Page 114 of The 9th Man

Which they’d been doing for the past few minutes.

“Hear that little rattle in their snort?” Eckstein asked.

“I do,” Jillian said.

“There’s something spooking them.”

Luke focused toward the barn, but saw nothing. “An animal?”

The old man stepped back toward the open terrace doors. “They’d be squealing and stomping more.”

His senses came alert.

They all retreated inside.

Eckstein stepped to the gun rack and retrieved a shotgun. “They’re all loaded. Extra ammo is in the cabinet beneath.”

He and Jillian each grabbed a weapon and some spare shells. They already toted their Berettas. Had Talley found them? Maybe Eckstein was wrong and Rowland knew all about him.

“Could be nothing,” Eckstein said. “But secure your information, including those Love Field photos and my flash drive. You need to keep ’em safe.”

Luke gathered up his laptop, drawings, and photographs, stuffing them back into the travel bag. He slipped the flash drives into his pocket.

Eckstein had assumed a position at one of the windows.

Luke heard a familiar sound.

The deep basso tones of helicopter rotors.

Far off.

Coming closer.

“Is there a way out of here toward the north?” he asked.

“There’s a saddle that drops down to a ravine, which curves north and snakes its way to an old mining camp, the Ishawooa—”

“How far?”

“Not quite a mile. If we can get that far we might have a chance to lose ’em in the storm.”

Luke was counting on Talley not having had time to fully reconnoiter the area. Sure, Google Earth could supply some information, but that didn’t mean it was right. Maybe Talley had missed the mining camp, or considered it unimportant.

“Here it comes,” Jillian said, nodding out the window.

Over the treetops navigation lights skimmed off the valley floor, then the heavy chopper touched down a few hundred yards away.

Men emerged.

Armed.

Then Talley himself.

“I’m guessing you two have more experience with this kinda thing than I do,” Eckstein said. “What’s our play?”

“To be gone,” he said.

“Wouldn’t we be better off holding up here? Defensive position and all that?”

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