Genesis (Extinction Book 1) Read Online Free Page B

signaling a message. It wouldn’t take Ryan long to figure out the code to the voicemail and retrieve her message.
    By the time he did, she had to be at least close to the rendezvous point, and safety. The message was sent, via satellite uplink, from a secure com system encrypted by a code they could crack in their sleep. When Ryan activated it, anyone listening for her would pluck it right out of the air and the race would be on.
    Her Harley sat shrouded in canvas next to the small cabin, just outside the kitchen door. Mel took only enough time to check the fluids before raising the stand and pushing it none-too-gracefully down the dirt two-track path that led to the highway. Ryan was a heavy sleeper, but not even he would sleep through the rattle and roll of the old bike if she started it. It would be a thunder crash in the still mountain night and bring him on the run.
    Under other circumstances, watching her lanky disheveled nerd, barreling out of the house with a baseball bat he had never christened with sweat, would have been too much to pass up. Now, the thought brought a fresh rain of tears and she dug in her heels to push the big bike faster.
    At the highway, Mel straddled the old Sportster, waited for the trembling in her legs to subside, and fired it up. Before she could let herself think about it, before she let herself chicken out, she turned onto the macadam and throttled up, barely slowing for the hairpin turns that would take her out of the San Francisco Peaks. In Flagstaff she headed west, leaving behind the mountains for the dry Mohave Desert.
    Once on the interstate that would take her to Nevada, she opened the Sportster up. Breakneck speeds on a motorcycle kept her focused, there was no time to mourn the loss of her daughter, or feel guilt over the chaos she’d left in Ryan’s life. It was her, the bike, and primal instinct.

7
     
    When the Asian guy in the black tunic tossed him a small handgun, he almost turned it on him and the old woman. Instinct said he was better off alone. Trust no one. He might have, anyway, if having the gun tossed to him hadn’t caught him by surprise.
    Only the sound of the chopper winding down stopped him. Having a little help, at least for the next few minutes, might be a good thing.
    Nor was he completely stupid. If he stood next to the odd couple and fired, the newcomers would make a connection between them, despite there not being one. There would be no chance to talk himself out of a potentially painful death. No chance to use the device as leverage. Waiting to let them fight it out and see who came out on top seemed the better option.
    As soon as the gun was in Max’s hands, the Asian guy vanished. He tried to follow on legs still shaking from the juice he’d received, but the old woman was bent over Diego’s corpse. When she stood, she dangled small keys that glimmered in the dim light. She made quick work of removing the cuffs before turning to release the shackles that bound his ankles.
    When they hit the concrete floor, Max stepped away from the metal bracelets and turned, but the old woman was gone. He stepped into the corridor, looked right, and then left. It was empty. Not so much as a grey hair pointed towards the direction the old woman had gone. It was a Mexican jail, for crying out loud. A small one at that. There was nowhere to hide.
    Boots pounded the wooden floorboards above his head. With no idea where the other two went, and nowhere to hide, Max stepped back into his cell and over the fat policia . No sooner had he made it to his bunk and spun around, than he was admiring the graceful detail of the barrel of an assault rifle. It was close enough that it looked like the entrance to the Eisenhower Tunnel.
    That old bat set me up , he thought, and dropped the handgun on the bunk as if it had turned into something that would bite. Considering the disappearing act of the odd couple, the gun had probably been empty. Or worse, it probably held nothing but