by Mark Nolan
Easton took out a pair of metal handcuffs and stared at Sarah. She looked at the handcuffs, and she accepted the facts of the situation. “Yes, I will follow orders and assist with this mission in any way I can.”
Easton nodded, turned on his heel and took off down the stairs while talking to Agent McKay on his phone. Terrell climbed through the access panel and went down on one knee next to Greene. He saw her federal agent ball cap on the floorboards, and he put it in his back pocket. Terrell then picked up Greene in a fireman’s carry and carefully squeezed himself back through the access panel and stepped into the stairwell.
Terrell carried Greene to the nearest floor. Sarah opened the door and held it open for him. A nurse saw Terrell carrying Greene down the hallway, and she grabbed a gurney and pushed it toward him. Two Secret Service agents made sure his face matched up with the copy of his ID they had on their phones.
“Put her down on this gurney,” the nurse said. “Gently now, that’s good. Briefly tell me what happened. I see the injury on her forehead. What else do you know about her condition?”
“She’s a federal agent who was struck on the head by a criminal,” Terrell said.
The nurse frowned and checked Greene’s eyes, shining a small penlight at her and studying her pupils. “I’ll order up a CAT scan of her cranium. Hopefully, she’s only been knocked unconscious, and there is no permanent damage.”
“She has ID on her, is there anything more we can do here?” Terrell said.
“No, we’ll take it from here.” The nurse began to call out instructions to her team.
One of the Secret Service agents took a picture of Greene and sent it to Agent McKay. Terrell spoke to him. “We’re taking the dog to search Katherine Anderson’s floor. Can you take pictures of these two and distribute them?”
The agent nodded and took a phone pic of Sarah and Cody.
Terrell pulled out Greene’s ball cap from his back pocket and held it up in front of Sarah so she could see the words “Federal Agent.” He put the cap on her head. “Keep that hat on so you don’t get arrested or shot by accident. If anybody has questions for you, just tell them to talk to Agent McKay. Now follow along with Cody as he does the search.”
“We’re ready, let’s go, Cody,” Sarah said. She followed Terrell with Cody trotting by her side.
Chapter 115
Jake went through the access panel door and ran along the wooden plank in the direction he’d seen Zhukov go. When Jake reached the end of the walkway, he took a quick look around the corner of a large metal vent duct. He saw Zhukov raise his weapon, and he immediately jerked his head back. A bullet hit the duct a moment after Jake had moved out of the way.
Jake got down on his stomach and peeked around the corner again with his MP5 pointed down the other corridor. Zhukov saw him and fired off a wild shot as he ran but the shot went high because he hadn’t expected Jake to be down on the floor. Jake fired a burst of rounds that landed near Zhukov, and one round hit him on the back of his right shoulder. Zhukov was wearing a bulletproof vest, but the impact spun him around and knocked him down. Jake fired several more rounds in the direction of the prone man, but Zhukov had rolled out of sight and taken shelter behind a horizontal support beam.
There was a quiet pause and Jake ducked back around the corner in case Zhukov was taking aim at him. After Jake had moved, several bullets struck the wood plank floor where his head and arms had been moments before. Jake stood up and held the MP5 high up near his head, then stuck the weapon around the corner and fired a quick burst blindly in the general direction of his target.
Zhukov was waiting in ambush, and he fired a well-aimed round from his weapon that hit Jake’s MP5 and knocked it out of his hands, sending it flying over the scaffolding and down into the open shaft below. Jake cursed and shook his fingers from the sting of the shock, then drew his SIG pistol and checked that it was loaded.
Zhukov called out, “Wolfe you’re going to die tonight, and it’s such a pity. I think you and I may be alike in many ways. We might have been friends under different circumstances.”
“We’re nothing alike.”
“Don’t fool yourself. You want to kill me, and you would enjoy doing it.”
“Why don’t you come at me right now and find out? Unless you’re afraid. That’s it, isn’t it? You’re a coward who only shoots unsuspecting civilians.”
“Your crude attempts at making me angry are not working,” Zhukov said. And yet he fired a bullet in anger and hit the duct near Jake. After that there was silence, and Jake wondered if Zhukov was coming toward him right now in a sneak attack, or moving toward Katherine, or waiting in ambush for Jake to show himself.
Jake glanced around and saw a long chain hanging from a beam above him, one of many chains holding up the scaffold he was standing on. A crazy idea occurred to him, and he had enough adrenalin coursing through his veins to try it. Hopefully, if only one chain was removed, it wouldn’t cause the scaffold to fall and take him down with it. He got a chain unlatched and he tested his weight on it. It seemed to be anchored with plenty of strength to hold his weight and more.
He stuck the pistol in his holster, grabbed the chain with both hands and moved back a ways on the plank walkway, pulling the chain with him until it was played out. He looked down at the long fall into the empty shaft below him and then quickly looked away as he climbed over the railing of the scaffold. He wrapped the chain around his left leg, gripped it in both hands and jumped out into the void.
The chain anchor on the beam far above Jake made a creaking and groaning sound as he flew through the air in a wide arc toward a far off scaffold. His estimate of the distance was only a guess. While Jake was airborne, he kept a grip on the chain with his left hand and both legs, and he used his right hand to draw his pistol and hold it out in front of him. Jake got a brief glimpse of Zhukov as he swung past a space between air ducts.
“Hey cupcake!” Jake said. He fired rounds at Zhukov, striking metal ducts near him as he tried for a headshot.
The surprised look on Zhukov’s face when he saw Jake swinging through the air and shooting at him was amusing. Jake laughed out loud, taunting Zhukov as he emptied the entire magazine from his pistol.
Zhukov took cover and angrily fired off some bursts from his automatic weapon. But he was too late, Jake had flown past the opening and out of sight. Zhukov couldn’t see him, but he could still hear his laughter.
The momentum of Jake’s swing took him to the far end of the scaffold and over the railing. He almost kept on going past it, but he used his foot to hook the metal railing’s top bar as he passed by. The impact on his foot felt as if someone had clubbed him with a metal pipe. It stopped his forward progress, and he was able to drop to the wooden plank below him. Jake let go of the chain and grabbed onto the railing to keep from falling. The chain rattled against the rail and flew back to where it had come from before he could grab ahold of it and tie it off.
A long horizontal air duct stood between the two wooden plank walkways, blocking Jake’s view of Zhukov. Jake reloaded his pistol with a full mag, and ran down the plank. He hoped he was now running neck and neck, parallel to his enemy. His foot throbbed with pain as he ran. The duct’s forced air fans made a whirring noise, muffling the sound of his feet.
Jake reached the end of the walkway and the air duct and he came around the corner with his pistol up, intending to go for the kill shot. Instead, he saw another panel door that was hanging open and there was a smear of blood on the wall.
“Got you,” Jake said, and he ran toward the door.
As Jake ran he felt a weird sense of danger to his left and he stopped and ducked and reversed direction as fast as he could. At that moment, an automatic weapon fired several bursts, and the panel door was shot full of holes. If Jake had tried to open the door, he would have been shot in the back. His Kevlar vest might have blocked most of the rounds, but it couldn’t block a headshot. He had to admire the devious mind of his opponent.
The angled duct creaked and swayed, and Jake knew that Zhukov was going for a slide down the tube. He ran to the duct in hopes of firing a shot at the escaping killer, but he was too late. Zhukov was out of sight, and only a smear of blood remained on the metal bottom of the shaft. Jake stepped back and methodically fired rounds into the lower part of the shaft. He started at the far end and worked his way backward.
After a moment, there was no movement from the shaft at all. Jake could follow Zhukov down the slide but when he reached the bottom he’d be a sitting duck to be picked off with a head shot. Jake turned and ran down the wooden plank walkway to the panel door that had been shot full of holes. He went through the panel into the stairwell and called Terrell on his phone. “The shooter slid down a large air duct. He may go into a crawlspace and try to drop out of the ceiling into Katherine’s room. I’m on my way down the stairs now.”
“Roger that, I’ll tell the agents,” Terrell said.
Jake holstered his pistol and ran down the stairs but was stopped by a Secret Service agent guarding the door to the seventh floor. “Hands above your head, don’t move.”
Jake raised his hands. “Listen to me. My name is Jake Wolfe. I’m working with you guys. See my spiffy jacket? The shooter is here on this floor, right now.”
“You can tell it to my boss,” the agent said.
“Good, get Agent McKay on the phone and make it quick.”
“I don’t take orders from you.”
“Your orders are in my top left pocket. You’ll be glad you took a moment to look at them if you value your career, believe me.”
The man frowned skeptically at Jake, but he told a fellow agent to cover him. He noted the US Marshals badge on Jake’s belt, then reached inside his jacket and pulled out an envelope. Inside, he saw an official letter from the President of the United States.
The agent blinked his eyes at the letter in disbelief. “This is highly irregular.”
“Check your phone sir, I believe you’ll see a copy of that letter in a text message,” Jake said.
The agent’s phone buzzed and he answered it. “Yes Agent McKay. Yes, he’s here. One moment.”
The agent handed his phone to Jake. His body language indicated that he was not at all pleased about it.
Jake put the phone to his ear and said, “McKay the target slid down an air duct to the seventh floor. He might in a crawlspace right now. If so he could drop out of the ceiling in any room or hallway.”
“Officer Hayes brought it to our attention. I’m going to make an announcement on the radio, designed to confuse the shooter.”
Jake touched a hand to his borrowed Secret Service earpiece and he heard McKay’s announcement. “This is Agent McKay. The target is in a duct or crawlspace above the seventh floor. We’ve moved our protectee away from the area and have cleared the eighth floor. Fire at will into the ceiling at any sound or movement detected.”
Jake handed the agent’s phone back to him. A moment later Jake’s throwaway phone vibrated. He answered it, and Terrell said, “Someone is stealing my SUV. My car alarm is set up to call my phone when it goes off. I keep turning the car engine off remotely with my phone, but someone keeps turning it back on again.”
“It has to be Zhukov,” Jake said. “Who else would steal a police car in a building that’s surrounded by police? I’m heading to the garage.”
Jake got into an elevator and rode it downwards while calling Easton on his phone to let him know about the situation. Once Jake reached the basement parking level, he exited the elevator and he could hear the police SUV’s car alarm going on and off. He held his pistol up in front of him as he ran toward the vehicle.
Moments later, Zhukov was finally able to override the alarm system in the SUV and keep the engine from being turned off. He drove fast toward the garage exit with the police lights flashing.
Jake saw Zhukov escaping, and he fired several rounds at the police vehicle as it roared away. Bullet holes appeared in the driver’s door, and two starbursts appeared on the driver’s window, but the car kept on going. Jake cursed as he remembered that Terrell’s SUV had the armored upgrade. It was bulletproof.
Easton came running toward the armored black Chevy Suburban that they’d arrived in. Jake ran up to the vehicle at the same time. Easton got into the driver’s seat as Jake jumped into the passenger side. The Suburban took off with a squeal of tires in pursuit of the fleeing Ford Police Interceptor. Jake put his window down so he could lean out and fire his pistol at Zhukov.
When Zhukov reached the exit he didn’t slow down. He held his hand out the window and flashed the badge he’d taken from the Secret Service agent on the roof. The badge and the police car made the cops and agents at the exit hesitate a moment. That was all Zhukov needed to maintain the element of surprise. He turned on the siren and then yelled orders over the vehicle’s loudspeaker.
“I’m acting on orders from Agent McKay. Get out of the way. It’s an emergency.”
Zhukov glanced in his rear view mirror and saw a black Suburban approaching behind him. He punched the gas and drove straight toward the officers that were standing in front of the red and white striped boom gate barrier arm.
Agent Greene came out of an elevator into the garage then. She had a bruised bump on her forehead and fury in her eyes. Easton pulled up and stopped the SUV next to Greene for five seconds, and she jumped into the back seat. Easton drove off again with a roar of the engine before Greene even had a chance to close the door. He pressed a button and spoke over a loudspeaker. “This is Agent Easton. Stop that stolen police vehicle. Ivan Zhukov is driving it.”
The two police officers who were standing in front of the exit had to jump out of the way to avoid being run over by Zhukov’s vehicle. The stolen police car crashed through the barrier arm and then drove into the street. A rookie officer tried to pull his police car in front of Zhukov’s SUV but missed by a few seconds. He blocked the following Suburban instead. Easton rammed the rookie’s police car hard, and the Suburban’s strengthened bumpers pushed the car aside. Easton gunned the engine and roared down the street in pursuit of Zhukov.
Above them on the rooftop of the hospital, an FBI helicopter was coming in for a landing on the emergency medical helipad. The FBI pilot saw the two cars racing from the scene. He turned up the volume on the police scanner he was monitoring and heard what was going on.
“The fugitive is in one of those vehicles,” the pilot said.
FBI Special Agent Reynolds grabbed her assault rifle and said, “Let’s get him.”
The pilot took off after the two fleeing SUVs, and he shone a spotlight down on the street behind the vehicles as he flew the helicopter between tall buildings.
Reynolds put on a harness with a safety strap, opened the side door of the helicopter and leaned out. She took aim at the closest vehicle, the Suburban. She had no idea that Agent Easton was behind the wheel.
Chapter 116
Terrell knew that Jake was heading to the garage, so he went down an elevator to the hospital’s front door. He planned on cutting off Zhukov’s escape route from the outside of the garage exit. He saw Beth going out the door with Sarah and Cody following behind her. He then saw his own police vehicle drive past on the street, with a black Suburban chasing in pursuit. A helicopter flew overhead and followed after the two cars.
He spoke to Beth. “We need a vehicle. That was my car that just went by.”
Beth nodded. “We’re going to have to borrow one.”
They headed toward a long row of police vehicles that were parked all along the sidewalk. At that moment, a black and white police car pulled to the curb and stopped. The uniformed cop in the driver’s seat had his window down. Beth ran
up to the car, and she recognized the driver as a man named Wilson. “Wilson, where have you been? Everybody is going into the garage and they’re asking where you are.”
Wilson looked at Beth in surprise. “They treat me like a mushroom. Just keep me in the dark and feed me BS.” He got out of the car and took off running for the garage.
Beth smiled when she saw that Wilson had left the keys in the ignition after she’d distracted him. She got into the driver’s seat. “Get in, let’s move.”
Terrell got into the front passenger seat and Sarah opened a back door so Cody could jump in. Then she got in beside him and hoped Terrell wouldn’t object. Beth hit the gas and drove fast in pursuit of the two other vehicles. Terrell reached over and turned on the lights and siren. He then looked at his phone display and called the throwaway phone Jake had used earlier.
Jake answered the call and said, “Grinds, we’re in pursuit of your stolen vehicle. Zhukov is driving it.”
“Yeah, time for plan B. We’re coming up fast on your six in a black and white, and we’re bringing Cody with us. Now I’m going to call it in, to HQ.”
“Roger that.”
Easton drove aggressively as cars in the street ahead pulled over and out of the way of the two police vehicles with their lights flashing and sirens wailing. He brought the Suburban closer to the fleeing car and rammed into the vehicle’s back bumper. The stolen police car took a sudden hard right turn, drove one block and then took a left. Jake fired off a shot and hit the right rear tire of the car. But the vehicle had run-flat tires, and it didn’t slow down.
Easton wrestled with the steering wheel of the Suburban, as Zhukov drove completely around the block and back onto the same street he’d been on before. Easton was able to keep Zhukov in sight but he lost some ground, and he now trailed behind the lead vehicle. When Easton turned back onto the road they had originally been on, his windshield was struck by several rounds fired by Zhukov but they ricocheted off of the bulletproof glass.
