RITUAL SACRIFICE: The Ultimate Alpha Female & Political Corruption on the West Coast (Noah Reid Action Suspense Thriller Series Book 5)

by Wesley Robert Lowe

  Noah, the Dragon Emperor, snaps out deceptive kicks with the blade of the foot. Then with full fists, he lashes out at Chin’s head, arms and torso. Noah mixes the moves unpredictably, keeping the Tiger Master off guard, switching from soft to hard movements with the speed of a heartbeat.

  But Chin has one advantage over Noah. He has been pushing his body to the limits in rehab for months. The Tiger Master has one more gear in his arsenal.

  “Hit me!” Chin screams.

  Noah swings, but Chin cockily sidesteps him.

  “Again!” mocks Chin.

  Noah delivers an arcing leap kick to Chin’s chest, but Chin grabs Noah’s leg, twists it and sends him floundering to the ground. “You are going to give me the money now, Noah. You are going to transfer all of the funds left in the foundation’s account into mine, and I am going to complete the deal for Coyote River.”

  Three martial arts star fly at Chin. Bull’s eye at the forehead, throat and chest.

  Falling to the ground, Chin sees Prez driving his own dao into his heart.

  Chin doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t need to. Prez has done exactly what he would have done. Protect his own interests. He was testing her by saying that he would take the money, not Prez. She passed with flying colors.

  “I’m proud of you, Prez,” utters Chin with a dying breath. “You have proved yourself.”

  Noah turns to see Prez and Turk. Prez has a Komodo tooth on Olivia’s jugular and a hand over her mouth. Turk has a Komodo tooth directed at Kathy’s eye.

  “The funds will go into my account,” says Prez simply.

  “It’ll never go through,” says Noah.

  “I wouldn’t count on that,” says Turk. “A certain amount of legal documentation will work wonders.”

  “Don’t do it, Noah,” cries Olivia. “It’s against everything we stand for. It’s against everything, you, your parents, my parents, Master Wu stood for.”

  The lines are as corny as the corniest of B-list movies. Except for one thing. This is real, this is life and sometimes life is cornier than fiction.

  “Olivia, I could never live with myself if I let you and the baby die.”

  Olivia nods. Suddenly, she lunges at Prez. Prez, not expecting this, severs Olivia’s jugular. Blood gushes from her open vein.

  “No!” screams Noah. He jumps up and rushes to Olivia.

  He kneels before her. “Why? Olivia, why did you do this?”

  Olivia touches Noah’s face. “Because you would never let me die, and that is absolutely the wrong thing to do.” She smiles the smile that lights Noah’s heart for the final time. “You made me happy, Noah”

  “Don’t talk like that, Olivia.”

  She touches his lips. “I love you.”

  With that, Olivia closes her eyes.

  “Who else do you want to see die?” says Prez, now with the dragon’s tooth at Kathy’s throat.

  Noah walks up to Prez, unbuttoning his shirt as he approaches.

  “What are you doing, Noah?” yells Kathy.

  “Olivia’s not around anymore, so I’m free,” says Noah as he tosses his shirt to the ground.

  His eyes search Prez’s. “I want to finish what we started yesterday.”

  For a fraction of a second, Prez lets down her guard and drops the dragon’s tooth away from Kathy.

  That moment is all Kathy needs to break free from Prez.

  BANG! GANG! Prez and Turk are both shot. There’s a bullet hole in the middle of Prez’s forehead and another over Turk’s heart. They turn around to see Brad with a smoking revolver in his hands and his arm around Kathy. It’s the same gun he tried to shoot Noah with, but this time he didn’t miss.

  “I couldn’t let them do that to Kathy,” say Brad. “I love her.”

  ***

  The announcement by the tribal council was delayed by half an hour. That’s because the council had yet another meeting to conduct.

  First item was to accept Sally’s resignation from the council.

  Second was to swear in Brad and Kathy as Turk’s and Sally’s replacements.

  Third was to rescind yesterday’s vote and go with Noah’s proposal.

  Then they are ready to have the public meeting in the school’s field.

  Noah addresses the three hundred attendees.

  “The Chad Huang Foundation is happy to donate five million dollars to the new Coyote River Youth Center. The purpose of the funds is to pay off all loans to any financial institutions, government or tribal organizations so that the center will be completely debt free. There is also adequate funding to ensure that there will be half a dozen staff members whose salaries are guaranteed for the next five years, after which I hope Coyote River will be self-sustaining. I have every confidence that Brad and Kathy will make excellent co-directors of the new organization.”

  “Thank you, Noah, for your generosity and faith in Coyote River. We’re planning a celebration tonight in honor of this new direction and hope you will say a few words,” says Chief.

  “Thanks, Chief, but I’ve got a plane to catch to New York in a few hours, and then I go to Hong Kong later tomorrow. Besides, you don’t need me. You’ve got everybody here you need.”

  Chapter 22

  “Am I going to have spend the rest of my life watching after you?” says the bandaged Sam in his hospital bed to Noah.

  “Actually, I think I’ve finally got rid of you,” grins Noah.

  “What?” Even though his face is hidden by dressings, Sam’s voice sounds his concern.

  Noah pulls open the curtains surrounding the bed to reveal Sam’s buddy, Walrus, standing there.

  “It means you are going to be my brother,” states Walrus. “Somehow, Noah was able to pull it off in the last couple of days while you lay on your ass, sleeping. I took the first plane out here when I found out.”

  Being adopted by the Potter family was something Walrus and Sam talked about but never really thought would happen. But when Walrus thought he was going to lose his friend, he spilled his heart out to Noah.

  “We’ll see what we can do,” was the former lawyer’s reply.

  Working on this was good therapy for Noah. Otherwise, he would just brood about the loss of Olivia. A few phone calls did the trick. Sam’s jailed father and drug addict mother were happy to give up the son that neither of them had interest in anymore. Especially when Noah added ten thousand American dollars in cash for quick signatures.

  “So, bro, what’s happening?” says Sam, cocky attitude back in place.

  “Mom was talking about moving to Vancouver.”

  “With Dad gone and you now part of the family, why not spend some time in Hongcouver? (The nickname given to Vancouver due to the abundance of Chinese living there)”

  “So when do we go?”

  “Duh, you gotta get outta here first.”

  Noah quietly leaves the two new “brothers” and steps out of the room.

  He’s going back on the road.

  ***

  This is Noah’s final meeting as the president and as a member of the Chad Huang Foundation. Zach will take Noah’s position. His father, invited as a guest, watches with pride, sorrow and uncertainty.

  “Thanks for doing this,” says Noah to the junior and senior Doctors Tang in a private booth in a Canal Street Chinese restaurant in New York.

  “It’s not every day someone asks me to run a two-hundred-and-fifty-million-dollar youth fund,” says Zach. “Any specific instructions?”

  “Nope. When I give something up for someone else to do, I have to trust that they know what they’re doing. My resignation is effective immediately.”

  “What are your plans, Noah?” asks Zach’s father.

  “I’m going to Beijing.”

  “Then what, Noah?”

  “I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

  “Can I suggest that you visit the Temple of Heaven in Beijing?” asks Dr. Tang.

  “I’m not really in the mood for sightseeing.”
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  “I’m not suggesting that go there for that. I’m suggesting you go to find your soul.”

  Noah looks at the elderly man curiously. “You’re the third person to have told me to go there. My father and Master Wu and now you. But they themselves never went. Why do you suggest that?”

  “Because I did go when I was young. Noah, you don’t feel that anywhere is home for you, do you?”

  “Well, I’m a white guy born in Shanghai and raised in Hong Kong who went to university in California. And I was raised by Christian missionaries and mentored by a Shaolin. I’m neither fish nor fowl, Oriental or Occidental, East or West.”

  “Or maybe you’re completely bi-cultural. And that’s why I suggest the Temple of Heaven. Earth meets the sky there, not physically, but spiritually and psychologically. Many years ago, I went to seek direction.”

  “And?”

  “I came to New York to be a doctor to primarily illegal Chinese immigrants. Like you, I am part of The Way of the Tao and the Way of the Fish.”

  ***

  After landing in Beijing, Noah takes his time to get to the Temple of Heaven. It’s quite the ride of discovery. There is the so-called Bird’s Nest, the spectacular National Stadium where the 2008 Summer Olympics were held. Swiss and Chinese built and designed, Noah looks hard, but despite the East/West connection, this is not the direction of his future—it is a glorification of man, not the spirit.

  Just a few minutes from his destination, Noah passes the bustling Wangfujing shopping area. Olivia’s favorite part of Beijing, where commerce has been going on since the Ming Dynasty, seven hundred years ago. While she loved the upscale shopping malls where she could buy Gucci or Prada, the musician in her delighted in poking through the vast variety of Chinese flutes and violins of Chinese instrument shops and street vendors.

  From this mecca of commercialism, it’s only a few minutes to Tiananmen Square where the huge portrait of Chairman Mao at the entrance of the Forbidden City greets him. It is a symbol, or maybe embodiment, of the dichotomies of China—the idealism of student reformers, the site of the ancient Imperial Palace, the founding father of the People’s Republic. Noah is beginning to sense who he is.

  From here, he walks the half hour to the expansive park where the seven-hundred-year-old Temple of Heaven complex of buildings stands. What is remarkable about this building is that it is a monument to a single deity that the Chinese call Shang Ti. Because of the religious practices associated with the building, many feel that this temple is proof that God revealed Himself to the ancient Chinese.

  Noah has never been here before, but he came because he wanted to be somewhere where he could feel as if it were home. Here, at the Temple of Heaven, he feels God breathing His Spirit on him. At the same time, Noah can sense Shang Ti’s presence throughout.

  His father told him about a distant relative, a great-great-great granduncle James Legge, who was a missionary to China and the first Oxford professor of Chinese who had translated the works of Confucius into English. It was reading Reverend Dr. Legge’s work on the Chinese that convinced Noah’s father to go to China.

  Noah needs to do two things here. One is to discreetly dispense Olivia and his unborn child’s ashes here. That won’t be too hard. It’s an ugly day, and almost no one is here to watch. He lifts the lid of the little urn and throws the ashes into the air. He watches wistfully as the wind lifts the gray powder into the air and spreads the particles to the universe.

  Noah then leaves the temple and finds an old, knotted and gnarled cypress tree.

  He sits under it closes his eyes, meditates, and prays. This is the second thing he needs to do.

  Discover your inner being. Find your soul. Connect. All clichés. All completely applicable.

  His thoughts are guided by the teachings of the great influences in his life.

  One is the Way of the Fish. His parents were Christian missionaries, full of love and enthusiasm for the Jewish carpenter who claimed to be the Son of God.

  The other is the Tao, called The Way, or what Chinese feel is the primordial essence of the universe.

  By dinnertime, Noah opens his eyes and stands up. He has made his decision. He will be both old and new, East and West, yin and yang. Call it a new creation or a rebirth, but the old Noah is gone.

  Like his parents and Master Wu, he will not charge anything for his efforts but knows that somehow, “The Lord will provide.”

  And no longer will he rely simply on The Way of the Shaolin.

  He will follow the legacy of his physical and spiritual ancestors. He is fully Christian, and he is fully Shaolin. There is no conflict. There is synergy.

  And there will be a new beginning.

  INTRODUCING RAYNA TAN

  The Rayna Tan Series is our new Action Thriller series featuring twenty-six-year-old Rayna Tan. RECRUITED, the opening novella, is the story of why chose to leave the secretive world of the elite Canadian Forces Special Operations counter-terrorism unit (JTF2) to join an even more shadowy operation, Fidelitas. She’s a fascinating character: stunningly gorgeous, IQ off the charts, a sniper in the league of Chris Kyle… Flaws? Naturally, but she’s definitely one very dangerous and very human lethal weapon.

  RECRUITED EXCERPT 1

  Irbil, IRAQ

  The mission plan came together quickly.

  It had to. Otherwise, the four missing US and Canadian forward air controllers wouldn’t last long. The Special Forces team disappeared while calling in air strikes for the 17A Kurdish Peshmerga Brigade a day ago. Every hour they were incommunicado lowered their chances of survival exponentially, assuming that they were still alive.

  For two weeks, two thousand Kurds on the east and west flanks had been battling ISIS in Naraj, a Northern Iraqi city, trying to take back key supply routes from the Jihadis. It had been a seesaw battle with huge losses on both sides. While the Kurds appeared to be winning now, a video text message was sent to the base in Irbil, then forwarded to the Canada United States Expeditionary Targeting Force (CANUS-ETF) command center four hours earlier. CANUS-ETF was an elite group of under two hundred US and Canadian Special Forces operators formed to engage high-value targets in the border area of Syria and Iraq.

  A simple film that changed everything.

  In the video, eight masked insurgents in a large room held the four missing CANUS-ETF soldiers hostage. One of the insurgents who was standing by the coalition fighters fired four bullets, one into the leg of every man. He turned to the camera and growled in crude English, “No man going anywhere. You want back. One hundred million dollars. Cash. Leave in truck in front of Malla Square. Tomorrow, before evening prayers.”

  There was no way the Canadian and American governments were going to pony up the money the Islamic terrorist hostage takers demanded. While the natural desire was to send in a squadron of planes to “blast those mothers to kingdom come,” everyone knew the best possible chance of rescue was to deploy a small strike team of the best combat rescuers.

  Finding the hostages’ location was remarkably easy—it took the geeks at Naval Intelligence less than an hour. So easy that it raised hackles of suspicion throughout the US and Canadian chain of command. Were the hostage takers leading them into a trap? Were they a splinter group with insufficient knowledge to know how to hide their whereabouts properly… well, none of that was important. All that mattered to the high command was getting their boys back.

  No matter the cost.

  With more than six hundred combat missions under his belt, thirty-one-year-old American Navy Seal Captain Jonathan Rogers was an easy choice to head this hasty mission.

  While not usually enthused about relying on foreign allies, Rogers smiled when he learned that his Canadian counterpart from JTF2 would be twenty-six-year-old Rayna Tan. He’d met her three years earlier, back when he was an instructor on a three-week jungle warfare training stint in the Philippines. She was bright and deceptively strong, sure, but what really mattered was that she was so much more creative tha
n the typical breed of Special Forces warriors. Friendly, but not friends, they were familiar enough to call each other “Jon” and “Rayna” instead of addressing each other by the typical practice of using their surnames.

  ***

  On the outskirts of the war-ravaged town of Naraj, a lightless and decrepit three-story building beckoned. A lone man with a rifle sat outside the front door, but there were no other signs of life for blocks in any direction. Even the thermal sights couldn’t detect anyone inside.

  A few kilometers away, Rogers lowered his high-power binoculars and rolled over. He twisted around and gave a thumbs-up to his recon team, all lying prone on the hillside around him.

  “Oh yeah, this is the target all right. Even a graveyard isn’t that quiet.”

  His earpiece squawked with the chirpy voice of the main assault team leader.

  “Snake 6, this is Butterfly 6. What’s the status? Are we a go or no go?”

  Rogers raised his thermal sight and studied the roads around the target. There he finally found some heat differentials. Small ones hidden in bags lining the streets. He marked the IEDs on his handheld “battle tracker” computer with little interest—bombs were hardly big news in this part of the world. What really nagged at him was that in all his years in the sandbox, he’d never hit such a valuable target before with so little time to prepare.

  Well, plans were just details. The fundamentals wouldn’t change no matter what trap the enemy had set up. The name of the game was surprise, speed and violence of action. The SEALs would breach via the ground floor, while JTF2 breached from the roof. From above and below, they’d storm the building, converging on the second floor to free the hostages. He whispered in his radio.

  “You ready, Rayna?”

  “Ready like Freddy.”