Ahern, Jerry - The Nightmare begins

Karamatsov pushed a buzzer on his desk and in seconds the door behind Rourke opened and Rourke could hear the guards coming. He didn't turn around. In Russian, Karamatsov, his voice still unsteady, rasped, "Take this man out and secure him in the rooms on the lower level—watch him!"

Rourke smiled, standing. He set the burning cigar down on the desk, stubbing it on the blotter and letting it lie there. "Get out," Karamatsov growled in English.

Chapter Forty

Captain Reed sucked on the empty pipe in his mouth, glanced one more time over the shoulder of the radio operator and turned on his heel and started through the doorway. He strode down the narrow basement hallway and up the stairs two at a time to the main floor of the house. He could hear through the open doors to the library the voice of Colonel Darlington, calm, collected, and the raving of Randan Soames, the paramilitary commander. Soames was shouting, "Over a hundred of my men were killed by them gawd-damned commie bastards, colonel—and you want me to calm down!"

Reed knocked on the door, then entered without waiting to be bidden to do so.

Soames was starting to speak and Reed cut him off. "Colonel—I just checked down in the radio room personally. The frequency for the Harrier is open, and if Lieutenant Brennan were aboard, he'd be picking us up—I ordered a shutdown on that frequency. I figured the Russians could try and use it as long as we keep it open to get a fix on us. I think they got Brennan and captured the president."

Soames was still talking, as if, Reed thought, what he had just said had no meaning. "They got more than a hundred of my boys while they was attackin' this gang of renegades up on some damned plateau out there in the middle of the night in a gawd-damned rainstorm. Just come down in their helicopters nice as they pleased like they owned the whole damned place."

"They do, for now at least," Colonel Darlington said, knitting his fingers together and glancing to Reed.

Reed said to Soames, "Sir—haven't you heard what I said? I mean, the loss of your men is important, it's terrible—but they must have nailed President Chambers, when he landed in Galveston!"

"We can get a new president," Soames said quietly, "No—we can get this one back," Darlington said. "I've been considering this, and I think Captain Reed and the others would agree with me. It's time we showed the Russians we can still fight. According to what's left of military intelligence in the Galveston area, the Russians have taken over one of our top secret air bases down there—I worked there for a time. The underground complex is hardened and would have protected anyone inside from a neutron air burst. They would have been trapped there until the Russians landed and by then it would have been too late. That air base is probably being used by the Russians right now—probably where they have Chambers. Probably got a couple hundred of our airmen imprisoned there too—wouldn't have had the time to get 'em out to a detention center, or the equipment free to do it with."

"You want to make a strike, sir?" Reed stuffed tobacco into his pipe and looked at Darlington.

"What do you think captain—your boys on the ground, some of my people in the air in some more of those Harriers—could we do it? Get in and get Chambers out, maybe free our boys—hurt the Russians a little and let 'em know we're still alive and kicking? Soames' men could back you up—he's got the numbers on his side there."

"We could land about seventy-five miles from there, then push in."

"Closer than that—I can get you within twenty miles of the base. You want to try it—they're your men. Reed?"

Reed looked at the air force colonel and nodded, striking a match to his pipe.

Soames was still muttering about the "gawd-damned commies."

Chapter Forty-One

Rourke heard a knock on the door of the small two-bunk room he was locked in, then the door opened and Natalie was standing there. She was wearing a long-sleeved white blouse, a black pleated skirt and low-heeled shoes, her hair styled, make-up—it was hard for Rourke to remember the way she had looked back on the plateau—the mud stained jeans, the wet hair plastered to her face. And she hadn't looked vastly different, just drier, in Karamatsov's office— Rourke checked his watch—three hours earlier. "May I come in, John?" she asked.

"You run the place, I don't—come ahead, "Rourke told her, standing up as she entered the room.

"I thought I'd let you know—they got Paul out of surgery and they're holding him in what you'd call intensive care—but he's fine. No major damage to the intestines or whatever—I don't know a lot about anatomy. They've got a tube in his stomach for drainage, but he's going to be all right."

"That's good," Rourke said, then, "Thanks— look, I know you tried. I'm not angry at you, really— you did what you could."

She didn't say anything for a moment, then, "I saw Chambers—he's well. They haven't sedated him or anything. There's a plane coming from Chicago to pick you up—they'll want to take Chambers, too. General Varakov wants to see you both.

Actually, you're lucky—Varakov is a good man. He'll be easier than Vladmir would have been."

"Yeah, real lucky," Rourke said, not trying to disguise the bitterness in his voice.

"I brought you a cigar," she said, her face brightening. She handed it to him, then reached into the right-hand pocket of her skirt and pulled out her cigarettes and a lighter. She lit the cigar for Rourke, then her own cigarette.

She sat down beside him on the bed. "John?"

"What?"

"You aren't in the CIA anymore, are you?"

"I told you I wasn't—all I'm interested in for now is finding my wife and children."

"Tell me about them, John—all of them."

"Why?"

"Just tell me about them, please," she said, her voice a whisper. Rourke stared at her, watched the deep blue eyes, the exquisite profile.

He dragged on the cigar, saying, "Well, my son Michael is six—smart, independent little guy, but what do you say—he's a neat little man. There's Annie—my daughter, she's just four—kind of funny, cracks you up sometimes, pretty like her mother. And sometimes she drives you crazy."

"What's your wife like?" Natalie asked.

"Sarah—dark hair, brown though, not like yours. Gray-green eyes, about five-seven. She's smarter than I am. She's more—what would I say—she's more of a diversified person, wider interests—she's—"

"Do you love her that much?"

"We talked about that already, didn't we?"

"Give me an honest answer to one question," the girl said.

"All right, if I can," Rourke told her, watching the tip of his cigar, not wanting to look at Natalie.

"If you'd never met Sarah, didn't have Michael and Ann—would you have—ahh—never mind, John," and she started to stand up.

Rourke put his left hand on her forearm, his hand moving down to her hand.

"Maybe I'm crazy," he said, forcing a smile.

"No," she said quietly. She looked at the door, then hitched up the skirt over her right leg and Rourke saw the COP pistol, the little stainless steel .357

Magnum, strapped to her right thigh with a length of white surgical elastic. She undid the elastic, stuffing it under the pillow on the cot, and weighed the gun in her hand, then pointed it at him.

"John—your weapons, Rubenstein's weapons, they're in my husband's office. He's learned of an attack on the base—here, late tonight. We have a spy in Chamber's organization in east Texas. Vladmir is calling down a neutron strike at the time the attack starts, then you and Chambers will be flown to Chicago. You'd never find your wife and children. Rubenstein would be made to talk, when they found out he didn't know anything, they'd kill him then. You wouldn't leave here without Chambers, would you?"