CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

 

 

Micah spotted Zaluski by the stubble of his shaved head, across the courtyard outside of Mountain Haus. Scratches from when they’d tussled outside the hangar still lined Zaluski’s face like diagonal war paint. And he was with Nathan Auerbach, the man at the heart of all this, whom Micah still hadn’t encountered in person yet.

Micah had met his twin brother, of course, had seen him die while slumped on his bathroom tile. Had transported his dead body across town to dump him near the warehouse in Broomfield.

Nathan was tall and handsome. Micah wouldn’t have suspected him of anything strange, if he didn’t know better. He and Zaluski were on the opposite end of the courtyard, weaving through a crowd, on a path to reach the covered bridge.

Looking at Nathan’s face, Micah couldn’t help but picture Alec heaving those final breaths, before the light had gone out of him.

“There,” Micah said, pointing. He grabbed the sleeve of Frank’s jacket.

Micah still had four zip ties in his back pocket, enough to secure both of these bastards until Gavin could come back and take them into custody. Would Gavin have enough evidence to do that? Micah wasn’t sure yet if he could tie Nathan to the surgery room.

Micah reached for his taser, but Frank put his hand on top of Micah’s. “Too many people. Let’s see where they’re going. Get them alone.”

Nathan bumped into a woman in the crowd and she said something to him. Micah couldn’t hear it, but she waved her hands in angry slashes as she spoke. Nathan reacted by slipping a knife from his pocket and slicing the woman across the face.

Micah gasped.

The woman screamed and people around now took notice of the melee. The woman didn’t appear gravely injured, but a streak of blood cascaded down her cheek. She stood, frozen, crying and wailing.

A man standing next to her took a swing at Nathan, who responded by ducking and then jumping back a step. The nearby arms of different people tried to grab Nathan, so he and Zaluski broke into a run.

“The bridge!” Micah shouted.

Frank lumbered left, toward the covered bridge. Nathan saw this, growled something at Zaluski, and the two of them changed course. Now they were headed down the bank of the creek.

Micah waved at Frank and they both raced after Nathan and Zaluski. Even though the creek was low, trying to cross that water was going to slow them down.

Nathan plunged into the creek, splashing as he high-stepped through the water. Zaluski was on his heels. Chunks of ice cracked and floated downstream. By the time Micah reached the water, they were already on the other side, onto Bridge Street.

Micah changed course, raced back up the bank and thundered onto the covered bridge. Frank was close behind, huffing and puffing to keep up. The wooden structure rumbled with their heavy footfalls.

On the other side of the bridge, a uniformed officer emerged from a shop and held up a hand, barking at Nathan.

Nathan drew his pistol and shot the cop in the chest. The officer crumpled into a heap on the ground. Pedestrians everywhere began clambering to flee of the immediate area. Some people dropped into a crouch or went prone in the street. The little faux-European village turned into a madhouse of blurred clothing. Shouts and screams from all directions.

Micah emerged from the other side of the bridge, but with the flurry of people, he could no longer find Nathan among them. Like a marathon finish line where everyone was running in a different direction.

Micah paused, chest heaving. Lungs burned from the frigid air. Frank came to a stop next to him, violently coughing.

“I lost them,” Micah said.

Frank squinted at the crowd. Lifted a finger at the haphazard mess. “There,” he said, pointing at Zaluski, sprinting toward a roundabout and turning left.

Why weren’t they returning to the parking garage?

“The gondola,” Micah said. “They’re trying to get up the mountain.”

Micah and Frank struggled to find a path through the moving organism of the crowd. Once they’d made it to the roundabout to follow toward the gondola, Frank reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a folded baseball cap, which he slipped onto his head and pulled low.

“What are you doing?” Micah said.

Frank pointed across the roundabout at three men, also racing toward the gondola. “Cops. But not the kind on our side. Those are Welker’s men.”

Micah didn’t know who Welker was, but he could tell these cops weren’t here to arrest someone. The three men were all brandishing semiauto Beretta 9mms—pointed up and ready to fire—as they disappeared between the buildings. Micah gripped the hilt of his stun gun and Frank readied his own pistol.

When they rounded the corner, a few hundred feet from the gondola, they found Nathan and Zaluski racing toward it. Gondola cars coming on the return trip down the mountain slowed as they circled the base of the lift, their doors automatically opening as they passed through the loading station.

A Liftie standing at the gondola operator’s station was waving his hands.

“We’re shutting down for the evening, guys,” the Liftie shouted. “Last ride was five minutes ago.”

Zaluski raised his pistol and shot the Liftie in the head. He spun, then he fell face-first into the ground. His body didn’t even twitch after he fell. Dead before he’d started to fall.

Nathan and Zaluski jumped into a gondola car as it slowed. As the doors were shutting, they opened fire at the cops in pursuit of them. They immediately shot two of the police officers in mid-stride, which sent them tumbling to the ground. The remaining cop ducked behind a bronze statue of a skier in mid-turn. He peered out around it, but the gondola was already off the ground. He fired a single shot, which pinged harmlessly off the metal base of the gondola car.

Micah set his sights on the still-moving gondola. If he hurried, he could board the next one. That was as close as he would get until the next unloading station, halfway up the mountain.

As they neared the cop, the guy turned and lifted his pistol at Frank. Frank reared back and punched the cop in the face before he could get off his shot. The cop keeled over, his head banging against the base of the statue.

Micah and Frank reach the gondola loading station as the next cabin was passing through. Micah hopped in through the open glass door, and he spun to reach for Frank. Yanked on Frank’s hand to bring him inside in time before the doors automatically shut.

“Who was that?” Micah said.

Frank wheezed, trying to catch his breath. “Everett Welker. Piece of shit detective I used to know, back in Denver. He was supposed to meet those two at Mountain Haus.”

Micah looked ahead at the cabin in front of them, two hundred feet up the cable. Nathan and Zaluski, standing, glaring smugly down at Micah.

“What do you think their plan is?” Micah said.

Frank coughed for a few seconds before answering. “Can’t be escape, that’s for sure. Wouldn’t make sense for them to go up the mountain to get away.”

“Then they have to have backup up there, or something like that. Some kind of failsafe plan in case the meeting at Mountain Haus didn’t go well. Maybe they have more men waiting, or a stash of guns, or maybe they’re going to grab snowmobiles and disappear over the mountain.”

“Whatever it is,” Frank said, “it would be better to find a way to not let them de-board.”

Micah peered through the glass, down at the mountain. The gondola route would take them up and over the ski runs, sometimes as close as thirty feet from the ground, sometimes two or three times that high.

Micah looked back to the base of the mountain, at Everett Welker standing next to the statue. Gavin Belmont came racing up behind Everett, then he stopped, and the two of them shook hands. Everett had a pistol hidden behind his back.

“Damn it,” Micah said.

“What?”

“Our only backup is about to be murdered by your piece of shit detective.”