forty-three

“I can’t see them.” Dave was looking down on the US 64, flying at five hundred feet and studying the traffic heading directly east. With his experience of flying, he’d told them he would be able to discount anything but white vans in an instant. Other than the highway, they could see only a thin network of narrow roads sprouting away north and south into open countryside, with few buildings and even fewer moving vehicles.

Earlier, as they were heading out from Alva and leaving behind a growing pall of smoke from the burning front section of the jail, he had described the road layout in the area and where the attackers might be headed. “If they keep going east on the six-four, they’ll clip the Salt Plains Wildlife Refuge and State Park. Then it’s a long road to nothing.”

“Is the park big enough to hide in?” Ruth asked.

“For a while, I guess. But it’s pretty open and there’s a lot of water and trees to navigate. In a van, I wouldn’t rate their chances on staying there forever or not coming to grief with a busted axle or a flat.”

“Where else could they go from here?”

“I guess a city would be their main aim. If they keep heading east until they hit the US three-five, they could turn south towards Oklahoma City or Wichita in the north.”

“Unless they plan on joining up with Malak at Altus.”

He nodded. “There is that. But that’s close on two hundred miles. That’s a lot of driving on open roads and they must know they’ll be on every local and state cop’s radar by now. Frankly, I’m not sure these guys figured things out too well. They’re either crazy or dumb. Attacking a county jail in this territory, they were putting themselves way out on a limb.”

“Maybe that’s what Malak wanted,” said Ruth. “I got the impression from what Donny said that he’s a one-man show and doesn’t care much for the people he uses. They were a useful diversion while he disappeared.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time that’s happened,” said Dave. “But if you ask me, wild as it seemed, it still took some planning. He had to get the men and the weapons together, and I doubt he’d have gone to the trouble unless he had something to gain by it.”

“What do you mean?”

Dave turned his head and looked at her. Suddenly she gained an insight to the FBI agent and man-hunter he had once been, focussing instinctively on understanding and interpreting the situation that had unfolded. “Think about the timing: he can’t have been interested solely in busting Donny out of the jail because he wouldn’t have had time to get this team together. If we were in the middle of a big city, sure—he’d have had men on tap and ready to go. But out here?” He shook his head. “It’s too big and open. They were already on their way when Donny got arrested.”

“So why, then?” Ruth asked the question, but deep in her heart knew the answer already.

“I think he was after you. This guy’s a thinker, we know that. He knew you were out there and that you must have come all the way from London to find Chadwick. That probably shook him; it showed personal commitment. So he figured you’d hear about Donny being captured and that you’d want to talk to him. Wherever he was taken would be the best place to stop you.”

“Killing two birds with one stone,” Vaslik agreed. “Getting Ruth was one; shutting Donny up would be a bonus.”

“That’s about the size of it.”

Ruth stared down at the distant fields and roads below and felt a shiver of apprehension. It was hard to imagine any one man being so committed that he would go after a single person this way when he or she wasn’t his primary target. But then, Malak was just that; he was committed to striking a blow against the United States. A man with that level of self-belief and determination would have seen any threat to his plans as one worth dealing with, even at great risk to the men sent to do the job.

She looked up to find Vaslik watching her. He fluttered his eyebrows at her and smiled.

“What?” she said.

“Sounds like he’s got the hots for you.” He smirked and looked away, and Ruth dug him in the ribs with her elbow. She knew he was only trying to lighten the atmosphere, and appreciated it. But the thought that she had become a specific target was unsettling.

“There,” Dave said. “One o’clock heading south—a dust cloud. Hold tight.”

He took the helicopter down, aiming at a distant plume of white visible along a narrow road through a patchwork of vast fields. It quickly became obvious that the vehicle creating the dust was larger than a car but smaller than a semi truck and travelling very fast. Seconds later they had more detail: it was a white van.

“It’s them—see the roof vent?” said Vaslik.

Dave nodded. “Got it. What do you want me to do—track them while we call backup?”

“No way.” Ruth didn’t hesitate. “We have to stop them before they find hostages.”

“Attagirl.” He grinned and took the machine to within a couple hundred feet of the van. At that height they could see that the rear doors had been peppered with holes and one of the glass panels was missing. As they watched, a head appeared briefly out of the passenger side window and looked up at them in obvious shock before ducking back out of sight. The van wobbled in response before the driver got it back on track, narrowly missing a line of potholes along the verge.

“Well, now they know we’re here,” Dave commented, “we’d better get ready to duck. This could get heavy.”

As he spoke, the rear doors of the van flew open and the same man appeared. He stared up at them for a few seconds then turned and brought something out from the interior of the van.

“Assault rifle!” Dave shouted and took the helicopter away to the left and up, the engine howling in response. Ruth and Vaslik held on tight as behind them they heard the brief stutter of shots being fired. None came anywhere near them.

Dave levelled out and stayed a quarter mile out to one side, where the gunmen couldn’t reach them with any accuracy unless they stopped the van to take careful aim. “We need to get in front of them,” Dave said and increased speed, leaving the van behind.

After a few minutes he brought the helicopter round on a long curving course until they were facing back along the road towards the speeding van, now nearly a mile away but closing fast.

Ruth caught a flicker of movement to one side. Instinct told her there should have been nothing there, and when she glanced over she felt her gut go tight. A track was bisecting the road the van was on, and driving along it towards the junction was a pickup truck.

A pickup with three children in the back, waving at them.

“Dave!” She pointed. If the pickup continued at its present speed, it would meet the men in the van. And that could only have one outcome.

Hostages.

But Dave had seen them. He nodded and took the machine down fast. The airframe rattled as the wind battered the fuselage, and it seemed to Ruth that the helicopter was standing on its nose with the ground below coming up much too quickly. Then he levelled off and the tail dipped before the skids touched the ground with a thump alongside the junction.

The van was now closing in, the billowing trail of dust a testament to the speed it was travelling.

Vaslik was out first, gun in hand and running to meet the oncoming pickup. He was waving his arms at them to stop, but it didn’t seem to be making any impression on the driver.

Ruth jumped out and watched the van. For a moment it seemed to be holding its course along the road.

Then without warning the van turned and tore across the verge, bursting through a thin line of wire and rough grass. Once clear, it began to speed up, bouncing over the uneven ground and trailing an even greater dust cloud in its wake like a pillar of smoke.

This put the men in the van on an intercept course with the approaching pickup, and it was clear what their intentions were.

Ruth turned and stared at Dave, who had joined her, the rotors of the helicopter still spinning slowly. “We have to do something.”

He took in the scene unfolding, with Vaslik still running but too far away from the pickup to be able to help. And Ruth saw by Dave’s face that getting back in the air would take too long; by the time he did that, the terrorists would have stopped the pickup and be in command of the situation.

Dave shook his head and turned away, reaching into the baggage compartment. When he came back he said, “Are you any good with these? If not, say so and I’ll do it. But I’m better with a handgun.”

He was holding an M4 carbine.

Ruth nodded. “I think so.” It had been a while since she’d used a rifle, but she’d always prided herself on being reasonably accurate. The problem right now was there was no time for error or hesitation; one glance told her the van was closing in fast on the pickup, which was now slowing, the driver undoubtedly confused by what he or she was seeing.

“You’ve got about twenty seconds,” Dave said calmly as Ruth took the weapon. “Don’t waste time on the tyres—it won’t stop them. Aim for the driver’s door; these rounds’ll punch right on through.” Then he knelt by her side and slapped his shoulder before clamping both hands over his ears.

She realised what he wanted her to do. She knelt alongside him, instinctively checking that the safety was off and the rate of fire selector was turned to a three-round burst. The weapon smelled oily and new, and she wondered if this was another Tom Brasher decision, just in case. If it was, the man had been amazingly perceptive.

“Two hundred yards.” Dave’s voice was steady, counting off the distance between the van and the pickup.

Taking a deep breath Ruth zoned out everything else around her—the pickup drawing to a stop, the children in the back jumping out and staring towards the charging van with open mouths, the dying whine of the helicopter engine. Vaslik was still running, holding his gun in the air to draw the terrorists’ attention and make them slow down. But they weren’t stopping. In fact the side door was now open and the barrel of a rifle was visible where the gunman inside was trying to draw a bead on Vaslik.

Nothing else mattered, Ruth told herself. Just stop the men in the van. She breathed easily, nestling the butt of the rifle into her shoulder and bending her head to the optical sight. She felt the warm mass of Dave’s shoulder beneath her supporting arm, and the brief movement of his head as he watched the van. The view through the rubber eye-piece blurred for a moment, then cleared and steadied as she adjusted her stance against Dave and achieved a clear and steady line of sight. The van suddenly blossomed in the viewfinder, the face of the man in the side doorway bright and clear, struggling to line up his rifle on Vaslik while shouting something at the driver.

Ruth took another breath and let it out slowly.

“A hundred yards.” Dave again. “Do it.”

Ruth squeezed the trigger.