The Buried

CHAPTER 30

“Higher,” Orbits said, his voice echoing through the otherwise empty room.

Branson, one of his new team members, tilted the girl’s head back.

“That’s good,” Orbits told him.

He snapped off three more photos.

“All right, give me a moment.”

Branson let the captive’s chin fall back to her chest.

Orbits scrolled through the shots he’d taken. Of the last three, two were fine, but in the third he’d captured part of an eye, showing it was closed. He couldn’t have that. Someone might get the idea she was dead. He trashed it, and then looked through all the others to see what else he might need. The problem was, he didn’t know exactly what would identify the girl to someone, and if his plan were to work, others had to know for sure he had her.

He’d already shot pics of the pads of her fingers, and the small butterfly tattoo on her waist. There were other torso photos, lower-face photos, back photos. He’d even shot a full range of her nearly bald head. What else could there be?

He was about to tell Branson they were done when the picture of her face gave him one last idea.

“Pull her lips back,” he said. “I want to take a few of her teeth.”

“You got it,” Branson said. He tilted her head up and peeled back her lips.

Orbits took a shot. “Now open her mouth.”

When Branson pried the woman’s jaw apart, she stirred slightly, moaning. Apparently it was almost time for Orbits to force some more of the sedative down her throat.

He moved in really close, took several shots of her upper teeth, and then switched his angle to do the same with her lower. Her tongue had lolled to the side, though, and partially blocked the shot. He grabbed it to move it out of the way, but as his thumb touched the underside, she flinched.

It couldn’t have been from pain. He had barely touched her. Curious, he bent her tongue back and spotted several black marks. They were small and the angle made them hard to see clearly. He took a picture and brought the photo up on the display.

Not random marks — a tattoo of numbers.

“Is that it, or do you want to take some more?” Branson asked, still holding the girl’s mouth open.

Orbits looked up in surprise, having momentarily forgotten anyone else was there. “Yeah, yeah. I got what I need.”

He walked way, staring at his phone. Could this be the reason everyone wanted the girl?

He zoomed in on the tattoo a bit more. Two sets of eight digits, with a period after the first two numbers in each set, and, in front of the second set — the one beginning with 95—a minus sign.

Whoa. Whoa. Whoa.

He knew what this was. GPS coordinates.

When he entered them in his phone, up popped a map of northeastern Kansas, an arrow dropping into the countryside not too far from a town called Meriden. He clicked on the satellite view but it didn’t make things any clearer. The surrounding area was mostly farmland, while the exact spot was a small, grass-covered clearing encircled by a thick grove of trees. After zooming in as far as he could, he saw a few spots of white within the grass — rocks, probably — but nothing else.

This had to be what was so important about the girl.

He thought for a moment.

Though this put a whole new spin on things, there was no reason to scrap his original plan. He could still reap its benefits and snag an even bigger score. It would not be without risks, but hell, he was Ricky Orbits. If anyone could pull it off, he could.

He e-mailed the girl’s pictures to Donnie, with a note telling him to move up the start time to immediately, and then turned back to Branson.

“Pack everything up,” he ordered. “We’re moving out.”

After the ambulance’s engine rumbled to life, the driver headed back into the rear of the building, leaving the vehicle unattended.

“Do you have a tracking chip?” Quinn asked Nate.

“No.”

Quinn didn’t have one, either. They’d brought several on the flight east, but they were in a bag in the back of their car.

“Your phone,” Quinn said, holding out his hand.

“What?”

“Your phone. Quick.”

Nate pulled out his cell.

“Call me,” Quinn said.

When Quinn’s phone vibrated, he answered, and then switched devices with Nate.

“What are you doing?” Nate asked.

“Just stay here,” Quinn said.

He moved into the large room and hurried over to the ambulance. He would have liked to put Nate’s phone in the back portion of the vehicle, but if the others returned while he was doing it, he’d be seen right away. He settled for the front cab. Making sure the cell was on silent mode, he jammed it under the driver’s seat, the microphone end as close to the edge of the cushion as possible without revealing itself.

Before he could make his retreat, he heard footsteps enter the room. Sneaking around the front of the ambulance, he crouched beside the grill and peeked under the vehicle. He could see the legs of two men approaching the back. When they arrived, they stopped and seemed content to just hang out.

Quinn heard the clatter of wheels coming from the back of the building. Knowing there was only one way he would be able to remain unobserved, he snaked under the ambulance until he was completely beneath the rear section. Across the room, the gurney appeared in the doorway, escorted by two more men. No, three, he realized, the last mostly hidden from view by his companions. Though his was a low angle, Quinn could see Dani on the bed, unconscious. As the group moved across the room, one of the guys waiting at the back of the ambulance climbed inside.

Quinn calculated the odds, but he couldn’t take out all five men on his own without Dani getting hurt. He shot a look toward the front room. The door was closed, Nate remaining hidden as ordered.

The men loaded the gurney into the vehicle, and then two of them climbed in with Dani and the man who was already inside. One of the remaining two took the driver’s seat while his companion walked over to the wall and started pulling the chain to open the rolling door.

The ambulance began moving forward.

Wonderful, Quinn thought sarcastically.

The second he was clear of the rear bumper, he hopped into a crouch and moved with the vehicle, staying tight to the back and below the rear windows. Though this kept him out of sight while the vehicle headed for the exit, his makeshift plan had one glaring problem — when the ambulance passed the rolling door, the man holding the chain would see him.

Quinn moved as close as he could to the passenger side, and the moment the man came into view, he flew at him.

The chain ripped from the guy’s hands as he sailed backward. Grazing the outer wall, he twisted around, hit the floor shoulder first, and tumbled onto his chest, his forehead bouncing off the concrete. Quinn jammed a knee into his back and raised his palm, intending to hit the man in the head, but realized the guy had been knocked out.

Quinn pulled out his gun and jumped to his feet, knowing what would come next.

A loud metallic rattle filled the air as the ambulance pulled outside.

Orbits turned toward the back window just in time to see the rolling door sail downward, barely missing the ambulance.

The driver, Stafford, hit the brakes and looked back at Orbits. “That asshole nearly took us out. What was he thinking?”

“Must have lost his grip,” Parnell, another member of the team, said.

Orbits was tempted to tell Stafford to drive on and leave Conway here, but given what was about to go down, he might need all the help he could get.

They watched the pedestrian door. When Conway didn’t come out, Branson said, “Maybe he’s hurt.”

“Shit,” Orbits said under his breath. “Someone go get him.”

“On it,” Branson said.

Quinn moved behind the pedestrian door and waited. It wasn’t long before he heard steps heading his way.

When the door opened, the new arrival’s focus was in the other direction, toward the rolling door. As soon as the man saw his colleague on the floor, he hurried over.

Quinn followed, and placed his suppressor against the man’s neck as the guy knelt down next to his friend.

A moment of frozen time — the man motionless as he assessed his options, Quinn steady as he watched for the first sign of resistance.

There.

The man twisted around to grab Quinn’s weapon, only the gun wasn’t there anymore.

Thup.

The bullet ripped through the guy’s calf. As he yelled out in pain, Quinn whacked the hot barrel against the base of the man’s skull. He was dazed, but not out. Quinn hit him again and sent him to the ground with his buddy.

He rushed back to the door to await the next one.

Orbits started getting antsy after twenty seconds. When forty had passed, he became downright anxious.

“Should I go see if they need help?” Parnell asked

Orbits stared at the building. Something was wrong.

“If he needed help, he would have come back and asked for it by now,” he said. He turned toward Stafford. “Go. Get us out of here.”

Stafford didn’t need to be told twice.

As they raced away, the door to the building opened.

For half a second, Orbits thought it was Branson, but whoever it was never stepped outside.

The hunter fumed. Somehow their location had been discovered.

Quinn watched the ambulance race away. It had been too much to hope they’d keep coming in one by one. But he had taken out two of them, reducing their manpower by forty percent.

He yelled for Nate to join him. When his partner appeared, he was holding Quinn’s phone up to his ear.

“Is it working?”

“Yeah, but they’re not talking much.”

“Have they at least said where they’re going?”

“Not yet.”

Quinn looked over at the two unconscious men on the floor. One or both of them might know where the ambulance was headed. But with Dani’s chip and now Nate’s phone, he and Nate didn’t need to waste time questioning them.

They left the men where they lay and headed back to their car.