The fourth vehicle of a largely uneventful night. Sanchez walked out into the middle of the night, Wilkes moving into position behind him as he waved the SUV to a halt.
The driver’s side window rolled down as Sanchez approached.
“Deputy Sanchez, Shenandoah County Sheriffs’ Department. License and registration, sir,” the deputy requested, addressing the only occupant of the Excursion, a man who looked to be in his mid-forties.
The profile of his face…Sanchez looked down at the crumpled print-out in his hand. The picture of Nichols hadn’t been that good to begin with, but now the falling snow had blurred the photocopy. They weren’t allowed to print in color anymore, not with the budget cuts.
“Sure thing,” the SUV’s driver responded, reaching slowly into the glove compartment. “Out looking for the spy?”
Sanchez stiffened. “Why?”
The driver chuckled, handing out his paperwork through the window. “Else this is one heavily armed sobriety checkpoint. I watched the whole thing on CNN last night, some crazy stuff goin’ on, right?”
“Sure is,” the deputy responded, looking carefully at the photo on the driver’s license. Robert Stephenson.
“You’re from New York?”
“At the moment,” Harry replied, looking the Hispanic deputy in the eye. “My wife moved down for her work a month back — I’ll be here as soon as I can find a job.”
The deputy handed back his license and papers with a snort. “This is a bad time to be finding one of those. What’s your wife do?”
It seemed like a casual question, but Harry could see the glint there. Not bad. “She’s a private nurse. Her patient — used to be a big shot with Apple — was recommended to get out of the city — smog, pollution, all that. So he moved down here.”
A nod. “And what brings you out on the roads at this time of night, Mr. Stephenson?”
“Haven’t seen her in twenty-eight days, bro,” Harry spread his hands. “No sense stopping for the night when she’s right over the mountain. I’ve been lonely.”
“And frustrated,” came the deputy’s comment, along with a sideways grin.
Harry laughed. “Yeah, that too.”
The grin vanished as quickly as it had come. “I’d like you to step out of the vehicle, Mr. Stephenson. Keep your hands where I can see them.”
There was no time to wonder what had triggered the command. Harry reached low and unbuckled his seat belt, pushing open the door of the Excursion. It was a two-man roadblock, the second deputy hustling toward them now, an AR-15 clutched in his gloved hands.
The way he held the carbine told Harry everything he needed to know. The deputy didn’t know how to use it. Might be good, might be bad.
“Keep him covered, Wilkes.”
His gaze swept south, taking in his surroundings in a single glance just before the first deputy turned him around against the hood of the SUV and began frisking him.
There were lights there to the south, the lights of a house shining through the snow. Probably not a hundred yards off the road. Close enough to hear if shots were fired.
Harry felt the deputy’s hands run up his body, underneath his jacket, and he smiled, thankful he had given the 1911 to Carol. Now if she’d just remember what he’d told her — stay away…
“He’s clean,” he heard the deputy announce, taking a step back. “If you’ll give us your keys, I’ll take a look in the back, Mr. Stephenson.”
So many years, so many times in the field, but Harry could feel his body tense at the question. The point where the lies broke down. The guns — well, the guns were securely hidden away in the compartment custom-built into the false floor of the Excursion. But the MREs, the other supplies — would raise too many questions. Now or never.
“Keys are in the ignition,” he gestured, taking the opportunity for one last fix of the men’s positions. The man called Sanchez was about four feet to his left, near the open door of the SUV — he would be the one to go for the keys.
The second deputy was about three feet behind him, carelessly close, the AR-15 held loosely in both hands. If he was following his training, the safety was still on.
Men like him knew nothing but their training.
Lowering the shotgun, Sanchez leaned his upper body into the Excursion, his fingers groping the ignition area for the missing keys. It was at that moment that Harry struck, throwing his body weight against the open door.
The driver’s side door of the Excursion had been armored to withstand the impact of 7.62mm rifle rounds. What resulted was a heavy door swinging shut across Sanchez’s lower legs, pinning him. A scream of pain and surprise rent the night.
Harry pivoted in the snow, his hand coming up as the second deputy took a step backward, his fingers fumbling with the safety of the AR-15.
Harry’s hand connected with Wilkes’ throat, a brutal edge-of-hand blow that sent him reeling.
The deputy collapsed into the snow, clutching at his crushed vocal cords. Dropping to one knee beside him, Harry jerked the Glock 19 from Wilkes’ retention holster, bringing it up and pulling back the slide to chamber a round.
Movement out of the corner of his eye and Harry pressed the Glock’s barrel against the temple of the prone, gasping deputy. He looked up to see Sanchez limping toward him, the Mossberg leveled. The muzzle of the twelve-gauge gaped large as the mouth of a cannon, a yawning hole dark as the night.
“Another step and I put a bullet through his brain,” Harry announced calmly, looking up at Sanchez. The deputy stopped stock-still, the shotgun wavering in his hands. He was breathing heavily, great gasps of steam escaping his lips and drifting off into the darkness. The red and blue lights of the patrol cars continued to flash across the snow, adding a surreal aspect to the scene.
“You — you wouldn’t,” he said finally, his voice trembling. “You wouldn’t kill a cop.”
Harry’s eyes never changed, his lips forming into a cold, hard smile. “Believe that if you want to — you can even tell his widow the same thing. I’ve spent fifteen years of my life killing…what’s one more body?”
“You’re never gonna make it out of here alive,” Sanchez insisted, raising the shotgun to his shoulder once again. Harry could see his hands shaking, could see the uncertainty written across his face. The emotional anguish of a man who didn’t know if he could pull the trigger.
“This isn’t a movie, son,” Harry said, extending his left hand. “So, don’t try to be a hero. Nobody needs to die here. Just lay down the gun — everyone goes home.”
A long moment passed, the deputy caught in torturous indecision. Finally Sanchez shifted the Mossberg into his left hand and threw it into the snow. “You win.”
Harry rose, the Glock in his hand now aimed at Sanchez’s heart. “Turn around.”
Tarik rose before the dawn, before the call to fajr, morning prayer, had rung out over the city.
A recording, yes — but a beautiful sound, and one increasingly common in this land.
A quiet smile crossed the Pakistani’s face, a light flickering for a brief moment in those dreaming eyes. Such was the will of Allah. He walked over to the window and opened the venetian blinds, looking out over the city, lights sparkling in the darkness. Dar el Harb.
The house of war.
His laptop was open on the small table beside his bed, a website he had visited the previous night still on-screen.
The face of a woman stared back at him, boldly, without shame — a woman in her fifties, her naked face framed by brown hair. United States Representative Laura Gilpin, Texas, read the caption beneath her picture.