She lifted her torso and sat upright, then brought her left hand to the front of her body. Seconds later, she maneuvered the wrist bindings off the slats, completely freeing herself of the encumbrance of the wood chair.
She jumped to her feet—and almost ended up flat on her back. Her low blood pressure, combined with the lack of food, sent her head spinning. She threw her arms out to balance herself. As the dizziness cleared, she heard crunching in the snow outside the cabin. She darted toward the front door, where Hung Jin had left her Colt. She grabbed the weapon and brought the gun up, only to remember it was empty. But Hung Jin had only used one of the rounds; the rest he had dumped onto the ground. She scampered across the floor, her numb fingertips frantically coursing over the rough wood, searching for just one bullet.
And then she found one. Kneeling on the floor, she flipped open the Colt’s cylinder. The crunching footsteps were getting louder. A whimper escaped her throat as she clumsily fumbled with the round before—finally—shoving it home. As she snapped the cylinder closed, the cabin door swung open.
The bright gray glare was blinding. Still on her knees, she threw the gun up in front of her chest and yelled.
Hung Jin swerved to catch the corner of the snow-covered side street that came upon him suddenly. The Navigator skidded and slid along the thick ice, but he regained control just short of the embankment. He continued on at a fast clip, faster than he should have been traveling on this road under such conditions. But at the moment all he could think about was the feel of Lauren’s supple neck writhing in his hands. In his mind, her eyes were bulging as he squeezed the life out of her.
As usual, he did not expect law enforcement to be a problem. He knew how to stage the crime scene to make it appear as if something else had occurred. A suicide, a kinky sex session, a robbery gone bad. If the local authorities had enough brains to figure out what had really happened, they would probably still not think of reporting it to the feds. And without the FBI’s involvement, the locals would never make the connection to him.
He knew another thing, too: he had to temper his anger so he could make one last attempt at extracting the information he needed from Lauren Chambers. Sometimes it was a delicate balance. Sometimes you needed to bring the subject to the brink of death before he fully realized his life was on the line. Sometimes you went too far, and if you couldn’t revive him in time, you lost out on a valuable opportunity. That’s why such an interrogation was more art than science. That’s why he was so good at what he did.
He did not usually make mistakes.
Cody’s jaw dropped as he took in the broken remnants of the chair, the blood on the floor, the scurrying rats as they searched for darkness and warmth. Just as quickly, the man’s lips curled into a smile as he started to reach behind his back with his right hand.
“Stop,” Lauren yelled. “Keep your hands where I can see them!”
“Or what?” Cody said, continuing to move his right hand to the back of his jeans. “You gonna shoot me? Bitches like you don’t have the guts to kill.”
Lauren pulled the trigger—and an empty chamber clicked.
He laughed hard, a smoker’s raspy crackle gurgling in his throat. “Guess you proved me wrong, huh, darlin’?” He brought his Smith & Wesson nine-millimeter handgun forward and waved it at Lauren. “Too bad you ain’t got no fucking bullets.” He laughed again. “My boss would rather I didn’t kill you, least not yet.” He unzipped his pants and gyrated his hips. “But he didn’t say nothing about having a little fun while he’s gone.”
He took a step toward her and Lauren began squeezing the trigger in rapid succession, the empty chambers firing in her mind like the hollow click of footsteps in an empty warehouse.
“Stay back!” she said, still gripping her weapon.
The metallic click-clunk of Cody chambering around took her breath away as she squeezed one last time. Finally, the bullet exploded from the Colt and hit her assailant between the eyes. His body hung there for a second, the dumbfounded look of a brain-dead animal settling across his face as he dropped to his knees and then fell forward, his head and torso landing in a bloody heap by her feet.
Lauren sat there, panting hard. A chill blew in through the open cabin door and made her body convulse in a prolonged shiver. She threw her leg out and kicked at Cody’s dead hulk, then stood up and booted his gun into the far corner of the cabin.
“This bitch has the guts, asshole. My daddy taught me to shoot to kill.”
Another gust of wind blew against her face like a wake-up call, and she suddenly became aware of the dangers now facing her: Had anyone heard the gunshot? Did Hung Jin have any other accomplices? Was Hung Jin nearby? She needed to get out of there, and fast.
Clothes.
Keys.
Car.
Lauren bent down and yanked off Cody’s sneakers and socks. Attempting to forget for the moment where the clothing had come from, she slid the sweaty tube socks over her cold feet. The tennis shoes were a couple of inches too large, but she had little choice. Lauren tugged on the sleeves of Cody’s navy pea coat and pulled the jacket off his body. There was some blood spatter across the shoulders, but she didn’t care. What mattered now was survival.
Her hands still shaking, she frantically searched Cody’s pockets for car keys. But there were none.
Damn.
She shoved the spent Colt into her coat pocket, picked up Cody’s loaded Smith & Wesson, and ran out of the cabin across the snow to her right, toward a blue, two-door sedan. It looked like the beat up 1970s Plymouth Barracuda a friend of her mother’s had owned. This one appeared to be in similar condition.
She tried the driver’s door, which creaked loudly as it opened. But no key was inside. She slammed her hands down on the steering wheel, then noticed the small, two-story home off to her right. As she approached the door, she pulled up and realized that more of Hung Jin’s men could be inside. But she was out of options.
Hung Jin could return any minute—or, if Cody missed some predetermined checkin time, others could be on their way to scout out the scene. Lauren did not plan on being here when or if that occurred.
That she had gotten this far was more than she could reasonably have expected. But this was the beginning, not the ending. Holding the gun out in front of her, she opened the front door to the house and waited. Listened.
Slowly, she edged inward, eyes combing the living room chairs, sofa... the small bedroom to her left... and the kitchen. She stopped and listened again. There were no noises other than her rapid breathing. Reasoning that anyone else in the cabin would already have responded to the gunshots, she let her guard down long enough to begin searching through the kitchen for the keys. She scanned the countertops, pulled open cabinets, and yanked open drawers.
Just then, her eyes caught a glimmer of gold across the room on the round kitchen table. Lying there partially obscured by a splayed-open copy of
Guns
&
Ammo
was her necklace, the small key still attached. She pushed aside the magazine, scooped up her keepsake and saw a ring of keys. She snatched them up, then grabbed a bag of pretzels and a can of Barq’s root beer that were sitting on the counter. She knotted her broken necklace and put it back on, where it belonged.
Hung Jin’s heart was pounding something fierce. He was light-headed and jittery. Years ago, during his first couple of contract hits, he’d had this same sensation. Too much adrenaline. He had been taught that the hormone sharpens the senses, makes one more aware of his surroundings. But he had once made the mistake of being so focused that he lost the ability to see peripheral issues crucial to the success of his mission—and it had almost gotten him killed. Like an animal that survives in the wild, he had adapted and learned how to control his aggression.
But that was before he spent six years in prison. Before it got personal.
He turned right onto Summit Ridge and accelerated.
Five minutes to the bungalow...and truth. Or consequences.
Lauren ran to the car, cranked the engine, and drove past the open cabin door, where Cody’s body lay sprawled across the floor in an unmistakable death pose. She followed the sloping ice-covered dirt road until it widened a bit, hoping it would lead to a main artery. Out in the mountains, on an overcast day, she had no way of getting her bearings. Was she headed north or west? For that matter, was she in California? Arizona or Nevada? The disorientation was overwhelming. She grabbed for the radio and turned it up loud.
She continued driving for another half mile, at which point the road forked. She skidded to a stop and swiveled her head in both directions. To the left was a narrow roadway named Summit Ridge. To the right was Auburn Hills Pass. She rested her forehead against the steering wheel and closed her eyes. Which way? The wrong road could take her in circles or send her deeper into the middle of nowhere. As the seconds passed, she realized that putting distance between herself and the cabin—and Hung Jin—was most important. Her instinct told her to go right. She turned the wheel and accelerated.
Ten minutes later, after nearly sliding into the embankment several times because of the icy conditions, Lauren finally found signs of civilization: a two-lane road labeled Highway 88. She continued on for a couple of miles before seeing a large grouping of a dozen motorcycles parked outside an aged white building on the corner of Centerville Lane.
She parked the Barracuda and walked into the Valley Bar. Loud music was blaring from a jukebox in the corner, where a gathering of locals was laughing and hooting. The bartender looked up and caught sight of Lauren, then put down her sink rag and moved out from behind the counter.
“You okay?” she asked, appraising the bruises and cuts on Lauren’s face.
“I’m fine. I had... an accident. I just need to make a call.”
“Come on over here.” The woman led Lauren to the bar and showed her the telephone. “Can I get you something?”
“No, I don’t have much time. I’ve got to get going.”
“I can wrap it to go.”
“I lost my wallet in the accident. I don’t have any money.”
“Not a problem. I’ll put something together. Meantime, go ahead and make your call.”
“One thing.” Lauren hesitated a second, then asked, “Where am I?”
“I know, there aren’t any signs around here. You’re in Gardnerville. Blink twice and you’ve missed us.”
“No, I mean what state?”
The woman eyed her cautiously. “Nevada.”
Lauren thanked her and lifted the telephone. When the woman stepped away, Lauren called Nick Bradley collect. She told him her location and gave him a brief rundown of what had happened to her. Not until she mentioned the name Hung Jin did he interrupt her story.
“Lauren, I want you to call the sheriff and wait there till they get to you. I’ll make some calls myself—”
“No, Nick, no sheriff.” A burst of raucous laughing in the background made it difficult for her to hear. She plugged her other ear and tried to make out what he was saying.
“Lauren, this is not something to fool around with.”
“We’ll call Deputy Vork from the airplane. That way he won’t be able to detain me to take a statement.”
“Detain you—for what?”
“That’s assuming he wouldn’t arrest me first and ask questions later.”
“Arrest you? Lauren—”
“Right now, I need to get to Michael, and nothing is going to stop me from doing that.”
She promised to give him a full accounting of what had happened to her, then asked him to book another flight for them to Virginia. As she hung up the phone, she turned to see the bartender standing beside her with a can of Coke and a cellophane-wrapped sandwich.
“Hope you like turkey.”
“Oh, I can’t—”
“Sure you can. You look like you could use some help. Anything else I can get you?”
Lauren took the food and shook her head. “You’ve been great, thanks so much.”
She got back in the car and headed down Service Route 88, which, according to the bartender, would lead her to U.S. 50 and take her all the way to Placerville. She reached for the radio, turned it up loud, then sighed deeply.
Michael, what have you gotten me into?
Hung Jin brought the Navigator to a stop ten feet from the cabin. His heart was banging so hard that he felt as if it would rise up through his throat.
But as he slammed his car door shut and approached the cabin, he realized that something was wrong. Blood spatter in the snow, stretching a few feet across the threshold...
He stepped closer and saw Cody’s body. The dumbstruck look on his face, the bare feet. The broken chair.
The empty cabin.
His howl rattled the woods. Though muffled slightly by the snow-covered mountains, the shrill noise numbed his ears.
He stepped into the cabin, howled again, then threw himself down and pounded his fists into the floor until pain shot up to his elbows. He was on all fours, his knees beside his fallen colleague’s bare feet.
He grabbed a broken chair slat off the floor and began beating Cody’s torso, the dead thumping sound drowned out by his fury.
“No!” he screamed. “No, no, no!”
It was a plaintive wail of great pain. Deep emotional pain. Not because his colleague was dead, but because he had been looking forward to the challenge, to the intense satisfaction Lauren Chambers’s death was going to bring him.
His hunger raged; he felt cheated.
Again.
He jumped to his feet, grabbed the door, and tore it off its hinges. Then he strode to his car and set off in search of his prey.
Lauren brought the Barracuda to a stop in the driveway leading to the carport behind her house, where a late-eighties, brown Ford Tempo was parked. She strained to see the car’s interior, but no one was inside. At least, no one she could see. Her hand immediately closed around Cody’s Smith & Wesson.
She thought of driving to the sheriff’s department and telling them a strange car was parked in her driveway. But dressed in torn pajamas and looking as if she’d just spent a couple of days being beaten would invite questions, questions she could not answer just yet. Particularly with Cody’s blood spattered all over her clothing.