Fatal Error, page 10
He pointed his flashlight at the gleaming rails.
She nodded. “Got it.”
The tunnel seemed a bit brighter off to her left. “A train station?”
“Yeah.”
“There’re a few of these alcoves along the length of the tunnel.” Morris pointed his flashlight at a small open space tucked into the wall. “Find one and hop in there if a train comes, okay?”
She nodded again. “Got it.”
Morris jogged toward the light ahead. Jess followed. They caught up with a group of Vanelli’s officers, who were silently moving from one defensive position to the next.
Jess stayed behind Morris, who remained twenty feet back from the ROS as they cleared each alcove and hiding place. They found no one.
She passed a metal door. She rapped on it. The sound rang out, echoing louder than she’d expected. Morris grabbed her hand, and placed a finger across his mouth. She nodded and mouthed “Sorry.”
She gripped the door handle, and twisted. It didn’t move.
Morris pointed to a box on the ceiling. “Signal lights,” he whispered. “Probably an electrical—”
Behind Morris, flashes leapt into life. Gunfire rang out. Two shots. Booming and echoing in the enclosed space.
Jess ducked onto her haunches, and pressed her head down between hunched shoulders. Morris did the same, though he pointed his gun in the direction of the noise.
Vanelli’s men shouted in Italian and doused their lights.
In the near total darkness, Jess could discern movement, but not much.
More gunfire flashes erupted. Short controlled bursts, irregularly spaced. More Italian shouting from Vanelli’s team that Jess couldn’t translate.
The slight movement she’d noticed in the distance became a rushing hoard. The ROS piled past her, carrying a wounded carabiniere.
She recognized him. Vanelli’s young Subaru driver, Nicci. His right shoulder was pumping blood around the hand he pressed tightly against the wound. They disappeared into an alcove, and a flashlight went on.
Vanelli arrived, and sent an officer up the rope to the surface.
He knelt beside Morris. “One of my men was hit.”
Morris pointed to the rope and the shaft. “Headed to find a medic?”
“And Polizia. Reinforcements.” He gestured forward. “If Ficarra reaches the station before us, he’ll disappear into the crowds, and we’ll never find him.”
“If it’s Ficarra.”
Vanelli shrugged. “He shot my man. It doesn’t matter who he is now. He will not escape.”
Morris nodded and pointed to his radio. “Does it work?”
“Maybe.” Vanelli shook his head. “Too far underground.”
Morris jerked his thumb in the direction of the firefight ahead. “How many are shooting back at your men?”
“One. Could be two. Probably not more.” Vanelli’s eyes narrowed. “Too dark to be sure.”
“What’s stopping Ficarra from running?”
“I have two men keeping him pinned down, but it’s dark.”
“You think he’ll risk moving on to the station and out of the tunnel?”
Vanelli exhaled. “He had this escape route planned. He saw us long before we saw him. Probably using night vision. He can see better than us, so he can do more than we can.”
The carabinieri regrouped around Vanelli. Jess shuffled back to let them get close. She heard hushed orders. Her ears hadn’t returned to normal since the first gunshots from the shaft, but she didn’t understand most of the Italian that she could actually hear, anyway. She caught metallic clicks. Guns, safeties, and new magazines.
She turned around to peer into the darkness. She felt a breeze. Wind blowing down the tunnel. Her skin tingled. She shook Morris’s arm. “Train.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The breeze picked up. The wind blew into her face. She heard the rustle of debris blown around on the ground.
Vanelli’s men split into two groups, racing for the alcoves, gear rattling as they moved.
Jess scrambled into the closest alcove. Morris and Vanelli squeezed in beside her.
A single point of light appeared in the distance. The train’s headlight.
The ground trembled and the wind intensified. The train’s roar grew louder until the sound seemed to ring down the rails.
The train’s light illuminated the tunnel’s textured surface. The outline of the train became clear. Its single headlight was set high above two arched windows. She squinted against the glare to make out the driver. Unlike every subway she had ridden, the train wasn’t speeding past, but seemed to crawl, its wheels scraping and squealing on the rails.
Vanelli put his head out of the alcove. He shrank back, and activated his radio to talk to his men. “The train is slowing for the station. Ride it past the target.”
Seconds crept by. The roar grew louder. The air blowing down the tunnel became a gale, shoved aside by tons of metal. The ground shook.
The train reached the alcove. One moment it wasn’t there, the next it was thundering by, shaking the ground, swirling trash, spilling light on the trio pressed into the alcove.
The first carriage replaced the train’s engine in Jess’s narrow view. Vanelli slung his gun over his shoulder, and stepped out into the small space between the textured wall and the hurtling metal.
The gap between the carriages flashed by, too fast to distinguish its features. Jess twisted her head, looking for handholds on the ends of the carriages. The gap disappeared before she identified any of the carriage parts.
The train’s brakes squealed. The next carriage passed. And another.
She blinked. Now she saw a step and a handrail. One at the end of each carriage. Her vision hadn’t improved. The train must have slowed.
Vanelli had seen, too. He ran out of her field of view.
She leaned forward.
Vanelli grabbed a handrail and pulled himself up onto the step. By the light of the passing carriages, she saw three more of Vanelli’s men jump onto the train.
The brakes squealed. The train was definitely slowing.
Now Jess could see the windows and the graffiti rolling by. She could make out people standing inside the carriages. The pressure of moving air had dropped.
The train was slowing for the station.
Morris tapped her arm. “Stay or go?”
She looked at the train moving not much more than a fast walking pace now. She could do this. “Go.”
They stepped out and jumped for the train. Morris caught the end of one carriage, and Jess grabbed the front of the next.
She squeezed down, and peered through the gap between the carriages. The light from the train illuminated a clear view into the alcoves as they passed. She braced herself to pull back if she saw Enzo Ficarra or whomever they were chasing.
But she saw no one.
The train rolled on, and she saw it turn through a sharp bend and out into a station.
She pointed forward. “He must have made it to the station,” she shouted.
Morris nodded.
The train emerged into the blinding white light of the underground station. Jess had to squint.
The crowds backed away from the platform’s edge. Vanelli jumped off the train, waving his arms and shouting orders. The crowd drifted toward the other end of the station, shying away from the men in combat gear and guns.
Jess jumped onto the platform. Morris followed. He ran back the way they had come, his gun ready.
The tail end of the train entered the station. Passengers were lining up at the doors. Some were pointing at Morris and the ROS, the uniforms and guns clearly grabbing their attention.
The train didn’t stop. It kept rolling. Not fast. Not accelerating. Just enough to stop passengers from opening a door and exiting the carriages.
Vanelli ran past her, calling to Morris. “Keep back. I’ve got a man on the way to the surveillance room.”
Morris took up a position at the end of the platform, to one side, with the wall as protection. Vanelli waved the carabinieri into similar positions on the platforms on either side of the station.
Jess crouched beside Morris. With the train gone, the tunnel had returned to pitch dark. “No one saw him?”
“Seems not.”
“Could he have ridden the train? Like we did?”
Morris shook his head. “Vanelli’s men had it covered.”
Jess looked into the tunnel’s blackness. “There was that door.”
“There were several doors.”
Jess exhaled, her breath hissing between her teeth. “He probably took one of those exits while the doors were lit by the train.”
“I doubt it.” Morris shook his head. “He has night vision gear. Amplifies the light for him but not for us. He’d want to exit when we couldn’t see him.”
Jess peered into the pitch-black tunnel. “What light?”
“Right.” Morris shifted his weight. “He’s probably got an IR illuminator.”
“Which is?”
“A light, only infrared, not visible light. Hunters use them.”
“Infrared?” Jess peered into the darkness. “Same as the lasers?”
“You won’t see it.” He nodded. “We didn’t bring—”
Jess leapt up, pulled her phone from her pocket, and activated the camera. Morris grinned. “Good thinking.”
She pointed the camera down the tunnel and turned the exposure to max. In the distance, a faint glow bobbed up and down.
Morris grabbed the phone, angling it left and right, destroying the image. She eased it from his grasp and held it steady. “He’s running.”
Vanelli had returned. He pushed close, staring at the screen and talking into a radio.
The glow moved left, jerking up and down twice. “He’s crossed the tracks.”
Vanelli waved to his men. They started down the tracks in the gunman’s direction.
The glow dimmed.
“He’s entered an alcove on the left,” Jess said.
The darkness swallowed Vanelli as he ran toward the alcove.
Morris lowered himself from the platform onto the tracks.
Jess moved the phone for a better view, but the dim glow had disappeared. “He’s gone.” She looked at Morris. “He’s found an exit door.”
Morris shouted to Vanelli, and in a moment, bouncing flashlights lit the tunnel. Vanelli’s men were running, full tilt.
Jess jumped down to the tracks and followed Morris, keeping close enough to benefit from his flashlight. They ran hard, chasing Vanelli’s men.
The flashlights ahead disappeared.
“They’ve taken the door,” Morris said.
Less than a minute later, Jess and Morris reached the same door. Morris pressed his ear against the smooth surface before whipping it open.
Inside were racks of equipment, lined up in rows. Wires dangled everywhere. Some on bound bundles, some single strands that trailed to the ceiling or above their heads, or from row to row.
She heard Vanelli, somewhere ahead, ordering the station closed, and the doors to be sealed.
Morris shoved her behind him as he walked down a row of equipment.
She patted the Heizer in her pocket, to be sure she hadn’t dropped it. Vanelli wouldn’t take well to her being armed, and he’d produce a lot of fallout for Morris. She compromised. She kept close to Morris. And kept her hand on the gun.
They passed several doors before reaching the far side of the room. Someone shouted, and Vanelli’s men ran to the right. She followed Morris.
Vanelli stood by a door, listening to his radio. A garbled voice came from the radio, and he charged through the door. The carabinieri followed. So did Morris.
Jess ran behind Morris into a stairwell. Spiral steps encircled an open central square. Jess looked up but she couldn’t make out the top of the stairs. Shouts echoed. There was a brief exchange of fire. Jess flattened herself against the rear wall, away from the open space.
The gunfire stopped. Morris sprinted up the stairs. Jess followed.
Above them, were more shouts, and door slamming.
Jess kept close to the wall. After five flights, her legs began to burn. She breathed steadily through her half-open mouth and held her head up, looking up the stairs, to give her lungs room to work.
Morris slowed. Three flights later, they reached the top of the stairwell. There was only one door. Morris pushed Jess behind the door as he opened it.
He nodded. “Good to go.”
They emerged into a large receiving bay. Fluorescent lights hung from the ceiling. Half the space was filled with haphazardly stacked boxes. An eighteen-wheeler was backed up to a raised loading dock.
Beyond the truck, Jess could see the blue and black uniforms worn by Vanelli’s team.
Morris ran along the side of the truck. Several dark blue carabinieri vehicles were screeching to a halt. Carabinieri piled into the vehicles and Morris dived for one of the rear seats.
Jess reached the gazzellas as they tore off. She waved her arms. Morris’s face flashed by, looking sheepish. “Sorry” he mouthed.
She fumed. How the hell could they leave her? She was the one who found the guy in the office cube. She was the one who found him in the tunnel. If not for her they’d be back in the industrial junk yard, listening to talk radio.
She looked left. A tall chain-link fence separated her from the building they had stormed minutes earlier.
She looked back at the loading dock, an entrance for the supplies needed to run the station. She clenched her fist. She was at a train station.
Damn, she wasn’t thinking straight.
She raced around the building to the station entrance and a line of taxis. She jumped in the passenger seat of the first one she reached.
The driver frowned at her. He opened his mouth to speak, but she waved her hands. “Carabinieri.” She pointed in the direction the blue gazzellas had departed. “Avanti, avanti!”
The driver hesitated a moment before putting his car in gear.
“Now!”
“You American.” He stared into her face. “Not carabinieri.”
Jess exhaled, and pointed to herself with her thumb. “FBI. Now move.”
His eyes widened, and he floored the accelerator. The car lurched away from the curb, rotating a full hundred and eighty degrees before fishtailing into a straight line, following the carabinieri.
Jess struggled to buckle her seatbelt as the driver negotiated the surface streets. They hurtled along an access road and joined the freeway with the speedo needle climbing past 150 kilometers an hour.
“Where?” he said.
Jess strained for a glimpse of the dark blue gazzellas. Nothing. She dialed Morris. He answered on the fourth ring.
“Sorry, Jess.” She heard the weariness in his voice. “They are hot to capture Nicci’s shooter. He’s at the hospital. He’s lost a lot of blood.”
“We’re all on the same page there.” She pushed thoughts of Nicci aside, for now. “Where are you?”
“Some ring road.”
“I’m on the same.”
Silence.
“I got a taxi.”
“Hang on.” She heard him cover the mouthpiece and some muffled discussion in the background. He came back on. “We’re turning off the ring road for the SS4. Going north. Vanelli has a helo inbound.”
She turned to her driver. “SS4. Northbound.”
The driver nodded, and pressed harder on the accelerator. “Chase criminals?”
“Kind of.”
“We’re exiting for some train yard,” Morris said.
“Train yard?”
“Big shunting area, and—” Morris swore. She heard a squeal of tires and shouting. Morris grunted. “We’re at a crossing. He crossed. He’s on the other side of a train. We’re stuck waiting. I have to go.”
“Keep me updated,” she said, but Morris had already hung up.
The taxi driver hunched forward, his chin only inches from the steering wheel. His eyes met hers in the rearview mirror.
“Chase criminals? Pella, Esercito Italiano, er, Italian Army, before.” He pointed at his chest with his thumb and leaned forward as if the taxi could travel faster with a bit of encouragement. “In treno…” He made a back and forth motion with his hand. “Train?”
“A train yard, yes.”
Pella grunted, and slowed.
“Don’t slow down.”
Pella shook his head. “SS4, to the train yards…” He yanked on the wheel. Jess was thrown sideways. The tires squealed and the car lurched across the lanes, crossing a white-hatched area and exiting the freeway.
She strained to see the signs but they went by too fast. “Where are you going?”
He weaved around traffic that was slowing for a traffic light, and floored the accelerator as they passed through on the last vestiges of amber. “We go the other side. Faster. Catch criminal.” He waved his hand in the air. “I know the way.”
She dialed Morris.
He answered the first time. “We’re still waiting for the train to clear. Chopper is still five miles away.”
“Well, apparently my taxi driver knows best and we’re heading to the other side of the yard.”
“But…”
“We turned off before the SS4. We’re on surface streets. He knows a short cut to the train yard, I think.”
“Jess. Don’t go into the train yard.” He lowered his voice slightly. “Vanelli’s men are armed to the teeth and pumped. This guy shot one of theirs. They’re not giving up until they get him and they don’t care if he’s still breathing when they’re done.”
Jess braced herself as Pella slung the taxi around a ninety-degree corner. Train tracks stretched to her left as far as she could see. Trains were moving. A delicate ballet of precise timing that allowed heavy goods to be routed to their proper destination.
“We’re there.” She sighed. “Big place.”
Morris grunted. “No kidding. If you get inside, get up as high as you can. See if they have a control tower or something.”
“No problem.” She hung up.
Pella raced along the street. An almost endless expanse of iron railings surrounded the train yard. She saw large square notices in Italian that she guessed were the equivalent of “keep out.”
