by N. J. Croft
“She’s not here, Noah.” Peter repeated his words. But they had to be wrong.
Harper had to be here. She was hiding. Or unconscious. Or…
A roaring filled his head. His chest tightened, and for a moment he struggled to breathe. He sucked in the air, concentrated on inhaling. Exhaling. Forcing down the panic clawing at his insides.
Turning slowly, he searched the cabin for anything that might make sense. That might give him a clue. Hope. Had they just got it wrong? She was never here?
Something on one of the seats caught his eye. A newspaper. He took the few steps and picked it up. It was the paper Harper had held up for the proof of life video.
She had been here on the plane, and now she was gone.
Had they done the video, sent him the proof he’d demanded that his daughter was alive, and then killed her? Dumped her body?
The adrenaline oozed from his system, leaving him weak and shaking. He sank to the seat behind him, paper still clutched in his hand, and closed his eyes. When he opened them, nothing had changed. He’d failed.
“They killed her. She’s dead.”
Somehow they must have discovered what he had planned. They’d told him Harper would die if he spoke to anyone. It had been a calculated risk involving Peter, and he’d lost.
A scream was building inside him.
They’d promised to send her back in pieces. Now the best he could hope was that she hadn’t suffered. She was eleven years old. It wasn’t fair. He almost choked on the words. Since when had life been fair?
“Noah, listen to me. She’s not dead.”
He stared into Peter’s eyes. “You don’t know that. Your fucking girlfriend killed my daughter.”
“My niece. And Harper’s not dead. There would be no point. They still need her. Michaela wants the location, and she’s running out of time. She wouldn’t jeopardize that.”
He tried to find hope in the words, but his mind was sluggish like trudging through thick mud. Drowning in it. Could Peter be right? But he’d been wrong about this.
“Unless they don’t believe I have the location. Maybe she knows I was lying. Maybe someone told her.”
“I swear I told her nothing.” Peter sighed. He shoved his pistol into his shoulder holster and sank down into the chair opposite, running a hand around the back of his neck. “I told her nothing,” he repeated. “This is a message to me. She doesn’t trust me. I’m guessing Harper was on the plane, and they dropped her off somewhere on the way. Michaela set me up.”
Noah concentrated on the words, trying to get his head around them. Could she be alive? If so, for how long? Because he didn’t have the location. He had nothing to trade.
Peter had been his betrayer, but also his hope.
Now he had nothing.
“She believes you betrayed her?”
“I doubt that. If she believed that was the case, I’d likely be already dead. All the same, she doesn’t entirely trust me on this. And it’s too important for her to risk. I’m guessing I’ve been sidelined. I’m sorry, Noah.”
“Sorry doesn’t fucking help.” He rested his head in his hands. “Sorry isn’t good enough.”
None of them would have been tangled up in this were it not for Peter.
Clayton still believed he had the location. The only way forward was to make her believe that was the case. Lure her to a place and try and get Harper away. It was hopeless.
There was no way she would come alone. She’d likely have an army.
Plus he had been warned by the Darkhats that if he stepped within the Great Taboo again, he would be killed, and he had no doubt they would carry out their threat. Likely he’d be dead before he ever reached the meeting point.
He’d suggested they arrange the meet in a different area, but according to Eve, the Descendants already knew the general location of the tomb. There was no way they would believe it to be anywhere other than the Great Taboo.
At the same time, he had no choice except to try. Maybe with Peter’s help, he could somehow get Harper away before Clayton realized she’d been double-crossed. Though how much help would Peter be if Clayton no longer trusted him?
“We’ll go ahead with the swap,” he said. “If you’re right and Harper is still alive, then we’ll try and find a way to get her safely away.” Maybe that could be the agreement. Peter would take Harper while Noah went with the senator. How likely was she to agree to that? Right now, he couldn’t come up with anything better.
“She’s alive.”
Something else occurred to him. “What about the summit?”
The plan had been for Peter to call the president as soon as they had Harper safe. They hadn’t wanted to risk blowing Peter’s cover before Harper was free.
The summit was only two days away. Soon they would all be in place. The world’s leaders would arrive the day after tomorrow. They had to be warned.
“We can’t take the risk that we die and there’s nobody left who can stop the attack.” Zach would try, but he had been blocked at every move. He was a rogue agent; no way would anyone listen to him. “I think you should make the call now.”
“It will mean she definitely knows I’m working with you.”
“I think we can take that as a given anyway. You’ve lost any strategic advantage you might have given us.”
Peter didn’t look happy, but he nodded and pulled his cell phone from his pocket.
“Put it on speaker,” Noah said.
Peter pressed a series of numbers in, and it clicked through a relay.
“General Blakeley requesting a code red contact with the president.”
“Access denied.”
There was another series of clicks and then…
“General Blakeley, I’m afraid all your calls will be re-routed to this number in future. We’ve been ordered to bring you in for questioning.”
That didn’t sound good.
“To whom am I speaking?”
“I’m afraid that information is classified. If you will give us your current location, we will send people to pick you up.”
“I have important information regarding an imminent terrorist threat to the president. As Commander of Project Arachnid—”
“Project Arachnid has been terminated and all personnel detained for questioning.” And Noah was guessing they would be held somewhere out of contact until after the summit. “I suggest you give yourself up, general. Any further attempts to make contact will be re-routed here.”
Peter glanced at him and shook his head. He ended the call. “We’re cut off. Isolated.”
A shiver ran through him.
Just how much power did these people have?
Chapter Thirty-Six
They got back to the hotel an hour later.
Noah was drained. Exhaustion tugged at him, mingled with despair.
The situation was hopeless.
He wanted to rage against fate, fight back, but he could see no way through.
The best he could hope for was to get Harper out of this alive. And maybe get close enough to Michaela Clayton to take her out. While that might not finish off the Descendants, it would maybe buy him some time to expose the organization.
It was impossible.
They’d tried to contact some of his old team, starting with Alex, and gotten nowhere. He could only assume that they had indeed been detained.
As he stepped into the coolness of the reception area, he came to an abrupt standstill. A woman stood at the desk, her back to him. Tall and slim, she wore khaki pants tucked into boots and a black tank top.
“What is it?” Peter asked from beside him.
He shook his head but didn’t answer. Instead, he closed the distance between them. When he was a couple of feet away, she turned as though sensing his presence. For a long moment, she stared
at him, her expression wary as if she was unsure of her welcome. Then her gaze flicked past him to Peter and back to him.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
He wanted to hate her, though the truth was he couldn’t. Sara hadn’t betrayed him—she had betrayed her own people. She could have killed him that night, but she had let him live against direct orders, knowing she would be in dire trouble for allowing him to survive. Having said that, he was still pissed that she had lied to him. That she had lied to him and then slept with him. He’d thought there was something between them. It had all been an act, and he felt…used. Christ, he was pathetic. He hadn’t allowed himself to care for anyone since Eve.
“I need to talk to you,” she said.
“You do? What about?”
Her gaze flicked back to Peter. “In private.”
Maybe she’d come to finish the job and kill him. She’d have to get in line.
He nodded and turned to his uncle. “Can you give us a moment?”
“Of course. I’ll go get my things together and we can leave as soon as you’re ready.”
Noah waited until the other man headed toward the elevator and then steered Sara into the bar. It was empty at this time of day. They found a booth in the far corner. She slid onto the seat, and he took the one opposite.
“Was that your uncle, the general?” she asked.
“Yes. He came to…help me out.” He couldn’t tell her what they were doing. Likely she’d go straight back to her people and he would lose any chance of luring Clayton anywhere. “What do you want? I thought you made your position perfectly clear.”
“I…” She shook her head. “Have you heard anything about your daughter?”
“Why?”
She closed her eyes for a moment. “I want to help, Noah.”
“I thought you couldn’t or wouldn’t help.”
Anger flashed across her face, then her eyes narrowed. “I’m going against everything I was brought up to believe here. Cut me some fucking slack.”
“You were supposed to kill me. Don’t tell me you didn’t consider it.”
“You’re still here, aren’t you?”
He sighed. “I’m sorry. You’re right. Tell me why you came.”
She took a deep breath. For a moment, she looked away. Whatever she had come here for, she wasn’t finding it easy. “I memorized the GPS coordinates from the image file before I destroyed it. If you still need the location of the tomb to save your daughter, then it’s yours.”
For a moment, the words didn’t make sense. She had the location. She would give it to him. Why was she doing this? Could she be trusted? Or did she have some agenda of her own? The questions were spinning in his head. “Why? Why the change of heart?”
“Because, the truth is I’ve changed. I grew up believing we had a purpose. That we were important. But really what are we doing? Keeping a meaningless secret. That’s not worth killing for, and I don’t want anyone else to die, either. Not your daughter. Not mine. Whatever is there, it’s not worth it. It’s just a tomb, a body probably turned to dust and ashes. We’ve spent our whole lives guarding the grave of a man who died centuries ago. I don’t believe anymore. He’s long dead, and that’s not what’s important. The living are what matters.”
He sat back in his chair, and the tight band around his chest loosened. He hadn’t even known it was there. Now relief flooded his system, and he could breathe again. There were good people in the world. He’d believed he was losing the ability to tell the difference. Or that they just didn’t exist. Not in his world, anyway. Peter’s betrayal had hit him hard.
But Star or rather Sara had hit him equally hard. Now she was here. Offering her help, though it would cost her dearly. And maybe there was hope again.
He studied her. She looked…earnest, caring even. But this was a woman who had managed to lie consistently to him for days. She was clearly a good actress.
The thing was he wanted to believe her. And she hadn’t had to come here.
Who was this woman really? It was unlikely he’d have the chance to get to know the real Sara. He was running out of time.
Maybe she had some underlying motive, but he couldn’t see the point. He needed time to think. Too bad he didn’t have any.
“Let me help,” she said, resting her hand on his arm.
What choice did he really have? He exhaled and then gave a short nod.
She closed her eyes for a moment. Clearly, she’d been in no way sure that he’d accept her offer. That made him feel a little better.
His mind was racing, trying to work how he could use this to his advantage. Would it make a difference? They could go ahead with the exchange. Get Harper out alive and then go after the senator.
Was Clayton aware he knew her involvement? She must have her suspicions. So even if she didn’t kill him outright, there was a good chance she wouldn’t risk leaving him free to try and stop her before the summit. But that was a risk they would have to take. They had the night to come up with a plan.
“So you’ll make the exchange?” she asked.
“It’s arranged for the day after tomorrow. We’d planned to use a bluff and hope to get Harper away. Though there’s still the problem of getting into the Great Taboo without your people killing us before we get to the meeting place.”
“I know. But I have an idea.”
…
Sara studied him across the table. He looked terrible, worse than the last time they had met. Like he hadn’t slept or eaten. The bruises had come out on his face, and he looked like a really crappy boxer.
She’d slipped away from the camp without telling anyone she was leaving. Although she was quite aware they could have stopped her if they wanted to because nothing moved in the Great Taboo without her people knowing it.
She’d argued with her father, trying to make him see that times were changing and they needed to change with them. She’d told him that she no longer believed that their cause was worth any more deaths. She was supposed to follow in his footsteps and one day become the next leader of the Darkhats, but how could she when she no longer had faith?
Despite that, for some reason, they had let her go, but then they weren’t aware that she had the location of the tomb. If they’d known, things might have been very different. At best, she would likely have remained a prisoner. At worst, she would be dead.
While her father loved her, unlike her, he had never had any doubts as to their cause.
And she had no doubt that they would follow through on their threat to kill Noah if he returned to the Great Taboo unless she could persuade them otherwise.
“Go on,” he prompted.
“You’re right. Even if I give you the location, you won’t make it. My people will kill you before you ever get there.” She’d searched her mind for an answer, and she did have an idea. Though it was far from foolproof. So first she needed to discover if they had any other options. “Could you not arrange the swap elsewhere? Say the tomb was never on Burkhan Khaldun? Arrange the meeting somewhere far away.” At least that way there would be one less group trying to kill him.
“No. Eve says they already know the general location. It was tied in with where the spear was found. Finding the spear is what allowed them to home in on the location of the actual tomb.”
That wasn’t good. She wished she could just go far away from here. Perhaps to some tropical island with Noah. Except that wasn’t who he was. In his own way, he was as blinded as her father, totally dedicated to a cause. At least he had a genuine purpose—to save his daughter and stop a complete megalomaniac from taking over the world.
The only hope was to make a trade with her people. That she could convince them that there were bigger threats to the Darkhat’s cause than Noah, that in fact he was fighting on their side. If the Descendants rose to power, her people were finished
. If not now, one day soon the Descendants would find the tomb. They wouldn’t back down if they failed this time. They would keep coming, and if all Noah had told her was true, they had the resources to finish this. An army at their disposal and her people would be decimated.
So she needed to make them see that times were changing and they needed to change with them.
But how?
“Do you have any clue who you’re dealing with?” Maybe a concrete enemy would convince them.
Noah pursed his lips and didn’t answer straight away. Maybe he didn’t trust her. Could she blame him? He knew something, though; he was just weighing up what to tell her.
“It’s Senator Michaela Clayton.”
Noah’s employer. Sara had done some investigation into the company when she’d been researching Noah, and it was vast, its resources almost limitless.
She remembered the woman from the cemetery the day of Eve Blakeley’s so-called funeral. Tall, with dark red hair and green eyes. While there were no reliable images of Genghis Khan, many believed that rather than the typical Mongolian coloring, he’d had green eyes and red hair.
Christ, if only they’d known. “Are you sure?”
“My uncle confirmed it.”
“How does he know? Has it just come to light?”
“Not really. You could say he had insider knowledge. He’s been working with the Descendants since he was twenty-one.”
She sat back in her seat. “You didn’t know?”
A tic jumped in his cheek. “Of course I didn’t fucking know. I would have killed the bastard. He’s lied to me all my life. Shit, I believed he was one of the good guys. Hell, maybe the only good guy. Instead, he’s been deep inside the very organization we were hunting. The organization that has caused thousands of innocent deaths, that took my daughter.”
“His niece. Yet you’re working with him now?”
“I didn’t have a lot of options.”
“And you trust him?”
“To be honest…I don’t know. I think my finding out was in some way a relief for him. He’s lived with doubts for so long.”
Well, she knew all about that.