"Everyone gets afraid, but sometimes you just have to go ahead."
"What do you do when you're afraid, Daddy?"
"Well, the first thing I do is admit it to myself. It doesn't do any good to pretend I'm not scared, or that I don't feel the way I really feel. That's where courage comes in."
"Courage?"
"Courage is accepting your fear and doing whatever needs to be done anyway. Cowards are people who can't face up to their fear and let it get the better of them. There's always a place for courage. There's always something that can be done. You might not see it right away. Sooner or later something comes to mind that can help you through it. You make up your mind that it's okay to be afraid and you are going to be all right. Then you do what has to be done. That's courage."
Courage. She needed that now.
Elizabeth heard Ronnie groan.
"Ronnie, are you okay?"
"Unnh. Yeah. Head hurts. I'm all right. I'm going to kill that bastard."
"How did they get in?" Elizabeth took a deep breath through her mouth.
"I was watching the monitors. Next thing I knew there was a muzzle at the back of my neck. I never saw them or heard them coming. They beat the alarms somehow. NSA bullshit."
Elizabeth took another breath through her mouth. "Dysart has to kill us. We've got to figure this out, and fast. I wonder if he knows about the tunnel?"
"Doesn't help unless we can get free."
Stone fireplaces took up each end of the basement, big enough to stand in and wide enough for eight foot logs. In the days before central heating they had warmed the house above. The concealed escape tunnel began behind the back wall of the fireplace at the far end. On the other side of that wall were weapons and a straight route out of the safe house. It might as well have been in China for all the good it did them.
"How long you think we've got before they come down and start asking questions?"
"I don't know, Ronnie." Elizabeth spit blood. The flow from her nose had slowed to a trickle. She coughed, gasped for air.
"Your nose looks broken." Selena looked over at Elizabeth. "The bleeding's almost stopped."
"When is Nick due back?" Elizabeth breathed through her mouth.
"He didn't say." Ronnie twisted in his restraints, but it was no use. "I hope it's soon."
They waited for their executioners.
CHAPTER FIFTY
Nick tried raising Harker and the others. Lamont didn't answer. He was still at the hospital with his mother and probably in a place where a cell phone would set off fifty heart attacks. Nick's ear felt like bees were crawling on it. Under Alpha Red, no response to communications within two minutes meant trouble. Something was wrong.
He was still driving the armored Suburban. It was already deep twilight. He parked well away from the safe house and moved on foot until he could see the front of the building. There were no cars out front. Everything looked normal. He stayed low outside the stone fencing and followed it around the property. In the back, a light burned in the kitchen window. Two black Jeeps were parked under the trees.
He crouched behind the wall and thought about his options.
Two vehicles meant at least two men, probably four, maybe more. He'd never make it to the house undetected, past the alarms and cameras. But there was another way in. He went back to the Suburban and drove with his lights off, past the house to where the highway came to a wide stream. He pulled as far as he could off the road and parked. He took the shotgun and a flashlight and followed the bank of the stream until he came to the grill sealing off the escape tunnel.
The tunnel looked like a large, rectangular storm drain. Carter disabled the alarm, pulled the grill away and set it aside.
The tunnel was dry and high enough to walk in. The light from his torch shone on cement walls stained with damp. Bugs and spiders scuttled out of his way. He reached the end of the tunnel. He looked through a spy hole behind the fireplace and saw the others bound to columns, feet stretched out before them on the floor. Harker's face and blouse were bloody.
Nick stepped through the back of the fireplace. He set the shotgun against the wall, pulled his knife and started cutting them free. First Ronnie, then the others.
"Nick!" Ronnie whispered. "Dysart and six others. Heavy firepower."
Ronnie picked up the shotgun and ran to the bottom of the stairs. He eased the slide back, checking to see if a round was chambered. Selena rubbed her wrists. She touched Nick on the arm, as if making sure he was real.
Stephanie ran to the tunnel, opened a steel locker and took out weapons. She handed an M4A1 to Selena, one to Harker and quietly racked the bolt on her own. They loaded up.
"They've got Mac-10s," Ronnie said in a low voice.
Nick took out his pistol. "What do you think? Should we go up, or bring them down here?"
"Up. There's no way to get them all down here at once. We have to go after them."
"Is the door locked?"
"I don't know. Probably not. They think we're helpless." He smiled. Nick knew the look. Ronnie was mad. It wasn't a good idea to get Ronnie mad at you.
"Black flag, Ronnie."
He nodded. "I'll go first." He patted the stock of the Remington. "More spread, close quarters, lots of noise. Should take them by surprise."
Nick felt the adrenaline rush. He took a few breaths to calm himself.
"Stephanie, Director," he said in a low voice. "You wait down here. Take them out if someone gets by us. Selena, you follow Ronnie and me up. Cover us. Lay down fire when you can. You get a clear shot at one of the bad guys, take it. Don't get yourself killed."
The three moved silently up the stairs. Light and the murmur of voices slipped through the crack under the door. Ronnie put his left hand on the knob and turned it in a slow, even movement. He nodded.
Nick held up three fingers, mouthed the count. One. Two. Three.
The door flew open. The man who had mauled Selena sat with one of the others drinking beer. Their guns were on the table in front of them. They went for their weapons.
The Remington blew the first man out of his chair and painted the wall in back of him with blood. Nick fired twice as the second lifted his gun. The big hollow point bullets drove him into the stove and to the floor. Two down.
Nick caught movement in the living room and dove to the side. He heard Selena's weapon behind him. The arch around the entrance to the living room disintegrated in a shower of plaster.
A long burst from a Mac-10 sprayed the kitchen with rounds. He could hear the bolt snicking back and forth over the soft stuttering of the suppressor. Ronnie fired twice, the twelve gauge loud as thunder inside the house. The double ought buckshot lifted the shooter off his feet and threw him backward.
Nick got to his feet and reached the living room. Another burst from a MAC-10 chopped the kitchen cabinets into bits. China and glass shattered behind him. Ronnie fired and a shape behind the sofa collapsed. Someone stood and Selena shot him. He went down firing, the bullets stitching a pattern into the ceiling and blowing out the chandelier. In the next room a man reached around the doorway and fired. Selena fired a short burst and he crumpled.
A man in uniform ran for the front door. Nick let off three rounds into his back. He slammed face first into the door and slid to the floor, arms spread wide, leaving broad smears of blood behind on the smooth, white enameled surface.
Loud silence.
The rooms filled with the smell of cordite, blood and the stink of emptying bowels.
"I count seven," Ronnie said. "That's all of them." He racked the slide on the shotgun, ejected an empty casing. It bounced with a hollow clatter onto the wooden floor.