It was very dark down here, but he was following the vertical current caused by the bulk of the descending vehicle.
He was moving so fast his head nearly collided with the top of the sedan.
He felt along the edges and then downward until his fingers closed around the door handle. It was partially open but the pressure of the water wouldn’t let it move another inch.
Through the window he could make out two figures inside. He couldn’t tell for sure, but they seemed to be facing each other.
Rogers planted his feet against the rear door of the car, gripped the front door handle with both hands, and gave a titanic
tug.
The door opened fully.
He reached inside and grabbed Puller’s arm and next the waist of the woman. He didn’t know if they were unconscious or even alive. But if they were still alive they wouldn’t be for long unless he got them out of the water.
He kicked off hard to the surface. A few moments later he broke it cleanly and hauled them up, one on his right, one on his left. He used his legs to kick to shore, careful to hold their faces out of the water.
Both were wheezing and spitting up water, but their eyes remained closed and they made no move to free themselves from his grip or try to swim on their own.
He set them both on land. Then he rose, dripping wet, and examined them more closely.
Puller was breathing hard. He turned to the side and upchucked water. When his eyes fluttered and he looked like he might try to sit up, Rogers reached down, gripped his neck, and gave a squeeze firm enough to cut off a substantial part of his airflow. The weakened Puller gave a shudder and passed out.
Rogers turned to the woman. Her eyes were closed and she did not appear to be conscious. He checked to make sure she was breathing and then effortlessly lifted her over one shoulder and used his free hand to grab Puller by the scruff of his jacket. Carrying the woman and dragging the large Puller like he weighed only as much as a child, he got them over the wall and hurried over to the van.
He loaded them both in the back, climbed in, and gave a long searching look in all directions. He saw no one.
He leapt into the back of the van and checked the pulse of each, just to be sure. He was afraid he might have squeezed Puller’s throat a little too firmly. But he found that both were alive and breathing, though the woman turned to the side and threw up, as had Puller, before slumping back, unconscious.
Rogers used some rope from the back of the van to securely tie them. Then he closed the driver’s door, put the van in gear, and drove off.
Chapter
54
HE WAS DEAD.
And he knew she was dead because he had watched her die.
But dead people were not capable of thinking, were they?
Puller slowly lifted his head and looked around.
Tools, shelves, ropes, and the smells of paint, oil, and old food met him head-on.
To his left was Knox, her eyes still closed, but she was breathing.
Puller shook his head clear with difficulty.
How was this possible?
The car. The water. The last breaths.
He had been prepared to die.
He thought he had died.
Then he realized he was tied up.
He felt a hand on his shoulder. He felt the fingers grip and then dig slightly into his skin.
Puller felt the otherworldly strength in those fingers.
He shook his head again and felt that same grip on his arm, pulling him from a car submerged in thirty feet of water.
The hands lifted him up and turned him around so the men were facing each other.
He looked up into the countenance of Paul Rogers, though he only knew the man as Paul.
Rogers’s features were rigid, though Puller could see momentary flashes of pain, represented by grimaces, flit across the man’s features.
“You got us out of the water,” said Puller.
Rogers rubbed the back of his head but said nothing.
“My car went out of control. It was driving itself. Drove us right into the water.”
Rogers continued to rub the back of his head as Knox stirred, her eyelids fluttered and then opened fully. She saw Puller, then Rogers, and then looked down at the ropes binding her.
“Paul saved us,” Puller said.
Knox processed this and nodded. She too could see the look on Rogers’s face and knew that Puller was trying to keep things calm, trying to keep Rogers calm.
“Thank you,” she said.
Rogers moved his hand away from his head and sat there on his haunches.
“You work for her, don’t you?” said Rogers.
“Who?” asked Puller.
Rogers slammed his fist into the side of the van next to Puller’s head and drove a dent three inches deep into the metal. He removed his bleeding hand from the pit he’d created and looked back at Puller.
Knox looked desperately at Puller, but he kept his gaze directly on Rogers.
“We met with a woman named Claire Jericho because she called and told us she wanted to meet.”
Rogers inched closer to Puller so their noses were barely centimeters apart. “Why would she want to meet with you unless you were working for her?”
“To tell us to back off our investigation. And if we didn’t that something bad would happen to us.”
Something occurred to Puller and he glanced at Knox. “They bugged my car. They heard me tell you that I was going to continue the investigation.”
“And they remotely took over the car and ran us right into the channel,” added Knox.
“They tried to kill you?” said Rogers.
Puller said, “Well, I didn’t drive myself into the water to die.”
Rogers sat back against a shelving unit built into the interior wall of the van.
Puller said, “You know Claire Jericho?”
Remaining silent, Rogers nodded.