Line of Fire Read online

  “Then we’d better do something now,” I said. “What is that you have, a lighter?”

  She held it up for me to see. “Picked it up a few nights ago when one of them dropped it.”

  Could we set fire to the place? Would that help us escape or would the smoke kill us first? Probably the latter.

  “Well?” asked the tough girl. My eyes had adjusted enough for me to see her hair was blue and her nose pierced.

  “I don’t know yet. Let me think.”

  Cody sat down a foot away from me. I expected him to tell me to give it up, but he said, “If we could take out a guard, we might be able to get a gun.”

  “You know how to shoot?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “How do we lure only one here?” I thought a moment more. “They take your shoes, too?”

  “Yeah.”

  So no trying to use them on the boarded window.

  “What about the bathroom?” I asked. “There’s not one in here, is there?”

  “Nope.” The tough girl fingered her nose piercing. “They take us one at a time.”

  The girl with the light grimaced. “They stand in the hallway and won’t let us close the door. It’s embarrassing. We try not to go often.”

  “Just one man takes you?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  “I could take one,” I said to Cody.

  “Probably. But they know that after what happened outside the restaurant. They’ll be prepared.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Let’s think on it a bit more.”

  I nodded, but inside I was beginning to feel desperate. The darkness in the small room and the presence of so many was beginning to weigh heavily on me. It reminded me of other times in the dark when I’d been fighting for my life.

  I had to do something.

  The opening door made my choice for me. Kirt was framed by the light behind him, gun in hand. “Get your blankets and anything else you have. We’re leaving in five minutes.”

  A tremor of fear rippled through the girls and in my own heart. It was now or never. I stood and took a few steps toward the door. “I need to use the bathroom.”

  “You got to be kidding.” Kirt shook his head.

  “I just ate dinner at a restaurant. I drank a ton of water. Ask him.” I thumbed at Cody.

  “She’s a regular camel,” he said with a grunt.

  “Come on. What’s it gonna hurt?” What would I do if he said no?

  Sighing, Kirt motioned to someone who came into view: Dale. “Take her to the bathroom. Keep your gun on her and don’t hesitate to shoot.” To me, he added. “Don’t try anything, Ms. Rain.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I waved his voice away, faking a confidence I didn’t feel as I moved into the hallway. Another guard was there, a big brute of a man with black hair and bronzed skin, his handgun at the ready. I wondered if he knew any martial arts.

  Kirt shut and locked the door behind me. “Tiny, make sure Harrison’s got the van ready,” he said to the big man. “I have a phone call to make, and then we’ll get started with the girls.”

  I decided Harrison was our driver from earlier, the man I’d bested. “Twenty girls and all of you in that van? Don’t you think that’s impossible?”

  “I’m not interested in anyone’s comfort.” He turned his back on me. “Take her to the van when she’s finished.”

  Dale opened his mouth to speak but apparently thought the better of it.

  The bathroom was down the hall, around a corner, and past a large room that had once housed coffins. I caught a glimpse of several overturned crates and packing material littering the floor. They’d apparently finished moving drugs. After they loaded the girls, they would leave for good.

  “Give any thought to my suggestion about calling the police?” I said, sugar in my voice.

  “You already got me in trouble with that nonsense, so shut up and keep it shut—unless you want a love tap from this.” Dale tipped the pistol in a quick motion, indicating his willingness to follow through on the threat.

  “I think I’ll pass.”

  “Well, go in then.”

  I shrugged off my coat, letting it slip to the floor in the hall. It would be a hindrance in any real fight. My pants were dried, but dirt stained the material in patches all over, and there was a tear by the hem. I wished I’d worn jeans.

  Stepping into the bathroom, I started to close the door.

  Dale put his foot against it. “Leave it open. I won’t watch.” His grin told me otherwise.

  “If you think I’m going to be cowed like those poor little girls, you’re wrong.” I folded my arms and leaned against the wall, calculating my distance from the door carefully. Use what is available, my martial arts instructor always said.

  “Oh, yeah?” Dale’s voice turned ugly. “We’ll see about that.” He lunged toward me.

  Perfect. I slammed the door into him. A loud thunk answered my efforts as the door rammed his shoulder and head. Hard but not hard enough.

  “You little—” he gritted.

  I shoved the door against him again, and a third time, catching his arm. The gun fell to the floor. Whipping open the door, I punched hard, following with a jump kick to his stomach. As he curled forward, I brought my fist down on the back of his head, raising my knee to hit his face at the same time.

  “That’s for that poor girl crying under the blanket,” I whispered as he collapsed, unconscious.

  I leaned over him to get my gloves from the pocket of my coat before picking up his gun, a Colt with a silencer. One of the .45 hollow points would take down just about anything on two legs—not that I would ever be able to bring myself to fire it. I took a few more precious seconds to work off his holster and clip it onto the right side of my pants. It was meant for concealed carry, which placed the gun inside my waistband, its bulk making my loose pants comfortably snug.

  Shannon would say that was a sign that I should always carry. If I got out of this alive, I wasn’t going to tell him.

  My heart thundered in my chest and pounded in my ears. No one had come running yet, but I wouldn’t have much time. Grabbing Dale’s hands, I dragged him past my coat and down the hall into the bigger room, hiding him behind a crate. He was even heavier than I expected. Sifting through the garbage on the floor, I found lengths of thick, rough, packing twine long enough to tie his hands and feet and strong enough to cut flesh before it would ever break. On his ankle I found a holster with a smaller gun, and I took it off and put it around my own ankle. It felt heavy and awkward, so I ripped it off again, took out the magazine containing the bullets, and slipped it into my pocket. The gun I tossed into an empty crate. Better to stick with what I knew than to make myself clumsy with the extra weight.

  Still unsatisfied, I tied another longer piece around his wrists.

  “Enough, already,” I could imagine Shannon mocking. “Godzilla couldn’t break out of that.”

  I put a few extra lengths of twine in my front pocket. Better to plan for success.

  From Dale’s pocket I pulled a cell phone, but it was protected by a password. Even the emergency call option was unavailable.

  I tossed it on top of him.

  What now?

  I considered my choices. The safest thing to do would be to escape and call the police from a different location, but they were loading the girls now, and by the time the police arrived, they could be long gone.

  I couldn’t leave them.

  Or Cody, though he hadn’t given me any reason to care about his well-being.

  So I was staying.

  Two men that I knew of were inside the mortuary, and at least one was getting the van ready. If the driver was alone, he’d be the best place to start.

  The window in the room was the kind that lifted upward, and for a moment I feared it had been painted shut, but it opened up easily under my hand. Pushing out the screen took a bit more effort, but soon I was climbing down into an overgrown bush covered in snow.

>   My callused feet noted the chill, but it wasn’t that uncomfortable, not yet. On the other hand, the rest of me felt freezing. I’d left my coat in the hallway, and it was too late to go back for it now. Besides, it’d probably get in the way.

  I climbed out of the bush and sprinted around the back of the house, pausing at the corner where I could see the van parked near the ramp where I’d entered earlier.

  Kirt, the driver Harrison, and Tiny were talking at the top of the ramp.

  “I don’t like it,” Harrison was saying. “There’s only four of us. We should take two vans with four guards each. There’s too many girls.”

  “We don’t have a choice,” Kirt said. “We’ll shoot one or two if we have to.”

  “He won’t like that,” Harrison said.

  Kirt’s voice grew cold. “I’m in charge here.”

  “Sure.” There was a bit of mockery in Harrison’s voice that told me Kirt wasn’t what he believed he was. The imprint on his keys indicated that he was relatively new to the operation, so he answered to someone, but I had no idea who. Possibly some bigwig from out of town.

  Then there was the informant from the sheriff’s office. How involved was that person? Had he—or she—fooled everyone for years or only recently been sucked in?

  Well, I’d wait until Kirt and Tiny went inside and then jump Harrison. I’d bested him once before, and I had surprise on my side now. Maybe I could drive away with Cody and the girls before Kirt and Tiny noticed.

  Harrison walked down the ramp, pausing at the bottom. “What about the woman and the old man?”

  “We’ll bring her along,” Kirt said. “She’s valuable if she really can do what they say. She might even come around and work for us voluntarily. But we’ve no use for the old man. Once we have the girls loaded, we’ll get rid of him.”

  I chewed on my bottom lip. Get rid of him? That messed up my plan big time. Even if I could take Harrison’s place driving the van, I couldn’t sit in there and let them shoot Cody.

  Harrison stalked over to the van and yanked open the sliding door. “Bring them, then.”

  I waited until Kirt and Tiny left. How long would it take them to get the girls? Since there were so many, they’d probably make the effort to tie their hands, but either way, they wouldn’t waste a lot of time. They had to know that regardless of who their inside person was at the sheriff’s office, they didn’t have much time until those who were actually doing their jobs caught up with them.

  Like Shannon.

  Unless they’d taken care of him, too. He could have walked into a trap like I had—and he’d be just as useless to them as Cody.

  The thought made my stomach cramp. I told myself that I’d feel the same way no matter who was working with me, but that wasn’t the truth. I cared about Shannon a lot.

  The driver drew out a cigarette and started lighting it. The perfect opportunity because I could see both hands. I pulled the gun from my holster and stepped out from the house. Harrison did a double take and dropped both his cigarette and his lighter.

  “Keep your hands where I can see them,” I ordered, hoping he couldn’t tell how much I was shaking.

  Harrison scowled. “You’re making a mistake.”

  “No, you made the mistake. And now you’re the one who needs to be quiet.” I had no idea how I was going to tie him up without putting down the gun, and I wasn’t about to shoot him. So all he had to do was rush me or pull out his own gun and I’d be the one fighting for my life.

  “Tie this around your wrist.” I tossed him a length of twine. “Tie another knot. Pull it tight. Good. Now lie down inside the van on your stomach. Put your arms behind you.”

  He lay down in the open middle space between the two long seats running under the darkened windows. I jumped inside and put my knee on his back before tucking the gun back into its holster. It was ridiculously easy to finish tying his hands and feet, but I had to search in the dark van for a cloth to tie around his mouth. Instead I found a roll of duct tape in a box under one of the seats. I suspected it had been used for just such a purpose before, probably with some of the girls. I also found more twine, a few short squares of cloth, and a liquid in a bottle that I’d bet was chloroform.

  I had to hurry. Time was not on my side, which Harrison must have realized because he wasn’t trying to resist. Or maybe he was afraid of me. Searching him, I found another useless cell phone, keys to the van, a knife, and two more guns, one a .45 like the one I carried. I relieved the pistols of their magazines before tossing them and the knife into the bushes along the back of the house. The magazines and keys went into my pocket. After another rapid internal debate about what to do next, I started up the ramp near the van.

  Almost immediately I heard voices. The back entry was large enough to accommodate several coffins, but the door from the hall was the regular size, so there was enough room for me to press myself against the wall close to the door, though I felt exposed because of the bright lights.

  Show time.

  “Straight ahead,” Kirt was saying. “Outside, down the ramp, and into the van. No one make any moves, or Tiny here will have some fun with his gun.”

  The girls filed past me on quiet bare feet, all tied together in a row. A few were supported by their neighbors. In this bright light they looked young, forlorn, and near tears. One glanced in my direction, and I put my finger to my lips. She looked away quickly. More glances from others and a slight straightening of their shoulders when they saw me and my gun.

  I hadn’t even realized I’d taken it in my hand again.

  I felt sick. How could I overcome two men without endangering the girls or myself? I’d have more of a chance if their guns weren’t involved.

  I prayed for strength. For anything to tip the balance in my favor.

  “I got it from here,” Tiny said before reaching the door. “They ain’t going nowhere with those ropes. And like you said, I could always shoot a few.” He laughed at the terrified glances the girls cast back at him. “Why don’t you go back and off the old man so we can get out of here?”

  “I thought, well … you’ll probably need my help.”

  “Harrison will help. Don’t worry. Besides, you got only one arm.” A note of mockery entered Tiny’s voice. “Unless you’re not up to the job. That woman is probably finished in the bathroom by now, so Dale could help you.”

  “Shut up.” Kirt’s voice was a growl. “You get them in. If anything goes wrong, it’s your hide I’m taking it out on.” There was promise in his voice, and I knew Tiny didn’t have much of a future under his command. Tiny didn’t seem worried, which reminded me I didn’t know who was really in charge. Maybe whoever it was had been grooming Kirt and his cousin to run the operation in this part of Oregon. Perhaps Tiny and Harrison and Dale were on loan until Kirt could arrange his own loyal thugs.

  If he didn’t get these guys so angry they killed him first.

  I had no time to relish Kirt’s footsteps going back down the hall. They only meant Cody didn’t have much time, and I needed to act fast to save him. Besides Tiny was coming into view, his gun held casually at waist height.

  I squeezed tighter against the wall, lifting my gun. “Drop it!” I said in a low voice.

  He froze. For a moment, I thought he was going to turn his gun on me, but his grip eased and he held it out between two fingers. The tough girl with blue hair lunged at it, toppling the two girls tied to her, but managing to secure the weapon.

  “Down on your knees, scum!” she grated, pointing it at him.

  As he obliged, several of the girls started crying.

  “Take this gun instead,” I told the girl, “and hold it on him.” I was fairly sure his gun was racked and ready to go, but I had to make sure. It was another silenced .45, a match to the one I’d already stolen.

  She traded me and I whipped out my string and began tying his hands behind his back, threading the twine also around both ankles. “Hold still and she won’t shoot you,” I said
, more to the girl than to him.

  Searching him, I found his second gun and yet another cell phone I couldn’t use.

  “He has a knife, too,” the tough girl said, stepping closer, the gun aimed at his forehead. “He used it for this rope when he tied us together.”

  “I’ll find it. Don’t shoot him unless he tries something.”

  “I hope he does try something,” she said, her voice unnaturally high. “Then it’ll be me having fun with his gun.”

  Nothing a little counseling couldn’t resolve, I hoped.

  I found the knife and cut her loose. “Free the others,” I said, taking the gun and giving her the knife. She let the pistol go with relief, and I added its magazine as well as his other one to the growing collection in my pocket. Any more, and I might need a belt to hold up my pants despite the bulk of the holster at my waistband. Good thing I was wearing these black ones, after all; the material stretched to fit more magazines than my jeans would have.

  To Tiny, I said, “Down on your stomach! These girls are going to tie you up a bit more with some of your own rope and some duct tape that’s in the van. Then they’ll go out and wait for me there. Oh, and girls, there’s another guy in the van. I’ll help get him out when I come back so there’ll be more room. Hurry, now! As fast as you can!”

  I had to get them away from here before any more criminals made an appearance. Then I’d find a phone to call Shannon.

  First I had to save Cody.

  If I wasn’t already too late.

  Chapter 19

  I hurried down the hall on my bare feet, not bothering to muffle my steps. Maybe the noise would prevent Kirt from shooting Cody. He might think Dale or Tiny needed his help.

  My entire body was tense as I waited for a shot that wouldn’t come because surely he used a silencer like his goons. Even in this deserted area there had to be someone to report a gunshot to the police, and though Kirt was young and stupid, he obviously had some experience.

  He was also cold-blooded, as his involvement with these girls proved beyond any doubt.

  “Dale, is that you?” Kirt’s voice, coming from the room where they’d kept the girls. I paused outside the door, waiting to hear more. “Get that woman to the van and get back here. We have some unfinished business. We’ll need to dispose of the body.”