The Protector

6

They dropped to the water. When they rushed into the corridor, the glare of the lights on the floor revealed ten bodies. Cavanaugh grabbed a submachine gun and prepared to shoot in case anyone was faking. He saw the contorted body of a man in a business suit, a doctor's valise next to him. He saw Edgar lying facedown in the water and reached into the man's baggy pants pockets, removing the Emerson knife and the Sig Sauer he'd expected to find there. He gave the handgun to Jamie and shoved the knife in his own pocket.

Grace. Damn it, where was Grace?

Hurried footsteps directed Cavanaugh's attention toward the end of the corridor. Silhouetted by sunlight, a figure darted up the steps toward the entrance.

Cavanaugh fired.

Bullets struck the steps, but Grace had already vanished through the opening, ducking to the left. Evidently, she had pressed the remote control on her belt. The concrete door began to descend.

Cavanaugh raced toward the steps, wondering how the hell Grace had survived. She must have been standing away from the water. Perhaps she'd been wearing rubber-soled shoes.

The concrete door sank lower. Cavanaugh heard Jamie charging behind him, but all he concentrated on was reaching the steps and lunging up them.

The gap of light was only two feet high now. He dove sideways, scraping his bare shoulders and back when he rolled. His body and then his shoes cleared the door a moment before it thudded into place.

In eye-stabbing light, he caught a glimpse of four startled men as he rolled upward and pulled the trigger, muscle memory controlling the length of time he pressed his finger against it. Tap. Tap. Tap. Three and four rounds at a time burst from the MP-5.

One man lurched back, blood spurting from his unarmored chest before he could raise his weapon. Another man did manage to raise his weapon, the wallop of bullets into his face deflecting his aim toward the sky as he fired and then dropped.

The third and fourth men scurried toward the rubble of the collapsed barn.

At the same time, Cavanaugh raced toward what remained of the burned mansion.

He dove behind the remnants of a stone wall just before the two men opened fire, bullets ricocheting. He hurt his bare chest when he landed on stones, but he didn't care-all that mattered was surviving, killing whoever blocked his way, and getting Jamie out of there.

But to open the door, he needed the remote control on Grace's belt. Where was she? Cavanaugh hadn't noticed her when he'd shot and run for cover. She'd disappeared to the left of the entrance, which was now on Cavanaugh's right. Her Ford Explorer was in that direction. Was she using it to hide?

A dark green station wagon, presumably the doctor's, was in front of the Explorer. Grace might be inching along them, trying to outflank me, Cavanaugh thought. Peering through a gap in the stones, he didn't have a vantage point that allowed him to see under the vehicles, where the movement of Grace's shoes might tell him what she was doing.

Likewise, the ringing in his ears prevented him from hearing faint sounds that might have warned him of what Grace or the two men were up to. His heart pounded furiously as he realized that he'd landed in a trough that one of the gunmen had made when the assault team had hidden among the rubble. To his left were similar troughs where wreckage had been removed. He crawled through them, over rubble, following the length of the collapsed stone wall. Trying to make as little noise as possible, he searched for a gap in the stones, a place through which he could study the ruins of the barn and perhaps get a better view of the vehicles to his right.

He examined the MP- 5 in his hands. Its magazine was capable of holding thirty rounds of 9-mm ammunition. He tried to judge how many rounds he had remaining. He'd fired three bursts. He'd been trained to release approximately four rounds per burst. But perhaps he'd fired more. Assuming he'd shot sixteen rounds, that left fourteen in the magazine-if it had been fully loaded-and one in the firing chamber, if the gunman had inserted a round there before attaching the magazine.

Be conservative, he thought. Assume you've got only twelve rounds.

He flicked the selection lever from automatic to the single-fire position. He extended the butt from a slot in the MP-5's frame, trying to make it aim like a rifle. When he raised himself to peer through the gap in the stones, he saw movement in the barn's rubble, to the right and left of the closed door. But before he could shoot, bullets struck the stones near his head, forcing him down. His forehead stung. Liquid trickled from it. When he touched his brow, his finger came away with blood from where a chunk flying off the stones had grazed him.

He picked up a charred piece of board and tossed it underhand toward where he'd first landed behind the wall. He hoped that the clatter would make the gunmen think that he'd returned to that position. Peering quickly through the gap he'd just used, he saw the man on the right raise his head from cover, aiming toward where he'd thrown the board.

Cavanaugh fired, hitting the man's shoulder, knocking him down. Immediately, he ducked below the gap as a volley from over there blasted the area through which he'd been peering. More chunks of stones flew, dust rising. He felt little elation that he'd hit one of the men. The wound hadn't been center of mass. It wouldn't have been incapacitating. The man was still a threat.

Jamie, he thought. She'll go out of her mind down there. Maybe some of the gunmen aren't dead. Maybe she'll have to fight.

Stop thinking.

He squirmed farther to the left along the collapsed wall, snaking over wreckage, scraping his chest more severely. He came to the edge of the ruins and realized that the men at the collapsed barn couldn't see him if he stayed low when he shifted along this far side. If he could reach the front and creep along to the opposite side, he'd have a chance of surprising his hunters. He would also have a chance of surprising Grace if she was behind the Explorer and the station wagon to the right of the collapsed barn.

When Cavanaugh reached the front of the wreckage, he found the Taurus where Jamie had parked it. Not that it did him any good. Without the ignition key, he couldn't start the car unobtrusively enough to be able to use it as a surprise weapon. In front, the rubble was high enough for him to run in a crouch. Blood oozed from the scrapes on his chest. His tongue felt thick. He peered around the next corner, seeing the station wagon and the SUV near the ruins of the barn. Their sides were angled toward him, concealing what was behind them, but from this vantage point, he could hug the ground and see under the vehicles.

Beneath the Explorer, Grace's sturdy walking shoes were visible near the front tires. He saw the cuffs of her khaki slacks. She knew enough to crouch behind the engine, the only spot where a high-powered bullet couldn't go all the way through. Then Cavanaugh saw movement just above the hood. Near the windshield, blond hair showed as Grace raised her head slightly to peer toward the collapsed wall at the back of the mansion. The angle of her gaze prevented her from noticing where Cavanaugh studied her from the front corner.

The MP-5 had a range of 220 yards. In contrast, the Explorer was about seventy-five yards away. But under the circumstances, the distance was considerable. Cavanaugh wondered if his aim would be accurate enough to hit so small a target-the top of her head showing above the hood-with a weapon whose barrel was short and whose sights he hadn't calibrated. After everything he'd been through, his hands felt unsteady. His nervous breathing would also be a liability, making it difficult for him to keep his arms still. If he missed the shot, he'd have exposed his position. All Grace and the two men would need to do would be to separate and make a wide circle toward the front, catching him in a pincer movement.

Changing his mind, he pressed his bare stomach to the ground. In this position, propping the MP-5 against the dirt, he had a better chance of keeping the weapon steady. With both eyes open, he aligned the front and rear sights, keeping them in focus while he aimed under the Explorer toward Grace's shoes and shins. Although her feet were apart for balance, the angle from which he viewed them made them seem together, giving him a better target than the top of Grace's head. He held his breath, braced his arms, and flexed the trigger.

The crack of the shot was so loud that he couldn't hear the bullet's impact, but he did hear a scream from behind the Explorer. Staring under the vehicle, he saw Grace fall to the ground, her pain-contorted face near one of the SUV's front tires. To readjust his aim, he had to peer farther around the corner. Grace saw his movement and pointed a handgun under the Explorer in his direction. He rolled back an instant before a bullet tore away a chunk of burned wood.

"The bastard's on this side!" Grace shouted. "At the front!"

Cavanaugh rose to a crouch and hurried along the front of the ruins, going back the way he'd come, toward the left side of the mansion. Nearly sick with the shock of the fight-or-flight hormones rushing through him, he relied on all his training, all his years of combat experience, all the nerve that he could muster, and charged past the corner. A shocked gunman froze. Having responded to Grace's shout and rushed from the barn, the man was halfway along the left side of the mansion when Cavanaugh shot him with two quick bursts, tearing the man's chest apart.

Cavanaugh kept charging, reached the fallen man, verified that he was dead, and grabbed the man's weapon. He had no idea how much ammunition remained in its magazine, but at least it gave him more than he already had. Carrying both, he reached the left rear corner of the mansion. The remaining man over there was wounded and wouldn't emerge from cover unless he had a good reason. Grace was wounded also, and could move only by hobbling or crawling. She would want to remain behind the Explorer until she knew what was going on. Neither of them had any way to tell the outcome of the shots they had heard. Logically, the man over here would have yelled to them if he'd been victorious, but if he'd missed and was stalking Cavanaugh, he'd have maintained battle silence, so the lack of a triumphant shout didn't necessarily mean that Grace and her partner would conclude the man over here was dead.

Cavanaugh decided to wait, to let them bleed a while longer, before he risked showing himself.

Then, despite the ringing in his ears, he heard a drone. Frowning, he told himself that the sound wasn't possible, that it indicated the concrete door was opening, but he couldn't imagine how that could be.

The drone continued. Jesus, had Grace used her remote control to open the door? Was she trying to lure Jamie out, to use her as a hostage?

Reasoning that the last place either Grace or the gunman would look for him was at the very bottom of the corner, at ground level, he dropped to his chest and peered around a rock. Squinting toward the ruins of the barn, he saw that the concrete door was indeed opening.

He looked behind him, suddenly not trusting his position, wondering if Grace was raising the door in order to distract him. Was she hoping to hobble around the wreckage of the mansion and sneak up on him while he concentrated on the barn, on keeping Jamie from showing herself at the open door?

After another quick look behind him, Cavanaugh once more peered around the bottom rock at the corner of the collapsed wall. The door was fully open now. Amid the darkness beyond it, something moved.

"Jamie, don't come out!"

Cavanaugh ducked back as he shouted it. The next instant, gunfire shattered several stones at the mansion's corner. Fragments flew, dust spewing. Some of the shots had been bursts from a submachine gun, but others had been single shots from a pistol, telling Cavanaugh that Grace was still behind the Explorer.

"Do you hear me, Jamie! Don't come out!"

This time, Cavanaugh's voice didn't attract shots, presumably because Grace and the gunman were saving their ammunition.

"I hear you!" Jamie's voice was faint. "I'm staying where I am!"

"If you show yourself, they'll shoot you or grab you as a hostage! That's why Grace opened the door!"

"Grace didn't raise the door! I did!"

What? Cavanaugh thought.

"Those wires you were going to press together! The ones you thought might raise the door! You were right! They do!"

"Stay down!"

"How many are out there?"

"Grace and one of her men!" Cavanaugh shouted.

"Where are they?"

"Grace is to your left! Behind the Explorer! Where you saw her park it! The man's in the wreckage behind the door to the lab! For God's sake, don't come out!" "Is the man to my right or left?"

"He was on your left, but he might have moved! I'm telling you, don't try to come out!"

"I'm not!" Jamie shouted. "But I've got an idea! When I tell you, get ready to shoot!"

"Whatever you're thinking, don't do it! It's too risky!" "Give me twenty seconds!"

What the hell is she going to try? Cavanaugh wondered.

Wary, he looped the strap of his MP-5 over his left shoulder. Then he gripped the MP-5 that he'd taken from the man he'd shot. His rationale for using the dead man's weapon was that the man wouldn't have risked leaving cover and stalking along the side of the mansion unless he'd had an acceptable amount of ammunition, but there wasn't time to remove the magazine and make sure.

Cavanaugh backed from the corner. That was where his shouts had come from. It was where Grace and the gunman would expect him to show himself. Certain that his heart would burst from the rate at which it was pounding, he shifted back twenty feet from where he'd been. There the wreckage remained low enough that if he stood, he could shoot over it.

Yet again, he glanced warily behind him. If Grace did decide to try outflanking him, how long would it take her to crawl or hobble around the mansion?

Jamie shouted from the open door, "Get ready!"

Whatever she's planning, it had better work, Cavanaugh thought.

"Count to five!" Jamie shouted. "Now!"

Baffled, Cavanaugh did so.

One. Two.

He set the submachine gun's selection lever to semiautomatic fire.

Three. Four.

Two explosions startled him. They came from the direction of the barn. Christ, they're throwing grenades at the open door, Cavanaugh thought. Furious, he surged up and fired at the wreckage to the right and the left of the door. Two more blasts went off, the fierce bangs accompanied by eye-searing flashes. Not grenades! Cavanaugh realized. Jamie's throwing flash-bangs over the back of the door.

Two further detonations shook the rubble. Smoke rose. So did the wounded gunman, who clutched his ears and rushed to get away.

Cavanaugh steadied his aim and shot three times. The bullets were all aimed at center of mass, but while one hit the man's back, the other went wild and hit his neck. The third missed entirely. No matter. So much blood flew from the man's neck, Cavanaugh knew he'd bleed to death within seconds.

"He's down!" Cavanaugh shouted to Jamie.

Bang!

Bang!

Bright, ear-torturing explosions on the far side of the barn told Cavanaugh that Jamie was now throwing flash-bangs toward the Explorer.

Bang!

Cavanaugh raced toward the front of the mansion and tried to control his frenzied breathing as he peered around its corner. Then he raced along the front and reached the corner on the right side of the mansion. Again, he checked carefully before he risked showing himself.

Bang!

Even at a distance of seventy-five yards, the flashes of the detonations around the Explorer were punishing to Cavanaugh's eyes. Reasoning that Grace must surely be immobilized by them, Cavanaugh took the chance of racing into the open, staying wide of the ruins, trying to get a view of the other side of the Explorer.

The driver's door was open. He saw Grace lurching inside, her left leg bleeding. He fired at the door, but instead of punching through and hitting her, the bullet made the walloping sound of a projectile hitting armor. Grace yanked the door shut. Her short blond hair and high cheekbones were vivid behind the windshield as she rammed a key into the ignition and started the engine.

Cavanaugh fired at the windshield but only starred it, realizing that the glass was bullet-resistant. He fired again as Grace floored the accelerator and steered from behind the station wagon, rocketing the Explorer toward him.

He fired a third time, starring more glass. Cavanaugh knew that most bullet-resistant glass couldn't withstand five rounds within an eight-inch radius. After that, the glass would disintegrate, allowing bullets to penetrate it. So he held his ground and fired a fourth time, but now Grace was racing so close to him that her glacial blue eyes seemed intensely huge.

When Cavanaugh pulled the trigger a fifth time, he felt the firing pin click on empty. He cursed, hurled the weapon at the windshield, and dove to the side an instant before Grace would have struck him. As the Explorer roared past, throwing up dust, he rolled across the dirt, feeling the MP-5 strapped to his shoulder dig into his bare skin.

Instead of speeding along the lane toward the road from which Cavanaugh had entered the valley, Grace twisted the steering wheel sharply and curved back in Cavanaugh's direction.

Surging to his feet, he unstrapped the MP-5 from his shoulder, but Grace was too close for him to have time to shoot.

He darted to the left.

Grace steered in that direction.

He darted to the right.

Grace pursued him.

At the last moment, Cavanaugh feinted to the left, then dove to the right. Feeling the rush of air from the Explorer speeding past him, he struck the ground, winced, and came to his feet, expecting Grace to turn sharply and come at him again.

Instead, the Explorer sped toward the rear of the valley. As its roar diminished, Cavanaugh heard something else: an approaching rumble. Gaining in intensity, it made a rapid whump, whump, •whump sound. A helicopter. Grace had used her cell phone to call for reinforcements, Cavanaugh thought. Then he realized, No, she'd stay if the chopper was one of hers. She's trying to get away from whoever's in it.

Cavanaugh ran to the Taurus, grabbing a rock along the way. On recent American cars, the steering-wheel locks were sturdy enough that he couldn't break them by pressing his shoes against the steering column and tugging on the wheel as he had when he'd rescued Prescott from the warehouse. Now he was forced to yank the unlocked door open, unclip the Emerson knife from his pocket, thumb the blade open, and shove it into the ignition slot, using the rock to hammer the butt of the knife's handle, ramming the tip of the blade solidly into the slot. He closed the knife's handle halfway and twisted violently, gaining torque from the ninety-degree position of the handle. The blade's metal was extraordinarily hard, designed for this kind of brutal use. After one more fierce twist, Cavanaugh felt the ignition lock break, freeing the wheel.

Moving faster, he reached under the dashboard and pulled down a hidden Radio Shack switch box that he'd installed when he and Jamie had modified the Taurus: a standard precaution in case they didn't have the ignition key. The switch box was connected to the starter wires. A press of a button and the engine started.

The passenger door banged open. Cavanaugh raised the Emerson knife to defend himself, only to lower it when Jamie dove inside.

"Go!" she yelled. "Go!"