Authors: Kathleen McCabe Lamarche
Cassie leaned forward, hanging onto the sharecropper-turned-hacker's every word. “And?"
"Remember that cop I talked to in Quincy? Well, someone questioned why yer car was parked at the airport all day, and that cop remembered you. Well, what with one thing leadin’ to another, it looks like the FBI has narrowed their search for St. Joan to this area and think that you've hooked up with her. They have orders not to harm
you
, but those don't extend to St. Joan. Or anyone else.” He stopped, letting his words sink in. “And, since I was seen with you, it won't be long before they're on my doorstep."
"But I heard you say, or rather imply, that I am in danger, too,” Cassie said.
"Well, we're hoping that you aren't,” Selena said. “But, well, Joshua, you go on."
"There was some mention that your ‘protector,’ as they phrased it, might have to yield to the, uh, ‘greater good,’ and if that meant goin’ against his demands, well, so be it."
Cassie stood and walked across to the front window, listening to the wind rustle through the trees. Somewhere in the distance an owl
whoo'ed
into the darkness.
My protector. Uncle Hamilton maybe?
She shook her head.
Trust no one ...
Her thoughts vanished at the sight of headlights approaching from the distance. Dozens of them. “It looks like you've got some late-comers,” she said, pointing out the window.
Joshua leaped from his chair and looked outside. “Counter action one,” he ordered, striding toward his wife's bedroom.
A split second later, Cassie found herself being pulled by Selena into the bedroom, where she grabbed the computer, the satchel, and her suitcase while Selena rearranged the sheets and bedspread. Within moments, they were out the kitchen door and fleeing through the cornfield between the house and woods. Behind her, the air was filled with the sound of motors, shouts, and then ... nothing.
Coarse leaves grabbed at Cassie's face, her arms, her legs. Her bare toes sank into the soft earth, and the smell of withering corn filled her nostrils as she struggled to follow Selena. The small computer, suitcase, and satchel grew heavier with every step. For a moment, she thought she'd lost her way and stopped, listening for the swoosh of Selena's progress through the cornstalks.
"I'm right here, Cassie,” Selena whispered in the darkness, as if sensing her confusion. “Just follow the row that you're on. I'm just a few steps in front of you."
Cassie took a deep breath and obeyed. Perspiration seeped from her forehead, stinging her eyes. Mosquitos buzzed around her ears and nose. She longed to set her burdens down and wipe her face, but whatever had happened back at the farmhouse urged her onward. As she trudged ahead, her mind sifted through what had just occurred and their well-orchestrated retreat. Joshua had gone to his wife's room with the stocky, brown-haired woman following close behind. The others had spread out through the house-Cricket and the baby-faced man to the kitchen, the bespectacled man and the tall, broad-shouldered black man to the dining room. By the time she and Selena made it to the kitchen and out the back door, it appeared that everyone had left except Joshua, who was walking out onto the front porch, closing the door behind himself.
Suddenly, the ground beneath her bare feet changed. No longer was she walking on bare earth but on pine needles and leaves. The cornstalks stopped cloying at her, and there was a sense of openness as the smell of pine trees filled the air that now stirred freely across her skin. She felt Selena's hand on her arm.
"Just a little farther,
Querida
. Then we can rest."
"Okay,” Cassie managed, her voice hoarse.
True to her promise, Selena led Cassie about forty paces deeper into the woods and stopped in a small clearing studded by large tree stumps. The moon cast just enough light to allow Cassie to see three shadowy figures pulling something from what looked like a pile of branches. Cricket was one of them. Upon seeing the two women approach, she walked over and handed a canteen to Selena. “I reckon y'all need some o’ this,” she murmured.
Selena smiled and nodded, her white teeth visible even in the dimness. Cassie watched her take several short sips, more aware than ever of her own thirst and the oppressive heat that enveloped them. When the canteen was finally passed to her, she gulped the lukewarm water, savoring the feel of it sliding down her throat.
"Not too much, girlie,” Cricket said, taking the canteen from her and screwing the cap back on. “We can't know how long we'll be out here or whether we'll have to move on."
Cassie relinquished it without enthusiasm, picked up her belongings, and picked her way to the nearest big tree stump, eager to rest at last. As she pulled the hot gloves from her hands, a soft crackling noise off to the right drew her attention to the men across the clearing. One of them was doing something to a small ...
radio.
The guy with the glasses was trying to send a message.
"Sentry Jericho to any cluster. Code alpha, bravo, alpha, alpha. We have condition orange. Repeat. Condition orange. Over...” A burst of static was the only reply. He tried again, and then a third time, adjusting the controls with each attempt. Still there was no response. He stood a moment, wiping his glasses with his shirttail, then stooped again as static sliced through the air, followed by a woman's voice.
"Alamo to Sentry Jericho. Charlie, bravo, alpha, bravo. Repeat message. Over."
Four-eyes raised the mike quickly to his mouth. “Roger, Alamo. This is Sentry Jericho. We are in condition orange. Repeat. We have condition orange. Over."
"Understood, Jericho. No others have reported the same. Repeat. So far, your condition appears to be isolated. Alamo standing by. Over."
Cassie watched Four-eyes stand, wipe his forehead with the back of his sleeve, and turn to speak to the baby-faced man beside him. A moment later, Selena and Cricket were at her side.
"What's this all about, Sel ... St. Joan?” she asked, looking from Selena to Cricket and back again.
"Apparently, the Feds were closer than we realized. We thought we had at least until tomorrow."
Cassie's mind raced.
The Feds don't play games.
She looked up into Selena's dark eyes. “What about Joshua? And his wife?” she asked, then remembered, adding, “and the brown-haired lady?” She paused, realizing that someone else was missing. “And where's the black guy?"
"We won't know until someone lets us know,” Selena answered, “but we've planned for this carefully and have practiced many times. We clear out, everyone taking anything that could implicate Joshua as part of our effort. We have kept a close inventory and are always ready to move it. Joshua stays behind. He is, after all,
expected
to be there. It is his home. Lourdes, eh, the brown-haired woman, pretends to be nursing Joshua's wife, and Joshua goes outside to ‘see what all the fuss’ is about. Daniel, the black man, is a trained commando. He stays behind, too, as our lookout and first line of defense. If all goes well, the agents will be caught off guard by Joshua's friendliness, will take one look at Aggie-you saw all the gadgets and gizmos the doctor has her hooked up to-and think they've made a mistake."
Cassie thought a moment. It sounded too simple
not
to work. “But what about your cars? When they see them parked at the house, it'll be a dead giveaway,” she asked Cricket.
"There is only one car. We all rode with Lourdes."
While Cassie digested what she was told, Selena and Cricket moved away, each to a different tree stump as a thick blanket of silence fell over the clearing.
Daniel hunkered down between the limbs of the large live oak that grew about fifty yards from the side of the house. The AR-15 assault rifle was strapped across his chest. Shouldered and ready to fire was the scoped Ruger 10/22-equipped with a homemade silencer and thirty-round magazine of sixty grain super sub-sonic “brain scrambler” sniper bullets. All the lights were on inside-according to plan-allowing him an almost clear view of what went on, especially in the bedroom where Aggie and Lourdes stood guard over their precious cache. It had taken years to amass the guns and ammunition, hand grenades, tear gas, and, most precious of all, the two shoulder-mounted rocket launchers and three cases of rockets. Daniel reached cautiously around to check the razor sharp Commando knife he had sheathed on his belt at his back, making sure he hadn't lost it in his hasty climb up the tree. It was there. His last line of defense.
So far, all had gone fairly smooth. The others escaped into the cornfield just moments before the Feds surrounded the house. Joshua had played his part perfectly, but the Feds-all dolled up in full assault gear, right down to the wide goggles and Kevlar gloves-behaved true to form. They'd shown no warrant and didn't bother to identify themselves.
Those
procedures had disappeared with the raid and kidnap of that Cuban kid from his uncle's home in Miami. Daniel grimaced at the sight of Joshua still pinned against the house by three of them, a rifle barrel held to his cheek by a fourth one.
Plans were fine, but Daniel trusted only himself. He had survived in Afghanistan against the ruthless Al Queda, because he expected just one thing-the unexpected. So far, the Feds had done exactly what they always did-surround the house, blocking any exit through doors or windows, while a good fifteen or twenty of them stormed through the doors.
He'd had to force his finger away from the trigger when five of “America's finest” swarmed into Aggie's room, shoving little Lourdes into the corner away from Aggie, whom she'd been trying to protect. One of them had started toward Aggie, but, thankfully, had been pushed back by another, who gestured toward the slings and cables that kept Aggie's spine in position. They'd ransacked every other room in the house, near as he could see, even the refrigerator-slinging food everywhere for no good reason. But Aggie's bed-and the floor beneath it-had been spared. So far.
Daniel held his breath. A big man had entered the bedroom and was interrogating Aggie. Lourdes, still cornered, was talking and gesturing toward the bedridden woman, but stopped suddenly when one of the officers stuck a rifle in her face. The 9 mm. Beretta in Daniel's belt dug into his stomach, but he ignored the pain and stayed motionless, hoping he wouldn't have to use any of his weapons. There was no way he could match their firepower, and he was in no hurry to die. Still, if they got too close, he'd have to fire. The cache had to be protected-at any cost.
He squinted down the barrel of his rifle at an officer who was rummaging around under Aggie's mattress. Probably hopes to find a gun. They'd need nothing else to send the two women and Joshua off to prison for ten years. Would they send Aggie to jail? Probably. If she had a gun, she'd be a “danger to society” even though she was already the prisoner of her own body. Bastards. A blood-curdling scream reached out through the open window as the officer tried to lift the mattress beneath Aggie, and Daniel felt the trigger against his finger. Cold, hard, deadly. But another officer shoved the mattress back down and pushed his comrade away. So, at least, one of them is halfway human, he thought, letting his breath out but not relaxing his grip.
A small female marshal entered the room. From the reaction of the others, it was clear she was in charge. Daniel watched a lengthy exchange between her and the big man who'd been interrogating Aggie, then she gestured for Lourdes to be allowed back to Aggie's side. Leaving only one man behind, she led the others from the room.
Movement on the porch drew Daniel's attention from the scene in the bedroom. Joshua was moving toward the front door, followed by two of the men who'd held him pinned against the wall. The other two moved down the steps toward the vehicles. It was a good sign. Their excuse for being there was St. Joan, and she was not there. And if Godiva was also on their list, they hadn't found her either.
Strike two
. Daniel almost allowed himself to smile.
The woman in charge appeared in the kitchen, issuing orders of some kind, and within moments, the officers moved outside to the yard.
Oh, God. Don't let them start searching out here
. Daniel's prayer was answered as he watched them mill around aimlessly for a moment then make their way toward the front of the house and the vans and SUV's that had brought them. He sat statue-like, afraid to breathe, while two of them passed close beneath him.
"Wild goose chase,” one of them said, sounding bored.
"Yeah. Well, the one thing you can count on in this job is screw-ups,” the other replied.
A voice from the front yard barked for everyone to “step it up,” and the two men double-timed it toward the waiting vehicles.
Daniel waited until they had all rumbled out of sight, and Joshua appeared in the bedroom window to give him the all clear signal before abandoning his hiding place. Placing the sling of the rifle across his chest, he adjusted its weight against his back, leaving his hands free to climb down, but suddenly froze as a lone figure moved around the back corner of the house.
They've left one here. No. There'll be two of them.
Daniel waited, not daring to move, when the shadowy figure moved away from the house toward the tree. His scalp prickled. Twenty yards away. Ten. Ten feet.
Daniel jumped. He felt the man's body crumple beneath him, heard the breath escape his lungs, and before the man could react, grabbed his forehead and chin, yanking his head backward and around. There was no mistaking the sharp cracking noise nor the sudden limpness that followed.
With a quick look around, Daniel stood and raced toward the wall of the house to hide in its shadows. Every nerve in his body tingled. His senses strained to hear, to see, to smell the presence of the second man he knew was somewhere close by. Wishing that Joshua would turn off some of the lights that bled from the windows into the yard, he edged along the wall toward the back of the house. Nearing the kitchen, he hesitated. Light poured from the back porch into the yard. He dropped to the ground, thanking God for the unenclosed crawl space under the house, and removed the rifles from his back and chest, careful not to make a sound. Placing them behind the brick support column, he took the Beretta from his belt and shoved it into his hip pocket, then crawled beneath the house and bellied his way toward the far side.