Capital Crimes

58

KINNEY LOOKED AT HIS WATCH, then pressed the button on his cell phone.

“Yeah?” the team leader said.

“Go,” he said, and he waved his half of the SWAT team forward. They were all ru

INSIDE THE BEDROOM CUPBOARD, more than a dozen blips were converging on the cottage. Ted had already tiptoed out of the bedroom with the duffel, grabbed his parka, and was moving slowly down the stairs to the basement. He was pretty sure they couldn’t hear him down here. He got into his warm clothes, went to a large cupboard against the west wall, took hold of it and shifted it away from the wall a couple of feet. Behind the cupboard was a heavy wooden door. He pushed it open and tossed his duffel through the opening, then he backed through the opening on his knees, and reached out and dragged the cupboard back against the wall, hiding the door. He shut the thick door and double-bolted it from the inside, then he turned around in the tu

THE SWAT TEAM had the doors open in a few seconds, and the black-clad men, wearing night-vision goggles, moved through the house, searching each room, each closet, each cupboard. “Okay,” the team leader shouted, “goggles off, lights on!”

People began switching on the house lights in each room.

Ki

The team leader came out of the bedroom. “He’s not here,” he said, “but come look at this.”

Ki

“Basement door!” somebody shouted from the hall.

“Go get him!” Ki

Ki

“Wait a minute!” Ki

TED COULD SEE the tu

He reached another door, opened it, and slipped through into the concrete culvert. Closing and bolting the door behind him, he began to move down the culvert, which was larger in diameter than his tu

He looked up, checked the stars, and began jogging overland, keeping roughly parallel to the road.

He had, maybe, three-quarters of a mile to go, about twelve minutes. He paced himself, breathing deeply. Five minutes later he was loosening clothing to cool down.

“WHAT?” the SWAT team leader asked.

“Is anything in this basement movable, except that cupboard?” Ki

“No, sir, I don’t think so,” the man replied.

“Have a couple of your men move it away from the wall,” Ki

The leader made a motion, and two large men got hold of the cupboard and moved it out.

“There,” Ki

The two men tried and failed to open it.

“Use a door charge,” Ki

“Do it,” the team leader said to his men. “Everybody upstairs. The concussion will kill your ears in this basement.”

Everybody clambered up the stairs. The last man up held a remote control in his hand. He closed the door behind him.

“Blow it,” the leader said. Everybody stepped back.

The man pressed a button, and the door flew off its hinges into the hallway, followed by noise.

The team leader was first down the stairs, with Ki

The team leader shone his light past the splintered door. “We’ve got a tu

Ki

“We’ve got another door,” the leader hollered. “Hold up!” He tried the door. “It’s like the other one. We’re going to have to blow it. Everybody out of the tu

There was barely enough room to turn around, but gradually, the tu

Ki

Everybody stood in the front yard and looked around.

“The beach,” Smith said. “That’s where I’d have it come out.”

“Everybody to the beach,” Ki

“There’s a culvert,” Smith said, shining his light on it. “A good-sized one.”

“Everybody shut up,” Ki

“They blew the door,” Smith said. “The tu

Ki

TED CUT ACROSS the road past a farmhouse and ran toward the airstrip. Finally, he had to walk, for fear of having a heart attack; he was fit, but he had just run three-quarters of a mile, carrying a heavy bag. He made the airplane, unlocked it, and tossed his bag into the passenger seat, then released the tiedown ropes. No time for a preflight; he climbed in and started flipping switches. He primed the engine, then turned the key to the starter position. The prop began to swing, and a moment later, the engine caught and started. There was no wind to speak of, so Ted knew he could use either end of the runway.

He started taxiing, then put in twenty degrees of flaps. He stopped at the end of the runway, ran the engine up to full power, paused a moment to make sure it was going to keep ru

KINNEY RAN for a few hundred yards, then turned back. He met Kerry Smith back at the culvert.

“Hey!” a voice shouted from a distance. “Over here!”

It came from the other side of the house.

Ki

“The culvert ended here,” he said.

“Where is the guy going to go?” Ki