Sam knelt again and put his eyes to the binoculars—he already had them braced on the rail and lined up on the barn.

The men on the ground were just visible through the whipping dust. It churned in big sideways swirls, roiling in the space between the chopper and the barn. Within seconds the helicopter settled fully on the ground.

It was big—probably twice the size of the little choppers Sam had seen above L.A. every day of his life. Most of this helicopter’s size was devoted to what looked like a cargo bay in the back, a huge space with both its side walls wide-open to the night. Sam could see right through the cargo bay to the barn door behind it.

No sooner had the thing touched down when the men began hustling to load things into it. In a flurry of movement they shoved in the boxes they had carried outside earlier.

At the same time, one of them came out of the barn pushing a dolly, like people used in stores to move heavy appliances. This dolly held a steel canister that looked like a propane tank for a gas grill—only bigger. It was the size of a punching bag, with some kind of valve assembly at one end. The whole thing was painted black; it gleamed in the dusty light.

Two men lifted it off the dolly and struggled with it, shoving it into the chopper’s cargo bay. A third jumped up next to it and began securing it to the floor with heavy straps. Already one of the others was rolling the dolly back into the barn.

As Sam watched, he heard Pierce behind him in the house, speaking just above a whisper. “Pick up. Jesus Christ, somebody…”

The men rolled a second giant canister out, and hoisted it into the chopper.

Sam heard Pierce hang up the phone, then lift it again and punch in another number.

“No!” Dani said, all but screaming the word.

Sam could already see what she was reacting to:

Even as the men hauled the third metal canister out of the barn, another of them carried out something else: a person, short and skinny, with long hair, writhing and twisting in the man’s arms. It could only be Lauren Coleman.

Lauren’s hands appeared to be bound in front of her, maybe with duct tape like Pierce’s had been. Her ankles, too. The man handed her off to someone in the chopper.