She heard a rustling in the trees, but didn't react to it and draw the .—it was Paul, her eyes having caught sight of his movement in the instant prior to the snapping of the twig. What Paul Rubenstein still lacked in expertise, she felt he more than compensated for by ingenuity and tenacity—and she liked him anyway. She saw a form on the ground at the edge of the trees—but it was unmoving.
Her left hand unsnapped the flap of the Safariland holster on her other hip, both of the customized, slab-side barreled stainless L-Frames coming into her hands and their muzzles leveling toward the treeline's edge. She kept walking, lengthening her stride, glancing down once at her black booted feet beneath the black whipcord slacks.
The leaves—multi-colored the way autumn had always been near Moscow when a little girl on her way to ballet—were beautiful.
She stopped, five yards from the form of the man on the ground—dead. She glanced from side to side, then walked forward, knowing Paul was still in the tree cover, watching for signs of a trap.
Natalia stopped beside the body, kicking it fast once in the exposed rib cage just to be sure, then stepping back quickly. There was no betraying movement—however slight. She bolstered the revolver in her left hand, then dropped to her knees.
Her skin touched its skin—still warm. The eyes were closed—unnaturally, by whoever had put the twin holes in the body, she deduced. "Not heartless," she murmured to herself, then more closely inspected the wound in the neck and in the chest. "But very good."
She stood up, walking in the direction from which she judged the shots to have been fired. She stooped to the ground—a piece of brass, still shiny and bright, freshly fired. . ACP—Natalia glanced at the headstamp, recognizing the ammo brand. It was what Rourke carried, as did she herself. "Hmm," she murmured.
There was a second cartridge case and she picked it up, noticing a disturbance in the leaves a few feet further on. She walked toward that, already noting the imprint of motorcycle tracks.
"John?" She studied the tracks. For the last seven days, she and Paul Rubenstein had been searching for him. There was the urgent message from her uncle. There was the fear that somehow Rourke had not survived the storms which had swept the coast and central section of the country. There was the loneliness she felt—and the confusion of purpose, identity. She was Russian—she was helping Americans.
America and Russia were technically still at war, despite the fact Soviet forces occupied much of the land. She was KGB—a major.
She shook her head to clear it.
There would be time later to wrestle with herself—wrestle with herself as she had done already.
Natalia walked past the motorcycle tracks, seeing something glistening on the leaves. She bent over, taking a dry leaf and touching it to the moist leaves that had shown the glistening effect. Without bringing it too close to her nose, the smell confirmed her initial suspicion—urine. Probably human. There was another, similar wet spot a few feet to the left.
"Natalia!"
"She glanced behind her. Paul was running toward her, his Schmeisser submachinegun dangling from its sling under his right arm, a riot shotgun—or at least the major pieces of it—in his right hand.
"I found this—somebody deliberately made it inoperable."
"It could still function single-shot—hand chambering. I noticed it, too. I think John was here, Paul—and just a few minutes ago."
"That louder shot was from this—"
"And the two lighter ones from these that we heard," she nodded, showing him the spent cartridge cases.
Rubenstein took them from her, inspecting them. "That's John's brand all right—"
"But also one of the largest ammunition manufacturers in the world—the cases could have been from a thousand other people—ten thousand. But I found this,"
and she gestured toward the motorcycle tracks. "And signs of
someone urinating here about the time we heard the shots. That dead man's flesh is still warm. I think it was John—stopped to—to—"
"To piss," Paul nodded, smiling embarrassedly.
Natalia felt herself smile, "Yes," she nodded. "And somebody came up on him—that man over there. John shot him, then disassembled the shotgun so no one could use it afterward. Then he finished—pissing. Then he drove off."
"But when there's one brigand, there's usually a bunch of 'em—"
"There aren't any signs of them—did you find any?"
"Nothing—no," and Rubenstein shook his head, his left hand pushing his wire-rimmed glasses up off the bridge of his nose, then sweeping across his high forehead through his thinning dark hair.
''And neither did I—if you were John—"
Rubenstein laughed. "Ha—if I were John—if anybody is closer to John in the way they think—you are. What would you do—kill one brigand and figure there are more around?"
"John urinated twice—as if he'd been doing it when he heard the man, then there was the gunfight, then John checked the man's pockets—I noticed that when I checked the body. Then John finished what he'd been doing."
"That's John for you," Rubenstein smiled.
' 'He would have been here long enough to tell if others were coming—and none did. Which would mean this dead man could have been a straggler—"
"There wasn't any bike—no signs of a truck or anything—"
"Or he could have been alone and on foot."
Paul shook his head. "I don't think so."
"Neither do I—his boots were marked from riding a bike, and the soles were polished almost smooth—but they weren't worn down as if he'd walked a great deal."
"John would have figured there were brigands in the' area and whatever they were doing, hearing what maybe would have been gunshots wasn't important enough to pull them away—"
Natalia nodded. "Laying a trap—ambuscade—"
"What?" Rubenstein asked, his face quizzical looking to her.
. She felt herself laugh—"That's only English, Paul—ambuscade—it means ambush."
"Ohh," and he nodded. "Yeah—I knew that," and Rubenstein laughed.
She touched her left hand gently to his right forearm. "John is probably looking for the other brigands—the rest of the dead man's gang."
"Can't be more than a couple miles—guy wouldn't have left his wheels—"
"He could have been a scout—maybe from a base camp. But you're right, Paul—not more than a few miles."
"If we can backtrack him through the woods—"
"We'll know soon enough if John did the same thing," she interrupted. "And we can find him—"
"Before he runs into a dozen or two brigands I hope," Rubenstein added soberly.
"Before—yes—come on," and she started running back toward her bike, glancing over her shoulder as Rubenstein threw the useless shotgun into the trees, then started running in the opposite direction—for his bike, she knew.
She reached her own machine, the Harley-Davidson Low Rider Rourke had used in the trek across the West Texas desert, the machine he'd taken from the brigands after they had murdered the survivors of the airliner crash. Paul had told her about it.
"How long ago?" she murmured, thinking of the times they had spent—times of danger, death—but in a strange way, happier times than she had ever known.
She snapped closed the flaps of the Safariland Holsters for the stainless Smith & Wessons on her hips, then straddled the machine.
She brought the engine to life . . .
John Thomas Rourke studied the panorama before him, focusing the armored Bushnell xs on the group of six men moving through the field which covered the valley floor. Camouflage fatigues, crusher hats, M-s—either Marines or Army—but forces of U.S. II. Likely an intelligence patrol, he surmised.