There was a hatch set into the back of the cab, between the rear two seats, which led to the cargo compartment at the rear of the truck. Keeping his head down Chapel moved back there and opened the narrow hatch, then slipped back into darkness. Light streaming in from the cab showed him there was a lamp set into the ceiling of the cargo compartment, but he couldn’t see how to switch it on — and wouldn’t have if he could, since that would have given any hypothetical sniper a great target to work with.
Slowly Chapel’s eyes adjusted to the darkness. The cargo compartment was packed full of supplies. Most of the room was taken up by fuel and water tanks and huge spare tires. There were some crates toward the back, next to the rear doors. The guns had to be there. He climbed in over the spare tires and started making his way over to the crates, then stopped in place when he heard a sound.
A series of sounds — a repetitive banging noise, like someone hitting metal with a hammer. The sound a sledgehammer might make as it pounded on a rusty padlock.
Someone was trying to get into the shed.
Chapel moved to the back doors of the truck and felt around until he found the latch that opened them. He eased one of the doors open just a crack so he could see outside.
The locked doors of the shed rattled and banged, and he could see dust sifting down across them. They hadn’t been opened in a long time, and they screeched as the lock broke and they sagged open. He heard someone shout, and then the doors flew open all at once and four men came rushing through, each of them carrying a pistol. Three of them were blond, and one wore glasses.
It was the same man he’d fought back in Bucharest, one of the gangsters who’d come for them when they were picking up Bogdan.
Had the Romanian gangsters followed them all this way? It seemed unlikely but Chapel definitely recognized the man’s face. Glasses even had a bandage on his left wrist — where Chapel had stomped on it.
The four men moved quickly into the shed, spreading out, their pistols covering the decrepit chicken coops, the rafters overhead, the dead body of Varvara’s driver. They weren’t trying to be subtle, this time — they looked like they expected a fight.
Well, Chapel aimed to give them one.
With the back door of the truck cracked open, a little light spilled into the cargo compartment. Just enough for Chapel to make out the various boxes and crates stowed there. One looked very familiar to him, a long, narrow wooden crate. He reached for its lid and found that it wasn’t — thank God — nailed shut. Inside he found a bunch of torn-up newspapers that stank of gun oil. He reached in and felt around to see what kind of weapons Varvara had provided.
She hadn’t stinted on the firepower. He felt a couple of pistols in there and the long wooden stock of an AK-47 assault rifle. There were clips for each of the firearms, already loaded with bullets.
Outside of the truck the four men moved step by step through the shed, their guns up and ready. Chapel had no idea where Nadia or Bogdan might be. He had to assume he was on his own for this. He pulled out the AK-47 and one of its curved clips.
Now came the tricky part. He slotted the clip and drove it home, as gently as he could. It made a sharp click as it locked into place, a sound the whole world was probably familiar with from hearing it in so many movies.
Outside the truck someone spoke, but he couldn’t catch the words. They must have heard the click.
He couldn’t give them a chance to figure out where it came from. He slid the firing selector on the rifle all the way down, to semiauto, and kicked open the truck doors, then jumped backward out of the truck and down onto the floor of the shed.
The four gunmen must have split up, two on either side of the truck. On the left side, one had climbed up the ladder to look inside the cab. Another had bent to look under the truck in case anyone was hiding there.
Chapel didn’t waste time looking for the other two. He brought the rifle up and squeezed the trigger, releasing a burst of three rounds into the body of the one hanging on the side of the cab. The man fell away from the truck instantly, and Chapel swiveled around even as the one looking under the truck started to stand back up.
The man had time to look over at Chapel, time for his features to take on an expression of surprise. Chapel’s second burst caught him in the chest and knocked him sprawling backward, onto the floor.
The noise of his firing echoed loud enough in the shed to drive any thoughts out of Chapel’s head. He moved on instinct, dodging left around the side of the truck, keeping his body behind one of the huge tires. He heard movement on the other side of the vehicle — the two men who had gone to the right, moving to react to the sudden attack.
They were smart enough, or disciplined enough, not to just come running around the side of the truck and straight into Chapel’s line of fire. He heard them shout back and forth, and though he couldn’t understand their words, he was sure they were making a plan to flank him. One would come around the front of the truck, the other around the back. He wouldn’t be able to fend them both off at once.
He had to move. He looked toward the open end of the shed, the same direction the truck was pointed. There might still be a sniper back there, the one who had killed Varvara’s driver. He glanced to the other side, toward the doors the gunmen had come through. There could be more of them out there, waiting for anyone foolish enough to come running out of the shed. The noise of the rifle fire would have alerted them, and they would be ready if Chapel showed his face.
The truck was too high to climb. He considered ducking underneath it, but if either of the remaining gunmen even glanced down there, he would be a sitting duck.
It was while he was thinking about what to do that he heard gunshots outside the shed, out front — pistol fire, and then someone screaming. He glanced out and saw a blur of movement, something fast bouncing around the piles of decayed wooden pallets. It took him a moment to realize it was a human being. He saw it drop to the ground and roll on its shoulder, then spring back up to its feet.
It was Nadia, he realized. She had found another gunman hiding in a pile of tires. The killer brought up his pistol to shoot her, but she was already striking, her hands clenched together for a blow that knocked the pistol right out of the gunman’s grip. He tried to recover, but she was just too fast for him, her knee coming up to catch him in the groin. As he bent forward she struck the back of his neck and put him down.
Behind her, another gunman was climbing up on a rusted water heater, lifting his pistol to aim at her head. She would never see him in time.
Chapel didn’t think about what he did next. He didn’t have time. Roaring like a bull to draw attention, he dashed toward the open front doors of the shed, not even bothering to keep his head down. The gunman who had aimed at Nadia turned a few degrees to the side.
Chapel lifted his rifle and fired a burst into the gunman’s midsection, making him twist and fall backward off the water heater. His pistol spun up into the air.
Nadia darted across the open space in front of the doors and dove for the pistol, sliding across the trash on her side. She didn’t quite catch the gun before it hit the ground, but Chapel could have sworn it was still spinning when she snatched it up.
He started to ask if she was all right, but then she lifted the pistol and pointed it right at him. He ducked to the side, and she fired twice, one shot, a beat, a second shot, neat as that.
Behind him he heard someone gasp in pain. Of course — he’d left two gunmen back there, Glasses and the dark-haired one. Chapel ducked down and turned to look. The dark-haired one was on the ground, clutching a wound on his neck. Blood streamed down his shirt inside his suit jacket.