Джеймс Паттерсон - Criss Cross

I went up the next flight of stairs and found a fifth container car, this one with three workstations and an array of computers and monitors, all dark except for two set up on a bench in a corner.

Those two screens were each split into four quadrants that showed real-time feeds from security cameras. It was obvious which feed came from the camera over the door: you couldn’t see a thing because of the mud I’d smeared on it. The next three feeds on that monitor seemed to be from cameras fixed high on the anthill; they showed various angles of the darkly shadowed meadow.

Had I been seen? No, I decided.

The next feed was a wide-angle shot that showed the road to the house and the machinery parked there. The last two cameras were trained on the house, one aimed at the front, one aimed at the back. Nothing moved behind the windows, which were not shuttered or draped.

There were no more stairs, but a fixed ladder led to the last container car, that bunker on a bunker that stuck out of the top of the anthill. It was not lit inside, and I had to use the flashlight again to look around.

It was then that I saw that slits about six inches tall and three inches wide had been cut at intervals in the upper walls of the container. Shooting ports.

And there was a sliding window cut into the wall facing the house. I peered through it, noticing that a metal flap could be lowered across it for protection.

There was a small door that allowed access out to the roof of the anthill. I opened it, looked out, and saw a winch bolted to the side of the container car with coils of rope on the roof below it. That puzzled me until I saw a low metal gate in the waist-high defensive wall that surrounded the roof.

The gate was almost three feet across and I realized Rivers must use the winch and rope to bring things up the side of the anthill.

I stepped back into the bunker and was taking one last look around Rivers’s little citadel when I happened to glance through the window back toward the house. Even though I was two hundred yards away, I saw something move up there.

I spun around, clambered down the ladder to the room with all the monitors, and ran to look at the feed from the cameras facing the house. Nothing. But on the feed showing the road and the excavation equipment, I saw something. The camera picked up the motion and shifted to some kind of infrared lens.

Dwight Rivers was walking fast down the hill and carrying a shotgun.

Then he broke into a run and sprinted toward his doomsday bunker.

CHAPTER 38

I BOLTED DOWN TWO FLIGHTSof stairs and stopped, breathing hard, knowing I would not be able to get out of the bunker before Rivers got to the hatch.

I desperately did not want this to go sideways. Will he notice the padlock isn’t closed? I thought as I pulled out my pistol. Will he come searching for me?

My breathing slowed and I heard metal scraping against metal. The padlock being opened? Or snapped shut, sealing me in here?

The hatch wheel turned. I eased deep into the shadows on the landing.

The hatch swung open. No flashlight beam. And no sounds for several long, gut-wrenching moments.

“Done playing games,” Rivers said in a low, gravelly voice, slurring his words. “Time for follow-through. Time to commit, baby.”

I crouched and looked down through the risers of the metal staircase into the hallway that led out. Was there someone with him?

“Time to commit, baby,” he said again, and I heard the hatch swing shut. “Only those who commit get the goodies in life.”

No response. I decided he was probably talking to himself. He chuckled, and I knew for certain he was drunk when he began walking in a wobbly line toward the staircase.

I saw the barrel of his shotgun first and raised my pistol ever so slowly.

The faint glow of the radioactive tritium in my rear and front sights found Rivers. He paused at the staircase, glanced upward, and for a terrible moment I thought for sure I was going to have to shoot defensively.

But then he looked away and chuckled again. “Everything you dreamed, baby. Here it is, yours for the taking…” He trailed off as if he’d fallen into a trance and stood there, unsteady on his feet.

Then Rivers threw back his head and howled like a wolf two or three times before stopping and beginning to laugh hysterically at some inner joke. When the echoes of it died, he leaned over the railing of the staircase and called down into his underworld.

“Can you hear me down there, Maxine?” he shouted. “Can you?”

He paused and listened, as did I. But no sound came back up the shaft.

Rivers set the gun against the rail, reached into his pants pocket, and came up with a flask. He opened the flask and drank from it. When he was done, he laughed softly and roared down the shaft again. “You’ll hear me soon enough! You better get running, girl, cause Daddy’s coming down there to find you!”

The doomsday prepper snatched up the shotgun and started down the stairs, increasing his pace until his footsteps sounded like someone pounding on a door. They got farther and farther away, and the moment I could no longer see him, I crept down the stairs and padded fast to the hatch.

I paused, listening, and heard him howl again and then open a door several stories belowground. The humming noise grew louder, but only for a second.

Part of me wanted to go after him. Part of me wanted to know if there was actually a woman named Maxine down there. Was this the woman who Rivers’s old girlfriend had heard crying through the anthill’s air vents?

Was Maxine down there?

I wanted to find out, but I’d pushed my luck already. I checked my watch. I’d been gone fifty minutes.

I left, shut the hatch, kept to the shadows, and made it to the tree line without incident. Ten minutes later, I exited the woods to see the silhouette of Sampson standing there on the dirt road.

“I was just coming for you,” he said.

“Sorry I’m late. Let’s get out of here.”

We were in the car and a good mile down the road before I told John what I’d seen and heard inside.

“You think he’s got someone down there?”

“Could be,” I said. “But no way to prove it for the moment.”

“So what do we do?”

I chewed on my lip for several moments before saying, “We follow Rivers everywhere he goes outside the compound. And when—”

My phone dinged in my pocket. I pulled it out, saw a Wickr text from Ali: Dad, Nana wants to know when you’ll be home for dinner.

The message vanished, and I typed back, On my way, Mr. Bond!

CHAPTER 39

I WAS THE FIRST ONEup the next morning.

By the time Nana Mama showed up in her blue robe and slippers, I’d already made coffee, broiled bacon in brown sugar, and scrambled eggs.

My grandmother stood there and eyed me as I poured coffee for her, then gave my food preparations the once-over. She picked up a piece of bacon and bit into it. “That’s good.”

“Everything’s better with bacon and sugar,” I said and gave her a kiss. “Go on, sit down. I’ll serve you this morning.”

Nana cocked her head. “Well, what’s come over you?”

“Just remembering some advice you gave me back when the kids were young. You know, about making meals family time.”

She smiled and went willingly to the table. I served her and then Bree when she came down, and we all caught up with one another’s lives. Ali arrived next, once again babbling about his ride with the Wild Wheels.

“There were twelve kids, four my age, all boys, and, my God, Captain Abrahamsen is an amazing mountain biker. We were riding in Rock Creek Park, and he hopped his bike over a log like it was nothing!”