"I don't need a light," she said. "Come on." She slipped past him, her body brushing against him in the narrow passage. Once more he felt her hand close over his wrist, and she pulled him along after her.
Bolan could tell by the unevenness of her stride that she had been hurt by the fall. She seemed to be limping. Far ahead, like some geometric hologram, a rectangle of brilliant lines began to glow. It grew larger as they ran, and Bolan realised they were approaching another door, be yond which there was light.
"Not much farther," she said through teeth clenched against the pain.
Bolan could tell when to stop, and he waited impatiently while she fumbled with the door. It swung open without warning, and the surge of white light hurt his eyes. He turned away, squinting to protect his eyes, and barely avoided tripping down a pair of steps.
Behind him, she slammed the door, rammed the last bar in place and turned to him. Her lips were set in a straight line. Her face was as nearly expressionless as any face he'd ever seen.
"Now that we can see again, you can go back to feeling superior," she said. "You can lead the way." She stretched out a bronze hand, her long, delicate fingers quivering like the fronds of a water plant swaying in the current.
Bolan closed his huge hand over hers and patted her on his forearm. "You tell me where to go," he said.
"Don't tempt me," she stated. She shook her head slightly, then pointed to the wall behind him. "Through that door."
"Are you willing to talk to me now?"
"Nothing has changed," she said. Her lips returned to their rigid set as Bolan scrutinised her. He had been right about her height if anything, perhaps an inch too generous. Her hair was as black as the tunnel they'd just left behind, and was piled on her head and held in place with simple combs of ivory or bone. An exquisite face hovered under the jet-black cloud like a coppery mist, broken only by a hint of pale lipstick. She wore jeans and a green work shirt, neither of which did much to conceal the generous figure.
"You're lovely," he said matter-of-factly, surprised that the words had come out of his mouth.
Despite her seeming toughness, there was something innocent about her.
But she misunderstood. "And you're wasting time," she said with just the suggestion of a smile.
Not bothering to explain, Bolan shrugged before turning slowly. She moved after him, her hand resting lightly on his shoulder now. He opened the door she had pointed out and stepped through.
"No need to lock this one," she said as she followed him into the next room.
"Where to now?"
"Straight ahead."
Bolan nodded, then said, "All right." They were in a large, empty room. Its ceiling was thirty feet above them, composed of corrugated tin over rusting girders. It appeared to have functioned as a warehouse at one time.
"Go all the way across," she prompted.
"Don't we have to worry about them blowing through the other doors, just like they did the first?"
"That's been taken care of," she said.
He didn't know whether she meant it to sound cryptic, but it had that effect.
As they neared the center of the huge room, her hand slapped him on the shoulder. He stopped, thinking he had been going too fast. He turned to wait for her, and realized she was deliberately backing away from him.
"What's the matter?" Bolan asked.
She shook her head. "Nothing." He took a step toward her, but she held up a hand. "Stay right there," she hissed.
He heard a rustling sound and turned toward it.
Four men, each carrying an automatic rifle that was trained on his midsection, stood in a semicircle.
"You are in no danger," she assured him. "I'm sorry, but it has to be this way. You will understand soon."
At a gesture from one of the men, Bolan raised his hands. He thought, for one fleeting instant, about reaching for the AutoMag. But it was hopeless. They would cut him in half before he got his hand on the butt of the big .44.
They stood there in a motionless tableau for a long moment. Bolan examined the men in turn, and shook his head. They were cut from the same cloth. All small, wiry and dressed in faded camous.
The only way to tell them apart was by the four different mustaches.
One of the men split off from the others and advanced on Bolan from the right side. He kept his rifle, an AK, at the ready until he slipped in behind Bolan. Quickly the Desert Eagle and the Beretta were lifted. The man knelt for a moment to pat him down. When he was satisfied, he tugged Bolan's hands down behind him and clicked a pair of handcuffs in place.
"Too tight?" the man asked.
"Not if I have to wear them at all," Bolan said.
"Sorry, Senor Belasko. But we have to take precautions. We mean you no harm. You will see."
Bolan flinched when the blindfold was looped over his head. It happened so suddenly that he thought the man meant to garrote him, and sighed when the cloth was positioned over his eyes.
"Who the hell are you people?" Bolan demanded.
"All in good time, Mr. Belasko. Please, be patient." It was the woman who spoke.
He felt her hand on his arm again. She simply squeezed reassuringly, then let her hand fall away. Bolan heard a heavy door rolling on a metal track, and the rumble of an engine. It sounded like a van or small truck. He thought immediately of the van that had charged him from the rear, and wondered whether it was the same one. Then, realizing that under the circumstances it didn't much matter, he pushed the thought out of his mind.
The vehicle approached, stopped nearly in front of him, and hands pushed him forward.
"Step up, a little higher," one of the men said. He was helped into the van and heard a door close. He sensed someone present and, as if in answer to his unspoken question, the woman said, "Don't worry. You are not alone." Not much, Bolan thought.
Bolan tried to plot the course of the truck in his head. He quickly gave it up when he realized he had no idea of his starting point. They had run so far and so long in the tunnel that the warehouse could have been anywhere. And because of the motion of the truck, it was impossible to gauge direction from inside. The truck rocked and rolled heavily, making it difficult to tell when they turned and when they had merely rolled through a particularly large pothole or around an obstacle in the road.
He had tried to engage the woman in conversation, but each time, she turned him away with a single syllable. After the third time, he gave up.
If she had anything to say to him, she would say it, he decided. So far she hadn't.
7
They had been traveling for nearly two hours, and his shoulders were sore from slamming into the sides of the van. No matter how he positioned himself, a sudden jolt would dislodge him and send him pounding into a steel wall or tilt him over onto the floor.
Finally he lay flat, wedging himself into a corner, and let gravity do what it could to protect him. With his hands cuffed behind him, it was far from comfortable, but at least he would spare himself the worst of the bumps and bruises.
Resigning himself to his situation, he tried to sleep but found, paradoxically, that it was too dark.
He thought of what it was like to lie in bed and watch the play of light and shadow on the ceiling: the glare of passing headlights, the gradual passage of the moon, the winking blue or red of neon outside a cheap hotel window, all the things that conspired to prevent the darkness of the night from being perfect.
He sighed in exasperation, and she must have realized what he was thinking. "There is nothing quite like it, you know."
"Like what?" Bolan asked.
"Like being hostage to someone's whim, simply because he has a gun..."
"I'm sure," Bolan replied, not knowing what else to say, but feeling the need to say something to keep her talking.