Velocity (Karen Vail #3)(113)

Vail didn’t know a whole lot about helicopters, but she had seen videos of them catching a skid or rotor blade and jackknifing into the ground in a spectacular and deadly crash.

Jesus Christ. What the hell is he doing?

As Vail opened her mouth to ask that very question, a dense, billowing cloud of dust rose and swirled in front of the SUV.

“This baby’s big enough to cause a brownout,” Turino said. “Main rotor downwash. Blown up dust and debris, driver can’t see where he’s going.”

The Land Rover slowed. “Okay, this is it!” Turino rapidly swung the Huey alongside the SUV. “Here’s the ‘hang on’ part—”

He shoved the chopper’s skids against the roof of the Land Rover, and the SUV swung sharply left, down the graded embankment, skirting the water’s edge. With a sudden jolt, its right fender glanced off a boulder, sending the vehicle into the lake.

Turino banked hard right and upward, moving away from the Land Rover as it splashed against the water and stopped abruptly, as if caught in a giant spider web.

“He’s down!” Turino said.

Vail phoned DeSantos. “Target’s in the water. Repeat. Target is in the water. We’re circling back to get a light on him.”

Turino and Vail removed their NVGs. Turino switched on the Huey’s spotlight and trained it on the Land Rover. Vail moved it around in a sweeping left to right manner, attempting to locate the vehicle’s occupant.

“There,” Turino said, pointing at a spot below. “Swimming back toward shore.”

“Got him.” Vail angled the light onto his position. The man was splashing desperately toward the lake’s edge. As soon as the area around him became illuminated, he stopped and looked skyward, the downdraft of the rotors flapping his hair and rippling the water’s surface.

Vail pulled her BlackBerry back to her face and shoved it beneath the earpiece of her headset. “Your game now. When you’ve got him in custody, we’ll join you on the ground.”



DESANTOS WAS FIRST to make it to the lake’s edge. He drew down on his target and waited for the man to approach. DeSantos could’ve jumped in after the suspect, but he didn’t have a change of clothes, and he reasoned that due to the temperature of the water, the man had no choice but to return to shore.

And a moment later, that’s exactly what happened. A thin man with what appeared to be a gold front tooth slogged onto the rock-strewn edge, then placed his hands behind his head.

DeSantos knew that having him provide answers might be a more difficult task. “Search him,” he said to Dixon, who was closest. While DeSantos covered her, Dixon holstered her pistol, then moved to the prisoner and shoved him facedown on the ground. She pulled a long switchblade from his back pocket, a cell phone, and ID that DeSantos was sure would turn out to be bogus.

As Mann stood guard, watching the area behind them, Dixon read the suspect his rights, then placed a set of flex cuffs around his wrists.

Fifty yards to the east, Turino set the Huey down. Vail deplaned and ran toward the knot of task force teammates.

Dixon yanked the prisoner to his feet and DeSantos stepped up to him, remaining far enough away that the man would not be able to land a kick.

“You speak English?” DeSantos asked.

“Yeah,” the man said.

“Your name?”

The suspect turned and looked off into the darkness. Vail tried to recall the photo she had taken from Cortez’s house, but whether or not it was the stress of the moment—of the past few weeks—she couldn’t retrieve the image from the recesses of her memory. She was not sure if this man was Arturo Figueroa.

“Silent treatment ain’t gonna work with us,” DeSantos said. “Believe me, you don’t want to know what I do for a living.”

The man lifted his face and turned it toward DeSantos. “And you don’t want to know what I do for a living.”

“We already know,” Vail said, Robby’s jacket flapping in the breeze. She walked past DeSantos and stopped a foot from the man’s face. “And I’m in no fucking mood to play games. You can either cooperate and answer a few simple questions, or we push you back into that water and hold your head down till your lungs fill up. We cut your cuffs and let you sink. No one would question it. You drove into the water and drowned. And in case you didn’t notice, it’s pitch black and we’re in the middle of fucking nowhere. You see any witnesses? Because I sure don’t.” Vail tilted her head back and observed. The man tensed his brow and narrowed his eyes.

The wind whipped up, sending a shiver shuddering through her body. She gathered the jacket tighter around her torso. “I get it,” she said. “You don’t believe me. Federal agents don’t kill innocent suspects. Well, you got that right, asshole. But you’re not an innocent suspect. And I need the answers now. So the rules aren’t what you think they are.” She stopped and waited for him to process that. “Let’s start with your name.”

The man did not respond.

“All right, fine. We don’t have time for this shit. Drown him,” she said, then turned to walk away. Dixon and DeSantos each grabbed an arm and dragged him backward. He fought them, kicking his legs and twisting his torso.

But as they approached the water’s edge, he yelled, “Arturo. Arturo Figueroa.”