Cold Silence (A High Stakes Thriller) (38 page)

The colonel looked up at the empty room and wondered where the other Russian was. Surely he'd heard the noise. At that moment, he caught a flash of motion through the window to the deck.

He pulled Cody down just as the window exploded toward them. Shots rang out and he heard one ping against the stone fireplace they'd seen in the picture of Ryan. Another made a dull thud as it sank into the Sheetrock wall. The Russian's Glock was within reach, and the colonel shifted himself onto his belly to grab it.

As soon as he did, he was back in Vietnam. He saw the thick, lush grass and smelled the heavy scent of burning opium. The bugs covered his face like dirt, and he no longer even tried to swat them away.

He forced himself to take aim on the dark spot in the distance. He fired once, then twice, then three times. He heard the rattle of fire back and then it was silent.

When he moved, Cody was pulling herself up beside him, silent tears streaming down her cheeks. The gun was tucked under his arm. On the deck, he could see the body of another Russian. The gun burned in his hand and he pushed it away.

"Cody," he begged.

She shook her head. "I'm okay."

"He's not dead, Cody."

She didn't respond.

"He's not. He can't be. Not yet."

She looked up and nodded, the tears on her cheeks like tiny stripes.

He'd never seen anyone look so vulnerable.

"The snowmobile," she whispered, her eyes wide with hope.

The colonel nodded. "It had to be him."

She put her hand on his leg and he winced at the rush of misery that followed. She looked down. "You're shot."

"I'll be okay. Go. Search the house."

Without a backward glance, she got up and ran. He closed his eyes and took measured breaths, waiting for her to return. He focused on every sound. It was too quiet. When he opened his eyes, she was standing before him.

He didn't need to ask. He knew she hadn't found Ryan.

As she knelt beside him, he watched as the tough agent took over again. Leaving the gun, she pushed herself to her feet and pulled a flannel shirt off a nearby chair. Using the sleeves as a tourniquet, she bound his leg and put two pillows under his knee to keep him from losing too much blood. As she looked over her work, the colonel grabbed her hand.

"Go find that boy."

"I don't want you bleeding out on me."

He pushed her hand away. "I saw another snowmobile out there. You take that and find Ryan. And then you get back here."

She looked around the room and handed him the Russian's Glock.

He took her hand and gave it a tug so her eyes met his. "I want you to get the hell out of here. Now!"

She held his gaze and then nodded. Then, tucking her weapon at the back of her pants, she was off in a sprint.

He heard the back door slam closed and he fought off a wave of panic. Using his hands, he dragged himself backward, stopping to pull the Glock along, until his back was flat against the fireplace. Then, setting the gun in his lap, he shifted the pillows under his knee, checked the bleeding, which seemed to have stopped for the moment, and sat back to wait.

He hadn't been much of a praying man, but he'd done it in the last war and he'd gotten out of that one alive. Maybe he was pressing his luck, but he figured it was worth a try.

Lord, Jesus. Watch over Miss Cody. Find her Ryan and get them back here so I can go get my Florence and take her to see her baby. She's been sick, Lord, but she never did anything to deserve that. Maybe you're punishing me, and I surely deserve it. But don't punish Florence. And Roni.

And as he pressed his back into the cold stone and felt the warm thick, blood ooze across the wound, one thought crossed his mind: Goddamn it, I am going to die.

Just then he heard the stomping of feet on the stairs. He hoisted the gun up off the ground and waited for the war to begin anew.

Chapter 37

The snowmobile bounced through the hard-and soft-packed snow like a Jet Ski in the ocean, and Cody could feel her nausea rising over the crest of her gut and crashing up into her throat. It was almost pitch-black, and it was all she could do to focus on the tracks of the other snowmobile. The moon came in slices of light, which mostly served to make the headlight less effective against the bright snow.

Each time she ran into a patch of moonlight, she had to pause to let her eyes adjust to the new brightness before she could find the other trail again. The wind had picked up, and the path, which had been relatively clear in the untracked snow, was starting to be covered by the fresh snow the wind blew across the snowmobile's tracks. Panic nipped at her chest, and she drove it back and kept moving.

The snowmobile was a new sensation, too. Her life used to be filled with new experiences. In the past five years, she'd done very little that was new to her. Keeping Ryan safe, guarded had been her primary activity. She'd become soft, she realized. After what she guessed was a half mile, she had finally mastered the pressure on the throttle. Still, each time the machine buffeted against a hard pack of snow, Cody bumped halfway off, sometimes even losing hold before righting herself.

She concentrated on Ryan, trying to will him to stay strong. If he'd been on the snowmobile she'd heard, then she figured he'd been out here twenty, maybe twenty-five minutes at the least. But without the proper clothes, that could be forever.

A million questions flashed across her mind. How many had him? Where was Kirov? She saw Ryan's tiny body sandwiched between two giant Russians and thought that at least he wouldn't be cold. The wind whipped through the thin fleece she wore and she had to alternately open and close her fists to prevent them from cramping. Mostly, though, she was just feeling numb. She understood how people decided that freezing to death would be better than going by fire. She thought of the irony of Kirov's first attempt. Maybe he would get her by ice.

Her chest tightened and she felt the tears cloud her eyes. She allowed herself to think no further.

She swiped her face with the back of her hand, the scratch of the frozen wool against her cheeks a welcome distraction from the self-pity. Her focus needed to be somewhere else. The colonel and Florence crossed her mind, and she prayed someone from the police or the Bureau was there by now.

She could be the only one left up here before too long, and she wasn't sure she could handle the number of deaths. No, it wasn't going to be that way.

She pushed the throttle down with a solid grip and the mobile jolted forward. She clutched the handles as the machine bumped along the road. As she started to make a turn, she caught sight of a small set of tracks in the snow. At first she assumed they were animal tracks, but as she slid by one, she realized it was too long and narrow to be any animal she could think of. She stopped and leaned down, setting her own foot beside one.

It was smaller than her own print, but the same basic shape. That would be about right for Ryan. She felt her heart dance. She looked at the next and then the next, searching for a bit of tread that hadn't been erased by the wind. The search was futile, and Cody knew that even if she saw a tread, she wouldn't know if it was Ryan's. But the shoe size was right, and she couldn't help but be encouraged.

She looked around and felt her chest tighten. Where was he? Had he been let go here in the dark to freeze to death? Oh, Jesus.

"Ryan," she screamed.

She paused, listening to the silence. She got off the snowmobile, following the footprints. There were only ten or twelve steps before the snowmobile track crossed them again. She pulled herself up and turned full circle. Had he dropped something, given her some clue?

On her knees, she pushed the snow left and right. "Ryan," she screamed again.

The silence was even louder than what she'd heard before. Was he somewhere nearby, hearing her, but unable to call back?

As she got to her feet, she heard something.

She halted, staying as quiet as she could.

The sound was gone. She turned toward the other snowmobile's path. It had come from that way, hadn't it? Was she hallucinating?

She shook her head and brushed her knees off, running back to the snowmobile and getting on. No.

She had heard something. She was sure of it. Someone was out there.

It had to be Ryan. She revved the engine high and bent forward over the handles. "Ryan," she screamed again.

As she pushed the throttle down harder, she thought she heard another response. She pressed on, ignoring the lashing her pelvic bone took as she was tossed across the seat.

In the distance, the edge of the lake appeared, and she caught the tracks leading that way in her headlight. She squinted at the snow up ahead, hoping for a sign of the other machine or machines. She wondered if she was even following the right track. She shook the thought free. Kirov would want her to think that way. She would not give in to him.

She rode the accelerator as she neared the lake. Surely it would be easier to see him in the more open landscape. She ignored the tracks momentarily and pressed the accelerator as far as it went. Large white flecks had just started to fall again.

She glanced back down to check the tracks and caught sight of a log in her path. The other snowmobile had gone right, so she braked and turned right hard.

She was too slow and the machine caught the edge of the log, making a loud crack. Cody flew off and felt the log smack her in the ear. She rolled over, breathless.

Her vision blurred and there was a clanging in her ear. She struggled onto all fours and let out a choking sob.

She pushed herself to her feet and stumbled to the snowmobile. The left front of the machine was lodged against the end of the log, and Cody fumbled to turn off the engine.

Her feet braced against the log, she tried to push the snowmobile free. It was stubborn and weighed a ton. With her face to the machine, she squinted in the dark to see if there was a reverse mode. The seconds ticked by and her pulse grew faster with each one. Leveraging herself off the log again, she gave the snowmobile three hard shoves until it finally came loose. Jumping back on, she revved the engine and hit the accelerator. She drove recklessly, trying to make up for lost time and having no idea how far behind she even was.

At the edge of the lake, she forced herself to slow to scan the far side of the lake. Be calm. She had to believe that if there were others, they would be using their headlights. But it was nearly pitch-black and she might not see them in the distance. Along the right side of the lake, she could make out the homes that they had passed on their way in, but they were all darkened. There was no sign of anything.

She sped up. The pain on the side of her head had dulled, but she felt the sensation of warm moisture there. She touched the finger of her glove to her head and then brought it in front of her face.

Catching the reddish tint in the light, she knew was bleeding. She ran her whole hand across the wounded area and looked at her glove again. The entire surface of it was red. She wondered how long she would last out here. As she wiped her hand on a patch of snow that had formed on the side of the snowmobile, she caught a flash of light in the distance.

She looked up, slowing down as she tried to focus on its origin.

She caught it again and realized it was a headlight cutting through the trees on the far side of the lake. She shut off her own headlight and pushed forward, using just the light of the moon as she tried to see how many there were.

The headlight pointed straight at her, and Cody hunched behind the machine as she watched. For a moment all she could see was the round light of the headlight. Then the machine turned away from the lake and she saw the side of it. The driver was a man, she was sure, and he had something in front of him. It could have been a satchel or an animal, but she dared to hope it was Ryan. In another second, the snowmobile cut behind a tree and was gone.

Wind picked up bursts of snow and tossed it in her eyes. It was gritty and dry and felt more like sand than snow. She brushed it off her face and ignored the burn it left.

She moved forward, still without her headlight. The tracks she followed edged the lake now, and she felt herself tremble at the thought of the frozen water, how fast hypothermia would hit. Ryan was a strong swimmer, she told herself. He loved it like his father always had.