Page 138 of Tom Clancy Line of Sight

He held his pistol in front of him as he descended, pointing down toward the bottom of the stairs. The musty smell grew. The stairs were still lit by the light from behind him. He was a backlit target here.

Jack moved quickly, sighting his weapon into the muddy black of the rest of the basement where Aida was. He wished he had night-vision goggles or a high-powered tactical flashlight.

He reached the bottom of the stairs, the foundation wall just a few feet in front of him.

He could barely make out another wall on his right, six feet away. He dashed over to it.

No, not a wall, exactly. More like shelving. In the dim light, he saw cases of American MREs, folded Bundeswehr camouflage uniforms, canned food, bottled water.

Jack felt his way along the shelf wall, listening intently. He heard nothing but the far distant music, and felt a faint, cool breath of earthy air brushing against his skin.

He reached the end of the shelving wall and found a doorway. He knelt down.

Aida was on the other side, her pistol pointed at the opening, ready to blow his head off.

From his crouching position, he reached his pistol around the corner and fired his last five shots, emptying the mag. His ears ached from the explosions stabbing his unprotected eardrums like ice picks.

The slide of the empty pistol locked open. Jack pulled the weapon back around, dropped the empty mag, slammed home his last full one, and racked the slide shut, chambering a round in just under two seconds. He’d done it enough times in training with his eyes closed and Clark firing a pistol next to his face that it was as natural a movement as breathing.

He listened again through his ringing ears.

Nothing.

She was either dead or one cool customer.

He didn’t really care which.

Alive was good, because she would have valuable intel.

But dead would feel a helluva lot better.

Jack turned the corner with his weapon up, ready to shoot.

She was gone.

66

Aida was gone, all right.

Right down the damn hole in the ground. A square steel trapdoor lay open. The cool air that brushed against him earlier was now almost a breeze. It smelled like wet dirt and wood. A tunnel. Lit from down below.

There was a wooden ladder, but Jack skipped it and made the five-and-half-foot drop, his gun at high ready. He thumped onto the hard-packed dirt, his boots nearly stepping on another packet of money that must have fallen out of whatever Aida was lugging around. He crouched to avoid the low timber ceiling and the naked bulb hanging by a wire just above his head. The walls were lumber, too. It reminded him of the Tunnel of Hope near the airport that Aida had shown him before.

He was glad for the lightbulb over his head. He hated the idea of running down here in the dark. Three shots rang out from the black void ahead. Wood splintered by Jack’s head.

He swore bitterly.

Idiot!

The damn light only made him an easy target.

He smashed the bulb with his pistol before leaping for the dirt. He heard dull footfalls far up ahead.

Jack jumped to his feet and charged forward, still crouching to keep from knocking himself out on the timbered ceiling. There was no more light in the tunnel, and the crunching glass beneath his feet told him that Aida had been smashing bulbs as she ran. He’d HALO’d out of airplanes on moonless nights without batting an eye, but somehow running down here was a lot more frightening. He couldn’t shake the feeling he was about to slam facefirst into something running full speed in the dark.

He must have covered two hundred feet in his low, crouching run before Aida’s pistol roared and flashed at the dark end of the tunnel, its sharp retort muffled by the wood and dirt. Splintering timber cracked nearby and Jack dropped to the ground again, firing three shots back in the direction of the flashes.

Five shots left.