Her nausea intensified, as the floor twisted up and swatted her on the side of the head. She came to on the floor, and tried crawling again on her hands and knees, to get closer to the fallen men. Gas. They must have been gassed. She tried not to breathe.
She wouldn’t have even seen it if she hadn’t been on the floor already, her eyes in line with the baseboard. The tiny flexible rubber tube that had been threaded through an air vent. She could hear the whine of high pressure gas hissing out of it.
She sagged to the floor again as the door burst open. Cold air revived her, just enough to focus on the men coming through. They all wore gas masks.
She was hoisted up. The world lurched. Her weight shifted. Loud, harsh voices. Bright light. A white sky. The pinpoint burn of icy snowflakes on her face.
Hard hands, pinching her, handling her with bruising force.
She was slammed violently down into a dark box. No, it was the trunk of a car. Four men were looking down at her. Three had gas masks.
The one with no mask was Gil. He was smiling widely as the trunk came down.
“We should be there in five,” Nate said as he pulled off the highway exit. “Call your sister and tell her to be watching for us.”
Josh tapped into the phone, and listened. He met Nate’s eyes in the rearview and shook his head. “Eight rings. Voicemail.”
Nate could see from Josh’s eyes that the same fear had gripped him. Always lying in wait. Always ready. He pulled off the road. “Let me try Mitch,” he said.
Same. No answer, then voicemail. He tried Clint. Same.
Without another word, Josh got out of the back seat, using the side of the Jeep to support himself, and staggered up to the front passenger side. He climbed in, with some difficulty. “So,” Josh said. “Now what?”
Nate stared up at the hill toward the house. “I’m going to drive past the place. There’s a spot off the road on the other side of a draw that’ll give us a clear view. It’s pretty close as the crow flies. We’ll look with the binoculars and the thermal specs.”
They drove in silence past the turnoff to the house and around the draw. He parked at a wide side of the road, pulled out a handgun and handed it to Josh. “Hold this, and stay here.”
Josh handed it back. “I’m going with you.”
Fuck. The kid clearly had a mind of his own, and Nate didn’t have the energy or time to assert authority. He let the younger guy limp behind him, his filthy socks stained with mud and blood.
He lifted the binoculars and studied the house. The big picture windows were curtain-less. He could see the gaming consoles, the computers, all the way through the house. He even saw the cluster of shopping bags that Elisa had dumped near the door of the living room. He saw security monitor in the kitchen window.
But no people. No one on guard. No one watching the monitor. Fuck.
“No cars are parked there but the one Mace brought, and the one that Clint came in from Granger Valley,” he said. “No activity. No one patrolling outside.”
“Gil’s been here,” Josh’s voice was bleak. “She gave everything to help me, and that son of a bitch got her.”
“Don’t rush to conclusions,” Nate said. “Let’s go in and see what the place tells us. I’ll check the house. You stay in the car.”
“I’ve been staying where I’m told for eight months,” Josh said. “Don’t take it personally, but I’m never taking orders again. Gil took her, and they’re gone.”
They got back into the car and drove straight up to the house. There was no need for subterfuge at this point. The main door was unlocked. They went inside.
Nate saw Clint first, on the ground and sank down to feel his pulse. His heartbeat was slow, but it was there.
“There’s another guy here in the kitchen,” Josh said.
Josh had his good hand at Mitch’s throat when he got over there. “He’s alive,” Josh said. “And he’s waking up. These guys should be okay. Just hung over.”
“But what the hell?”
“Knock-out gas,” Josh said. “Gil has a guy who’s good with small combat robots. Cutting edge AI warfare. He probably remote piloted a crawler that went under all the motion detectors and missed the thermal detection. The robot stuck a tube of gas through the vent. Jamison used to brag to the others about the stuff he could do with robots. The evenings got long and quiet up on Bailey Ridge.”
Clint let out a cough and a groan. Nate slid and arm behind him and helped the guy sit up. “What happened?”
Clint shook his head. “No fucking idea,” he said thickly. “We saw nothing. Heard nothing. Then suddenly, we just went down. Bam, just like that. Jesus.”
“Nate.”
The stark tone in Josh’s voice made Nate’s head whip around. The young man was still clutching his blanket around himself with his good hand, pointing at the wall. At the whiteboard, to be exact. A big one that hung on the kitchen wall, with magnets and clips for schedules and coupons and grocery lists.
There was a cheerful border of dancing cartoon animals, and beneath it, someone had cleared the space with the eraser, and written in the black marker that hung next to the board.
CHECKMATE BITCH
“Gil,” Josh said. “That’s Gil.”
Nate stared at the word, struggling with his own rage. He heard his dad’s taunting voice in his ears, interspersed with those awful thudding sounds as he slapped Mom’s head back against the kitchen wall. You got a problem with that? You got something to say to me, dumb bitch? Why don’t you just say it? Don’t be shy. Say it!
He’d wanted so badly to kill that asshole. The one time he tried, he ended up in the hospital in a neck brace. He’d ‘fallen down the stairs.’ That old fucking classic. Mom had used it herself on many occasions.
He was shaking, hard. Rage, and fear. A toxic blend that could make him stupid. Make him fuck things up. Chill. She needs you. You have to fucking…chill.
They jerked around at the muted buzz of a phone. It took a few moments to understand where it came from.
The burner phone. The one that he’d given to Elisa, which was lying on the kitchen island. Gil had taken it out of her pocket, and left it for them.
Nate snatched it up, as the phone stopped ringing. He tried to call back, but the call wouldn’t go through. Then a notice for a text message appeared.
Some GPS coordinates, and then, Bring me the flash drive. Bring Josh. Move fast. Come alone to the meet. We’ll meet you and bring you the rest of the way.
Nate replied. Don’t hurt her
Gil’s response was instant. I’ll do whatever the fuck I want. This is not a negotiation. Be quick. No Josh = she dies. No flash drive = she dies. Too slow = she dies. Bring company = she dies. Police show up = she dies.
Nate stared down at the message, his mind racing. I don’t have Josh. He’s at the hospital ICU.
What hospital?
Amity Springs, he wrote. In shock. Broken arm, concussion. Burns.
If you’re lying, she dies. The window is closing. Move your ass.
“Flash drive?” Josh asked. “What flash drive?”
Nate pulled it out of the breast pocket of his leather jacket and showed it to him. “Nasty sex videos. It shows Gil fucking an underage prostitute at one of Shel Sinclair’s orgies, among other things. Your sister gave it to me to look after.”