Another bullet whizzed through the blown-out back glass, passed through the length of the truck, careened off a doorjamb, shot sideways, and took off a chunk of the steering wheel. The chunk flew back and hit Reel in the forehead, snapping her head backward against the seat, and then she was propelled forward, only coming to a halt when her harness engaged.
As she slipped into unconsciousness, she looked up ahead and saw the straight road. She also knew they had lost two tires.
Somewhere in the depths of her muscle memory a survival spark engaged.
She clamped her knees around the wheel and wedged her ankles against the console and the door.
Then, blood dripping down her face from where the chunk of hard rubber had collided with her head, Reel passed out.
“Jess? Jess, you okay?”
When Robie looked to the front of the Yukon he saw Reel slumped over. “Jess!”
The cruise control was still engaged.
They were still going at a high rate of speed.
But they had two blown-out rear tires.
And nobody was driving.
Robie had no choice. He abandoned his rifle and threw himself over the seat, even as the Yukon started to slide off the road as Reel’s legs lost their rigidity.
Robie grabbed the wheel with one hand and fought to keep the Yukon steady and on the road. But they were vibrating so badly now that he knew that couldn’t last.
A few seconds later a tire came off the rear rim, which made the truck lopsided. It pitched to the left like a boat in heavy seas.
Robie couldn’t keep it on the road at this point.
He used a finger to punch off the cruise control.
This made the control situation better as their speed dropped.
He hit the gas with his foot to keep them moving forward.
He used his free hand to check Reel’s pulse. It pumped strongly in her veins. He glanced down at the wound on her forehead. It was bloody but not deep. Her breathing was steady. He eyed where the missing chunk of steering wheel had been, and what had happened to her came into clearer focus.
He looked back and his features grew grim.
The trucks were right behind them and a dozen guns were pointed their way.
Robie cut the wheel to the right and the Yukon cleared the road and bumped over the uneven ground.
Robie hit the gas and then cut the wheel to the left, aiming for a stand of trees.
He reached it, slammed the truck into park, leapt back over the seat, and took up his sniper rifle once again.
The trucks pulled to a stop twenty yards away.
Robie placed his crosshairs on the driver in one of the trucks.
He didn’t have enough ammo to take them all out, but he would take as many as he could with him. One less hatemonger alive was always a good thing.
His finger slipped to the trigger guard. His plan was simple.
Go down fighting.
The men climbed out of the truck beds. They had an assortment of shotguns, rifles, MP5s, pistols, and UMPs.
With all Robie had done over the years, all the dangerous countries where he could have died so many times, he had never imagined taking his last breath in rural Colorado.
But so be it, he thought.
At least Reel wouldn’t see it coming. She would die peacefully.
He expected them to simply start shooting, engulfing the Yukon in fields of fire until a round found its mark or the gas tank exploded.
Instead, two men climbed out of the second truck.
And they were pulling someone along with them.
Holly Malloy’s face was bruised and bloody. Her clothes were torn. She looked half dead on her feet.
One of the skins put a muzzle against her temple. “You put your fucking gun down and come out here or the bitch gets it right now. You got two seconds. One…”
Chapter
31
ROBIE WAS SHACKLED and sitting next to Reel, who still had not regained consciousness, but sat slumped to the side.
On the other side of her was Holly, similarly shackled and also gagged.
They hadn’t been able to talk at all after Robie had put down his weapon and the skins had hustled him out of the Yukon and carried the unconscious Reel behind him. They were now in a panel van that had driven up a few minutes after the battle had ended.
They were seated on the floor in the back with three skins across from them, pointing weapons at their heads.
Reel’s head lolled around and came to rest against Robie’s.
One of the skins grinned at him. “We’re gonna so mess you up, asshole.”
“Not the first time I’ve heard that.”
The man sneered. “You and the bitch got lucky before. Now your luck’s run out.”
“Not the first time I’ve heard that either. You know we’re federal agents. You want to bring that kind of attention down on you?”
“I see it as a bonus. Government’s the enemy. And you’re the fucking government in spades.”
It seemed that they had been driving a long time before the van slowed, then stopped and then started up again, but only for a short distance. Robie thought he could hear some sort of machinery running.
The back doors of the van opened and more men appeared there. They were all skinheads, tatted with swastikas and other symbols of hate. They looked more like rabid animals than human beings, what with their malevolent eyes and bared teeth.
Reel moaned, twitched, and then opened her eyes.
She looked around, and as her thoughts passed from fuzzy to firm, she snapped back to her old self and her expression grew grim but focused.
She looked at Robie and whispered, “Sorry.”
“No need,” he whispered back. “Look to your left.”
Reel turned and saw the bound and gagged Holly. “Shit,” she muttered under her breath.
They were pulled up and hauled outside, their shoes hitting dirt a moment later. They were prodded and pushed toward a plywood-and-shingle building that was set inside a tall wire fence. The machinery sound that Robie had heard was the motorized gate, which had opened to allow them entry to the compound of twenty-first-century Hitler lovers.
“Déjà vu all over again,” Reel hissed behind him.
He simply nodded at this and kept walking. Gun muzzles periodically poked him in the back, just because the armed men could do so without fear of attack.
Robie looked right and left and took in the entire compound, which looked like an Army outpost. Men in mismatched uniforms jeered at them. They carried rifles over their shoulders, and some had World War II–era Nazi caps and tunics with German medals on them. Some wore the black uniforms of the Gestapo. There were also 1940s-era military jeeps, half-tracks, and what looked like a small tank. For a moment Robie thought he had stepped back in time. But then he decided they had probably just bought the shit from some military surplus goods store.
Or maybe they got it online. You could buy anything on the web if you knew where to look.
One line of men stood by silently. They were all on aluminum crutches with their lower legs bandaged and their feet booted. These were the men that Reel had shot in downtown Grand when they had attacked Luke at the B&B.