released her. “Come on, let’s have a look at what you think you saw back here.” He aimed the beam of light into the cavern, picking a path forward, then stopped to snag his pack and his pistol from out of the dirt.

  Ten feet farther in he found what she’d seen, what had pushed her across the trip wire and possibly sealed their fate.

  “It’s a satellite phone.” Mac went to his knees and turned over the bulky gray metal box. He popped the latch and flipped the cover open. Inside was a handset and a dial pad. “Hold this.” He handed the flashlight to Emma. She focused the beam on the box.

  Mac picked up the receiver then pressed the on button. Nothing. He pressed it again. Nothing.

  “This is what Rahul has been doing out here? He’s been using this satellite phone to talk to someone?”

  “Overkill. Why not just use a cell phone or a landline?”

  “I don’t know. But the signals from these can be encrypted. If you didn’t want anyone to know what you were talking about, this is the way to go.”

  “An encrypted phone to talk about race strategy with the sheikh?”

  “I doubt it was anything that innocuous.” Caution fired into his brain, but he put his concerns aside for the time being. They had to get out of this cavern before it became their final resting place.

  “I’ve got my cell phone, will it work in here?” She was already pulling it out of her coat pocket. She flipped it open and lowered it into the light. “No signal.”

  Mac pulled his pack off of his shoulder, opened it and took out the bottle of water. He handed it to her. “Take a drink, but let’s be conservative, make it last for as long as we can.”

  She took the bottle while he dug his knife out of his pocket. He turned the box over, pulled a blade open and worked the screws out on the top and bottom. He separated the sheet-metal cover from the electronics inside and stared at the spot where the phone’s battery should have been.

  “Here’s why it’s not working. Someone removed the power supply. It’s doubtful that we’d be able to get a signal from underground, anyway.”

  He tossed the phone’s guts aside, stood up and raised the three-sided box into the flashlight’s beam. “From a phone to a satellite-shovel.”

  Mac turned his effort on the mountain of debris and started to dig.

  EMMA GLANCED AT HER WATCH—8:30 p.m. on the dot.

  “Give up the shovel, Mac. It’s my turn.” For seven hours straight they’d been at it, trading off with the makeshift scoop every half hour, scratching into the dirt and rock separating them from the outside world—and from life itself if they couldn’t break through.

  Mac rocked back from his position near the top of the heap and shuffled down the mound, raising a cloud of dust.

  “We’re making progress.” He took the half-empty water bottle from her, uncapped it and took a single swallow. “Maybe by tomorrow we can open a fist-size hole at the top. Enough to get a cell-phone call out.”

  “I hope so, but the water isn’t going to last that long and the granola bar is almost gone. It’ll be harder to work without something to eat or drink.”

  She stared at the sheen of sweat coating his bare chest, at the ripple of six-pack abs flexed just beneath his skin, and prayed he would save the last of his energy to make love to her again, one more time before they died.

  Averting her gaze, she willed the silly thought away and gave in to the sting of tears burning behind her eyelids. She wasn’t a girly-girl, had never worried about a broken nail, or a miss-sprung curl, things that set some women off in a panic. She hated to admit it right now to herself, but for the first time in her life, she was scared to death.

  “Em?” He reached for her, pulling her against him. “We’re going to make it out of here. If it’s the last thing I do, I’ll push you through the opening I’m going to dig at the top.”

  The visual on that one struck her as funny. She busted out laughing, pushed back and stared up into his face.

  “I can see you doing that for me. That’s why I’m in love with you, Mac. You’re a man of your word.” There, she’d finally put words to the feelings in her heart. The emotion that had taken her by surprise was finally out in the open air between them and it had a name.

  Love.

  “You don’t have to reciprocate. I’m okay with that, but I wanted you to know, just in case….”

  Frustrated, she pulled the satellite-shovel out of his hand and headed for the mountain of dirt, feeling a zing of liberation pulse through her veins. She could die now with no regrets.

  Mac’s heart squeezed in his chest as he watched her go, hearing the echo of her admission over and over in his brain. It was desperation talking, her last hurrah in the belly of a cavern he hoped would release them, but he couldn’t be certain that it would.

  “Emma, wait.” He stepped toward her and paused, uncertain of the clunking sound he could hear. The sluice of shovels scooping into loose earth, and the deep rumble of rocks rolling away.

  She stood frozen at the base of the mound.

  “Did you hear that?” Mac asked, wanting to be certain.

  “Yes. It sounds like people are digging their way in.”

  Louder, it was growing louder, and closer with each passing second.

  Caution spurred him to action.

  He unholstered his weapon and reached for her, easing her in behind him before training the flashlight beam and the gun barrel at the top of the mound, where a pinpoint of light began to appear.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Emma watched shovels full of earth cascade down the mound and held her breath.

  Who was on the other side?

  Fear skittered through her as she worked the answer. Dago’s ex-crew were the only ones who’d been out here.

  “Don’t shoot,” someone yelled through the opening. “I’m coming to you.”

  English. Thank God. It couldn’t be anyone from the stud barn.

  She watched in horror as a man dressed from head to toe in black slithered though the narrow opening and rolled down to the cavern floor, the
n slowly came to his feet with his hands raised. “We’d have come for you sooner, but we needed to wait for dark in case the cavern’s being watched.”

  Mac stepped back, pushing her behind him, with his weapon aimed at the man’s center of mass. “Take off the ski mask,” he demanded.

  The man in black grabbed the top of the mask and pulled it off of his head to expose his face.

  Mac sized up the details in a matter of seconds. Clean shaven, military-style buzz cut, straight-faced defiance.

  “Who are you?” A measure of caution circulated in his blood, and until he was certain the man wasn’t a threat, he’d hold the bead.

  “Agent Renn Donahue, NSA. We need to talk, Mr. Titus.”

  “I’m listening.” He lowered the .44 Magnum slowly and holstered it, glancing at another man who wormed through the opening and down the mound, where he pulled two water bottles out of his pack and handed one to each of them.

  “Thanks,” Mac said, eyeing them both.

  “We were monitoring this site up until a week ago when they stopped transmitting from it.”

  “Victor Dago and his crew?”

  “Just his crew, Mac. Victor Dago was Agent Victor Coronado.”

  Mac’s stomach knotted. “National Security Agency?”

  “Department of Homeland Security.”

  The pieces of the puzzle started to slot into place for him, and he guzzled back half the water bottle before he recapped it and stared at Donahue. “You’re the man who signed his body out of the morgue in Lexington?”

  “Yeah. He was my friend. He’s got a wife and three kids in Louisville.”

  “I’m sorry, man. I found your camera in the stud barn, you must know which one of the crew members killed him.”

  “Karif. It was Karif and Javas. They smashed his head in with a tire iron and threw him into Dragon’s Soul’s stall to make it look like an accident.”

  “Sick bastards. Why don’t you go after them for murder?”

  “Because we don’t know what the cell is planning yet. If we close in on them now, they’ll simply scatter and perpetrate the act somewhere else.”