by J D Lasica
She aimed at the top of the complex—don’t want to hit Bo—and opened fire, chewing up the top of the bamboo structure. Incognito and Lucid saw they were directly in the line of fire, so they veered away from the building, off to their right. An armor-plated SUV appeared on the service road to the north. Incognito and Lucid jumped in and the vehicle tore off down the road.
The guards took to one knee and returned fire with their SCAR smart rifles. Nico scrambled behind a two-foot tree stump while she took cover behind a big fallen tree trunk. Viper made a flanking maneuver to her nine. Automatic gunfire crackled. Rounds shredded the slightly elevated ground behind her. A spray of bullets ripped into the tree trunk, keeping Nico from firing a shot.
It might have been an even match, the guards’ SCARs versus her HK416, but it didn’t factor in her penchant for long-range precision marksmanship. She did a commando crawl to the lopped-off edge of the desiccated tree trunk and found a clear shot. She went with a fifty-meter zero, a good, flat trajectory for her targets a hundred meters away. Her finger kissed the trigger and she watched the rounds slam into the guards’ torsos. Through the scope she saw the bodies flop lifeless to the ground.
Nico rose to her left. “Field is clear.”
Viper marched toward her, his face a dark storm. “You had a clear shot at Incognito. Why didn’t you take it?”
She hesitated. After Dallas and now here, her kill count was up to three. She didn’t want to get used to this.
Viper’s veins popped from his neck. “You always cut off the head of the snake.” Kaden thought that was ironic, coming from a guy named Viper. Was he right? She had a split second there where she might have been able to take Incognito down by shooting him in the back.
Viper turned to go. “You’re gonna get your father?”
She nodded.
“I need to find Judy and the others.” Viper headed east, back to the apartment units.
“We’ll be right behind,” she said.
She and Nico neared the Archery Center. The door was locked, so she yelled a warning to stand clear and she blasted the lock to hell. She opened it and inspected the interior with Nico right behind. She gave the all-clear call for the main room.
She entered the manager’s office in the back. Bo was there in the far corner, gagged and tied to a chair. She ripped the duct tape covering his mouth.
“Bo. Are you all right?”
“I’m good. What about Bailey?”
“Bailey’s fine—for now. But we need to move. We’re easy targets here.”
She finished untying him. If I could just get everyone off this island, everything will be all right.
“Still all clear,” Nico said, peering out the front entrance. “But not for long.”
Bo stood and grabbed her by the shoulders. “My God, what did they do to you?”
She didn’t care about the blood on her outfit. It was mostly Savić ’s. The painkillers had kicked in. As long as she could run, they could hold off the enemy. “We need to go.”
The three of them sprinted out the door.
54
Samana Cay
Volkov and Lucid hustled into the armor-plated black SUV at the far end of Immersion Bay. They entered through the open door on the right side as the vehicle shielded them from the intruders’ weapons.
During the commotion, Volkov needed to remove his ski mask for an unimpeded view of the threat and to take evasive action. The mask lay on the ground outside the archery building. As he entered the vehicle, he saw the driver looking away as he’d been trained. Unlikely he’d seen Volkov’s face.
With the dark tinted privacy window raised, the driver peeled out on the service road to avoid gunfire. “Where to, Chairman?”
“Headquarters,” he barked.
Sitting in the belly of the SUV, he and Lucid came face to face for the first time in four years. There had been one earlier misbegotten encounter, only a few fleeting seconds long, when Volkov had entered a meeting room by mistake. Lucid—candidate for chief operating officer of Samana Ventures—was sitting at the conference table.
Volkov hired him rather than kill him.
Volkov leveled a hard stare at Lucid. “Don’t get used to this. You’ve seen me unmasked once before and lived not to tell about it.”
Lucid cast his eyes at the passing landscape and said nothing.
“Mobilize the National Guard reserves,” Volkov ordered. “We need every able-bodied man deployed to neutralize the threat.”
Lucid took out his phone and tapped out orders to the field commanders. “On it. Should I increase the island’s threat level?”
“Yes. Threat Level One—Critical.” Every CCTV camera, every sensor on the island would now make tracking of the intruders a critical priority. Every citizen would receive a text alerting them of the threat. “Make sure you circulate photos of the terrorists.”
“Including Bailey Finnerty?”
“Including the girl. Offer a reward.”
Just before the shooting started, he and Lucid had received notifications from Immersion Bay security forces that Savić was down and Kaden and Bailey had escaped.
“Done,” Lucid reported.
Volkov looked out the window at the dark clouds gathering in the distance beyond the emerald hillside and Guava Ridge Estates. The vehicle exited the service road and turned left. They were now speeding west on Columbus Highway.
“When we put down this rabble, have someone retrieve my bike and helmet from Immersion Bay.”
“Your Harley? Yes, sir.” He sent out a brief voice text and put away his phone.
It was odd, relying on Lucid to issue orders instead of doing it himself. But he’d be back in his office soon enough. He’d turn it into a makeshift command center until the terrorists could be brought to heel.
“Are things on track with today’s big shipment?” Volkov asked.
The Plant next to the Lab had been producing new batches of the next strain for deployment. Lucid had arranged for containers of the treated water to be stored in the hold of Kasparian’s luxury ship, the Seaduction. It would be disguised as Samana Cay spring water in five-gallon water cooler dispensers to get past U.S. Customs.
Lucid nodded. “Six o’clock tonight. We’re all set.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Volkov saw Lucid shoot him a discreet look once, twice.
“What is it, Lucid?”
“Chairman, if I may. I’ve been on board with Project Ezekiel, with using the Paranoia Strain to sow discord in the West. To foment fear and civil unrest in the population. It’s a genius plan when facing an enemy with a vastly superior military. Early reports are that the Paranoia Strain is having the desired effects.”
Volkov peered out the window at the thicket of woods blanketing War Games Valley. “I’ve been monitoring the news as well. Phase One is meeting expectations. But we need to accelerate the timetable. Send Kasparian a message. We want to strike the next targets immediately. Today’s incursions show we have vulnerabilities.”
“Chairman, what will the Fantasy Strain do?”
“Give us a new beginning.”
“But what specifically will the new strain do?”
“Stay in your lane, Lucid. Enough questions!”
He calmed himself by recalling a passage from Ezekiel 5:17.
So will I send upon you famine and evil beasts, and they shall bereave thee; and pestilence and blood shall pass through thee; and I will bring the sword upon thee.
Three, four minutes passed in silence. Finally Volkov said, “The terrorists. We need to draw them out.”
Lucid furrowed his brow, then he whipped out his phone. “I have an idea, Chairman. Actually, two ideas. Oh, this is good!”
55
Samana Cay
Kaden, Bo, and Nico ran side by side along the trail leading back to the apartment units. Viper was scouting out this area to find the other prisoners. But they needed a plan and they needed to get out of sight—fast.
&nb
sp; “Any ideas?” Bo seemed out of breath already.
Kaden tried to recall any suitable venues she’d seen that would give them cover. “We passed a building that looked vacant on the way over. There it is.”
It was large and gray, the color of a dirty puddle. The name in front said, Art Barn. She ducked inside. Empty. The lights were off but a skylight scattered the afternoon rays every which way. The main area was a ceramics studio with art sculptures and pottery—no doubt made by the kidnapped girls—scattered on workshop tables on three sides. She spotted a wooden ladder halfway across the room. It led to a loft.
They climbed it. Perfect. It gave them a hidden place to figure out next steps. They slumped down against the side of bound bales of straw.
“Weapons check?” Bo asked.
“Two Heckler & Koch HK416s,” Nico said, indicating the assault weapons they got from Viper. “And you can have your Scorpion back.” He handed Bo the handgun.
“We need comms.” Kaden turned to Nico. “Let me borrow your phone. I need to access my accounts. See if Bailey’s all right.”
Nico handed over his phone and she went to work. She wasn’t sure if the Wi-Fi signal was strong enough to bring up Amelia. Instead, she logged in and saw a message from Annika.
“Good news.” She looked up at her father. “You know that guy Carlos and Tosh were tracking in Zug? The one who led you to the meeting of the Compact?”
“Sure,” Bo said. “I assume they tracked him here?”
“Better. He’s one of these biohack types.” She was always careful to avoid the word “freak,” given how often it was wielded as a weapon against her when she was a kid. “He’s even implanted a video camera into his eye. Annika and Sayeed just hacked the feed.”
“Damn, they’re good,” Nico said. “Red Team Zero 1, Island of Misfit Psychopaths 0.”
“What else?” Bo asked.
Kaden read a second message. “They tried to access Samana Cay’s internal security system but they can’t break into the servers.”
“I thought your people could hack into anything,” Bo said.
“These guys are extra security-minded. Their servers may be on a private network. We could be looking at an air gap.”
“Try English,” Bo said.
“Corporations and government offices with sensitive materials sometimes cordon off their servers from the Internet. So you have to physically access the facility if you want to hack in.”
Bo frowned. She doubted he understood, but no time for a remedial hacking course.
“Any word from Viper?” Nico asked.
“Not yet,” Kaden said.
“What about Bailey?” Bo had hope in his voice for the first time in a while.
“No. But I can see she’s just left Immersion Bay. She’s on the move.”
“Thank God.”
Nico peered around the loft for a lookout perch, but there was none up here. “Rachel’s place is a couple of hundred yards from the marina where Viper docked. Should be a fast extraction.”
Bo nodded and forced an unconvincing smile.
“Let’s do a reality check.” Kaden had learned a lesson during her boot camp training. Don’t go off half-cocked until you have a solid plan. “We have Viper approaching the apartment units, looking for his wife Judy.” She looked at Bo. “Was Judy with Tosh and Carlos earlier?”
“Last I saw,” Bo said. “But that was before I threw a chair through the window.”
“I’ll let Viper know.” Kaden sent off a quick voice text. “Now, what about Paul Redman, Alice, and Charlie?”
Bo glowered. “They were separated from us. But I heard one guard talk about other prisoners. So they’re probably nearby.”
“That’s good. Alex may or may not be with them.”
“Listen, Kaden. This isn’t your fight. I’m responsible for you being here. Look at you, you’re a mess. Now that we have Bailey, I say you, Bailey, and Nico get off this island. That should be priority one. Nico can drive Viper’s boat. I’ll stay behind and look for the others.”
She thought it over. Tempting, the idea of getting off this rock, taking her shiny new sister to safety. Maybe even bonding. She’d already gotten her revenge against Savić. Her part of this mission was done.
Bo added, “At the very least, go to Rachel’s and be with your sister. Your mother would have wanted you to be safe.”
She retrieved the small photo of her mother from her shirt pocket. Looking at it, she smiled. Her mother died when she was three. She had only the vaguest memories of her mom, but she remembered her smile, her laugh, her boundless affection for her little girl.
She could choose love, safety, normalcy. Nobody would blame her. Or she could stand shoulder to shoulder with her father and his righteous anger, trying to help the others escape.
“I’m not abandoning you,” Kaden said. She’d turned out more like her father than her mother.
“Headstrong, like your dad,” Bo said.
“I think the word you’re searching for is ‘independent.’”
Bo smiled, but it came with a sadness he couldn’t hide. He had something else to say. “If you’re staying, now’s the time for all cards on the table. The next few hours may be life or death. When I was tied up waiting for the end to come, well, you start thinking. About the things you’ve done. The things you didn’t get a chance to say.”
He looked over at Nico, who put up his hands and said, “I’m not here.”
She wondered what he was about to share. He kept too much inside. After her childhood with her fake parents and grandfather who abandoned her, she just wanted him to be genuine. That was her line in the sand. No deceit or lies.
Bo edged closer, but he was still a good five feet away, back against the bales of hay.
“I’ll make this quick. Kaden, I didn’t tell you everything in the diner about those early days. After your mother died and your grandfather decided not to keep you, I took you in.”
“You took me in?”
“For three weeks.” He wrung his hands, lowered his head so his voice was barely audible. “I tried as best I could as a single working father. The foreign assignments were brutal, and a nanny just wouldn’t work on a government salary. But it was more than that. Every time I looked at your face, it reminded me of Deirdre, and it broke my heart. So I gave you back.”
She looked away, trying not to tear up. “You gave up on me?” She thought of all those years with the fake parents Blackburn had hired.
“I’m sorry. I screwed up.”
She was crushed about what could have been. But maybe she could make a difference with Bo and Bailey.
“Have you told Bailey about what you do?”
Bo looked up, surprised. He started to say something. Maybe something like, “That’s none of your business.” But he thought better of it. Instead, he said, “Can we do this later? She knows I work for a government agency. Or used to work. I’m on leave.”
She let that new wrinkle slide. But her sister needed a cold dose of truth. Kaden fetched Nico’s phone from her lap. She punched in the shortcode to dial her wearable device.
“Bailey? You safe?”
The video on the pendant was jumping around like crazy, but she could hear her sister. Bailey was hurrying along a walking trail. “Yes, we’re good! What about Dad?”
“He’s safe.” Kaden switched to the phone’s rear lens to show their father, who rose and came over.
“Sweetheart. I’m okay. You too?”
“Thank God! Okay, are you meeting us here? Can we get out of here?”
Bo looked from the video chat to Kaden and back. “Sweetheart, we have to go rescue the other prisoners. They’re still somewhere in Immersion Bay.”
“But—how is that your job? Why not the Navy or Marines or CIA?”
Kaden nodded, urging her father to tell Bailey the truth.
“This really isn’t the time, sweetheart,” he began. Kaden shot him daggers, so he relented. “I formed a spe
cial ops team to rescue you.”
“But—you always said you were a paper pusher. A bureaucrat.”
“I was a field operative. I couldn’t tell you the truth—for your protection.”
“What? You were a spy!” Bailey looked flustered. “So all those trips?”
“Overseas assignments.”
Bailey looked on the verge of tears. “Is that—is that the reason I was kidnapped?”
“I don’t know. I gotta go.”
“All right. Be careful, Pop.”
“I will. I love you.” He shut his eyes.
Kaden ended the call. That was tough to watch.
Bo straightened. “Fantastic. I could be killed in a few minutes and my last conversation with my daughter was about how I’d lied to her all these years. Happy now? See! That’s what the truth gets you.”
He stormed off to the other side of the loft.
Nico stood and grabbed his HK416 from on top of the bale of straw. “So. What’s the plan?”
Nico’s phone buzzed in her hand. But it was an incoming call for her.
A call from Alex Wyatt.
“Alex, is that you?” she said.
“Kaden? Yes, it’s me.” She recognized his distinctive accent, Miami by way of New Jersey. “Don’t have much time. I managed to distract one of the guards and grab my phone from the other room. We’re locked in the Dance Studio.”
“How many of you?”
There was a slight pause. Then he said, “Four. Paul, Alice, Charlie, and me. Where are you? Can you help us break out?”
“I’m close by.” She didn’t want to give away their whereabouts.
“Guard’s comin’.” The line went dead.
Kaden rose to her feet and Bo came down the rows of hay to see who’d called.
“Sorry for before,” he said. “Who was that?”
“Alex. He and the Axom crew are in the Dance Studio, about 300 yards from here.”
“All right, then.” Nico headed toward the top of the ladder. “We have our target.”
They moved through the thin woods rimming the south end of Immersion Bay, figuring that was a safer bet than a straight shot across the exposed grassy field. Kaden remembered passing it on her dash to free Bo, and they now approached it from the rear. They gathered in a thicket of brush behind the studio, a one-story affair with a wide thatched roof and light-rose stucco exterior. Viper was waiting for them there after Kaden had messaged him.
