competent help.
The strap buckle had made an effective weapon, as the first unlucky man had discovered, and the rest of the binding straps had proved useful to provide a cradle between the exposed pipes running along the ceiling, where the sheetrock had long ago rotted away.
The man she’d body-slammed didn’t look good — he was still struggling for air, flailing like a fish on the deck of a fishing boat. It was possible that one of his ribs had punctured a lung, judging by his inability to breathe, but it wasn’t her problem — they were all lucky to be alive. She dragged him by the hair and dumped him in the room with his unconscious colleagues, then took a moment to consider the pile of bodies before pulling the door closed, driving the bolt home and then turning and surveying the hall. A few still-wet footprints in the accumulated dust told her which direction the men had come from.
The agent’s pistol back in her hand, she crept cautiously down the hallway, past thirty doors identical to the one she’d been locked behind, towards the stairs at the far end. Light filtered in from above, and she saw a slick of greasy fluid tracing its way down the stairwell, which stank of rot and filth. Wherever this was, it had been unoccupied for a long time.
She ascended and paused at the landing, allowing her eyes to adjust to the unexpected gloom of the ground floor. All of the windows had been boarded up, and the only illumination came from an exposed incandescent bulb hanging from a workman’s scaffold; motes of dust floated in orbit around the sixty-watt glow.
Jet crept to the double doors and peeked through one of the spaces between the moldy plywood. A broad driveway stretched into the distance, empty except for a black and white cat skulking near an empty fountain in the center of the plaza that served as the arrival area. A few outdoor lamps lit the immediate surfaces with a harsh white glare, but thankfully it got darker farther away from the building — if she could make it to the shadows undetected, she would have a running chance. Glancing at her watch, she saw that it was seven o’clock. So she’d lost at least almost a full day.
Whatever the time, she wasn’t going to stick around and see what kind of reinforcements showed up after the men locked in the tomb below missed their check-in calls.
Jerking her pistol free, she pushed one of the oversized doors ajar a foot and slipped through the opening into the frigid evening air. She didn’t see anyone, so if there was any exterior security, it was lax, unless the grounds were wired for motion or infrared — which she’d discover soon enough.
Keeping to the overgrown hedges that lined the drive, she trotted in a crouch to the massive iron gates that sealed the compound from the road beyond. A rusting chain held the barrier closed, but she was able to squeeze through the gap between the two sections, turning to take in the hulking faux-French facade of the building she’d escaped. It looked abandoned, except for the new fencing that ran just outside of the rock perimeter wall that circled the grounds.
“Hey. What are you doing here? Go on, get outta here. This is private property,” a gruff man’s voice yelled at her from near the left wing’s entry. Jet could see that the guard was uniformed and carried a shotgun. She slipped the pistol back into her jeans and pulled her light sweater over it. He was far enough away that he wouldn’t be able to make out the detail in the half-light of dusk.
“Sorry. I was just looking,” she called and waved, then backed away from the entrance, turning after a few feet and jogging down the darkened road in the opposite direction.
Sensing that something was off about a woman in the middle of nowhere without any car, the guard screamed at her again.
“Hey! Wait a minute. Come back here.”
She ignored him and picked up the pace, the exercise a welcome relief after being immobile for countless hours.
“I said come back here.”
His voice trailed off in the distance as she ran.
Depending upon how smart he was, she could expect him to call in a suspicious person to whoever he reported to sooner than later. And then it would be a manhunt, unless the CIA wanted to keep its abduction of innocents on American soil to itself. She hoped that was the case, but couldn’t bet on it.
She would need to get off the road. Soon.
Once she was out of sight of the guard, she moved onto the grassy shoulder, maintaining her speed as she raced along the roadside, the last gray light fading into the darkness of night. At the first sign of headlights she could be in the trees, which grew dense on both sides. Barring infrared gear, she could probably remain undiscovered until she could sort out her next step.
Her first priority was to find Arthur. Find Arthur and she would find Hannah.
This same man had stolen her daughter away from her twice. First working with Hannah’s father, David, and now this time, for his own selfish ends.
He was about to discover that he’d been right to be scared of her when he’d been in the room, regaling her with his troubles. The instinct to keep her bound like a deadly predator had been a sound one.
One way or another, she would find him. And when she did, what she would do to him would make whatever nightmare had burned his face off seem like a Hawaiian vacation.
Chapter 7
Jet’s footsteps thudded against the hard-packed dirt of the road shoulder. She hadn’t seen a single vehicle since leaving her prison’s grounds, but she knew it was just a matter of time until her captors mounted a search. Twenty minutes after escaping, she came to a clearing that housed a few rural buildings — a market, gas station and a restaurant with an attached bar, its tired neon sign blinking intermittently.
A dozen vehicles sat in the seedy lot, almost all pickup trucks. The place looked like a working man’s watering hole, where after a long day on the construction site, its patrons could throw back a few to soften life’s inevitable harsh blows.
Perfect for her purposes.
She slowed, checking to ensure that the pistol was completely concealed by her top. Satisfied with the result, she pushed her way through the doors and took a quick survey of the patrons. Mostly male, mostly mid-thirties to late forties, almost everyone sporting a baseball cap adorned with a heavy equipment company’s logo. She moved easily to the long wood bar, most of the eyes in the room on her, and then pulled up a stool and sat down. A bald man with a flushed face and about a hundred pounds of extra bulk waddled from a corner where he’d been cleaning glasses while watching a talent program on the Seventies-era television that served as the primary point of interest.
“What’ll you have, darling?”
“I’m sorry. Nothing just yet. I’m…I’m waiting for a friend.”
He appraised her.
“I wouldn’t leave someone like you waiting very long,” he said, then returned to his position near the TV.
Jet caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror that lurked behind an army of half-empty liquor bottles that were seemingly lined up for inspection. She wiped a smudge of dirt from her cheek. All things considered, she didn’t look bad for a woman who’d been kidnapped and imprisoned, had neutralized three armed guards and run at least a good three miles.
She sensed the presence of a body sidling up to her before she turned to face the man. Decent enough looking, with a day’s growth of stubble and a profile starting to go to fat, but with twinkling blue eyes that hinted at some joke known only to him.
“Hello there.”
Jet ignored him for a few measured seconds, then smiled. “Hello yourself.”
“What are you drinking?”
“Nothing right now. I’m waiting for someone. We’re supposed to meet, but I got here late, and he’s not…I’m waiting for someone,” she repeated.
“Barkeep! A drink on me!” he yelled to the desultory bartender, who reluctantly tore his eyes from the screen
