Fear No Evil

Chapter 100

On the east side of the river, Sampson had not moved position since the two bursts of machine-gun fire and the two pistol shots had gone off in the thick patch of trees a hundred yards north of his position. He was lying prone over the top of a hummock of dirt, looking through binoculars at scattered live trees and standing burned trunks between him and the heavier timber.

He started at automatic-weapon fire from across the river, his heart racing, his stomach souring. Alex was engaged.

Sampson turned his binoculars westward and focused on the big piece of timber where he guessed the shooting had come from. A second burst of gunfire confirmed it.

Sampson tried to dissect the woods opposite him but could make out nothing. He swung the binoculars back to study the timber patch out in front of him.

He went back and forth this way for ten minutes before hearing a single blast that sounded more shotgun than rifle. When he looked over there, his grin surfaced and then broadened with every second that passed without automatic gunfire.

Sampson shifted the binoculars back to his side of the river, to where the trail met the woods a hundred yards out, and saw nothing. He panned them slowly left and locked.

Right there, not sixty yards away, stood the mammoth black guy who’d ridden shotgun during the first helicopter attack. How had he not heard him? How had he not seen him?

Sampson was six nine and weighed two hundred seventy-five pounds, but this guy was big too, six foot six easy and pushing the upper two hundreds.

Massive. Solid muscle. A Goliath.

And Goliath was dressed and equipped for modern war, right down to the black clothes, the black gun, the Kevlar vest, and the goggles he wore.

Those can’t be night-vision, Sampson thought. They’ve got to be thermals.

Goliath started to swing his head.

He’s going to peg my heat signature in this rain!

Sampson dropped the binoculars and shifted to get behind the bear gun. He moved too fast. M’s man jerked his head Sampson’s way.

Before Sampson could flip off the safety on the Ruger, Goliath leaped sideways and started sprinting downhill off the trail and in an arc through the trees, firing short bursts at John. Rounds smacked the front side of the hummock and blew mud in his face.

Sampson swung the barrel of the bear gun after the running man. He fired and missed, hitting a stump just behind the giant.

Ducking down, John ran the bolt on the .375 just before Goliath responded with another burst that chewed up the front of the hummock he was hiding behind.

When Sampson peeked again, Goliath was still running like hell and across the hill. When John had first seen the giant, he had been at Sampson’s eleven o’clock. Now he was at ten o’clock and showed no signs of slowing.

Sampson swung the gun after him, fired, and missed again. Nine o’clock.

What’s he doing? Where’s he going?

Sampson ran the bolt a third time, looking past the running Goliath all the way to seven o’clock, and understood. There was a ridge about seventy yards out that climbed and ran west toward the river. He was going for higher ground.

Sampson knew he’d have to reload after this next shot and wanted to make it count before Goliath could get the advantage and shoot down on him.

Keeping both eyes open, John swung the .375 after the running giant a third time, found the man’s left side in the sights, moved the crosshairs just ahead of Goliath, and tapped the trigger. The bear gun roared.

The heavy bullet hit the giant in the ribs below his shoulder.

Dead before he knew it, Goliath did a twisting somersault, bounced off the trunk of a burned tree at the base of the ridge, and crashed to the ground, unmoving.