Page 61 of Cross Down
Bastinelli says, “Yeah, well, I’m gonna finish it. Excuse me.”
He exits the kitchen and I look at Deacon, who’s staring at the screens showing armed men coming our way. We’re isolated, outnumbered, and probably outgunned, but Deacon has a blank expression on her face.
Like she was expecting this raid.
I follow Bastinelli down a short hall to a living room filled with furniture and books but no TV. He opens up a closet with a large safe that locks with a keypad instead of the usual dial. His explanation as he punches in the numbers: “When bad guys are coming up at you, you don’t want to worry about your fingers shaking.”
There’s a soft click. He tugs at the handle, and I blink at the sight of the small armory: handguns, shotguns, long rifles, and, tucked in one corner, a huge rifle I recognize as a .50-caliber Barrett M82, a semiautomatic rifle that fires the world’s largest cartridge. One round can penetrate a car’s engine block with ease.
Bastinelli throws on a bullet-resistant vest. He says, “I see you spotted my little friend.”
“Impressive,” I say.
“It tends to stop people in their tracks and make them rethink their career choices.”
Deacon joins us. “What are you planning to do?”
He tightens the Velcro straps. “Well, like a good homeowner, I’m going to protect the old homestead. My entire property is posted with no trespassing signs.”
I say, “We didn’t spot any signs on our way in.”
He takes two steps down the hallway, stops beneath a square ceiling panel, and reaches for a dangling cord. “What, you want me to advertise that there’s a house deep in the woods? Nope, there’s lots of them and they’re visible, but not from the road.” Bastinelli pulls on the rope, and a folded ladder descends from the ceiling. I peer up, and lights have flicked on, revealing a ladder rising about fifty feet to a metal grid floor.
“You like my tower of terror? I go up there and I can last a long time. I’ve got fields of fire cleared, I’ve got pyrotechnic surprises scattered through the woods, and the only weapon I can’t withstand is an anti-tank missile.”
Deacon says, “You mean you’re going to shoot them first?”
He goes back to the safe, puts the slinged Barrett over one shoulder, picks up two metal boxes of ammunition. “Yep.”
“You’ll go to prison.”
He shakes his head. “The property is posted. The men are armed. I fear for my life. This is the Live Free or Die state; no jury here will convict me. But we’re wasting time.”
I say, “Come with us, Gary.”
He heads to the ladder. “Nope.”
Deacon says, “We need you.”
He stops at the bottom of the ladder. “Feeling’s not mutual, sorry. I enlisted right after 9/11, when the entire nation was united, filled with determination to strike back against the attackers and settle accounts. Well, thanks to the politicians, the uniformed bureaucrats in the Pentagon, and the talking heads on cable, that unity was pissed away. I don’t even recognize this country anymore. I once pledged to defend the Constitution and the nation. Now, it’s just my close friends and family I’ll defend.”
Deacon says, “But—”
“Go,” he says. “Drive around the rear of the property. There’s a kids’ swing set there. Use it as your marker, line up straight in front of it. Go right through the trees and keep going due south until you hit a dirt road. I’ll be up in my tower, providing cover.”
No time to argue. “Elizabeth, we’ve got to go.”
“But—”
Bastinelli starts climbing the ladder. “Whatever happens, I got your backs here. But you’re on your own once you leave the area. And good luck figuring out what in hell is going on out there, either in the States or in the ’Stan.”
Up he goes and I give credit to Deacon—she doesn’t argue. She turns and we move quickly to the front door to leave before the bad guys get here.
Chapter
71
In the motelroom, Maynard tells Willard, the NSA contractor, “Run it again.”
