The Innocent (41 page)

R
OBIE MADE NO
visible reaction to the laser dot. He knew it was from a sniper rifle. He didn’t look to the window, where he knew the blinds must be partially open. The rifle and the shooter were out there somewhere, probably within a thousand yards of a house that had just become as unsafe as it was possible to be.

He inwardly chastised himself for not earlier noting the open blinds.

He put his hands under the table separating him and her. He smiled.

“What’s so funny?” she asked quizzically.

“You ever play a game called Whac-A-Mole?”

“Uh, are you feeling okay, Will?”

He felt along the underside of the table. Solid wood, not cheap composite. That was good. About an inch thick. That might be good enough. It would have to be good enough. He would have to perform two movements, one with each hand. He drew a breath and his smile deepened, because if Julie made any sudden movements it would be over.

“I was just thinking about something that happened to me a long time ago—”

He flipped up the table with one hand so it was shielding Julie from the sniper, and drew his Glock with his other hand.

Julie screamed as Robie fired, killing the overhead light. The rifle shot shattered the window and drove into the wood and passed through it, but the barrier had served to throw off the line of fire. It struck the wall to the left of Julie.

“Get down,” snapped Robie. Julie immediately went to her belly. Robie heard footsteps rushing down the hall.

Robie moved behind the table.

He turned to Julie, who lay flat on the floor with her hands over her head.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she said in a trembling voice.

“Did you open the window blinds?”

She peered up at him. “No, they were like that when I got here.”

The door started to open. A voice called out, “Robie,” you okay?”

Robie recognized the voice as belonging to one of the agents guarding them. He called out, “Put your gun down on the floor and slide it in the room with your foot.”

One of the men yelled, “What the hell is going on, Robie?”

“Just what I was about to ask you. Who opened the blinds in this room?”

“The blinds?”

“Yeah, the blinds. Because a sniper just took a shot right through that opening. So unless you have an answer I’ll shoot the first person that comes through the door. I don’t care if it’s you or anybody else.”

“Robie, we’re the FBI.”

“Yeah, and I’m one seriously pissed-off guy with a Glock. Where does that get us?”

“There’s a sniper outside?”

“That’s what I said. Didn’t you hear the shot?”

“Hang tight.”

He heard the feet running away again.

Robie looked down at Julie and back over at the window. He wasn’t hanging tight. He pulled out his phone, thumbed Vance’s number. She answered.

He said, “Sniper at the safe house. Mole somewhere. Need backup. Now.”

He clicked off took Julie’s hand. “Keep low,” he warned her.

“Are we going to die?”

“Just keep down and follow me.”

He led her out of the room, cleared the hall, and they ran, not to the front or back doors, but to the opposite side of the house from where the shot had come. They crouched down in the room while Robie did a turkey peek out the window. There was no way he could do a clean sweep of the area with his naked eye, but he didn’t see a scope reflection, although the high-end equipment they had out there now wouldn’t necessarily have such a signature wink of light. He had no idea if the guy who had told him to hang tight was an ally or foe, and he didn’t think it was a good idea to wait and find out for certain.

They would be expecting them to go out either the back door or the window on the side opposite from the sniper fire.

So Robie planned to go out the front door.

But first they had to get there.

They moved back into the hall, and with Robie leading they made their way slowly toward the front of the house. The house was in a neighborhood with one road in or out. There were no houses close by. You had to really want to get to the place. Someone evidently had. And he had done so with help from the inside.

When Robie looked around the corner into the front room he saw the body of one of the agents lying there, feet closest to the front door, blood around his neck. Not a bullet wound. Robie would have heard the shot, and only a shotgun would have made a gash that big. Had to have been a knife. Hand over the mouth, knife slash to the neck, not much sound. Death would come fast.

Hand over the mouth. Killer would’ve had to get real close for that.

Another traitor in the ranks.

“Oh my God.”

He looked back at Julie. She had just seen the body.

“Look away,” said Robie.

He thumbed his phone keypad again. Vance picked up. Robie could hear the sound of her engine. She must’ve had it revved to over a hundred.

“Got one dead agent. Don’t know where the others are. Dead
guy has up-close wound. Whoever nailed him he thought was a friend.”

“Shit!” exclaimed Vance.

“How far away are you?”

“Three minutes.”

He put away the phone and turned to Julie.

“We’re going to go out that front door, but we need to draw attention somewhere else.”

“Okay,” she said, her gaze darting between Robie and the dead man. “How?”

Robie cleared the chamber on his pistol, popped the mag, pulled out the two top rounds, inserted the two rounds he’d taken from his jacket pocket, and smacked the clip back into place. He racked the slide, which pushed one of the new rounds into the chamber.

He edged to the door and used his foot to move it open.

“What are you going to do?” asked Julie. “Shoot your way out of here?”

“Cover your ears.”

“What?”

“Cover your ears and look away from the door.”

Robie waited while she did so. Then he aimed and fired.

The first round hit the gas tank on the Bucar parked in the driveway. The incendiary round ignited the gasoline vapor and the explosion lifted the sedan right off the asphalt.

His second shot was aimed at the second Bucar, parked next to the first. A second later it joined the fireball of the first.

Robie grabbed Julie’s hand and they sprinted through the doorway. Keeping the wall of flames and smoke between them and, hopefully, whoever had just tried to kill Julie, they turned away from the house and ran down the street. Robie had debated trying to reach his car but decided that that would be akin to painting a target on their heads.

A car turned onto the street and accelerated. Robie saw the blue grille lights. He flagged Vance down. She hit the brakes and the Beemer skidded to a stop. Robie threw open the door, pushed Julie into the back, and jumped into the front passenger seat.

“Go, now!” he told Vance.

She put the car in reverse and smoked her tire tread backing down the street. She hit a J-turn, and as soon as the hood of her car was pointing in the other direction she gunned it. She reached the end of the street and turned left.

She looked at Robie and then glanced at Julie huddled in the back.

“You both okay? Nobody hurt?”

“We’re okay,” said Robie tersely.

“So tell me what the hell happened.”

Robie said, “Just keep driving.”

R
OBIE RODE SHOTGUN
and he kept rotating his gaze to look behind and then over at Vance. His gaze was suspicious and his hand gripped the butt of his Glock. That had been unbelievably close. If he hadn’t looked down and seen the dot, Julie would have joined her parents among the dead. It was apparent to Robie that the other side no longer required either or both of them to continue living.

He settled back in his seat, but his posture was rigid, coiled. He did not think the danger was over just yet.

Vance kept her gaze on the road mostly. Every once in a while she would glance at Robie’s gun and then her gaze would travel to his face. When their eyes occasionally met, she would quickly look away.

They had traveled about two miles when she finally spoke.

“You have a particular reason keeping your gun out with the muzzle pointed in my direction?”

“I have about a dozen reasons for it, but you’ve probably thought of them all.”

“I didn’t rat you out, Robie. I’m not the one behind all this.”

“Good to know. I’ll take that into consideration.”

“I can understand why you don’t feel you can trust anyone, including the FBI.”

“Again, good to know.” His voice was flat, dead. Robie didn’t even recognize it as his.

“Where do you want to go?”

He looked at her, his expression inscrutable. “Why don’t you pick a place? We’ll see how it goes.”

“Is this a test?”

“Why shouldn’t it be?”

“Will you guys stop? This is not helping.”

They both glanced in the rearview mirror to see Julie staring at them.

“Someone just set us up while in FBI custody,” said Robie, his voice calm and even. He said again, “So pick a place, Agent Vance. Take us there and we’ll see what happens.”

“How about WFO?”

“How about it?”

“Robie, I’m on your side!”

He glanced out the window. “The guys you called in from out of town?”

“
I
didn’t call them in. They were called in by others at the Bureau.”

“What others?”

“I don’t know specifically. I put in a request for agents from out of town.” She gave him a hard stare. “At your insistence. They were the ones who were sent.”

“One was killed,” said Robie. “I doubt he came down here to die. So we can rule him out. But someone left the blinds open in the room where Julie was placed.” He looked at her. “Which agent sent you back there?”

Julie said, “The one who came to the door after the shot was fired. I recognized his voice.”

“The one who never came back. The one who killed his partner,” added Robie. “The one who told us to hang tight.” He glanced at Vance. “Just like you told me to. Hang tight.”

Vance slammed the Beemer to a stop in the middle of the road. She turned and faced him.

“Okay, shoot me, then. If you don’t trust me I’m no use to you anyway. So put the gun against my head and pull the damn trigger.”

Robie said, “Histrionics really won’t get you anywhere on this.”

“So what exactly do you want me to do?”

“I already told you. For now, just drive.”

“Where?

“Pick a direction and stick to it.”

“Shit,” Vance muttered in a shaky voice. She put the car in gear and sped off.

She said, “I heard explosions before I turned onto the street. Your doing?”

“I blew up two Bureau cars. Be sure to bill me for that.”

“You blew them up?”

“We needed a diversion,” chimed in Julie. “It was the only way we got out of the house alive.”

Robie sat back in his seat. “So I’ve got traitors in my own organization. Traitors in the FBI. A puzzle I’m not close to solving. And time is running out.”

“So what are you going to do?” Vance asked nervously.

“Regroup and rethink. The three of us are going to stick together. But we need new transportation.”

“What’s wrong with my car?”

“Principally, that people know it’s your car.”

“Are you going to steal another car, Will?” asked Julie.

“Another?” asked Vance in a raised voice.

“He’s really good at it,” added Julie. “Makes it look easy.”

“And I hope you’re just as good at driving,” said Robie to Vance.

“Why?” asked Vance.

He had his gun up and he hit the button to bring his window down.

“Because we have an SUV on our six and it’s coming fast.”

V
ANCE LOOKED IN
the rearview mirror. An SUV, black, big, and gaining on them way too fast. It looked like a bulky jet barreling down the runway just prior to liftoff.

She punched the gas and the Beemer leapt forward.

“Wait a minute,” she exclaimed. “Do you think they’re cops or Feds?”

The shot shattered the Beemer’s rear glass. Julie shrieked and ducked down as the bullet passed between Vance and Robie and cracked the windshield.