This was Daeng’s doing, the extra help he had enlisted. Only the plan had been that the sudden influx of monks would confuse Bell, and create movement problems for his men, allowing Logan to grab Elyse.
But Logan was nowhere near Elyse. And while the tactic was definitely slowing the others’ escape, the flash mob created by the monks was also blocking Logan from getting closer to Tooney’s granddaughter.
He continued to push his way into the crowd, trying to squeeze through any seam that he could find.
“We have a problem.”
Logan looked over. Daeng had somehow caught up with him.
“Yeah. I noticed,” Logan said as he kept shoving his way forward.
“It’s the mother,” Daeng told him. “The monks tried to detain her, but she wouldn’t stay. Then some of your farang friends grabbed her as she was about to start up the stairs.”
Bell’s other men, Logan thought. The ones that were missing.
Daeng must have read Logan’s silence as displeasure, because he said, “The monks did all they could, but they weren’t going to hold her by force.”
“I know,” Logan told him. “It’s okay.”
It wasn’t okay, but it wasn’t their fault, either. He should have given Daeng the signal as soon as Bell had stepped onto the temple grounds. They would have had Elyse by now, and they could have communicated that down to the monks who’d been with Sein. But he’d wanted to make sure he had accounted for everyone, and had gotten in as close as he could first.
Once more his delayed action had caused a mistake.
Get the girl. Carl’s voice whispered in his mind.
As they got closer to the exit, Logan could see that some of Bell’s men had been forced off to the side, and were being surrounded by monks. One of them stared at Logan across the crowd. It was the guy who had the beers on the train. Logan could see the light blub go on as he suddenly realized Logan must have something to do with all this.
The man shoved one of the monks out of his way. Only he didn’t get very far. Laying a violent hand on a monk was unheard of. Several Thais had seen the shove and were pulling the man back. More quickly joined in.
Logan craned his neck, looking ahead and hoping other monks had been able to corner Bell and Elyse, too, but no such luck. Bell was leading her and the Myanmar man down the short steps to the courtyard, with one of his men still with him.
“Excuse me!” Logan said loudly. “Excuse me!”
Daeng was shouting something in Thai next to him that he assumed was the equivalent.
It was working, at least a little. Some of the monks would look at them, then step out of the way once they saw Daeng. The biggest problem was the tourists. The sudden appearance of all the monks confused them, and they didn’t seem to know what to do, so they just stood in the way, taking pictures.
Finally, Logan and Daeng reached the exit steps. They raced down into the courtyard, not even worrying about grabbing their shoes.
“What about the generals’ men?” Logan asked. “One of them’s with Bell, but the others are going to get away.”
“No,” Daeng said. “They’ve been taken care of.”
“What do you mean?”
“The monks.”
“I thought you said they wouldn’t hold anyone by force.”
“I said they wouldn’t hold her by force. Elyse’s mother has done nothing wrong.”
Logan had a quick vision of the temple in Rangoon, and monks being beaten by the secret police. There would be no love lost here for those associated with that inhumane act.
They reached the top of the long, dragon-lined staircase. Logan took two seconds to pull off his socks so he wouldn’t slip, then kept moving. The others were about two-thirds of the way down, and he could see they’d taken a moment to put on their shoes. Bell’s man was carrying Elyse over his shoulder. It would have been nice if that had slowed him down, but he was moving as quickly as the others.
Daeng’s hand flew up, and he touched the Bluetooth receiver in his ear.
“They have Sein…in a van,” he said, his voice punctuated by the steps and the rhythm of his breath. “It’s waiting at the bottom.”
Bell was going to get away before they got there.
No! Logan thought. No! No! No!
He couldn’t fail again. He just couldn’t.
He increased his speed, knowing he might end up tumbling all the way down, but he didn’t care.