Parker said nothing for a moment. Then: “It’s behind us now.”
Life gets by on ninety percent truth and ten percent deception. And not all of those lies are bad. Sometimes honesty derails a train bound for important destinations. In any event, this wasn’t Colter Shaw’s game. He was here to make sure they survived in body, not in heart and soul.
He gave the phone to Hannah. “Signal?”
“No. Still blank.”
Shaw decided, to be safe, he’d use the navigation app in the car and find a circuitous route to get to Millton, back roads and neighborhoods exclusively.
The odds of pursuit?
If there was still gunfire, he’d say ten percent.
With the silence, he guessed sixty. No, Jon Merritt had not killed them all. But they might think that he, Allison and Hannah had fled on foot into the woods and be looking for them there.
They must be only—
Suddenly there was a flash of white to the right.
Parker screamed, Hannah said, “Mr. — !”
The Ford Transit thundered through the brush and broadsided the Buick hard.
The impact shoved the vehicle over the embankment. It rolled two and a half times, crushing emaciated pine saplings, and came to rest, upside down, in the middle of the steep hill.
90
Shaw smelled the sweet aroma of gasoline.
“Out!” he called, rolling down the windows, unlocking the doors. All of the airbags had blown. Parker and her daughter didn’t seem badly hurt, though they were stunned. “Gas. Get out!”
He undid his belt, dropping to the ceiling. He turned and undid Parker’s. She’d been fumbling with it. She landed in a pile, barking a muted scream of pain. Hannah hit her own harness and twisted as she fell, landing like a cat on all fours. They crawled out.
Hannah reached back for the water clock.
Shaw said firmly, “Han. No.”
She looked toward him and nodded.
“Stay low. Move that way.” He pointed downhill — and lateral. Not only was the sedan at risk of catching fire, but it teetered at a twenty-degree angle on soft earth. It wouldn’t take much to start it tumbling.
Shaw stood and fired one round into the windshield of the Ford van. There was no human target; he wanted only to tell them he was armed, which would buy some distance and time, and allow them to set up a good defensive position. He heard shouting: directions given, possible sightings. It seemed to be only the Twins. Had Merritt gotten the others? Shaw had a feeling that he had.
Hannah was helping her mother.
As the three continued down the slope, Shaw glanced up the hill and saw the two forms coming after them. Yes, the Twins. They had drawn their handguns and were beginning to shoot in the direction of the ruined car. Their tactic with the van hadn’t quite worked. They too had been slammed by the airbags and, still stunned, weren’t firing accurately.
Still, a random bullet could be just as deadly as one fired with precision.
When they were about fifty feet below the Buick, Shaw noticed Parker slowing.
Looking back up the hill, he saw Tan Jacket standing to fire. The man dropped just as Shaw squeezed off a round.
A miss.
Thirteen shots left in the weapon, two fifteen-round mags in his pocket.
Never lose track of remaining ammunition...
Ahead of them, Shaw spotted a culvert about three feet deep. “There.” He gestured them into it. Then he rolled in and peered over the top like a soldier in a trench, scanning with his weapon. He looked behind them. No escape that way. The hill, descending to the river, offered limited ground cover and the moon was up, its cool light bright enough to spot targets.
He looked back over the lip of their trench, scanning to the left.
“Mr. Shaw!” Hannah whispered. She’d ignored his order to stay low. “Right! Look!”
It was Suit.
Shaw acquired and was about to fire when the man vanished.
They’d be flanking, he assumed. And they’d need to finish up quickly. The highway wasn’t far away, and on a pleasant night like this, car windows might be down, drivers and passengers would be wondering about the shots. No hunters at this hour, of course.
“What should we do, Mr. Shaw?”
He looked around the immediate area. “Cover yourselves up with leaves as much as you can.”
She hesitated. The girl who wanted a gun didn’t seem happy at the thought of hiding.
But then she got to work, piling leaves on her mother and then hunkering down and burrowing under the rustling blanket herself.
“I’m moving up there.” He pointed to high ground. “I need to get into position.”
She gave a smile. “That’s what people like you say. They get into position to engage.”
He nodded to her and went over the top of the ridge and began a soldier’s prone shuffle to the left.
Where are you? Where?
The breeze was troubling dry leaves and branches, covering up the sound of his transit, but also making it difficult or impossible to hear the Twins’ steps.
He rose and stood before a thick swath of tall grass. He couldn’t see much: the top of the Transit, the inverted Buick.
Gazing from left to right, looking for any sign of movement that was not caused by the wind.
Left, right...
Except flanking was not their tactic.
Maybe assuming his attention would be to the sides, they went for a frontal assault.
One of them, high on the hill, began covering fire in Shaw’s direction, while the second, hunched low, like a linebacker, rushed through the tall grass, directly toward him.
In a crouch, he aimed at where the man would be, judging from the sound and the disturbed greenery.
He inhaled, exhaled leisurely, holding the firearm out.
What if somebody’s attacking you?
Even slower then...
Forty feet away, thirty-five, thirty...
Now.
Shaw fired. The Glock kicked.
The man kept coming.
Two more shots, slightly left and right of where he’d first aimed.
Neither did these hit him.
Impossible. Shaw hadn’t missed. Body armor?
The man was now only twenty feet away. He’d break from the grass into the clearing any minute. Shaw aimed at the spot where he’d exit.
By the time he realized that this wasn’t the enemy at all but the spare tire from the Transit they’d rolled his way, the wheel sped from the grass and slammed into Shaw’s chest, sending him tumbling down the hill.
91
The Twins charged forward in the wake of the tire.
Shaw had dropped the Glock under the impact. He rose to his knees, struggling to breathe and scanning for the weapon. Suit fired a shot his way and kept coming. Shaw rolled into a thicket of brush to take cover.
Jacket turned to his left, searching for Parker and Hannah. He was not far from the culvert where they lay, but with the darkness and under the camo, he was having no luck spotting them.
From his cover, Shaw scanned the ground and saw his own gun lying twenty feet away, directly in the path of cautiously approaching Suit.
Maybe he’d miss it...
But, no, the big man paused and then stepped forward fast, snagging the gun. He whispered, “Dawndue...” Like a weird birdcall. The man had said the same thing at the house just before they burned the camper to the ground.
Suit stood upright and looked around. He called, “Come on, Motorcycle Man. I have your six-shooter. Show yourself.”
Shaw noted that he had another weapon. Something strapped behind his back. Maybe one of the .223 assault rifles.