Beth considered her stubborn expression, and then nodded reluctantly. “Fine. You come. The rest of you stay here,” she ordered.
“Where she goes, we go,” Oksana announced with a shrug that said there would be no argument on the matter.
“Whatever,” Beth said with exasperation and moved out of the bushes in a crouch. Honestly, she was beginning to understand why everybody at the university had seemed to dislike Kira. It wasn’t just her attitude, and she did at times have some serious attitude, although there seemed to be less of that every day since she’d come to Toronto. The real problem was the women who guarded her. All but one of them were stubborn, sullen and miserable, and seemed to want to make everyone around them miserable as well.
Beth crept along the edge of the woods toward the barn, very aware that she was being followed by a parade of Kira, Oksana, Nika, Liliya, and Marta. Liliya was the only bodyguard Beth liked. The petite woman, unlike her larger compatriots, was quiet, efficient and easy to get along with. If Beth had a choice, Liliya would have been the only one with them.
Pausing at the edge of the woods adjacent to the corner of the barn, Beth took a moment to survey the building, and then ran lightly across the open area to reach it. Once there, she put her back to the wall of the barn and watched the others follow. The moment they were all standing like her, with their dart guns out and their backs against the building, Beth turned and began to move along the wall.
She hadn’t gone far before a nail caught on the material at the shoulder of her long-sleeved black shirt. Beth paused to unhook herself, and then continued. Another nail caught at her at the same place several more feet along, and she paused again, this time taking note that the nail was bright silver and shiny-new . . . and Beth wasn’t positive, but she thought the first one might have been too.
She considered that briefly, and then continued on much more slowly, scanning the wall as she went. Three boards later, Beth found the tip of another shiny silver nail poking out of the wood at her shoulder level. She examined that nail briefly and then the wood itself, noting that the board wasn’t as thick as the ones on either side of it.
Glancing along the length of wall ahead, Beth saw that every third or fourth slat was recessed a bit. Whoever had built the barn hadn’t bought the wood at a Home Depot or some other big-box store where the planks would have been a standard width, depth, and length. Heck, for all she knew, the barn had been built before big-box stores. Whatever the case, the nails were showing only on the slats that weren’t as deep as the others. But they were all new and at the same height.
“Those nails are new,” Kira whispered by her ear.
Beth turned to nod at her. She almost wanted to pat her on the head and say “good girl” for paying attention and using her brain, but managed to quell the urge. Kira might think she was being condescending or something, so Beth merely whispered, “Something doesn’t feel right. Stay alert, remain at least a step behind me, and keep your eyes open. Tell the others.”
Kira nodded and turned to pass along the message to Oksana.
Beth watched the Amazon stiffen and narrow her eyes, and knew at once that the woman didn’t appreciate orders from her. As far as Oksana was concerned, Beth was a nobody, with no say about anything she did. Fortunately, Kira seemed to realize that too and stepped past the woman to pass the message to the others herself.
Beth waited patiently until Kira’d finished, ignoring the glowering looks Oksana was giving her as she did, but once Kira returned to her side, she continued along the building. This time, Beth didn’t stop until she reached the barn doors. Dropping into a crouch just to the side of where the two doors met, she glanced back to see that the others were doing the same . . . all but Oksana.
“You are so slow,” the Russian growled with disgust, standing out in the open. “Why you not just walk in there and shoot up rogue if he there? Is no good you skulk around like big English, Spanish, American coward!”
Well, Beth thought wryly, at least the woman had got it mostly right and hit on every continent where she’d lived. Deciding the element of surprise was definitely over now, and stealth and caution were wasted, Beth turned away from the angry woman and eased the far door open enough to poke her head through and glance around.
There wasn’t much to see. A couple of moldy old bales of hay were stacked at the far end of the barn, but other than that it appeared to be empty. Frowning, Beth straightened and pulled open first one door and then the other. She then moved cautiously to stand in the opening to survey the interior of the building again, but now with the aid of the day’s dying light coming through the open doors.
“There is nothing,” Kira whispered a step back on her left, and Beth was pleased to hear concern in her voice rather than confusion. It told her that the girl seemed to understand that that was wrong. There was supposed to be—
“Where is the coffin?” Liliya asked just as quietly from a step back on her right.
Beth was as proud as a teacher on graduation day. Liliya and Kira would make good hunters in the not-too-distant future.
Not so much Oksana, though, she acknowledged as the woman stomped forward into the seemingly empty building, snapping, “Why you whisper? There is no one here.”
“Oksana, get back here,” Beth growled, her inner alarm going from a mild blip of warning to a shriek as she took another look around the building. This time she noted the wooden slats with metal in the middle that had been nailed to the walls and ran down each side of the building.
“I no take orders from you,” Oksana growled, continuing forward to the middle of the barn. “I no take orders from cowards. Athanasios will be disgusted when I tell how you—”
Beth heard the hissing sound just before Oksana’s words died. She instinctively grabbed the arm of each woman on either side of her and dragged them backward out of the barn a good half a dozen steps, nearly tripping over Marta as she did. The woman had obeyed her instructions and stayed behind her. Nika, however, hadn’t, and Beth wasn’t able to grab her. The woman also didn’t immediately follow. Instead, she stayed just inside the door, seeming transfixed.
“Nika?” Beth said worriedly when a moment passed with no sound from Oksana and no movement from Nika. Gesturing for the other women to stay where they were, Beth moved quickly up beside Nika, but stopped just inside the doors when she felt something bump the top of her shoulder. Spotting the razor-thin wire, she reached out to touch it and then noted that it stretched completely across the opening, and in fact from one wall inside the barn to the other. It was attached to what turned out to be a track, which was the metal strip in the middle of the slats she’d noticed stretching nearly to the back of the barn. Something had set it off, sending it shooting forward to the end of the tracks on this end of the barn, slicing through anything in its path . . . like Oksana, she saw, peering into the barn at the woman on the ground . . . in pieces.
Sighing, Beth turned back to Nika and saw that the wire was presently embedded in the taller woman’s upper arms and her chest just above her breasts . . . and her heart.
“Yeah, that’s gotta hurt,” she muttered.
“Da,” Nika agreed in a trembling voice, and Beth glanced to her face with surprise. She’d thought the woman unconscious, which she supposed was stupid since she was standing upright and stiff as a board. Must have been wishful thinking, she decided, because getting the woman off the wire was going to be a painful exercise, and she really would have rather had the woman unconscious for it.
“What is it?” Kira called with concern and started to move forward.
“Stay back,” Beth ordered.
“But what—”
“It was a trap,” she explained. “A wire was rigged to slice through anyone who entered.”
“What?” Kira squawked.
“Yeah, that’s how I feel,” Beth muttered, ducking under the wire to move in front of Nika. As she did, she spared a glance for Oksana, her mouth tightening as she peered at the woman lying on the ground about twenty-five feet in. Her body was in two pieces. Well, four, she corrected herself. Oksana was the same height as Nika, and the wire had cut through her chest and upper arms too. Only it had gone all the way through.