THE 13: STAND BOOK TWO (24 page)

He wasn’t mad. More like intrigued. The fact that he was reacting like this made her breath catch. This was crazy. Could she and Farid really have a life together? “You go on ahead, and I’ll meet you there. You can have a couple drinks at the bar while you wait. I shouldn’t be more than thirty minutes or so.”

Farid looked at her curiously. “What if I wanted to come with you?”

She thought about that for a moment. It might be fun to take him along. Let him see her in action. But that was way too risky. Something maybe a rookie would do. No, she decided. It had to be this way. “I’m sorry Farid. I can’t take you.” She leaned in and kissed his cheek. “But I promise, I’ll only be thirty minutes. And then we’ll have the rest of the night to ourselves.” She thought about Pemberton’s plan and the timeline. “Actually, we’ll have the next week or so to ourselves.”

That seemed to make Farid happy. “Good. Perhaps tomorrow we can go somewhere secluded for a few days.”

She kissed him again and put him in the cab. When he was gone, she gave the valet her ticket. Her car was brought around a minute later.

She’d thought about waiting to do this until tomorrow, or the next day. But after killing Peterson, her date with Farid had turned out to be
electric
. She figured why not go two-for-two?

She was a little distracted, though. Ever since she had left the farmhouse. Something was niggling at the back of her mind. She just couldn’t place what it was. And it was bothering her. She reached over to the dash and turned the heat up a notch. When she did, the automatic fan kicked on, blowing a fresh scent through the vent, carrying the warm air up to her nostrils. Suddenly, it hit her. She realized what had been bothering her.

That scent. The one she had caught a whiff of, at the farmhouse. She’d smelled it before. In Dubai. She could remember lying there, on the sand bleeding out, as the FBI agent stood over her. She could smell her perfume—or lotion or whatever it was. But it was a distinct smell. The same one she had caught at the farmhouse.

She gripped the wheel tighter. What had Pemberton said?

“Seems last night when Hayes got home, two federal agents were in his house.”

No way. That would be the most monumental coincidence in the history of the world. The same agent who had tried to kill her in Dubai all of a sudden shows up in Raleigh, follows Hayes to a secret meeting, and hides out in the field while she stood right there? No way.

The hair on the back of her neck began to stand up. She didn’t like that. When it happened, it meant whatever she was trying to convince herself of wasn’t working. The logical side of her brain was trying to win out. And right now, it was winning.

How could Hayes be so stupid? Surely he had to know they would be following him. Even an idiot would take some precautions not to be followed. And what was
she
thinking? She was smack-dab in the middle of another plot to destroy America. Of course Jon Keene and his team would be involved. She should’ve expected it.

She pounded the steering wheel in frustration. She had let her guard down. All of this running around with Farid like some infatuated schoolgirl had clouded her judgment.

She gripped the wheel tighter and punched the gas. She would take care of Milton Hayes. And then she would deal with this mistake between her and Farid.

M
egan pulled the car off to the side of the road in front of Hayes’s house. The guard shack was visible from where they were, but she couldn’t see the guard anywhere inside.

“Where do you think he is?” she asked.

“Probably went to the loo.” Eli laughed.

“Well, he better hurry up,” Megan said. “I’m in no mood to be waiting around.”

“We could just go over the wall again.”

“Uh-uh. We’re going in through the front door. And Hayes is coming out with us.”

Eli held up his hands. “Hey, like I told you. I’m just along for the ride.”

She recalled his taking off from her at the farmhouse. “Yeah, right.”

She started to cross the street toward the gate when Eli called to her.

“Hey, wait a second.” He stepped to the rear door and opened it.

“What are you doing?”

“Just grabbing a couple extra magazines. If Hayes decides to point that hand cannon at me again, I don’t want to run out of ammo.”

“Fine. Hurry up.” She stood by and waited for him to catch up with her.

Suddenly Eli scrambled out from the backseat. “Megan! Get over here. Now!”

She had no idea what was going on, but his tone was anything but subtle. He had crouched down beside the car, as if he were taking cover. Out of instinct, she drew her weapon and started looking around as she hurried back to where he was.

“What is it?”

“This.”

The tracking device from earlier was in his hand. And the little red dot was blinking furiously. Her eyes went wide. “She’s here?”

“Her car is, anyway.”

She leaned back against the car. “Okay, we have to think this through. If she’s in there, it means one of two things. Either they’re having a private meeting…”

Eli finished her thought for her. “Or she’s here to make sure Hayes isn’t coming with us.”

Megan nodded.

“So how do you want to play this?”

She thought about it for a moment. She was too small to get over the wall on her own. “Can you scale the wall around back without me?”

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Okay, then you go around back. I’ll wait two minutes, and then I’ll come through the front.”

“What about the guard?”

She peeked her head up over the car. The guard was still nowhere to be seen. “Got a bad feeling about him. Not sure he’s going to be an issue.”

“Okay. Give me two minutes.” He started to move.

Megan reached out and grabbed his arm. “Hey. Keep your head down and your eyes open.”

Eli smiled at her. “No worries. I’m the real James Bond, remember?”

“That’s what worries me.” She pulled her sleeve up and started watching the second hand on her watch as Eli took off.

At one minute and fifty seconds, she darted out from behind the car and crossed the street. She stayed close to the wall as she approached the guard shack. When she got there, she popped her head around the corner and then right back. Nothing.

She stayed low and hugged the wall as it turned into the drive. The guard shack was only twenty feet away. She crept up to the side door and turned the knob. The door opened without any resistance. Inside, lying on the floor in a pool of blood, was the guard. He had been shot twice through the forehead.

A door on the opposite side of the guard shack led to the property on the other side of the gate. She opened the door slowly, her gun pointed ahead of her. The path leading to the house was empty. And she could see now that the lights in the house were all off, except for one upstairs, and another down.

She hurried across the circular drive, stopping once in front of the huge water fountain sitting in the grassy center of the circular drive. She tried to strain her ears to hear anything. But she couldn’t hear a sound. She popped her head around once more to make sure the coast was clear. Then she took off at a dead run for the door.

She half expected to feel bullets whizzing by her head as she made her way to the door. But nothing came. She was beginning to wonder if maybe Hayes
was
having a private meeting with Sokolov. She went to turn the knob on the door but noticed that the door was already ajar.
So much for the private meeting theory
.

By this time, she was sure that Eli had made his way over the wall. She wondered if he had bothered to stop and disarm the alarm this time. She didn’t know if it really mattered or not, but if it did, she hoped he had. The last thing they needed was to alert Sokolov they were there. Especially if Hayes was still alive. She wanted Hayes for herself.

She quietly pushed the door open and stepped inside, sweeping her weapon as she moved. Hayes’s office was just off to the right, down a short hall. She decided to clear that area first.

She had just made it to the office when everything went wrong. She heard thumping coming from upstairs. Then shots. At least five. Then someone screaming. A man. But not Eli. No, the voice was too high pitched. It had to be Hayes.

She turned around and began moving quickly back down the hall. More shots. She made it back out to the foyer. More shots. And glass breaking. Then, more shots. Suddenly, a loud crashing sound came from above her. The banister from the catwalk above came crashing down into the living area. And with it, a body.

Megan screamed in horror as she realized what had just happened. “Eli—no!” She ran out into the room, firing her weapon blindly up at the catwalk. Eli lay with his leg twisted behind him and two bullet wounds through his chest.

She had just gotten to him when more shots began to ring out from above. She raised her weapon and began firing as fast as she could at the catwalk as she ran into the kitchen. “Lights up!” she yelled. Slowly the lights began to come up. She dove for the marble-covered island that stood in the middle of the room. She had just gotten behind it when more shots rang over her head and into the cabinets behind her.

“Nice to see you again, Ms. Taylor. It’s been awhile.”

The voice was evil, and it sent chills up Megan’s spine.

“I thought I killed you,” she yelled over the island.

“Yeah. Me, too. Guess not, though.”

More shots.

“But you can bet on one thing,” Sokolov shouted.

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” Another four rounds hit the cabinets behind her.

“I’m the one walking out of here today.”

Megan decided to take a chance and stick her arm around the side to fire. She braced herself and whipped her arm around the corner and let off a barrage of fire, almost emptying her magazine. “We’ll see about that,” she yelled.

Nothing.

She waited another few seconds. “Hey, Sokolov—you alive?”

She was answered by another round of shots above her head.
I guess so
, she said to herself. Then, “Hey! Why won’t you just die? It would make my life a whole lot easier.”

Another round of fire. This time, though, they were aimed right at the island. She heard the rounds splinter the wood inside. Another couple of rounds like that, and this island wasn’t going to be much for cover anymore. She needed to move. But there was nowhere to go. The closest line of escape was a hallway that led to a set of bedrooms and the formal dining room. But it was fifteen feet away. And she would have to move out into the open to get there.

“Tell you what,” Sokolov yelled. “Why don’t you just come out here? I promise, I’ll kill you quick. I won’t just leave you here to die…like you did me.”

Another round of gunfire came at her. This time, Sokolov hit her mark. Two of the rounds had come through the island. Megan was knocked back against the sink behind her as one round hit her in the shoulder. The other in the leg.

She began to panic a little. She had never been shot before. But she’d heard about it. All the rumors were true. You felt the impact, but not the pain. At least initially. It was the body’s reaction to a violent injury. Shock. But it wouldn’t last for long, she knew. Within minutes, she was going to feel both of those rounds. And it wasn’t going to be pleasant. She had to move. Now.

She raised the gun over her head, above the island, and fired until she had emptied the magazine. She quickly ejected it and slammed a fresh one home. She stood up and started firing as she ran for the hallway. She made it halfway there when something like a freight train slammed into her chest. It knocked her down to the floor. She couldn’t breathe. What was happening? Her vision was beginning to blur.

She tilted her head in the direction of Sokolov. She saw the assassin step out from behind the half wall that separated the kitchen from the living area and begin walking toward her. She had a twisted, noxious smile painted on her face. She raised the gun and pointed it at her head.

“Well, Ms. Taylor. It looks like I win this round.”

Suddenly, Megan caught movement right behind Sokolov, as someone slammed into her from behind. Sokolov’s gun pitched forward and slid across the tile floor of the kitchen. Sokolov scrambled to her feet and turned to see her attacker. Eli was there, on his knees with his Glock pointed at her. He let off a string of shots as Sokolov dove for cover. Megan heard her shriek. Eli must’ve hit her. He kept firing until his magazine was empty. Then he fell back to the floor in front of her.

Megan heard a door slam, then the sound of a car’s engine. Then tires squealing. Sokolov was gone.

Megan forced herself up off the floor and tried to drag herself over to where Eli lay. She had felt for her sat-phone in her pocket but remembered she had tossed it in the console when she and Eli had started checking out hotels, trying to find Sokolov. Her breathing was becoming labored now. She felt weak. She only had a few more feet to go. If she could get there, maybe Eli had his sat-phone in his pocket. She almost got there before her arms gave out. She slammed back to the floor. She was so tired.

Maybe she would just close her eyes for a second.

T
he steps to the G-5 lowered as Keene and Boz stood by the door ready to move the moment the stairs hit the ground. Keene had been trying to reach Megan on the sat-phones Jennings had given her and Eli for almost two hours now with no luck.

Keene had called Jennings on the way to pick Boz up and told him that they needed a plane. And they needed it now. He filled Jennings in on the call from the Prophet. Jennings made a few calls and told him that a G-5 would be waiting for them.

The flight was quick—they were only in the air thirty minutes. And Jennings had a car waiting for them when they arrived. Jennings had also caught Keene up to speed on what Megan and Eli had been doing for the last two days. When Keene heard they had been tailing Judge Hayes, he decided Hayes’s place was where they would start.