Alex held his hands out, too, reluctantly, but in the end surrendering. It was still not the right time.
They were cuffed and led down a cool gray hall made of cinder blocks. The light fixtures overhead were wire-caged bulbs dangling from aging wire. The two of them were placed in a small room in two hard-backed chairs. Another bulb hung in there, and nothing else. The door was closed, locked.
“They’ll be listening,” Alex whispered. “It’s standard. Leave us alone awhile, see if we say anything revealing.”
“They want revealing, I’ll give them revealing,” Mel said. “You guys are not going to live very long. Because my family is going to come over here and kick your ever-loving asses all the way back to wherever the hell you came from.”
The door opened a half hour later. Mel had spent the entire time talking about the numerous ways in which the men responsible for this were going to suffer, while Alex had spent the entire time warning her to keep quiet. She didn’t care. She wanted to piss them off. You pissed a man off, he would lose his temper, just as sure as night followed day. And when a man lost his temper, he could be outsmarted.
A man came in, puffing on a big fat cigar, pacing the floor in front of them. “You are very wise,” he said to Alex. Then he sent a narrow-eyed glare at Mel. “And you are very sure of your father’s reach and his power. Overconfident, I would say.”
“I really don’t care what you would say,” she said. “But you might be interested in what Freud would have to say about the way you’re sucking on that cigar.”
He laughed softly, shrugged. “Amusing.” He’d gone a bit red in the face, though. Good. He closed the door, locked it from the inside with a key, then dropped the key back into the pocket of his green camouflage shirt. “Your names,” he demanded, turning to face them, walking toward them until he stood right in front of them.
They were alone in the room with a guard outside the door. The key was in this man’s pocket. Mel could see Alex’s sharp eyes taking in every detail, analyzing, plotting, weighing the odds. God, she found that attractive, that sharp mind of his.
“Your names,” the man said again.
“Sonny and Cher,” Mel snapped. “What, you don’t recognize us?”
The man drew back his hand and smacked her so fast she never saw it coming—a swift backhand across the face that snapped her head to one side. Alex surged to his feet, but the man was expecting that. He had a gun in his other hand, and he pressed the barrel to Alex’s forehead and used it to shove him back into his chair.
“Your names,” the man repeated.
Mel touched her split lip with her tongue, looked the jerk in the eye. “He’s Donny, and I’m Marie. Haven’t you seen our show?”
He came toward her to hit her again, but she stuck her feet out and tripped him so he landed face first on the floor. Alex sprang fast, kneeling on the guy’s back, wrapping the chain of his cuffs around his throat and pulling tight to cut off the flow of blood giving oxygen to his brain.
“I lied,” Mel said, leaning close, just before the guy’s eyes closed. “He’s Batman, and I’m Robin.”
The fat man passed out. Or died, she wasn’t sure which and didn’t particularly care. “The son of a bitch hit me,” she muttered.
Alex got off him and rolled him over, patted him down and found the handcuff keys. Then he unlocked Mel’s cuffs and searched her face. “Are you all right?”
“That son of a bitch hit me.” This time she punctuated it by giving the big lump a good swift kick in the ribs. “Try that when I’m not handcuffed, you fat bastard,” she muttered. Then she met Alex’s concerned eyes. “Yes, I’m all right. I’m royally pissed, but I’m all right.” She took the keys from him and unlocked his cuffs. He touched her lip where she was bleeding.
Alex located a microphone, barely concealed in the light fixture, and crushed it. “I’m sorry I couldn’t stop him.”
“He looks pretty stopped to me.”
Alex pulled the gun from his waistband and handed Mel the weapon he’d taken from the fat slob on the floor. They went to the door, and Alex used the key to unlock it, then opened it just a crack, peered out, closed it again.
“Well?” she asked, watching his face, trying to read their chances there.
“One guard, armed, just to the left. Another one standing in front of another door, just across the hall. That’s probably where they have the other two. That’s all I can see from here.”
She nodded, holding her gun ready. “I’ll take the one across the hall,” she said. “You take the one beside the door.”
Alex paused to look at her with a frown. “If I didn’t know better, I’d almost think you were enjoying this.”
“I’ll enjoy it more when we’re out of here.”
“Yeah, I’m with you on that one. On three, okay?”
She nodded, took a breath.
“One, two…” On three, Alex yanked open the door and clocked the guard upside the head with the butt of his handgun. The one across the hall reached for his weapon, but Mel had hers a foot from his nose before he could do much harm. She pressed a forefinger to her lips to tell him to be silent, then took his gun away and herded him into the room she and Alex had been in. Alex dragged the unconscious guard inside, as well, then looked at the frightened conscious one. “Sorry about this,” he said, and nailed the guy just as he had the other one. The guard looked briefly surprised, then slumped to the floor.
“Now what?” Mel asked, closing the door behind them after glancing up and down the hall to be sure they hadn’t been seen. Alex was handcuffing the two guards, hands behind their backs, not in front as Alex and Mel had been cuffed.
Then he returned to the door, opened it and looked out. “The door across the hall is still closed. We have to assume that’s where they are, and that there’s someone in there questioning them, as well.”
“So what do we do?” She was whispering, just as he had been, in case someone, somewhere, was listening in.
“We go in there and get our counterparts, and then we get the hell out of here.”
“That door is probably locked like this one was. How are we going to get them to open it?”
Alex shrugged. “We could try knocking.” He strode across the hall, rapped twice on the door. Mel locked the door of the room they had been in and closed it behind her as she hurried to follow Alex.
Muttering, the man inside, who had no doubt been questioning Katerina and Thomas just as Alex had surmised, unlocked the door and opened it. He was greeted by a fist to the face. The guy went down hard on his back, his head landing right at Thomas’s feet. Thomas hauled off and kicked the man repeatedly.
“All right, all right, he’s out,” Alex whispered, as he and Mel rushed into the room.
“He should be dead,” Thomas growled. “You leave his kind alive, they only come back to attack you again later. Kill him. This is war.”
Alex shook his head, and Mel knew it was too late to warn the couple to be quiet. “That’s not war,” Alex said. “That’s murder. Now come on.” Using the key he’d pocketed, he unfastened Thomas’s handcuffs, then tossed the keys to Mel. She unlocked Katerina’s cuffs.
“You’re going to get us all killed,” Katerina whispered, tears streaming down both cheeks.
Thomas took the gun from the fallen man, and the four of them crept into the hall, locking the door from the inside and pulling it closed behind them. Not that Mel thought it was going to fool anyone at this point.
The hall was long, windowless, with doors at either end. They knew that beyond one door were stairs leading downward, deeper into the earth, because that was the one they had come through from their cell to this area. Alex led them toward the far end of the hall and the other door. Another hallway crossed the one they traversed. They crept through the intersection, and Mel realized she was holding her breath. God, she was scared. And alive, more alive, she thought, than she had ever been. It occurred to her that Alex had been right. She was enjoy
ing this somehow, somewhere far beneath the fear. Sneaking through an underground bunker filled with killers, carrying a gun, rescuing a princess. Even if she was a spoiled and whiny little princess. Hell, Mel thought, she might just love this. If they survived, anyway.
“I’m sick,” she muttered. “Sick.”
“It’s just the stress,” Alex whispered. “Try to hold on, hon, we’ll be out of here soon.”
He called her “hon.” She loved that, too.
They reached the door, opened it, saw a set of stairs leading upward and took them. At the top, another hall led to a door with natural light shining in around the edges. It had to lead to the outside. Mel’s heart beat faster.
They ran toward that door, and then all stopped, crowded around it, breathless with anticipation. Alex gripped the knob, turned it.
“Unlocked,” he whispered.
He pushed the door open very slowly, then peered outside. Mel crowded closer to him, so she could see outside, as well. There were outbuildings, but they seemed lifeless, dead. There was a low stone wall, where some building had been started, but never finished. But there were no people. There were no guards. No one in sight at all. And there was a helicopter resting in the distance.
Chapter 12
A lex skimmed their surroundings. It was late afternoon, but full light. The sun hung low in the sky, painting it in brushstrokes of gold, orange and red. And the terrain here looked less desertlike than before. There were rocky hillsides and scraggly vegetation dotting the landscape.
The place appeared to have been some kind of storage facility at one time. A handful of barn-size structures stood in a half circle. Crumbling now, abandoned—or they had been until these jokers had taken up residence. He didn’t know where the hell they were, or in what direction safety might lie. But he did know one thing. He knew he could fly that helicopter. Probably. Mick had given him a few informal lessons on his own chopper, back when they’d worked together in the Secret Service. The one outside wasn’t exactly the same, but similar enough that he might just be able to get it off the ground.
Was it worth the risk?
Hell, they were facing certain death here. At least in the chopper they would have a chance. And a chance was all they needed.
“What’s the plan?” Mel whispered from close beside him.
At his shoulder. He liked that about her. She didn’t cower behind him the way Katerina cowered behind Thomas. She stood beside him. He had no doubt he could count on her in a pinch. She’d proven it often enough over the past few days.
He glanced down at her. “The chopper,” he whispered. He nodded toward the only visible guard he’d been able to spot. The man was silhouetted in a glassless window, in the peak of the building off to the left. His head swung slowly from left to right as he scanned the area, keeping watch. Alex picked up the pattern, the cadence of his movements. “Crouch low and run to the helicopter quick as you can when I say go.”
Mel turned to the two behind her, repeated his whispered command.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Ready.”
He watched the guard, facing their building, gaze sliding like a shadow over it. Then he was scanning the opposite direction. “Go!” Alex whispered.
They ran, bent low, silently, scurrying like bugs when the lights came on. Alex reached the chopper first and helped the others in, one by one. He climbed in last. “Get down low. Now!” he whispered.
They all crouched down in the chopper. The guard turned slowly…and saw nothing.
Alex knew it was only a matter of minutes, seconds maybe, before the interrogators and guard dogs he’d left bound and unconscious inside would come around and start stirring up a commotion. He examined the panel, the controls, his heart pounding so hard he swore it was audible to the others as he dug down deep for the knowledge he needed to get this thing in the air.
“Can you fly this thing, Alex?” Mel asked, her voice very low, a little shaky.
“We’re about to find out.” He licked his lips, nodded firmly. “Yeah, I think I can.” Glancing at the other two, he said, “Get your weapons ready. The second I start this thing, they’re going to come out shooting. I’ll need a few seconds to get us off the ground. You’re going to need to hold them off.”
Mel caught his eyes, her own wide. “Should we…shoot to kill?”
“Aim for the torso. Less chance of missing.”
She nodded, but he saw the look of uncertainty in her eyes.
“If it makes you feel better, don’t think of it as trying to kill them. Think of it as trying to stop them from killing us. We’ll send help back for them the minute we’re safe.”
She met his eyes, and the resolve in her own hardened and held. “They’re not giving us much of a choice.” She looked at the gun in her hand, it was bigger than the little .38 she’d had before, a semiautomatic, not a revolver. She checked it, flipped off the safety. She’d said she wasn’t used to an automatic, but she seemed to know her way around the piece just fine.
Then she glanced at the other two. “Katerina, you get in the middle and stay down low.”
Alex pulled out his own gun, checked Mel, saw her with hers in her hand, her eyes dilated by adrenaline and skimming the compound.
“Let’s do it, then. I’m a fair shot,” she said. “You, Thomas?”
“I’ve won trophies for my marksmanship,” he told her.
“Then you take the tower guy and I’ll cover the door,” Mel told him. She shot Alex a look. “You focus on the chopper. And don’t worry, I’ve got your back. Just get us out of here.”
He nodded once, flipped on the switches and hit the start button. The chopper came to life, motor humming more loudly than he had expected it to.
Behind him, Thomas’s gun went off. But return fire came from the tower, pinging off the metal just above Alex’s head.
Mel spun, aimed, fired, hitting the guard dead center of the chest and knocking him backward and out of sight.
The blades were beginning to turn, painstakingly slow, like tired old men walking up a long flight of stairs.
Another guard appeared in the window of the second outbuilding, looked toward them, frowning. The blades moved a little faster. A couple more seconds.
Mel’s gun went off again just as the guard shouldered his rifle.
Alex saw him go down. Damn, she did have his back.
“Hurry, Alex,” she said, turning toward the main building and firing three times. Then Thomas joined in. Alex turned to see a dozen men spilling from the open door of the building from which the four of them had just escaped, all armed, their weapons spitting fire. Alex pulled out his own gun to help. It sounded as if the chopper were in a hailstorm. Three men lay on the ground, and before Alex could even take aim, Mel dropped another.
“Thomas, aim before you shoot! You’re just wasting ammo!” she shouted, and popped another.
She was freaking amazing. The blades were whirring now. Alex fired off two rounds, then took them airborne as fast as he could manage. The chopper leaned to one side, then the other, as he fought to remember his lessons. He got a feel for the stick, but they were still being hit by gunfire. Finally he got the thing moving more efficiently. Seconds later they were out of range of the men shooting at them from the ground.
Mel whooped a victory cry. “We did it,” she said. “By God, we did it! We got away!”
Alex glanced at her. Damned if she wasn’t glowing.
“You’re one hell of a shot, Melusine Brand.”
“You’re damn straight I am.”
Their gazes locked for just an instant, and there was something there, something between them. Unspoken, unexamined, but real. He felt it right to his toes. If it wouldn’t have meant crashing and burning, he would have kissed her right then. Long and hard. The urge to say to hell with the controls and do it anyway was almost too insistent to resist.
“Is that a radio?” Thomas asked, pointing at the headset that dangled from a hook near Alex�
�s head.
“Looks like.” He put the thing on, spent a few seconds locating the controls, and then turned knobs until he heard crackling in his ears. He found the frequency dial, then turned it until the digital panel showed him the emergency channel he and Mick had used in the old days. “Mayday, Mayday,” he said. “Mick if you’re listening, we’re in a chopper, and we’re safe. We have picked up the package, but we’re being pursued.” He glanced around them, shouting landmarks into the mike, having no clue if any of them were unique enough to help anyone find them.
A red light came on, and a deep-throated hum buzzed intermittently, like a persistent alarm clock. Alex looked at the gauges. “Hell, we didn’t need this.”
“What is it?” Thomas asked from behind him.
“They hit the fuel tank. We’re going down.” He met Mel’s eyes. “I’m sorry. I tried.”
“Tried and succeeded. You got us out of there, Alex. And we’re not dead yet,” she told him. “We’re far from down for the count.”
“There are parachutes back here!” Thomas yelled.
“How many?” Alex glanced back to see the man already strapping Katerina into one of them.
“Two,” Thomas answered.
Alex nodded, manning the stick, trying to keep them in the air as long as possible, to steer them as far away from the compound as he could manage. He had no doubt those men were in pursuit, even now. He hadn’t seen any other choppers on the ground, but there had been vehicles. Plenty of them.
“Two ’chutes,” he repeated. “That’s enough for the women. Mel, you and Katerina have to jump. I’ll try to ditch this thing as far from you as possible. They’ll follow the chopper. With any luck, they won’t even see you two go down. I’ll try to lead them away, give you plenty of time to get to safety. Or at least get hidden.”
She stared him dead in the eye. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Look off to the right. That looks like a town off that way. As soon as you get to the ground, get out of the ’chutes and head for it. It can’t be more than a couple of miles.”
Mel put her hand over his on the stick. “I’m not going anywhere, Alex. If you think I am, then you haven’t been paying much attention over the past few days. But I think you have been, and I think you know me a little bit better than you’re pretending right now.”
Secrets and Lies Page 16
