by Katie Reus
It made sense that his boss would want him, especially if they’d found the terrorists. Then they wouldn’t need whatever knowledge she had buried in her memories anymore. While she was glad they might have found the terrorists, a small, completely emotional part of her was bereft. What did this mean for her and Cade now? Once they caught the bad guys, there would be no reason for him to be with her anymore. She could go home and try to grieve and just deal with everything that had happened. She should be relieved. It wasn’t as though she envisioned a future with him or wanted anything long-term. Not after the way he’d bailed on her before.
Instead a new ache settled in her chest. “Good, let’s go, then.” Her voice was raspy and she felt a new onslaught of tears coming so she looked out the window.
A tense silence settled between them like a wall. “I swear I’ll come back to you after this assault.”
As tears tracked down her face, she kept her head turned out the window. “Sure.” It was all she could squeeze out.
“Maria . . .” Just when she thought Cade might continue, he sighed and steered the truck away from the curb as they headed to wherever the suspected terrorists were.
• • •
Date: November 7, 2006
To: Cade O’Reilly
From: Maria Cervantes
Subject: re: Hey
Don’t worry? Yeah, okay. I’m going to be biting my fingernails until I hear back. But I’m glad you told me. It’s easier knowing this way. I’m glad my other letters made it. I wasn’t sure if they’d gotten lost in the mail. I’m looking forward to you guys coming back too. Miami in the spring is perfect. You’ll miss the humidity and it’ll be warm enough for the beach. And I’ve got some new places I want to take you and Riel to, including a couple food trucks. Which might sound gross, but trust me, I found some jewels last month, including a Middle Eastern one. Not sure if you’ll even want that type of food when you get back, but it’s pretty good.
So, what would you want to do if you got out? There are so many opportunities and you’re still young. Maybe something in law enforcement? Or do you want something totally different?
I look forward to all your e-mails too. They’re usually the highlight of my day. Miss you and I’ll be praying for your mission.
xo,
Maria
Chapter 13
Tactical team: a highly trained small law enforcement unit that uses military-grade weapons and engages in high-risk operations, including hostage rescue and counterterrorism maneuvers.
Mihails carefully slid the blasting caps into the last half brick of C-4. He, Oto, and two other team members had strategically placed the explosives around the spacious penthouse suite. They’d secured them to all of the load-bearing walls to inflict maximum damage. Next they’d be moving on to another of the penthouse suites, then down ten floors, where one of his men had checked in under an alias. After they’d placed similar explosives on that floor, they would move to the floor right above the lobby.
Three strategic areas of the building guaranteed to make the place implode on itself and pancake down, layer upon layer, until it was just a heap of rubble. But he would call in a bomb threat this time, only giving the people inside enough time to escape. Maybe ten minutes. He was sending a message to the owners of the Opulen, but there was no need for collateral damage today. Not like at the Westwood mansion. That had been unavoidable, but he didn’t relish the thought of taking more human lives. He wasn’t a monster. Not like the men who’d hurt his sisters and countless other women.
Even with the bomb threat, it would be impossible for the police to make it to the island in time. And if they somehow did, his lookout would tell him of their presence and he would detonate everything before they arrived.
As he stepped back into the middle of the main living room, his phone buzzed in his pocket. All their phones for this mission were burners, but he’d designated initials for each member of his team. When K came up on his caller ID, he knew it was Kristaps. The other man had taken care of a problem for them and was now their lookout. If he was calling, it couldn’t be good.
“Yes?”
“It is a nice day to go parasailing.” An amenity the hotel offered to its guests. In this case, it was a code for “get out now” and use a boat as a means of escape instead of the recently stolen SUVs they’d acquired. Since they’d already wiped the vehicles down, he wasn’t worried about DNA or fingerprints being left behind.
His heart rate increased a fraction, but he kept his voice calm. “Yes, it is. Will you be joining us?”
A pause. “No.” Which meant it would be too difficult for Kristaps to meet them without exposing either himself or the rest of the team.
“See you soon, then.” If all went well, Kristaps would meet them at their previously designated rendezvous point, but if he was captured, Mihails knew he wouldn’t talk. None of his men would. They’d all planned for this. Each one was prepared for the consequences, and in this case, the American justice system was so weak and flawed that going to prison here was nothing to be feared.
After he disconnected, Mihails placed his earpiece on the rectangular table behind one of the couches. He would leave it to be destroyed in the blast. While they wouldn’t be able to raze the hotel to the ground now, they would still be setting off the current charges. There was no way these would go to waste.
“Everyone leave your phones. It’s time for plan C,” he called out. The place had impressive insulation and, with the layout of the hotel, he wasn’t worried about any neighbors overhearing since they didn’t have any. Not to mention that civilians were the least of his worries now.
At this point he didn’t know how bad the situation was, but for Kristaps to call meant it was serious. They could have less than five minutes to get out. And it was almost a guarantee that one or more government agency would be monitoring incoming and outgoing calls in the vicinity. If they remotely suspected something, it would have been the first thing they did before descending on the place. So even though he and Kristaps had spoken in code, it wasn’t much of a cover if the government knew their identities. Not that he was sure they did or even had eavesdropping capabilities. He hated not knowing at this point, but now the only thing they could do was try to get out of the Opulen alive and finish the rest of their objective.
Moments later Oto and his two other men emerged from other rooms. They tossed their phones onto whatever was closest to them.
Wordlessly, they all converged on the two suitcases his other men had brought. He and Oto pulled out the standard uniforms the security members at the hotel wore. Simple black suits, white button-down shirts, and black ties. They also had fake badges that might not hold up under scrutiny, but for their current plan, they would be perfect. Once he called in a bomb threat, people would be running around and not paying attention to badges. The other two men changed into blue maintenance uniforms.
As soon as they were dressed, they discarded their clothes on the floor and Mihails grabbed his burner phone. He’d be ditching it soon, but he had one more call to make. Moving quickly, he kept pace with Oto as they made their escape. He and his friend headed toward the east elevators while the other two men went to the west-side elevators.
Once they’d descended to the floor directly above the lobby, they exited and Mihails pressed SEND on a number stored in the throwaway phone.
“Opulen Hotel, how may I help you today?” a chirpy female answered.
The hallway was empty as Oto pointed toward the stairs. Mihails nodded and kept his voice low as he spoke. “In five minutes your beautiful hotel will be rubble.” Not exactly true, but they would do some damage. Without giving her a chance to respond other than a gasp, he continued. “If you don’t clear out everyone, you will all be dead. The clock is ticking. Leave or die.”
She gasped and started to say something, but he ended the call and tossed
it into the stairwell. For all he knew, law enforcement had already moved into the hotel and were doing sweeps. The unknown was making him edgy. But they hadn’t been able to bring in a big team for this op. It was too difficult to get eyes in this hotel without arousing suspicion. The owners were paranoid—because of their own illegal activities—so Mihails had needed to play this operation right. Unfortunately his lack of sight around the perimeter was now hurting him.
As they reached the floor that would lead to the lobby, a piercing alarm went off, the wail echoing in the stairwell. They bypassed the current floor and continued to the underground parking garage. He was sure that panicked guests would be running around everywhere soon.
There was a door in the garage that emptied out near the pool area. They would have to ascend another set of anterior stairs once they went through it, but from there, escape would be a straight shot to the hotel-owned marina. All they would have to do was retrieve their boat and they would be free.
• • •
Cade stood in the oversized van next to Burkhart and another member of his four-man tactical team. Maria sat against one wall between two well-armed men Cade trusted with his life. She’d been quiet on the drive over, and he hated that he’d had to drag her here, but anyone he trusted to watch her—and there was no way he’d entrust her safety to local law enforcement—was on-site at the Opulen Hotel. There’d been no other choice and she seemed to understand, even if she was withdrawn. Not that he blamed her. Fuck, he hated that she was here. And he hated that he’d been dumb enough to touch her.
Again.
It was as though he couldn’t stop himself. The hunger he experienced around her was intense, making him out of control. He looked away from her, scanning where she’d be staying.
The van they were in was their on-scene command center. Computers lined one wall with two very dedicated analysts sitting in small swivel chairs reviewing angles of the Opulen video cameras and running various data such as the incoming and outgoing phone calls made in the last hour in the direct vicinity. Considering that they were on an outlying island off the coast of Miami, it was easy to pinpoint calls. Eavesdropping was impossible at this point, but they were hoping to get a pattern or something from the calls as the tactical teams surrounded the outlying areas of the hotel.
Burkhart hadn’t told him the tip about the terrorists had come from Levi fucking Lazaro until he’d arrived on-site, but now that he was aware of that, Cade was more amped up than ever. No matter what choices Lazaro had made, he wouldn’t lie to men and women he’d worked side by side with before. Cade knew it in his gut.
He’d always thought Lazaro had gotten a shitty deal when his wife was murdered. No one—at least no one Cade knew within the company—blamed the guy for wanting revenge. But that wasn’t important now.
Once the NSA had hacked the hotel’s Wi-Fi cameras, they’d started running a facial-recognition software. So far it hadn’t picked up either Mihails Baolodis or Oto Ozols in the last twenty-four hours of fast-forwarded footage. But that didn’t mean anything. The men were trained and would know how to avoid detection or disguise their appearance. Of course disguises only went so far with the type of software the NSA had. But if they’d been in the hotel previously doing recon, they might not have been as careful while learning the layout of the security cameras. Not that that helped the NSA right now, because they didn’t have hours and hours to dissect the footage. They needed a hit now.
If the terrorists were here, they’d have a hell of a time getting away. The main road had been blocked off, eliminating exit on land, but there were other ways to escape. Including sea or air, and with just the NSA and FBI working this op, they couldn’t cover the entire damn island—which encompassed the personal residences of some of the highest-per-capita-income individuals in the damn country. If they tried to search any of those residences without a warrant, they’d be met with a giant fuck-you and follow-ups from attorneys. For all they knew, the terrorists had already escaped the hotel and outlying areas.
“Fuck,” Burkhart muttered.
Cade turned to look at him, alert. “What?”
His boss tapped his earpiece. “Someone called in a bomb threat to the front desk. The hotel is evacuating.”
Burkhart turned to one of the analysts, but before he could ask the question the others wanted to know, the petite woman with jet-black hair said, “Only one call was placed to the front desk in the last couple minutes. . . .” She trailed off as her fingers flew across the keyboard at warp speed. Numbers, words, and other data popped up on the screen directly in front of her; then, “Throwaway phone. I can eventually trace where it was bought and track funds unless it was bought with cash, but it won’t do us any good now. . . . Wait. There was a call to this number five minutes before the outgoing bomb threat.”
Cade glanced at Burkhart, who gave him a hard look. There were a dozen different scenarios that played out in his mind, but the simplest, the one that made the most sense, said that whoever had placed the bomb threat had received some kind of warning call. The tactical teams show up; then a bomb threat is made? No fucking way. He’d done enough operations like this to be secure with his instinct. And his gut said the bad guys were here.
The threat might be fake, designed to cause a panic, but after the destruction at the Westwood mansion, no one would take that chance.
“Evacuate the hotel now. No one goes in!” Burkhart shouted into his phone at someone as he hurried from the van, using the side door.
Cade quickly looked at Maria to see how she was holding up before he focused on Ortiz, one of his teammates for this operation. “You ready?”
He nodded, his M-4 at the ready as he headed for the door at the back. Sunlight filtered in, bathing two of the computers in light as he stepped down from the vehicle.
Cade followed but stopped in the doorway and looked at Maria. “I’ll be back soon. You’ll be safe, I swear.” No one was getting in this damn van. It was the command center, but if the shit hit the fan, everyone in the van was under orders to get off the island. One of the reasons he’d made sure Maria was stationed inside it, even if her presence was irregular.
She nodded, her eyes red-rimmed and slightly puffy. She’d cried on and off in the truck on the way over, though she’d tried to hide it, and he could see the pain etched so clearly on her beautiful face. “Don’t worry about me. Just be safe.”
He paused, not used to anyone being concerned about his safety. He was well trained and his boss and various teammates all looked out for one another, but they didn’t worry. Not like the way he could see she did. He hated that today of all days he had to leave her. What he wouldn’t give to stay and comfort her, but he couldn’t.
His boss had assigned him as point man of this four-man team, and if he could be instrumental in bringing down the fuckers who had killed Maria’s mother, he wanted to be part of that. He hadn’t been able to save her brother, but if he could give her some small peace in this way, he would.
As he dropped to the ground outside the van, Ortiz shut the door and they turned to face Bell and Freeman, two other operators he’d worked with before. Bell was former Delta, sent in as extra support, but the other two were Black Death 9 agents just like Cade. Normally their jobs were covert and off the books.
Except today. Today they were going to dominate their objective in broad fucking daylight.
Cade tapped his earpiece. They’d all programmed theirs to one channel. “Testing.”
All three men nodded in unison.
Cade quickly glanced around the parking lot next to the hotel. He didn’t have a full view of the front but knew teams were in place helping people get out after that bomb threat. He’d seen the flood of guests and employees hurrying out the main doors from one of the analyst’s video screens. Normally they’d be sweeping and clearing the building, but with the impending danger and so many of the teams helping th
e civilians to safety, everyone was staying outside. Soon they’d create a perimeter in case that bomb threat was real.
“Let’s go, then.” They headed across the lot. The sun beat down on them as they hurried, single file, sweeping around the back of the hotel toward the pool area.
Each team had a designated objective. Theirs was to secure the small marina the hotel owned. While the Opulen hadn’t given them complete access to their hotel, they were being cooperative enough and had ordered all employees to evacuate to one location in the northwest parking lot. Of course that bomb threat had moved Cade’s team’s time frame up, so they had no clue if there were still employees lingering at the marina.
His team was about to find out, though.
As they bypassed the empty pool area and neared the marina, Cade scanned the front dock that ran parallel to the water. Clear.
The main dock had seven different very long docks attached to it, with about a dozen boats of varying sizes tied to each one.
“Ortiz, take the farthest on the east, Bell, you take—”
Pop, pop!
For a fraction of a second they stilled at the unmistakable sound of gunfire. A roaring engine followed a split second later. He could hear what direction it was coming from, but there were too many boats blocking their view. Using hand motions, Cade signaled that he and Ortiz would take the second-to-last dock and the other two should take the very last.
As he and Ortiz raced down the evenly spaced wooden planks, Cade held up a hand signaling that he was slowing down when they neared a Grady White.
Once he reached the edge of the front of the boat, he used it as cover to peer around it. Fifty yards down, two men were boarding a Donzi that two other men were already on. The speedboats were incredibly fast and if they made it to open water, they could get away if the NSA’s air support didn’t stop them.
