them Army guys comin' and if we could hardly hear them shots, a cinch them Army guys didn't.' Jed's eyes followed Crip as the taller man turned and glanced down along the defile and toward the valley below.
Spotted behind rocks and boulders and trees were more than two dozen men—armed with everything from riot shotguns to automatic weapons. And past these, at the far side of the valley, more visible from the wake of trodden down grass and wild oats tracking their line of march, were six figures in olive drab.
Crip was peering through binoculars now, 'Those guys gotta have maybe a coupla hundred rounds of ammo apiece on 'em—and the six M-s. Maybe got other shit we can use.'
'We could use gas better,' Jed murmured.
'Yeah—well—with more ammo and better guns, maybe we can get us some gas, too.
been plannin'—'
'But killin' Army guys—maybe they're fightin' the Commies or somethin'—maybe—'
'Maybe shit,' Crip laughed. 'You wanna go fight Commies, go on and do it. Me—I wanna stay alive, stay cookin'—like the guys down there want. I take 'em to war with the fuckin' Russians and they'd run like hell. I take 'em to war to get some neat shit, to have some fun—they stick, they fight. Them Army guys down there's like ever'body else—fair game. They'd plug us soon as shit—but we'll ice 'em first.'
Crip went back to looking through the binoculars. Jed puffed anxiously on the cigarette—and his hands still shook . . .
Natalia Anastasia Tiemerovna brushed the dark lock of hair back from her face, dismounting the bike, walking across the clearing. The fingers of her left hand swept back through the hair again, tiny knots in it from riding the bike against the wind. She made a mental note to put her hair up after she brushed it, either that or tie a scarf over it. The fingers of her right hand were half hidden under the full flap of the black leather holster on her right hip, the fingers—all but the first finger—wrapped around the smooth finger-grooved Goncala Alves stocks of the round butted Smith L-Frame, the firsf finger poised and slightly outstretched, to reach into the revolver's trigger guard as soon as she cleared leather.
She heard a rustling in the trees, but didn't react to it and draw the .—it was Paul, her eyes having caught sight of his movement in the instant prior to the snapping of the twig. What Paul Rubenstein still lacked in expertise, she felt he more than compensated for by ingenuity and tenacity—and she liked him anyway. She saw a form on the ground at the edge of the trees—but it was unmoving.
Her left hand unsnapped the flap of the Safariland holster on her other hip, both of the customized, slab- side barreled stainless L-Frames coming into her hands and their muzzles leveling toward the treeline's edge. She kept walking, lengthening her stride, glancing down once at her black booted feet beneath the black whipcord slacks.
The leaves—multi-colored the way autumn had always been near Moscow when a little girl on her way to ballet—were beautiful.
She stopped, five yards from the form of the man on the ground—dead. She glanced from side to side, then walked forward, knowing Paul was still in the tree cover, watching for signs of a trap.
Natalia stopped beside the body, kicking it fast once in the exposed rib cage just to be sure, then stepping back quickly. There was no betraying movement—however slight. She bolstered the revolver in her left hand, then dropped to her knees.
Her skin touched its skin—still warm. The eyes were closed—unnaturally, by whoever had put the twin holes in the body, she deduced. 'Not heartless,' she murmured to herself, then more closely inspected the wound in the neck and in the chest. 'But very good.'
She stood up, walking in the direction from which she judged the shots to have been fired. She stooped to the ground—a piece of brass, still shiny and bright, freshly fired. . ACP—Natalia glanced at the headstamp, recognizing the ammo brand. It was what Rourke carried, as did she herself. 'Hmm,' she murmured.
There was a second cartridge case and she picked it up, noticing a disturbance in the leaves a few feet further on. She walked toward that, already noting the imprint of motorcycle tracks.
'John?' She studied the tracks. For the last seven days, she and Paul Rubenstein had been searching for him. There was the urgent message from her uncle. There was the fear that somehow Rourke had not survived the storms which had swept the coast and central section of the country. There was the loneliness she felt—and the confusion of purpose, identity. She was Russian—she was helping Americans.
America and Russia were technically still at war, despite the fact Soviet forces occupied much of the land. She was KGB—a major.
She shook her head to clear it.
There would be time later to wrestle with herself—wrestle with herself as she had done already.
Natalia walked past the motorcycle tracks, seeing something glistening on the leaves. She bent over, taking a dry leaf and touching it to the moist leaves that had shown the glistening effect. Without bringing it too close to her nose, the smell confirmed her initial suspicion—urine. Probably human. There was another, similar wet spot a few feet to the left.
'Natalia!'
'She glanced behind her. Paul was running toward her, his Schmeisser submachinegun dangling from its sling under his right arm, a riot shotgun—or at least the major pieces of it—in his right hand.
'I found this—somebody deliberately made it inoperable.'
'It could still function single-shot—hand chambering. I noticed it, too. I think John was here, Paul—and just a few minutes ago.'
'That louder shot was from this—'
'And the two lighter ones from these that we heard,' she nodded, showing him the spent cartridge cases.
Rubenstein took them from her, inspecting them. 'That's John's brand all right—'
