Another man wearing a Richard Nixon mask had jumped out of the van’s side door, brandishing a revolver and running around the back of the Porsche.
“Whoa, whoa!” Quincy pointed at the plane. “I’ve got armed security right in that plane—”
“If you haven’t figured it out, your security is worth crap now.” The man in the Nixon mask yanked open Quincy’s door.
William stepped out and Lily immediately embraced him at the waist. “Lily, get back in the car—”
The ski-masked man pushed them towards the open door of the van. “Get inside!”
“Put your hands up and drop your weapons!” a voice from a bullhorn echoed through the air.
The men in suits had stopped, their pistols aimed. “I repeat: Put your hands up where we can see them and drop those guns, or we will have no choice but to open fire….”
The voice began trailing off.
William realized the girl’s arms were no longer wrapped around him.
As in the cotton field, the men began to fall, one by one. With one hand still clutching his pant leg, Lily had raised her other and pointed. As she swiped across them, the men violently shook and crumbled.
“Holy Mary, Mother of God,” the man in the ski mask said.
For a moment they stood in stunned silence between the incapacitated Porsche and the van, staring at the unmoving bodies littering the airstrip.
“Let’s go!” yelled a female voice from inside.
“Move,” the ski masked man said. “Move, now!”
He practically shoved William inside but made no move towards Lily. She scampered after in a daze, still holding on to William. The other masked man used his pistol to move Quincy quickly in as well. As they fumbled into the seats, the door slammed shut.
“What just happened out there?” a woman yelled from the driver’s seat.
“Just go! Go!” Even muffled by the ski mask, the man’s voice was clearly rattled.
“Go where?” She was looking back, her mouth covered by a bandana. “The gate is blocked!”
“Ram it. Don’t let them shoot the tires!”
“Do not ram anything!” Quincy said, his hand bracing himself as the van began to spin around. “Whatever you want, I’ll pay it. Just stop and let us out—”
“Shut the hell up!” the ski-masked man said, pointing the rifle inches from Quincy’s face. “Go! Go!”
William leaned over to look out the windshield as the van wildly swerved, a pinging sound cutting through the air.
“Get down!”
The bullets then suddenly stopped as the van headed directly for the helicopter’s tail. The men in suits that had piled out were now scrambling away.
The van made a horrible crunching sound as they smashed into the tail, the helicopter blades still whirling above. The rotor blade came dangerously close to slicing into the roof.
The woman gunned the engine, continuing to push the helicopter. As soon as it had moved far enough, she spun the wheel, and propelled the van forward through the open gate.
“Don’t stop!” the ski-masked man yelled, sliding down the aisle to the back. The back doors of the van flew open, and William watched as he scrambled with something in a metal box and threw it out.
The chain flew out wildly into the air and crashed onto the road. “Hope your tires like that, you fuckers,” William heard him say.
Quincy jammed his hand into his suit coat pocket. “Name your price. Whatever you want, I will pay. Just let us go.”
“Please shut up,” the man in the Nixon man said, pointing his pistol at him. “And get your hand out where I can see it.”
The woman called out from the front. “Rudd, are we heading—”
“You know where to go, Neve. Anyone trailing us yet?” The man pulled off the ski mask, revealing the face William had seen frantically waving at them to pull over on the interstate.
“Not yet. But Rudd, what the hell…”
“Plan B. We go to Plan B right now,” he said.
“Already there,” the man in the Nixon mask said, pulling out a metal box from under the seat. From inside, he brought out plastic bags and threw one to the bald man in the back.
Taking off the Nixon mask, he fumbled with the bag in his hand. For a moment, William saw a flash of a vial and some thin plastic tubes.
“Wait,” William began. “What are you—?”
The man spun around with such speed that he had the needle in Lily’s leg before William could block him. She gasped in pain.
William leapt forward, grabbing the man’s arm. He ripped the syringe from the man’s hand just as he felt a needle slide into his own arm, followed by a swirl of hot pain.
William swung back, hitting the bald man who had come up from behind. The world immediately began to fade.
“What…” William’s voice slurred.
“What the hell are you doing?” he heard Quincy yell.
“Don’t… hurt…” William fell to the floor.
“Not to worry, Mr. Chance.” The man who once wore with the Nixon mask leaned down, patting his cheek roughly. “Your grandmother gave specific orders.”
FIVE
The rain splintered the view outside the window of the town car, blurring the beginnings and endings of the warehouses. Developers had salivated over the district along the Potomac for years, dreaming of demolishing the old buildings and slamming shiny condos in their place. Yet the industrial stain along the river remained, the owners clutching to their decades-old property deeds that promised sales that would one day pay for beach houses along the Gulf Coast. In cash.
I’ll give them this, Kate thought: It’s a hell of a place to hide.
She tapped her fingers on the armrest, her other hand holding her iPhone, frantically scrolling through her news feed.
“BREAKING: Jeep belonging to William Chance found near home in Little Rock, tires shot out.”
“DEVELOPING: Maintenance crew outside private landing strip at Clinton National Airport report hearing gunfire.”
“TIMELINE: What we know at this hour about the discovery of William Chance—“
Kate leaned forward. “Is it much farther?”
“We’re actually here, Senator,” the driver responded.
She’d had her misgivings even entering the Lincoln town car when it arrived at her townhouse as scheduled. But it had the standard government plates, and the driver flashed a proper security badge. When she questioned the location, knowing that no government agencies were housed that far from DC’s central corridor, the driver had referred to the paperwork delivered to her by a process server containing the official seal with a raised emblem that included the address. It had been signed by the agency’s director, Mark Wolve.
She’d done her due diligence, finding the obscure branch of the FBI in the encrypted database provided to her first thing in the morning. But even in those internal records, it was simply listed as the SSA. Everything checked out, except for the glaring fact that no one had ever heard of it.
The driver came to a stop in front of yet another nondescript warehouse. He stepped out and opened her door, umbrella ready. It was a short walk to a lone metal door. The driver reached out with a key.
A key? That’s the security for a supposedly top-secret agency?
He inserted it into a weary lockbox next to the door. A turn of the key revealed a keypad within. He flashed his security badge at a small screen, punched in a code, and leaned down to do a quick retinal scan. Finally, he placed his thumbprint on the screen. She heard a series of heavy locks release inside.
“I stand corrected,” she murmured.
The small front lobby featured no furniture. A woman wearing a black suit similar to the driver’s sat behind a window, sliding it open without a word. She requested both their security badges, examined them, and made a quiet phone call. She then asked for the umbrella, which the driver provided. She simply nodded towards the only other door in the room. “I can buzz you through—”