Perilous Panacea (30 page)

To Curt’s left, Simmons advanced tentatively. Curt blasted him with a flattened stream from the bent megaphone, completely blanketing his dark-brown face with a layer of the white foam.

Like an advancing ghost, Simmons kept coming. Arms extended, hands open, he groped forward one small step at a time.

Curt swung the canister and let it fly.

A strike: Simmons howled and crashed to the floor like a white-headed bowling pin.

Beecher regained his feet, rubbing his eyes with one hand and feeling forward with the other. Curt shoulder-blocked him back down, side stepped the foam, and ran for the door.

“Markum, Maxwell,” Beecher yelled.

From the other end of the hall, Maxwell hurried toward Curt. Markum ran around the corner from the other corridor.

Curt knew that if Applenu had not unlocked the office door, he’d have to face them head on, without a fire extinguisher or a wine bottle. He would end up like Surling, banging into a green door.

“Shoot,” Lormes yelled. “Kill the bastard.”

Curt grabbed the doorknob and prayed.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Like the waters of the Red Sea parted when Moses waved his staff, the office door opened when Curt twisted the cold brass knob. As he slammed the door, he heard Lormes yell, “Kill the son of a bitch.” He locked it and plunged into the darkened room, lit only by the glow from the hall that seeped through the opaque glass window. Across the room, the window of another door glimmered from the street light, and he headed for it. Behind him, someone smashed the opaque window to get at the lock.

Curt unlocked the door to the outside.

Thuck! Thuck!

He heard the gun spit as he stepped through the door. The window of the door shattered and sprayed him with glass shards.

“Kill that son of a bitch,” Lormes yelled.

- - - - -

Saul heard the noise and saw a second flash of light inside General Nuclear American just as Lori Reedan said, “Did you see that light? Did you hear that? It sounded like glass breaking.”

Saul nodded, his gaze fixed on the door across the street, where a tall, gangly man charged onto the small porch to the accompaniment of the sound of more breaking glass as the window of the office door shattered behind him. He ran straight into the porch rail, looked both ways, turned to his right, and bounded down the steps.

“It’s Curt!” Lori Reedan said.

Once off the porch, he turned and disappeared between the buildings.

“Curt! Curt!” Lori Reedan yelled and opened the door.

“Quiet,” Saul said. “Close that door!”

“It’s my husband.”

Before Saul could move, a hefty man with a gun lumbered through the office door. He plodded down the steps and headed after Reedan.

“Maxwell,” Lori Reedan said in a loud whisper. “He’s one of the bastards that came to our house, one of those that…that raped me. I lost my child because of them.”

“What do you mean raped you, lost your child?” Saul asked.

Lori Reedan ignored his question. “Mr. Saul, you’ve got to do something to help Curt. They’ve got guns.”

Saul stared across the street, wondering what he could do. He fumbled his cell phone from his pocket, located the Knoxville office phone number in the directory and dialed. He got the duty agent in charge for the night and told him he needed a task detail to raid a factory that housed the stolen nuclear material. There followed a lengthy discussion about where the factory was located in Oak Ridge.

As Saul talked, he saw a stocky guy with a gun rush through the office door and follow Reedan and the fat man. Somebody yelled something indecipherable from around the side of the building.

Saul, his heart accelerating, turned off the phone and slipped it into his jacket pocket. Is this why he joined the Bureau? He’d never fired a gun at a man. Actually, he had only drawn his gun twice, both times in a relatively benign situation. What was standard procedure for an incident like this? He should have believed her and had a task force with him now. “How many more are in there?” he asked.

“Two or three,” Lori Reedan said. “I saw Beecher, Applenu, and a dark-skinned man out here two days ago. I saw Beecher earlier this evening plus the two that just went after Curt, but that other car may mean more of them.”

Saul knew he could not go running off after two men with guns and leave the others in the building to come after him. He started the engine. With a wide u-turn, he pulled up parallel to the Town Car, with the Town Car between them and the office door. Then he pulled forward so they could watch the entrance with the Ford Fusion headed into the street for a quick getaway.

Only one chance: catch those inside by surprise, while the two with guns chased Reedan. After that he would worry about the others.

He slipped his gun from the holster inside his jacket and jerked the keys from the ignition. He turned to Lori Reedan. “I’m going to try to get inside that dark room. I figure your husband can keep those two on the run for awhile.” He handed her the keys. “Get over here in the driver’s seat. Then give me ten minutes inside. If I’m not back, get the hell out of here. If the other two come back, blow the horn, start the motor, and get ready to take off.”

“Give me a gun, and I’ll go with you,” Lori Reedan said. “I can shoot a pistol. Or give me a shotgun.”

He smiled. They might have torn this girl up, he thought, but she had chutzpa. “I’ll be okay, Mrs. Reedan.”

As he opened the car door, Lori Reedan reached out and grabbed his arm. “I can help,” she said. “I want to help get those bastards for what they did to me and my family.”

“We’ll get them.” He pulled away and headed toward the building.

- - - - -

Sweating and disoriented on a lifeless street on the other side of the building, Curt stopped to try and think. For the first time in what seemed like years, he could breathe fresh air and did not have fluorescent lights beating down on him. Here it was pitch dark, no way to see which way to go.

He shook his head and tried to concentrate on the situation. He was certain he heard his name called just as he left the building. Clear as a bell, he heard Lori’s voice. It couldn’t be. Now, he heard only the sound of footsteps. He began to run.

Maxwell yelled to Markum: “This way, around the corner.”

Curt thought he heard the silenced gun spit, but he didn’t hear the bullet hit. More importantly, he didn’t feel it hit. He ran along the side of the road. A slight pain nucleated in his left side—dues for all that beer and no exercise.

Sweat rolled down his forehead and flooded his eyes, igniting a burn. Dampness in his arm pits grew to a puddle. After starting to unbutton the long-sleeved khaki shirt and strip it off, he decided against it; a white tee-shirt would make a better target.

He crossed the street and plunged into a thicket of bushes and scrub trees. Almost as soon as he hit the wall of bushes, he ran out of them and into an open field.

Maxwell yelled. “He went through there.”

He ran through a mass of weeds and stubble where weeds had once grown; they slapped at his knees and thighs, while others brushed and scraped across his arms. Scattered around the field, black monsters of all sizes watched him stumble on. Only when he passed close to a tall one did he recognize the silent spectators as cedar trees planted at random by shitting birds.

Weeds: a tall one with leaves rough as a rasp raked across his hand, making him glad for the long-sleeve shirt. Dew-soaked grass and weeds cooled his ankles and soaked his socks and pants legs. If only he could collapse into their coolness and rest for a few seconds.

In his rush to move on, the only sounds to reach his ears were his frantic footsteps and his labored breathing.

Markum yelled: “There he is.”

With each lung full of air, he sucked in equal amounts of fire that ignited in his throat and lungs. A knife sliced at his side, threatening to open it. He had to be in better shape than Maxwell, so he had to be moving away from him. A younger and leaner Markum posed a problem.

The uneven ground reminded Curt of running in a freshly plowed Iowa field. He stumbled more than he ran: one step on a mound, the next in a deep hole. He tripped, stumbled, and went down to one knee; he pulled himself up and ran on.

He thought he detected the sounds of two shots from the silenced gun, barely audible above his crashing feet and labored breathing. The shots triggered muscle contractions across his back and deep in his chest, while his brain transmitted memories of bullets ripping into Surling’s body.

Up ahead, another row of tall bushes and trees loomed like those on the other side of the field. Another street? Houses? People?

Like the coxswain for a sculling crew, his brain called the cadence for the two pieces of lead that were his feet. Right. Left. Right. Leffttt… Instead of finding the earth in the same place as the previous step, his left foot kept going down. When it hit, his center of gravity leaned too far forward, and his momentum pitched him into a headfirst dive, like a belly slide into home plate.

He lay there, groaning, his sweat-drenched face cooled by the damp plants. His brain switched channels: from the cadence of escape to an urgent request for rest. His lungs sucked from deep within, rapid gasps that tore fire through his nostrils and throat down into his chest. Rest, got to rest, he thought. When he raised himself to his hands and knees, pain seemed to spurt from every region of his body.

“Where did he go?” Markum yelled.

“He fell down. Let’s get him.”

Curt levered himself up. Pain shot through his knee, twisted in the fall.

“There he is. Shoot.”

Three hobbling steps and his left foot landed in a hole. His leg crumpled, sending him to his hands and knees. On all fours, he stumbled and crawled for the bushes. Once more he struggled to his feet.

Although he didn’t hear the shot, he heard a bullet smash into a cedar tree to his right just as he crashed headfirst through the wall of bushes. He somersaulted down a steep bank, landing flat on his back on a rocky creek bottom, his left arm chilled in a water puddle.

His face burned, and he tasted blood from where a thorn-filled weed had clawed his face like an angry tiger. He lay on the damp rocks that cooled like a refrigerated bed. Rest, he needed rest, just a few minutes for the pain in his side to subside, and then he would be ready to get up and run some more.

He sucked more air, hoping it came with an escape plan. It came with an awful stench that singed his nostrils and threatened nausea. What to do? Run up the creek? If his throat hadn’t burned so, he would have laughed at the thought. He struggled to his feet, hesitated, and ran up the creek.

- - - - -

Lori remained on the passenger side with the window rolled down to better see Saul sneak toward the building, his eyes fixed on the office door. He shouldn’t go alone, she thought, too many people in there. She should have told him she had a gun and could use it, instead of expecting him to have a gun for her to use. How do you tell the FBI you’re carrying a gun? Probably too macho to be burdened with a woman, knowing without a doubt she couldn’t help. Should she take it out and just go along? What about Curt? Should she follow him and see if she can help? She knew she would never catch them, probably never find them. Curt had a head start, and even with his bad leg he would easily outrun that slug Maxwell.

She watched Saul work his way along the side of the building toward the door. Still no lights in the office, although light from an open door at the back of the room dappled the windows with shadows.

New shadows flashed across the office windows and then lights went on in the room. Saul froze in his tracks. The office door opened, and Beecher stepped onto the small porch, wiping at his face with a cloth while holding something in his other hand.

“FBI,” Saul yelled, his gun held in two hands and pointed at Beecher. He moved out of the shadow of the building. “Drop the gun, or I’ll shoot.”

Startled, Beecher dropped the cloth. His head snapped around to locate the source of the voice.

“Drop it,” Saul yelled, advancing toward Beecher.

Beecher hesitated and then slowly lowered the gun and laid it on top of the banister.

“Now raise your hands and step away from the gun. Higher.”

“Now, back down those steps,” Saul said, his voice loud enough to be heard by Beecher, but hopefully not by those inside the building.

Lori watched Beecher hesitate, his gaze on the banister and the gun, his massive form looming at the top of the porch like a shadowy monster. Out of the side of her eye, she caught movement of a man running in the shadow of the building coming from the direction of the loading dock, maybe from the other car. He ran toward Saul, his arms extended. He had a gun.

- - - - -

Saul watched the big man on the porch stall. “I said back down those steps,” he said, hoping no one inside heard him. Then he sensed movement behind him. Lori Reedan, he thought; she should be in the car.

“Drop your gun, Mr. Saul,” a man’s voice said from behind.

He turned his head, the gun still pointed at the big man on the porch, and glanced at a man twenty-feet away wearing a baseball cap with a gun pointed at him. “Atkinson? Austin, it’s Austin,” Saul said, recalling the NNSA picture and the face across the table at the hotel two hours ago.

“Enough with the introductions now drop your gun.”

Saul glanced back at the porch, hesitated, his gun steady in front of him. Slowly, he lowered his hand as if to drop the gun. With one quick motion, he whirled to face the big man on the porch, whose gun pointed at Saul.

Before he could aim and pull the trigger, the big man fired. Two flashes at the end of his arm, two loud pops followed quickly by two louder pops, closer and without flashes. The impact of the bullets from behind propelled his body forward and sent him sprawling. The pain of the fall and the scraping of his face across the rough asphalt masked the location of the bullets in his body. Aware of the footsteps of the big man running toward him, he decided to stay down.

- - - - -

Horrified at seeing Saul gunned down, Lori grabbed her shoulder bag, opened the door, and started to get out.

“Stop her.” the man in the baseball cap yelled. “Mosely said he was with Reedan’s wife.”

She realized that with Saul down, she would be no match for two men with guns. Footsteps pounded toward her as she slammed the door and scrambled across the front seat and slipped behind the wheel. As she fumbled to insert the keys into the ignition, she heard the passenger-side door open.

The motor turned over immediately, but as she reached for the gear-shift lever, Beecher’s big paw grabbed her right wrist and twisted. Then he was inside the car, and he jerked her left hand from the steering wheel.

“Well, if it isn’t the lovely Mrs. Reedan. You just can’t stay away from me, can you, Lori?”

- - - - -

Applenu glared at Lormes, who dabbed at the lapel of his expensive gray pin stripe with a towel, trying to brush away the last bits of foam. “All you and your people had to do was keep one bloke in line, and you mucked it up,” Applenu said. “Besides that, your people probably set this bloody place on fire.”