SIXTEEN
• • •
Jed stopped, pressed his back against the wall, and listened. It had to be the man with the sunglasses. Jed was right about him after all. Unless some national park worker saw him enter the stairwell and decided to find out what business a coworker had in the subterranean dungeon. But an employee would have a flashlight, certainly standard equipment for navigating the maze of dimly lit corridors beneath the prison.
As the footsteps neared, Jed tensed and held his breath. Slowly, careful not to make a sound, he slipped into one of the old cells and backed into a darkened corner.
Though Jimmy did not enjoy the darkness, he’d spent enough time in it as a child to hone and sharpen his other senses. His stepfather used it as a form of punishment. Locked in the closet, Jimmy would sit by the door, near the line of light between the door and the wood flooring, pull his knees to his chest, and listen to the sounds of the beating the jerk gave his mother. He’d separate every sound, the tearing of fabric, the smack of flesh, the moans, the grunts, the sniffles, the cries. The swearing. So much swearing. Finally, when it was over, he’d listen to his mother whimpering and apologizing, groveling. He hated his stepfather. It was one of the motivating emotions that drove him to the Navy. He was so full of anger and hatred he needed an outlet. The SEALs gave him that outlet.
Now, listening as he moved, he methodically separated the sounds of dripping water, tiny feet, and the brush of clothing. He zeroed his ears in on the clothing. Then on the faint whisper of breathing. It was him, the target. He was ahead about twenty feet. He’d just slipped into one of the cells.
Jimmy stepped slowly, his sidearm in one hand, the other feeling along the wall. And he listened. He was so good at listening.
• • •
The footsteps stopped at the first cell, shuffled, then continued, pausing every several feet until they arrived at the cell in which Jed hid. A man swung around the corner and stepped through the doorway, a handgun extended at arm’s length and gripped by both hands.
Jed raised his own weapon. They were no more than five feet apart. Darkness obscured the man’s face, but Jed could tell by his backlit outline that the guy was young, much younger than Jed.
At first, neither man said anything. The raised guns, trained, ready to fire, were all the information they needed. They turned a slow circle, each taking small steps to the right. Neither wavered; neither blinked.
Finally Jed said, “There’s no way we’re both getting out of this, you know.” He didn’t want to shoot the kid. There had been enough killing.
The younger man said nothing. He stared at Jed, eyes wide, lips tight. A thin film of sweat now covered his entire face.
“Are they making you do this?” Jed said, continuing to match the kid’s sidestepping circle.
Still, though, his adversary did not respond.
• • •
Jimmy could have killed Patrick ten times over in the minute they’d spent circling each other. Patrick had made the mistake of talking. Talking diverted your attention from the target, from the task at hand, from the fractions of seconds involved in a showdown like this. He could have pulled the trigger and lodged a bullet in Patrick’s head before Patrick’s brain had even registered the movement of Jimmy’s trigger finger.
But he hadn’t because he’d been ordered not to. And because he didn’t believe Patrick would fire. It wasn’t in his psychological profile. The man didn’t thrive on violence like some of the operatives did. Some were just animals with no minds of their own, no free will, no conscience. They were useful, sure, but they were also dangerous. The handlers had too much control. It wasn’t natural.
Patrick was more like Jimmy. Thoughtful. Intelligent. And from what Jimmy knew of the man, he assumed Patrick wanted nothing to do with this lifestyle. The last thing he’d do was kill; it would remind Patrick too much of what he was trying to escape.
Jimmy had the advantage here because he knew more about Patrick than Patrick knew about him. He held his weapon steady, the barrel staring at Patrick’s forehead.
Suddenly, unexpectedly, Patrick’s handgun discharged.
• • •
Jed ducked right as he pulled the trigger. He’d missed intentionally, placing the bullet just inches from the side of his foe’s head. He knew the man did not expect him to fire and that the concussion of his gun and muzzle flash would take him by surprise, cause him to flinch. And that flinch was all Jed needed.
Leaving the guy no time to recover, Jed brought his forearm down hard on the man’s wrists. The gun snapped loose and rattled to the concrete floor. But before Jed could square himself, the man spun and landed a booted foot to the side of Jed’s head. The room burst with light, then went dark. Jed stumbled into the wall, his head spinning, his thoughts stuttering. His ears rang and his vision went blurry. He nearly dropped to his knees but was able to steady himself against the wall. The guy was young and quick. Quicker than Jed.
The man attacked again and followed the kick with a series of punches to Jed’s ribs and kidney area. He then grabbed Jed’s head with both hands and head-butted him just above the right ear.
Now Jed did drop to his knees. The dungeon wheeled around him, turned and turned. He thought he might vomit from the vertigo. Another kick and another blow to the head, this time midforehead. Jed knew he had to stay conscious. If he lost it here, the man would kill him. But his thoughts were jumbled, and disorientation overcame him.
But one image held steady in the midst of the barrage of blows. Lilly. His daughter. His baby girl. She smiled at him, her eyes sparkling, her blonde hair moving gently in the breeze. He couldn’t lose her. He couldn’t.
From somewhere deep inside, that place where body and heart and spirit all comingle, Jed dug up strength he didn’t know he had and cried out to God to give him the power to use it. He caught the man’s foot with both hands and turned hard, flipping his entire body and rolling to his side. The man lost his balance and hit the damp floor hard.
Jed didn’t wait for another opportunity; he needed to take advantage of this one while it was here. Holding the man’s ankle with one hand, he rolled back and pushed himself to his knees, almost simultaneously bringing a fist down on the man’s lower leg. The bone didn’t break, but the man did holler out in pain. Jed followed up immediately, bringing a heavy fist down again on the outside of the shin. And again. And again. Each time the man groaned and hollered, and each time Jed showed no mercy, repeating the violence.
With enough adrenaline now pumping through his veins to counteract the dizzying effect of the blows he’d suffered, Jed scrambled to his feet. His head still throbbed and his vision remained a little hazy, but the pain in his ribs and back had faded. The man grunted and rolled several times to put distance between himself and Jed, then climbed to his feet as well, balancing himself mostly on his right leg.
Little light seeped into the dank cell. Jed sidestepped to his right, forcing his adversary to move to his left and into the light filtering in through the doorway. This would give Jed the advantage of being in the darkness for his first move.
Feigning right, Jed stepped to his left and attacked; he charged the man with a left hook that caught him along the side of his face. The man stumbled back but remained on his feet. Jed followed him and threw another punch, but this one was blocked. Jed came at him with a right jab, but it too was deflected. The man had incredibly quick hands.
With his back now against the wall, the man continued to deflect Jed’s advances and attacks. Finally Jed let up for only a second, and his attacker took advantage of the moment, landing a knee to Jed’s groin. Intense pain and nausea spread through Jed’s gut, and his natural reaction would have been to double over. But he forced himself to ignore the pain and remain upright. To double over would make him too vulnerable, and his opponent would see the opportunity to finish this fight.
Stepping back to create space and give himself time, Jed kept his arms up, ready to react and defend against an advance. But the attack Jed had expected never came. Seeing the opening, Jed lunged at his adversary, dipped, ducked, squatted, and swept his leg with such force that when it struck the side of the man’s left lower leg, the bone snapped mid-tibia. The man howled and crumpled to the floor.
Jed sprang and landed with his knee on the guy’s chest. The man panted and grimaced like he’d just run a mile at full throttle. Sweat soaked his face and hair.
“Who are you?” Jed said. “Who do you work for?”
The man said nothing.
With the heel of his hand planted firmly against his attacker’s forehead, Jed pulled the man’s eyelid up with his thumb, fully exposing the eyeball. He then raised a fisted hand and let it hover above his opponent’s face. “Tell me. Who do you work for?”
Still the man said nothing.
Instead of dropping his fist on the man’s eye, Jed slapped him hard across the cheek. “Is it Murphy? Do you work for Murphy?”
No sign of recognition altered the man’s expression. He stared past Jed, at the ceiling, a glassy, distant look in his eyes.
Jed supported himself with both hands and kicked his adversary’s fracture site. The man moaned and gritted his teeth. His eyes rolled back in his head. Saliva ran from the corner of his mouth. He’d been professionally trained, that much was obvious, and part of his training would have been to ignore pain, even to welcome it. Jed had endured the same training. Pain is weakness leaving the body. That’s what he’d been told over and over.
Jed kicked the injured leg again. And again the man reacted but did not talk.
Finally Jed wrapped his hand around his attacker’s neck and squeezed. The man’s eyes bulged and his face immediately turned a deep shade of red. “Who hired you?”
But the man remained silent.
Just before ending the man’s life, Jed released his grip and backed off, getting to his feet. On the floor, the man coughed and sputtered. He pawed at his throat and face, smearing saliva and blood across his cheeks.
Jed could have finished him, maybe should have, but he didn’t. He wasn’t a killer anymore. He searched the man and took a phone from his pocket. Then, without saying another word, Jed retrieved both guns from the cell and headed down the corridor, into the mazelike tunnels of the dungeon.