He shuffled back to the desk and hefted the phone. He touched the button to call Mr. Aarons.
“Sir?”
“Where’s my helicopter? I’m leaving.”
“I can have it here in ten minutes. It’s on station at a secure location.”
He was pleased at least one thing was being done correctly. “Gather my computer, the server drives, and my assistant Dorothy. I want everything on the roof by the time our ride gets here. You and two of your men are coming with me. Get as many of the rest of them out of Denver and up north to Yellowstone.”
“Sir? Did you say Yellowstone?”
“Yes. The TKM dig site by Yellowstone. It’s going to be my new base of operations.”
“Understood,” Aarons said, a second before Petteri hung up.
He’d have to put out a press release saying he had no idea his people were going to blow up the rock in Kansas City. He’d offer the standard help, recovery efforts, whatever. If he did nothing, it would stir up local mayors and governors to rally against him. Far from being an act of defiance against the terrorist hordes, it would become a rallying cry against him and his company. It might already be too late to head it off.
That being said, he looked down on the partially reduced ball of ore sitting in the street with a new perspective. He wondered if he should ask Mr. Aarons to dedicate a team to wire it up for a second big bang. If one group blew up a rock without him knowing about it, who’s to say two groups wouldn’t act without his express consent? A big explosion could be his personal goodbye to the mayor of Denver.
As he laughed to himself and considered acting out his rage, he realized there was an even better way of torching the rock.
He ran back to his phone.
CHAPTER 21
Rawlins, WY
“All right, super soldier. This is where you earn your keep.” Grace faced Misha, hoping her words would inspire him into action. Instead, he scanned the rail cars, the engine, then the yard containing Nerio’s tree. When he was done, he looked back to her.
“You and him must shoot over switches. I will run for train cars. Then I attack her from other direction.” He pointed behind them. Robert’s engine was about thirty feet away, but the line of coal hoppers was less than fifteen.
She patted Asher on the shoulder. “You got that? We’re the diversions. We’re going to shoot when he says.”
“I hear you,” he replied, not sounding too happy about it.
“Okay, in three, two, one,” Misha counted down, then leaned back as if ready to run. She and Asher stood halfway up, then aimed over the top of the switch boxes.
She lined up the tree where she knew Nerio was standing, but she accidentally saw one of the little kids in the window of the house. The small girl popped up, then dropped back down, perhaps thinking it was a game to play with the strange people in her yard.
“Wait!” she cried out before Asher could fire.
Nerio had no qualms about using her weapon. Several cracks of her gun were followed by metallic zings as bullets hit the hoppers. She spun around, expecting Misha to already be on the far side of the coal haulers, but he was on the ground almost where he’d started.
“Misha!”
He grasped at his neck as if he’d been hit.
“Help me get him over here,” she said with excitement.
She and Asher pulled him over the rocks. His hand was bloody, and the big Russian man groaned in pain, but the wound didn’t seem life threatening. It was, however, on the same patch of skin where she’d burned him days earlier.
“Are you all right?” she asked.
He forced out a smile. “My neck stings like hornet bite. She shot me before I could get safe. Why did you not fire?”
She’d almost forgotten about it. “The kids! There are kids in the window next to the tree. I didn’t want to hit them.”
Misha rolled his eyes.
Nerio cried out. “Misha, I’ll give you one more chance. Kill them yourself and I’ll let you go. But you have to get the engineer and any passengers, too. I don’t want any witnesses.”
Misha checked his hand when he pulled it off his neck. He also showed the wound to Grace and Asher. “What do you think? I am okay?”
The bullet had grazed his neck. No arteries appeared severed.
“You’ll live through this battle,” she said dryly.
A bullet whizzed off the switching equipment.
“Come on!” Nerio screamed. “I don’t have all day!”
Misha looked at her with a serious gaze. “Will you trust me to shoot with delicate touch?”
She waved for him to try it. “Please don’t hit the kids.”
He wiped the blood on his shirt, then got the weapon ready at his chest. After sucking in a few deep breaths, he put the gun up on the equipment, aimed, then rifled off five or six shots. When another came back, he ducked down.
“Her husband is by other tree. He is trying to move around. Take shots on our flank.”
Grace figured there was no way for the man to get around the sides of their position since he’d have to cross empty railroad tracks, but the evil couple was gaining an edge over them. One could talk while the other shot or moved. Grace and her friends were losing more control over the encounter, stuck behind the equipment.
She sidled up to Asher.
