Cut and Run 09 Crash & Burn (31 page)

Zane and Earl crouched in a depression running through the backyard, squinting into the woods. They didn’t dare fire, because they’d heard Ty’s voice coming from out there.

“Who’s after you?” Earl asked.

“Who’s not?” Zane grunted. “NIA, cartel, maybe CIA, we’re a little iffy on whose side they’re on right now.”

“God damn, son.”

Zane almost laughed.

“If we can get back to the house, we can get to the big guns, some high ground and cover,” Earl whispered.

Zane peered over the lip of the ditch they were stretched out in. “That’s a lot of open ground,” he said as he stared at the back porch in the distance. Not only did they risk exposing their silhouettes to the moon and becoming easy targets for whoever was out there, but also their own men might not know it was them and think they were attacking the house. He didn’t know where Owen was, other than the general direction he’d gone in. Zane could only hope Digger had found Ty out there so he wasn’t alone.

He shook his head. “Too risky, they’d cut us down.”

Earl shivered next to him. He’d run out into the cold night in just his jeans and long-sleeved shirt. He wasn’t even wearing shoes. Zane looked him over, hoping Earl was as fucking tough as Zane thought he was.

Movement off on the periphery of the light drew Zane’s eye, but it was difficult to tell what was real and what was a play of the lights and falling snow.

“That them?” Earl asked breathlessly.

“I saw it,” Zane told him. They both strained to see. A moment later, Zane watched two men scampering over the driveway and climbing into the back of the truck. He would recognize the roll of those shoulders anywhere. “It’s Ty.”

“The hell are they doing?”

Zane shook his head. Bullets pinged off the truck. One hit a tire, and it hissed as it flattened. Whatever Ty and Digger had gone in there to do, their movement had created one advantage: Zane turned right and aimed for the muzzle flashes in the woods, offering a spray of covering fire. From somewhere to their left, they heard a bloodcurdling scream.

“Johns,” Zane breathed, praying to God that hadn’t been Owen out there. He was alone with a broken arm, and that had been the scream of a dying man.

Earl grabbed the back of Zane’s shirt and hefted him off the ground. “Come on, boy,” he growled, and they both ran toward the house, staying low, using the distraction Ty and Digger had offered.

They made it up the porch steps, only to be met with a rifle in their faces as they tried to get through the door.

Mara lowered it and waved them in just as a shot pinged off the metal doorknob.

“Oh, the hell you are!” Mara shouted into the night. She shouldered her way past Earl and raised the rifle, sparing the briefest of moments to take aim before she fired. A dark figure out in the yard stopped in its tracks, propelled backward by the shot.

“Damn it, Mara, now ain’t the time!” Earl cried, and he picked her up with an arm around her waist and dragged her inside. “Keep your head down when you take that shot!”

Zane could hear commotion outside, and he headed for the stairs. Mara handed him her rifle as he went, then headed for the study where the rest of the guns were kept locked up. He took the steps three at a time, shoving into Deuce’s old bedroom, and went to the window, turning the crank with one hand as he tried to pry the screen loose with the other. From here he could see Digger and Ty in the truck, lying prone and doing something with the tools that were in the bed.

Then Zane understood. That was Digger down there, and the landscaper’s truck was full of bags of fertilizer. They were making bombs. Zane grinned and set the rifle on the windowsill, snugging it against his shoulder. Through the sight he tracked the men approaching the house. The light from the spotlights filtered out into the forest, landing accusingly on anything that moved.

Zane took a shaky breath, lining up the first figure he saw wearing bulky black armor, and pulled the trigger.

Another scream rent the night in the echo of the rifle, a plea for mercy to God and mother, cut short by a sudden silence.

Zane’s breaths were hard and fast to his own ears as he stared into the woods. What the hell was making these men scream like that? Was it Owen? Please let it be Owen. Actually, Zane almost hoped it was a mountain lion. Would serve them right.

A road flare burst to life near the truck.

Zane lined up another shot, taking it and missing as his target hit a hole in the ground and was suddenly too low. The bullet whizzed past him, and Zane cursed. He pulled back, readjusting. A streak of fire arced its way toward the woods. It hit high up on a tree and stuck there for a few seconds, and just as it began to slide to the ground, it burst open. Shards of the tree and flaming debris spread out, and someone screamed.

Two more fertilizer bombs flew into the woods, both exploding a few seconds after they hit.

Zane panned the rifle around the periphery of the woods, but he couldn’t find anyone. He pulled back, heading to Ty’s old bedroom and the window facing the backyard. When he saw no movement outside, no one approaching, he headed downstairs to find Mara sitting on the bottom step with a shotgun across her lap. “I think we pushed them back for now,” he told her.

Earl came into the large foyer from the living room, nodding as he heard Zane’s last words. Zane headed for the front door, opening it carefully to stick his head out. “Ty?”

“Clear?” Ty called from the bed of the truck.

“Stay frosty, baby,” Digger called to him, laughing delightedly.

Zane was almost as disturbed by that as he’d been by the screams out in the woods.

Ty and Digger both vaulted over the back of the truck, scuttling across the driveway to the cover of the porch. Movement to the left caught Zane’s eye, and he raised the rifle until he could make out Owen carefully approaching.

Ty and Digger ducked inside to safety, and Zane covered Owen until he joined them.

“Was that you?” Ty asked Owen.

Owen’s eyes were wide. “What?”

“The screams. Was that you?”

Owen jerked his head. “I got one, but he died quiet. I was hoping it was one of you. Almost pissed myself with the first one.”

Ty paled and met Zane’s eyes. Zane sort of felt sick, realizing none of them had been responsible for the dying pleas of the men in the woods.

Earl set his rifle down, glancing around the house. “Where’s Dad?” he asked Mara.

The back screen popped open before she could answer, and everyone who was still armed raised their weapons again, waiting breathlessly for the heavy footsteps to draw near. Chester came around the corner, a rag in his hands, wiping them clean. His shovel was held in the crook of his elbow, the shaft resting on his shoulder. Blood dripped from the sharpened tip of the blade.

“Got me a couple,” he said with a pleased grin.

Kelly threw himself into a chair in the corner of the living room of a ratty, old safe house just outside Charlottesville, where they’d agreed to meet the other team. Nick watched him surreptitiously as he rolled his head around and made his neck pop.

“This shit is getting on my nerves,” Kelly finally said. “I liked it better when they showed us a picture, and we went in and killed it.”

Nick raised an eyebrow.

“What? It was sort of fun.”

“If it was only sort of fun, you were doing it wrong,” Liam offered.

“I’ve decided I like you,” Julian said as he passed through the living room to the kitchen.

Liam frowned as if that didn’t sit right with him. “It took you
this
long?”

“I don’t make rash decisions.”

Nick sat down hard and stretched his aching legs out in front of him. The cold never did good things to the shrapnel in his thigh, and tension was adding to it. His eyes closed and the voices of the others faded.

Liam’s hand landed on his elbow, and Nick had his gun against Liam’s chest before he even realized he’d been asleep.

Liam put both hands up slowly. “Mate. Not cool.”

Nick flicked the safety on with his thumb, lowering the gun to his lap and eyeing the room. Julian had gone off somewhere, but Kelly was standing nearby, shoulders tense, watching with wide eyes. He either hadn’t expected Nick to wake like that, or he’d fully anticipated Nick shooting Liam in the face and was disappointed it hadn’t happened.

“You okay?” Kelly asked carefully.

Nick nodded, glancing up at Liam. From the look in the man’s eyes, he knew he’d almost died.

“The others are here, looks like they ran into some trouble,” Liam told him.

Nick hefted himself out of the chair and peered through the front window. The landscaper’s truck Ty had been driving wasn’t out there, and the old SUV they’d acquired was sporting West Virginia plates.

Nick went to the door as they trudged up the walk. “What happened?”

“NIA,” Ty answered.

Zane was halfway grinning when he added, “Digger got to blow shit up.”

Nick shook his head in confusion as he stepped aside, letting them file in.

Once they’d locked up the safe house again, Ty related what had gone down in Bluefield. “We sent my family to Texas.”

“Texas?” Kelly asked.

Ty nodded. “Zane’s ranch. I got in touch with Preston, he convinced the CIA to put agents from Austin down there to keep an eye out.”

Julian perked up at the mention of the name. “Is Preston joining us?”

“He’ll be here any minute. He said he has a job for you.”

“Excellent,” Julian said with a huge grin.

“How’d Tanner pan out?” Zane asked.

“He knew about the safe,” Kelly answered. “Said a man claiming to be Burns’s son came to him, asking about hiding spots. He told him where the safe was.”

Nick was wincing and shaking his head as Kelly spoke. Something about Tanner’s story hadn’t settled right, but he wasn’t sure what.

“Irish?” Ty asked.

Nick raised his head, surprised to find all of them looking at him. He sighed heavily. “I think he was lying as a misdirect so we’d think it was the cartel.”

Nick had a hard time looking at Kelly, who had difficulty concealing his surprise. Nick wasn’t used to playing his cards this close to the vest, and he could see it driving a wedge between him and Kelly with every passing minute.

“Something he said, about the safe in the floor. He made a joke.”

“Jack Tanner was nothing but a big walking joke,” Zane told him. “He was always really sarcastic. Maybe he hit you wrong?”

Nick shrugged. “It was a reference to ‘The Tell-Tale Heart.’”

“So?” Owen asked.

“The book we found in the safe,” Ty answered. “It was a collection of Edgar Allan Poe stories.”

“Why the hell didn’t you point this out earlier?” Liam demanded of Nick.

“Because I hate you, shut up,” Nick grunted. He rubbed his eyes.

“If Tanner suspected you weren’t who you said, he could have been playing with you.” Zane sounded almost hopeful. He glanced at Ty. “Damn it, we should have gone to him, he would have known us.”

Ty didn’t respond, and his frown deepened.

“What’s the plan now?” Digger finally asked.

The room was silent, everyone uncomfortable and tense without a solid answer.

Without a viable next step, the group decided there was no time like the present to gather their resources and get some sleep. They’d taken many extra hours making sure they hadn’t been tailed to this location. They were safe here, for now. Ty couldn’t shake off the sense that something was fundamentally wrong, but he supposed sitting here and staring at Liam while his chest throbbed from the beanbag he’d run into was bound to make him inherently uneasy.

Preston showed up not long after they did. He brought a folder with him that he silently handed to Ty.

“What’s this?” Ty asked.

“The information you asked for,” Preston told him, then turned to Julian, a smile spreading over his face. The two men embraced, holding on to each other for a long time.

Ty left them to their reunion, taking the folder over to Zane and sitting beside him at the card table in the kitchen.

“Is that the replacement cipher?” Zane asked, sounding impressed. They’d sent Preston copies of the printouts from the photos, and told him what book he needed for the key. It paid to have the CIA breathing down your neck, apparently.