spun toward the steel door with the Glock aimed at center mass. He waited. His own breath was stable and smooth. He hadn’t even broken a sweat. Otets took sharp, gasping breaths, cradling his fractured finger with his good hand.
No one else came.
I just shot three men.
No time for that now. Get the hell out of here.
“Stay,” Reid growled at Otets as he released his hold on him. He kicked the Desert Eagle into the far corner. It skittered under the file cabinet. He had no use for a cannon like that. He also left the TEC-9 automatic pistols that the thugs had; they were largely inaccurate, good for little more than spraying bullets over a wide area. Instead, he shoved Yuri’s body aside with his foot and grabbed up the Beretta. He kept the Glock, tucking a pistol, and his hands, into each of his jacket pockets.
“We’re getting out of here,” Reid told Otets, “you and me. You’ll go first, and you’ll pretend that nothing is wrong. You’re going to walk me outside and to a decent car. Because these?” He gestured to his hands, each stuffed into a pocket and wrapped around a pistol. “These will both be aimed at your spine. Make one single misstep, or say a word out of line, and I’ll bury a bullet between your L2 and L3 vertebrae. If you’re lucky enough to live, you’ll be paralyzed for the rest of your life. Understand?”
Otets glared at him, but he was smart enough to nod.
“Good. Then lead the way.”
The Russian man paused at the steel door of the office. “You won’t get out of here alive,” he said in English.
“You’d better hope I do,” Reid growled. “Because I’ll make sure you don’t either.”
Otets pulled the door open and stepped out onto the landing. The sounds of machinery instantly came roaring back. Reid followed him out of the office and onto the small steel platform. He glanced downward over the railing, looking out over the shop floor below. His thoughts—Kent’s thoughts?—were correct; there were two men working a hydraulic press. One at a pneumatic drill. One more stood at a short conveyor, inspecting electronic components as they slowly rolled toward a steel surface at the end. Two others wearing goggles and latex gloves sat at a melamine table, carefully measuring some sort of chemicals. Oddly, he noticed they were an assortment of nationalities—three were dark-haired and white, likely Russian, but two were definitely Middle Eastern. The man at the drill was African.
The almond-like scent of the dinitrotoluene floated up to him. They were making explosives, as he had discerned earlier from the odor and sounds.
Six in all. Likely armed. None of them so much as looked up toward the office. They won’t shoot in here—not with Otets in the open and volatile chemicals around.
But neither can I, Reid thought.
“Impressive, no?” said Otets with a smirk. He’d noticed Reid inspecting the floor.
“Move,” he commanded.
Otets stepped down, his shoe clanking against the first metal stair. “You know,” he said casually, “Yuri was right.”
Get outside. Get to the SUV. Crash the gate. Drive it like you stole it.
“You do need one of us.”
Get back on the highway. Find a police station. Get Interpol involved.
“And poor Yuri is dead…”
Give them Otets. Force him to talk. Clear your name in the murders of seven men.
“So it occurs to me that you cannot kill me.”
I’ve murdered seven men.
But it was self-defense.
Otets reached the bottom step, Reid right behind him with both hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket. His palms were sweaty, each gripping a pistol. The Russian stopped and glanced slightly over his shoulder, not quite looking at Reid. “The Iranians. They are dead?”
“Four of them,” Reid said. The din of the machinery nearly drowned out his voice.
Otets clucked his tongue. “Shame. But then again… it means I am not wrong. You have no leads, no one else to go to. You need me.”
He was calling Reid’s bluff. Panic rose in his chest. The other side, the Kent side, fought it back down, like dry-swallowing a pill. “I have everything the sheikh gave us—”
Otets chuckled softly. “The sheikh, yes. But you already know that Mustafar knew so little. He was a bank account, Agent. He was soft. Did you think we would trust him with our plan? If so, then why did you come here?”
Sweat prickled on Reid’s brow. He had come here in the hopes of finding answers, not only about this supposed plan but about who he was. He had found much more than he bargained for. “Move,” he demanded again. “Toward the door, slowly.”
Otets stepped off the staircase, moving slowly, but he did not walk toward the door. Instead, he took a step toward the shop floor, toward his men.
“What are you doing?” Reid demanded.
“Calling your bluff, Agent Zero. If I am wrong, you will shoot me.” He grinned and took another step.
Two of the workers glanced up. From their perspective, it looked like Otets was simply chatting with some unknown man, perhaps a business associate or representative from another faction. No reason for alarm.
The panic rose again in Reid’s chest. He didn’t want to let go of the guns. Otets was only two paces away, but Reid couldn’t very well grab him and force him to the door—not without alerting the six men. He couldn’t risk shooting in a room full of explosives.
“Do svidaniya, Agent.” Otets grinned. Without taking his eyes off of Reid he shouted in English, “Shoot this man!”
Two more of the workers looked up, glancing between each other and Otets in confusion. Reid got the impression that these men were laborers, not foot soldiers or bodyguards like the pair of dead goons upstairs.
“Idiots!” Otets roared over the machinery. “This man is CIA! Shoot him!”
That got their attention. The pair of men at the melamine table rose quickly and reached for shoulder holsters. The African man at the pneumatic drill reached down near his feet and lifted an AK-47 to his shoulder.
As soon as they moved, Reid sprang forward, at the same time yanking both hands—and both pistols—out of his pockets. He spun Otets by the shoulder and held the Beretta to the Russian’s left temple, and then leveled the Beretta at the man with the AK, his arm resting on Otets’s shoulder.
“That wouldn’t be very wise,” he said loudly. “You know what might happen if we start shooting in here.”
The sight of a gun to their boss’s head prompted the rest of the men into action. He was right; they were all armed, and now he had six guns on him with only Otets between them. The man holding the AK glanced nervously at his compatriots. A thin bead of sweat ran down the side of his forehead.
Reid took a small step backward, coaxing Otets along with him with a nudge from the Beretta. “Nice and easy,” he said quietly. “If they start shooting in here, this whole place could go up. And I don’t think you want to die today.”
Otets clenched his teeth and murmured a curse in Russian.
Little by little they backed away, tiny steps at a time, toward the doors of the facility. Reid’s heart threatened to pound out of his chest. His muscles tightened nervously, and then went slack as the other side of him forced him to relax. Keep the tension out of your limbs. Tight muscles will slow your reactions.
For each tiny step that he and Otets took back, the six men took one forward, maintaining a short distance between them. They were waiting for an opportunity, and the farther they stepped from the machines, the less likely setting off an inadvertent explosion would be. Reid knew it was only the threat of accidentally killing Otets that kept them from shooting. No one spoke, but the machines droned