The Outsider (James Bishop 4) (13 page)

Now no longer rolling, the grinding noise of the roof scraping across the bumpy desert floor at thirty miles an hour reverberated through Bishop’s body like a jackhammer. He opened his eyes and looked at the upside-down world ahead and saw the ground rising up towards them at speed.

Then, a second later,
impact
.

The noise was immense. The car smashed against the side of the ditch, rose a few feet into the air before coming back down on its roof in a thunderous sound of mangled metal.

Stillness. The only noise came from the faint rumble of the idling engine.

Bishop took a second to check himself. He didn’t feel any pain anywhere. Not yet anyway. No broken bones. He probably had bruises, but that didn’t matter. He was still upside down, the safety belt still holding him in place. He saw Barney and Strickland still held in their seats, their arms hanging over their heads. Barney’s eyes were still closed, but Bishop couldn’t see any blood or obvious injuries. And he was breathing normally. Strickland was still conscious, though. He was just staring ahead with his mouth open.

‘Holy Jesus,’ he said, then turned to his son. ‘
Barn
.’

‘He looks okay,’ Bishop said. ‘I don’t think anything’s broken.’

He got himself into a decent angle, pressed the release on his seatbelt and slid to the roof. He plucked the multi-tool from Barney’s pocket again and extracted the blade. Reaching past the boy, he cut through Strickland’s cuffs and said, ‘Free Barney, then take cover behind the car. They’ll be coming any second now.’

‘Right.’ Strickland brought his hands round and got to work on his belt.

Bishop needed some weapons, fast. Fortunately he had immediate access to two. Maybe three. He dragged himself through the window frame on his side and saw they were at the bottom of the incline. It looked like they were in a dried-up riverbed or something, or maybe an unused drainage channel. The road was somewhere twenty or thirty feet above them. No sign of the shooters yet, but they’d be coming to finish the job at any moment.

He turned and leaned into the front driver’s seat. The airbag had already deflated and there were chunks of safety glass and blood everywhere. It looked like an abattoir in there. The smell was rank. He also noticed both the scanner and radio were destroyed.

Bishop reached up and pulled Trooper Steve’s duty weapon, a Glock 22, from his side holster. He stuck it in his waistband and also took the spare magazine attached to the holster.

Now for the shotgun. It was still secured safely inside the gun rack, and probably unlocked via the control pad on the console. Bishop swept his eyes across the inverted buttons.
There.
Top left corner. The printed words,
GUN LOCK
. Bishop pressed the button and hoped the electrics were still working. A second later he heard a loud metallic click above his head and the shotgun clattered to the roof.

Bishop heard a screeching of tyres nearby and turned to look behind him. Nothing up there yet. He had seconds before that changed.

He pulled the shotgun out and tested the weight. It felt fully loaded. These things had a seven- or eight-round capacity, but he didn’t have time to check. He erred on the side of caution. Call it seven rounds. And one semi-automatic with two full magazines. Hopefully they’d be enough.

He racked the shotgun as he ran round to the other side of the overturned vehicle, what was left of it. But it was the only cover around. Strickland was there too, crouching next to the trunk and patting Barney’s cheeks as he tried to wake him. And it seemed Barney was responding too. The boy’s eyes were closed as he moved his head from one side to the other, groaning softly.

‘Stay down, both of you,’ Bishop said and moved to the front of the car, using the wheel for cover as he raised part of his head. Seconds later he saw the Civic’s bumper and hood appear at the top of the crest fifty feet away. Then the rest of it appeared as the vehicle left the road and slowly made its way down the incline towards them.

Bishop waited. It was all he could do. At some point they’d see the empty rear seats and assume the worst. But the closer they came, the better for him. Bishop checked the Glock’s magazine and made sure there was one in the chamber.

He was ready.

When the Civic was twenty feet away, it made a slow hundred and eighty until it was pointed back towards the road. Then the front passenger door opened and the passenger slowly got out. Stocky. Wide in the shoulders. Close-cropped hair. Wearing a sports jacket and jeans. He stayed where he was and kept his gun aimed in Bishop’s general direction as he studied the wreckage. Bishop aimed his own Glock at the man’s chest area. He was just squeezing the trigger when the man must have spotted the glint of metal and dived to his left.

They both fired at the same time. Bishop’s shot went nowhere. The gunman’s shot hit the underside of the car to Bishop’s immediate right.

Bishop corrected his aim and fired off five more shots at the man’s mass. He saw blood appear on his upper thigh and knew he’d scored at a hit, maybe two. He was about to fire again when the other door burst open and the driver jumped out of the car, dived to the ground and rolled along the desert floor. He was gripping a micro sub-machine gun of some kind. Bishop stood up and followed him with his sights. When he stopped rolling, Bishop had time to miss twice before the driver got to his knees and fired.

Bishop ducked down as a stream of rounds pitter-pattered against the side of the patrol car then stopped. He stuck the Glock in his waistband, picked up the shotgun and crawled to the front of the car and peered round.

He saw the passenger slowly getting to his feet. He looked in pain. Good. Bishop quickly raised the Remington to his shoulder, aimed and fired. The explosion echoed throughout the area. The man yelled and went down again. Looked like a leg shot. Bishop swore. The aim on these things wasn’t worth shit.

He pumped the forestock and the spent shell flew out the ejection port as a new one entered the chamber. Then he ducked back as the driver sprayed the hood of the patrol car again with the machine pistol. As soon as Bishop heard a loud click, he got to his feet. The driver was back at the car. He was crouching behind the open door of the Civic as he inserted another magazine into his weapon. Bishop aimed the shotgun at the door window and pulled the trigger. The shotgun roared. Glass smashed. The driver fell back to the ground with a large red stain in his left shoulder. He quickly raised himself up, pointed the machine pistol and Bishop ducked again.

More rounds sprayed the patrol car, followed by the sounds of a semi-automatic being fired. Which meant the passenger was back in the game. Bishop stayed where he was and waited for them to shoot their loads. Seconds passed. The shooting stopped. He didn’t hear a gun click empty though.

He looked over at his principals. Strickland had managed to bring Barney round. The boy was crouched against the side of the trunk, hand pressed to his forehead as he stared groggily at the ground. Strickland said something and then left him there, quickly crawling the six or seven feet to Bishop.

‘Give me a weapon,’ he said.

‘Yeah, sure.’

‘I’m not screwing around here, Bishop. Give me a piece or I’ll—’

Bishop snapped his head upwards as something small and cylindrical arced down towards them from the sky. ‘
Incoming!
’ he shouted.

The M84 flash-bang landed on their side of the car directly at Barney’s feet.

Pushing Strickland out of the way, Bishop yelled, ‘
Barney
,
close your eyes
,’ and dived towards the device, clamping his own eyes shut in preparation.

He figured he was still two feet away when the grenade detonated.

There was a deafening explosion accompanied by a flash of white. Bishop felt a blast of hot air hit him in the face and he rolled away. Through his impaired hearing, he could hear a muffled scream nearby. Bishop opened his eyes and saw Barney was already on his feet with both hands pressed to his face.

‘
I’m blind
,’ he was shouting. ‘
Oh God, I’m blind
.’

‘
Get down
,’ Bishop yelled.

But Barney couldn’t hear or see him. His primary senses and motor functions were gone. Before Bishop could get up, Barney was already stumbling blindly away from them, still shouting. Worse, he was moving in the direction of the other car.

Bishop fought his disorientation and got to his knees. He pulled the Glock from his waistband, shook his head and stood up unsteadily. The passenger was limping towards Barney. He was only a few feet from the boy. Bishop raised the Glock. Aimed for the man’s chest. His hand wavered slightly. His vision blurred.

Then he immediately ducked as the machine gun played a drum roll against the car’s underside. Bishop hadn’t seen him, but it had to be the driver giving his partner cover. Another brief drum roll followed as he sprayed the car again, followed by another.

Bishop stood up and raised the weapon again and saw the limping passenger backing away towards the car, using Barney as a shield.

Barney
.

The killer had one arm around the boy’s neck and was dragging him back with him. The driver was no longer visible. But the car was now reversing towards them with the front passenger door swinging wide open. The passenger saw Bishop and aimed the Magnum. Bishop ducked and heard the blast and the round hitting the car. When he raised his head again, the Civic was right beside the man and his hostage. The passenger threw Barney into the front of the car. He fired another shot in Bishop’s direction and got in after the boy.

Bishop just gripped the Glock tightly. Unable to fire. Unable to do anything.

Impotent.

The vehicle took off in the direction of the highway. Bishop watched uselessly as it climbed the gradient. It came to a stop at the top and Bishop saw the front passenger door open again. The killer leaned out, left something on the ground and closed the door.

Then the car took off and disappeared from view.

‘What do you
mean they took Barney?’ Strickland yelled, grabbing Bishop by his jacket lapels. ‘How could you let those bastards take my boy?’

‘I didn’t have a whole lot of choice,’ Bishop said in a calm voice. His own vision was all right now, but both ears were still ringing from the blast. ‘The stun grenade blinded Barney and he panicked and ran right into their hands. There was nothing I could do.’

Strickland let go in disgust. ‘They took off, and you just stood there and
let
them?’

They didn’t have time for this. Bishop sighed and said, ‘Look, I was still feeling the effects of the flash-bang myself and could barely see straight. If I shot at the car in that state, I risked hitting Barney. I made the only decision possible.’ He finished wiping his prints off the shotgun and dropped it on the ground. It was too big to be of any use anymore.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We need to get out of here before somebody spots this wreckage and calls the cops. If they haven’t already.’

Strickland’s anger had already dissipated. He slumped to the ground with his head in his hands. ‘Oh, sweet Jesus, they’ll kill him. They’ll kill my boy and it’s all my fault.’

‘That’s the very last thing they’ll do, Strickland. Think about it. It’s you Hartnell wants, not Barney. If those two hitters hadn’t both been bleeding like stuck pigs they would have tried to make the trade there and then. My guess is they’re both heading off to get themselves fixed up, knowing they’re already ahead on points.’

Strickland looked up at Bishop. ‘You’re just guessing. You don’t
know
.’

‘Of course I do. What other option is there?’

Strickland frowned as he considered the logic. He was an intelligent man, but he was also still groggy from the grenade. It was taking time to get through, and they didn’t have any time left. ‘Come on, Strickland, we have to move. Let’s go.’

‘Why? What’s the point?’

‘The cops, remember? Right now our only strength lies in our freedom of movement. As long as we control our own destinies we can negotiate for Barney. If the feds get you into their custody again we lose that ability. That’s if they don’t shoot us first. I hate to think what they’ll make of this mess, but I can take a wild guess and it doesn’t look good.’

‘Okay.’ Strickland nodded and slowly got up. ‘Okay, I guess that makes sense.’

‘Good. Now let’s move.’

Bishop grabbed hold of Strickland’s arm and urged him along as they ran up the shallow hill to the road. When they reached the top, he could see nothing but empty highway in both directions. Which was both good
and bad. Bishop looked around until he spotted the item they’d left by the side of the road, about thirty feet away. A cell phone, of course. He jogged over and picked it up.

It was a cheap brandless pay-as-you-go job you could pick up at just about any 7-Eleven. It looked new. It was also currently switched off. Strickland caught up with him and saw what he was holding. ‘They leave that for us?’

Bishop nodded and pressed the button that switched the phone on. A tinny chiming sound erupted from the speaker and a logo he’d never seen before lit up the small display screen. After a few seconds, a basic menu appeared. Then a large banner flashed up on the screen:
1 MESSAGE RECEIVED
. The sender’s number was listed as
Unknown
.

Bishop opened the message. It read,
NO LAW OR U NO WHAT
.

Strickland was looking over his shoulder. ‘Well it looks like you were right, thank God. They’re gonna deal. So what do we do now?’

Bishop looked up and saw a large vehicle in the distance, heading back towards Vegas. Which was about the last destination they wanted. But beggars couldn’t be choosers.