“The terrain will complicate things, especially if we have to hunt them into the mountains.” She spoke more for her benefit than his and made a mental checklist of her supplies. “We’ll pack water in CamelBak hydration packs, but not nearly enough if this takes more than a few days. That would be too much weight to haul. If necessary, we’ll have to purify what we find. And we’ll have field rations to supplement what we can’t forage on our own. Tracking these bastards, we won’t have time for hunting.” She rested a hand on her knee and stared at him. “We brought extra food and water for you and Joe.”
“Good,” he said. “Sounds like you’ve got things covered, but Joe will stay with the boat and handle getting us out. Does that work?”
Alexa nodded her approval. “You never asked for weapons. Do you have what you’ll need?”
“Yeah. Plenty.”
Spoken like a true mercenary,
she thought. And the expression on his face might have chilled her if she weren’t playing on the same team.
“Make sure you and Joe are ready first thing. We’re leaving at dawn.” She leaned back in her chair. “We’ll pick you up. You’ll meet the team and take us to the boat.”
“We’ll be ready. Anything else?” He was done talking and was giving her cues it was time for her to leave.
“There is one more thing. And it’s not good news, I’m afraid,” she said. That got his attention. “Garrett is tracking a tropical storm that’s forming in the Atlantic. It may hit Cuba and mess with our timetable.”
Kinkaid dropped his chin and let out a sigh with his eyes shut. He looked tired. It was the first time she’d seen a chink in his machismo armor. Whoever Kate was, she was a lucky woman to have someone like Jackson Kinkaid as a dark guardian angel. Lucky, that is, if you discounted being abducted by terrorists.
Kinkaid’s moment of vulnerability came and went.
“Shit happens. We’ll deal with it.” He stood and waited for her to do the same, not bothering with idle chitchat or pleasantries. He’d provided his part of good intel. Now he doled out the bum’s rush. No mixed signals. He wanted her gone.
He turned out the lights and opened the door for her to leave. When she walked by him, he touched her arm, and the scent of his warm skin mixed with soap carried on the faint breeze.
“I want to…” His handsome face was outlined by a streetlamp behind her. “…thanks for everything, Alexa. What you’re doing…I won’t forget it.”
“Let’s hope you still feel that way when this is over.”
She touched his cheek and stared into those green eyes but didn’t linger. She walked away and heard him close the door behind her.
Jackson Kinkaid might have distracted her by the sudden display of intimacy, but it didn’t stop her from wondering what else he was hiding. When it came to details of their mission, he was very forthcoming. Yet so much had gone unsaid. Gut instinct told her that.
Whatever he was hiding, she had a feeling she wouldn’t like it.
After Alexa left the motel room, Kinkaid collapsed onto the mattress and stared at the ceiling. The room was spinning, and he shut his eyes. When that didn’t help, he opened them again to find Joe staring down at him.
“This isn’t gonna work, Jackson. You can barely stand,” his friend protested. “How are you gonna tackle mountains in Cuba and a fuckin’ hurricane?”
“Like I said, I’ll pull myself out if things go bad.” After Joe backed off, he propped pillows behind him and sat up. “I’m gonna need pills from your doc. Antibiotics, no pain meds. I gotta think straight. Can you swing that?”
Joe pointed a finger. “Yeah, but I’m not happy, just so you know.”
“Duly noted. And thanks.”
His friend got on the phone to arrange for the boat and the antibiotics. Kinkaid shut his eyes again, know
ing his mind wouldn’t let him sleep. He had too much to do before dawn.
Most of all, he worried for Kate.
Kate had been right before, when she said she was surprised he remembered the day they met at the hospital. In truth his memory back then was not much more than Swiss cheese, riddled with holes that only merged together in a jumbled mess. What he had recalled might have been more attributable to what others had told him later, but one memory held firm.
He had remembered the heat of the sun on his face and the sudden rush of coolness when her shadow blocked the light and she sat next to him. She was a soothing touch when he needed someone to care. The world had carried on without him in shades of black and white—absent any color and mind-numbingly empty—until one day he heard a woman’s voice.
Kate’s voice.
She had engaged his muddled brain, even after he had given up.
Later, he learned that she sought him out each day. She read to him and talked with him as if they were old friends. It hadn’t mattered that their conversations were one-sided. Little by little, he began to listen to her. And one day, he said the first words he’d spoken in a long while.
It had been a start.
There were days since then that he wondered if her efforts had been worth it. His cynical nature made for a tenacious adversary. But as relentless as Kate had been with him back then, Kinkaid wouldn’t give up on find
ing her now. In his mind, her life tipped the scales in importance when compared to his. Any lifeline she’d given him years ago, maybe it had been for a reason.
He owed her his life, such as it was. The least he could do was return the favor, even if it meant risking any future he had.
Southeast Cuba
With the strain of the day, Sister Kate felt her body shutting down. Her throat was parched and her mouth bone dry. She had climbed rugged mountain trails through a dense, bug-infested jungle. And despite the stress her body had endured, she noticed her sweating had stopped and muscle cramps in her legs and back had grown more painful.
She knew the symptoms. Dehydration had hit her hard. And yet her captors had no mercy. Only now, after a full day of climbing, had they gotten any water at all. She shared her tin cup of water with the children, giving them the rest after she’d taken a small sip and held the moisture in her mouth.
Hunger made her stomach growl as she watched the men eat in front of them at the campfire. On the trail they had discarded their masks and she’d been shocked to see their young faces. Most were under twenty. They looked Middle-Eastern, but she had no more understanding than that. Dark-skinned boys with the hardened eyes of hostile men, obsessed with ideologies she would never comprehend.
Kate held the children. Listening to the sounds
of their breathing, she knew Andre and Daniel were asleep while Faye and Joselyne kept their eyes on the men near the fire. They clutched at her tunic with their small hands. Firm, tense grips. She felt their bodies tremble and could do nothing about it. The ordeal was wearing them down, and she was completely exhausted herself.
Several times she nodded off in the muggy heat, oblivious to the torment of bug bites. Every time she dozed, she imagined the horror happening again. The hacking sound of the machete and the screams would jolt her awake. If such nightmares haunted her, she couldn’t imagine what the children were going through.
To stop fear from gnawing at her belly, she turned toward the other hostages. Coughing caught her attention. George was getting worse. He’d been shot in the shoulder during the siege at the medical clinic. Earlier, she had tried to help. There wasn’t much she could do now. Infection had set in and with the scent of blood in the air, the bugs had targeted him. She could tell he had a fever and had no way to treat it. She’d done her best to stop the bleeding, but George had been coerced at gunpoint into climbing the mountain trails like everyone else.
The man would not last long in these conditions. He needed medical attention. And she knew that their captors would never allow it.
Voices and laughter near the fire grew louder and more threatening. She turned back toward the flame and watched the young men become more agitated. The blaze deepened the shadows on their faces and
made them look more sinister. And as they crossed in front of the fire—becoming more frenzied in their movements—their dark silhouettes eclipsed the light and cast elongated shadows over the hostages.
Kate couldn’t understand what they were saying, yet by the looks they gave the women hostages, the young men were working up the nerve to do something wrong. They joked. They laughed. They yelled and coerced. And she feared for what would happen next.
Two boys were hauled to their feet and shoved toward the hostages by other young men with rifles. The boys looked over the women, one by one. When they made their decisions, they grabbed two and grappled them to their feet.
Kate recognized one of her missionary teachers, Susan Fleming, a single woman in her early thirties. The other woman was older, perhaps in her forties and the wife of a local Haitian government worker. Both women kicked and screamed. That only spurred the boys on. The violence escalated until more men got involved. And the one with the video cam followed the horde to record the humiliation.
Kate’s eyes widened, and she glared at the leader—hoping he had the decency to stop what was about to happen—but he only watched his men with faint amusement.
God, no!
She wanted to scream.
Do you have no mercy?
After awakening Andre and Daniel, Kate rushed to her feet and confronted the leader, who sat on a fallen tree at the edge of the campfire. She didn’t know where
she got the strength to approach him, she only knew that someone must.
“Please…stop this. Can’t you see this is wrong?”
He stood and glared at her, eyeing her up and down in a vile fashion as he walked a circle around her. A few of his men, who had remained at the fire, laughed at her.
“Wrong? Who are you to tell me what is wrong?” he demanded. “Your God will not save you, you know. Your life is in my hands.” He grinned, white teeth against dark skin. “I am as powerful as your God now, yes?”
The women struggled against the young men who hauled them away. Kate wanted it all to stop and didn’t know how to make that happen. Her breathing escalated, and she thought her heart would burst from her chest.
“I’m sorry if I offended you. I didn’t mean to.” She lowered her head and fought the hysteria welling in her belly. “These women did nothing to deserve such treatment. You can stop this.”
“Yes, I can. But my men have needs.” He stopped pacing in front of her and stared down. “And this…” He tugged at her tunic. “…this will not protect you from what will happen out there. So do not call attention to yourself…or my men will be reminded you are nothing but a woman to pleasure them.”
She kept her head down and avoided his eyes. A tear slid down her cheek. She had been shocked by his disrespect. Living the life of a nun had sheltered her. She had come to expect civility and deference to her position. Yet here she was nothing.
Less than nothing.
“Tell me,” he said. “If something happened to you, what would become of the children?” When she reacted to his threat with a choked breath, he laughed. “Go. Sit down and shut up.”
He dismissed her and turned his back. And she shut her eyes, feeling utterly powerless. In a daze, she replayed his words in her head as she walked back to the children. They clutched at her and pulled her to the ground next to them.
“Why did you do that?” Joselyne asked with her eyes watering. “He could have killed you.”
She saw it on the girl’s face—she was the only lifeline these children had.
“I’m sorry if I…” She couldn’t finish.
The two women had been taken into the jungle, yet not far enough away to cover up the sounds of their torment—the cries, the beatings, the howling when each man took his turn like jackals with cornered prey. It made her sick. Through the trees, an eerie light from the video camera flickered, casting its light on images she never wanted to see. She shut her eyes, but that only made the reality more vivid in her mind. The boys had been goaded into losing their virginity by rape, an act of violence and degradation no one should endure. The young boys’ bodies were pumped full of adrenaline, and the pressure of mob mentality had taken over.
There would be no turning back. And no shame for their actions.
“What’s happening, Sister?” Joselyne asked. “What are they doing to those women?”
All the children clung to her. Kate didn’t want to
answer Joselyne’s question. She only shook her head. The words—and the horror—were wedged deep in her throat. Yet she had to say something to calm them.
“Time for a prayer.” She forced a faint smile and felt her lips trembling. “Can you pray with me?”
She touched each of their faces to get their attention and prayed aloud. The children joined in, murmuring low. Kate’s body rocked as she held them. She fought the nausea building in her stomach and tried to block out the tortured screams coming from the jungle.
Impossible.
Unable to stop herself, she looked toward the campfire and saw the terrorist leader watching her and the children. His dark cruel eyes held no remorse. He smiled at her and, despite the heat, her body shuddered.
If she’d had any tears left, she would have cried for them all.
The sun seared the horizon and streaks of orange impaled the gray edge of nightfall—that solitary time of morning when words were an intrusion. Kinkaid had met Alexa’s team at the motel as promised. They all knew what to expect and got down to the business of tracking killers.
When they got to the pier where LaClaire had moored the boat, Kinkaid headed belowdecks and loaded his gear, taking over the cabin that had been his from the prior voyage. He wouldn’t need overnight accommodations, but old habits died hard, and he liked his privacy. And having a cabin with a door and a bed would ensure that he had sack time on his way to Cuba if he needed it. Once they landed, there’d be no luxuries like a mattress or downtime. And the last thing he needed so early in the trip was for Alexa to get curious about why he was moving slower than the rest of her team.
He heard the heavy footfalls of Alexa’s men on deck, and the boat engine kicked in. They’d be under way soon, and Alexa would expect him up top. He’d have
precious few minutes to himself before the mission to rescue Kate and the others would consume him. And he knew exactly how he wanted to spend the time. Kinkaid took his iPod from its canvas pouch and put in his earplugs. He listened to the digital recording he always brought with him. It centered him, yet not always in a rational way.
With his back to the half-opened door, he sat on the edge of his bunk and shut his eyes. He steadied his heart to a slow rhythm and imagined a different time and place, then pictured him there. He felt the boat lurch as it left the dock, and the water rocked the hull. Nothing distracted him—until a sultry woman’s voice pulled him from where he was.
“I was wondering who had the choice digs.”
When he opened his eyes, Alexa stood in the doorway to his cabin. He saw her blond reflection in a mirror and turned. Before last night, it had been a long time since he’d seen a woman like her. Tall and lean, she filled out her camo BDUs in all the right spots. Her Nordic good looks blessed her with flawless pale skin, full sensual lips, and blue eyes the color of glacier ice. A well-trained, intelligent woman he could trust with his life.
But the life of Sister Kate was another story. He’d learned long ago. Never be the middleman to trust.
“Sorry. I didn’t know you were there.” He pulled out his earplugs and stowed his iPod in a side pocket of his bag. “You need something?”
“Didn’t know you were so into your tunes. You’ve…changed.”
He stared at her a moment, trying to figure out how to respond. He decided this mission was too important to get sidetracked.
“So I’ve been told.” He gave her no explanation. Nor did he make excuses for the man he’d become. “What’s up?”
“Garrett sent an updated weather report. Lady Luck is not with us.” She narrowed her eyes and looked around the cabin before her gaze settled back on him. “Come up top. See for yourself.”
She shut the door behind her and gave him privacy to wash down more antibiotics and check his bandages one more time. He was dodging a fever and knew it. He felt the heat under his skin.
A little time, that’s all I need.
On deck, he spotted Alexa alone at the bow of the boat and went to join her. The breeze buffeted her blond hair as she stared dead ahead. Her team was in the stern. Each man prepared for the mission in his own way. Some men needed to talk out the adrenaline rush and others only wanted solitude. She’d brought five men. All experienced hands.
Joe was at the helm in the wheelhouse and gave him an anxious nod as he walked by. He’d seen that look before. The salty air was thick with humidity. Not even diesel fumes off the back of the boat masked the impending storm. The wind had picked up. And a dark bank of clouds menaced the horizon to the northeast.
His friend had a right to be concerned.
Once they got by the breaker wall, and the boat hit cruising speed, the swells pounded the hull and sprayed
a mist onto their faces and clothes. It cooled his skin. Kinkaid stood next to Alexa, widened his stance for balance, and held on. For a long moment, they both watched the darkening horizon in silence, each rapt in thought.
“That tropical storm has been upgraded to a hurricane, category one.” She turned toward him, her blond hair edged in fiery red from the sun. A surge of dark clouds welled up behind her, a somber warning. “Garrett tells me the experts are predicting it’ll get worse. We may have another Katrina on our hands, a category four with winds up to 150 miles an hour.”
“You gonna pull the plug?” he asked, staring toward Cuba.
“What if I did?” She crooked a corner of her mouth. “You’d dump me off on Gilligan’s Island and still head to Cuba, wouldn’t you?”
“Yep.”
“And you wouldn’t respect me in the morning.”
“Nope.”
“Then it looks like we’ll have a ringside seat to the first hurricane of the season,” she told him. “You think they’ll name it after me?”
“If they knew you, they would.”
That made her smile. And inside, he did, too.
New York City
Afternoon
“There’s something you’ll want to see on Al Jazeera.” Tanya Spencer leaned over Garrett’s desk and worked
the controls to pull up an enlarged Internet screen for the Arab news network and project it onto one of his TV monitors on the far wall.
He took off his suit jacket, pulled down his tie, and grabbed another cup of coffee while she worked behind his desk.
“Can I get you a cup?” he asked.
“No, thanks,” she said. “I won’t be here that long. And you’ll be busy after you see this.”
He watched her work, a somber expression on her face and efficiency to her hand movements. Tanya had worked with him for over ten years. An elegant black woman with a keen intellect, a quick wit, and timeless fashion sense. Her Southern drawl could ooze sex appeal or demand your attention with its commanding tone.
And Tanya knew how to wield both.
She brought up a column marked
TODAY’S SCHEDULE
on Aljazeera.net and scrolled down to what she wanted him to see. A dark screen filled the monitor with an arrow in the center. Once she clicked on it, the show would start.
A video.
In the wake of al-Qaeda evacuating Afghanistan, the movement and its various splinter groups had gone underground and launched greater efforts online. The Internet gave them a new lease on life. And they utilized a growing range of multimedia content, including video training clips, photo stills of victims about to be murdered, podcasts that featured testimonials from suicide bombers, and even movie shorts with dramatic
music that romanticized life in the jihad and aided recruiting.
“I’ll warn you now. This is disturbing,” she said. Tanya gave him a look that got his attention.
“That’s something, coming from you.” He took a seat near the screen.
“No, really, Garrett. I mean it,” she warned.
Without another word, Tanya dimmed the lights in his office and started the video. Shaky camera work and poor lighting made it hard to tell what was happening at first. Yet the recorded screams gripped him from the start. English-speaking men and women were yelling. Their voices were mixed with the angry demands of armed men in masks, speaking a dialect of Arabic. He didn’t know enough about the language to understand it, but the AK-47s made their hostile intentions clear.
The video camera zoomed in tight on two women. Both looked terrified and were begging for their lives. The drama held him spellbound. And what happened next made him jump. A machete came from off screen. He would never forget the sound of the blade hacking into the woman’s neck and hitting bone.
“Oh, my God.” He’d never seen a beheading that close before. Blood sprayed the lens, and the video continued, but he’d seen enough. “That’s it. Turn it off.”
He’d spilled coffee on his dark slacks. The accident gave him an excuse to turn the lights on and compose himself as he wiped the stain with a napkin. In his lifetime, he’d seen enough death to lose sleep when certain memories surfaced. And he had certainly killed when
it had become necessary, yet the level of brutality some men inflicted on others never ceased to amaze him.
“I tried to tell you,” she said.
“I forgot. You’re the queen of understatement.” He set down his coffee and tossed the napkin onto his desk. “I’m assuming there’s a reason you wanted to share this with me.”
“My team analyzed the background and some of the faces. We did a facial recognition on a couple of them.” She stepped behind his desk and removed the video from his monitor, replacing it with a news channel on mute.
“And?” he prompted.
“It’s footage from Haiti,” she replied. “A couple of faces matched the hostage list, including a nun who ran the missionary school. Sister Mary Katherine organized the fund-raiser that the terrorists attacked.”
“She wasn’t one of those women, was she?”
“No. And her body wasn’t found at the medical-clinic siege either. We can only assume they still have her.”
“Have you been able to trace the video upload?” He clenched his teeth and waited for her answer.
“Not yet. There’s no guaranty we can trace it to a source, and they may be working through someone else. Chasing down all these angles will take time.”
“Time we don’t have. There’s a hurricane bearing down on Alexa and her team.” He slumped into his desk chair and swiveled as he thought. “I’ve been following the media on their Haiti coverage. The attack doesn’t have the feel of al-Qaeda, yet that’s what the
talking heads are speculating. I think the authorities are being misled.”
Tanya took a seat in front of him. “You have any ideas on who’s behind this?”
“Not yet. But I think this video could lead us there. Kinkaid told Alexa that these bastards carried high-tech gear. GPS units, laptops, the works.” He took a deep breath and stared across the room.
“They probably had cell phones that used the Internet, too. Those are not easy to trace,” she added. “A person could have a New York City phone number, but calls made to that number would get routed through the Internet. Anyone with online access could use it. Chasing all this down takes time and manpower.”
After a long moment, he brought up another idea. “What if I got you more help, someone who had mad skills when it comes to the computer? I have a feeling that discovering the source of this video will be vital. It might be worth a shot.”
She raised an eyebrow. “Although I’m not sure I like bringing in someone from the outside, I have confidence in your judgment. You trust this person?”
“You know me. Trust doesn’t come easy.” He grinned. “Let’s just say in the trust department, he’d come highly recommended. I’ll arrange it.”
“What’s his name?” she asked. “You want me to do a background check on him?”
“Already done. I had the need to run one a few months ago.” He gave her the details of where she could find the background check. “His past on paper is
sketchy, but I’ve learned a great deal more about him since then. His name is Seth Harper, an acquaintance of Alexa Marlowe and Jessica Beckett. And as luck would have it, he’s here in the city.”
“How will you utilize his expertise? Outside our walls or do we bring him in? I’m sure you’ll want to follow security protocols either way.”
Implementing Sentinels’ security measures would test Harper’s sense of humor. A guy vacationing in New York would not expect to be hijacked into a covert operation with security measures, but that couldn’t be avoided. He felt sure Seth would want to help Alexa.
“Certainly,” he agreed. “I’ll locate him and get back to you. Thanks, Tanya.”
After she left his office, Garrett took the first step in locating Seth Harper in New York. And he had a pretty good idea where to start. Although Tanya and her team had the computer expertise to trace the origins of the video in time, the extra manpower wouldn’t hurt. And recruiting Seth would give him a chance to see him in action.
A very convenient opportunity indeed.
New York City
Upper East Side
Jess knew enough about New York City to realize Alexa lived in one of the high-rent districts. The Upper East Side was a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan between Central Park and the East River, sometimes called the
silk stocking
district because of the
pricey real estate. Her new friend lived in a residential area off Lexington Avenue. Canopied storefronts were combined with small apartment buildings and elegant brownstone row houses.
Yep, this is so you, Alexa.
Jess fought a smile as she took in the sights at a crosswalk, sipping coffee from a travel mug and finishing a warm bagel. She’d seen many new things since she moved east. And New York City had been a real departure from her Midwest roots.
Daytime hours in Manhattan were filled with the usual crush of humanity on the streets, locals and visitors from all over the world, everyone with places to go in a hurry. Jess had never gotten into the rat-race mentality. She walked at her own pace to take in the sights. And there was always plenty to see.
When New Yorkers ran out of acreage in Manhattan, they went vertical with the architecture. Over time, modern skyscrapers had been erected next to older structures, and she loved how the city had preserved a keen sense of history. Everywhere she turned, impressive historic buildings looked like a backdrop to a movie that could span decades. And another unusual nod to history was the odd wooden roof-mounted water towers on many of the city’s buildings.
The sights, sounds, and diverse culture of the city infused her with energy as she carried her overnight bag slung over her shoulder and waited at the corner for traffic, the usual sea of yellow cabs, to come to a stop. When the light changed, she crossed the street with the rush of pedestrians and headed for the address Alexa
had left on voice mail. Staying overnight would give her a chance to learn more about a part of the city she hadn’t seen.
But she wondered why Alexa left town without much explanation. That only reminded her how little she knew of her friend and how private she was. Jess assumed the trip was work-related, something quick she was doing for Garrett Wheeler. That made her wonder all the more. Was this trip too important for a rookie to tag along?