Ryan didn’t introduce the skinny men who were with him but nodded them aside as he walked up to Moll, squatted in his sniper nest and looked over at the cabin.
“They’re in there?” Ryan asked.
“That is correct.”
“Who?”
“Merritt, his ex, the girl. And Motorcycle Man.”
“Thoughts?” Ryan asked.
Desmond said, “Merritt’s got a car somewhere, but it can’t be that close and I don’t think they’ll hike to it. One of ’em’s hurt. We saw blood, fresh.”
“Which one?”
Moll said, “Woman, I think. So. They’ll try and take Kristi’s car.”
“Where is she?”
“Can’t you see?” Moll asked, suddenly irritated.
Squinting and scanning the area, Ryan grunted when he noted her body. “Shit. She was good. She drove getaway a couple jobs for me and lost investigation reports at the sheriff’s office. That sucks.”
It did. All the more because a couple of times she’d spent the night at Moll’s house. It was after Chloe and before Jean. She’d been more interested in the faux furniture than the sex but that was more or less true for Moll himself. He said he’d paint her a piece but never got around to it.
The two kids removed Bushmaster M4s from the cases—short, black assault rifles. They went through the ritual of loading and charging. Moll had never understood the label, and the stigma attached to it. “Assault.” They were no different from any other semiautomatic rifle—one finger pull, one shot. A deer did not care one bit if it was hit by a slug from a scary-looking soldier’s gun or one from an elegant walnut-stock hunting rifle with an engraved, blued barrel and receiver.
Though, for his part, he would never own anything but the latter, like the Winchester he gripped now.
One sneery boy, the skinniest, said, “I’m a shot. Want me to take out a tire?”
Moll said, with a hint of exasperation, “Do you think it mightbe better to wait till they were all inside the vehicle? Or do you want to dig them out of the cabin?”
The kid said nothing, not appearing offended, and Moll supposed it was a helpful quality to be able to accept your own dimness.
The other sneerer asked, “What’d that kid do that Harmon wants her gone?”
“Do not know.” When Marty Harmon had hired him and Desmond for the special services, the CEO had not shared. Fine with Moll.
He said to the newcomers, “They think it’s only the two of us. No idea it’s five, and that we’ve got those.” A nod to the M4s. “They’ll keep the car dark and hit the driveway as fast as they can. They’ll think we’ll have time to get off maybe two, three shots and then they’ll be gone.”
Desmond said, “But when they get to that spot—” He pointed to a patch of dirt and grass at the end of the parking area. It was an unobstructed view from the ridge here. “—we’ll open up.”
“Good kill zone,” the chastised sneerer said approvingly, as if he spent a lot of time thinking about things like that.
Desmond led the two younger men down the ridge and positioned them with a good view of the clearing.
Ryan squinted once more. “Can’t see in the cabin.”
Allowing himself a contraction, Moll said, “We’ll know. When we hear the engine.”
Which, just at that moment, sparked to life.
86
When Jon Merritt started the deputy’s sedan, Colter Shaw climbed from the side window of the cabin and dropped into the brush below the sill. He scanned the landscape, sweeping the Glock, two-handed, from right to left, back again.
“Clear,” he whispered, then tucked the gun away, reached up and guided Allison Parker out and to the ground. She winced not a bit. The drugs that Jon had relieved the foot-shot tweaker of were doing their job.