And then a thought got through it anyway. A possibility that shone like a search lamp in the pitch black.
He considered the idea. He thought he saw a way to test it. It would require an assumption, but not much of one: the belief that if Claire’s captors had murdered her, they would still have the body with them. That they would not have dumped it in some random place where authorities might find it. If they did still have the body, it might be wrapped up in plastic by now. It might even be buried. But it seemed plausible that they could get to it, if they had to—if he was wrong about that, then this idea wouldn’t work. There was nothing for it but to try anyway.
“You say she’s there with you,” Dryden said.
“Yes.”
“Is she right there? In the room?”
“She’s close by.”
That sounded vague. Which was good. Maybe.
“Okay,” Dryden said. “She has a birthmark behind her left ear. Just under the hairline. It has a distinct shape. Describe it to me.”
No bluff this time. The birthmark looked like a sideways teardrop, its point aimed almost straight back toward the nape of her neck.
It was a question the man could answer in seconds, if Claire was really unconscious in the same building as him. Or he could answer it within a minute, if she was dead and bundled up in dropcloth. Or five minutes, if digging was required.
But if he couldn’t answer the question by then … if he couldn’t answer it at all … it might be very good news.
“Are you there?” Dryden asked.
No response. Except for the breathing. In and out. Hissing. And speeding up.
Dryden was focused intently on that sound, and so he didn’t immediately notice when V-neck and his five men turned their attention away from him. They turned around and stared west, into the glare of the sunset. Dryden caught the movement just as the last of them pivoted. He saw them shielding their eyes against the hard light, and cocking their heads to listen for something.
Dryden heard it. The rattle of a chopper coming in, its shape still hidden in the sun glare.
An instant later there came another sound: the impact of a bullet against one of the Escalades.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
The five men around the Escalades threw themselves flat, putting the vehicles between themselves and the helicopter. V-neck turned and sprinted back toward them, diving for the ground.
Dryden pressed the button to end the phone call. Keeping his eyes on the six men, he drew back to the Ranger’s tailgate and ducked around it, using the truck as cover against both the chopper and V-neck’s guys—though he found he wasn’t very worried about the chopper.
He heard another bullet strike one of the two SUVs. One of the struts framing its windshield broke in the center and buckled inward. The windshield itself spiderwebbed and caved in around the point of impact.
By then the sound of the rotors had begun to change—the helicopter wasn’t due west anymore. It was angling south as it came in. Dryden leaned past the Ranger’s back end and caught sight of it, a quarter mile out, hugging the desert at an altitude of fifty feet above ground level. It wasn’t the FBI chopper he’d flown in. It wasn’t anything official, judging by its markings. It was a Bell 206 or some close variant, blue and white with a tail number Dryden couldn’t quite read. It was privately owned, whatever it was. A civilian aircraft.
The bay door on its side was open, and someone was sitting there, strapped in, holding a weapon. Dryden saw a muzzle flash from the end of it, and a split second later a tire blew on one of the Escalades. One of V-neck’s guys started screaming, the sound full of pain.
By now the chopper was dead south, tracking around in a tight arc that would put it directly east of the vehicles. V-neck’s guys were yelling and shouting; Dryden heard them scrambling to reposition themselves on the far side of the two SUVs, away from the chopper’s line of sight.
The aircraft reached a position maybe two hundred yards east, then tilted back and checked its forward momentum. It settled into a hover, the pilot rotating the vehicle to give the gunner in the bay a clear angle.
The rifle’s muzzle started flashing again and again, once every second or two. Dryden heard the bullets passing over him. Heard the impacts as the Escalades took hit after hit. Heard the men scream as the rounds passed all the way through the SUVs and struck their bodies, one by one. The rifle had to be .50 caliber.
On the breeze, coming from west to east, Dryden smelled tire rubber and gasoline. And gastric juices. And blood.