Twister (20 page)

'The detonator,' screamed Danny. 'Where is it?'

It was nearly impossible for the mercenary to breathe, let alone speak. But he managed to get one word out.

'Why?'

'Never mind why,' Danny shouted. 'Just give it to me.'

The mercenary looked into Danny's eyes, then narrowed his own. He wanted to stop the explosion, that much was clear. But too much trouble had been gone to for him to allow that to happen. Far too much.

And if the refinery didn't blow now, then that would be the end of the money coming his way. Money he wanted.

The mercenary didn't speak. He just manoeuvred his hand so that the gun was pointing upwards. The bullet would go through his jacket and straight into his attacker's belly.

And then he could get on with his work.

He was quite expressionless as he pulled the trigger. The same could not be said for Danny. The dark-haired man's eyes widened suddenly, and his grip loosened immediately. It only took a gentle nudge from the mercenary to push his attacker off him, and he watched without emotion as Danny rolled powerlessly to one side.

The mercenary pulled the gun out from his jacket. His outer garment was shredded by the force of the bullet and wet from the sudden burst of Danny's blood. With a look of distaste he quickly pulled the green jacket off and cast it onto the floor. Then, without a second look at the assailant he had just shot so calmly, he hurried back to his truck, started the ignition and drove away.

The sound of the gunshot went through Ben as surely as if the bullet itself had entered his body.

He froze; at the same time he heard Angelo gasp.

'Stay still,' he hissed. 'We don't know what's happening out there. We can't risk being seen.'

They remained as still as stones, pressed against the uncomfortable wet metal of the pick-up with the rain sheeting down on top of them. Ben strained his ears to listen to what was happening, but it was almost impossible to hear anything above the howling of the wind.

It felt like they had to wait for ever, their hearts in their throats.

And then they heard it. The low rumble of the truck moving off again.

A deathly chill seemed to freeze Ben's limbs. Only one person could be driving that truck, and that person wasn't . . .

'
Danny!
' Ben whispered. Angelo looked at him in shock and it was clear that the same thing was going through both their heads. They pushed themselves up from their crouching position and jumped over the side of the pick-up. The mercenary's truck was already disappearing into the distance. Ben looked around, desperately hoping to be able to see Danny standing, fit and well.

But that was a hope too far.

It was Angelo who saw him first. The Italian cursed under his breath in his native language as he tugged on Ben's sleeve and pointed to the ground in front of the pick-up.

Danny's body was lit up by the headlamps of the pick-up. He was lying with his face to the sky, clutching his belly, as the rain poured down on his now-pale face. He was shaking violently and Ben could see something dark seeping through his clasped hands.

Ben ran to his side and knelt down. With obvious difficulty, Danny turned to look at him. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a coarse coughing sound. A thin trickle of blood oozed from the corner of his mouth; the rain smeared it at first, then washed it clean away. Ben looked over his shoulder at Angelo.

'Help me!' he shouted. 'We need to get him into the truck.'

Angelo ran to his side; but as he did so, Danny finally managed to speak.

'Ben,' he croaked, 'you have to leave me here.'

Ben felt hot tears of anger rising in his eyes. 'I'm not leaving you anywhere,' he said from behind gritted teeth.

'He's getting away, Ben.' There was another bout of feeble coughing. 'You won't catch him if you don't leave now.'

Ben looked furiously down the road. The lights of the mercenary's truck had completely disappeared.

'He's right, Ben,' Angelo whispered. 'We don't have any time.'

Still Ben hesitated. He had forgotten all the bad things Danny had done that day: at that moment he was just a wounded human being who needed their help.

Danny spoke again. 'Listen to me,' he hissed weakly. 'I woke up this morning expecting to die. If it happens, it's no more than I deserve. I was wrong – I understand that now. But you have to help me undo everything that's been put in motion. You
have
to stop him, both of you. For me. And for my sister.'

Danny stared at them. Somehow his pale face managed to look urgent.

And then, slowly, as if in a dream, Ben stood up. It was clear what he had to do.

'I'm coming back for you,' he told Danny hoarsely. 'Stay here, because I
am
coming back for you.'

Danny didn't reply. He didn't even look as if he had heard. His body started shaking more violently and the coughing came back. It was a pitiful sight.

Ben felt another tug on his sleeve.

'We have to hurry, Ben,' Angelo urged him. 'He's getting away.' The Italian's voice had a high-pitched note of panic in it.

Ben allowed himself one more look down at Danny before nodding his head, reluctantly but decisively.

'All right,' he said quietly. 'Let's go.'

An absolute determination surged through him as he headed round to the driver's side of the pick-up truck.

This had to stop, he told himself. It had to stop now.

Danny lay on the ground. The pain in his stomach, which had been acute at first, had become numb. In fact, his whole body was numb.

It was strange. For the first time since the storm had started he found he could not hear the wind. He couldn't hear anything, actually: just the unsteady beating of his heart, and even that was getting weaker. He coughed. Something warm entered his mouth and spilled out of the sides. He supposed it should worry him, but it didn't. He was past worry now.

Danny closed his eyes. It was a peculiar thing, but he found he could almost imagine he was back home. Somewhere in the corner of his mind he heard the voices of his mother and father, as if they were in a different part of the house while he was on the brink of sleep. He couldn't quite hear what they were saying, but they sounded happy. Danny smiled weakly. That was good. It meant Basheera had returned to them.

In Danny's feeble, dreamlike state, he did not realize that this was impossible.

For a brief moment, he heard the wind again: a highpitched wail. Or
was
it the wind? His eyes flickered open. For the second time that day he thought he heard his sister's voice in the air. He couldn't work out what it was saying; indeed it didn't really sound like it was saying
anything
. It was howling, furiously, impatiently.

And then it all came back to him.

Ben. Angelo. The detonator. He allowed his head to roll in the direction in which the pick-up truck had moved off and it was at that precise moment that the pain in his stomach returned with a vengeance. He gasped.

The howling of the wind grew angrier. Danny felt he had to do something. He tried to push himself up, but his body couldn't do what his mind had instructed and he simply fell back down uselessly onto the hard road.

His eyes started to grow dim as the shrieking overhead became more intense.

He coughed again, and then he spoke. His voice was weak, barely audible. Even if there had been anyone by his side, they would have struggled to hear him.

'I'm sorry, Basheera,' he whispered in his native language. 'I'm so, so sorry.'

And then his eyes closed again. He lay there for a few agonizing seconds before exhaling a long, rattling breath.

Danny could hear nothing any more. Nor could he feel a thing. He would not be able to whisper his sister's name ever again, and he would be able to do nothing to help Ben and Angelo in this, their final, desperate mission.

As the wind howled furiously over Danny's body, his dark hair blew around slightly. But that was the only part of him that moved.

Danny's limbs were already growing cold now. He was quite dead.

'We need to keep the headlamps off,' Ben had shouted to Angelo as he started the engine of the pick-up. Leaving Danny alone at the side of the road was the most difficult thing he'd done all day and that, he realized, was saying something. It was almost a reflex action that made him concentrate on the job in hand to keep his mind from more distressing matters. 'If he sees us approaching, he'll detonate.'

Angelo moved Danny's shotgun a bit further along the seat, then slammed his door shut. 'Er, Ben,' he said dubiously, 'won't that make it a bit difficult to drive? It's very dark out there, you know.'

Ben shrugged, determination in his face. 'We haven't got a choice,' he replied.

'Maybe he'll just think it's a different truck.'

Ben turned to look at him. 'Is that a risk you want to take?' Angelo thought about it for a few seconds, then shook his head silently. 'I didn't think so,' Ben murmured. He started the truck and moved forward, taking care to circle around Danny as he proceeded.

Every instinct Ben possessed shrieked at him to go slowly but that wasn't a luxury he had. The mercenary would be going as fast as he dared now; Ben had to go faster if he was ever going to catch up. He held his breath, gripped the steering wheel firmly and put his foot down.

It was like being on a roller coaster in the dark. The road itself was straight, but Ben still had to strain his eyes to keep a watch out for any twist in its path. Come off the road now, he knew, and it would all be over. Just keeping the truck straight, however, was a job in itself. He was used to it being buffeted by the winds, but now there was a new urgency – and a new difficulty – to what they had to do. Each time the pick-up veered from its course, he felt a sickness in his stomach as he desperately tried to hold the vehicle straight.

Ben could feel waves of nervousness coming from Angelo. His Italian friend didn't say anything, but he didn't need to. He clutched onto the passenger door with both hands. Ben couldn't see them, but he imagined that Angelo's knuckles were as white as his face. Every time the wind blew them off course and the Italian's body jolted, he would gasp. But still he kept quiet. They both knew Ben was doing the only thing he could. The way they were going, the pick-up could end up a jumble of steel on the highway, but that was a risk they just had to take.

With his eyes firmly fixed on the gloomy road ahead, Ben did not even try to look to either side of him.

When Angelo shouted out 'Water!' therefore, it came as something of a surprise. He allowed his eyes to flicker left and right. There was very little ambient light, but he could just about make out what looked like the foam on huge waves in the distance. It looked like they were surrounded by sea.

'We must be on the Overseas Highway,' Angelo shouted.

'The what?'

'The Overseas Highway. It's a big road that goes over the ocean. It connects Florida to the Keys.'

Ben snapped his eyes back to the road ahead. 'How long is it?'

A brief pause. 'I don't know, Ben. I've never been on it before. Just keep the truck straight, won't you?'

As if to underline what Angelo had just said, there was a sudden gust that made Ben veer suddenly and dangerously to the left. He struggled to keep control of the pick-up.

'I'll do my best,' he shouted breathlessly at Angelo once he was straight again.

Ben was almost glad it was so dark. He didn't much like the idea of being on the Overseas Highway in the middle of a hurricane; he didn't even want to think about what would happen if the tornado caught up with them. A phrase Danny had used in the pick-up popped into his head: out of sight, out of mind. Well, the roaring waves of the ocean on either side of them weren't exactly out of mind, but as long as they were out of sight Ben could pretend he wasn't running a fool's errand. He could keep his attention focused on driving straight and looking out for the mercenary's truck ahead.

It was a few minutes later that they saw it. Hazy and indistinct in the distance, the two red lights didn't seem to be moving very fast, but Ben knew they probably were. 'That's him,' he shouted at Angelo. 'It has to be.' He didn't say out loud everything that was going through his head:
It has to be, because nobody else would
be stupid enough to be out here in this.
'How are we going to stop him?' Angelo asked. 'We can't stay hidden for long – as soon as we get a few metres away, he'll know we're on to him.'

It was a good question. Different scenarios passed through Ben's mind. He could try and get alongside the other truck and nudge the mercenary off the road. But the pick-up was the smaller of the two vehicles: in a collision it would come off worse. He could try and overtake, then bring the pick-up to a halt at right angles across the lanes; but the road was too wide for him to block it entirely, and the mercenary would simply be able to drive around them.

It was then that an idea came to him.

'Hey, Angelo,' he shouted. 'Ever fired a shotgun before?'

Angelo hesitated. 'A few times,' he said. He struggled for a moment as he searched for a phrase. 'Clay pigeon shooting, I think you call it.' Ben sensed him looking down nervously at the shotgun by his side. 'Look, Ben,' he said, his voice wavering a bit, 'I know we have to stop this man, but I don't think I could . . .'

'Don't worry,' Ben interrupted. His voice was hoarse and sore from shouting. 'That's not what I was going to suggest. But if I get close enough, do you think you could hit one of his tyres?'

Angelo stared at him. 'In the dark?' he asked. 'Ben, I don't think I'll even be able to
see
them.'

Ben thought about that. 'What if I switch the headlamps on at the last minute. Reckon you'd have a chance?'

Angelo looked down at the shotgun. 'I don't know,' he said dubiously. 'It only holds two rounds. That means I'll only get two shots at it, and once we've let him know we're here . . .'

'He's going to find out sooner or later,' Ben interrupted. 'We might as well grab the element of surprise.'

There was a nervous silence. Suddenly the windscreen of the car was splashed with water. What scant vision Ben had disappeared for a moment.

'What was that?' he screamed.

'Rain?' Angelo suggested.

'I don't think so,' Ben shouted back. 'It's been raining all the time. That was something else.' He glanced out of the side window. 'I think it was spray from the sea. It must be getting rougher out there.' An image of the tornado they had seen flashed across Ben's brain. The thought of it made him shudder, and he tried not to think of it any more than he had to.

Angelo was gingerly picking up the shotgun. 'I'll need to open my window,' he told Ben.

'OK. Wait till I get closer.' He fixed his eyes on the lights of the truck up ahead and concentrated on narrowing the gap.

It wasn't easy. More than once his vision was blinded by spray from the sea; the road was slippery too, and it became more and more difficult to regain control of the pick-up whenever the wind knocked it off course. They drove in silence, each of them knowing that when they came within firing distance of the mercenary's truck, they wouldn't have much time to bring him to a halt; and as soon as they alerted him to their presence, they wouldn't get a second chance.

The atmosphere inside the pick-up truck seemed thick with tension as they drew closer. They were barely twenty metres away when Ben spoke again.

'Ready?' he asked Angelo.

The Italian boy took a deep breath then nodded his head slowly. 'Ready,' he replied. 'As ready as I'll ever be, anyway.'

Slowly, he wound down the window.

It felt as though they had suddenly let the storm into the truck. Ben was blinded by a blast of spray and he almost lost control of the pick-up as he wiped the water from his face. His lips tasted salt: clearly the water that had just splashed into the truck was not rain, but sea.

'Keep it steady!' Angelo yelled, a note of accusation in his voice.

'I'm trying!' Ben shouted back. The muscles in his arms burned as he tried to keep the truck on course. '
I'm trying!
' His ears were filled with the howling of the wind as, beside him, Angelo awkwardly manoeuvred the shotgun out of his window and then leaned out himself.

Keep it steady
, Ben told himself.
Keep it steady
. Angelo was looking precarious, and it was clear that any sudden movement would risk throwing him out of the truck altogether.

Fifteen metres. The truck ahead kept a steady course: there was no indication that the mercenary had seen them approach.

'Closer!' Angelo shouted. 'You need to get closer!'

Ben set his jaw. The pick-up felt like it was wobbling over the slippery road, but he held to his course and increased his speed a little. The gap between them started to close.

'
Closer!
'

Ben's clothes were soaking wet, but he still found himself sweating with concentration. The gap shortened to ten metres.