Chapter 17
2094 Words
She picked up her pace, moving ahead of him.
They reached the other side of the street. She slipped between two parked cars. Meldrin did the same. She hustled down the street. He picked up his pace and grabbed her arm. “Hey, I’m talking to you.”
He didn’t get an answer.
The explosion knocked them both off their feet.
CHAPTER
16
Meldrin CAME TO FIRST. He had no idea how long he’d been out, but it couldn’t have been very long. There were no cops, no first responders. It was just him and a bus that was no longer there. He gazed over at the skeleton of burning metal that had once been a large piece of transportation equipment and thought that, like a plane crashing nose first into the earth from a great height, there could be no survivors.
This area of D.C. was deserted at this late hour and there were no residences nearby. The only people wandering out to see what had happened were obviously homeless.
Meldrin watched as one old man dressed in ragged jeans and a shirt turned black by living on the street stumbled out onto the sidewalk from his home of cardboard and plastic trash bags inside a doorway. He looked at the bonfire that had once been a bus with passengers inside and called out between rotted teeth, “Damn, anybody got something good to grill?”
Meldrin slowly rose. He was bruised and sore and would be even more bruised and sore tomorrow. He looked around for the girl and found her ten feet from where he had landed.
She lay next to a parked Saturn whose side windows had been blown out by the blast. Meldrin raced to her and gingerly turned her over. He felt for a pulse, found it, and breathed a sigh of relief. He checked her over. No blood, a few scratches on her face from where her skin had collided with the rough pavement. She would live.
A few moments later her eyes opened.
Meldrin eyed the grenade that she still clutched in her hand.
“Did you leave a real one of those on the bus?”
She sat up slowly, looked toward the demolished bus.
Meldrin expected the sight to evoke some reaction from her, but she said nothing.
“Somebody really wants you dead,” he said. “Any idea why?”
She got to her feet, spotted the knapsack lying a few feet away, and retrieved it, dusting off the outside and putting the strap over her shoulder. She looked up at Meldrin, who towered over her.
“Where’s your g*n?” she asked.
This caught him off guard. He didn’t know where his g*n had gone. He looked around, then squatted down and looked under a few cars parked on the street. There was a storm drain. It might have fallen in there when he’d gotten blasted off his feet.
“I’d find it if I were you.”
He looked at her. She was watching him from a few feet away.
“Why?”
“Because you’re probably going to need it.”
“Why?” he asked again.
“Because you’ve been seen with me.”
He rose. He could hear more sirens. Someone had finally called it in, because they were getting louder. The responders were heading this way. The homeless guy was now dancing around the bonfire yelling about wanting some “damn s’mores.”
Meldrin said, “And why is that significant?”
She glanced at the destroyed bus. “What? Are you stupid?”
He gave up the search for his g*n and came over to her.
Meldrin said, “You need to go to the police. They can protect you.”
“Yeah, right.”
“You don’t think they can?”
“If I were you I’d get out of here.”
Meldrin said, “There’s no one left alive on that bus to tell the cops what happened.”
“What do you think happened?” she asked.
“Over thirty people just lost their lives on that bus, including a guy who was trying to kill you.”
“That’s your theory. Where’s your proof?”
“The proof is in that bus. Some of it. The rest is in your head, presumably.”
“Again, your theory.”
She turned and st
arted to walk off.
Meldrin watched her for a few moments. “You can’t do this alone, you know,” he said. “You’ve already screwed up, or got ratted out.”
She turned back. “What do you mean?” For the first time she sounded interested in what he had to say.
“They already followed you to the bus or they were waiting for you. If the latter, you were set up. They had advance intel. Knew the bus, the time, everything. So either you screwed up and let them follow you, somehow, or else someone you trusted turned on you. It’s either one or it’s the other.”
She looked over his shoulder at the burning mass of metal and flesh.
He asked, “How did you spot the guy on the bus? Looked to me like he had a clean kill angle.”
“Reflection in my window. Tinted glass, overhead light inside, dark outside equals a mirror. Simple science.”
“You were reading a book.”
“I was pretending to read a book. I saw the guy sit down behind me. He passed by three empty rows. Made me think, you know? Plus I saw him get on. He was doing his best not to let me see him.”
“So you would’ve recognized him?”
“Maybe.”
“I was behind you too.”
“Too far behind to do you any good.”
“So you spotted me too?”
She shrugged. “You just get used to checking stuff out.”
“So he followed you to the bus. Did he chase you? I see the dirt on your hands and knees. Looks like you took a tumble before you got to the bus.”
She looked down at her knees but didn’t answer him.
Meldrin said, “But you still can’t do this alone.”
“Yeah, you already said that. So what do you suggest?”
“If you won’t go to the police, you can come with me.”
She took a step back. “You? Where?”
“Somewhere safer than here.”
She eyed him coolly. “Why don’t you stay and talk to the cops?”
He stared at her and listened to the sirens drawing uncomfortably close.
She said, “Did it have something to do with that g*n and your being on that bus at this hour?” She eyed him more closely. “You don’t look the type, you know?”
“Meaning?”
“You don’t look like you have to ride in a crappy bus in the middle of the night to get to New York. And neither did the guy who was sitting behind me. That was his other mistake. You have to dress for the part.”
“You want to go it alone, go. I’m sure you’ll be able to hold them off for a few more hours. But then it’ll all be over for you.”
She looked once more over his shoulder at the burning mass.
“I didn’t want anybody else to die,” she said.
“Anybody else? Who else has died?”
Meldrin had the feeling that she wanted to dissolve into tears, but she said, “Who are you?”
“Someone who stumbled onto something and doesn’t want to leave it.”
“I don’t trust you or anyone else.”
“I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t either.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“Someplace safe, like I said.”
“I’m not sure there is such a place,” she said in a voice that, for the first time, sounded like a kid’s. Scared.
“Me either,” said Meldrin.
CHAPTER
17
Meldrin DIDN’T JUST have an escape plan in case something went wrong on one of his missions. He had a safe house too. Now, with someone else in tow, he had opted for Plan C.
Unfortunately, Plan C was already getting complicated.
Meldrin’s gaze swept the end of the alley. He’d put his goggles on. It was only a glimpse, but he clung to it, because he knew it was important: reflected light off a g*n scope.
He removed the goggles, slipped back into shadows, looked down at the girl.
“What’s your name?”
“Why?”
“Just something to call you. It doesn’t have to be your real one,” he added.
She hesitated. “Gaby.”
“Okay, Gaby. You can call me Will.”
“Is that your real name?”
“Is Gaby your real name?”
She fell silent, looked past him, out into the darkness. They had covered about ten blocks, so far in fact that the sound of the sirens had receded. She had not committed to go with him. They had silently agreed to leave the scene of the explosion by simply turning and walking away together.
Meldrin could visualize the activity surrounding the bus. The first responders would be trying to determine what had caused the explosion. Faulty gas tank? Or terrorist attack? But then he concentrated on that glimpse.
“There’s someone out there,” he told Gaby in a low voice.
“Where?” she asked.
Meldrin pointed over his shoulder even as his gaze was running over her. “Any chance you have a tracking device on you? Because I’m good at getting away, and that was pretty fast to catch up to us.”
“Maybe they’re better than you.”
“Let’s hope not. Tracking device? How about your cell? I didn’t notice one in your pocket. But do you have one? And is your GPS chip enabled?”
“I don’t have a cell phone,” she replied.
“Don’t all kids have cell phones?”
“I guess not,” she said stiffly. “And I’m not a kid.”
“How old are you?”
“How old are you?”
“Forty.”
“That’s really old.”
“Trust me, I’m feeling it. How old?”
She hesitated again. “Can I lie?” she asked. “Like with my name?”
Sure. But if you say you’re over twenty I probably won’t believe you.”
“Fourteen.”
“Okay.”
He looked the way they had come. Something in his gut very clearly told him not to go back that way.
“What did you see that made you think there’s someone there?” she asked.
“Reflection, just like yours in the bus window.”
“It could be anybody.”
“Reflection of light off a rifle scope. It’s a pretty unique signature.”
“Oh.”
Meldrin studied the walls on either side of them. Then he looked up.
“You afraid of heights?”
“No,” she said quickly, perhaps a little too quickly. He hustled to a construction Dumpster parked in the alley and searched through it. He finally pulled out several lengths of rope and quickly knotted them together. There was a lenth of plywood in the Dumpster too. He positioned it so that it rested on top of the Dumpster’s rim, giving them a platform on which to stand.
“Strap your backpack down tight around you.”
“Why?”
“Just do it.”
She yanked the straps tight and looked at him expectantly.
“What are we doing?”
“Climbing.”
Meldrin lifted her up and placed her on top of the plywood and hoisted himself on top of it.
“What now?”
“Like I said, we climb.”
She stared up the brick face of the building.
“Can you really do this?”
“We’ll find out.” He motioned to her. “Come on. You need to stand on my shoulders.” He pointed up. “We’re aiming for that.”
It was a fire escape ladder that in its up and locked position ended well above street level.
“I don’t think I can reach it.”
“We can try. Keep your legs rigid.”
- Writer
