The First Billion

Two vehicles approached from across the valley, their xenon headlights cutting an electric blue swath before them.

Christ, they're driving like hell, thought Grafton Byrnes, squinting at the harsh beams. As they neared, he yanked at the wheel, steering the truck onto the shoulder of the narrow road. The cars flew past in a flash, but a flash was all the time Byrnes needed to recognize them. Twin black Suburbans. Outland sentinels from the Kirov fleet.

Byrnes rammed his foot impotently against the accelerator. The engine did not respond. The pickup continued its downhill run, the gearshift parked in neutral, speedometer showing seventy kilometers per hour. He had run out of gas two miles from the dacha. Somehow he'd babied the truck to the edge of the slow grade that led from the hilltop observation post to the sweeping flatlands below. He'd been coasting for a while now. It was hard to tell how long. Five minutes. Maybe ten. He checked the rearview. The taillights were already specks, Satan's fireflies receding into the distance. They would be back. And when they came they wouldn't be coasting at a leisurely fifty miles an hour. They'd be hauling ass at a hundred easy, looking for the truck they'd passed five minutes earlier.

Despite his anxiety, a wave of exhaustion swept over him, and Byrnes gripped the wheel more tightly. His vision blurred. His jaw fell to his chest. Just as quickly the exhaustion passed, the band of cold sweat dampening his forehead its only reminder. He took a breath, steadying himself. Had he really expected to get away? He was feverish and half starved. His body was struggling to fight off the infection raging in his hands. He couldn't touch the steering wheel without wincing. How could he have thought himself in any condition to make it to Moscow?

Because he had been trained as an officer and an officer's duty was to escape.

Because Jett Gavallan would have done the same damned thing.

Because there was no other choice.

The slope began to flatten. The needle on the speedometer eased to the left- 65… 60… 55. The rain had stopped. A half moon played hide-and-seek behind fast-moving clouds, its slow-blinking light casting a silver shadow across an endless vista of waist-high grass. Desperately, Byrnes scanned the horizon, looking for some sign of a village, a service station, an all-night 7-Eleven, where he could pop in, buy a coffee, and make a lifesaving call to the embassy in Moscow. The plain was infinite and dark, sheaths of grass waving back and forth in a whispering wind.

The speed continued to bleed- 45… 40… 35. Byrnes guided the pickup off the road, letting it cut a path across the grass for a few hundred yards, hoping he might find a gully, a hollow, where he could hide the truck. No such luck. The truck hobbled to an arthritic halt on flat ground. Byrnes got out and looked back. He was close enough to the road to see the pavement. The roof of the pickup shimmered in the moonlight. Where to go? Where to hide? He didn't think about his chances. He had none.

He began to run. South. Toward Moscow.

The ground was hard and even. The grass fell effortlessly before him. He crossed back over the highway, hoping to confuse the pursuers he knew would soon come. His step acquired an ugly, pounding rhythm. Once he'd routinely run three miles in eighteen minutes. He'd cranked out a hundred sit-ups in a hundred twenty seconds and dropped from the bar after twenty-two pull-ups. Once he'd eaten nails for breakfast, spat fire, and drove his country's hottest jets.

Once…

Byrnes laughed bitterly at himself. He was forty-four years old. He drank a half bottle of wine every night with dinner. In the twenty-odd years since he'd graduated from college, he'd added thirty pounds to his runner's frame. The last time he'd run any kind of distance was a year ago on vacation in Hawaii with his fifteen-year-old boy, Jeff. After a lousy half a mile, old Dad had veered off the white sand beach and ditched at sea, crashing his well-marbled bulk into the delightful ocean water.

Byrnes thought of Jeff, now, and of his daughter, Kirsten. He saw their faces in front of him. He ran to them. He ran to the warm saltwater oasis. His breath came hard. He was sweating, really sweating, beads of perspiration rolling off his forehead, stinging his eyes. The boots were small, tight in the toe. A blister was coming up on the heel. Another hour and his feet would be bleeding.

Still, he ran.

He ran because he was scared. Scared of going back to the dacha, scared of being caught, scared of what they would do to him. He didn't have the strength to go through another session with Boris.

"No," he whimpered aloud at the thought, fear beginning to grip him.

Mostly, he was scared he might betray his friend and the company they'd built together.

And for a minute his steps lengthened, his gait quickened, and he swore that he would not allow himself to be used by Kirov.