Terrorbyte (25 page)

Someone shouted behind me. I ducked behind the far bunker then raced for the road.

My face hit the dirt, as someone landed on top of me – all the breath in my body escaped in one gasp. I clenched my fist and jabbed my right elbow backwards. He groaned and moved slightly, trying to grab at me. I rolled over, pulled my legs up and kicked. Both feet hit his lower abdomen. He snarled and tried to grab my feet. His voice rasped under the exertion, “Come here, bitch!”

I rolled out of reach and stood up. I could see him properly. It was the soldier, on his feet.  Metal flashed. The knife again. I couldn't see the other man but assumed he was close by – I wasn't about to take my eyes off the guy with the knife to look for him.

I watched his shoulders and eyes for his next move. The knife moved back and forth in his right hand. I backed away. A hand in my back shoved me forward.

So the man in the black pants was behind me. Good to know.

Enough playing around. I raised my forearms to cover my body and watched the blade. As the blade rushed down I stepped inside the path of his knife and it caught my forearm. I punched him as hard as I could in the side of the neck. Using both hands I grabbed his neck and his knife hand, pushing the knife away from me while grasping his neck firmly. With a step backwards I forced him to the ground, shoving his face in the dirt.

I whispered in his ear, “Don't fuck with me, Marine.” I straddled his back and dropped my knees onto his biceps. As I reached down to pry the knife from his hand, I remembered the other guy.

Someone hit me in the back. Once. Twice. I slipped sideways trying to take the knife with me. I couldn't hold it. My hand stopped working. I looked down at blood.

Something hard hit the back of my head turning the scene in front of me blue, then black. The now-faint motherly voice in my head whispered, ‘Hold on, Ellie, just hold on.'

My head turned slowly.  A gun came into view lying on muddy stones, just out of reach. How did a gun get there? Where was the knife?

My right arm lay bent in front of me. A pool of sticky red oozed from underneath, spreading out among the pebbles in the mud. There was considerable resistance as I tried to lift my arm, so I rolled my arm and hand, palm up, to inspect the damage. A deep wound ran at least four and a half inches down the inside of my forearm and blood flowed freely. That was going to smart a bit. The absence of overwhelming pain told me I was in the grace period between trauma and pain. If I didn't move now I never would. I knew I was looking at a defensive wound. A fight. The two men who kidnapped me. There was a fight, and for whatever reason I was still alive.

The fingers on my right hand twitched. I covered the gaping wound with my left hand and pressed hard, hoping to stem the flow of blood. I needed the gun: to achieve that I needed to exercise control over that arm. I made a decision to do it A-sap before the pain started. I had to let go of the wound to reach the gun. My hand scraped the muddy dirt, raking up stones, scrabbling in sandy muck. As my fingers inched towards the gun, blood spread like gravy onto the stones.

It seemed my hand was capable of reacting only to every other instruction from my brain. It wasn't moving properly nor were my fingers capable of grasping. It felt like someone had turned off the power but rogue current was still filtering through at random intervals.

A shadow moved. Shit.

I half closed my eyes, letting them roll back a little in my head, barely breathing and hoping to go unnoticed.

Don't let him take the gun.

The shadow moved away. I waited, then carefully focused on where it had come from. About six or seven feet from me, I saw legs, the backs of legs wearing dirty denim. I willed the person not to turn around. I breathed in deeply and smelt bourbon. Why was I still alive? Why hadn't they killed me outright?

Every ounce of energy and determination coiled into my good arm. I knew I had to roll to grab the gun. The damage to my right arm was too great, and I would never be able to grasp, hold and shoot. Assuming I could roll and there weren't any other injuries. One chance: roll to the right, snatch the gun and shoot, before he turned around. I didn't have the energy to fight. I took my only chance. One, two, my arm flung over my body, taking my shoulder with it. I felt the rubber as my fingers wrapped around the grip, index finger sliding onto the trigger.

I leaned heavily on my elbows; my blood-covered hands made the grip slippery. He was talking on his cell phone. I hoped I could hold the gun steady for long enough to find out what was going on.

I croaked, “FBI. Put your hands up.”

The man spun to face me. His face first registered surprise, followed by anger. He ran towards me, drawing a weapon.

I squeezed the trigger. The first shot hit him in the middle of the chest, the second in the forehead, moments before he fell face forward. He and his phone hit the dirt at the same time. Firing sent shock waves of pain through my arm and left a bloody splatter as my elbows gave way and my arms hit the ground. Grace period was ending. I needed his phone. I scrabbled to my knees and then my feet and staggered as I tried to walk upright, the gun still in my left hand. I kicked his gun as far away as I could without losing my balance. I shoved my gun into the waistband of my jeans, half fell, half knelt down, picked up his phone and looked at the last number dialed.

The voice in my head said, remember that number, Ellie. I nodded. Then another voice told me the number would stay in the phone's memory anyway. It was a relief to know I didn't have to squander brainpower. Using the phone in my left hand, I pressed 911. My knees wouldn't let me stand. I toppled, falling back hard. Automatically, my right arm went down behind me to protect me from the fall. Violent pain erupted. It skipped my arm and went directly to my head, as a robotic-sounding voice spoke in my ear.

“What service do you require?”

I cleared my throat, my mouth was dusty and dry and I don't even know if my voice was audible, “All of them.”

“Ma'am?”

“Special Agent Conway, FBI. I need help.”

The robotic voice became softer, “Agent Conway, where are you?”

All I could see was sandy dirt and dust and almost-dried muddy puddles. “Between reality and a dream.”

“Keep the cell phone turned on; we're trying to get a fix on your position.”

Yeah, great, good luck with that.

I wondered if anyone had noticed I was missing. Had that woman called to say what happened? Where was Mac? Where was Lee? What happened to Sam? I never went anywhere without one of them. Even seeing Praskovya would have been comforting about now. In front of me, there was a car. It looked like my car. I couldn't see the tags. The phone beeped. I glanced at it. Low battery. It slipped from my hand as I struggled to my feet. Once erect I knew I couldn't pick it up again and I left it on the ground. With my right arm cradled against my body, I walked carefully. I leaned on the driver's door and peered into the closed window. That was my jacket on the passenger seat. The doors were unlocked. I opened the door and eased into the driver's seat. My brain kicked in. I had GPS; all was not lost.

I will be okay.

The keys were in the ignition. I turned the key, bringing the onboard computer to life. There it was on the screen, my coordinates, even the name of the road. I hit the central locking button on the driver's door, then locked my door. Why didn't my driver's door automatically lock like the other doors? The car phone sat idly in its cradle on the dash, watching me. Finally I registered that the little blue light was flickering. My phone was on standby waiting for instructions. I stared at it then remembered the voice tags and heard mom's voice loudly in my head. “Call Mac!” I said, hoping my voice was stronger than it felt.

I wrapped my left hand around the wound on my right arm. It didn't help much.

Mac answered on the fourth ring, “Ellie?”

“I made a 911 call but I have my car now and I know where I am.”

“Jesus.” I pictured him running his free hand through his hair. “Where are you?”

My lips had stuck together, making speech difficult, “Will send directions to your truck and to EMS.”

There was a long sigh from Mac. I'm sure he didn't want to hear the EMS bit.

“I'm on Deakyne Road, Fort Belvoir.”

I let go of my arm. It throbbed. I sent the directions then opened the glove compartment and fumbled out a bottle of water. I took small sips of the warmish liquid but could hardly swallow. My throat hurt. “Please hurry, Mac.”

My shirt was stuck to my back in places. I leaned forward; it stayed stuck but didn't hurt. I decided it was sweat and refused to pursue any alternative lines of thought.

The man I'd killed was not either of the men who had abducted me. Where the hell were they? I thought back and remembered the woman and the children on the side of the road. Why take me? How had anyone known where I was going? I was supposed to meet McNab. It was a trap. Was the dead person something to do with the case? If this was our Unsub, why was I still alive? From the relative security of the car, I could see a half-full bottle of bourbon lying not far from the marks I'd made in the gravelly sand. The sight of the bottle sent a chill up my spine. I looked at my bloodied forearm. I reached under the seat and dragged out the first-aid kit. I heard Lee's voice, as if he were there, telling me to apply pressure, so I lay a thick pad of as many wound dressings as I could on the gash and bound it tightly with gauze. Not a bad field-dressing attempt. Blood began seeping through almost immediately. I scrabbled one-handed in the first-aid kit looking for the telltale foil hemostatic sponge packets and found one. I ripped it open with my teeth, removed the soaked, now dripping, bandages and shoved the sponge into the wound.

With a roll of hemostatic gauze, I wrapped the entire site, applying as much pressure as I could. Then took a triangle bandage and made a sling. My theory was if I could hold my arm against my body with my hand up on my shoulder it might help. It certainly helped with the throbbing. For the second time in a week I was pleased that we had decent first-aid kits and that the government had sprung for QuikClot trauma packs. I reclined my seat a little, making it harder to see me. Just in case there was someone else around.

Whoever the man was, he'd been talking to someone before I interrupted him. The number popped back into my head. I dialed it on the car phone. It was the best way I could think of to keep it safe. A man with a Russian accent answered. I hung up. Another Russian? I was starting to feel that we lived in Eastern Europe, not Northern Virginia. I felt safe in the knowledge that my car phone number was permanently withheld and confidential. It would not show up even with caller ID. Wouldn't even show on his phone if he tried to call me back.

Where had my charming abductors gone? When did the dead guy arrive? I had no memory, not even a glimmer that explained those things.

A low-flying Apache helicopter stirred the water in the bay, whipped up sand and rocked the car. For a second, I thought it was the cavalry coming to save me but it flew on over. My eyes wanted to close. I needed to take a nap, just a little one. I checked the door locks again.

I forced my eyes to remain open just long enough to look around the area. Two bunker-type structures: I'd seen them before. No sign of life. I thought back to the reason I'd set off from Washington alone.

I was supposed to meet someone at Tulley: McNab. Had he set me up? Was this what was so damned important?  Setting me up?

I knew I needed a pass to get onto the base but I hadn't planned on being on the base until after the meeting, and had intended to use Tulley Gate, like all visitors. Yet I knew whoever had brought me here used a different gate and the other car had a Department of Defense decal.

My everything hurt. I turned my attention back to the outside and surrounding area.

What could I see? Another car but not the car I'd seen when we'd first arrived here. The body of the man. A bottle of bourbon. I couldn't see anyone else and as my eyes closed I wondered how long it would be before the person on the other end of the phone turned up to find out what happened.  The need to know the identity of the Marine who drove the other car gnawed at me.

A loud bang jerked me awake. My vision was still slightly blurry. Someone was banging on the car window: a dark-haired male. I blinked. I heard my name. The door unlocked before I was conscious of actually unlocking it.

“Come on.” Mac helped me out. “You okay?”

I knew I smiled as I said, “Yeah, I'm okay.” Tired but I think I'm okay. No, better not to think, just be okay.

“Let's get you out of here.” Mac's arm slipped around my shoulders. I was safe.

Lee yelled, “We got company coming!” He was facing away from us, down the road. “Two cars maybe.”

I couldn't see anything but a cloud of dust.

“Could it be EMS?” I asked.

“They're not on base yet; they're waiting for our okay.”

I did a mental head slap. Of course, they'd secure the area first. Mac and Lee would have overridden my EMS call until everything was secure. “Hey, wait a minute, this base has a hospital.” I swallowed a surge of panic; I didn't want to be trapped anywhere within the base. “Do not let them take me to the base hospital. We need to get out of here.”

“I won't.”

Mac steered me towards a Ford Expedition parked twenty feet away. The familiar black-tinted windows and shiny black exterior was a comforting sight. A loud engine noise from behind made us both turn. I knew instantly it was too late. Mac turned back to the truck and in that split second something whizzed past my head. I looked around and Mac was gone. He lay sprawled face down in the muddy sand.

Lee yelled from my right, his voice grew louder as he came closer. “Do not do this, Mac. Cowboy – the fuck up! Do you hear me?”