Last Chance to Die by Noah Boyd (large screen ebook reader .txt) 📗

the utility of the larger system he was about to sell him the secrets to. Then they took out Russian-made Bison submachine guns, chambering the first round. Positioning themselves behind the car, they waited for Vail and Bursaw to drive back.

A hundred yards farther down the curving road, Bursaw hit the brakes. They were at the beach of a small lake. At one end of the sand was a dock with a ladder leading down into the water, presumably for getting on and off small boats. “Where did they go?” Bursaw asked.

“We must have missed some turnoff, but I didn’t see anything other than an overgrown path.”

“Think this is where the bodies wound up?”

“If it is, then why aren’t they down here?” Vail said. “You’d better go back.”

It took Bursaw a couple of passes before he could completely turn the car around. He still hadn’t switched his headlights back on, but he drove a little faster in case the two men from the LCS had used the maneuver to lose them. He came around the curve and almost hit Barkus’s car before slamming to a stop. “What the—”

Bursaw’s unfinished question was answered by automatic fire that ricocheted off the front of the Bureau car. In the muzzle flashes, Vail could see that the men were wearing night-vision goggles. After the first burst, the two gunmen ran from behind the car and into the woods to get some flanking fire into the vehicle from a vantage point where they wouldn’t have to fire through the engine block. Both agents saw where they were going and scrambled out of the passenger-side door. “Do you think they made the surveillance?” Vail asked.

“I’d go ask them if I spoke Lithuanian.” Another burst of fire raked the car, taking out the driver’s-side windows.

“I don’t suppose you have anything useful in the trunk, like a SWAT team.”

“Just a shotgun.”

“Did you see the goggles? They’re thermal-imaging.”

Bursaw waited a moment for some explanation as to how that was going to help them and then said, “What a fun fact, Mr. Science.”

“As soon as they figure out that we only have handguns, they’re going to fire and maneuver until they can get around our car, and we’ll be sharing a three-body condo with Longmeadow. Go back by the trunk. As soon as you hear them firing at me, look and see where it’s coming from. Then start firing in that direction. Take your time, empty a clip—but slowly. As soon as you finish, I’ll take off. Those goggles have a very narrow field of vision. I’ll fire at them, and they’ll see only me, but they’ll think we’re still together. Then get under the car toward the front. With the engine still running, there’ll be a billowing heat signature down there, and they won’t be able to distinguish you from the car. They’ll chase after me, thinking we’re together. Once they do, take the shotgun out and get down to the water as fast as possible.”

Vail took off his jacket and pulled off his black sweatshirt, putting the coat back on against the freezing cold. He took out his pocketknife and cut two slits into the shirt.

“You’re going down to the water?”

“Something like that. Once you hear gunfire down there, or me yelling . . . well, you can figure it out from there. Just remember, I’ll be the guy without the goggles.”

“There’s no place to hide down there.”

“Sure there is,” Vail said. “You ready?”

Bursaw moved to the back of the car. “Ready.”

Vail stood up, and almost immediately automatic-weapons fire raked the opposite side of the car as he ducked down again. Bursaw leaned across the trunk and fired in a slow rhythm.

As soon as he finished, Vail took off, firing a couple of shots to attract the two gunmen’s attention. Bursaw scrambled under the car and waited, his handgun reloaded and ready.

When Vail reached the beach, he ran out onto the pier. At the end, by the ladder, he carefully placed his Glock at the edge. Then, without hesitation, he jumped down, breaking through the thin layer of ice covering the lake. Using the ladder to keep himself under, he held his breath in the freezing water that bit into his skin like hot needles. He held a finger to his carotid artery and timed his heart rate. If he and Bursaw were going to get out of there alive, he was going to have to induce the initial stages of hypothermia to lower his body’s heat signature. After the run, his heart rate was at fifty-two. After a minute and a half, it had dropped to forty.

He raised his head out of the water and listened. He could hear the two men yelling to each other, working their way through the woods toward the beach. He lowered his head back into the water and waited.

When his heart rate hit thirty-six, he began to shiver uncontrollably, another sure sign of hypothermia. He started feeling light-headed and knew he was on his way to losing consciousness.

Slowly, so the dripping water couldn’t be heard, he climbed the ladder, picked up his automatic, and shoved it in the back of his waistband. Then he crawled onto the dock, placing the black shirt over his head and positioning it so he could see through the slits he had cut. He lay still with his hands underneath him and waited for his clothing to freeze. He was shivering violently.

Less than a minute later, Barkus and Mindera stepped onto the beach searching for the agents, looking as much at the woods behind them as in the direction of the water.

The two men were speaking Lithuanian and sounded as though they were both now on the sand. Vail closed his eyes and put his head down so they wouldn’t be able to detect the heat coming through the eye slits in his shirt.

Hopefully Bursaw had survived, but Vail couldn’t depend on that. Then he heard one of their voices coming closer, almost as if it were aimed