over and saw the wound in the center of his chest. His eyes were open and fixed. Pine reached down and closed them. “Damn. I’m…sorry, Max.”
“Pine!”
She looked back to see Laredo running up to her. She got to her feet. “Wallis is dead. Straub shot him. He’s got Jenny. Come on!”
They raced after Straub.
Chapter 74
DESPITE RUNNING THROUGH A CEMETERY with wide, open spaces, Straub had managed to completely disappear somehow.
With Jenny.
Pine and Laredo raced around the corner of the outbuilding and quickly scanned the surrounding area. They saw no one.
“Do you think Jenny is still alive?”
“Yes.”
“How can you be sure?”
“He took her with him. He wouldn’t do that if she was dead.”
“That makes sense.”
“You go right, I’ll go left,” barked Pine.
Laredo nodded and sprinted off to the right.
Pine raced ahead for about fifty yards and stopped. How could he have just vanished?
Then the answer hit her. He had an escape plan in place. Just in case.
But what plan would that be?
She looked down at her feet, suddenly remembering something she had been told about this place.
Escape tunnels dug by Union soldiers.
She ran to the spot that the park ranger had shown her on her first visit here.
The steel grate had been forced open. She looked around for Laredo but didn’t see him. She called him on her phone and told him what she was about to do. He was clear on the other side of the park. She would have to do this alone.
Pine clipped a Maglite on the rail of her Glock and climbed down into the hole.
She landed on her feet and stumbled a bit. The tunnel was a good six feet under the surface. It was about twenty degrees cooler down here. Righting herself she moved forward, her hearing acutely tuned to anything up ahead of her. She headed down the tunnel, slowly at first, but then picked up her pace when she heard the sounds of a girl cry out.
Jenny. She had regained consciousness.
Pine chugged along, her light making slashing moves in the darkness. She didn’t know if Straub would be waiting to ambush her. She eventually saw the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. Pine was cautiously approaching the exit when she heard a voice.
“Let me go!”
That was Jenny.
She rushed forward and saw a rough set of bricks wedged into the dirt. Pine slipped up them and peered out, her gun making arcs in front of her. She took a moment to get her bearings.
She was in a small clearing in the woods. Pine heard a sound to her left.
She glimpsed a figure skirting through the trees, and she ran that way, reaching a path that wended through the woods.
“Straub!”
The figure stopped and turned.
Straub put Jenny down on the ground and squatted down, using her as a shield. The girl was dressed in the mannequin’s outfit.
“Let me go,” she cried out again.
He put the gun against her head, and Jenny froze.
Straub looked at Pine, who was aiming at him with her Glock.
“Stand down, Agent Pine,” said Straub calmly. “I need to get away and you need the little girl. I think we can work something out. I assume you have experience in this sort of thing.”
“Pretty recent, actually,” she replied grimly.
“I’ve got another car nearby. You let me go and you have my word that I’ll leave the girl safe and sound somewhere and call you with directions to her.”
“You want me to take the word of a man who’s killed five people?”
“You’re wrong there. I didn’t do the boy, Britta did.”
“Bullshit.”
“That little lady has a dark side, Pine, that maybe you missed. I told her how to do it, though.” He tapped the back of his neck. “You hit the base of the spine here, it’s lights out.”
“And where did you learn to do that?”
“Spent some time in the Army. They teach you shit. I never used it against a kid, though.”
Pine looked at Jenny. The girl was clearly scared, but she had shown her feistiness.
“Why would Britta want to kill Frankie?”
“She said it was her duty. And she seemed to think she was doing the kid a favor. But don’t expect me to explain the woman. So do we have a deal?”
“Not a chance.”
With more urgency, Straub said, “Well, that’s unfortunate. The way I see it, if you don’t let me go, she’s dead. If you do let me go, she has a chance. Sounds fair to me.”
“You’re not leaving here with Jenny.”
Straub’s features turned ugly.
“Use your brain. I’ve got nothing