by Liliana Hart
He’d put three bullets in her chest, leaving her for dead after she’d given him her trust—something she’d never given lightly and would never give again. To anyone. Then he’d left her for dead and gone for her friend Shai, who’d given her Proteus’s identity in the first place. Shai’s body had been found in the Jordan River with his throat slit along with evidence of prolonged torture—his back teeth had been missing as well as his genitalia.
Salt had always been a good interrogator, and she had no doubt that by the time he was finished, Shai had given him names of anyone else who knew Proteus’s identity, as well as where he kept his computers where the information was stored.
Yes, she wanted revenge. But that was just a side benefit. Salt was a threat to all humankind. And the lives he’d taken, and would continue to take, were why she needed to end him.
No one else had been as close to him as she had. He’d helped train her and had been her partner. Who else would know how to hunt him better than she did?
She’d slipped out from under the agency and gone her own way. And it hadn’t been easy, because Jonah was very good at what he did. She liked to think she was better. Like any agent, she had safe houses scattered in different countries that held bags of cash, new identities and weapons. They’d allowed her to survive and blend during her time off the grid.
It had taken her months to recover from the gunshot wounds enough to go out on her own. They told her she’d died twice on the operating table and was lucky to be alive. She believed in a higher power and understood that she’d been spared so she could finish this last task. Part of her knew she wouldn’t come back from this mission alive. And she’d made peace with that.
After leaving the hospital, it had taken another six months to get herself back into shape so she could fight without getting her ass handed to her on a plate. Her body was stronger now than it had even been before her accident, her muscles honed and lean. The scars from the bullets were only another reminder of her mistakes. Mistakes she’d never make again.
It had taken her another six months to get a trace of Jonah’s whereabouts. He’d laid low for a while, avoiding most of the terrorist activities Proteus had been suspected of. Jonah was arrogant, and that was going to be his downfall. Her patience finally paid off when she’d picked up his trail along the Kamchatka and Russian border.
She had a safe house up in the mountains. It was time to regroup and restock her weapons since she’d had to leave her others behind before crossing the border. She only had the knife in her boot and her fists for protection. It was enough. But one could never be too prepared.
It hadn’t been hard to pass through unnoticed. She spoke the language like a native. And no one paid any attention as she started the climb up the mountains to where her safe house was located. She’d only been there once before. Had only needed it once before. But her memory had never failed her.
The weather was brisk and wind slapped at her face the higher into the mountains she climbed. Her jacket was made out of a special material that was thin enough to give her freedom of movement if she needed it, but was as warm as any heavy coat. Neoprene gloves covered her hands for the same reason. They weren’t the warmest, but they wouldn’t impede her if she needed to fight.
The higher she climbed the more quiet it became, and the little hairs on the back of her neck began to stand on end. The temperature had dropped a good thirty degrees and snow crunched beneath her boots as she continued to climb.
There were little signs that most people wouldn’t pay attention to—broken twigs or the displacement of small rocks. But she wasn’t most people. The mountain was silent, no birds or wildlife to be heard, and because it was silent she walked an extra mile around the perimeter where her cabin was located. She pulled the knife from her boot and waited—just listening—ignoring the white puffs of air that escaped her mouth and the way the cold made her muscles twinge where she’d been wounded.
She crept closer and closer until the cabin was in sight, but she knew by looking at it that Jonah was already gone. He’d definitely been there, though. And he’d left a gift for her to find.
Audrey secured the house first, making sure he wasn’t waiting to ambush her, before she came back around to the front. The body was placed just in front of the steps to the front door, so you’d have to step over him to get in.
She didn’t recognize him, only that he’d been a man of some importance. He was dressed in full military regalia and had enough badges and medals pinned to his chest for her to know he’d been in command.
Jonah never did anything without a reason, and leaving the body here was significant, though she wasn’t sure why. He’d laid the body out like it would be inside of a casket, with arms crossed over the chest and the ankles crossed as well. His throat had been slit, and the blood had turned the snow beneath him brown. The man’s eyes were closed, which meant Jonah had made them that way, and a light dusting of snow covered his eyelashes and hair.
The weather made time of death tricky to pinpoint, but she was guessing the kill was right around twenty-four hours old. Audrey had wondered if Jonah would feel her closing in on him. It didn’t worry her, but it did complicate matters. Now it would become a game, to see who could outmaneuver the other.
The Russian military would miss this man, whoever he was, which meant she needed to get what she could and get out as fast as possible before she had the Russians on her trail. She didn’t have time for another complication.
She left the body where it lay and approached the cabin, stopping in front of the door. The number 165 was written on the lintel, and when she touched her fingers to it, she realized Jonah had used the blood from the man at her feet to write it.
Definitely a game. He was emulating The Passover with the blood over the doorframe because of her Jewish faith, letting her know that this message was meant for her and no other.
Audrey reached down and gathered a handful of snow and then rubbed it across the numbers, wiping them away until the snow in her hand melted red. The number would be committed to her memory forever and there was no reason to give whoever would come after her any clues.
The cabin could be wired for explosives. It was a trap she’d considered and discarded. Jonah would want to see this played out and he’d wait before he tried to kill her again. So she was safe. Probably.
She tested the doorknob and found it unlocked, and then she pushed the door wide and stepped inside. It looked exactly as it had the last time she’d seen it. She’d been Mossad then, but a safe house was a safe house. All agents had them, no matter what country they served, and she’d thought this one would be safe from Jonah. She had no idea how he’d found out about it.
The floors were wood and barren, with nothing scattered about to get in the way of an easy exit. A single twin bed was shoved in the corner with blankets folded on top of it. There was canned food in the cupboards and a wood burning stove.
Audrey went to the bed and shoved it across the floor so it screeched against the wood, and she knew by looking at the boards beneath that Jonah had found her stash. But she pried up the loose board anyway and stared down into the empty space.
“Fuck.”
She grabbed a penlight from her belt and knelt down, shining the light and running her hands along the sides of the small crawlspace. She was looking for the next part of his message. Obviously the number 165 was a coordinate, and considering where they were the distance wouldn’t be too far. Etched in the dirt in the far corner was the number 66.
“Not too far away at all.” She plugged the numbers she had into her handheld device so it could start searching for possible routes and locations by process of elimination. She stood and dusted off her hands. He’d taken her extra clothes and the main stash of weapons and supplies she’d kept inside.
“Asshole.”
The cabin groaned and creaked from the cold, settling into itself as she took stock. Annoyance and frustration bit at her and her first thought was to
rush through and see if he’d found her reserve stocks, but she held herself back and centered her focus on the room itself. He wanted her to find him, for whatever reason, but he wasn’t going to make it easy on her.
“There you are, you bastard.” One of the cupboard doors was ever so slightly ajar. It wasn’t noticeable unless you compared it to the order of the rest of the room.
On her way to the cupboard she stopped at the little stone fireplace and stuck her hand up inside it. Her fingers brushed against the gun taped inside the chimney and she ripped it down, at once feeling more at ease with it in her possession.
She held the gun down at her side and approached the cupboard door, edging it the rest of the way open with her finger. And there it was, written in pencil this time. 0800. And just beneath that was a 51W.
Audrey looked at the watch on her wrist and swore. Wherever she was going she had less than twelve hours to get there. She needed the other coordinate and she needed it fast.
But there was no coordinate to be found. At least not on the inside of the house. She put her gun at the small of her back and stepped back over the body of the man at the base of the outside stairs. Sunset was still a couple of hours off, but she needed to be gone before dark fell and the chances of an ambush rose. She’d prefer not to traverse unfamiliar Russian soil in the middle of the night.
Hers were the only footprints visible in the area. Snow would have fallen between the time Jonah left and when she arrived, making her assumption right that it had been at least twenty-four hours since he’d been there, as snow tended to fall nightly and disappear in the daytime during that time of year.
She made her way to the back of the cabin and the small woodpile stacked waist high. A light sheen of sweat covered her skin as she moved all the wood, exposing the secondary trap door she’d built into the ground. She brushed off dead grass and dirt to reveal the rusted iron strongbox she’d buried.
The lid protested as she pulled at it, and eventually gave way with a sound similar to nails on a chalkboard. A sigh of relief she hadn’t realized she’d been holding in escaped when she saw the items inside it had been untouched. A secondary cache of money, a new I.D., extra hunting knives, a .9mm pistol with an extra magazine, and a long-range rifle.
She worked quickly, outfitting herself for easy access to her weapons, and then assembled the rifle and strapped it to her back. The sun was barely visible above the trees and she still hadn’t found the last coordinate marker.
With fierce determination, Audrey searched the cabin looking for the last number. She stopped in front of the body Jonah had laid out so precisely and tried to get into the mind of a brilliant criminal.
The position of the body was purposeful. Jonah had laid the man out for burial. The head was facing east, an important detail in many religious ceremonies. She was missing something important.
She knelt by the man and said a small prayer, wishing his soul safe travels into the afterlife, and then she went about the task of searching his body. His hands were empty and there were no marks on his skin discernable to the naked eye. And then her eye caught the glint of metal on his chest, reflected in the last rays of the sun.
“13th Infantry. 13 North. That should do it.”
Now she just had to figure out how to navigate her way across the Bering Strait and make sure she did the last thing Jonah Salt would ever expect.
CHAPTER THREE
It turned out the last thing Jonah would expect her to do was to come in by water.
The coordinates he’d left her led her back into U.S. territory, north of Nome, Alaska. The exact location was in the middle of the water, and there was nothing nearby except oil rigs, tankers, and a smattering of whaling and fishing vessels.
The time frame Jonah had given her had been just enough for her to find a plane and fly herself back into the States. There was one advantage to such an isolated area; it was easy to enter and leave without notice. She landed the seaplane she’d “borrowed” some ways out from shore and used the inflatable life raft in the back of the plane to paddle to shore.
Salt would expect her to come for him by land, to set up a trap and take him out as he made his way back onto soil. She’d never be as good as him on the water. It was just fact, and he knew it. Jonah had gone through BUD/S training with the SEALs, and was mentally and physically at home at sea. He’d never expect her to come at him from the water. Audrey would only have one shot to catch him by surprise.
Stars glittered unusually bright in this part of the world. By Alaska standards, Nome was a large town, but it still had a population of less than four thousand people. She looked through her night vision goggles, getting the layout of the land. The town itself was nestled on a small flat area of land, but the surrounding areas were hilly and the terrain difficult. A thick covering of snow blanketed everything and it smelled as if more could be coming. She’d be able to assess better in the daylight.
Fishing and whaling boats were scattered haphazardly—different makes, models and sizes—and hooked to rough hewn docks along the shoreline. They floated lazily in ice-crusted waters, well used and rusted with age. There wasn’t much movement in the town, but the docks were already busy with those getting ready to take their boats out.
Audrey paid a fisherman named Jerry—who in her opinion needed to head back home and sleep it off—handsomely for the use of his boat. It was smaller than the others along the shoreline, more maneuverable, and the engine sounded smooth and fast when he started it up. Jerry might be a drunk, but he took good care of his equipment.
She set out on the cold and choppy waters, the sea black as pitch and the stars and a sliver of moon the only light in the sky. Droplets of icy water splashed on her face and clothes and her breath clouded white with every breath she took. The wind cut like a scalpel and made her joints stiff if she stood still too long.
The coordinates Jonah had given her were programmed into her watch, and she turned the engine of the boat off when it buzzed on her wrist, telling her she’d arrived at her destination. She still had half an hour to prep and get set up. Now she only had to wait and watch, and hope she hadn’t miscalculated Jonah’s expectations of her.
The darkness was both her friend and her enemy. She’d be concealed for a time, giving her the edge she needed. But it would make the shot she’d have to take even more difficult, despite the infrared scope on her rifle.
The long shots weren’t her specialty. She could make them, but to be accurate she needed time and intense concentration. Almost perfect conditions. The choppy water and harsh winds were going to be a factor, and she had to make the shot count.
She set up her rifle and scanned the waters through her scope, flexing her fingers to keep them loose. A tanker almost completely concealed the Zodiac anchored next to it. She would’ve missed it completely if she’d been set up to take the shot on land. That’s what he’d been hoping for. He wanted to draw her out. There wasn’t a good place for cover on land. There were no trees to speak of and hiding in the hills would’ve made the distance too great to make an accurate shot.
It was obvious he’d come early to do whatever task he’d assigned himself—nothing good if his past was anything to go by. But Jonah had planned to be finished by the time he’d given her and then he’d expect her to fall into whatever trap he’d set for her. Because he thought he knew her, understood her. When what he’d really done was underestimate the strength of her anger.
The water rippled just before he broke the surface next to the Zodiac and she watched as he rolled in with the experience of hundreds of missions at sea. He spit the rebreather out of his mouth and tossed it in the bottom of the boat. The water and winds were cold, so he kept the neoprene mask pulled down over his face.
She didn’t need to see his face. She recognized the way he moved—the relaxed movements that spoke of someone completely at ease in the water. She recognized the breadth of his shoulders and the cruel slash of his smile as he checked the time at his
wrist. He was waiting for her, and as if he’d read her mind he picked up his infrared binoculars and looked toward the shore.
He lay flat in the Zodiac and it was then he picked up the rifle that had been laying at the bottom and tried to set his sights on her.
“You son of a bitch.” As if her words had carried the distance across the water he turned and his gaze met hers through the binoculars. She took the shot before he could roll himself back into the water.
She’d aimed for the center of his chest, the largest target she had, but her aim and his movement had altered the course of the bullet and she’d seen it enter his shoulder instead.
“Dammit.” Her only hope was that the bullet had hit something vital. She crawled her way back to the engine and started the boat up, not caring that Jonah could see her now. Gunfire sounded and she heard the ping as a bullet glanced off the side of the boat. She’d gotten him in the right shoulder, so he’d be shooting left handed. He wasn’t as proficient using the other hand, but he was still pretty damned accurate.
Her only goal was to get back to land. He’d have to spare precious seconds to stop and bind the wound so he didn’t lose too much blood, and those seconds were what she needed to make her escape.
At this time of the year, dawn came late and was just rising over the horizon by the time she docked. Sunlight glared in her eyes and off the water, and she wasn’t sure she’d ever seen a sunrise quite so bright.
Her adrenaline surged as she hopped down to the rickety dock and used the boat for cover, knowing it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility for Jonah to be closer on her trail than she estimated. She still wasn’t out of the woods and wouldn’t be. Not until Jonah Salt was dead.
Jerry sat in his lawn chair on the snow covered dock with a blanket spread over his lap and the smell of hundred proof something reeking out the top of his flask. He eyed the boat and then his gaze went to her and he wheezed out a gin soaked breath as she passed him another wad of bills as a thank you. She didn’t realize until it was too late what had seemed off about Jerry. He’d had guilty eyes.