Snowbound - Blake Crouch [79]
When Kalyn’s voice came over the channel, she said, “You probably just heard the front doors close.”
“No, I didn’t actually. What’s going on?”
“I stepped outside with Ethan’s whistle, called in the wolves. Figured maybe if they find our bad guys, we’ll hear them, get a sense of where they are.”
“Good deal.”
The radio went quiet.
Rachael returned. She leaned against Will and closed her eyes for a little while, then let him do the same.
Two minutes shy of midnight, Will glanced over his shoulder, saw Kalyn right where she’d been all night, sitting on the base of the freestanding hearth.
“I’m gonna go talk to her,” Will said.
“Why?”
“Something’s not right. I mean, why haven’t they come yet?”
“I don’t know.”
Will sighed. “You’ll be all right on your own for a minute?”
“I’ll be fine.”
He struggled up, legs sore, feet numb from two hours of sitting in one spot, immobile. “If you see anything, hear anything strange, radio me immediately.”
Will started down the corridor toward the lobby, and it had just crossed his mind that maybe Javier and his men weren’t coming tonight after all, that maybe they’d decided to let them sit it out until morning, until everyone was nerve-frayed and psychotic with exhaustion. Just then, the lodge rumbled and all the lights winked out.
Flashbang
SIXTY-THREE
Will froze in his tracks, Suzanne’s voice squeaking over the radio in his pocket. “What just happened?”
Kalyn responded, her voice a whisper: “They cut the power. This means they’re close, wearing night-vision goggles, and getting ready to make their move. I know it’s pitch-black at the end of those corridors, but your eyes will adjust, so everyone stay calm. You all have flashlights, and if you shine the beam in their eyes, you’ll screw up their vision for a minute or two. Now I don’t want anyone using the radio again until you’ve made visual contact.”
Will could see the lobby just ahead, lantern light flickering across the wall and the floor. He thought he heard Kalyn whispering, wondered if she was sending up prayers against whatever was coming.
Will turned around, jogged back toward the alcove, practically tripped over Rachael in the darkness.
“Just me, honey.”
“I can’t see a thing, Will.”
“Get your flashlight out.”
“I’m already holding it. Should I turn it on?”
“No, but be ready when I say. I’ll handle the shotgun. You be my light source.” Will found his radio, just a red dot in the darkness. He pressed TALK. “Suzanne and Lucy? Copy?”
Suzanne’s voice came back: “Yeah?”
“Don’t turn it on yet, but one of you operate the flashlight while the other mans the shotgun. Better than each of you fumbling with two pieces of equipment at once.”
The radio went quiet, and Rachael and Will stared at the alcove, waiting for their eyes to adjust, to begin picking out form and shape in the darkness, but they never did.
SIXTY-FOUR
Roddy hated Fidel and Javier. They’d controlled every aspect of this job. Told him where to go, how to go, talked down at him like he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing out here in the bush in his own state. This wasn’t Mexico or the Arizona borderlands. This was his block, and he resented being treated as a foot solider under their command.
Of course, he didn’t utter a word of that dissatisfaction. Didn’t venture an eye roll, display a single millisecond of outward frustration. He and Jonas had agreed: They want to run the show? Fine. Because what outranked Roddy’s frustration with Fidel and Javier was his fear. You did not fuck with Alphas. They were mythic. Doing business with them, regardless of how lucrative, entailed severe risk, since the possibility existed that things wouldn’t work out, that you might insult them or be perceived as trying to take advantage.
He thought it strange—the Alphas were here on principle, didn’t give a shit about the money, the women, said Stoke could have whatever they found. They’d spent tens of thousands to come up here just to deal with that ex-FBI agent. Stoke had warned Jonas and the boys not