14
The pick-up truck and sedan stopped outside Union Station at the north end of Seventeenth Street in Downtown Denver. The big sign on the building – ‘Travel By Train’ – loomed above them.
It was close to four in the morning.
The driver of the truck got out and walked across the road. He looked down the street, three blocks from the diner at the corner of Market Street where Raines was going to meet Matt Horn. There was little traffic on the streets and the air was cool on his skin.
The man went to the sedan where the driver’s window slid down silently.
‘So?’ the driver of the sedan asked the other man.
‘He said we wait.’
‘Then what?’
‘He’ll call when it’s time. When he’s about to move.’
The sedan driver nodded, looking past the other man and down the street to the diner.
‘After that we go in shooting?’
The pick-up driver nodded. ‘Everyone is a target.’
‘Just the way it should be.’
‘Okay, we can’t wait here. It’s too close to the diner. The Feds will be scoping the place out and probably holing up somewhere nearby.’
The sedan driver nodded.
‘Let’s park up somewhere else. Not too far. We need to be close when it goes off.’
The pick-up driver went back to his vehicle and got inside. He grabbed a baseball cap from the floor and pulled it on.
‘Let’s go find somewhere to hang. Get some sleep,’ he said.
His passenger looked at him solemnly.
‘What?’ the driver asked.
‘We’re really doing this? I mean, we could get out of this now. Before, you know …’
‘Chain of command. And we never leave a man behind.’
‘We’re not at war.’
‘Yeah, we are.’
15
Irvine’s thigh muscles started to shake from the effort of holding her position at the door. She eased back up and shook her legs to loosen the muscles.
‘You’re doing fine,’ Armstrong told her from the floor.
She looked down at him. He looked alert. Kind of.
‘You okay?’ she asked.
He held his injured hand up, dripping blood on to the carpet.
‘Right,’ Irvine said. ‘Sorry.’
Armstrong smiled. Or, at least, that’s what it looked like he was trying to achieve.
Irvine whipped her head around at the sound of more movement down the hall. Four shots sounded in quick succession, blasting through the door frame. Irvine threw a hand up to shield her eyes from the splinters.
Butler made his move.
Irvine heard the sound of his feet running. Coming at her.
She stepped into the doorway and swung the bat high. She knew from his army records that Butler was around six feet tall.
Her aim was good. The timing a little off.
Butler was almost past the door when Irvine completed her swing. The tip of the bat caught him on the ear and sent him thumping into the opposite wall. He stayed on his feet, dazed, and swung the gun round at Irvine.
She ducked and fell into the room as the wall where she had been standing evaporated, showering her and Armstrong in dust.
She threw the baseball bat full force out into the hallway.
Butler put a protective arm up in front of his face and fired again into the doorway.
Irvine closed her eyes and felt the snap of the bullets as they passed through the air beside her head, thinking: Now he’s got us.
The sound of the gunfire stopped.
Irvine heard Butler’s footsteps as he ran down the stairs and outside. A gunshot sounded and the woman’s screaming stopped. Other people shouted and screamed.
Irvine grabbed her mobile from the floor and went to the window in time to see Butler get into a car and drive off, the tyres screeching as he floored the accelerator.
This time she was sure she heard sirens.