edged with a metal band. A white porcelain sink with two separate spouts, one for hot water and one for cold. It was stacked high with plates and bowls that were crusted with food. An empty box of Jimmy Dean breakfast sausages lay discarded in the middle of a tin-topped kitchen table.
I heard the woman’s voice again, much clearer now, coming from the next room. From the back of the house.
Not from a TV.
The voice was Alexa’s.
99.
Amped with adrenaline, I burst into the adjoining room, gun extended.
“—Bastard!” she was saying. “You goddamned bastard!”
Then her tone changed abruptly, her voice wheedling, high-pitched. “Please, oh God, please let me out of here, please oh God please oh God what do you goddamn want? I can’t stand it I can’t stand it please oh God.”
And I saw that Alexa wasn’t in here.
Her voice was coming from computer speakers. A black Dell computer on a long wooden workbench that ran the length of one wall. In the monitor I saw that same strange close-up of Alexa’s face, with a greenish cast, that I’d seen in the streaming video.
But she looked so bad I almost didn’t recognize her. Her face was gaunt, her eyes swollen to slits, deep purple hollows beneath them. She was speaking out of one side of her mouth, as if she’d had a stroke. Her face shone with sweat. Her eyes were wild, unfocused.
In front of the monitor was a keyboard. To the left of it was a small, cheap-looking microphone on a little plastic tripod. Like something you’d find in a discount bin at RadioShack.
For an instant Alexa seemed to be looking at me, but then her eyes meandered somewhere else. She fell silent, then started whimpering, all her words rushing together. I could make out only “please” and “God” and “out of here.”
I spoke into the microphone: “Alexa?”
But she went on, uninterrupted. On the stem of the microphone was a little black on/off switch. I slid it down to ON. Said, “Alexa?” again. This time she stopped. Her mouth came open. She began to sob.
“Alexa?” I said. “It’s Nick.”
“Who—who is this?”
“It’s Nick Heller. You’re going to be okay. I’m at the house. Right nearby. Listen, Alexa, help is coming, but I need you to stay quiet and keep calm, all right? Can you do that for me? Just for a little while. You’re going to be okay. I promise.”
For a second I thought I saw a flash of light in the backyard coming through the window.
“Nick? Where are you? Oh my God, where are you?”
The light again. A car’s headlights. I heard the rumble of a car’s engine, then a door slamming.
Zhukov was here. It could be no one else.
But I couldn’t see him. He’d parked on the side of the house that had no windows.
“Nick, answer me! Get me out of here please oh God get me out of here, Nick!” She started screaming.
“You’re going to be okay, Alexa. You’re going to be okay.”
Finally she seemed be listening. “Don’t leave me here,” she moaned.
“He’s back,” I whispered. “Can you hear me?”
She stared up, her lips parted, and as she nodded she began sobbing again.
“Everything will be fine,” I said. “Really. As long as you don’t say a word. Okay? Not a word.”
I gripped the SIG in both hands.
But what if it wasn’t Zhukov who’d just arrived? What if it was the police? It was far too soon for the FBI’s SWAT team. They were driving, since getting a helicopter there and loading it and all that, would take even more time, and would also deprive them of the heavy armaments.
Zhukov, if it was him, would enter the house through the front door, as I had. The worn path told me that. Yet he wouldn’t expect anyone to be here. That would give me a temporary advantage. If I positioned myself correctly I might be able to get a jump on him.
Heart thudding now. Time had slowed. I went into that strange calm place I so often did when faced with grave danger: senses heightened, reactions quickened.
A door opened somewhere.
But not the front door. Which one?
The side door I’d noticed earlier.
I needed to conceal myself, but where?
No time to hesitate.
A door next to the kitchen entrance. A closet, probably, with a wooden kitchen chair next to it. I slid the chair a few inches out of the way.
Opened the door with my left hand, stepped into the darkness—