The Ties That Bind. Cliff Ryder

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СКАЧАТЬ me,” he said, turning away to begin resealing the crates.

      She sighed and stomped out of the room. Not long after, he heard the sound of her pulling up on one of the machines. The engine cut out and he called to her, “Come in and lend me a hand.”

      Tina came back into the building. “Now what?”

      “Now we load the crates onto the trailers and haul this stuff to the coast.”

      “Are you crazy?” she half yelled. “You’re going to steal from the smugglers?”

      “No,” he said, “I’m going to return their merchandise. The rifles are Russian. The rocket launchers are probably black market, sold out of Vietnam or somewhere else in Southeast Asia. It’s only fair that I put them back into the sea, where they can make their way home.”

      “Let’s just go,” she said. “Let the authorities deal with it.”

      “Help me or not,” he said, his voice turning cold. “If this is a drop point, then these weapons will eventually wind up in the United States and that puts a lot of people at risk. I won’t allow that to happen.”

      For a long moment, it looked as if she was going to argue, ask questions or put up a fight, but then she sighed and kept whatever was on her mind to herself. Jason suspected he’d be hearing more about it later.

      Without another word, she moved to the end of one of the crates and together, they quickly loaded the trailer. Once all the crates had been loaded, he checked the other buildings to make sure there wasn’t anything else left behind.

      “All right,” he said. “Now, I want you to drive that machine down to the coast and wait for me there. Just give me a bearing. I’m going to make sure our dead friends here aren’t left out for scavengers.”

      She shuddered dramatically. “I’d rather not know. Just head due east for two miles, then bear north. You’ll find the coast without a problem. I’ll look for you.”

      “Good enough,” he said. “Now get going. We don’t have much light left and I want to find shelter before dark.”

      She nodded once, then left. Jason got to work, dragging the bodies into the abandoned Inuit building and covering them as best he could. The door was long since gone, but with the cold and their winter gear, they might not give off a scent that would attract predators—at least for a little while. Once he was done with that, he returned to his own ATV and headed for the coast.

      His mind worked at the situation rapidly. Obviously, Tina knew more about the smuggling going on in the area than she’d read in some newspaper article. Just as obvious was the fact that if these smugglers could get large crates of weapons into this area from Russia, they’d have no problem at all importing other weapons, too. Like bombs.

      If a terrorist group decided to infiltrate using this method, there’d be little to no chance of knowing it before it was too late. His mission parameters had suddenly expanded. Now he had to find the sub…and also figure out a way to stop the smuggling operation. He’d have to get word to Denny about what he’d discovered as soon as possible.

      Tina had said there were no phones up here, but Jason had a satellite phone and other advanced communications equipment in his gear. At the first opportunity, he’d check in with Denny and Room 59 and find out what they wanted him to do. Surely they would recognize the additional threat and move to put a stop to it.

      He clocked the distance and it wasn’t long until he found the tracks from Tina’s vehicle. There was no way to wipe them out…and if the smugglers wanted vengeance, it was only a matter of time until they found out which direction they’d gone. He could be in for the fight of his life.

      What was he truly fighting for? he suddenly wondered.

      He shook his head, plagued again by questions that he’d never seriously considered before. None of these questions mattered. Not right now. Right now, he had a mission to accomplish. Everything else was secondary to that.

      In the far distance, he saw Tina waving her arms at him. They had a long way to go before they’d reach the village she’d shown him on the map, and already the evening darkness was closing in.

      5

      Jason pulled up alongside Tina at the edge of the village. He could see the shapes of houses and they moved into the village. They had arrived well after dark and the cold was beginning to seep through the layers of clothing and give his skin that vague itching-burning sensation that came with freezing temperatures. Tina hadn’t spoken a single word since they met back up along the trail and argued about her not listening to his instructions. He supposed he should have expected it.

      She had gotten rid of most of the weapons, but had kept one crate containing a variety of the arms they had found. She said she wanted to be able to prove to the authorities that what they were saying was real. Jason had been furious, but understood why she hadn’t listened. In truth, he didn’t plan on dealing with the local authorities at all, but now he’d probably have to. Either way, ever since then, there’d been nothing but silence between them. The quiet was more worrisome than the millions of questions that he knew must be rattling around in her head.

      Tina pulled her ATV to a stop next to a large cabin, gesturing vaguely for him to follow as she climbed off her machine and headed up the steps of the cabin. Shutting his own machine down, Jason stood and stretched, considering the load of weapons that they were carrying. They had covered them with a tarp, but he felt uneasy about leaving them out in the open. Anyone might happen along, get curious and find themselves armed with a Russian assault rifle.

      Tina ran back down the steps.

      “Leave them,” she said, her voice almost as cold as the air around them. “No one is going to bother anything out here, and unless you want to freeze I suggest you get inside.”

      “Isn’t there anywhere safer we can store them?” he asked as the wind began to pick up speed with surprising force.

      “It’s not like we just pulled into New York with a U-Store-It around every damn corner!” she yelled over the howling winds. “If you want to babysit a crate, you’re more than welcome. I’m going inside.”

      She climbed the stairs again. Jason didn’t hesitate this time. He was only half a step behind her as she pushed open the cabin door. He turned as the wind ripped the door out of Tina’s hand and slammed it against the wall. Reaching past her, he grabbed it and leaned his weight against it, pushing it shut. The sudden silence was almost as eerie as the sudden onslaught of wind had been.

      “I thought the weather didn’t start getting dangerous for another month or so,” he said. “Where did that come from?”

      His guide laughed harshly. “Why did you think you were wearing all that gear? In case the weather got bad in another month?” She sighed, then said, “Those winds can come off the ocean any time of the year, especially as the season changes and the jet stream along with it. They’ll freeze an unprotected person to death in very short order, but they are fairly rare this time of year.”

      Tina looked thoroughly disgruntled. She pulled the cap from her head and crossed to the fire that was already burning in the fireplace, careful not to stand too close and cause her hands to ache more than they must have been already. She must have arranged for the cabin in advance; the fire had obviously been going for a while, as a nice pile СКАЧАТЬ