Джеффри Дивер - The Final Twist

Droon: “I’ll text the Men in Black. They’ll get one.”

“Soon. Out in the open here. Don’t like it.”

Droon sent the message. He was grinning. “But maybe he’ll cooperate ’fore they get here. And we’ll just leave him be.” He gestured toward Blond. They rolled the dumpster into the mouth of the alley, largely protecting them from view. Blond used only his left hand and kept the gun trained near Shaw. The safety was off, the finger outside the trigger guard. He knew what he was doing.

Shaw’s impression was that neither man reported to the other. Blond, a facilitator like Droon, would also work for Braxton.

“Now, son, let’s have ourselves a confab, don’tcha know?” He reached under his jacket and withdrew a knife from a camo scabbard. Shaw recognized it. Long, serrated. It was a SOG SEAL Team Elite fixed blade.

Looking around, Shaw judged angles and distances.

No good defensive solution presented itself, let alone an offensive one.

“Number one, that manuscript of your daddy’s you so kindly let me have down in Silicon Valley coupla weeks ago, that was just a waste of good tree, wasn’t it?”

Not for Colter Shaw, it wasn’t. The four-hundred-some-odd-page stack of notes, maps, drawings and articles that Ashton had assembled was ninety-nine percent misdirection. But it contained the code that had directed Shaw to Echo Ridge, where he found the map and the letter that led to the Alvarez Street safe house and started Shaw on his mission here.

“I wouldn’t know. You stole that from me too, didn’t you? I never had a chance to read it. Did it have anything interesting in it?”

Shaw wondered if a passerby, someone in a window or on a rooftop, seeing a man with a gun, would call the police.

Droon was pointing the wicked blade Shaw’s way. “How’d you find our library? Your daddy knew about it, did he?”

“Think he mentioned it.”

“And you remembered that? From all those years ago?”

Blond said nothing. He was a block of wood, if wood could be attentive, suspicious and deadly.

Shaw told Droon, “I have a good memory. I’m lucky that way.”

“Naw, naw. There’s someplace here. Your daddy’d have a buddy in town you’re staying with.” He looked him over closely. “Or maybe a safe house all his own. Yep, betcha.”

Somebody must have seen the pursuit and called 911.

But not a siren to be heard.

Not a ripple of flashing light to be seen.

Shaw was watching Blond. The big man’s face was completely placid, as if were he to have any emotion that might distract him, that would lower his defenses. The eyes scanned constantly, the coal-black dots complementing the swarthy face, jarring with the sunburst of yellow hair.

Droon was a wild card. Blond was a pro.

Blond asked, “Where should we take him? The basement?”

“Library’s compromised. I’d say the Tannery.”

Not, of course, a place where you morphed into a beach bum under UV rays.

Droon sent another text and read the reply. He told Blond: “Irena’ll meet us.”

Shaw leaned toward the scrawny man. “Will Helms be there too? I hope so.”

Droon was silent for a moment, unmoving, as if trying to process Shaw’s interest and intent. “He went back to the hotel.”

Not getting his hands dirty in sports like torture.

“But Irena’s lookin’ forward to our chat. As much as I am. Probably more. I do assure you, friend, that you will not like what’s going to happen.” He mimicked stabbing and twisting motions with the blade.

Shaw shrugged.

Droon thumbed the steel. “Everybody breaks, don’tcha know? Tell us what you’ve found out about Gahl and what he stole from us. You do that, and you’re free to go. Get yourself a gelato.”

“I don’t like it,” Blond said.

The rattish man glanced not toward his companion but toward Shaw.

“His eyes. He’s working something. Doesn’t look that bothered.”

Droon said, “Checking stuff out, is all. He does that. The first time we met... Remember that, Shaw? I was having a laugh with a harmless little firebomb and you were sizing me up — and down and sideways. Every whichaway.”

Blond muttered: “He’s planning a move.” He removed something from his inside jacket pocket. It appeared to be a thick rod of black metal, about a foot long. He said, “I cover him. You break something. Take him out of commission.” He offered the bludgeon to Droon.

The man took it and slipped the knife back in its sheath. He nodded to the gun that Blond was holding. “Why not?”

“You need him alive. Don’t want to risk a bleeder.”

A pro’s pro...

Droon seemed to agree. He hefted the rod and his expression reported that he liked the idea of breaking bones.

“Shaw, sorry t’have to do this. But, fact is, you just don’t look desperate. You know what I’m saying? My word, you are the least desperate-looking person I have ever seen on this earth. You’re not wasting time on worry; you’re running through a big list. What can I do with this, what can I do with that?”

Pretty much.

There’s not a lot an unarmed man can do in combat against two opponents when one of them is holding a gun and the other a bone-breaking rod with a knife on his belt.

With some cheer, Droon said, “Man up. Hold your hand out and let’s do this fast...” He cocked his head and gave an odd grin, which pinched his face. “Or, better idea, you can tell us what you know. And waltz around an icky bout of pain now followed by the main course — a trip to the Tannery with my knife.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Okay, hand out.”

Shaw held his right arm out.

“Nup. Other one. You may need to write down your ABCs for us, draw a pretty map, or some such.”

Shaw did as instructed.

He now incrementally shifted his balance, so that most of his weight was on his right leg. When Droon swung the bar, Shaw’s right hand would move in an arc and clamp down on the man’s wrist. The mass of the heavy rod meant the slim man’s arm would be driven toward the ground and he’d be off-kilter. Shaw would then spin him sideways, turning him into a shield against Blond’s weapon and executing a choke hold, rendering Droon largely nonresponsive.

Shaw’s right hand would dip into the jacket for the pistol he hoped the man still had on him and draw. He wouldn’t threaten Blond, tell him to drop the SIG. He’d just fire away. He’d aim for the gun arm and hand. He recalled where the safety was located on Droon’s Beretta.

If Droon didn’t have the gun, or if Shaw couldn’t get to it instantly, he’d rip the bar from Droon’s hand and fling it toward Blond’s face, then break a wrist and pull the knife.

He and his siblings had been taught the art of knife throwing by Ashton. It was hard to hit your target with the point, but you could count on your enemy to be distracted by a spiraling razor-sharp blade. Shaw would charge Blond when he ducked and try to wrestle the SIG from his hand.

If not, as a last resort, he’d vault the dumpster. The other men didn’t look like they could follow him in a leap. It would take some seconds to push the unit out of the way. He would turn back toward the library — the direction they would least expect him to run, and the one with the fewest innocents on the street.

Shaw plastered an expression of dread on his face as Droon stepped forward, hefting the metal. The facilitator’s gaze was one of pleasant anticipation.

Four feet away, three feet...

Playacting again, Shaw said, “Look, let’s work this out, can’t we? Money. You want money?”

Droon was drawing back with the bar.

“Wait.”

Droon was beaming. “Don’t you go whining, there, boy.”