MatchUp

GAYLE AND DAVID COFOUNDED INTERNATIONAL thriller Writers, so it was only fitting they be teamed together for this anthology.

Gayle’s character, Liz Sansborough, appeared in her first novel, Masquerade (1996). The story of an old assassin trying to come in from the cold, the book was rejected some thirty times, largely because publishers believed the market for international spy thrillers was as dead as the Cold War. Plus, there was another problem—Gayle was female, and as one publisher told her agent, “No woman could’ve written this book.” High-octane adventure and a geopolitical story that spanned the globe was then a male-only field. Still, Masquerade went on to become a New York Times bestseller, and Publishers Weekly has listed it among the top ten spy novels of all time.

Rambo, of course, derives from the classic First Blood, which David penned in 1972. That character has evolved into icon status. It’s even now an actual word in the dictionary. Few fictional characters can claim that fame. There’s not been a new Rambo story in print for over thirty years. David has toyed with ideas, but none have “spoken to him,” which is a prerequisite for him before starting any project. When asked to be a part of this book we hoped that something might speak up and, thankfully, it did.

This story was a true collaboration.

David and Gayle e-mailed and talked on the phone many times, hashing out the plot, engaging in a vigorous back-and-forth reminiscent to them both of 2004 through 2006 when they were busy creating International Thriller Writers. David was a little apprehensive about using Rambo in a short story. He worried that whatever he might do with his character in the future might be compromised.

So he and Gayle devised a clever solution.

One that delivers on all fronts.

Rambo on Their Minds.

RAMBO ON THEIR MINDS

BLUE RIDGE MOUNTAINS

WARREN COUNTY, VIRGINIA

THE LONG SHADOWS OF MORNING drifted across highway 55. Forests clothed in autumn golds and reds pressed the road where a dusty five-year-old van cruised the speed limit, attracting no attention. In the front seat, the driver and his passenger—armed and alert—wore sunglasses and baseball caps pulled low across their foreheads.

From the vehicle’s rear came the sounds of a moan and coughing.

The passenger peered back over his shoulder. His name was Rudy Voya, a muscular man in his midthirties, with a broad pale face and high Slavic cheekbones. “She’s waking up,” he reported. He carried a .40 Smith & Wesson in a shoulder holster under his leather jacket. At his feet lay his AK-47. “Looks as if you shot her up perfect, Max.”

“Not like we don’t have a lot of practice,” the driver, Max Tariksky, said with a nod. He was Rudy’s cousin, the same age and hearty build, but forty pounds heavier. His face was round, his nose a ski slope, and his hooded gray eyes steely. He carried a 9 mm Browning under his windbreaker.

They had snatched the woman when she was on her dawn run through Rock Creek Park in Chevy Chase. Her name was Liz Sansborough, and she was a professor of psychology at Georgetown. She should’ve been an easy mark, but she was also ex CIA and rumored to have been an undercover officer. Taking no chances, Rudy had pretended to lose control of a bicycle, crashing into her, knocking her to the ground, while Max had hurried from a bench to help her stand but instead had injected her with a fast-acting sedative. They’d shoved her and the bike into the van before anyone had a chance to realize what was happening.

Now she was curled like a lemon peel on the floor behind them.

The highway bent sharply left and crested a ridge. As a mountain valley unfolded below, Max slowed the van. No vehicles were in sight. On their right an asphalt lane came into view and he turned the van onto it, braking inside the trees. Ten feet ahead stood a reinforced security gate with barbed wire on the top. On either side a chain-link fence extended into the forest. The sign on the gate warned PRIVATE PROPERTY. NO TRESSPASSING.

Rudy jumped out, hurried to the gate, and pressed four numbers on a security pad. By the time he ran back to the passenger seat the steel gate had slid open. After Max drove through, the gate closed behind them. They now had complete control of the property’s hundred acres.

The drive wound up through oaks, pines, and poplars for nearly two miles. In this part of the Blue Ridge Mountains hunt clubs were common. The family had owned this one for nearly twenty years and was considered a good neighbor. Which meant they minded their own business. In rural Warren County privacy was next to godliness.

Checking on Liz Sansborough, Rudy saw that she’d rolled over onto her other side. He studied her in her sleek, yellow jogging clothes, her auburn hair falling out of her ponytail. With her full lips and wide-set eyes she was pretty. Her hands were scraped from when she’d tried to cushion her fall after the bicycle struck her. Other than that, she didn’t have a scratch or a bruise on her.

That will soon change, Rudy thought.

HER EYELIDS FLUTTERING, LIZ HEARD herself moan.

She felt dizzy, sick to her stomach. Where was she? What had happened? As the stench of exhaust burned her nose, she began to remember—two men in the park, a bicycle knocking her down, someone offering to help her stand, the sting of a hypodermic. Just before she passed out they’d thrown her into a van. The van. That must be where she was now.

The vehicle stopped.

So did the engine. Two doors opened and banged shut.

She forced herself up into a sitting position just as the rear door swung open. Two men stared at her, the same two who’d kidnapped her. One briefly aimed his AK-47.

Then they yanked her out.

Rallying, she slammed her knee in a hizagashira strike into the belly of the larger one. Swearing, he grabbed her and threw her down hard. Gravel bit into her palms. She felt dizzy again. She forced herself to lift her head and look around. The van had stopped in front of a two-story log house. Next to it was the berm of what appeared to be an outdoor shooting range. Farther over she saw a swimming pool, covered for cold weather.

What is this place? she wondered in a daze.

One of the men was aiming a cell phone at her, holding it so long that she realized he must be making a video.

“Say something,” he ordered. “Say, ‘Help me, Simon.’ ”

She hurt everywhere. Her vision was blurred. “Go to hell.”

The other man swung his hand, his palm connecting with her cheek. “Say it.”

Pain exploded through her face.

He swung the other hand and slammed the other cheek.

She pitched over, tasting blood.

“Say it. Goddammit.”

Need to—

Her eyes closed. She smelled pine trees.

Escape.

She heard water trickling.

A stream?

A forest?

Some kind of camp?

WASHINGTON, D.C.

FOR THE TENTH TIME, SIMON childs scanned the items on the restaurant’s breakfast menu. Yet again, he glanced past the hostess toward the entrance. Once more he looked at his watch—a vintage Rolex that Liz knew he admired and that she’d given him as a prewedding present.

Twenty minutes to ten.

He and Liz had made plans to meet here, in Georgetown, for breakfast at nine and then go to a final meeting with their wedding-reception caterer. He didn’t understand why she hadn’t phoned to tell him she was going to be late. He’d called her three times but had reached only her voice mail. Amid the clink of silverware and the murmur of conversations, a voice interrupted his worried thoughts. He looked up, surprised to see the hostess standing next to him.

“Mr. Childs, this arrived for you.”

She handed him a small box wrapped in silver wedding paper. He frowned, seeing his name on an attached card.

“A messenger delivered it,” the hostess explained. “He pointed toward you and said to tell you that Ms. Sansborough apologizes for being late.”

“Thank you.”

As she returned to greeting more guests, there was a faint buzzing sound from the box in his hand. It vibrated. In an instant, he realized why. He tore off the bow, ripped off the wrapping paper, and yanked off the box’s lid. Inside was a cell phone. He pressed the Answer button and held the phone against his ear.

“Liz?” he asked.

“She’s been detained,” a female voice said.

His chest tightened. “What do you mean ‘detained’? Who is this?”

“Someone who’s concerned about your fiancée’s welfare.” The woman’s voice had a Russian accent and the confidence of someone accustomed to exerting authority. “I sent you a video attachment. Unless you want to disturb people sitting near you, I suggest that you watch it outside. I’ll call you again in three minutes.”

The transmission went dead.

He walked swiftly toward the door, sidestepped a couple entering, and hurried out to the parking lot. Ignoring the cold morning air he scrolled through the phone, found the video attachment and pressed it.

And saw Liz lying on gravel.

“Say something,” a man’s voice ordered. “Say, ‘Help me, Simon.’ ”

Liz looked groggy, stunned. But managed to say, “Go to hell.”

A hand with a jagged scar on it streaked into view, the palm crashing into one cheek, then the palm of the other battering her other cheek, drawing blood. “Say it. Goddammit.”

The image abruptly changed to one in which Liz slumped on a padded bench. There were zip-tie cuffs on her wrists that were looped around some kind of metal pole. Both cheeks looked raw and swollen. Blood smeared her nose and chin.

The same scarred hand clasped her injured cheeks.

“Let’s try again. You know what I want.” The camera moved closer, her blood-covered face filling the screen. “Say it.”

The hand squeezed so hard that its knuckles whitened.

Her eyes widened.

She tried to scream, but the hand kept squeezing. Crushing.

She writhed, managing to say past the hand, “Help . . . me . . . Simon.”

The video ended.

But he continued to see Liz’s battered face.

The phone vibrated.

He jabbed the Answer button and said, “I will find and kill you.”

“You don’t have time for useless threats,” the woman’s voice said. “Last night, in Washington, the FBI arrested an associate of mine. His name is Nick Demidov. I want him released.”

“We don’t have anything to do with the FBI.”

The woman’s harsh laughter reminded him of an old Russian expression—the ruthless walk over the dead.

“You’re an MI6 operative on temporary assignment to the FBI for a special Russkaya Mafiya task force. And your fiancée used to work for the CIA, probably still does. I’m giving you less than twelve hours to get Nick free, so use your influence. Call in favors. It should be easy. He’s not important. The FBI will admit that they just swept him up because they hope he’ll lead them to someone higher.”

“If he’s that low level, why does he matter to you?”

“He’s my brother. Our mother is upset, as am I. Poor Nick isn’t smart, which is obvious, given that he allowed himself to be arrested. But he’s family. You’ve got until nine o’clock tonight to deliver him.”

“But—”

“Keep the phone I gave you. It has an open mic. Even when it’s turned off, the phone transmits everything you and anyone near you say, so don’t even think about warning your buddies at the FBI about what’s going on. If I even slightly suspect you’re playing games, the next video will show your fiancée’s ears being cut off.”

“I want a video report every half hour to prove Liz is alive and healthy,” he demanded.

“Every two hours is often enough. Remember, the world won’t end if the task force lets Nick go. But your world will end, if they don’t. Give me my brother, or I’ll give you your fiancée’s dismembered corpse.”

LIZ AWOKE TO POUNDING PAIN in her face.

Keeping her eyes closed, she reached to hold her burning cheeks, but her wrists were secured to something. She was slumped on a padded surface. As she struggled to remember where she was, the sound of voices penetrated her foggy mind. With a chill, she recognized them as those of her kidnappers. Drifting in and out of consciousness, she’d heard them talk to each other and to someone else, a woman, on what sounded like a speakerphone. The woman had addressed one of them as Rudy and the other as Max. Breathing deeply to fight the pain, she made herself focus on them.

“John J. was on TV last night,” Rudy was saying.

“ ‘John J.’? What are you talking about?” Max asked.

“John Rambo. You know, First Blood,” Rudy said. “When I was growing up in Moscow, I got better at English by watching the movies.”

She noticed the slight hissing of his s’s, a characteristic of some English-speaking Russians.

“Rambo hardly says a word. How could you learn English from those movies?” Max asked.

“From the other characters.”

“After the way the third Rambo movie made us Russians look, I’m surprised you watched any of them.”

“I admit the third one isn’t the best, but that first one was great.”

She was learning nothing from them, so she forced her eyes open and saw that she was lying on a weight lifter’s bench beside a massive Nautilus machine. As her mind cleared, she realized that the plastic zip-tie cuffs on her wrists encircled one of the machine’s metal poles, holding her arms up. The restraint was so tight it cut into her skin. She studied the pole and the multigym station with its pulleys, handles, and weights, wondering whether there was a way to twist free. It didn’t look hopeful, and if she succeeded, she’d still have to deal with the two bastards who’d grabbed her.

“If you wanted to learn English from Rambo, you should’ve read the novel,” Max said.

“There’s a novel?”

“He dies at the end.”

“No, the police chief’s still moving at the end. You can see him twitch when they put him in the ambulance.”

“Not in the novel,” Max said.

“The police chief dies in the novel?”

“And Rambo.”

“Stop bullshitting me.”

Following the sound of their voices, she peered across the room and saw that this was some kind of security center—the two men were sitting in the middle of a long curved desk, while above and around them rose five levels of closed-circuit TV monitors displaying views of a steel gate, a driveway, the exterior of the log house, and a chain-link fence, most in dense woods. Because the majority of screens showed the fence, she guessed it surrounded the property and there must be many forested acres.

Carrying a coffee mug, Max swiveled in his chair and headed toward a kitchenette. “I’m telling you Rambo gets killed in the novel. Colonel Trautman shoots him.”

“No, no, no. Rambo can’t die.”

“That’s what Stallone said. That’s why the movie ends the way it does.” Max poured coffee.

“Then why would Stallone end the novel that way? You’re not making sense.”

“Stallone didn’t write the novel.”

“You’re starting to bother me.”

“I’m telling you.”

“Then who the hell wrote the novel?”

“I can’t remember.” Max returned to his chair and sat.

“You’re making all this up.”

As they talked, she studied the room.

On her left was an expansive gun cabinet in which a dozen M4 assault rifles stood neatly in a line. Boxes of ammo were piled on shelves. To her right a wooden staircase climbed upward. All four walls were made of concrete blocks. There were no windows. The place had the feel of not only being secure but underground.

She focused again on the men at the big console. They were watching a screen twice as large as the others. It showed a grid on which a green dot was slowly traveling along one of the lines.

“He’s on the move,” Max said.

Rudy laughed. “And he’s no Rambo.”

A phone rang somewhere in the chamber.

Max pressed a button on the computer, and a woman’s disembodied voice reported from a speaker, “We’ve got Simon Childs on a leash. I need you to e-mail me a video of Sansborough every couple of hours to keep him motivated, until he delivers the package.”

At Simon’s name, Liz tensed, feeling fresh pain roll through her. Now she remembered. The men had made her beg Simon for help. So Simon was involved and there was a “package.” What was so important that they’d kidnapped her to get Simon to do what they wanted?

“Not a problem,” Rudy said. He turned and grinned at Liz. “You want us to hurt her some more?”

“Not yet. Maybe later.”

Liz stared back at the asshole, refusing to show fear.

But they’d let her see their faces.

No way could they allow her to live.

AS SIMON STARED AT THE phone in his hand, a car horn startled him. He jerked his head up, abruptly aware of the restaurant’s parking lot. A taxi was stopping at the building’s entrance and the passenger was getting out. He ran to the taxi, veered in front of a waiting couple, and lunged into the backseat.

“Hoover Building,” he told the surprised driver.

While the taxi merged into the morning traffic, Simon examined the phone. The woman had told him it had an open mic. In that case Liz’s captors would now have heard where he was going. But he’d been ordered to use his influence, so his destination shouldn’t alarm them.

He hoped.

The time on the phone was 9:54 a.m.

Less than twelve hours remained.

He and Liz were scheduled to be married ten days from now, and by God he was going to make certain it happened.

The FBI’s headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue had been built with a rugged concrete exterior—to create a powerful, dominating impression. But after little more than four decades, the concrete was decaying, and nets enclosed the upper stories to prevent chunks from falling onto pedestrians.

Feeling that something might indeed crash onto him, Simon hurried inside the massive building. He tried not to arouse suspicion by looking impatient while he waited in a long line at the security checkpoint.

Another line blocked his way to the elevators.

A clock on a wall showed 10:28 when he finally entered the third-floor office where the Russian Mafia task force was located. The special agent in charge, a spectacled woman named Cassidy, spoke rapidly into a cell phone while a broad-shouldered man named Grant typed on a keyboard.

Cassidy ended her call and tossed Simon a puzzled look. “I thought you and Liz were finalizing your wedding reception today.”

“The caterer postponed the meeting,” Simon said, not daring to doubt that the phone did indeed broadcast the conversation.

He considered writing a note to alert them to what was happening, but he couldn’t depend on them not saying something that would make Liz’s captors suspicious. Instead he studied Grant’s computer screen and pointed toward a new name on a list.

“Who’s Nick Demidov?”

“Not sure yet.”

Grant clicked on the name, opening an almost blank document that showed photographs of a dark-haired, fortyish man in a black leather sports jacket.

“The police grabbed him last night when they raided a warehouse stashed with stolen prescription painkillers,” Cassidy said. “He has a Virginia driver’s license, but all he claims to speak is Russian. So far there’s no record on him. What’s interesting is he had two hundred thousand dollars in the trunk of his car. A six-year-old car, no less. If he had that kind of money, he should have been driving the best. He seems to be a courier.”

“We sent for a translator,” Grant said. “Maybe Demidov can lead us to somebody important.”

“You know, he’s starting to look familiar,” Simon lied again.

“Oh?” Cassidy asked.

“When I worked on the European task force, he was a bagman for a Russian money launderer in London. If I talk to him, maybe he’ll drop the ‘I don’t speak English’ act and tell me what he’s doing in D.C. Where are you holding him?”

LIZ FELT NAUSEATED.

Her head ached and her face still throbbed. Worse, whatever Max and Rudy had shot her up with had muddled her brain.

Dammit, enough whining, she told herself. Focus.

She heard Simon’s voice. “Where are you holding him?”

She snapped open her eyes and realized his voice was coming from a speaker on the computer desk across the room. Beside it sat the large monitor where the green dot had been moving the last time she looked.

Now the dot was motionless.

They’re tracking Simon.

Another man’s voice sounded from the speaker, answering Simon. “Demidov is in a safe house out by Tysons Corner. Here’s the address.”

She heard someone writing on a piece of paper and tearing it from a pad.

In his chair at the security center, Max grinned. “I love it when a plan comes together. We gotta get Demidov away from the FBI before they figure out who he is. I’m e-mailing this to Marta in case she didn’t pick it up.”

“I’ll be in touch.”

Simon’s voice again.

On the speaker, a man and woman said good-bye to Simon, and the sounds diminished to footsteps and distant voices.

Max chuckled and leaned back in his chair, hands clasped behind his head.

“That Simon guy is no Rambo.”

Rudy headed toward the Nautilus multigym. “The first Rambo movie’s okay, but I like the first sequel more.”

He did some upper-body stretches.

“The one where he goes back to Vietnam?” Max asked. “You’ve gotta be kidding. Russians look like idiots in that one also.”

“Hey, it was the Cold War. You need to give the movie some artistic license. How much weight do you think Stallone bench-presses?”

“More than you.”

With a shrug, Rudy sat at the machine, gripped two handles, and exhaled as he pushed his arms out and away from his body.

Weights lifted.

Liz’s wrists jerked up, her zip-tie cuffs caught in the mechanism.

Rudy noticed and laughed.

Inhaling, he returned to his original position and pushed out his arms once more.

Again her wrists were yanked up.

She stared at the cuff and realized it was being pinched. She wriggled her arms around so the tie was in the center between her wrists, and gritted her teeth as Rudy continued the exercise.

“Remember that scene where Rambo was tied to upright bedsprings,” Rudy said, “while the Russian interrogators ran electricity through the metal springs, torturing him?”

“Where would they have found bedsprings in the jungle?” Max asked.

“You’re starting to get on my nerves. I told you. Allow for artistic license. So Rambo starts shaking and shaking from the electricity, rattling the bedsprings, and all of a sudden the guys torturing him realize what’s happening, and Rambo’s so crazy with pain and rage, he—”

The sound of a car door being opened through the speaker interrupted them.

“Tysons Corner,” Simon’s voice said to someone.

THE TAXI TOOK AN OFF-RAMP from the rush of traffic on the 495. Avoiding the huge shopping malls and corporate buildings that Tysons Corner was known for, it reached a quiet street of attractive houses and expensive landscaping. Conscious of how swiftly time was passing, Simon forced himself to follow protocol, giving the driver an address two blocks away. The watcher at the safe house would think it suspicious if he arrived at the front door in a taxi rather than first cleaning his trail on foot. Paying the driver, Simon waited until the taxi disappeared around a corner.

As dark clouds threatened rain, he pulled out the cell phone he’d been given and hurried toward his destination. He continued to assume that anything he said could be overheard, so he didn’t bother using the number programmed into the phone and instead spoke directly to the blank screen.

“Prove that Liz is still alive.”

LIZ FELT A SURGE OF hope as Simon’s voice spilled from the speaker.

“Send a video update. Now.”

Max pressed a button on the console. “Marta?”

“Do it,” the woman’s Russian-accented voice ordered. “Let him see you damage her a little more.”

“Cool,” Rudy said.

Her stomach cramped as he turned toward where she was cuffed to the Nautilus machine, her arms stretched painfully above her head.

“Hey, Max, I’ve got an idea,” the broad-shouldered Russian said. “Why don’t we make our own Rambo movie?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Remember, when he was tied to the bedsprings.”

“You should see a shrink. You’ve got Rambo on the brain.”

“No, listen. When they weren’t shooting electricity through him, the guys torturing him heated his knife and made it look like they were going to burn out one of his eyes.”

THE SAFE HOUSE WAS A split level, with a huge lawn and a two-car garage under lace-curtained windows. Walking toward it, Simon told the phone, “I said I want a video update.”

“Your impatience is nothing compared to mine,” the voice of the Russian woman replied.

The phone made a chiming sound that indicated a text message had arrived. Simon opened an attachment. With a mixture of fear and rage he again saw Liz positioned on the padded bench, but this time her arms were stretched above her head, her wrists still locked around the metal pole. More blood covered her face. Abruptly her arms jerked higher, the force great enough to slam her head back against the wall.

She groaned.

With equal abruptness, her arms fell, only to be jerked upward again as if she were a puppet.

Her head sagged forward.

The camera tilted down to reveal the scarred hand that Simon had seen earlier. The angle suggested that it belonged to the man who held the camera. The fingers gripped a long, saw-backed knife, holding its blade against the noisy blue flame of a butane blowtorch set on a table.

“Out there, you might be the law, but in here, we are,” a voice with a Russian accent said. He seemed to be quoting from something. “Mess with us, and we’ll show you a war you’ll never believe.”

“Yeah,” another Russian voice said. “You don’t want us to come for you, Murdock.”

Who the hell was Murdock?

They sounded insane.

The point of the blade glowed red as the camera followed it toward Liz. She pressed her head desperately back against the wall. The fiery tip moved toward her left eye. She struggled to turn her head, but the blade went this way and that, matching her frantic movements. At once, it shifted toward her ear and branded it with the silhouette of the knife’s tip.

Liz screamed.

The video ended.

“It’s six minutes after twelve,” the Russian woman’s voice said from the cell phone. “You have less than nine hours to give me my brother.”

He lowered the phone.

Struggling not to show how agitated he was, he put the phone in his pocket and approached the safe house’s front door. As he pressed the doorbell, he peered up toward where he assumed a concealed camera watched him.

“Simon Childs,” he said. “Cassidy sent me.”

He waited while someone inside compared his face to the image in his electronic file.

A lock buzzed.

He turned the doorknob, entered, and showed his ID.

Thickly carpeted stairs led down to the left and up to the right. A man in a dark sport coat, a white shirt, and a loosened tie studied him from the bottom level. The open coat revealed a pistol in a holster on his belt.

“You looked like that phone call was bad news,” the man said.

“I’m getting married in ten days. The reception’s a logistical nightmare.”

The man nodded sympathetically. “The second time I got married, the caterer had a heart attack two days before the wedding. Cassidy says you might have seen Nick Demidov before.”

“His name isn’t familiar, but his photograph is. I think he’s someone the European task force picked up when I was in London.”

“London? Then he’s lying and he does speak English?”

“That’s one of the things I came to find out.”

He descended the stairs to a room that had a leather sofa and chair with plush cushions that showed no indication of having been sat upon. A coffee table was bare. At the far end, fake logs were stacked in a gas fireplace where blue flames wavered with artificial steadiness.

“Can’t get the chill out of this basement,” the man said.

“You’re here alone?”

He pretended to sound puzzled, when he actually felt relieved.

“Until nine p.m. when my relief checks in. No need for anyone else. The way this place is set up, one agent at a time is all that’s necessary. It’s not as if Demidov’s a heavy hitter and needs protection. But hey, maybe he’ll lead us to somebody big. I’m John Fadiman, by the way.”

They shook hands.

Then Fadiman led him into a room, where several video monitors showed the approaches to the house. Simon noticed a ring of keys and a cell phone next to a half-full coffee cup on a desk. He switched his attention to a glass wall that revealed an adjacent bedroom with little furniture. Wearing a black shirt and trousers, a dark-haired man lay on a narrow bed. His eyes were closed and his hands were folded on his chest. He had a heavy, expressionless face.

“That’s all he’s been doing since we put him in there,” Fadiman said. “Either he needs a lot of sleep, or else he’s been locked up before and knows how to pass the time.”

“That’s the man I saw in London. Are we visible to him?”

“It’s a one-way glass.”

“Then I need to go in there so Demidov can see my face. Once he recognizes me, he won’t be able to keep claiming that all he speaks is Russian.”

Fadiman nodded and stepped toward a door on the right. He pressed numbers on an electronic pad. With a soft click, the door unlocked.

The man on the bed sat up.

Fadiman opened the door. “I’ve got an old friend to see you.”

Demidov shook his head, seeming not to understand the words Fadiman used.

“Hi, Nick. Surely you remember me from London,” Simon said.

Again, Demidov shook his head, this time in what seemed genuine confusion.

“Yes, you and I and your sister had a long talk in London,” Simon continued. “If you want to see her anytime soon, you need to do what I tell you. Do you understand? Do you want to see her? Say it in English so I know we’re communicating.”

There was a flash in Demidov’s eyes. Anger? No, more disgust.

“My sister?” the prisoner asked.

“Damn,” Fadiman said. “That’s what I call fast results.”

The agent suddenly groaned as Simon thrust an arm around his throat, pulled the man’s pistol from beneath his jacket and pushed him into the room. Not knowing if Fadiman had a round in the chamber, Simon racked back the slide. Now, for sure, the weapon was ready to fire.

Fadiman held up his hands. “Are you fucking crazy?”

Standing inside the doorway where he could keep his pistol aimed at both Fadiman and Demidov, Simon ordered the Russian out.

Demidov moved smoothly past him and Simon followed, closing the door, making sure it locked. Through the glass wall he saw Fadiman charge toward the door and yank at the handle.

“Where’s my bitch sister?” Demidov asked angrily.

“Waiting.”

Simon whipped the pistol across his face.

LIZ’S EARLOBE FELT ON FIRE.

Her shoulders and wrists throbbed.

But more than anything, she was filled with rage. Adrenaline pulsing through her, she’d heard Simon talk with someone named Fadiman about Nick Demidov, the man Simon had been asking about at the FBI. The sound of a scuffle was followed by someone groaning.

Rudy and Max listened intently.

From the room’s speaker came Simon’s voice. “Let’s go, asshole. Your sister’s waiting for you.”

Max cheered. “He must’ve decked the FBI agent.”

The transmission crackled, garbling what Simon and Demidov were saying.

“Cell phone must’ve gone out of range. Simon Childs isn’t Rambo,” Rudy said. “But he busted out our Rambo!”

“Yeah, Demidov’s a hotshot,” Max said. “But that’s what it takes to run this outfit. Once he’s back, things’ll get normal again.”

“Drugs and whores,” Rudy whooped.

Max shook his head and laughed. “You’re so lame.”

Now Liz understood. Nick Demidov wasn’t a mere courier. He was the head of their Mafia clan. That’s why they’d gone to so much trouble to kidnap her and force Simon to help them.

Max set his coffee mug down on the security console. “I’m gonna celebrate the boss’s escape by taking a leak.” He hefted himself up and marched across the room toward the door on Liz’s left.

“No prob. I’ve got lots of entertainment here.”

Rudy cocked his head at Liz.

She looked away and made her voice small, frightened. “You’re not going to slam my wrists up and down again, are you?”

“That’s an idea.” Setting the big knife on the floor beside the multigym, Rudy returned to the chest press. “You’re a mess. Even if we let you live, your boyfriend would never marry you now.” He gripped the handles and pushed his arms out and away from his body.

The weights lifted.

Her wrists jolted up.

Tears slid down her cheeks from the pain, but what Rudy didn’t know was that while he’d been torturing her, the mechanism had been pounding her zip-tie cuffs. Earlier, she’d centered the tie. Since then she’d pulled her wrists wide apart to make the plastic taut every time Rudy used the machine.

Her wrists oozed blood.

Again Rudy slammed the chest press.

Clenching her jaw, Liz pulled, stretching the cuff. She thought of the Rambo movie that Rudy had described, Rambo tied to upright bedsprings, electricity making him shudder and writhe with pain and rage, furiously twisting at the rope that held him.

With a snap, the zip-tie broke, freeing her hands.

She lunged for Rudy’s knife on the floor.

Her fingers were numb from lack of circulation. She needed both hands to grab the knife and keep from dropping it. Furious, she spun upward, slashing the blade across Rudy’s throat. A deep cartilage split.

Blood spurted over her.

She stepped back. Fuck you.

Rudy fell off the Nautilus machine. She quickly knelt, preparing to turn him and retrieve the .40 S&W from his shoulder holster.

Somewhere in the distance, a toilet flushed.

Liz’s numb right hand pulled Rudy onto his side. Her fingers seemed not to belong to her as she tugged at the pistol in his holster.

The pistol didn’t move.

“Rudy, is something wrong?” Max said.

She pulled harder with her senseless fingers, but the pistol was snagged on Rudy’s coat.

Heavy footsteps approached on the other side of the door.

No time.

Pressing the knife to her side to keep from dropping it, she rushed toward the iPhone on the desk and swept it into the pocket of her jogging jacket.

As if the dogs of hell were on her heels, she dashed up the stairs and through a huge room with an immense stone fireplace and antlered deer heads on the walls. Fumbling, she unbolted the front door and rushed outside. The van in which they’d brought her was still parked in front. But when she reached it, she saw that the keys weren’t in the ignition switch.

A thick mountain mist drifted around her.

Chilled, she raced into it.

“LET’S GO, ASSHOLE,” SIMON SAID. “Your sister’s waiting for you.”

Demidov clutched the gash in his cheek, as blood dripped past his fingers.

Simon tore a sheet of paper from a notepad, crumpled it, and shoved it into the pocket that held the nosy cell phone. Whenever he moved, the crumpled paper would scrape against the phone, sounding like bad reception, making it difficult for anyone to hear what he and Demidov said.

“Yeah, I can’t wait,” Demidov rumbled. “Lead me to her.”

He whipped the gun barrel against Demidov’s other cheek. “First we need to have an understanding.”

“Goddamn you.” Demidov lurched back against the wall. “If you didn’t have that gun—”

“But I do.” Simon grabbed the ring of keys that he’d noticed next to the cell phone earlier. “Move.”

Demidov walked ahead, passing the sofa and coffee table, and opened a far door. A black sedan occupied half of a garage. Simon touched the button on the key fob that unlatched the trunk. Seeing the trunk lid rise, Demidov stiffened, whirled, and lunged hard and fast, his shoulder slamming into Simon’s chest, throwing both of them back against a workbench. Simon grabbed Demidov around the neck and shoved the muzzle of the pistol into his ear.

“You know what you have to do,” he told him. “Get in the trunk.”

“Bite my—”

He screwed the muzzle into Demidov’s ear. “Maybe you’d like to bite this. If you get in the damned trunk, I’ll let you talk to your sister.”

There was a moment’s hesitation. “Oh, I definitely want to talk to her.”

“Move slowly,” Simon ordered.

He relaxed his grip around Demidov’s neck and eased the gun away from his ear. Without taking his eyes off Simon, Demidov stepped back, then crawled into the trunk. Simon saw a roll of duct tape on a bench and threw it to him. “Wrap this around your ankles.”

“Why don’t you wrap it around your—”

He picked up a length of pipe and whacked the Russian.

“All right. All right.”

As Demidov bound his legs together with the duct tape, Simon removed the phone from his pocket. After activating the video camera, he focused on the blood-smeared face.

“What time is it?” Simon demanded.

“Time? Why the hell does that matter?”

“Believe me, it does.” He aimed the pistol and the camera. “Tell your sister what time it is, or I’ll use this pipe to break your knees.”

“When this is over—” Demidov glared at his watch, telling the camera, “Twelve twenty-eight. Marta, I don’t know who this guy is, but he’s batshit crazy. You’ve really screwed up this time.”

“Marta? Thanks for telling me her name.”

Simon ended the video and sent it.

“Now what?”

“Roll onto your stomach.” He jabbed Demidov with the pipe. “Put your wrists behind your back.”

No sooner did he finish taping the guy’s arms behind him than the phone buzzed.

“Hi, Marta,” he said, mimicking the tone of an old friend. “The good news is that no matter how bad your brother looks, a minute ago he was still alive.”

“You’ll never see your fiancée again unless you release him.”

Marta’s voice sounded worried.

“I always assumed you’d kill her, so I’m not losing anything.” He climbed into the car. “The thing is, that works the other way around too. You’ll never see your brother again, unless you release my fiancée. So from this point on, I suggest you treat Liz gently. Because I swear to you, Marta, whatever you do to her, I’ll do to your brother.”

He pushed a button on a garage-door opener attached to the car’s sun visor. The door rumbled open and gray daylight filled the garage.

“I’m moving the timetable up,” he told her. “Five p.m. That’s the new deadline for the exchange.” He backed the car out of the garage and drove off along the quiet street. “At the Lincoln Memorial. Lots of witnesses if you try something stupid.”

“I’ll need more time than that.”

“While you track me? Using the GPS on the phone you gave me?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Hang on a second.” Simon stopped the car across from a small park where city workers were gathering trash bags. He accessed the call history of the phone he’d been given and memorized the number it was linked to. Then he called that number, but this time he used his own phone. “Marta, that buzz you hear is me. It’s coming from my personal phone. Answer it.”

She sounded confused, but did as he instructed.

He resumed driving, came abreast of the city’s open-backed truck, and tossed her phone among the garbage bags.

“I’m untethered, Marta,” he said into his own phone. “Five o’clock. The Lincoln Memorial. Don’t forget. Anything you do to Liz, I’ll do to your brother.”

IN THE BACK OFFICE OF a dry cleaner’s shop in McLean, Virginia, a tall woman with long blond hair, intense blue eyes, and strong Slavic features pressed the End button on her phone. She was in her midthirties and might have been considered a beauty if not for the cruelty around her mouth. She stared at a monitor where a pulsing green dot in Tysons Corner no longer moved. In the front of the shop, steam presses hissed and machines rumbled, but she barely heard them or registered the chemical smell that permeated the office.

Her brother had laughed at her when she’d suggested buying the business and using it as one of their fronts.

“What’s so funny?” she’d asked.

“Don’t you get it? Dry cleaning. That’s what needs to happen to all the cash we bring in from the drugs and the gambling and the whores. We should buy a couple of laundries also. Just don’t screw this up like you did when you bought those restaurants that gave people food poisoning.”

Marta kept staring at the pulsing dot.

She heard the voices of what seemed to be workmen talking about the unusual amount of trash they’d picked up in a park. Obviously Simon Childs had thrown away the phone he’d been given and was now using his own.

Could she trust him not to have police and FBI agents positioned near the Memorial?

Hardly.

“Let’s see how much you love your fiancée,” she muttered.

She pressed the button for the phone at the hunting lodge.

MAX OPENED THE DOOR.

“Rudy, what were you shouting about?”

He tensed when he saw the streaks of blood across the floor and then Rudy’s body slumped next to the Nautilus machine.

He drew his pistol and spun to make sure he wasn’t threatened, then rushed to his cousin. Rudy lay on his side, his crimson throat gaping. He couldn’t possibly be alive, but Max felt for a pulse anyhow, shaking Rudy gently, hoping there was something he could do. But no one could have survived such a deep gash to the throat.

He spun and quickly checked the bunker.

Liz Sansborough wasn’t there.

He raced past the monitors toward the stairs and charged upward. There was a chance she was hiding at the top, ready to slash at him.

Rather than approach cautiously, he rushed through the opening. But she wasn’t there, and he kept running across the lodge’s community room toward the open front door. Behind him, below in the bunker, he heard a phone ring, but he didn’t dare stop to answer it.

The bitch was only thirty seconds ahead of him.

The outside air was gray and cool.

Mist encircled him.

Behind him, faintly, the phone kept ringing.

He heard something else, though.

Past the van.

Footsteps running across gravel.

LIZ PLUNGED INTO THE MISTY forest.

The weather had softened the autumn leaves, but they still made noise, and thinking quickly, she veered toward the soft duff of pine needles, leaping over patches of leaves as she came to them.

Sensation was returning to her fingers. She used the knife to cut off the plastic cuffs, wincing as the tip dug into the skin under them. Then she pulled out the iPhone she’d stolen. She needed to use its GPS to determine her location and text Simon. She prayed he was all right. As she touched the icon activating the map, she lifted her head, listening. Feet were crunching quickly through the leaves behind her. It had to be Max, and he’d be armed with his pistol, while all she had was the knife.

No time to text.

“Liz Sansborough, where are you?” Max’s voice boomed. “You’re dead. Do you hear me? Dead.”

Shoving the iPhone back into her pocket, she spotted a rotting log ahead. Now she wanted Max to hear her, so she ran hard, pounding through twigs and leaves. Then she yelled, “Stay away from me, Max.”

To the right, a steep slope descended into the mist. At the log she dropped onto her back, braced her feet against it, and used the strength in her legs to push. The sound of the log rolling over the slope was at first hushed in the mist, but then it hit a rock and bounced off an unseen tree, the noise exploding as it crashed down into brush.

“I’m coming to get you,” Max shouted.

She moved swiftly away in the opposite direction, into the trees again, leaping silently from one bed of pine needles to the next. She could hear him pounding down the slope, grunting and swearing and calling her name. Pauses told her he must have slid or fallen.

She smiled.

Hurrying as quietly as she could, she rounded an enormous boulder and saw the stream. It was about five feet wide and clear as glass. Desperately thirsty, she fell to her knees on the mossy bank. Cupping her hands, she scooped up water and drank. Then she splashed her face, the cold water, though stinging, like a tonic to her bruises and cuts. Wiping her hands on her jogging jacket, she took out the iPhone and touched the map icon again. No response. She frowned, checked the charge, saw it was good, and realized she had no reception. No surprise. She was out in the middle of nowhere. She had to get back to the cabin where there was wireless.

The forest was starting to come awake from the shock of human intruders. Unseen animals skittered through the underbrush. Birds complained in the treetops. The stream sounded extraloud. She’d heard it when she’d first arrived at the log cabin and realized it could lead her back there.

Abruptly, she heard Max searching for her, coming closer. Even in the mist, the yellow of her jogging suit would be obvious. The Rambo movies that Max and Rudy had talked about flashed through her mind, reminding her of the way the character always blended with the forest. Grabbing handfuls of mud, she smeared them over her face and her jogging suit. Soon her clothing was a monotonous brown.

She yanked the hood up and tied it under her chin, hiding her red hair.

Feeling the pressure of time, she ran along the moss and sand that edged the stream. She listened for Max, but he’d become silent once more.

That made her nervous.

With luck, he’d slipped and fallen, perhaps hitting his head on a rock on his way down into the hollow where he thought she’d run. If her luck were really good, the bastard was dead.

But she wouldn’t count on it.

Creeping through the mist, she reached a stand of beeches.

She slowed and crouched. Listened. Watched.

Then took out the iPhone and studied the screen.

Finally, reception.

MARTA LISTENED AS THE LODGE’S phone rang and rang.

She didn’t understand why no one was answering. Had she used the wrong number?

She pressed End.

Again, she called the number for the lodge, this time double-checking that she hadn’t made a mistake.

One of several errors.

Nick would be furious.

It was her fault that he’d been arrested. He should never have been at the warehouse where the stolen prescription painkillers were delivered. She’d neglected to arrange for a go-between to pick up the money they were promised—so huge an amount that Nick himself had driven impatiently to the warehouse to retrieve it, only to be grabbed by the FBI.

And that wasn’t the only screwup he would blame her for.

If she couldn’t make this right, she didn’t want to be around when he got out of prison.

After the twentieth time the lodge’s phone rang, she impatiently broke the transmission and called Rudy instead of the lodge.

FEELING A SURGE OF HOPE, Liz touched the screen’s map icon and saw a green dot that revealed her location in the middle of a large, unmarked rural area. She expanded the image and discovered an orange line indicating a road, along with a number for Highway 55. She expanded the image even more, revealing the name of a town—Marsdon—southwest of her.

Her fingers trembling, she started to type a text message and let Simon know where she was. But all she managed was ESCAPED. OFF H55 N. Music suddenly blared from the cell phone.

Damn.

It sounded like the theme from the damned Rambo movies. The trumpets startled her so much that she nearly dropped the phone, touching the Send button before she intended to. As the rousing anthem reverberated through the mist, she flipped at the mute switch.

The sudden silence unnerved her.

Every animal in the forest seemed to have become paralyzed. Birds no longer complained in the trees.

Max didn’t make a sound either.

No way he couldn’t have heard the music.

RUBBING HIS SIDE FROM WHERE he’d tumbled down a slope, Max stalked through the forest.

Abruptly he heard music. Trumpets.

Rambo music.

Then he realized it was the ringtone on Rudy’s phone. To the left. For a fierce moment Max almost charged toward it, but at once the trumpets ended, their echo subsiding into the mist.

He found an unexpected stillness inside him.

What would the big guy do?

Would he charge ahead?

No damned way.

The scum he’d hunted never knew where he was.

Rambo just struck out of nowhere and . . .

Listening for any sound that Sansborough might make, he changed his phone to mute.

Then he texted Marta.

BITCH ESCAPED. RUDY’S DEAD. HUNTING HER.

After studying the ground ahead of him, he stepped onto soft pine needles—exactly what Rambo would do—and moved silently toward where the music had come from.

MARTA GAPED AT THE MESSAGE.

BITCH ESCAPED.

Without the woman, she had no way to rescue Nick. No way to prove that she could make up for her mistakes. No way to keep from being the target of Nick’s fury. She desperately needed help, but the rest of the gang was in Texas, working on two hijack jobs that she hoped the police would blame on a rival gang—an idea that she hadn’t told Nick about and for which he would surely now punish her.

She pulled a .40-caliber Sig Sauer from a drawer, made sure that its twelve-round magazine was fully loaded and that a round was in the firing chamber. She scooped an extra magazine from the drawer, shoved it and the pistol into her purse, and hurried from the office.

IN THE DARKNESS OF THE trunk, Nick struggled to breathe as shallowly as possible. The stench of the spare tire and oily rags made him sick. He thought he smelled the bitterness of engine exhaust also, but if that were true, surely he’d be dead by now. His arms ached from the tight angle at which his wrists were duct-taped behind him, but no matter how much he squirmed, he couldn’t loosen the tape.

Sweat streaked his forehead.

A bump sent a jolt of pain through the swelling gashes on his face. He was as furious about the damage to his handsome features as he was about anything else that the bastard driving the car had done to him. But he was even more furious because Marta’s carelessness had gotten him into this mess.

Your sister’s waiting for you, the man had said.

And she’ll be sorry, he vowed.

IN THE DRIVER’S SEAT SIMON blended with the rush of vehicles on the Beltway. Back at the safe house, the FBI agent had said that he wasn’t due to be relieved until nine tonight. So the police had no idea what happened and wouldn’t be looking for the car.

In theory.

He tried to figure the best way to arrange the exchange and get Liz back. As he visualized vantage points around the Lincoln Memorial, he heard the ping of a text message coming through. He snatched up his phone from the seat next to him.

What he saw made him inhale sharply.

ESCAPED. OFF H55 N.

From a sender named Rudy Voya.

Who the hell is that? And where’s the rest of the message? The name’s Russian. Did Liz really escape, or was Marta playing with him? Trying to draw him and her brother away from Washington?

Knowing that H55 was the scenic highway west of Washington, he made an abrupt decision and took the first exit that allowed him to speed in that direction.

LIZ CONTINUED ALONG THE SOFT bank of the stream.

The trickle of the water hid the few sounds she made, but it also hid any sounds from Max. With trembling fingers, she typed the rest of her message to Simon.

NE OF MARSDON. A LODGE.

The moment she sent it, she tightened her grip on the knife and struggled to get control of herself. So far, she’d merely been fleeing. But she remembered what her CIA instructors had taught her during training exercises at the Farm.

If you’re on the run—in the city, in the countryside, it doesn’t matter—if you don’t have a plan, if you’re just reacting, you’re going to lose.

Following the stream had the merit of giving her a course, but when she looked again at the map feature on her phone, she found an overhead photograph of the area. The stream meandered, sometimes curving back to the middle of the forest, where Max was surely searching for her. But if she veered from the stream with no landmarks to guide her, only the phone’s GPS would keep her from wandering in the mist—and not for long. The battery-charge indicator was at twenty percent.

Soon the phone would be dead.

How long until the sun went down? Could she hope to find her way out of here by then, or would she be forced to hide in the dark?

The lodge.

Earlier, without cell-phone reception, she’d thought about heading back there until she came within Wi-Fi range and could contact Simon. But now that she’d been able to send a text, her only thought had been to put as much distance as she could between her and Max. It was counterintuitive for her to go back to the lodge. Max would never expect it. She thought about the weapons there and the communications equipment. She could lock the doors and send for help. The place looked like it had the strength of a bunker. Max and whoever came to help him wouldn’t be able to break in before the police arrived.

Ready with the knife, she turned away from the stream, stepped warily over patches of leaves, and headed toward her best chance to survive.

MAX RECALLED WHAT RAMBO HAD said in the second movie.

The best weapon’s the human mind.

Yeah, right.

The guy’s got a body like a chunk of granite and he wants to talk about his mind. But he decided the advice was good. He didn’t know the first damned thing about chasing someone through a forest the way Rambo did, with his bow and arrow and knife like fucking Tarzan. It didn’t matter. All he needed to do was be smart.

And use his phone.

He assumed that, when the outburst of Rambo music had suddenly ended, it meant that Sansborough had put Rudy’s phone on mute. Not that it mattered. He and Rudy had each installed the “find” app on their phones, adding each other to the lists. When he opened the app and told it what to look for, son of a bitch, a map appeared. A dot showed that Rudy’s phone was to his left, heading toward the lodge.

He knew what that meant.

She was trying to get to a gun.

He almost raced in that direction, but couldn’t do that without making a lot of noise and warning her.

Be smart.

He picked up a rock and hurled it high into the air, throwing it as far as he could, way beyond where he estimated Sansborough might be. The rock crashed down through mist-cloaked branches, snapping twigs, thumping onto the ground and bouncing. Its trajectory was almost straight down. He hoped it would make Sansborough unable to guess from which direction it had been thrown. He used that noise to hide any sounds that he himself made while he simultaneously moved parallel toward where Sansborough was.

That’s smarter than Rambo.

When he saw that the dot on his screen came to a stop in reaction to the noise from the rock, he grinned and hurled another in that direction, high and far. Again, he used the crashing, snapping noise to prevent her from hearing him step carefully toward the lodge.

Definitely.

Smarter than Rambo.

He tossed another rock.

With luck, he’d be waiting when she crossed the parking lot.

WHEN SIMON SAW THE HIGHWAY 55 road marker, he resisted the urge to drive faster, needing all his strength of will to continue to blend with the stream of traffic. If a policeman stopped him and wondered why he was driving a car that wasn’t registered to him, if the policeman used that excuse to search the vehicle and looked in the trunk, it would all be over.

His phone chimed.

Another text coming through.

Again he felt pressure in his chest as he looked toward the seat next to him and saw that Rudy Voya had sent a new message.

NE OF MARSDON. A LODGE.

ANOTHER ROCK CRASHED THROUGH UNSEEN branches beyond Liz, breaking twigs and crunching down onto leaves.

The echo reverberated through the mist.

The afternoon’s chill sank deeper into her, aggravated by her growing fear about whatever trick Max was planning. Obviously he was using the distraction of the rocks to hide any sounds he made. She doubted that he could have gotten ahead of her.

Which meant he was throwing rocks from behind her.

That tactic could work for her too.

She slipped the phone back into her pocket, freeing her right hand so that she could pick up a rock. She turned and threw it high in the air, imitating what Max had done. Maybe she’d get lucky and hit the bastard.

At a minimum she hoped to confuse him.

The rock struck an invisible branch and made more noise as it dropped past other branches. She used those precious seconds to risk the subtle sounds she couldn’t avoid, as she clutched the knife and crept onward.

MAX FLINCHED FROM THE CRUNCHING sound that his shoe made on the gravel of the parking area. The forest had been a vague hulking presence in what was now a misty drizzle. Now all of a sudden there weren’t any shrouded trees ahead of him. He stepped back onto soft earth and inched quietly to the right toward where his phone showed that Sansborough wasn’t far from him.

He thought he heard her moving past trees.

But maybe not.

It didn’t matter.

In a few seconds, she would step onto the gravel. The noise she made would give her away. She wouldn’t be able to recover before he lunged toward the noise and shot her.

In the face. In each breast. In the stomach.

For Rudy.

He knew that Marta would want Sansborough alive, to exchange her for Nick. But the truth was, Max didn’t like Nick. On the other hand, Rudy had been Max’s cousin.

His friend.

No more watching Rambo movies with him.

No more joking around.

Close to him, a shoe stepped onto gravel.

Shouting to engage her startle reflex and momentarily paralyze her, he rushed ahead, firing.

THE SIGN AT THE SIDE of the highway—Marsdon 20 miles—increased Simon’s feeling of urgency.

So close.

The clouds darkened.

A misty rain blotted the countryside, obscuring the beauty for which the area was famous. He switched on the windshield wipers and glanced toward his phone, hoping to receive another text.

When he finally made it to Marsdon, then what?

There were a lot of woods out here.

A black SUV sped past him, hurling spray across his windshield.

MARTA ADJUSTED THE WINDSHIELD WIPERS to a higher speed and pressed harder on the SUV’s accelerator.

LIZ’S SHOE CRUNCHED THE GRAVEL of the parking lot, the noise seeming so loud that she recoiled, nearly dropping the knife. Someone suddenly shouted to her left.

Max.

His footsteps thundering toward her.

Gunshots roared.

A bullet tugged her right sleeve.

It would have struck her chest if she hadn’t lurched back from the sound she made on the gravel.

Adrenaline broke her paralysis.

She saw Max’s indistinct shape charging into view. She had a rock in her right hand, having planned to throw it and distract him one final time before she raced toward the lodge. Now she hurled it toward his increasingly clear face and ran into the forest.

The drizzle started to dissolve the mist.

Trees began to materialize.

Hearing Max curse behind her, she stretched her long legs farther, faster. Finally able to see where she was going, she zigzagged frantically through the bushes and trees.

FOR A MOMENT MAX THOUGHT that he’d been shot, but then he realized what had struck his forehead.

A rock.

He raised a hand to the already throbbing, swelling lump and felt blood.

“That’s something else you’ll pay for,” he screamed.

His pain-blurred vision cleared.

He heard Sansborough crashing through the forest.

Let her run.

With the mist dispersing, it would be easy to follow her now. He fired once more in her direction, wanting to spur her into a panic, knowing that adrenaline would soon make her hyperventilate and sap her strength.

It wouldn’t be long now.

He took the almost-expended magazine from his pistol and stuffed it into a pocket. He freed a spare magazine from his belt and shoved it home. A round was already in the chamber. He didn’t need to rack the slide as so many stupid Hollywood actors unnecessarily did.

But never in a Rambo movie.

As the drizzle beaded on his windbreaker, he broke into an easy, confident jog, taking care that his breath rate didn’t increase.

That was the secret.

If his breathing remained steady, everything else about him would be steady. It didn’t matter how far Sansborough got at the start. He could easily track her down, using the “find” app. Ahead, beneath an evergreen branch, he saw something that made him smile.

Blood.

One of his bullets had struck home.

Now he had yet another way to know where she was heading.

LIZ LEAPED OVER A FALLEN tree, landed on wet leaves, slipped, and nearly dropped.

Her right arm felt numb.

She wanted to clutch it, to try to stop the flow of blood, but she had to keep a tight grip on the knife in her left hand. Racing onward, she didn’t understand why she felt out of breath. She’d run in marathons, for God’s sake. With all her stress training, she shouldn’t be breathing this hard this soon. But she’d never run a marathon after being shot.

“Sansborough, what you did to Rudy I’m gonna do to you,” Max yelled behind her. “But you won’t die as fast as Rudy did.”

Her brain raced. How had he known that she’d headed back to the lodge? The only noise made had been when she stepped on the gravel. Nothing before that. Straining to fill her lungs, she veered around a tangle of bushes. Her legs almost buckled, but this time it wasn’t because of slippery leaves.

“Bet you’re feeling woozy from all the blood you’re pumping out,” Max yelled. “Won’t be long now.”

She glanced desperately over her shoulder and felt as though she’d been punched when she saw splotches of blood behind her. If the drizzle didn’t wash them away fast enough, Max could easily follow her.

The question kept insisting.

How did he know she’d headed back to the lodge?

Running, she felt the lump of the phone in her pocket.

A wave of fury gripped her.

He was using that to track her.

She pulled out the phone and threw it away.

“You sound like you’re running a little slower,” Max shouted. “Legs feeling weak? It won’t be long now.”

Breathless, her legs losing strength, she peered down at the knife she clutched. She felt so light-headed she had to take care that if she fell, she wouldn’t land on it. The blade had sawteeth on the back, reminding her of the knife in a Rambo movie she and Simon had seen on television. The damned things were broadcast every week, it seemed. Rambo had unscrewed the cap, revealing a hollow handle that contained a needle and thread with which he’d sewn a wound shut.

Running, Liz unscrewed the cap on this one.

The hollow grip contained nothing.

She remembered a scene in which Rambo had burst from the camouflage of branches and—

JOGGING EASILY AFTER HER THROUGH the rain, Max glanced occasionally at the find app on his phone. Even though the noise Sansborough made was easy to follow—and to a lessening degree, the blood—it never hurt to be extrasure. Passing a tangle of bushes, he frowned when he saw that the dot indicated that Sansborough wasn’t straight ahead as the blood track indicated but instead she was to his left.

Somehow he was passing her.

He stopped and aimed toward a tangle of bushes. Was she hiding behind them? But he didn’t see any blood leading in that direction.

Wary, he took a step closer.

Another step. He tightened his finger on the trigger. Then he saw the phone on the ground. Dammit, she’d figured out what he was doing and thrown it away. Now he had only her blood and the sounds of her running to tell him where she was. But he no longer heard her running.

Had she collapsed from loss of blood and the shock of having been shot?

He returned to the trail she’d left and followed at a cautious walk. As water dripped off the brim of his baseball cap, he scanned the trees on each side. He passed a tall boulder and checked behind it. The rain had finally washed away the blood, but her footprints were more obvious, collecting water.

He moved faster.

He came to the stream and saw where she’d slid down to it. When she’d struggled up the opposite side, she’d made deep furrows in the mud. He stepped over a fallen log, eased down the slippery bank, started across the stream, feeling how cold the water was, and suddenly gasped from a blow to his back that hurtled him into the water.

LIZ LUNGED FROM THE HOLLOW she’d scooped from the mud under the log.

A few minutes earlier, she’d crossed the stream and entered the trees on the opposite side. There she found a dead branch that fit into the hollow grip of the knife. Then she circled back to the stream, walked through the water, and crawled under the log.

As Max descended past her, aiming toward the trees on the opposite bank, she had thrust with the rigged spear. Adding her weight to it, she pushed with all her remaining strength and plunged the blade deeper into him.

He groaned and fell facedown into the stream.

Her hands had shook. Her lungs felt starved for oxygen.

Springing toward him, she shoved the spear even deeper into his back. He raised his face from the water and struggled. Using her uninjured arm, she grabbed a rock from the stream and struck it against the back of his head. He slumped, his face partially out of the water. She struck his head again, feeling the softness of blood under his hair.

She struck a third time.

A fourth.

She heard his skull crack.

She hit him again and again.

The rock went deeper into bone.

Shrieking, she straddled his back and pressed his face into the water, holding it under until long after his death shudder had stopped.

She needed all her strength to stand and stagger backward. When she slumped on the muddy bank, she kept her grip on the rock in case she needed to use it again.

She couldn’t stop shaking.

Finally, she decided to head back to the lodge and stop her bleeding. She placed a foot on his back and tugged the spear free. The effort of using her wounded arm made her groan. Max had dropped his pistol. She picked it up. As the rain fell, the forest again seemed enshrouded by mist, but she knew that the haze was really the consequence of blood loss.

She gave Max a fierce kick just to make sure he was dead.

Then she climbed the bank and followed her trail of blood.

SIMON DROVE OVER A RIDGE and saw an asphalt lane on the right, flanked by forest. He’d seen two driveways in the past five miles. They’d looked welcoming, with signs that advertised facilities for training and breeding horses. In contrast, this turnoff led to a reinforced steel gate and a fence with barbed wire along the top. He steered off the highway and stopped in front of the gate. A number pad was mounted to a pole.

He left the car and pressed the key fob, releasing the vehicle’s trunk. After carefully raising it, he smelled the vinegar stench of carbon dioxide.

But it wasn’t enough to hide another stench.

“You son of a bitch, I pissed my pants because of you,” Nick said.

He lay on his side, his arms taped behind him.

“What’s the code to open the gate?” he asked, ignoring the rain that struck him.

“Code? Gate? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Do you want me to close the trunk again? I’ll keep it shut a lot longer. Maybe the next time you’ll do something else in your pants. Or would you rather see your sister?”

“My sister. Oh, I want to see my sister for sure. The stupid skank.”

“Your happy reunion isn’t going to occur unless you tell me the code to open the gate.”

Nick recited four numbers.

He pressed them on the pad and heard a whir.

The gate started to open.

He returned to Nick and told him, “Bye for now.”

He shut the trunk, hopped into the car, and drove through the open gate. In the rearview mirror, he saw it closing behind him. The lane continued through the forest for quite a while. Then Simon rounded a curve and abruptly came to a large clearing. Beyond a gravel parking area stood a two-story log house. A few small buildings sat next to a swimming pool that had been covered for the winter. A bermed area contained a shooting range with metal silhouettes of human-shaped targets.

A drab van was parked in front of the house.

The front door hung open, suggesting that someone had entered or left in a hurry. He stepped out of the car and drew the pistol that he’d taken from the FBI agent. Ignoring the rain, he scanned the clearing. He didn’t dare call Liz’s name, lest his voice attract whoever had been holding her captive.

He took a step toward the lodge.

Movement attracted his attention to the far side of the clearing.

A figure emerged from the trees, staggering.

Whoever it was held a spear and was covered with mud so thick that the rain hadn’t dissolved it. The figure stumbled across the gravel and Simon saw blood on the right arm—and a suggestion of yellow on the figure’s legs.

Liz’s jogging suit was yellow.

He started to run toward her, only to be stopped by a gunshot and a bullet that tore up gravel in front of him. He spun toward the lodge’s porch where a tall woman, with long blond hair and Slavic features, aimed a pistol at him. She wore a beige pantsuit and a brown suede jacket.

“Drop the gun,” she told him.

He obeyed. “Marta?”

“Where the hell is Nick?”

“In the trunk.”

“Alive?”

“How else would I be able to exchange him for Liz?”

“Show me.”

At the edge of his vision, Simon was aware of Liz’s grotesque mud-covered figure continuing to stumble across the gravel. She dropped to one knee, then planted the blunt edge of the spear into the gravel and used it to draw herself up.

“Never mind about her,” Marta said, stepping closer with the gun. “Show me that Nick’s alive.”

He pressed the key fob and opened the trunk.

Peering in, he told Nick, “Your sister’s asking for you.”

Nick said something caustically angry in Russian.

He dragged him out and propped him on his feet. With legs taped together, the man had trouble standing.

“Cut him loose,” Marta ordered.

“I’ll need to reach for my pocketknife.”

“Be careful.”

He pulled out the knife and cut the tape that secured Demidov’s legs. The Russian spread them, steadying himself. Simon sliced the tape that bound the wrists.

“Now drop the knife,” Marta said.

He did so.

Demidov winced as he moved his arms slowly forward, giving the impression that his muscles were locked, then he removed the tape that remained on his wrists.

“This is all your fault.”

“I’m sorry, Nick. I admit I made a mistake. But I corrected it. I got you out.”

“The goddamned restaurants that the health department shut down. The courier you didn’t send, so I had to pick up the money on my own, which is why the feds were able to grab me at the warehouse. That stupid dry-cleaning shop. Every time I leave the office, my clothes stink.”

“Nick, I told you I’m sorry.”

“Where the fuck is everybody? Why didn’t you bring more help?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Couldn’t? What do you mean?”

“They’re all in Texas.”

“What are they doing in—”

“Hijack jobs. It’ll look like Texas gangs did it. No one’ll ever suspect that—”

“You sent everybody to Texas? On your own?”

“I thought—”

“You stupid cunt, don’t think. You’re not good at it.”

Marta shot him.

He took a step back and looked surprised.

She shot him again.

Then a third time.

Blood first seeped, then poured from the wounds.

Demidov collapsed to the ground.

Not moving.

She aimed at Simon.

Liz continued to stagger across the gravel. Except for the blood on her arm and the bit of yellow that showed on her legs, she was still covered with mud. With each halting step, she placed the blunt edge of the spear ahead, using it to support her weight. Marta switched her aim toward Liz, then back toward Simon.

The woman peered down at her brother, then lowered the pistol. “Look at what you finally made me do.”

When Liz reached them, she wavered and remained standing only because she leaned on the spear.

“Where’s Max?” Marta asked.

“Dead.”

“I’m impressed.”

“Rambo,” Liz murmured.

“What?”

“Saw Rambo use his knife to make a spear. Saw him hide in a stream. Saw him do a lot of things.”

“You’d better get her to a hospital,” Marta said. “She’s delirious.”

“Hospital?”

“You kept your part of the bargain. Not that it matters.” Marta stared down at Nick’s body. “A lot of people are going to be angry about what I just did.”

“Maybe I can help.”

“How?”

“Protect you. Give you a new start. The FBI. Witness relocation program.”

Marta laughed as if he were making a joke.

Again she stared down at her brother.

Liz’s eyes closed, then she toppled. Simon grabbed her before she struck the gravel. She was terribly cold. He held her tightly, wanting never to let her go. When Simon looked up, Marta was gone.

A few seconds later a black SUV roared into view from behind the house and sped along the lane, disappearing among the trees.

“Sorry I missed breakfast,” Liz managed to say.

He looked down.

She did her best to smile.

“Same time tomorrow?” she asked.

“On a hospital tray maybe. No more talking.”

He picked her up, carried her into the lodge out of the rain, and laid her on a wooden bench.

She closed her eyes.

“Don’t go to sleep. You’ve got to stay awake. Fight the shock.” He tore open the right sleeve of her jogging suit, exposing a bullet wound, and found his cell phone. After calling for an ambulance, he searched the house and located a medical kit in a cabinet in the basement. He washed and disinfected her wound as best he could and bound it with a pressure bandage. She shivered, perhaps the first symptom of hypothermia. He pulled off her cold, wet jogging suit and covered her with a throw that he found on a sofa.

Then he held her.

“Rambo,” she murmured again.

“What about him?” he asked, alarmed by her delirium but humoring her, trying to keep her from falling asleep.

“Died in the novel.”

“Don’t talk about dying.”

“Bedsprings. Electrocution.”

Simon couldn’t figure out what she meant.

“Bedsprings,” she repeated.

“Yes, sweetheart. Bedsprings.”

“Rambo.”

“Yes, sweetheart. Rambo.”

“They said you weren’t him.”

He held her tighter, desperate to make her warm.

“But to me, you are.”

He smiled.

Both at her compliment, and at the sirens approaching in the distance.