Page 110 of The House of Cross

“Can I show you?” I said. “You’ll see it in the camera if they’ll let me turn.”

Another hesitation. “Hands clasped behind you when you do, or Sarah will shoot you in the back. You have no pride, no sense of honor, do you, Sarah?”

“None,” the woman said, staring at us with an expression that was colder than the swirling snow.

I put my hands behind my back, turned, took a step, and crouched, trying to aim the front of the helmet at the lower limbs of the tree. Nothing happened for five and then ten seconds.

“You’re boring me, Dr. Cross. Bean, Sarah, when he stands up, kill them one by—”

The green light flashed in the low limbs.

“There,” I said. “You could not have missed that.”

I caught a strain in his voice when he replied, “What is it?”

“A Jiobit. Tells moms and dads where their kids are. Transmits a GPS signal to any satellite on earth.”

“And yet I told you we jam all GPS frequencies in the area.”

“Except for ten seconds every twelve hours when your generators are switching over.”

There was an even longer pause before Malcomb laughed. “Touché, but ultimately, it’s unlikely that the signal was broadcast and received during those ten-second gaps. Stand up, Dr. Cross. Turn and face the end of our story together.”

I straightened slowly, turned, and stepped over to Bree. I held out my gloved hand and she took it.

“I love you,” she said, looking terrified.

“I’ve always loved you,” I said.

“Oh, please. Sarah? Bean? Finish them and then we’ll go to extreme measures. And destroy that device. Sarah, you will shoot first.”

“Extreme measures?” Sarah said.

Bean said, “That necessary, M?”

“You heard the man. A ten-second signal every twelve hours. We can’t take the chance.”

“Roger that,” Bean said. He stepped toward us.

Sarah did the same.

Bean said, “For my mates you killed, Cross.”

“And mine,” Sarah said, shifting her aim to Bree and hurling me into a panic.

CHAPTER 85

TWO FLAT REPORTS. TWOflashes to our right.

The shots caught Sarah between the eyes, blew out the back of her head and helmet, and dropped the former Mossad operator in her tracks.

Bean spun with his rifle toward where the flashes had come from. I tackled Bree and we landed in a snowdrift.

I looked up just in time to see Bean open fire; his bullets whizzed and cracked past us and then the SAS man’s body was riddled with a volley of return shots. He arched and crumpled into the snow amid the rising chaos.

Two of the four operators who’d come into the clearing to back up Bean and Sarah started firing. The other two spun around and made for the trees as Malcomb started yelling in thehelmet radio: “Extreme measures, Maestro! Repeat, extreme measures in place!”

More shots erupted from our right. One of the gunmen dropped. His partner ran for the woods, bullets slashing the snow at his heels, then vanished.

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