Absolute Doubt (Fallen Agents of T-FLAC Book 1)

by Cherry Adair

  Rafe rubbed his jaw as realization dawned. "This means the Nuts were perfected years before we learned they even existed."

  "Yeah." Daklin crouched down on one knee to inspect what they were dealing with, and responded almost absently. "Which means he's been working on a different delivery system for a hell of a lot longer than a couple of years. What the fuck is it? How would we know what we’re looking at is a bomb and not a fucking. . .cupcake?"

  Hunkering down beside the opening, he visually inspected what they were dealing with. Not just bad. Catastrophic. His watched beeped the countdown. 15.05.00. 3:05 P.M. He automatically synced it, to the second, with the tiny countdown clock wired into the cording.

  It showed today’s date, and the timer.

  Before her unexpected death, Seymour had planned this detonation for exactly this date and time. They'd checked their records. Sullivan was correct. This was Seymour's date and time of birth. "Five Nuts?" A few seconds later he got confirmation from operatives in London, Barcelona, Moscow, Tokyo, Mexico City, and Sao Paolo. In each location, they’d uncovered five Nuts. Same det cord. Same timer set to Mountain Time Zone, which was Montana.

  In those population-dense cities, the explosion would go up and out, flattening buildings in a fifty plus mile radius, killing millions upon millions of people. "I have Dr. Sullivan on his way. He's out of time, and out of options. He will tell us how to defuse this. Stay with me."

  A Nut, half the size of one of these, had annihilated the bomb lab and everything in a one-mile radius. The small outlying building, constructed of the same materials as the HQ building, had been decimated, leaving nothing but a smoking crater. That Nut had blasted through high-tech, explosion-resistant concrete walls reinforced with short steel fibers, with a tensile strength ten times higher than normal steel-reinforced concrete. The explosion had sliced through the bombproof wallpaper, titanium doors, and bombproof glass like a samurai sword through a cantaloupe. It had splintered trees, and crushed his truck to sheet metal.

  That had been just one half of one of the Nuts now residing in the wall, eleven floors beneath the ground. There were five full Nuts here. Glossy. Black. Lethal.

  The same Nuts were in six other locations worldwide. All set to detonate at 3:33:00 his time.

  They had twenty-eight minutes. Fuck.

  Daklin estimated the size of the crater the explosion would produce, should they detonate inside a twelve story building deep underground. It would create a void of upwards five miles in depth and diameter.

  And if it happened in a busy international airport, near a city center? Many hundreds of thousands of people would die today unless he contained the E-1x and got it as far away from HQ as possible in the short time they had left.

  Rafe dropped down beside him. "Honey informed me that Seymour had been in for a psych eval and spent the night here. We checked. This floor was under construction five years ago. Once we had the new intel, we decided to rip out the walls."

  Pissed, Daklin bit his tongue. There was no point now, but Goddamn it, the fucking walls should've been the first place to look. Cunning Seymour had been nothing if not thorough. She would've seized any opportunity to fuck with them. She must be laughing her ass off right now from her home in Hell.

  "Rip ‘em out on every floor that was under construction for the last ten years. She was Machiavellian enough to use the construction to hide more Nuts at various locations. Check for patches, unusual finishes, anything out of the ordinary. When in doubt rip it apart. We have less than twenty-eight goddamn minutes, people. Go."

  Twenty-Three

  "Move," Daklin ordered two rookie operatives standing back to observe. They ran, speaking into their comms as they went.

  15:04:43

  "Get that?" he demanded of Control.

  "On it."

  Daklin shot a glance at the men standing nearby. "What are you waiting for? Move!"

  Up and down the wide corridor, operatives armed with tools immediately started hacking away at bombproof wallpaper and sheet rock to search between the steel studs inside the walls. Two of Navarro’s team arrived at a run, pushing a small flat cart. "Packing's here." They moved the cart into position.

  "Ready?" Daklin waited for Rafe to maneuver into a crouched position beside him, balanced on his back foot so they could swivel toward each other to get the bomb onto the cart. "Let's get this show on the road and fuck Seymour's plan." Gingerly Daklin slid his hands under the first three conjoined Nuts as Rafe did the same with the trailing two. So lightweight, yet capable of causing so much damage. There was six inches of slack in the cord between each Nut. They moved slowly, painfully aware that any jolt that caused the Nuts to touch, or a tug on the det cord, and it would all be over. The other two guys slid the cart fractionally closer. They'd padded it with a nest of Upsolite-filled blast blankets. There wasn’t enough of the diffuser to mitigate the explosion, but it was a safer way to convey the explosives to ground level where the others waited.

  All they had to do was lower the Nuts so they didn't touch, and haul ass up top. Daklin’s attention was pinpoint and focused, but he couldn't forget that six other teams worldwide were dealing with massive issues of their own.

  "For Christsake, don't let them touch. Slow and steady. Ever see anything like this det cord?" he asked Rafe as they moved in unison and practically in slow-mo.

  About 2-mil long and dark green, the plastic-like covering consisted of two strands twisted together like a rope. The thinness of the wiring in no way represented the amount of power it would generate.

  "Never. But I'd sure as hell like to get a closer look when we aren't about to be blown to hell."

  Yeah, so would he. "Everyone got a plentiful supply of Upsalite?" Daklin did. But it was eleven floors up. For now, this small amount would have to do. He got a succession of yeses from the others on the comm.

  Upsalite technology had been in its infancy when Josh had been killed, but a highly motivated Daklin, a group of T-FLAC scientists, and a dozen bomb techs, had worked to perfect the formula over the past eighteen months.

  In a larger amount, not only could the beads absorb a massive shockwave, but each bead's surface was also porous. The walls of each one of the millions of beads could absorb a plethora of liquids. The wall of just one gram of Upsalite was over eight hundred square meters, meaning the product could not only absorb eight hundred times its weight in liquid but, theoretically, could dissipate a massive shockwave. The product had been tested on a much smaller scale. And it had worked. Now it was SOP on bombsites. Because of the massive weight of the amount needed at HQ, it hadn't been brought down the elevator to the eleventh floor. But it was on site. All they had to do was get this safely up to ground level where the larger quantity of Upsalite waited.

  Daklin knew the quantity of Nuts that each location had discovered. Each location had enough Upsalite on site.

  "Where the fuck's Sullivan?"

  One issue at a time.

  Nuts first.

  Nutcase second.

  3:05:01

  Simultaneously he and Rafe gingerly lowered the string, the Nuts, and the timer onto the nest of blankets.

  "Here," Gibbs said quietly.

  In his periphery, Daklin observed the scientist’s loafer-clad feet beside those of assigned jailer as the bombs came to rest with the gentleness of a mother lowering her child into its crib. He ascertained that there was no possibility of them touching by carefully filling the spaces between them with loose Upsolite beads. After layering the bead-filled blankets over the Nuts for transport, he got to his feet. "Start talking, and no bullshit. It’s time to shit or get off the pot, Dr. Sullivan."

  Sullivan gave him a sulky look. "What if I want to get off the pot?"

  "I'll haul you off by your fucking balls. Detonation is set at 3:33 p.m." Daklin studied him carefully, then added, "Your sister's in the building."

  15:07:00

  Thank God Dare had by now taken River above ground and had her at a saf
e distance. The only people still in the building were those ripping the place apart at a furious rate, and the skeleton staff in the Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility down on the twelfth floor. The SCIF room was the nerve center and brains of T-FLAC, and every technology was in play to keep the separate unit inviolate. It was electronically secure, and as blast proof as Fort Knox. But they hadn't fucking known about E-1x when it had been constructed.

  Support was still vital for operatives in the field working on unrelated ops worlds away. If T-FLAC HQ was high security, the people inside SCIF were protected by even more bells and whistles. The nerve center had been constructed with the highest of high tech materials.

  Daklin knew they'd be transferring intel and personnel to one of their other servers in the subterranean vault inside hidden salt mines in Kansas. They should be able to operate without too long a lag time. In some cases, though, the delay of seconds could mean an operative’s life. The SCIF team was determined to wait until the very last minute.

  This was the fucking last minute.

  "Alert SCIF to start evacuation," Daklin said into his comm, his voice low. "Are you willing to kill your sister, Dr. Sullivan? Because in a few more minutes, this will no longer be a theory."

  Shoulders hunched and not making eye contact, Dr. Sullivan jingled the change in his pockets. "She shouldn't be here."

  And he'd fucking completely missed the point. "No shit. But she's directly below us right now, so you'd better defuse this shit fast."

  This was already a goatfuck of gigantic proportions, and Daklin had to depend on a man who'd had to be drugged so they could drag bits and pieces of information out of him. He manipulated his comm, wanting the operatives in the field attempting the same thing to get the info in real time.

  He wanted options in case the Upsalite didn't fucking work. There couldn't be enough backups in this case.

  "You don't want her to die. Defuse this or we'll all die together." He nodded to the two men to take the cart up to ground level. They knew to move at a snail's pace.

  “Do me a favor. Kill the fucker. Make it hurt. A bomb blast is too clean an exit for this guy,” the operative in Barcelona said in his ear.

  3:08:55

  "Oliver!" River shouted from the other end of the corridor, her voice cutting through the sound of drills and hammers, and the low hum of voices.

  Daklin's blood froze and it felt as though his heart stopped. No. She was with Dare. She should be at ground level, far enough to be out of danger.

  But fuck no. She was here on level eleven. At ground fucking zero. Her eyes blazing, her booted feet ate up the distance until she stood toe to toe with her brother. Behind her, Dare caught up, looking just as pissed as Daklin felt. They'd have words later.

  River white-knuckle gripped a lowered Glock in front of her with both hands. "Answer Ash right freaking now, or I'll shoot you right here, right now, Oliver."

  3:09:03

  Two-handed, River raised the gun to point at her brother's chest. The gun looked enormous and unwieldy in her slender hand, a hand that shook with nerves and anger. "Talk, Oliver. One--"

  "Lower the gun, River. I've got this." The chance of her over shooting and hitting the Upsolite covered bombs was high, especially given the confined space and her lack of skill.

  River's attention remained fixed on her brother. Daklin could easily overpower her, but he quite liked the idea of her taking out her dick of a brother. "Go," he instructed the men with the cart as they hesitated. They hauled ass down the corridor heading for the elevator.

  15:11:54

  #

  She wasn't going to lower the gun. The only way River knew to resolve this was to threaten to shoot her brother. He couldn't doubt she'd do it, when she was standing here with a gun pointed at his chest.

  River was aware of Ash standing three feet away. He could disarm her with some clever move, but he was just watching her with those crystal blue eyes, his mouth a grim line. Every muscle in his body seemed coiled, ready to spring, but he stayed put.

  "He won't respond to you. But he will to me." She met Oliver’s eyes, the same eyes she saw in the mirror every morning, but without the light. "Tell him, Oliver. Tell him right Goddamned now, or I will shoot you."

  "Catherine said you wouldn’t understand. Poor, simple, River who just likes pretty things. Can’t you see what’s at stake? How these people aren’t protecting you? They’re holding you hostage. You’re just their tool. Just like Catherine was.”

  “Stop talking about your damn psycho girlfriend and tell Ash how to defuse the bomb!”

  “You don't know how to hold a gun, let alone shoot one."

  River squeezed the trigger. Oliver stumbled back when she shot him in the thigh. She was just as shocked as he was. She'd been aiming for his shoulder.

  He doubled over, clutching his bleeding leg. "Jesus Christ, River, have you've lost your-—"

  "Two." Her fingers buzzed, and her arms shook. “Oliver Michael Sullivan, you'll tell Ash exactly what he wants to know, and you'll do it right now. Next time, I'll hit an organ." Or the wall, or Ash. She repositioned the barrel to take aim at her brother's chest.

  Blood ran between his fingers, quickly seeping into the leg of his neatly pressed khaki pants, then dripping onto his shoe.

  River wished she'd stop shaking, wished the sick fear in her stomach would stop backing up into her throat. More than anything, she wished it hadn't come to this. But wishes wouldn't get Ash and his men what they had to have right now. The time to beg and plead had long since passed. "Talk!" This time, despite the inner nerves, her hands didn't waver.

  Ash talked quietly into his mic. Giving quiet orders, he fixed his attention on Oliver.

  "Two seconds and then I'll shoot you again. If you refuse to help them, then you're more trouble than you're worth. To them." River paused. "To me. At this distance, I'll hit you somewhere vital."

  "All right, all right," Oliver said, white-lipped, eyes blazing. "I need a gallon of oil."

  "What kind of oil?" Ash demanded.

  River shot him a quick look. He believed her brother? "Oliver, if this is your sick idea of a joke. . ."

  "Cooking. Engine. Doesn't fucking matter. Just bring me a gallon of oil."

  Asher didn't quibble. "Cooking. Mess, two floors up. Move it." He waved Ram Ortiz over. “Stand by in case this asshole passes out from blood loss. Operatives?" When they checked in, he repeated, “Oil. Any kind.”

  "You'd let me bleed to death in front of my sister?"

  Ash shrugged, eyes hard. "She's the one who shot you. What do we do when we get the oil?"

  Oliver's face was a set, pale mask. "I'll do it."

  "No. You won't," Ash informed him, his voice icy. "Tell me what and how, and I'll do what's necessary. River, go topside, and wait for me."

  Her jaw hurt from clenching her teeth. "If you and Oliver and all these other people are staying, I'm staying."

  "3:17:00." Ash noted the time.

  River's internal organs contracted with stress.

  "I suggest you lay out those instructions fast." He looked down the hall, presumably to see where his men were. River suddenly noticed that far from this drama playing out, the operatives were still tearing the walls apart.

  She hadn't even been aware of the noise as she confronted Oliver.

  "Where else did Seymour plant Nuts in this facility?"

  Oliver's smirk made River's finger twitch on the trigger. "There was no need for more. What you found is enough to take out half of Montana, you moron. She didn't know she'd be long dead and fucking buried before she'd see the fruits of our labor. Don't you get it? Even way back then, she planned to bring down T-FLAC from the inside." Oliver’s laugh turned to a grimace as he shifted, and blood welled from his leg. He shot River a menacing look, his features contorted by the pain. "You'll pay for this, River."

  River had zero sympathy, and didn't mind in the least watching her brother suffer. "You'll pay for this, Oliver. I'm th
e one with a gun in my hand, surrounded with men with bigger guns and better aim."

  Oliver looked back to Ash. "This is Catherine's retaliation for you bastards killing her. She set this one. But I was the one to order the others placed to coincide with this explosion." He pretended to raise a glass. "Happy birthday, my darling."

  "Most men would get their girl a fucking cake." Ash rose when two rookies came in, each carrying gallon jugs in each arm.

  The guy on the left said, "We have olive and canola oil."

  "Cut the top off the canola," Oliver ordered. "One will do."

  Ash used his utility knife to cut away the top of the plastic container, then set it on the floor.

  "This is still in the experimental stage," Oliver told him, his voice surly, eyes cold. "I'm not sure if it'll work."

  With lightning speed, Ash grabbed Oliver by the front of his shirt, lifting him onto his toes and pressed his gun under his chin. "Stop fucking around. I don't give a shit if you've made peace with your maker and are willing to die here and now. But trust me, I won't let it be fast, and I sure as shit won't make it painless. Tell me what to do with the oil."

  What chilled River to the core was her brother's expression. He didn't give a damn who died here today. Not himself, not her, not hundreds of T-FLAC operatives and personnel in the building. Not the countless thousands, maybe millions, of people the other bombs would annihilate. His gray eyes looked flat. He wanted to die.

  The knowledge sickened, saddened, and infuriated her.

  "Let go. I'll show you."

  "In your fucking dreams. Bring back the cart."

  Ash had two conversations going on. River got it. It felt like hours later, but was probably only seconds, when two men materialized beside Ash, pushing a small flatbed cart. She kept her eyes on Oliver, the whole time, watching his expression for any sign of what he was going to do. God only knew.