Broken Dreams (Delos Series Book 4)

by Lindsay McKenna

  “Any caves on this side?” Robert demanded, his gaze pinned on Alexa as she slipped, fell, and was kicked at by a soldier as she scrambled back to her feet. His fist curled into a knot.

  “Not where they are presently,” Wyatt said, looking at his laptop, which held the mission software on it. “On the other side it’s a whole different story. There’s a huge limestone cave complex that’s sometimes used as a hospital for wounded Taliban. I’ve been in those caves. There’s water there in some of them—ice melt—and they’re big. They’ve been used for decades as a main way station for Taliban.”

  “Have you got a drone up on that side?”

  Tal shook her head. “The drone has software issues, Dad. They’re racing to fix it, but it’s still down at Bagram.”

  “Damn it!”

  Her stomach clenched. Watching Alexa flounder, fall, and stagger back to her feet, Tal ached inside. If only she could reach out and pluck her out of that situation. The women ahead of her were getting along no better. They slipped and slid and fell as well, ice hidden beneath the newly fallen snow. She gnawed on her lower lip, hurting for her sister. The worst possible thing that could happen would be her captors managing to force Alexa to admit she was an Air Force officer. If they found that out, especially that she was an A-10 pilot, the Taliban would make short work of her.

  Taliban hated the Warthog drivers with a lethal passion. Those low-flying combat aircraft wrought upon them hell on earth, and if they discovered that she was one of those pilots—oh, God, Tal just couldn’t go there. She couldn’t . . .

  “Looks like they’re taking them up and over that goat path,” Wyatt said, his Texas drawl low. “They’re taking them into those caves, I’ll bet.”

  “To what end?” Tal demanded. She saw Wyatt’s mouth purse. She could tell he didn’t want to say it. “Tell me the truth.”

  Wyatt had been a SEAL and spent his entire career rooting out, finding, and kidnapping HVTs in Afghanistan. Tal knew he’d seen things that no one wanted to see. Now she felt him resisting her request.

  “It’s not gonna do any good to go over it. It has no mission importance, Tal. Let’s keep focused on the mission. Not the what-ifs.” He reached out, gripping her hand, giving her a gentle look that spoke volumes.

  Tal choked back tears. Wyatt was right. She was starting to come unraveled because it was Alexa, not some unknown person about whom she could remain calm and objective. She turned her hand over weaving her fingers between his strong, warm ones.

  “You’re right,” she managed to say in a strangled tone. “I don’t really want to know. My imagination is making up enough shit.”

  “Second drone is up,” Wyatt announced triumphantly. He watched his laptop screen. “It will be on station in thirty minutes, tops. We’ve got clear weather for once, but the winds at that altitude are going to be dicey.”

  Robert was riveted on a struggling Alexa. Every time she fell, the soldier was there, kicking at her to get up. God, he wanted to kill the sonofabitch. Just flat-out put a pistol to his head and pull the trigger. Violent anger swept through him and he gritted his teeth, watching his brave daughter climbing hard, obviously winded at that altitude. He saw the soldiers grinning, some of them rubbing their crotches suggestively as they herded the women up to the top of the windblown ridge.

  Many of the women were staggering now, their arms tight around their bodies, with no warm clothing for this kind of climate and these conditions. At least Alexa was warmer—he recognized her black nylon down coat. Thank God for little things. His heart went out to those civilian women. He wasn’t sure if they’d make it, but at least his daughter had military training.

  She also had the Culver backbone and her mother’s courage and strength. If anyone could survive this, it was Alexa. But Robert didn’t wish any ill to befall any of these other young women, either.

  “What are the ages of these women?” he asked.

  Wyatt popped up the list on another screen on the wall beside the big one. “Young, between twenty and twenty-six years old. All single. They’re working for NGOs and volunteered for their particular charity to help people in need.”

  “I feel so sorry for them,” Tal murmured, shaking her head. “I can’t even begin to imagine how they’re feeling.” But she could see it etched in their young, scrubbed faces. They were terrified, freezing to death, and afraid of the Taliban soldiers. Every once in a while, one of the soldiers would come up and squeeze one of their asses. Or run his hand up between a woman’s legs to her crotch and then laugh. She hated those bastards. She wanted a piece of them. So far, they’d left Alexa alone, but that didn’t mean anything.

  Tal didn’t want to watch the feed, but she had to. It was her sister in that video. It felt as if she were sitting in a Roman circus watching the Christians being stalked by the lions. It was a horrible feeling, and her stomach turned. She suddenly stood up, the chair scraping against the walnut floor. Without a word, she ran limping out of the room and down the hall toward the bathroom, her hand over her mouth. She hit the door, rushing in and barely making it to the first toilet.

  Everything she’d eaten the night before came up. Tal gripped the porcelain with her hands, her knuckles white as she continued to heave. She didn’t hear Wyatt come in, but when he leaned down to shelter her with his body, his arms going around her, holding her while she vomited, the tears came.

  Tal sobbed quietly, wiping bile from her mouth.

  “It’s gonna be all right,” Wyatt said, trying to comfort her, gently pulling her hair away from her shoulders. “She’s made of stern stuff, Tal. It’s gonna be okay . . .”

  His soft drawl always soothed her, and as she weakly sat back on her heels, spitting the last of the saliva out of her mouth, she watched as Wyatt got up and left her. She immediately missed his warmth and his strength, because right now, Tal felt like she was shattering into a hundred little pieces.

  Wyatt came back with a glass of water and crouched down beside her, one arm around her waist, handing her the glass.

  “Put some in your mouth, swish it around, and then spit it out,” he told her, holding her wounded, anguished gaze.

  Tal did as he instructed. After her mouth was clean, she drank the rest of the water and flushed the toilet, hating the smell of vomit. “I need to stand up,” she said, her voice quavering.

  Nodding, Wyatt rose and then helped her stand, taking the glass from her hand. “Come on,” he urged, guiding her out of the stall. He set the glass on the counter and then drew her up against him, wrapping his arms solidly around her. “It’s okay, sugar. You needed to do this. It was building up inside you.” He kissed her damp cheek, seeing the tears still trailing from her wounded eyes. He knew how close Tal was to Matt and Alexa. He smiled tenderly, continuing to rock her a little in his arms, wanting her to bawl her eyes out. Tears always helped.

  Wyatt knew his voice tamed those fierce emotions of hers. She was usually cool, calm, and collected. But this was her sister, her only sister. And Wyatt knew how devoted Tal was to Alexa. He felt the woman he loved shaking now, the sobs starting to tear out of her as she gripped his shirtfront with her hands, her face buried against his upper chest. He loved her so damn much for her bravery, and her large, giving heart. Wyatt wished he could take away the knifelike pain he knew she was feeling since they had found out Alexa had been captured. He slid his fingers through her hair, moving the tips lightly against her scalp. It was something Tal loved and he loved doing it for her. Wyatt wished he could do more.

  Little by little, her sobs diminished. His shirt was damp with her spent tears, but he didn’t care. Moving her thick, black hair away from her face, pulling some stuck strands off her cheek, he looked down, meeting her reddened eyes. “Feel a tad better?”

  “Y-yes. Thanks . . .” She gave him an apologetic look.

  “Don’t be hard on yourself, Tal. I can feel you goin’ there.” He saw her lips quirk, and she nodded a little bit, her cheek pressed against his chest, wan
ting his warmth, his quiet strength.

  “I’m so sick over this, Wyatt,” she whispered brokenly. “I had to take three weeks of SERE. Alexa only had two.”

  “Well, we black ops types all had to take three weeks. If we got caught, shit was gonna rain down on us, and the SERE teachers wanted us to realize the full scope of what we could expect.” He caressed her hair, giving her a searching look, her beautiful green eyes marred with terror. “Alexa got enough, darlin’. She knows what to do. And if she can, she’ll try to escape.”

  “I worry . . . I worry they’ll rape her.” Tal broke down in tears again, clinging to Wyatt.

  His mouth thinned and he held her gently. Wyatt wasn’t going to say anything, but it was a foregone conclusion that any military woman caught by the enemy in that country could expect to be raped. And he could hear the hurt, the raw anguish, in Tal’s voice as she’d given words to the worst possible thing that could happen to her little sister.

  Rape changed a person forever. It killed a part of their soul. It took a piece out of them they would never, ever get back.

  “Hey, hey,” he said soothingly, his hand cupping the back of her head, “we’re not there yet.”

  Tal sniffed. “Then tell me what you wouldn’t tell me in the War Room, Wyatt. You know what happens to these poor women and children who are kidnapped and sold as sex slaves.”

  He blew out a breath of air, holding her. “In the past, the Taliban took the hostages they managed to steal from an Afghan village to a cave. They usually had what I call ‘holding tanks’ for them. They would staff the caves with Taliban soldiers at certain times when they knew there was a raid in progress. There was a group of slave traders, men in the business, who would wait in those caves for the hostages.” He frowned and hesitated.

  “What else, Wyatt?” She gripped his shirtfront, shaking it. “Tell me all of it. I have to know. I’ll go crazy not knowing. At least if I know, I’ll be prepared.”

  His woman was no shirker and had a set of titanium balls on her. Wyatt had seen that stubborn courage come to life many times before. Tal hadn’t been the head of a Marine Corps sniper unit all those years at Bagram for nothing.

  “Okay,” he rasped, “I’ll tell you everything . . . But you may be sorry you asked.”

  CHAPTER 9

  Dilara couldn’t stand it. After Robert’s call an hour earlier, her stomach had become a nest of angry snakes that burned like a newly formed ulcer. Wyatt met her at the door to Artemis, which looked from the outside like a three-story 1850s farmhouse. It had new white siding and green shutters around all the windows.

  Within that huge old farmhouse was the heart of Artemis Security. There was an underground parking area along with five levels of top-secret floors, two of them dug deep into the earth. The other three levels were aboveground and shielded by the latest materials that stopped any satellite or other surveillance device from penetrating the busy facility.

  Although Artemis was officially going online next June, and it was only January, Dilara knew the operations center was well in place. The War Room, on the deepest level belowground, was state-of-the-art. Even the White House couldn’t match their technology. The family had spent millions to get the very best and the most cutting-edge devices, electronics, communications, and computers—money well spent.

  It was seven A.M., and the place was humming. Thirty people had been hired so far, all experts in their given area of military knowledge. Wyatt headed up the Mission Planning department and smiled slightly, giving Dilara a nod and placing his hand beneath her elbow.

  “I’ll take you to the elevator that goes to the War Room,” he told her after she’d checked in through security. Retinal scanners were the only devices used for anyone entering or departing the building. He slowed his pace for her sake. “How are you holding up?” he asked her gently, punching the elevator button.

  “Not well,” Dilara admitted, her linen handkerchief in her hand. “What else has happened since Robert called me?”

  “Well,” Wyatt said, entering the elevator, “they’ve taken all the women into a main cave. The drones are overhead, watching, but they can’t penetrate rock to see what’s going on inside those caves.” He saw her face crumple, her long, polished nails curving around her damp handkerchief.

  Dilara was a beautiful woman at fifty-one years old, her red hair the same color as Alexa’s. She also had incredible aquamarine eyes, while Alexa had inherited her father’s hazel eyes. Wyatt had seen the uncanny similarity between Alexa and her mother.

  “What about the SEAL team? Where are they?” Dilara asked.

  Wyatt watched the brass doors close. “They’re on their way to the caves. They have to land far enough away so they aren’t seen and the Taliban doesn’t hear the engines on the helo. They’re landing five miles south of the cave position. From there, they’ll get close to the cave entrance and watch, wait, and listen. They’ve got five snipers with them, and the plan is to take out the Taliban inside the cave. But until the SEALs can determine where the hostages are kept, they can’t just jump in there and start shooting.”

  “No . . . of course not.” Dilara blotted her eyes. She had already cried into her pillow after Robert’s terse call. Her husband tried to sound as if everything were all right, but she knew it wasn’t. She had married him at age twenty-one. He’d been twenty-six, a brash, confident, risk-taking Air Force jet combat pilot and officer. Robert had swept her off her feet, literally, and stolen her heart. He was a man who loved to learn, was cosmopolitan in his outlook, and was an astute political player who had respect from every military branch.

  He was the youngest officer to be assigned to NATO in the Middle East, where they had met in Istanbul, Turkey, when she gave a talk to NATO officials about Delos. She remembered his intelligent questions after her talk his insights deep into people who struggled to make it in this tough world.

  She needed him, more than ever. And she knew how much Alexa needed her family right now. There she was, alone. Surrounded by enemies who hated her. And she was so beautiful—that was what bothered Dilara most. She knew her daughter’s beauty would single her out, and she’d be sold as a sex slave to some very rich man in Asia, Europe, South America, or the Middle East.

  She pressed her hand against her stomach, not trying to stifle her emotions but to feel them and allow them to roll naturally through her. It was painful, but at least she wasn’t like most men she knew, who pushed their feelings down and later fell ill because of it.

  Wyatt led Dilara to the door of the War Room and placed his eye against the retinal scanner. Once inside, he released Dilara’s elbow and she moved over to where her husband sat with Tal and several other mission planners. Robert quickly rose, pulling a chair over so she could sit at his left elbow.

  “What is the latest?” she asked in a hushed voice. She saw that Tal looked pasty, her eyes red-rimmed. Her oldest daughter, usually so strong, resourceful, and steady, had been crying. Who hadn’t? She saw the concern and care burning in Wyatt’s eyes as he sat down next to Tal, his arm across the back of her chair, giving her a gentle touch to comfort her just a little.

  Tal said, “The SEALs have infiltrated the landing location. No one’s injured. They’re heading toward the cave, and we have a drone over them. They are not picking up infrared signatures except for some small mammals on the mountainside.”

  Robert placed his arm around Dilara’s shoulders in her black wool coat. Usually beautifully dressed and made up, today she was so damned pale that his heart ached. Robert wished he could do something for his suffering wife, but there wasn’t much anyone could do at this point. “The moment we see any human activity, we’ll be in touch with that SEAL team,” he promised her.

  “How far back do those caves go?” she asked hollowly, gripping the linen handkerchief in her lap.

  “Dilara,” Wyatt drawled, “they go on forever. The SEALs mapped this complex eight years ago because they found a makeshift hospital within it. The SEALs w
ho first bumped into it went in and found empty syringes, bottles of medicine, bandages, and other medical items.” He put the schematic of the cave system up on the screen for her to look at. Taking his laser pointer, he used the red dot to show her the area where the captives were led into the complex.

  “Good God,” Dilara whispered, her hand moving to her throat. “There must be forty different caves in that mountain! How do you know where Alexa and those other poor women are?”

  Robert grimaced, his arm tightening for a moment around her shoulders. “We don’t. I wish we did, Dilara, but there is no satellite, drone, or anything else that can go through hundreds of feet of solid rock to see what’s on the other side of it. I’m sorry.”

  “Then what is the plan? Surely there is one?”

  Wyatt used his laser pointer. “See this cave here, and how close it is to the surface of the mountain ridge?”

  Dilara squinted. “Yes.”

  “There’s an entrance there. It’s big enough to place a team of SEALs down through it; they can get into the cave system that way. If we don’t see any human activity in that major cave, they’ll shift tactics and enter through that opening. They’ll have to be very quiet and extremely careful. The first thing they have to do is figure out where everyone is. They’ll have listening devices on them to pick up sounds.”

  “But,” she sputtered, “it’s dark in there!”

  “Yes, it sure is,” Wyatt said with a faint smile. “This team is wearing infrared goggles, and they can see no matter how dark it is. They’re carrying M4s with silence suppressors. And they walk quietly, anyway. That’s our backup plan.”

  “How many enemy are in there?”

  Robert gave his wife a pleased look. “You missed your calling. You should have been in the military, Dilara.”

  That brought a small smile to her lips. “I use my keen strategic mind to run Delos. That’s quite enough,” she replied. She saw Robert wink at her, pride in his eyes for her astute intelligence and her ability to grasp a military tactical situation.