by J. B. Turner
“What the hell are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m trying to minimize the chances of thermal-imaging cameras picking us out.”
“Does it work?”
“It’s not foolproof. But if our clothes are wet, it might fool the technology for a few minutes.”
Stone noticed that the two boats were still approaching. “Fuck!” he said.
Beatrice was lying on her stomach beside him on the sand, the mangroves providing cover. “What do we do?” she whispered. “They’re coming from both sides.”
Stone saw that the boat on the northwest side of the island was about twenty yards offshore, edging slowly toward them. He saw the silhouettes of four men on board. Their chances of overcoming four operatives were not great. “Gimme the backpack.” She handed it to him and he pulled it onto his back. “Head down. We’re going to crawl back the way we came. Do you understand?”
Beatrice didn’t respond; she seemed to be in shock.
“Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
Stone began to crawl across the sand, through the stand of mangroves. Beatrice was right behind him. He caught sight of a boat with one man in it, driven partially up the beach. He took off the backpack, reached in. He felt Beatrice virtually on top of him. “You need to keep down.”
“My God,” she whispered, “who’s that?”
“It’s one of them. The people I was telling you about.”
“They’re going to kill us?”
“That’s their plan.” He handed her a 9mm Beretta, pulled back the slide, and flicked off the safety. “This is locked and loaded. Only pull the trigger if this guy gets me or if I say so. If he gets me, take the fucker out. Then get in his boat and get out of here.”
Beatrice took the gun.
“Do not point it at me, do you hear?”
She was shaking, huddled beside him. “I got it.”
Stone reached into the backpack and pulled out the military crossbow. He looked through the sights at the silhouetted figure who had jumped out of the boat.
“What are you going to do?”
“Quiet,” he said.
Stone held his breath as he lined up the target. He focused. And waited. And waited. Then he squeezed the trigger.
The bolt hit the man square in the chest, and he collapsed onto the sand.
Beatrice gasped.
Stone felt adrenaline surge through his body. He got up and hauled Beatrice with him as they dashed down the beach toward the high-powered airboat. He picked her up and virtually threw her into the boat, along with the backpack and bags. Then he hauled himself on board. He started up the engine and headed out of the shallows, careful not to stall the engine.
He switched on the GPS and saw their position east of the island. He maneuvered the boat slowly around the northern tip and then headed out half a mile into the channel and cut the engine.
The boat drifted.
“What are you doing?” she whispered.
“Be quiet.”
Stone took out the rifle and locked the magazine into place. Lined up the sights. Crouched low. He saw four figures on the beach through the crosshairs, their boat unattended.
He got the fuel tank in the crosshairs.
“Wish me luck,” he said.
“Oh my God . . .”
Stone held his breath and pulled the trigger three times. The bullets ripped into the gas tank, blowing the boat to pieces in a fireball explosion.
“What the fuck have you done?” Beatrice shrieked as the sky lit up around them.
Stone started up the engine and they sped south, away from the men. Shots whizzed over their heads.
“Stay down!” he shouted.
Beatrice peered over the bow of the boat.
“I said get down!”
Suddenly a bullet whizzed by.
“Aren’t you listening? Get the fuck d—”
Before he could get the word out, Beatrice let out a piercing scream and clutched her shoulder.
Thirty-Two
Catherine Hudson stared in horror as the real-time feed of a fireball in the Everglades lit up the screen in her Arlington office. She felt as if she were going to be sick. She kicked over a trash can. “What the fuck is going on?”
She began to pace up and down the office, seething at the sequence of events that had spiraled out of control.
Hudson fumed as she tried to gather her thoughts. She wondered who she should call first. She sent a text to Black, updating him and asking to speak immediately. A few moments later her cell phone rang.
“Catherine, is this secure?” It was Black.
“Yes, sir. Secure line.” She succinctly explained what had just happened out in the wilds of the Everglades.
Black sighed. “I don’t get it.”
“I’m looking at the footage right now; the sky is lit up like a bomb went off. I wouldn’t be surprised if they can see it in the Keys.”
“Are you kidding me? They had him surrounded? Shouldn’t they just have shot up Stone’s boat? He couldn’t have gotten far after that.”
Hudson felt sick. “I don’t think they’d located the boat yet. I believe they were eager to get onto the island and shut it down really quick.”
“Eager to get onto the island? I can’t believe we’ve gotten to this stage. This was all about self-containment, plausible deniability. We had no fingerprints. An explosion means the coast guard and the local police. It means explanations will have to be provided. God knows where it’ll end.”
“Sir, that’s exactly what I was trying to tell you. We need to shut this operation down.”
“Okay, we are where we are. I assumed with de Boer and his guys on it, this was a slam dunk. Turns out I was wrong.” Black was quiet for a few seconds. Then he swore. “What’s so difficult about wiping this fucker out?”
“Stone is resourceful. Smart. We trained him, after all.”
Black was silent.
She wondered if her comment had come across as a rebuke, so she pivoted. “The question is, Where do we go from here, sir? Doing nothing is not an option.”
“What we don’t do is interfere with the work of de Boer, Berenger, and the Commission.”
Hudson sighed, frustrated. They had to do something.
“There must be no trace of our involvement,” he said. “That was what we agreed when the Commission was green-lighted.”
“Sir . . . I have to disagree. Say he gets to shore, sir. And hands himself in. Says he’s Nathan Stone. And tells the full story of what he knows about the Commission. What the hell happens then?”
Black sighed. “I’m going to have a stroke with this bullshit.”
“Sir, I’d like to make a suggestion.”
“Yeah, go ahead.”
“No direct interference. Agreed. Also, let’s leave aside any talk of dismantling the Commission for the time being.” She knew she wasn’t going to get any traction there, so why waste her breath? “What I propose is a shadow operation.”
“By us?”
“By contractors, not us. You know the guys I’m talking about?”
“Yeah, they’re very good . . . Interesting.”
“It’s paramount, of course, that this is off the books. The budget might be tricky.”
“Leave that to me. We’ve got numerous ways of doing sensitive jobs.”
“I propose that I lead this. I created this. I will resolve it.”
“I can’t put anything in writing.”
Hudson knew what that meant. It meant that if there was blowback, she alone would take the fall. A rogue midlevel CIA operative. And those at the highest levels of the Agency would be protected. “I’m aware of the implications, sir.”
“Are you?”
“Absolutely, sir. I know how it works.”
“You will be putting yourself at risk, hypothetically, if things go to shit.”
“Once we don’t take risks, we’re not doing our job. I remember you said that
at a seminar once.”
Black sighed. “Your grandfather was the same way. He was all for blurring boundaries.”
“Then it’s only fitting. Leave it to me. I’ll put in the calls.”
Thirty-Three
Stone turned off the engine and let the airboat drift while Beatrice screamed incessantly in pain. He took off his soaking shirt and ripped it into strips.
“Motherfucker!” she yelled, gritting her teeth.
Stone kneeled down beside her. He touched the wound and felt the warm blood on his hands. “You were lucky.”
Beatrice was arching her back, eyes shut tight. “What? Are you kidding me?”
“An inch to the right and the bullet would’ve ripped through a major artery.”
Her skin was cold to the touch. It wasn’t good. But Stone couldn’t tell her how bad it was.
He wrapped the shirt strips tight around her upper arm to stop her from bleeding out. He pulled the ends as tight as he could.
“Fuck!” she yelled. “You bastard!”
Stone knotted the strips even tighter. “We need to stop the bleeding.”
Beatrice began panting as the pain and shock really kicked in.
Stone held her hand. “I will get you help. I will not leave you. I promise.”
“I need to go to a hospital. Fuck.”
“Leave it to me. I know a doctor.”
“What? I want to go to a hospital, motherfucker!”
“No can do,” Stone said.
Beatrice cried in pain. “What? Please . . . I don’t want to die!”
“You go to a hospital, they will find you. And then kill you.”
“Have you lost your mind? I need hospital treatment. I need to see a surgeon. I need civilization!”
“If you go to a hospital, two things will happen. First, they will get the bullet fragments out of your shoulder and save your life.”
“That’s a good thing! Thank the Lord.”
“But second, they will know where you are. And you will be neutralized in the blink of an eye. Your name will register on the hospital computer. And they will be watching for things like that. Do you understand?”
Beatrice was breathing hard. “I’m bleeding out.”
“I know you are. I will get you help. Trust me. Do you trust me?”
Beatrice fell silent and closed her eyes. She was losing consciousness. Fast.
Stone scrambled across the boat, back to his seat, and started up the engine. He hit the gas pedal. He set the course for an isolated area of the Lower Keys.
The airboat sped across the water as Stone prayed he could get Beatrice to dry land before it was too late.
Thirty-Four
De Boer cradled Bakker, crossbow bolt in his chest. His gut felt empty. He had lost Pieter, the younger brother he had always looked out for. Now Kevin had lost Bakker, one of his oldest friends. They’d grown up together in rural South Africa. Farm boys.
He, and only he, was responsible for both their deaths. He could have tasked someone else with the missions. Pieter didn’t have to go out on the motorcycle. And Bakker should have stayed with him on the lead boat. What the hell had he been thinking? Now he had lost both of them. A brother, his flesh and blood, and his closest friend. And for what? For a mission that was doomed from the get-go.
De Boer cradled his friend as the other operators crowded around on the beach, feeling himself being engulfed by a raw fury. He was in charge of this whole fuck-up.
He felt an arm around his shoulder as one of his team consoled him. “Kevin, I don’t know what to say.”
De Boer took a few moments to compose himself. He imagined his father in Pretoria, his reaction when he heard the news. He wouldn’t say much, if anything, but then would retire to his room. Alone. To grieve. That was how his father would deal with it. He would retreat into his shell, not wanting the world to see his pain. Then he thought about his mother. She would be crushed to know that her beloved youngest son had died in some fucked-up operation that wasn’t even his fight. He imagined that his parents would be better able to deal with it if Pieter had died serving their country. But he hadn’t. He’d died as a mercenary. For money. Nothing more, nothing less.
And now Roel Bakker. One of the good guys.
Fuck. In the name of God, why? And for what?
He began to push those thoughts to one side, as he had been trained to do. He had the rest of his life to grieve. Besides, Pieter and Roel had to be avenged. Pure and simple.
De Boer carefully extricated himself from cradling Roel and signaled everyone to gather in front of him. He looked around at the faces of the tough operatives who were left. “We’ve got a job to do. We need to focus and do it. Pieter and Roel are no longer with us. God bless them. My brother, however, was not the sort to countenance any sentimentality. To him, it was all about the here and now. So the operation goes on. Am I making myself crystal fucking clear?” Nods all around. “Can you hear me, Sarasota?”
The voice of the computer whiz. “We hear you, sir.”
“Stone and the woman, son. They were both there. The flare went off! We should have had them. So, where are they now?”
The computer whiz said, “I have night-vision footage from a long-range drone up on one of the screens.”
“And?”
“It took longer than expected to get this operational,” the computer guy said, “but it is what it is.”
De Boer nodded. “How long has it been active?”
“It left the airfield in Miami four minutes ago. Fixed wing. Range of three hundred miles. Full capabilities. We’ll find them.”
De Boer knew using the fixed-wing drone was his last option. It would be picked up by radar; he knew that. But as long as they kept away from military facilities and civilian airports, they would hopefully be fine. He thought of his brother again. Roel lay with a blanket over him, waiting to be evacuated by a backup team. Kevin felt as if his heart had been ripped out. His soul. He felt like breaking down. But he didn’t.
De Boer stared at the sky and looked around. The Everglades. The islands. The water. The thick, ancient, forested wilderness.
The computer guy said, “We’re going to have the drone fly to Cormorant Key and head south from there. It’s equipped with heat sensors and advanced facial recognition software. I swear to God we will find them, Kevin.”
“Height?” de Boer asked.
“It’s flying at ten thousand feet, so they won’t even know it when we do find them.”
De Boer’s cell phone rang.
It was Berenger. “Kevin.”
“Sir . . .”
“Christ, this is terrible. I want to express my deepest condolences to you once again.”
De Boer sighed, never feeling more alone. “I appreciate that, sir.”
“It might seem like the wrong time to raise this, but I’m going to raise it anyway.”
“Sir?”
“Both Pieter’s and Roel’s wives and family will be well looked after. Financially, I mean.”
De Boer didn’t know what to say. He had just lost his brother and his best friend. But he felt compelled not to tell Berenger to go to hell.
“Anyway, I’m really sorry for your loss.”
“Shit way to go. But . . . we all know how it works.”
A long sigh. “Kevin, if you want off this job, I’ll understand. I want you to know that I value your expertise and I believe you should have the time and space to grieve in peace. This is too much for one man.”
“Not an option, sir,” de Boer said. “I’m not walking away from the job that cost Pieter his life. And Roel. I’m going to see this through. I’m going to find Stone and the woman. And they’re going to pay for this if it’s the last thing I do.”
Thirty-Five
Stone pushed the airboat to the max, the saltwater spray drenching him, while Beatrice lay motionless. She hadn’t moved for nearly a minute. He negotiated the choppier seas away from the mangroves and seagrass. In the dist
ance, maybe a mile or so away, he saw lights. He slowed down. Then he took his foot off the gas.
He glanced at the GPS, then peered through the darkness. Up ahead was what looked like a bay boat, used in shallower waters to fish. As the bay boat drew closer, Nathan took out the 9mm from his waistband and placed it at his feet.
Aboard the boat were two big-looking guys, each with a can of beer in their hand. The boat’s powerful searchlight nearly blinded Stone.
“You okay, brother?” one of the men shouted across to Stone as they slowed down.
“I’m fine, man.”
“What the hell you doing out here?”
Stone realized the guys were blind drunk. “I was about to ask you guys the same.”
“Just some fishing. Came up from Cudjoe. Making a night of it. You want a drink?”
“No time, thanks.”
The younger of the two peered into the airboat. “Hey, who’s that? Is that a chick? Is she okay?”
Stone shook his head. “Shoulder was bleeding out, so I’m taking her back to dry land. Really need to step on it.”
“What the hell happened?”
Stone knew he couldn’t say she had been shot or they would think he did it. “Diabetic. Collapsed and lost blood as she fell onto the rocks.”
“Holy shit,” one of the guys said.
“Gotta get a move on, you see.”
“Sure, man. You want us to escort you back?”
“Much appreciated, guys, but I got this.”
The older man said, “You want me to call for help?”
“Already did,” he lied. “Really need to get going. Hospital is waiting. I think it’s superficial. Once she gets the insulin and they clean the wound, she’ll be fine.”
“She’s out of it, man,” the younger one said. “You need to get her to the hospital real fucking quick.”
The older man picked up the radio. “I’ll get on the hailing channel. Coast guard will be here in no time.”
Stone restarted the engine and gave a good-natured salute. “No need to confuse them, already done that. They’re meeting me a few miles south of here.”
“Oh I see. Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. They’ve got a medical guy on board too, so she’ll get help real quick, don’t worry. But I appreciate the concern.” Stone edged the boat forward. “Enjoy your fishing, guys. I need to get her to the doctors and they can patch her up good.”
