In For the Kill (McClouds & Friends #11)(125)

Per favore, consegna questi documenti alla polizia. Questo veicolo contiene pericolose sostanze radioattive.

Please deliver these documents to the police. This vehicle contains dangerous radioactive substances.





Well, then. There was the punch line, but she was in no mood to appreciate the joke. Her nerves could not be jolted more than they had been already. What she’d found in the cave had broken her heart wide open. This part was nothing. Just some delicate, careful mopping up.

She had to see if the stuff was still inside. She realized, as she kicked and flung garbage clear of the sliding door, that she had tears running down her face, into her nose. She had to wipe her face on her sleeve before she could see clearly enough to slide the door open.

Inside was a large, opaque yellow plastic container, with the symbol for radioactivity stenciled on the top and sides. She stared at it, wondering with a small part of her mind just how shielded that container actually was. She should get away from it until she knew.

She slid the door shut and started piling the shell of garbage back on top. Evil intentions, heaped on top of evil deeds. But it all stopped today. Those bastard f*ckheads were going down.

She pulled the sheaf of paper out of the cab. There were photos: of the lab, of the contents of the van, what was in the pit. There was a map, clearly marked. The pin drive must contain still more information.

The van had no keys, or she might have driven it straight to a police station. She knew how to hotwire a car in theory, but she had no tools, and it was difficult, with a car full of modern electronics. Plus, there was the locked razor-wire fence. And to top it off, it might be radioactive. Miserable as she was, she had no desire to cosy up to strontium-90, and she probably wouldn’t be able to maneuver the van over those heaps of garbage anyway. It was not an off-road rig.

She shoved the photos back into the plastic sleeve and the thumb drive into her pocket, and grimly set herself to burying the van in garbage once again, as completely as it had been hidden before. It would be a crass twist of fate to have the vehicle discovered, looted, or stolen by the subhuman creatures that had looted the abandoned lab. And an even more horrible joke if innocent local kids happened across it.

That done, it was a long, hard, sliding scramble up the steep mountain of trash to the top of the gully. Then she faced the long hike back to the car. The sun was low, and she did not want to be on this road when night fell. She felt unpleasantly visible up here. She could be seen from far away, and there was no place to hide. No trees to speak of. No place to run on the tumbled rocks.

Hours later, she got to the first chain-link fence. It was harder to climb it this time. Her legs felt hollow, floppy and rubbery. Her scraped, bloody hands burned against the sharp wires. Every downhill step toward the car seemed to rattle her loosened bones.

Bones. So many. Burned into her mind’s eye. When she closed her eyes, she saw them, heaped and scattered, gray and tan and yellow.

She was relieved to find the car where she’d left it, at the concrete barrier. She’d traveled so far today, it had been like going through a magic portal. A hundred years could have passed in the world outside. Her car might be a rusted fossil. The world changed beyond recognition.

But it was just where she’d parked it, shiny and new. She tucked the papers under the seat and got under way.

This was the part where Mama had come to grief, after all her effort and sacrifice, and the same fate could easily befall Sveti. She had to be sharp and canny and quick. Right now, she felt anything but.

Of course, if she hadn’t misplaced her f*cking phone, she could have called Tenente Morelli right now and told her everything. Morelli would not need the backstory explained. Sveti cringed at the thought of going into a small-town police station, trying to make something so horrific comprehensible to whoever spoke the best English. They might think she was crazy, or on drugs. She’d be exposed and alone for a long time before she could prove her claim was true.

She wanted Sam so badly. Beneath the day’s turmoil ran the constant, sour current of missing Sam. Even a screaming fight with him would be welcome. The thought of fighting with Sam was oddly bracing. It focused her enough to make a plan of action.

San Anselmo was a couple hours away, but it was bigger than the towns around here. She would go to that police station and search out a cop who spoke English. Beg for the use of a phone. Arrange for some heavily armed person to come to keep her company, as Sam and Tam and Val and Nick had insisted. She should have done that yesterday, but she’d been too busy sulking because that person could not be Sam. But she didn’t even have the energy to properly scold herself right now.

First, she’d copy the papers, photos, and documents. When she got to the cops, she’d speak to Morelli, just to spread the joy. She’d call home, tell Nick, tell Tam and Val. She’d widen the net of people who knew until it was too big for anyone to contain. She’d have accomplished at least that much. Whether they killed her or not.

Step Two, if she survived Step One, was to drive straight back to Sam’s hospital room and tell him the story. He would not be able to shut her up or throw her out, as injured as he was. She’d tell him she loved him and missed him so badly, she wanted to die. That she’d been a brainless * to flounce out the door by herself, that she wanted to burden him with the monumental pain in the ass that was Svetlana Ardova for the rest of his natural life. She’d collaborate. She’d be safe, sensible, as good as gold. Forever. Cross her heart.