THE THOUSAND DOLLAR HUNT: Colt Ryder is Back in Action! (12 page)

‘We’ll see each other again,’ I reassured him. ‘But it’s not going to go down like you think.’

‘We’ll see,’ the general said with a grin, tapping his driver on the shoulder, the jeep pushing up dirt as it pulled in a tight arc around me. ‘We’ll see.’ The jeep took off across the moonlit grassland, Badrock’s lunatic laughter echoing behind it.

As the jeep ploughed on until it was out of sight, I looked at the wilderness around me.

Alone at last.

The hunt had begun.

Part Three

Chapter One

I crouched low within the stand of black pine, eyes and ears scanning my environment.

I’d moved just moments after the jeep had disappeared from view, reluctant to stay out in the open; for all I knew, there were people watching me right now.

I didn’t kid myself that hiding in the trees would keep me from being detected; thermal imaging would still pick up my heat signature between the trunks. But it still provided cover from fire, and a sniper was less able to put a bullet in me with a thick bit of pine in the way.

The thermal imaging was going to be a real problem, that much was clear, and I began thinking about ways to defeat it. The problem was, there weren’t many. Mylar space blankets could trap heat, but only for a time. The Taliban in Afghanistan had used thick woolen blankets to disguise their heat signature, but again this only worked for short periods; and in any case, I didn’t have any blankets to use even if they
did
work. Acetate or glass could also be used to block signals, but the shape would still get picked up and – let’s face it – a three foot by six foot sheet of glass moving about the New Mexico grasslands might just garner some attention. And like the blankets, I didn’t have any glass anyway.

I’d already started to rub dirt over my exposed skin, pulling it up in great handfuls from the ground next to me. It was dry and wouldn’t really stick – and probably wouldn’t help much anyway – but any camouflage was better than none, and there was no point allowing my pale skin to draw attention in the moonlight. I attached grasses, sticks and leaves to my black uniform too, mud and twigs in my hair to try and break up my outline as best as I could. It might give me a few extra seconds, and that might be all I needed.

Finished with my basic camo, I lay completely still, and absolutely silent, tuning myself in to the world around me. Yes, the moon was bright, and I might see people approaching; but their imagers would pick up my heat signature from a long way out, which meant that the only hope I had to detect any pursuers in the area was sound.

Sound travels a long way, especially at night, and although the Vanguard men might have known what they were doing – although most of them probably didn’t – the civilian hunters were bound to have poor noise discipline.

You only really developed the talent when your job involved getting close to enemy soldiers who wanted to kill you, and I doubt any of them had experienced that first-hand.

At first there was nothing, just the sound of insects chirping and moving in the undergrowth; then I caught rustling noises, perhaps a small mammal further into the stand of trees.

Seconds passed, perhaps minutes, and I caught the slow foot pads of a large four legged mammal – or perhaps two or three of them – but they were some distance away, and no threat to me.

It took a while longer for the manmade sounds to reach me – diesel vehicles, voices – and I could tell that they were a long way away.

I couldn’t be absolutely sure that I wasn’t being observed, but I felt that the chances were good that – for the time being at least – I was alone, as the general had promised.

But I still kept low as I emerged from the trees, my training making me incapable of standing tall and presenting a large, easy target.

There were no clouds at all in the sky, and I wondered if Badrock had been making it up about the storm, just to give me something else to think about; but then I sensed the moisture in the air, and realized he was probably right.

It would be another benefit to me, even more so than the moonlight, and I welcomed it. Fourth generation optics were still pretty good in the rain, but it definitely made their job harder, as rain has the effect of making everything the same temperature. It would also limit the range of the sights, as light scatters off droplets of water.

Good news, all in all.

If I lived long enough to see the storm.

But I fully intended to live that long, and even longer besides; my threats to kill the hunters were not mere bravado, I actually intended to go through with it. It was what drove me, what motivated me, the mental key that would not only help me to survive, but to
thrive
out here in the park.

And so, without waiting a moment longer, I began.

I knew exactly where I was in the park, having familiarized myself with all the relevant maps as well as building a visual memory of the place from my various tours of the grounds.

I was on the open plain near the same spot the dogs had killed that zebra on my first day here, which put me in the northeast sector of the vast ranchland. If I kept heading north for a mile or so, I’d hit the fence line of the property; but of course, I had no intention of trying to escape.

I realized that meant other animals would probably be near – on that initial tour, we’d seen zebra, giraffe and elephant all in this area – but they were not generally nocturnal, and would all probably be holed up until morning somewhere, sleeping and resting.

Hippos were active at night, but I knew they generally confined themselves to the water and it was unlikely I would come across one here.

But I wasn’t staying here, I was heading to the water; and I hoped that when I got there, the crocs and hippos would be friendly.

Chapter Two

I lay in wait, immobile in the branches of a Piñon tree, watching the men below me.

I’d already heard shots fired from far away –a man’s screams, other men’s shouts of victory – and I’d known the half hour was well and truly up, and the hunt had started in earnest.

And the first scalp had already been taken.

Probably the terrified guy had just run in circles, or else not run at all, just stayed where he’d been dropped off, too scared to even move.

Easy pickings for a man with a night scope and an accurate rifle; it was no sport at all.

The second kill had occurred in what I thought must be my sector, a mile or two north, probably near the fence line. It was an obvious enough choice for the victim to have made, an attempt to escape this pit of death.

It hadn’t worked.

So that was two sets of hunting parties free to pursue me now, having taken the easy prey first.

I’d heard their vehicles approaching while I’d still been at the river bank, covering myself from head to toe in cool, wet mud. I’d chosen a spot by the river – which was more of a creek, really – which was approachable only via a narrow track through a wide Piñon wood, and made no effort to cover my tracks; even at night, the hunting team should be able to follow them.

It was for concealment, but also because I assumed that crocs and hippos would prefer more open areas of the river; luckily I’d been proved right, and my nighttime mud bath hadn’t been disturbed by any killer beasts.

I’d then reversed back into the wood, careful to place my feet back into the same tracks I’d made going the other way, and pulled myself quickly up into the tree to wait for the men who I hoped would already be on my trail.

The sooner they arrived, I believed, the safer I would be; for with every passing minute, my heat would build and threaten to emerge through the cool mud I’d caked myself in.

The hunters had arrived quickly, as I’d hoped, and I could hear the jeep idling nearby; the wood had forced them to move in on foot, another reason for my choice of location.

As they passed below me, I saw they were not all men; the paying customer was Yvette Williams, the army logistics colonel eager to get her first kill.

There were two Vanguard men with her, and I assumed that the third – the overwatch sniper – was probably back with the vehicle, not having had time – or enough information – to set up an effective fire position.

They followed the trail below me in silence, except for the occasional metal-on-metal contact of weapons and equipment which was common among amateurs. Eventually they reached the river, and I heard the colonel’s voice.

‘Dammit,’ she said angrily, ‘there aren’t any tracks going back, he must have gone into the river.’

‘What do you want to do?’ asked one of the guards, unconcerned now with noise discipline.

‘There’s no way we’re going in there after him,’ she said. ‘Let’s get back to the jeep, we’ll try and pick up his trail on the other bank somewhere.’

I steadied myself now, knowing the moment of truth was nearby – my first, and possibly therefore also my
last
, opportunity to get into the game for real.

I controlled my breathing – in through the nose for four, hold, out through the mouth for four, hold, keep repeating the pattern until calm – and then they were right below me again, far less careful now that they’d designated this trail as safe.

Just as I’d hoped.

As they passed by, I moved within the branches, shifted my bodyweight, and let go.

I dropped to the ground, right behind the rear marker; I immediately reached forward, just as he was reacting to the noise, grabbed his shoulder with one hand and around his jaw with the other and wrenched violently in opposite directions, snapping his neck and killing him instantly.

I scooped up his rifle and instantly fired it at the second man, who was still only mid-turn, and buried four rounds into his torso.

Within the next second, I’d leapt over his body and was in front of Williams, who had turned her body but failed to raise her rifle at the same time; it still hung uselessly on its sling. The barrel of my rifle, however, was jammed right up underneath her chin; and I saw the terror on her face as her night goggles picked up my frightening, mud- and twig-covered visage, an avenging monster come straight out of hell.

Her throat constricted as she tried to speak, but my trigger finger moved faster, a single high-powered round surging up through her head and blowing the top off her skull, blood and brain erupting, black in the silvery moonlight.

I picked up the body – the lightest of the three – and held it against my own as I stalked back down the trail to the jeep, and the third Vanguard man who was almost certainly now on full alert.

He would fire at the body as we emerged, and I would reply in the direction of the muzzle flash.

But before I got there, I heard growling, and screaming, and tearing and ripping, and I dropped Williams’ dead body and edged forward slowly to see what had happened, rifle aimed ahead of me.

I saw the edge of the wood, and an animal padding down the track toward me.

I relaxed; there was no missing that happy, carefree gait.

Kane had found me; done the business on Vanguard man number three as well, saving me the job.

I didn’t know how he’d rid himself of those catching poles, but they were nowhere to be seen. I thought back to the dog fighting pit I’d originally rescued him from, and realized that tonight probably hadn’t been his first experience of those evil contraptions.

I bent my knees as he reached me, ruffling his head. ‘Good boy,’ I whispered. ‘Good boy.’ I turned back to the bodies behind me. ‘Now let’s see what goodies we can find, shall we?’

As I’ve said before, to the victor go the spoils.

Chapter Three

An hour passed, and I’d heard more screams and shouts from around the park; I thought three or four out of the six workers must have been killed by now.

I still hadn’t heard Talia, and wondered what had become of her. She hadn’t asked for any of this, had been cast out into the wilderness to be hunted down like an animal because I’d asked for her help.

There were no sightings of her reported by the other teams either, at least up until Badrock had realized that I’d stolen a radio and ordered the frequency to be changed. The small device and earpiece were useless for the time being, but I’d already got something out of them, barking out a short, garbled plea for assistance at the wood in the hope that other teams would descend on the area to help.

I had weapons too – an HK417 assault rifle chambered in 7.62mm, a .40 S&W Sig Sauer P226, a hunting knife with a blackened six-inch blade, along with a nice little multitool and plenty of ammunition. The Vanguard men had also each had a couple of thermal grenades on them, and I was more than happy to add these to my arsenal too.

I’d also taken night vision goggles – the kind that used existing light and intensified it to create the familiar ghostly green image, and a fourth generation thermal imaging unit. The HK417 also had a TI, the same as the SCAR SSR I’d used the night before.

The kit weighed me down and made me more noticeable, but it was a trade-off I was willing to make. ‘Never turn down a weapon offered to you’ was my motto – whether it was offered willingly or not.

I’d used the preceding hour productively, first setting a little trap back on the woodland trail.

I’d dragged the body of Yvette Williams back to her fallen comrades in the middle of the track, leaving them in open view. Then I’d poured a nice bit of gasoline – from a spare jerry can strapped to the back of the jeep – around the surrounding area, leading it back to the jeep itself, where I’d put the jerry can back where I’d found it.

I’d then put one of the thermal grenades under Williams’ body, her jacket attached to the pin by a short cord, and put her back on the ground, face down.

I had then retreated to my present position, halfway up a small ridge about a third of a mile away from the wood, and waited.

But I hadn’t forgotten Talia – I’d given Kane the torn slip of the dress the girl had been wearing earlier, the one her father had tauntingly presented me with, let him take the scent, and sent him out to find her. With any luck, he’d lead me back to her when I’d finished up my business here.

My patience was eventually rewarded, as I saw not one but two 4x4 vehicles pull up to the wood.

Two hunting parties, drawn by my false, garbled message on the radio earlier begging for help. I knew Badrock would never fall for the ruse, but I was pretty sure someone would – and now I watched as both Ian Garner and Paul Gustafson arrived on the scene, looking over the ravaged, half-destroyed body left by Kane by the jeep with what I assumed would be a mix of utter horror, and dread fascination.

They then seemed to argue over who would enter the wood first; they both desperately wanted to be the one to kill the thousand dollar man, and suspected I might still be inside.

Eventually the governor of New Mexico appeared to overcome the arguments of the Wall Street banker, and it was Gustafson who took point when they entered the wood. Two men went with him, and Garner and the rest stayed by the vehicles, which they’d parked right next to Williams’ jeep.

I wondered if anyone would notice the smell of gasoline, but nobody appeared to; perhaps the coppery stench of the dead Vanguard man in the jeep was enough to cover it.

I waited, still and silent, as the party disappeared from view, wondering if my plan would work.

And then I saw a flash of light in the trees, heard the muffled
whump
of the thermal grenade igniting as someone tried to turn Williams’ body to identify it; then carried on watching as the trees caught fire around the bodies within, the trail suddenly catching fire too, the line of gasoline racing white-hot back toward the jeep.

The men outside the wood tried to react, but their comprehension was too little, too late – by the time they were moving, the flames had already reached the jeep, its fuel tank, and the extra gasoline in its jerry cans, causing it to explode in a huge fireball that took two more Vanguard men with it.

Garner and the remaining two men were left reeling, running in crazed circles from the flames, hands to their eyes to try and dissipate the pain and shock from the loud explosion.

It was an easy job to take them out with the HK417 and the TI scope. Aim – squeeze – Vanguard man down, head popping open like an overripe watermelon; aim – squeeze – second Vanguard man down, skull half-destroyed by the bullet’s impact.

Garner I let scrabble around in the dirt for a while, so he knew how it felt – if only for a short time – to be the hunted.

When I finally took the shot, I considered taking him in the gut, make him suffer a bit more; but in the end I decided that wasn’t me. Killing the man was one thing; wanton cruelty was another. And so I took out my third hunter of the evening, swiftly with a clean shot to the head that ended things instantly for the short, bespectacled banker.

I breathed out slowly.

Three hunting parties down, twelve people in total.

Not bad for an evening’s work.

I didn’t waste any time on guilt; I had already justified my actions to myself earlier, so I didn’t have to worry about it now.

The hunters wanted to pay to kill people –
innocent
people, who had done them no harm whatsoever. They were just animals to those rich men and women, like any other.

And the Vanguard men protecting them were complicit with the entire enterprise, and therefore just as guilty in my opinion. They facilitated the hunting of human beings, and protected those who did it, stacking the odds too far in the hunters’ favor.

There was simply nothing to feel guilty about.

I considered repeating my tactics here, just wait for the next group to show up and shoot them all with the HK.

But surely someone, somewhere, was going to start putting the picture together, and I doubted whether I could get away with it again.

If Badrock had any sense whatsoever, he would send men up this ridge to find me, would warn the others away from the wood.

It was time to leave and try my luck elsewhere.

A noise came from behind me and I was about to turn rapidly, go for my pistol or a knife for the short-range kill, when I recognized Kane’s low breathing and relaxed.

If I moved fast, that movement might give me away to anyone looking toward this ridge, and although I didn’t think there was anyone out there, I also knew that it wasn’t worth taking the risk and felt relieved I’d managed to stop myself in time.

Kane’s nose nuzzled me, and I knew he’d found something.

Talia
.

He wanted to take me to Talia.

‘Okay,’ I whispered quietly as I maneuvered slowly to my knees. ‘Let’s go.’

I could only pray that she was still alive when we got there.