A Better World (41 page)

“Leopard One, we have new orders for you.”

“Roger, Ground, ready.”

A stream of text began to scroll across the cockpit glass. Standard operating procedure during a mission with combat potential, don’t announce intentions over verbal transmissions, even coded ones, not when it was easy to send them—

Holy shit.

“Ah, Ground, I think we may have an error of some sort.”

“Checking.” A moment passed. “Negative, we’re showing everything green on your bird, Leopard One.”

Holly stared at the display. Hoping that somehow she had misread it. Knowing that she hadn’t.

M
ISSION
P
ROTOCOL
D
ELTA
O
NE
, and then a stream of familiar details. They reviewed all anticipated protocols before wheels
ever left runway, and she knew what this one said without reading it, but words kept leaping at her:
TARGET
and
COMPLEX
and
FULL PREJUDICE
and
AUTHORIZED
.

“Ground, can you confirm this order?”

“Roger, proceed with Delta One.”

“What? No.” Her mind was racing, and yet it felt like she was lagging behind. This couldn’t be happening. “Ground, this is an attack order.”

“Roger.” The voice cool and distant, and Holly wondered if she knew the person on the other end. “Proceed.”

Cooper’s forehead was throbbing from the head butt, one more part of his body that hurt. Pretty soon it was going to be easier to catalogue what
wasn’t
in pain.

Up on his elbows now, Ethan Park said, “You’re going to have to kill me.”

“Huh?” He bent down and picked up the revolver with his left hand. Should’ve asked for a weapon in addition to a car. But it would have meant a delay, and Soren was on his way. “You’ve got the wrong idea, Doc.”

“Who are you with?”

“I’m with the United States of Get Off Your Ass.” He smiled. “Look, I’m here to help. You’re in danger like you don’t even know. Besides, there’s a war about to start.”

“I’m . . . what?”

“I realize head-butting you wasn’t the best introduction. But then, you did try to shoot me.” He slid the revolver into his pocket, the barrel warm through his pants. “I’ll explain everything, but first, no bullshit, we gotta get out of here.”

“Let my wife and daughter go, and I’ll come with you.”

“Okay.”

“I mean it—wait. You’ll let them go?”

“Sure.”

Ethan Park stared up at him, distrust radiating from every muscle. But below it, fear, and not for himself. The man was scared for his family. Cooper could relate.

“Listen,” Cooper said, “I’m one of the good guys. I’m not out to steal your work. I’m not after your family. I’ve got kids of my own. All I want is to stop a war. And the happy news is, we do it right, it gets you out of the crosshairs too. So please. With sugar on top.” He reached a hand down. Ethan hesitated. Cooper said, “The other guy coming for you? He’ll feel differently.”

The scientist took his hand, and Cooper pulled him up. A twig cracked behind them, and his left hand flew to his pocket, fumbling awkwardly with the sidearm, stupid putting it away just to be able to help the guy up, but luck was with him and the gun didn’t snag as he yanked and pointed in one clean motion, framing up his sights on . . .

“Jesus,” he said. “You two are a pair.”

He recognized Amy Park from photographs in her file. An attractive woman, fire in her eyes, ten feet away and cocking an axe like a baseball bat. The head was rusty and pitted, a wood-splitter. Cooper lowered the gun, said, “Doc, would you mind?”

“It’s okay, babe,” Ethan said, his voice only marginally convincing. “If he wanted to kill me, he could have already.”

She hesitated, then lowered the axe. “You’re not with the DAR.”

“No.”

“Then who?”

“Right now what you need to know is that people are on their way here to murder your husband. You and your daughter too, I imagine.”

Her features tightened at that, a sudden ferocity. He didn’t need to be gifted to recognize a mama bear protecting her cub. Cooper had to admit he was starting to like the Parks. “Your daughter is inside?”

She nodded.

“Go get her. Hurry.”

Amy and Ethan silently conferred, their eyes locked. Then she dropped the axe and ran back around the house. Cooper turned to Ethan. “Anything here you can’t live without?”

Ethan shook his head. “We got robbed.”

“What about your research? Any notes or samples?”

“Abe kept all of that. What I have is in my head.”

Cooper had expected as much, but it would have been nice to be wrong. While President Clay would listen to him, it was hard to say whether he would act on their word alone. Especially without any sort of data. Of course, Bobby and the DAR could corroborate to a point, but—

Don’t get ahead of yourself. First get out of here.

The Porsche was pure sex, but it was also a two-seater. They’d have to take the pickup. He could call ahead, have a plane waiting to get them to DC. Time was running short.

God, he was tired. Cooper straightened and took a deep breath, drew it into the base of his lungs. The air was clean and cool, fragrant with the needles scattered on the ground. The bright cherry ember of a cigarette glowed near his feet, and he stepped on it idly, bad idea to be smoking out here with all this dry stuff, only the bright dot was on top of his foot now, weird—

Cooper whirled. A red dot darted up Ethan Park’s chest, and then Cooper noticed the silence, hadn’t there been birds before? He hurled himself at Ethan’s chest, a graceless tackle that tangled them and brought them down in a heap as the woods around them exploded with machine-gun fire.

“What are you talking about?” President Clay’s lips were twitching.

Leahy rose from the couch, walked to face the man.
What was Mitchum’s phrase?

Play for all the marbles.

“Right about”—he glanced at his watch—“now, three F-27 Wyverns are launching their ordnance at the Epstein Industries complex in New Canaan. I don’t know how much you know about Wyverns, sir, but they’re capable of carrying—”

“What have you done?”

“I thought that was obvious.” Leahy shrugged. “I gave the order to level those buildings. In your name. We’re at war.”

Clay stared, hollow-eyed and disbelieving, like he was trying to convince himself it was a joke of some kind.

“If we’re lucky,” Leahy continued, “we’ll get Epstein himself. But either way we’ll cripple the governing body, not to mention set them back technically.”

“No,” Clay said. He reached for the phone. “I’m going to stop this.”

“God, you really have no business behind that desk, do you?” Leahy laughed. “It’s already done, Lionel. Three planes just launched a devastating attack on a civilian building, resulting in the deaths of thousands. And they did it on your watch.”

Clay’s skin went ashen. Slowly he sank down into his chair. “You’ll hang for this.”

“No,” Leahy said. “I won’t. Instead, you’re going to pick up that phone and back my play. You’re going to order a full-scale attack against the New Canaan Holdfast.”

“I’ll do no such thing.”

“America just declared war. There’s no going back. It’s us versus them now. You can act, and secure a quick victory that saves countless lives. Or you can dawdle, and risk all-out genocide.”

“I’ll tell them it was you, that I didn’t—”

“That you didn’t order the attack? That the president of the United States can’t command his own military?” Leahy shook his head. “None of the dead will care who ordered the strike, and none of their surviving family members will split that hair either. You’ll have nationwide anarchy, riots that make Cleveland look pleasant.
Plus, you’ve never worn a uniform, so you might not understand this, but soldiers don’t like it when their commanders abandon them. I wouldn’t be surprised if you face a coup d’état. Regardless, America will be destroyed, and millions will die.”

Clay stared across the desk, a desk that had seen the rise and fall of nations, that had been here when the atom was split, when the first gifted were born. His hands gripped it like he was trying to hold on, like the wood might provide a solution.

“I’m going to say it one more time.” Leahy leaned in. “We. Are. At war. Your country needs you. What are you going to do?”

For a long, gut-churning moment, Clay just stared, and Leahy wondered if he’d pushed too hard, if he’d gone catatonic again.

Then, like a man in a nightmare, the president reached for the phone.

CHAPTER 44

Cooper hit the ground hard, the impact ringing his shoulder and sending a sick tearing sensation through his chest, a boiling-water shock of pain. Gunfire cracked the afternoon, three-round bursts like God stuttering. The window of the cabin exploded.

The pain was enormous, a razor-beaked creature inside his body, but there wasn’t time, and Cooper forced himself to roll to his side and then into a crouch. They’d landed behind the pickup truck; Ethan Park lay prone with his hands laced over his head, but Cooper didn’t see any blood. He pressed his back against the tire and craned his head up to peer over the hood of the truck. Bright flashes burst from the woods, and bullets pinged off the truck just as he yanked his head back—

Muzzle flashes from two positions about thirty degrees apart.

If the shooters were prone, the flashes probably wouldn’t have been visible.

Ending up behind the truck was a bit of luck, but it won’t hold. Assault rounds will punch right through sheet metal. The engine will absorb some of the fire, but not all.

You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.

—then dropped to the ground with the pistol aimed in front of him. Took a deep breath, said a silent prayer, and rolled, trying to fix exactly where he’d seen one spot of brightness, pine needles poking through his clothes, the smell of dirt and the cold of the ground, the gun held in his left hand and braced on his right wrist, the truck bumper, the sky, trees, a line of dense bushes, a
tall man duck-walking toward them with an assault rifle at his shoulder, the guy spotting him, tracking his motion, sighting, dirt exploding ahead, and then Cooper exhaled and double-squeezed the trigger, one-two.

Part of the man’s head sheered away, and he spun as he fell, muscle twitches making the rifle fire another burst into the sky.

One down. Not bad for a righty.

Cooper scrabbled back to the cover of the truck as bullets tore divots in the spot where he had been lying. No surprise, but these men were good. And Soren was out there somewhere.

One thing at a time.

“Doc, are you okay?”

Still prone, the scientist gave a quick nod.

“You want to stay that way, do exactly what I tell you.” Cooper wriggled his back up the truck, ready to move. “When I say, stand up, run for the house, and jump through that broken window.”

“What about the door—”

“Too slow. Ready? Now!” He stood up, exposing his head and chest, but he was already moving along the truck from the front to the bed, three quick steps chased by bullets, the windshield shattering, side windows blowing out. When he reached the rear tires, he pointed the gun and fired twice, snap shots with no chance of connecting, but they had the desired effect, made the other guy take cover. Cooper risked a glance over his shoulder in time to see Ethan take a Superman through the bay window, arms in front of his face to protect from what glass remained.

He turned back, braced his hands on the lip of the truck’s bed, aiming carefully. If the guy was macho and came out trying to aim, Cooper would have a slight edge on him. It was a terrible mismatch, a .38 revolver against a fully automatic assault rifle, but if there was a better move, he couldn’t think of it.

Come on, come on.

The gunman leapt from behind his tree. Cooper aimed, but the guy kept moving, sprinting diagonally forward, daring Cooper
to shoot. Thin trees screened his progress, and then he reached a towering pine, the trunk two feet across, good cover, only Cooper could read his intention, the strain of his muscles and his forward momentum, and he knew the man didn’t plan to stop behind the tree but on the other side of it.
Gotcha.
He put the gun there, and when his gift told him to fire, he double-squeezed the trigger.