Garcia’s brown eyes widened. “Let ourselves inside? Me and you and Ainura’s beat-up Kalashnikov?”
Quinn grinned. “I’ve seen you fight,” he said. “We won’t even need the rifle.”
He closed his eyes, feeling the soft brush of snowflakes hit his face. If this kept up, they could be stuck in these mountains for a very long time. He pushed the thought from his mind, focusing on the tasks at hand.
Garcia cuddled in next to him, sharing her warmth. “And what about that giant dog?”
Quinn pulled her in tighter. “I’m thinking we’ll have to make a sacrifice,” he said.
The approach to far side of the valley floor took a painstaking three hours of picking through the shadows of a mile and half of rock. They had to cross three mountain streams. Shallow and braided, the crossings were made more difficult by near complete darkness and slippery, ice-slimed rocks.
By the time they made it all the way around, nearly six inches of snow lay on the valley floor. Quinn had explained his plan before they left, going over Garcia’s job twice to make certain she’d have the timing down.
Timing, he knew, would be almost as critical as luck.
He held up his fist as they drew near the yurt farthest from the mountain face. It was one of the ones that he guessed held fodder for the milling herds of animals. The glacial wind hit them full in the face, bringing with it the odor of wet wool and the smoky bite of a cook fire. Though it chilled them to the bone, the wind direction was a blessing and made it less likely the big mastiff would pick up their scent.
“First contact is the trickiest part.” Quinn leaned in close to whisper in Garcia’s ear. “We have to make it happen on our terms.”
“Okay,” Garcia said, teeth chattering. “I’m ready to get out of this cold when you are.”
Crouching, Quinn covered the open fifty yards to the white mound of the nearest yurt in a matter of seconds, sensing, more than hearing, Garcia on his heels. He kept the AK in tight to his side, hand around the pistol grip, ready.
He stopped, straining his ears for sounds of danger, sniffing the wind to make sure it still worked in their favor. Satisfied they were still relatively safe, he handed the rifle to Garcia, then took out his Benchmade folding knife. In darkness thick enough to feel, he began to slice at the thick felt where the yurt was tied to the base of its inner wooden frame. Five minutes of sawing brought him through the thick felt and able to cut enough lashing cords to pry a two-foot gap in the wooden lattice support structure.
The sweet, dusty odor of hay and grain wafted out into the freezing air.
“Bingo,” Quinn said, reaching it to find a small bag of grain he could drag out through the opening. He sat upright, stretching his back from the effort of being stooped for so long. His ribs were still sore from Umar’s crushing bear hug and he was pretty sure at least one was cracked.
He held the grain up to Garcia. The bag was about the size of a pillowcase but only partially full so it was easy to carry.
“You hang on to the rifle,” he said.
“Ten-four.” He could hear her body shaking from cold and tension. They had to get out of this snow one way or another.
Crouching again, they moved toward the grunts and baas of milling sheep bunched together in the darkness. Twenty feet out, the animals heard the shake of the grain bag and moved toward it as if called. The click and thump of hoofs over frozen ground grew louder and their gentle baa s became more excited at the prospect of food to warm them on such a cold night.
It was only a matter of time before the guard dog came to investigate the change in behavior.
Quinn stepped into the moving sea of animals, with Garcia close behind. In the darkness it was imperative they stay together.
“Gotcha!” Quinn grabbed a young lamb by the back leg as it came to the grain. It wasn’t much larger than a poodle. He turned away from the herd and used the Benchmade to cut the animal’s throat, holding it tight until it ceased to struggle.
Garcia hadn’t been happy about the idea of killing a baby sheep. He was thankful for the darkness so she hadn’t seen him do it.
“You hear a growl?” Garcia said, moving in to give him the rifle.
“That would be our Goliath,” Quinn said.
Garcia moved in behind, next to the milling sheep. The power of food kept them from panic.
The mastiff came in fast, galloping like a horse toward the smell of blood. Quinn braced himself, rifle in one hand with the lamb carcass in the other.
As the black shape of the dog launched toward him from the darkness, he pressed the muzzle of the Kalashnikov to the lamb’s ribs and fired.
There was a muffled pop as the woolly carcass absorbed much of the rifle’s report. A split second later, the huge dog slammed into Quinn, knocking the dead lamb and the AK from his hands.
Quinn rolled, bracing for another attack that never came.
“Pretty good at shooting by Braille,” Garcia whispered as she helped him to his feet. “Now get my ass out of this snow. I’m from Cuba, for crying out loud. I’m not built for this.”
“Okay, then,” Quinn panted, slowing his pulse. “Let’s go see if they lock their door.”
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
Quinn left the rifle hanging on a sling around his neck as they approached the door. He and Garcia were dressed as natives, and a native without some sort of weapon in the high mountains would stand out.
Quinn banged on the heavy door, snow piling up on his shoulders as he stood, hunched over against the building wind. Garcia stood next to him, a scarf pulled piously over her head.
A short man wearing a wool hat and carrying a black Makarov pistol answered the door. He motioned them both inside the dark cave. Quinn explained that they were travelers who’d lost their way and needed a warm place to stay. The man kept the pistol pointed at Quinn’s chest, motioning them inside. He spoke irritated, rapid-fire Tajik, but Quinn spoke enough Dari, the Persian language of Afghanistan, that they were able to communicate.
He didn’t shoot right away, saying he needed to speak with his boss.
A second man, younger, but much taller than the first, appeared from around the corner and helped secure Quinn and Garcia’s wrists with plastic flex cuffs.
Both men shook their heads and muttered in amazement that their stronghold had even been found in the darkness, much less approached. They left Quinn and Garcia in a small holding room, not much larger than a closet, and slammed a dented metal door. The place smelled of sulfur and stale water.
“That didn’t go as well as I’d hoped,” Garcia said as she leaned back against the rough granite wall. A single bare lightbulb cast a dull yellow glow on the tiny room. She’d heard apocryphal stories of spies caught in worse jams and somehow managing to escape-but more often than not, they ended up an unnamed star on the Memorial Wall at CIA Headquarters. She found some solace in the fact that she was finally living her dream-and living it with the most amazing human being she’d ever met.
“They didn’t kill us first thing.” Quinn, who seemed a man always in motion, worked his hands under his butt and past his feet as he spoke. “And we got inside. That’s a win in my book.” He tipped his head toward the exposed lightbulb. “They must have some sort of generator inside the mountain. It would have to be vented outside. That’ll give us something to target when we get out of here.”
With his hands in front he was able to remove the five-fifty-cord laces on his right boot. The Haix P9s were high-tops and the lace was nearly three feet long. Garcia watched as he tied a six-inch loop in one end of the cord, and then ran the free end through the inside of the plastic flex cuffs before tying another similar loop. He looked up and grinned like a schoolboy as he put the loops over the toe of each boot and began to pedal his feet as if riding a bicycle. The friction of the five-fifty cord sawed through the cuffs in a matter of seconds. Once free, Quinn quickly replaced the lace in his boot. “Never know when I might need to run without my shoes falling off.”