“All clear that way,” Nate whispered when they reached the end.
Though Quinn didn’t see anyone in the direction he was looking, either, something did catch his attention. “Cover me,” he said.
He moved into the central aisle and over to a crate that had fallen on the floor and broken open. He pulled one of the sides back.
Rifles.
M16s.
Nearby were other crates, exactly the same size. More rifles, he assumed. Several of the stacks were identical.
From deeper in the room came a crash.
The girl had said there were three other floors just like this one. If Orbits could get to one of them, he’d have more time to search for additional weapons.
He found the way up at the other end of the room. A freight elevator, more than large enough to carry multiple crates between levels. As he took a step toward it, he heard a voice coming from back toward the tunnel and realized his pursuers were already in the room.
Hoping to slow them down, he rocked a stack of boxes back and forth until they tumbled into the aisle and blocked the way. He ran into the elevator and pulled down the vertical door.
Looking at the controls, he saw he was on level one, and that the other three levels were above him. There was also a fifth button off to the side with no markings, just a slot for a key next to it.
He pushed the button for level four, and the elevator began moving. When he arrived, he looked for the emergency stop button to keep the car there but the panel didn’t have one. It wasn’t all bad, though. When the car started moving again, it would alert him that trouble was on the way.
He ran out of the elevator and headed out among the boxes.
A gentle breeze blew across the meadow but did little to dampen the morning heat. Daeng had been born in a part of the world where it was hot year round and he was used to sweating, but he wasn’t stupid enough to stay in direct sunlight. Which was why he was sitting in the shade created by the open metal door when he heard the distant sound of a car in the woods.
He stood up and turned his head toward the noise, but after only a few seconds, the motor cut out. He was able to determine it had come from the same direction in which they had arrived. He sprinted across the meadow to the woods and crept between the trees, slipping between the strains of the barbed-wire fence and sneaking up on the spot where the cars had been left.
A small sedan had joined the three vehicles already there. He moved around until he could get a good look at it and saw it was empty. He studied the area for movement, but saw nothing. The new arrivals could have gone to only one place.
Moving quickly but without making noise, he retraced his path to the meadow. He was still a dozen feet from the edge of the trees when he spotted three people at the hatch. No, four, he realized, catching sight of a woman’s head right before she disappeared into the bunker. Two men followed her down. When the final person — a woman — followed, she turned just enough for him to see her face.
The Wolf.
There was no time to worry about how they had gotten free.
He raced across the meadow toward the hatch.
CHAPTER 41
It was as if the departure of the SUV from Karl’s K-4 was some kind of signal, because all of a sudden people began running from the gas station, and the cars that had been at the pumps raced away.
“Somebody get these things off me!” The Wolf yelled, holding up her bound hands.
Bianca rolled over to the man she’d killed when Orbits got away. Though the others had taken his gun, they hadn’t patted him down. Like most competent field agents, he was carrying a knife. After Bianca cut the zip-ties from the hands and ankles of The Wolf and the driver, The Wolf told the man to find them a ride and then freed her hunter.
Rubbing her wrists, Bianca said, “Well, that didn’t go as planned.”
The Wolf shot her a look. “You should have killed them.”
“The day’s not over yet.”
Something banged over and over from behind the building. Bianca motioned for her boss to stay where she was before moving around the back corner to check it out. When she returned, she had one of The Wolf’s other men with her.
“Where the hell have you been?” The Wolf demanded.
Bianca said, “He was tied up behind a Dumpster.”
“How did that—” The Wolf stopped mid-question as the driver raced up in a small sedan.
Once they were on the highway, The Wolf pulled out her phone. When the tech answered, she described the car Orbits had been using and said, “Find it!”
Two minutes passed before he called back. “Got him on satellite. He headed off the highway and disappeared into some woods.”
Following the directions he gave them, they made it to the little used road and found not only Orbits’s sedan, but The Wolf’s Explorer and a third vehicle. Five minutes later they reached the meadow. When The Wolf saw the rectangular object sticking up near the middle, she started to get a bad feeling. And when they looked down into the hole and saw the space below, she knew her instinct had been right.
That damn Ricky Orbits had gotten Danielle to tell him where the goods were located. The bastard had probably planned to hand the girl over and then empty the place of the weapons that rightfully belonged to her. She admired his audacity and vowed to tell him that right before she had him killed.
“What do you want to do?” the driver asked.
“What do you mean, what do I want to do? We go down.”
The cramped tunnel was not designed with pregnant women in mind, Orlando concluded. It was hard enough crawling on her hands and knees, but when she came to a ninety-degree turn, she almost gave up. Forcing herself to continue, she squeezed around the corner and shined her light ahead. At the farthest reaches of her light, she caught sight of Dani’s shoes as the girl rushed away.
“Wait!” Orlando said. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to help.”
Dani didn’t stop.
Groaning in frustration, Orlando yelled, “Come on, Dani! Please. I’m Quinn’s partner! My name’s Orlando. You might’ve heard him talk—”
Quinn’s partner?
Dani stopped crawling and called back, “You’re lying.”
“I’m not. We were trying to rescue you at the gas station.”
Dani had heard Quinn’s voice when the handoff went awry, and had even hoped he would get her out.
“If you’re his partner, you’re something else, too,” she said, remembering the conversations she’d overheard.
“You mean girlfriend? Yeah, that, too.” The woman paused, breathing deeply. “If I was here to hurt you, wouldn’t I have been shooting at you instead of at that jerk who took you?”
“People don’t want to hurt me. They want what I have.”
“Yeah, I have a feeling the cat’s out of the bag on that one. I mean, this place, right? It’s your big secret.”
Dani held her tongue. The silo was only part of the secret.
Beyond the light, Orlando groaned.
“Are you okay?” Dani asked. “Did you get shot?”
“What? No, um, just…give me a moment.”
Dani thought she heard another groan, but it was very low.
“How much farther does this thing go?” Orlando asked a few seconds later.
Dani hesitated. “I’m not exactly sure. Not too far, I think. There should be another exit up here.”
“Into what?”
“One of the storage levels.”
“Will you wait for me?” Orlando asked. “Please.”
Dani chewed the inside of her lip, not knowing if that was a good idea or not, but in the end said, “Okay.”