Джеймс Паттерсон - Private Rogue

I turned off the service road and followed a set of fresh tire tracks through the snow. I drove round the warehouse. When I rounded the final corner I saw one of Private’s staff cars, a blue Nissan Rogue, parked by the entrance. As I pulled up beside the Nissan, the back door opened and Justine and Mo-bot stepped out.

I joined them in the snow.

“That sounded ugly,” Justine said, hugging me.

“It was pretty intense,” I replied.

“Didn’t mean to get so close,” Joshua Floyd said, emerging from the pockmarked old building. Jessie was with him. They each carried a full auto-converted AR-15 over their shoulder.

“You did great,” I responded. “Thanks for keeping me alive, yet again.”

I turned to Mo-bot.

“How are we doing?” I asked.

She leaned into the Nissan and took a tablet computer from the back seat. She showed me the screen, which displayed a constantly changing map. At the center was the locator beacon representing the tracking device we’d installed inside the bronze figure I’d given Andreyev.

“We’re picking up the signal loud and clear,” Mo-bot said.

I turned to Floyd. “Let’s go get your wife and kids.”

We followed Andreyev’s convoy along Highway 209, keeping half a mile behind them, so there was less chance of being spotted. No one said much because we all knew the stakes. Floyd was particularly grim-faced, and I wondered how difficult it had been for him not to shoot the men who’d taken his wife and children. But if he had killed Andreyev and his accomplices, there was a good chance we would never have found Beth, Maria and Danny, so he’d restrained himself in the face of the scorching desire for vengeance that burned bright in his eyes.

I steered the Toyota off the 209 onto the Glasco Turnpike, a rural road that led toward Overlook Forest. We were in the New York wilderness, a few miles from Mount Marion. We drove through a white landscape, taking care to stay out of sight of the convoy. The road was deserted and the frozen landscape eerily still. I couldn’t help but feel the nausea of anticipation as we rolled on, and somehow the silence in the car made it worse. I looked at Justine, who sat next to me, and she gave me a strained smile. Jessie, Mo-bot and Floyd were in the back, each of them lost in their own world. Floyd caught me looking at him in the rear-view and nodded somberly. I recognized his expression; it was that of a warrior ready for action.

Ten miles from the 209, Mo-bot spoke. “They’re turning off. Left, in about eight hundred yards. From the satellite imagery, it looks like a farm. There’s a trail for about a mile and then some buildings.”

I slowed as we approached the turning.

“That’s it,” Mo-bot said, and I nodded and took a left that led me between two huge stretches of tall trees.

After a while, the forests either side of us thinned and gave way to rolling farmland. I slowed down, stopping just before the brow of a slope.

“Wait here,” I said.

I got out and ran along the icy gravel track to the crest of the hill. I crouched as I approached and peered down into a broad hollow to see the SUVs parked beside a farmhouse. Three large barns flanked a courtyard set a short distance away from the house. I saw two men standing guard outside one barn.

The corrugated-steel building seemed the obvious place to start looking for Beth and the children.

Andreyev stepped out of his SUV. His men did likewise. They removed their ski masks and chatted; some lit cigarettes. Andreyev examined the Bull and said something to the men around him before heading away from the house toward the barns. My heart sank. I hadn’t expected things to move this quickly.

He crossed the yard and signaled to the guards standing outside the farthest barn. One of them turned to open the door.

I had hoped we would have more time for surveillance, but it seemed we would have to act immediately.

I edged back from the brow of the hill, got to my feet, ran to the Toyota and leaned inside.

“We’re going to have to move now,” I said. “I think he’s going for Beth and the children.”

Beth was crying with exhaustion and the children were weeping as their little hands clawed desperately at the earth. All three of them were digging the hole Beth had started with the broken length of pipe. She felt a growing sense of desperation. Time was not their ally, and she knew escape was their only way of avoiding death. Danny’s fingers were raw, Maria’s bleeding.

“Please stop,” Beth said. “Let me do it.”

“No,” Maria replied tearfully. “We want to help. We have to get out!”

Danny’s face was covered in dirty streaks from where he kept wiping it with his muddy hands. Fresh tears sprang to Beth’s eyes as she looked at her brave children.

“I’m so proud of you both,” she choked out. “Let me check it.”

The hole was now big enough for the children to escape, but at last attempt it had been too small for Beth. She pushed her head into it, scrabbled under the wall, and tried to force her shoulders through. She could see the snow-covered field on the other side of the steel wall and was invigorated by a blast of cold fresh air. She pushed but the earth would not yield. She couldn’t negotiate her way through. It was a matter of centimeters only. She pushed herself back under the wall and inside the barn.

“A little more,” she said, and they resumed digging.

She hacked at the ground with the length of pipe, and the children clawed the loose earth clear. Her spirit was almost broken and she longed for sleep, but she couldn’t afford to indulge her ruined muscles and broken mind. Her children needed her to keep going.

She stopped suddenly and so did Maria and Danny. They heard the sound of a lock being opened.

“Go!” Beth said, grabbing Danny.

“Not without you,” he cried.

“I’m coming,” she told him. “Go.”

She pushed him into the hole and under the wall then grabbed Maria.

“Take him to the woods,” Beth said. “Hide!”

“Mom—” Maria began, but Beth cut her off.

“Go.” She kissed her daughter on the head and pushed her into the hole. Maria wriggled through and Beth tried to follow. She threw herself down as she heard the door open behind her. There was a shout in Russian and she heard footsteps pounding across the concrete floor of the barn.

She pushed against the frozen ground and cried with the pain and effort. She could see the snow-covered field and the forest in the distance, but there was no sign of the children.

Please let them be safe, she thought.

She pushed desperately as the footsteps drew closer, but she was stuck half in and half out of the barn. Then she felt hands on her shoulders and turned to see the children either side of her, Danny to her left and Maria to her right. They grabbed her under her arms.

“Push!” Maria yelled. “Come on, Mom. Push!”

Behind her the heavy footsteps were close. She knew she had just seconds. Beth pushed with every remaining ounce of strength. There was a gunshot. Then another. She felt the wall above her shake under the impact of the bullets. Fear and anger surged, but most of all she was propelled by the desire to be with her children.

She strained every fiber and felt the cold earth shift. She elbowed aside a giant clod of soil and wriggled further through the hole. Steely fingers grabbed her ankle, but she kicked out and pulled her leg through. Someone tried to shoot through the wall but the bullets stalled against the tempered steel.

She heard shouts in Russian from inside the barn and knew they were coming for her and the children.