Fatal Error, page 21
Enzo had chosen the location carefully. It was ideal for the handover, not that the ROS or FBI would be aware beforehand.
He visualized the final steps in his operation carefully, one final time.
Through some sense of duty or guilt, Agent Morris would carry the money. He would follow his instructions, and drive to the village to wait at the phone box for further directions.
From there, he would travel to the coast through the tunnel.
He would see Kimball at the ventilation shaft. He would stop.
Enzo would be there. She would have the towel with the explosives wrapped around her.
Morris’s phone would be out of range. They would talk for a few seconds. He’d implore restraint. He’d make sure she was okay.
He’d hand over the money for the woman.
Enzo smiled. He would disable Morris’s car. He would tell them not to follow him.
Agent Morris and Miss Kimball would never leave the tunnel. His second bomb would see to that.
The padlock on the entrance to the tunnel’s ventilation shaft yielded to a short crowbar. He carried the plastic box up the first flight of stairs, placing it in a corner, and brushing dust and grime from the floor over it until it looked as if it had been abandoned years before.
He unwound the spool of wire that would form the antenna and laid it along the side of the steps, working his way higher and higher.
After a minute’s climb he reached the storage room. He silently thanked his luck as the length of wire ended by the room’s only window.
He taped the free end to the window, where it would receive a good signal.
He would leave Morris and Kimball stranded in the center of the tunnel. Even if they walked for the exit, they would never reach it.
The soft rock that had enabled the tunnel’s construction would enable its destruction. The Semtex plastic explosive would collapse the whole structure.
From the window, he saw his old Fiat, still parked where he had left it days earlier.
The door from the storage room was locked, but as he rattled the handle, he knew it would give easily to outward pressure.
Satisfied his bomb was ready and his escape route good, he descended the steps. He returned to the Ford and rejoined the traffic.
After traveling a few miles, he turned for his grandfather’s land.
He was ready for the exchange.
He was ready for his five million euro.
And, he gripped the steering wheel hard, he was ready to avenge his brother.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
Morris stood in front of the map on Vanelli’s wall, and traced a line from the pushpin that indicated the side-by-side houses, across a small road and into a hatched green area. There were no paths or buildings marked on the land.
“A forest,” Vanelli said.
Morris rubbed his finger over a tiny blur in the edge of the main road. “An entrance?”
Vanelli stared. “Possibly.”
“Vacant land.”
Vanelli nodded.
Henderson stepped to the board. “So?”
Morris shook his head slowly. “People live in houses.”
Henderson frowned.
Vanelli sighed. “If there’s nowhere to live, maybe the hostage isn’t…still living.”
“We need to go,” Morris said.
“No,” Henderson said. “The search teams will get there in time.”
Morris shook his head. “It’ll take too long. We need to go. Now.”
“No,” Henderson said. “All I hear is possibly, maybe, conjecture. In the balance of things, you are jumping to conclusions.”
“It’s all we’ve got,” Morris said through clenched teeth.
“Vanelli is searching all the locations. Odds are he will find her.”
“Odds?”
Henderson held his hand up in front of Morris. “And may I remind you, you are officially no longer in charge of this case.”
“We have to cut down the odds. We have to go there first.”
“No,” said Vanelli.
Henderson smiled.
Morris looked slack-jawed at Vanelli.
Vanelli shook his head. “My teams have to work through the locations one at a time. If they jump around, they will waste time.”
“And how do we know how much time Jess has got?”
Henderson squared up his shoulders. “Ficarra told us how long we’ve got.”
Morris’s eyes went wide. “And you believe him?”
“As the Colonnello said, he wants his money.”
“Which you aren’t even preparing.”
“Because we are going to make efficient use of our resources, and find him.” Henderson’s tone was the same one he might offer to a recalcitrant child.
“But the houses?”
Vanelli shook his head. “It’s possible.”
Morris waved his finger at the pushpin. “It has to be there. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
Henderson snorted. “The only thing that makes sense, Agent Morris, is that you are no longer needed on this investigation.”
Morris clenched his fists, itching to punch Henderson this time for sure.
Vanelli stood up and looked at Morris. “I’m sorry, my friend. But I have to join the investigation.” He gestured for Henderson to leave the office with him. “We can use my mobile command truck.”
Morris clamped his jaw, hard, and did not respond.
Vanelli looked back from the doorway, and shrugged. “We have to play the odds. Investigate the locations methodically. These gentlemen can assist.”
Morris didn’t blink.
Vanelli pursed his lips. “And, I’m afraid, you are no longer in charge of the case.”
Vanelli closed his office door. Morris watched through the glass wall. Vanelli walked to the elevator, herding the ambassador’s man in front of him. He called two more officers from the cube farm.
Morris sweated. Blood pounded through his head. What was Vanelli up to? They had to go for the best chance. Play the odds. Damn it, Vanelli even said the same himself. And then he’d walked off with a pencil pushing overpaid contractor.
Morris turned, swinging his boot at a trashcan and kicked it across the room. It clanged off the far wall.
The office door burst open.
Morris turned to see Vanelli standing in the doorway. He darted into the office and reached for the bottom drawer of his desk, pulled out a bulletproof vest, and threw it at Morris.
Morris scowled. “What?”
Vanelli held out a jet-black submachine gun, the magazine longer than the barrel. “M12 Beretta. Can you use it?”
Morris nodded as he threaded his hand around the grip. “But…I don’t—”
“The idiot is on the way to one of the locations. Ties up two of my Polizia, but it’s probably a fair exchange.” Vanelli pulled another Beretta from his bottom drawer. He raised an eyebrow. “You don’t think I’m going to let him run the case, do you?”
“Not for a moment.” Morris tossed the vest over his head. He headed for the door, buckling the vest around his waist. “But I owe you a new trashcan.”
CHAPTER FIFTY
Jess twirled the remains of the tie-wrap between her fingers. Her wrists were raw with the constant rubbing against the stone wall, but the plastic had finally snapped. She was under no illusion about Enzo’s reaction if he discovered her newfound freedom. Whatever happened next, she had committed herself to escape.
She scrabbled from the bed to the floor, bracing her back against the metal frame, and aligning herself with the side wall. She ran her bare feet over the rough stone, and the smooth of the door, feeling for the boundary, getting her feet close to the edge, and her legs coiled down for the most force and greatest leverage.
Her hands trembled and her balance swam. She blinked hard, and shoved the thought she hadn’t eaten for at least twenty-four hours to the back of her mind. She had to focus.
She took large breaths, deep and slow. Oxygenating her body until her head buzzed. She clenched her fists, stretched her legs, rotated her feet, stretching her toes toward her nose, working her muscles, settling her bones.
She rolled her shoulders, and shuffled back against the metal bars of the bed’s frame. This was her chance. Her only chance.
The sound of boots on the wooden ladder were unmistakable. She counted the footsteps. Not because she knew how many it took to reach the door, but to prime her body and focus her mind.
Enzo’s steps were crisp and measured. Inflexible boots pounded the concrete floor of the tunnel. Workman’s boots. Cheap. Untraceable. Easily disposed of.
The footsteps stopped outside her door.
She took a deep breath, and held it. Her toes tingled. Goosebumps crawled down her back. She clenched her teeth.
Her cell was dark. She’d removed the bulb and shook it hard until she had heard the small wire inside break then placed the bulb back in its socket, the glass undamaged. A failed light bulb. An unlucky break, but an everyday occurrence.
She placed her hands together behind her back, as they had been when she was tied up, and peered in the direction of her feet. She saw only blackness.
Enzo’s boots worked their way to the shaft. A click as he cycled the light switch. He walked back.
She forced herself to breathe out and back in. New oxygen. Recharging her muscles. Managing her fear. She shoved that thought to the back of her mind.
The wooden bar scraped from its rest. Followed by silence. Long. Hard. Testing and probing.
She breathed again. Quick. A short cycle of her lungs. Carbon dioxide out, oxygen in. Quelling the electricity in her before adrenaline overwhelmed her plan.
The door creaked. The movement of an inch. A faint glow broke through its rough edges. Thin light in the darkness, but not enough to see much.
He was suspicious because her light bulb didn’t fire on. Waiting for a response. Keeping the advantage. Taunting her to escape if she dared.
She stole another breath, opening her mouth wide to hide the sound. She took her hands from her back, and gripped the bed. No point in deception now. When he opened the door, he’d see what he saw. She had to be faster than him. No other options would work.
The door sprang open, its metal hinges squealing. The tunnel’s light wafted in. Feeble and dim, but to Jess’s eyes, a torrent. She squinted, refusing her reflex to shut her eyes.
Enzo barreled in, elbow against the door, and his gun arcing around the room. He started at the head of the bed and scanned left, fearing the space behind the door.
Jess released her tension. Her electricity. Her fear. Anger fueled her now.
Her legs moved first. Muscles contracting. Electricity releasing.
The bends in her knees straightened. Her shoulders dug into the bed. Her back uncoiled.
Aligning her torso, shifting her weight, reinforcing her energy on a direct path to the supporting rock behind her.
Enzo stood no chance. He wasn’t even looking in her direction.
Her ankles were braced. Her feet flew toward him first.
All of her strength, all of her fury concentrated to connect with such a small patch of bone.
Contact. Her heel, his knee. Bone against bone. Sideways. Flexible cartilage and overwhelming force.
She felt his knee stretch and snap.
Her leg muscles jerked to a full stretch, pulling at her thighs, and wrenching her abdomen.
His knee bent unnaturally, horrifically sideways. Thank God.
His gun fired. A jet of light. The sound contained and concentrated inside the hard stone walls.
He pirouetted around on his good leg. His gun swept upward and his face turned toward her. He screamed. Rasping and guttural. Spitting and seething. Not words, but the anger generated from his pain produced a deafening, howling bellow worse than anything she’d heard emanating from Wilson Grantly’s cell.
She coiled her legs, and jabbed again, aiming for his other leg. Punching her feet, and bracing her muscles.
The second time, her contact was weak. The angles were different. Her feet glanced off the side of his thigh.
His arms swung down, one hand grasping for his knee. He dropped his gun. It clattered against the far wall, lost in the darkness.
Jess pulled her knees in, rolling her momentum forward to rise up and run.
Enzo pitched down, his hands gripping his ruined leg. His forehead smashed into her face. Blunt and heavy. A blow and a push, shoving her backwards, rolling her over, his howls unabated.
She thrashed her arms, fighting to roll him off. He shoved back. Instinct. His muscles responded to the agony of forced movement.
She bunched up her knees, and rammed her elbow into his throat. He toppled sideways, gagging as he fought for breath.
Jess squeezed her abdomen, and pulled herself to her feet. She grabbed the edge of the door and propelled herself into the corridor. She slammed the door shut behind her.
Enzo’s shocked groans turned from bellowing pain to roaring anger.
She lifted one end of the wooden beam and scooped her arm under the other. The weight of the timber wrenched at her back.
Behind the door, Enzo’s groans turned to grunts produced along with scraping noises. What the hell was he doing?
She pushed the beam against the door, shoving it flat against the wall. The door shook. A jolt, hammering into her arms, shaking the beam.
Enzo refused to be locked in his own prison.
She heaved her shoulder forward, bracing with her legs, pushing the weight of the wood against the door, and ramming one end into the metal brace.
One side in place. One more to do.
Enzo screamed. Not pain, but primal anger. He shoved the door. It vibrated and the wood splintered.
Jess grunted, driving her body forward, clenching her teeth, and rammed the beam into the second brace, sealing the door. Sealing Enzo inside. In the total darkness.
She fell backwards, hands waving to catch her fall. She slammed into the rough rock, driving the air from her lungs. She gasped. Her left leg burned. She ran her hand over her jeans and felt a rip in the denim. Her hand came away wet and dark and bloody.
Enzo pounded the door. He cursed and swore and screamed. Hateful promises of pain and death.
She rolled onto her side, and pushed herself up. The rock floor cut into her bare feet.
The light that had seemed blinding when he opened the door, cast dim shapes and the blackest of shadows. She put her hands out, and stumbled forward. Her bleeding leg burned.
She struck the wall on the right. The bare rock scraped the palm of her hand. She pushed off toward the faint white light at the entrance shaft.
The floor became smoother. She kept moving, swinging her arms, keeping her momentum up and her weight off her gashed leg.
The shaft came into view. The ladder stretched up into the circular hole. All she had to do was make it to the daylight.
She was on her way. She’d get out of here alive. She almost laughed.
She felt relieved tears running down her cheeks and wiped them away.
A deafening noise erupted down the tunnel.
Her heart leapt into her mouth. She whipped around.
Flashes of light carved up the darkness. Wood splintered and cracked. Staccato noises echoed off the rough walls, loud and cackling.
She spluttered and choked.
Enzo had found his gun.
CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE
Jess threw herself at the ladder. Daylight spilled down, too bright for her light-deprived eyes.
Her hands caught the ladder as the thundering gunfire stopped.
She looked back down the tunnel. Was he there? Had he escaped?
Her eyes darted left and right, probing the gloom.
She squeezed the ladder. What was she thinking? She couldn’t control him now. She had only one option—run.
She put her good leg onto the first rung, and reached up, moving rung by rung, pulling with her arms to keep her weight off her gashed leg.
She heard another shot. More wood splintered and cracked. A growling roar.
Enzo was using his pain and anger to fuel brute force.
She escaped the cell, but she’d wounded an animal, and left it more dangerous.
She curled up, dragging her feet a rung higher. She worked upward, hand over hand, stretching for the light, her knees scraping on the rusty metal.
Her left leg screamed in pain. A bolt of fire seared into her thigh when she put any weight on her leg.
The circle of light above her grew closer. She stretched and grabbed and pulled, throwing her hands upward, straining at her abdomen to bring her feet up the rungs, before stretching and reaching again.
Down the tunnel, wood creaked. She heard grunting and straining. Enzo was still in the cell. She needed the door to hold for a few more minutes.
Above, she saw the cabin’s ceiling. She pulled herself on up the rungs. Her hands reached the top of the ladder, a foot below the level of the cabin floor.
She gripped the last rung with all her might.
The pain in her leg was gone.
She was oblivious to the long drop and the narrow shaft.
She wrenched with her arms, drawing her whole body up six inches, stabbing her feet onto the next rung, pushing with her knees, and shoving herself from the shaft in one continuous movement.
Behind her, the cell door splintered and cracked. Old timbers crashed to the ground.
A long guttural scream, and then Enzo’s voice shouting a solid stream of swearing and cursing.
She rolled onto the cabin floor, head spinning and lungs burning. She swept her gaze around the room. Empty.
Enzo hadn’t brought any backup.
She dragged herself up, and hoisted the trap door closed. The clasp rattled. She ran her hands around the floor. The padlock was gone. She had no way to keep him in the tunnel.
“You. Will. Die,” Enzo shouted. His voice was hoarse, his throat raw from his exertions. Worse, the sound of his shouting wasn’t echoing down the tunnel.
