Page 68 of One Minute Out

Talyssa heard the transmission from the American; she could tell from the desperate tone of his voice and the exertion that she hears along with it that he was doing his best to get to her, and she was certain she would die if he did not. Already she could see a large square that ended at the main street of the Old Town, just a few blocks below her, and the gate that led out the eastern side of the walled pedestrian-only space was just to the right on the far side. She imagined there would be a car waiting out there for her, and she’d be in it in a couple of minutes unless she did something to slow them down more until the American could arrive.

The two men who had ventured off to check out the man running a couple of blocks over were still gone, but the other six men surrounded her, and they jostled her when she tried to slow again.

She knew she needed to do something, so she tried the only thing she could think of. On her next step down, she purposefully turned her ankle and fell onto the cobblestones, shouting in pain.

“My leg!”

She spoke for Harry’s benefit, letting him know that she was trying to delay her kidnappers. She didn’t know if it would be enough, but it was all she could think of.

One of the men grabbed her, pulled her upright while shouting at her in his native tongue. She knew almost instantly he was Albanian. He then switched to English. “Walk!”

She took a step and then started to collapse again, as if she really had injured herself, but two of the men lifted her off the ground and began all but carrying her with their hands under her shoulders.

“Put me down. Let go!” she shouted, this time to let Harry know her plan had bought her a little time, as the men carrying her would be forced to move slower now, and the others surrounding her would be forced to wait for them.

•••

I hear Talyssa while I’m in midair, making the desperate kicking leap over the first of the two north-south staired passageways between me and her. I land on the roof to the west, my hands and my feet striking the tile, and then I climb up, running diagonally along the pitched surface so that I am still heading in the right direction to get to the woman, or even to get back in front of her.

A few seconds later I make the crest of the roof, then run down the other side, picking up speed, and I launch myself off again, then land again, one block over. Unless the Albanians have changed direction, they should be three stories down on the other side of the roof I’m now on, so I move more quietly. At the peak I lower to my butt and crab-walk down towards the edge, then look over the side.

A group of six men surround the Europol analyst directly below me, and they are only twenty-five yards away from entering the large square with the fountain where I first saw the police surveilling Talyssa earlier in the evening. They are moving at a reasonable pace, but I can tell the girl is making things difficult for them.

Still, they will be through the square and out the eastern gate in under two minutes at their current speed, so there’s no time for me to focus on hashing out a brilliant plan. I start to reach for my pistol but stop when I recognize it will be too dangerous for Talyssa if I fire into the group from here.

Nope, I’ve got to get my ass down on top of them, where I can take them on up close.

I see multiple sets of clotheslines on the building outside the windows on the other side of the passage, one floor down from my position. Towels and clothing hang from them, and the line is about fifteen feet long before it loops into a pulley and then doubles back, making it thirty feet in all. An idea forms quickly, and I turn and head higher on the roof, yanking on gloves as I go. I then turn around, facing the passage.

I say, “Talyssa, count silently to five, then pull away from the men and run. Scream and shout while you do it. You have to do this for me in five seconds.”

I don’t expect a response from her; I can only pray she complies.

After a quick breath to ready myself, I begin running down the roof as fast as I can, counting as I go.

I leap off the building, kicking my legs as I drop down, and I cover the entire passageway with my bound. I hear Talyssa scream below and to my left just as I crash into the clotheslines affixed to the metal bars and pulley system, running alongside two second-story windows. As I hit, both of my gloved hands grab on to a towel hanging there and the line under it and, as expected, the clothesline absorbs the majority of my momentum, but my weight causes the pulley system to snap off the wall behind me. Hanging on with both hands now, I begin swinging down, alongside the building towards the backs of the seven people dead ahead, knowing good and well there isn’t enough clothesline to get me all the way down to the stairs, and the other pulley bar is going to snap right off once I swing down and it’s forced to endure my momentum and body weight.

I’m along for the ride now, but soon I’ll be flying on my own.

I wrap the line around my right hand so I don’t fall; the towel and gloves keep it from ripping my hand to shreds, but even hanging on as tightly as I can, I feel the towel slide down, and I know I won’t be able to hang on for long.

I am making noise, the pulleys sticking out from the wall above bend and creak, and my backpack scuffs the stone wall before I swing out farther away from the building. But everyone below me is shouting as one as they lunge for their prisoner, who herself is screaming and shouting.

She doesn’t manage to get very far before they grab her, but she does manage to cause an excellent distraction.

And if these motherfuckers think she is distracting, just wait till they get a load of me.

As the line whips me down to the lowest point I unwrap my hand, still ten or twelve feet in the air and arcing through the dark, and I shoot forward with all the momentum of my long swing. Landing on the cobblestones or steps would be painful at best, but I have no plans to hit the ground.

I’m instead aiming for that cluster of people right in front of me.

I fly out of the night air towards the backs of the tight group, and I slam into them from behind like they are bowling pins. I know Talyssa is in this crowd, and I’m sure I’m knocking her stupid like the others, but when you are fighting six versus one, a little collateral damage is difficult to avoid.

Everyone falls hard, slamming into one another and then hitting the ground, bodies tumbling out into the northern edge of the square. Talyssa ends up on the bottom of the pile, but I manage to roll over it all and am propelled up to my feet beyond the rest of them. I spin back around while drawing my weapon, and I aim at the first target I see: an Albanian in a black tracksuit on his knees right in front of me.

I fire twice into his chest at eight feet, shift aim, then fire once into the face of a man still on his back ten feet beyond. The noise from the shots pounds off stone all around us. A third man, this one also up to his knees, pulls his pistol and spins towards the fire, but I shoot him twice center mass, then shift my weapon to the left to drop another man, who has risen to a crouch and is just now reaching for his waistband.

But before I can press the trigger, another shooter opens up to my left, the boom of a pistol is close, and a shower of sparks blasts off the awning of a café just behind me. Whoever is firing is the larger threat now, so I drop to one knee and aim up the east-west street where the noise is coming from, scanning for a target.

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