The Import, page 7
part #1 of Matthew Riker Series
Riker’s face betrayed nothing.
“How’d I do? Remember, you have to tell me. Am I right?”
“Nope,” Riker said.
The waitress brought their food a few minutes later. The Salisbury steak was passible. Riker ate fast, keeping the steak knife gripped in his left hand as he took big bites, always with one eye on the entrance.
Li picked at her chicken fingers, still clutching a crayon as tightly as Riker was holding the knife. They ate mostly in silence. When Riker finished eating, he set down his fork, but he slid the knife under the table, holding it down by his leg in case he needed it.
“So this Dobbs guy we’re going to see,” Riker said. “Does he work for a big firm?”
“No, but it’s prestigious. He takes high-profile cases. Did you see that thing on the news last year about the stockbroker accused of killing his wife?”
Riker shook his head.
“Well, that was Dobbs’ case. He figured out there was no way the guy could have done it due to a delay on his subway line that day. It was brilliant.”
“And you’re confident he can protect you?”
“If he can’t, I’m not sure who can. It’s the best option we have.”
Riker didn’t argue with that.
The bell over the entrance chimed as the door opened and a man walked in. Riker sat up a bit straighter, alarm bells going off in his head. The man was average height, but he was broad and looked solid. He wore a loose-fitting jacket. In late August, a jacket certainly wasn’t necessary for warmth. Though if you were trying to conceal something—a shoulder holster for example—it might come in handy.
The man had a hard look in his eye as he scanned the diner. When his gaze reached Riker’s table, he hesitated for just a millisecond before moving on, as if he were looking for something else. He reached into his pocket and he started walking toward their table.
Riker turned, angling his body and leaning forward so he’d be able to spring at the guy the moment he made a move. He was suddenly very glad they’d been seated at a table rather than a booth. In the booth, he would have been trapped. Here, he could jump up and lunge at the guy in one swift motion.
“Helen,” Riker said softly, not taking his eyes off the man stalking toward him. “When I move, you duck. Grab Li and run to the bathroom, got it?”
“What?” Helen stared at him in confusion.
There was no time to explain further. Riker pushed back his chair ever-so-slightly and leaned forward on the balls of his feet. He’d have to get the timing exactly right. He could see a bulge in the man’s jacket now. The hand was gripping something. Riker got ready as the man began to pull his hand out of the pocket. The hand cleared the jacket, gripping something that caught a reflection of the light.
Riker started to rise, but stopped himself at the last moment when he realized what the man was holding—a cellphone.
The man smiled as he made his way past them and to another table. He joined a woman and two kids.
Riker let out a breath and unclenched his jaw. His heart thudded loudly in his chest.
“What was that?” Helen asked.
“Nothing. False alarm.” Riker loosened his grip on the knife. It had been a long time since he’d overreacted to the presence of a stranger like that. He supposed the events of the last couple of days had reawakened something inside him, something not entirely pleasant.
“All finished?” Helen asked Li in Mandarin.
“Yes,” Li answered. She’d set down her crayon and was looking vacantly around the restaurant.
Riker reached into his pocket and pulled out a quarter. He held it in his hand a moment, tossing it gently until he was sure he had Li’s attention. Then he held the quarter between the thumb and index finger of his right hand. He brought his left hand over as if to grab the quarter. As the hand closed around the coin, he executed a French Drop, letting the quarter fall into the open palm of his right hand even as he appeared to grab it with his left. It was a simple sleight-of-hand move, but a very deceptive one.
Li’s gaze followed his empty left fist as his right hand disappeared beneath the table. He slowly opened the fist, finger by finger, revealing it was empty. Li’s eyes widened.
“How’d you do that?” she asked in Mandarin.
“Magician’s secret.” He paused. “Unless you want to become a magician too. Then I'll show you.”
She nodded eagerly.
Knowing the quarter would be too large to hide in her small hand, Riker fished a penny out of his pocket and handed it to her. He showed her how to hold it between her thumb and first two fingers, and how to release the pressure with the thumb just as the other hand started to close around the coin. The first time she tried it, the penny clattered to the table, and she looked disappointed.
“Practice,” Riker said. “It will take a long time, but you’ll eventually get it right. Think you can do that?”
She nodded solemnly and tried again.
Helen smiled. “Okay, I’m going to revise my guess at your history. Now I think you ran away from home and joined the circus. You were raised by an old magician who taught you the ways of the coin.”
Riker chuckled. “Much closer.”
“You’re going to tell me someday.”
“Okay,” Riker said. “You want to know?”
Helen leaned forward in her seat.
“I did well in school. You were right about that. But the rest you got wrong. I was accepted to Cornell on a trombone scholarship, but I studied mathematics. My junior year, the FBI recruited me. I spent the next ten years hunting serial killers. I used my math skills to create a profiling algorithm. I was a rising star until the day I encountered Randall Jeffrey Stokes, a killer who liked to burn people alive. He murdered my partner, and I went rogue. After I took him down, I retired to my family’s bee farm and vowed to never hunt a serial killer again.”
Helen stared at him for a long moment. “Liar.”
Riker grinned. “Was it the trombone scholarship that gave me away?”
“Too many details,” Helen said. “You can always tell someone’s lying when they include so many details.”
“Duly noted. My next lie will be far more vague.”
Li was still practicing the French Drop. The penny seemed large in her tiny hand, and it was obvious she wasn’t really grabbing it. But at least she wasn’t dropping it anymore. It was a start.
“If we hit the road now, we’ll be in New York in five hours,” Riker said.
“Then let’s get to it,” Helen replied.
They paid the bill and headed back to the car. As they pulled back onto the highway, Riker felt a twinge of hope. Maybe this was all going to work out after all.
It wasn’t long before all hell broke loose.
11
THE CAR WAS quiet after dinner. The hum of the highway passing beneath them put Li to sleep. Helen stared out the passenger window in silence. As the lines on the road sped past, Riker’s mind wandered back decades. His conversation with Helen had brought up memories that he rarely visited.
Long ago, Coach Kane had changed the trajectory of his life with a simple question.
Early in his freshman year of high school, Riker found himself in the office. It was the first month of school and his third time sitting in a hard plastic chair in front of the door that read Principal. His face was swollen, and blood oozed from one split lip. He wondered if he would be expelled. Leaving school didn’t seem like a big deal to him, but the thought of his father’s reaction scared him.
Then Coach Kane walked by. If he had kept walking Riker probably would have been expelled, that day or one in the not so distant future. Instead, he stopped, looking Riker up and down.
“You’re that kid that likes to fight. I’ve heard about you.”
Riker didn’t respond. He just sat with his eyes on the floor.
“How would you like to fight without getting in trouble?”
Riker’s eyes shot up to meet Coach Kane’s. The man had his full attention.
Instead of expulsion, Riker was given a suspension, and Coach Kane took him under his wing. It may have been because he wanted to help a kid that needed it, or it may have been because he’d heard Riker took on four kids at once and held his own. Kane had helped him hone his aggressive, instinctive fighting style into a formidable wrestling technique.
Riker’s life changed drastically because a middle-aged teacher took two seconds out of his day. Riker wasn’t sure whether it meant much to Ed Kane, but that little moment made had all the difference for him.
Riker snapped back from the memory when he saw a Cadillac Escalade coming up fast behind him. It weaved around a few cars. Then it slowed and took a spot in the right lane. Riker thought of the guy with the phone in the restaurant. This might just be a driver who was about to get off on an exit, but Riker would rather err on the side of caution.
He sped up and passed a few cars. In the rearview mirror, he watched the SUV match his pace but keep its distance. He gradually slowed down and eased into the right lane. Cars passed him, but the SUV stayed back. That confirmed it—they were being followed.
Riker couldn’t believe it. Somehow the men had found them again. He looked at Helen and then down at the purse at her feet. They had placed a tracker on her. It was the only explanation that he could think of. There was no other way they could have found them on the highway in a random car.
“Is Li secured well?” Riker asked Helen.
“What? She’s in her car seat, so yes. But why?”
“Do you see the headlights four cars back? They are following us.”
Helen turned her head and looked back. “I doubt that. There is no way they could have found us. I powered down my phone and haven’t turned it on since the house.”
“There is a tracker on you or something you are carrying. First I’m going to lose these guys then we will ditch your things and get you to safety.”
“How are you going to ditch them if they can track us?”
“I’ve got an idea, but it will be a little bumpy.”
Riker drove at a steady speed until he saw an exit that he liked. The sign indicated a truck stop and nothing else. He sped up and watched the other car keep pace. At the last moment, he took the exit and went down the ramp as fast as he could. The Escalade took the ramp, but when they reached the bottom, the top-heavy vehicle had to take it slow.
Riker turned left and floored it past the gas station. The road was lined with cornfields on either side. There were no lights other than the beams cast by the car. He could see the Escalade coming up behind them. Riker got the old car up to ninety miles an hour. The interior rattled and the engine roared, but he needed the Escalade to have a lot of momentum for his plan to work.
Riker stayed in his lane as the SUV started to come around on their left. A street sign up ahead indicated an intersection. The Escalade’s passenger window slid down and the barrel of an assault rifle poked out. Riker waited as long as he dared.
“Hold on!” he shouted at Helen, and he slammed on the brakes.
The car skidded and he pumped the brakes, fighting to keep it on the road. The Cutlass threatened to spin out of control, but Riker kept it straight as his seatbelt bit into his chest. The Escalade hit their brakes and Riker saw the passenger shoot forward. The gun flew out of his hand and hit the inside of the windshield. Helen placed one hand on the dashboard and held the grab-handle with the other. Riker turned hard right when they reached the crossroad.
The car drifted, and for a moment Riker thought that he had taken the turn too fast. Their tires squealed and the car slid toward the shoulder. Just before the car hit the dirt, the tires gripped. Riker smashed the pedal to the floor, took one last look at the road in front of him, and turned off the lights.
Under the light of the moon, Riker could see a silhouette of the road. He hoped the grid structure of straight lines in the field would continue. If there was a sudden turn, he would not have time to react to it. He kept glancing back, watching for the glow of the SUV headlights.
Riker saw a break in the corn and slammed on the brakes. A slim, dirt access road led between two sections of the field. He threw the car into reverse and backed into it, rolling along the dirt until the car was hidden behind rows of corn. He put the car in drive and kept the engine running.
“Should we get out?” Helen asked.
“No. Stay put.”
Riker rolled down his window. The sound of the large Cadillac engine roared as it approached. Riker could hear the gears shift as the vehicle accelerated. The headlights grew brighter and brighter as they came down the road.
Riker’s heart pounded, and he waited with his foot floating over the accelerator. This was a game of milliseconds, and he needed his timing to be perfect. He had to judge the distance and speed of the SUV by the sound of the engine and the brightness of the lights.
Just before the Escalade was in view, he slammed his foot down on the gas. The car lurched forward out toward the road. The front of the SUV flew by, and adrenaline surged in his body before the moment of impact. For a moment, Riker thought he was going to miss his target, but then the crunch of metal filled his ears. In his peripheral, he saw Helen’s head whip forward. Her hair danced past the front of her face.
The Cutlass clipped the back panel of the Escalade, and the SUV’s back end slid on impact. The vehicle tilted, and its driver’s side wheels left the pavement. The world seemed to move in slow motion. Riker hoped to see the SUV tip and then tumble down the road. Instead, the driver managed to keep it from flipping, but there was no way to keep it on the road.
The SUV hit the small drainage ditch on the far side of the pavement. It went down two feet and then back up, hitting at an angle. A smaller car would have crashed the bumper into the far side of the ditch, but they had enough clearance to avoid the impact. They were going fast enough to send the Escalade two feet into the air when it came out of the ditch. The SUV bucked up and down in the rutted cornfield, spraying dirt and crops into the air. It came to a stop fifty yards into the field.
For a moment that seemed to last forever, everything was still. Li whimpered in the back seat, a sound that soon grew into a full-on sob. Helen shook her head to clear it and unbuckled her seat belt. She jumped into the backseat to check on the child.
Riker flipped on the headlights. The light on the driver’s side stayed dark, but the other still functioned. Riker could see some bent metal, but the hood wasn’t buckled. The engine was still purring. It had been protected by old fashioned American steel.
The SUV didn’t move. Smoke rose from the large vehicle’s hood.
“Is Li okay?” Riker asked.
“I don’t know. She’s not bleeding, and her seat looks intact. I don’t see any injuries.”
Riker took a deep breath and tried to put the sobbing child out of his mind for the moment. “We’ve got to keep moving. Stay back there with Li.”
Riker shifted the car into reverse. It let out a high-pitched squeal the moment his foot touched the accelerator.
“Shit!” Riker hopped out and ran to look at the front of the car. One side of the bumper hung down, touching the pavement. A piece of bent siding was pressed against one of the tires. He grabbed it and pulled as hard as he could, but the metal didn’t give.
A noise came from the direction of the other car. Riker looked over and saw one of the men stumble out of the passenger side. He looked at Riker and fumbled for his gun. Riker ducked behind the Cutlass just as a shot rang out.
The SUV started to move slowly. The passenger side door was still open and the shooter climbed back into the moving vehicle.
Riker jumped back behind the wheel and stepped on the gas, this time ignoring the horrible sound of metal scraping asphalt. The car pulled hard to the right and smoke rose from the wheel.
Helen watched out the back window as the SUV pulled out of the ditch and onto the road. “They’re still coming.”
“I know. This is going to get messy.”
12
RIKER GRIPPED THE WHEEL HARD, angry at his own stupidity. All of this could have been avoided. The men had found Helen and Li. Twice. They’d found them leaving the fair. They’d found them at the motel. And still Riker had just assumed the men were tracking them via Helen’s phone.
The truth was, the tracker could be anywhere. If only he’d taken the time to stop and locate it definitively before hitting the road. Instead, he’d run like an idiot just hoping they wouldn’t find him.
The last six years had made him dull. Granted, he could still win a fight—at least against guys with no real training. That had been ingrained in him by everyone from Coach Kane to Captain Morrison and three dozen people in between. His evasion skills were another story. He’d grown too comfortable. He was like his bees when he tended them, their senses dulled by the smoke to the point where they gorged themselves on honey rather than attacking the giant creature messing with their hive.
“What are we going to do?” Helen asked. The panic was clear in her voice. It was understandable, but it was doing nothing to help the situation.
“For the moment, we’re going to concentrate on staying on the road.”
The car pulled hard to the right, fighting Riker every foot of the way down the state highway. To his left, the interstate ran parallel to this road. There was an onramp up ahead. He glanced down at the speedometer and saw he was going forty-eight miles-per-hour. Between the smoke pouring from the engine and the way the metal was rubbing against the tire, he wasn’t sure he could push it much higher than that.
He glanced in the rearview and saw approaching headlights.
