“Let’s find out. What’s the worst they can do to us?” Bell said. “Fuck it. We have no choice.”
Bell put the limo in Drive and sped straight toward the snow piled in front of the gate, turning the steering wheel hard as they bent the turn onto the driveway. He heard the bottom of the limo hit the asphalt, bottoming out. He raced through the snowdrift piled in front of the driveway and drove through it.
The limo’s rear power-wheel slipped and slid on the steep driveway, unable to get much traction. Bell punched the accelerator. The power tire spun loudly, then finally caught asphalt. The front of the limo plowed on past the stone portals. At times the big car felt as if it was going to fishtail right off the road, but the lieutenant, fighting the wheel for control, was able to get the huge limo up to the top of the mansion’s driveway. They crested the hill and the driveway opened up onto a huge dark snowless expanse in front of the mansion that was completely dark. To their right was another long driveway that led to a huge barn-like structure.
“Why no snow on the ground?” Patty said, looking at the expanse of pavers in front of the mansion.
“It’s heated, I guess,” Bell said. “The driveway.”
“Jesus,” Patty said taking in the palatial “summer” house. She’d bumped up against the vacationing super-rich at the ranger station. They would send their bodyguards or personal assistants into the office to ask directions, or to make reservations for some of the hiking trails that were controlled. Sometimes, when she was out on patrol on horseback, she would pass them and their little armies: personal assistants, nannies, professional guides. She could tell the super-rich because they had porters and even cooks who would follow them into the back country. A family of four might have ten people in support. Quentin had told her about some of the fabulous places they’d built in the mountains around Timberline. The place in front of her looked as big as a hotel.
“A lot of Fun Hogs have heated roadbeds. They’re solar powered,” Rebecca said. “My uncle Ken puts them in. Maybe we can find some weapons, or whatever in the house. This thing is useless.” Rebecca tapped the ammunition-less weapon resting on her knees.
Bell saw headlights come up the driveway behind him. He looked in the rearview mirror. In a moment Johnny Ryder’s familiar stolen white Land Rover crested the hill going fast and almost rear-ended them.
“Ryder will think that weapon is loaded,” Bell said, turning to Rebecca. He could see she wasn’t afraid. She nodded.
* * *
Gary Summers was standing with the mountain bike he’d found at the bed and breakfast across from the Phelps cabin. Nothing lay in either direction in front of or behind him on the snow-covered, one-lane road. To his left was the road to Emigrant Gap, and beyond that Highway 50, which would take him to Sacramento. To his right was a ten-mile stretch, mostly uphill, that would take him into Timberline. He was so cold that he realized he couldn’t possibly bike to Sacramento—his plan—unless he was able to find some warmer winter clothes.
He wore only jeans and a light windbreaker that Rebecca had given him at her shop. He was cold in a way he’d never experienced before, to the very marrow of his bones. He’d sweated heavily while crawling down the long escape tunnel at the cabin, not sure whether he would be able to get out. He’d heard Dillon talking about the escape tunnel, but he’d not had time to look at the instructions in the control room. He’d been so frightened and ashamed of what he’d done, locking the trap door behind him, that he just wanted to keep moving to get away and save himself.
Looking at the hordes of Howlers running toward the cabin, Summers had realized that there was no way they could kill them all fast enough. When he’d seen them rushing the cabin carrying a battering ram, he’d lost his nerve. He’d stood up and stopped firing his weapon. He’d looked at the others firing theirs, the doctor helping load clips with a terrible expression on his face, and the horrific sound of the gunfire—five FALs firing at once. Terrified, he’d crawled toward the trapdoor on his belly and slid down the steep steps. Before he locked the plate down behind him, he’d hesitated; but he convinced himself they were all doomed upstairs. He wasn’t going to die there, in that cabin, torn apart by those things. He’d rammed the bolt home, locking the trapdoor and sealing his comrades’ fate. He’d crawled down the escape tunnel in the dark while the others were upstairs fighting for their lives against the massive attack. In the darkness, like a rat, he’d crawled toward he didn’t know what.
When he got to the end of the tunnel, he panicked and cried like a little boy. He accidently touched the end of the rope Chuck had hung from the trap door. When he touched it, he stopped crying and pulled. At first it hadn’t moved. The second time he used both his hands and slowly the lid, its top piled with frozen snow, cracked open and early-morning light flooded the pitch-black tunnel.
He raised himself up in the opening and saw, almost immediately, Howlers running through the forest toward the cabin, some crouching on the ground and calling. He gazed out, frozen with fear. If he could make it across to the road, he might escape and live. He scrambled out the opening and fell into the snow, crawling on his hands and knees through the fresh powder snow toward the county road only fifteen yards away. He could hear the gunfire coming from the cabin behind him, heard rounds smacking the pine trees around his head.
He lay in the snow, the heat of his body melting it and soaking his skin. He waited, too afraid to crawl, listening to the bullets whack pine-tree bark, making it fly off the tree just a few feet from his face.
A few Howlers were on the road in front of him. Most had run toward the cabin. He spotted the bed and breakfast on the other side of the road; it seemed to be deserted, but he was too frightened to risk standing up and running across the road, afraid that Howlers would spot him. He watched the road and urinated on himself, making the cold worse. He started to shake uncontrollably. If he didn’t get up out of the snow, he’d die of hypothermia.
Piss-stained and freezing, Gary Summers stood up as soon as the shooting stopped. He ran through the thigh-deep snow until he broke out of the woods. Without stopping he turned and ran toward the bed and breakfast, sure he was going to be chased down by one of the things and murdered. But he wasn’t. Gary Summers ran down the Country Bride Inn’s empty driveway and into the Inn full of dead guests and warm clothes he took from their open suitcases.
* * *
Bell got out of the limo. He raised the empty automatic and pointed it at the Land Rover. “Get the fuck out of the car,” Bell said.
Ryder slipped out from behind the wheel his hands up. “Okay, I know you’re pissed at me,” Johnny said. “I don’t blame you. But hear me out, Bell.”
Rebecca opened the back of the limo. Pointing her weapon at Ryder, she walked up to the passenger side of the Land Rover and dragged Sue Ling out, throwing her onto the driveway roughly.
“I’m going to kill this bitch in two seconds if you don’t throw out all your weapons,” Rebecca said. She held the short barrel of the assault rifle against Sue Ling’s cheek. The girl lay on the ground, terrified.
“Okay, okay!” Johnny said. “For fuck sake, on the backseat!” He nodded toward the Land Rover. Rebecca reached in and pulled out a Marine AA 12 shotgun. “And my pistol,” Johnny said. He lifted his jacket and showed the butt of an automatic. Bell had him toss the pistol to him by the barrel. It landed on the pavers in front of him.