“Orrin,” she called.
The older man backed up, still keeping his rifle trained on Will. Taylor was grateful for that unobstructed view of Will. Will was watching Orrin and the woman, but his eyes slid sideways, meeting Taylor’s, and just that went a long way to calming Taylor.
The woman was hissing — like Will and Taylor shouldn’t hear this? — “He’s a cop. A fed. Special Agent Will Brandt. He’s with the Bureau of Diplomatic Security.”
“What the hell is Diplomatic Security?” Stitch asked. “They supposed to be diplomats or something?”
“Yeah, we’re diplomats,” Taylor muttered, forgetting his resolve to keep his mouth shut.
“Oh yeah, where’s your embassy?”
“Oh, for chrissake,” the woman said. “Orrin.”
Orrin said to Taylor, “You’re a fed too, I guess.”
Taylor said nothing.
“That’s quite a coincidence. Two federal agents just happen to be up here camping off-season?”
“We’re on vacation,” Will said. “It’s a national park. A lot of people are camping here.”
“Not here, they’re not.”
Unfortunately, he was right about that.
“Search the tent, Stitch.” Orrin trained his rifle on Taylor, who was still leaning over, hands braced on his thighs, practicing breathing.
Feeling Will’s gaze, Taylor looked up again, tried to reassure him with his eyes that he was okay, and ready to back Will up on whatever he wanted to try.
“So here’s how it shapes up,” Orrin said. “We want the money that was on the plane. We don’t have time or inclination to sweet talk it out of you. You understand? If you want to walk out of this alive, hand it over.”
“There was no money on the plane,” Will said without hesitation.
And Taylor thought Will had called it right. No matter what they said or did, these bandits had no intention of letting them walk away alive.
“It’s your funeral.” Orrin nodded at the woman, who tightened her finger on the trigger. The blast tore through the night — drowning out Taylor’s scream of protest — but amazingly Will was standing there, shocked and furious but still unharmed.
And Taylor, who had jumped forward instinctively, stopped dead, sick with relief — not even hearing Orrin’s grim, “Don’t do it, son!” Not noticing the semiautomatic aimed at him.
Stitch was poking his head out of the tent. He held Taylor’s SIG. “Hey, look at this.” He smiled a big, goofy smile. “Sweet!” He shoved the pistol into his belt, and crawled out of the tent. “There’s nothing in there.”
He picked up Will’s backpack and began to go through it.
“The next one goes through your belly,” Orrin said to Will. “It’s your choice.”
“There was no money,” Taylor said desperately, and his fear for Will lent his tone a certain credibility that sounded misleadingly like truth.
“Maybe someone else took your money,” Will said. “You ever think about that?”
Which was about as close as he could come to reminding them of their own missing confederate. Not that they would have forgotten, but they obviously weren’t convinced of the way the skyjacking had gone, so they were eliminating possibilities. Taylor could follow their logic. And of course, while they couldn’t know it, they were quite right about Will and himself — if for all the wrong reasons.
But then, that was the confusing thing: how couldn’t they know it? How had they missed the body in the meadow? Or had they?
Yes, they had to have missed it, because if they’d found the body, there wouldn’t be any question about who had that money — and Taylor knew they were uncertain. Not that their uncertainty would keep them from clipping either himself or Will — but he didn’t let himself dwell on that.
If they’d been watching him and Will in the hot spring through binoculars they could have been miles back — still on the mountainside — which would have left them crossing that meadow in the dusk.
That was the only thing that made sense because if they’d been close enough to see them in the meadow, they’d have surely seen them stashing Taylor’s pack in the bear box. And they wouldn’t all be enjoying this little get-together.
“No money,” Stitch said disgustedly, pulling Will’s SIG P228 out of his backpack. He stuck that into his waistband too, and then turned the pack upside down, dumping all the packs of freeze-dried meals and desserts into the grass. “They got a helluva lotta food, that’s for sure.”
Silence.
“That is a lot of cheesecake,” Orrin drawled thoughtfully. “I think maybe I’m inclined to believe you,” he said to Taylor.
And Taylor knew Orrin was going to kill them.
Will must have drawn the same conclusion at the same instant. He said, “You’re out of your fucking mind if you think you can murder two federal officers in cold blood and walk away.”
Orrin said, “You’d be surprised at what people walk away with — when they’re willing to take a few chances.”
Now there was irony, and he hoped Will appreciated it; Taylor was pretty damn sure Orrin was a cop. The way he spoke, the way he handled himself: it all spelled law enforcement — maybe retired, given his age.
Will opened his mouth, and Taylor knew he was going to try and use the money as a bargaining chip. Waste of time. Any way you looked at it, they didn’t need both him and Will, and they could ensure that the one left alive started talking just by blowing off a kneecap.
Orrin confirmed this the next moment by saying coolly, “All the same, I think we’ll hang on to one of you for insurance. Just in case.”
He looked from one to the other of them, and reading that expression, Taylor went for him. Because if it was coming down to him or Will, it had to be Will. Taylor couldn’t see Will die and go on living. It was that simple.
But Stitch was there first, tackling him around the waist and throwing him back a few feet into the grass and weeds. Taylor landed awkwardly, only making it halfway to his
