The Final Twist
- Автор: Дивер Джеффри
- Серия: Colter Shaw #3
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: G.P. Putnam's Sons
- ISBN: 978-0-525-53913-1
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «The Final Twist». Краткое содержание книги:
Following the enigmatic clues his father left behind, Shaw plays cat and mouse with the company’s sadistic enforcers, as he speeds from one gritty neighborhood in the City by the Bay to another. Suddenly, the job takes on a frightening urgency: Only by finding the courier bag can he expose the company and stop the murder of an entire family — slated to die in forty-eight hours.
With the help of an unexpected figure from his past, and with the enforcers closing the net, Shaw narrows in on the truth — and learns that the courier bag contains something unexpected: a secret that could only be described as catastrophic.
“You made a copy, didn’t you? Sure you did, a buttoned-up boy like you. You’re on the treasure hunt too!”
He looked around the library. “You really think people don’t know I’m here?”
Irena Braxton joined in. “No,” she said. “Nobody knows you’re here. Now, Colter.” She was condescending in both tone of voice and her use of his given name, assuming the role of a mother or schoolteacher none too pleased with a youngster’s behavior. “Stop the nonsense. Of course you made a copy. And we have your history.” A nod at the computer terminal. “You searched Amos Gahl. So, no more games. We both know what’s going on here. You’ve got some other leads. A man like you, a professional tracker after all. What do you people say? ‘Hot on the scent.’ So, tell me about those notes in your father’s book. They’re codes. We know they are.”
Actually they were gibberish. But Shaw said, “The book you stole.” Summoning faux indignity.
She offered a perplexed frown. “We can’t make heads or tails of it. We need you to decipher them. Your father writes in riddles.”
“He’s not writing anything now,” Shaw said evenly.
Irritated, Braxton said, “As you’ve been informed, his death wasn’t our intent. And the person responsible is no longer of this earth.” She crossed her arms over her broad chest.
“That doesn’t bring him back.”
“This won’t do, Colter. We’ve still got a half-dozen locations on the map to check out and you’re going to help us. Amos Gahl stole something, and we have a right to it. He was our employee. You’re aiding and abetting that crime.”
“You got me. I confess.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“Let’s call nine-one-one. I’ll give myself up.”
The headmistress smiled kindly. “Once we have it, all the rough stuff goes away. And we’re out of your life forever.”
Shaw was eyeing his opponents even more closely than the matronly Braxton was studying him.
Droon displayed the want-to-smack-it-off grin. Blond was expressionless. He had a habit of flexing his fists. He’d been a boxer. But then, noting scars, Shaw decided that since boxing wasn’t chic anymore, he’d probably be into bare-knuckle boxing or mixed martial arts. And when he killed — there was no doubt in Shaw’s mind that he was a murderer — he did so without conversation. It was a job to complete; he’d kill, collect his check and get home, turning the pits of his eyes to TV or computer porn.
The other two, the guards in the suits, were uneasy. They didn’t smack of military and had probably never seen combat. They were a threat, certainly, given their weapons, but they would be second-tier risks.
Braxton, as he’d decided before, was probably not a danger — unless that colorful purse of hers, macramé, of all things, held a Glock or Smith & Wesson.
The woman said to Droon, “We have that meeting tomorrow. I want to tell him something. Something concrete.” She nodded to Shaw.
The petite, wiry man said, “Oh, I’ll get something. He may not be in a talkative mood now. But that’s gonna change. I guarantee it.”
Braxton looked over Shaw. “Here’s what’s going to happen. We’re going down to the basement and...”
Her voice faded as Shaw rubbed his eyes, shook his head slowly. He winced.
She gazed at him with curiosity, frowning.
“Not feeling all that great.”
Droon muttered, “Why’s that our concern, son, what you’re feeling, what you aren’t?”
Shaw closed his eyes and leaned against the wall.
“What’s he doing?” one of the security men asked, the bigger one.
“Watch him,” Braxton said.
“Let’s get him downstairs,” Droon said. He looked around. “This’s gone on for too long.” A glance at Blond. “You want a piece of him?”
The man with the bleached hair and the inky eyes said nothing but gave a brief nod.
Droon said to Braxton, “My man here gets good results.”
She said to the security guards, “We’ll be down there for an hour or two. No disturbances. Open the library back up. If anyone asks what happened, tell them it was a medical emergency. Nothing more than that.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said the bigger one. “We’ll make sure.”
Staring at Shaw, Droon asked no one, “The hell is he about?”
Shaw said, “Just... light... headed. Not feeling too well.” He sagged and rubbed his eyes again.
“Jesus,” Braxton said, angry. “Is he sick?”
“What’re you doing?” Droon snapped. “What’s he doing?”
“I’m dizzy.”
Which wasn’t an answer to the question. The true response was that Colter Shaw was engaging in the art of misdirection: keeping everyone’s attention focused on his eyes, shoulders, torso, arms.
Not on his left foot.
Which was presently easing up the wall to the electrical outlet near the floor.
A paper clip protruded from one slot in the outlet, another from the second slot, millimeters apart. He had taken them from the cubicle where he’d been just before he’d run to the wall. He had no intention of pulling the alarm, which he’d figured had been disabled too. What he wanted was to get to the wall and stick the paper clips, which he’d unfolded to triple their length, into the outlet.
Droon started toward him.
Still leaning against the wall, Shaw held up his hand. “Just give me a minute...”
Frowning, Droon paused.
Shaw pressed one paper clip into the other with the upper part of his left shoe.
The resulting spark and staccato bang, impressive, were like a firecracker detonating. Instantly the library went dark.
11
Droon and the security guards dropped into a crouch, looking around, not understanding what had happened.
“Shots!” the skinny man cried and ducked.
Shaw, protected from the current by his rubber soles, sprinted to the fire door.
“Wasn’t a shot, you idiot,” Braxton raged.
Shaw had taken a gamble — that the system overriding the latching mechanism of the emergency door would deactivate when power was lost.
Before Droon and the others could recover and pursue, Shaw grabbed a chair and then slammed into the exit bar with his hip. The door crashed open. He shoved it closed and wedged the chair back against the door handle, bracing it.
A shout. Shaw believed it was “Stop him!” He knew for sure it was Braxton’s voice.
Shaw was tempted to run straight to his cycle but he kept to his original plan, turning to the right, away from the Yamaha, and sprinted full-out for the cross street. He heard a crash. It would be the fire exit door being muscled open and the chair that barred it flying into the street.
“Shaw!” Droon was shouting.
Shaw sprinted harder. At the side street, Morrison Lane, he turned to the right again.
And learned he’d made a mistake. Morrison did end at a park, but it was filled with people, who’d be in the direct path of any shots.
Then Shaw noted ahead of him an alley, on his left. He knew from the map that it would lead him to several parking garages, which he could weave through, giving him the chance to shake Droon and Blond. Shaw could then emerge and circle around to his bike — and his weapon.
Thirty yards until the alley.
Twenty, fifteen...
A glance back. No pursuers in sight yet.
Ten.
Five.
Before he got to the alley, he stopped and ducked behind a dumpster. He looked back at Droon and Blond moving in his direction. They were alone. The black-suited security people would have continued along the street on which the library was located.