Страница 79 из 96
Utter blackness crashed across them.
What the—?
One of the MPs echoed him aloud.
Logan didn't even stop to think. He got the first one with a boot to the jaw. The man crumpled with an audible grunt. His inert body fell against the second man, who lurched off balance. Logan swung manacled arms in tandem and co
For a moment, Logan stood breathing softly in the darkness. Neither MP moved. He used his teeth to tug off mittens while he listened. Collins was unbelievably silent out there, but one helluva thunderstorm seemed to be brewing.
Logan blinked, distracted for a moment from the business at hand.
Thunderstorm?
In the middle of winter?
Collins' voice came from the side of the truck. Apparently, he hadn't moved so much as a toe during the brief fight.
"McKee? I know you took out those two fools."
Logan stooped cautiously, felt for and retrieved both rifles. They were loaded and ready to fire, with a round in each chamber. The soft snick of the magazines snapping back into place broke the brief silence.
Collins continued, still without moving. "That means you've got two rifles to my pistol. Think about it a minute, McKee. If I'd wanted you dead, I'd have shot you from out here and had those two toss your body into a ravine."
"What game are you playing, Collins?" Logan yelled. Then he stepped softly and swiftly three feet to one side, while bringing up the muzzle of the rifle to ready position, but Collins didn't shoot through the thin wall of the truck. Didn't, in fact, move at all.
"No games, McKee." The colonel's voice suddenly sounded weary beyond belief. "It's not your fault you stumbled into this mess. I'm risking lives that aren't mine to risk just to try and get you out of it again in one piece. And—maybe you can help."
Huh? "Oh, really? Is that why you and your doctor pal went through that little Mengele charade back on base? Piss off, Collins."
"Dammit, McKee! I'm trying to save your life! I know you aren't stupid! If I'd shown up the way you did on a top-secret post you were in charge of, what would you have done?"
He had a point there.
"We don't have much time, McKee. If you make a break for it from here, alone, Carreras will hunt you down and butcher you. But if you work with me, I'll do everything in my power to help you get safely clear. No more hospitals, no more lockups—and no Carreras."
Footsteps slowly approached the open tailgate, crunching softly in the snow. Logan stepped into an attack posture just inside the opening, ready to fire. A glow of light sprang up, revealing the resurrection of the flashlight. Collins stepped cautiously around the corner, pistol held harmlessly overhead. He'd pointed the flashlight at the sky, too. Collins' face inside the parka trim was waxy pale, full of stark blue shadows.
"Truce?" Collins offered.
For a moment they stared at one another. Lightning flared, insanely. A beauty of an electrical storm raged overhead. Deeply etched strain in Collins' face told Logan he hadn't told the whole truth yet.
Logan asked softly, "You got the keys to these things?"
Collins' glance traveled to the manacles locked around Logan's wrists. "The manacles? Yes—"
Logan kicked him in the temple. The colonel crumpled. Collins slid soundlessly into a dirty snowdrift. Logan landed beside him and glanced hastily under the truck to be sure no others were lurking out of sight. All clear. Rising swiftly from a crouch, Logan retrieved the colonel's Beretta and the other rifle. He then searched Collins' pockets for the manacle keys.
Ahh... Freedom felt wonderful. Even better than he'd expected, considering his grim thoughts on the way out here. Logan rubbed his wrists and blew on his fingers to warm them, then confiscated Collins' leather gloves and locked Collins' arms behind him. Once his aching hands had unfrozen, Logan relieved the unconscious MPs of assorted knives and small-caliber handguns, then locked his erstwhile guards into the back of the truck.
By the time he'd appropriated the colonel's holster and belt, fastened them around his own hips, and distributed the confiscated weapons into various pockets and pouches, the colonel was begi
Logan squatted comfortably and rolled the colonel onto his back. Collins blinked groggily. A thin trickle of blood had frozen to the side of his face. His lips worked to form a question. "Going to... shoot me now?"
Logan held silent for a moment and studied Collins' face. He saw no overt fear, but a crushing weight of despair had settled over the man's features.
"I want to know what's going on."
"It's a long story—"
"I've got time."
The colonel's eyes were haunted by an inexplicable terror. "No, you don't! Not on this side, anyway. And Carreras is waiting, damn him... ." His voice shook. Logan began to wonder if that kick to the head hadn't addled the man's brains. Collins added desperately, "He's got hostages, McKee. If I blow this, they die, too."
The other lives he had mentioned? "Whoa, Collins. Slow down. Start over."
The colonel squeezed shut his eyes, then drew a long, unsteady breath and released it slowly. "You're never going to believe this. Never."
"Try me."
Collins met his gaze squarely. "I'm the military liaison for a research project involving some very funky physics, Captain. I have a team of physicists here on base, mostly civilian. We're out here because this place is isolated. Some of the side effects of our research are pretty disruptive." He gestured with his nose toward the sky. Logan glanced up at the underbelly of a massive thunderstorm. Thick black clouds had come boiling down the mountainside. Phenomenal bolts and columns of lightning crawled out of the clouds in every direction.
The lightning was pink.
Logan's scalp crawled.
"It's effin' time travel. Isn't it?" he muttered.
"Yes. It is." The uninflected response sent a shiver down his spine.
He remembered vividly the disorienting drop through endless mist... .
Collins' voice reached through Logan's momentary disorientation. "It's still experimental. And it's dangerous, in unconventional ways. I mean ways other than the old question of paradox—can you change the future by altering the past. The very physics involved is potentially—" He stopped in the middle of the sentence. He closed his eyes and whispered, "We don't know yet the full range of side effects, but one of them is the backlash. Slippage." Collins finally opened his eyes again. "That's what you got caught in, McKee. When someone opened a portal near you, it caused... cracks. You fell through one." He shivered and added hoarsely, "You're the only one we know about."
"You mean there might be more? Christ, Collins, why are you ru
Collins' face looked ghastly in a glare of hellish pink lightning, all taut lines and purple-blue hollows. "We're not."
A chill which had nothing to do with the air temperature gripped Logan. The pieces began form more coherent patterns. "The Hispanic..."
"Carreras. Miami mafia."
"What? Whoa, fella, you gotta be kidding."
"Do I look like I'm kidding?"
He didn't. Logan had rarely seen a grown man in the grip of such profound terror. The hollows under—and behind—his eyes deepened. "Someone on my staff is into debt with them. Big time debt. I haven't found out who, not yet. Somebody's relative, maybe, or lover, or simply a customer without enough cash. Somebody leaked it, showed them enough proof from our first trial runs to convince them. They've got Sue Firelli's daughter, Janet. She's twenty, brilliant career ahead of her. Zachariah Hughes' grandson is only twelve. And..." His voice faltered. "They've got my wife and son, too, McKee. Neat, clean, quick. And quiet. Not even my best friends have figured out what's wrong."