by Lynda Filler
Samaar smiled. There was so much more to the handsome Sabra with the sad green eyes.
Zach smiled back, “Yeah, I spent the day with a nine-year-old African boy named Brian. It was very special. He opened up about his life. And we kicked around the soccer ball, a universal ice-breaker with boys. At the end of the day, he wrote me a letter and asked me to be his dad.”
Samaar stared at Zach. She knew for a fact that he was always first into the tunnels with his team in Afghanistan. And she suspected he pulled the trigger on Osama Bin Laden. He volunteered over and over again on the war against terror. In Israel, where she first met him while on loan from the USA, he’d trained with her like he had a death wish. His passion was equal only to her own. They were both motivated by the murder of their parents. And he fought with a brutality that at times frightened her and left her wondering if he had any kind of life outside the team.
“I’m tired of running, Zach. I want a good safe place to raise my daughter. This will be my last job. Alice deserves a mother. I have the money, I don’t need this anymore.”
“I know Samaar, I know. But my adopted country and Israel, have to be protected if we are all to survive as a people.”
Each was lost in memories as they watched the sun drop low turning the ocean blood red.
“When do we leave Zach?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Where are we going?”
“Let’s get some rest Samaar, we’ll talk tomorrow.”
25
A LIGHT WENT out on the edge of a dilapidated garage. Three Chinese enforcers, guns held expertly, moved cautiously towards the back of the shack. Sying, head-to-toe in black, adjusted her AK47, clicked the safety to fully automatic, and headed towards where she’d last seen movement.
Two Dobermans, bloody meat dripping from their vicious jaws, lay twisted, passed out, on the cracked pavement. The excess of digital hardware on the gate warned them this place was not what it seemed. She signaled to her men to advance.
Speaking into her headset, she questioned her lookouts: “How many men did you see go in there?”
“Five.”
“Too small for five people. This is definitely the entrance to an underground storage facility. We don’t have any time left. C4 the door.”
The lookouts and bodyguards scrambled to set charges and stand back.
The explosion knocked Sying back ten feet landing on her butt. Her gun discharged a round and killed one of her men instantly. “He shouldn’t have been in that spot.”
Two of her men were already rushing the almost demolished shed. Several shots were fired, then silence. She walked in cautiously. The boys were wrestling with a big metal door in the floor.
“Blow it and drop explosives down the hole. No time to see what’s down there. We will ignite and kill everything below ground!”
Terrifying screams were heard as the door was blown. Sying and her men fled the building as the floor exploded upwards. She sidestepped a body part that landing directly in front of her. She didn’t flinch.
“Let’s go! Come on, move it! We can’t afford to get caught by the police.”
“What about Han?”
“Is he dead?”
“Yes.”
“Grab his body and throw it into the trunk, hurry. We’ll drop it in the ocean under the docks.”
She looked back to the absence of anything that resembled a building.
“This will send a message to my competitors. I own the arms market!” Sying screamed.
“Play with Sying Li Ma’s fire, you will get burnt.”
26
LORENA WOKE TO sunny skies and warm, fragrant breezes. The odor of frangipani, her favorite tropical flower, filled her space. The palms swayed, the sea lapped gently around the pier at the bottom of her stairs. She’d found home in this laidback Yelapa vibe.
She stretched lazily and opened her eyes to a little creature studying her. Alice stood beside her bed silently waiting, Maddie held tightly in her arms. It was no use faking. Lorena was in love. She scooped Alice into her arms, tickling her and kissing her all over. Zach and Samaar were making Quesadillas in the kitchen and heard Alice’s laughter.
“Hurry guys or Zach’s going to burn your tortillas!”
Luci had packed her few things while Alice slept. Lorena had found her a pair of black jeans and a tight black turtleneck sweater. Definitely not Vallarta wear, but perfect for her travels North.
Luci planted her knife firmly in her custom-made boots, her Sig Sauer in her knapsack. Now for the hard part.
Three adults, one little girl and a dolly named Maddie walked down to the town pier. Alice looked at the luggage Zach carried. Then she looked up at her mommy. Samaar picked her up and hugged her hard.
“Alice go too, Mommy?” Alice stared fiercely at Samaar, Maddie tucked between them. Samaar held back sobs.
“No baby. You stay with Lorena. Mommy will be back soon. You be a good girl and play with Gato and look after Lorena.”
Alice’s lips trembled. She looked back and forth between the women. And then this child, with wisdom beyond her years, put her arms out to Lorena.
Dolly dropped on the boat dock. Both women scrambled to avoid the disaster of a drowned Maddie. Zach lunged at the same time. All three, with Alice in the middle, collided laughing.
The water taxi pulled up at that exact moment. Before anyone could say another word, Zach helped Luci into the panga and pulled away towards the open water of the Bay of Banderas.
Luci could not allow herself to look back.
27
RB LOCKED HIMSELF in Raven’s War Room. RB was happiest doing four things at once in front of multiple computer screens. He and Raven met when Luke lectured, and RB was a brilliant coder at Caltech. They were kindred spirits, friends for life, joined at the hip and in the head. They’d been inseparable—except after Lily died.
He remembered Sying. Sly. Gifted. But he always felt there was something off about her. She was a Martial Arts fanatic. Super competitive and hated losing at anything. RB heard stories about her cruelty but what bothered him the most was her not-so-subtle obsession with Luke.
He sensed something vile just under the surface with Sying. It was the most important mission in his life. RB focused on hacking into anything Sying was working on. He and Akaarn in Arizona worked in tandem, computers connected at all times. His name, possibly those of his family, were in the security clearance databases of the Office of Personnel Management, recently stolen from the USA allegedly by the Chinese Government. Raven was sure he could see Sying’s signature in the work, yet she’d manage to cleverly leave crumbs that would lead an ordinary intel guy to the Chinese. Proving it, finding the trails that led back to her, was RB’s primary objective.
RB opened the house comm-system. “Maggs what’s cooking?”
“Watch it, big boy. Don’t treat me like your ‘little woman’ or I’ll come in there and show you my kitchen skills!”
Maggs, ex-Army Special Ops, now part of Luke’s Team, was a fantastic cook. Tall, close to six-feet, she looked and often dressed like a supermodel. Freckles brushed across her nose, and red hair left no doubt of her Irish ancestry. She was number one in her class in training and formed part of an exceptional team of women in combat in 2011 before female combat was authorized.
In her spare time, she took advanced Michelin cooking classes. The boys couldn’t decide if they loved her for her lean and mean body or her skills in the kitchen. She enjoyed working out, and when Raven wasn’t around, she played computer war games with RB to keep each other sharp.
When Raven was gone, surprisingly, she was the Boss Man of home base.
Raven entered the underground parking garage through a secure elevator. They’d never had any challenges in the Whistler area, but Raven was smart enough to live as if he was a high-value target. He’d masterminded too many ops in the last couple of years to get sloppy for himself or his team.
George, his number one today had his
Ray-Bans in place, and his personal weapon in his shoulder holster for easy access. He always rode shotgun when Luke drove. His second, Israel, another ex-Navy SEAL, kept a keen eye on everything around them. Both men had AK47’s and permission to carry from CSIS, the Canadian Secret Police. They also held a few well-kept-secret prototype weapons in their vehicle just in case.
The white four-door Range Rover was bulletproof with the highest degree of armor plating. Luke should know, he designed it for the military. The winding roads down the Blackcomb mountain were only treacherous in ski season. No snow or ice at this time of the year. But rain and fog had rolled in from the ocean overnight, and the sun hadn’t broken through over the Coastal Mountain Range; visibility was a challenge.
The boys joked about the beating they’d taken in the gym from Raven the night before. They lived the life of the super-rich, state-of-the-art toys, money in the bank, and well-funded retirement programs; but they trained like an elite team. And their personal lives were non-existent. And their identities, even amongst themselves, changed on a regular basis. This life was a choice they’d made when they joined the Raven Group. Being prepared, knowing they could be called out on a mission at any time of the day or night was part of the package.
Raven dominated the roads like a NASCAR driver. Nothing could slow him down nor break his concentration.
Hitting a perilous downhill turn at a hundred and fifty kilometers an hour, they immediately reacted to a plastic barrier set across the road fifty yards ahead. George and Israel went into attack mode. Raven held his pedal to the metal for maximum speed and impact.
Two men on the right side held machine guns, the one on the left, a handheld rocket launcher. The hit team thought they had the advantage of surprise, but their shots went wild not expecting the speed of the SUV. And before they could recover, George had the roof open, and two lightweight prototype rocket launchers roasted the attackers. All three were dead as Raven smashed through the barrier.
Israel, sniper rifle focused on the surrounding mountains, advised the boys that all appeared clear.
“George. Call the house.”
“Already on it boss.”
“Get ahold of the Seattle office and have the team visually review the satellite feed immediately. Damn, RB was so focused on China that we missed this. We need to make sure there are no more operatives around, but RB and Maggs need to get out ASAP.” Luke continued driving at breakneck speed just in case there was a backup crew.
“Have the cleaners in the village take any fingerprints off body parts, DNA samples, photos, and run it through our database. Check China first. If no hits, the Russians, and then the US.”
“Got it.”
“We need to get to the airport in Pemberton and make that meeting. Tell Maggs to set the timer with the security code I gave her for the Safe Room. Blow it and everything in it. It needs to look like a gas leak. Have the team take the tunnel, then the Razr’s to the base of Blackcomb. Seaplane it out to Vancouver and meet at Base Seven. Text Green Lake!”
“On it,” George spoke in code to the team in the village.
"Let’s make sure the team is not compromised. Tell them to double-check for body chips, location devices, implants, anything that might allow a satellite to follow them to Seattle. Israel, pull out your devices and check that we’re all clean.”
“All over it Boss.” George and Israel calmly followed orders. Raven kept his pedal to the metal for maximum speed and impact. They’d hit the base of the mountain in two minutes.
“I should never have underestimated Sying. Unless of course, it’s our old friends in the White House.”
They turned onto Highway 99 and Raven drove the rest of the twenty-minute drive to the Pemberton airport deep in thought.
28
SYING LAUGHED OUT loud. Sam Woo had delivered!
“The game has begun Luke Raven!”
She turned off her iPad. She smiled at the sexy young Russian beauty walking around in nothing but a black leather thong and stiletto heels.
Sying lay naked on her massage table. She burned powerful incense in her personal spa on the eighty-fifth floor of the Jin Mao Tower. Buying the entire penthouse floor of the Grand Hyatt Hotel was a luxurious purchase, one befitting the woman at the pinnacle of China’s financial world.
“Tasha, I am agitated tonight. Focus my massage on my thigh muscles. Yes, right there. Umm. And my breasts, the muscles are so tight.”
Sying dozed for a few minutes, then awakened to thoughts of her plan for Professor Raven. Her anger rushed to the surface, muscles throughout her body tensed.
“I’m hurting?” Tasha questioned shyly.
“No.” Sying stroked the Russian girl’s nipple possessively. “Continue.”
Sying thought back to her Caltech days. She’d been an excellent student. Professor Raven was an exceptionally gifted teacher. He was the most brilliant man she’d ever met. She knew Raven sensed in her both her aptitude and her duplicity. Unfortunately, he could read her intentions. He was the first and only man she could call an equal. She had been sure that if there were no woman in his life, he would mate with her. They were of one mind. Together they could be unstoppable. So, she went after him. She used everything in her sexual arsenal to seduce him. Unsuccessfully.
And she loathed him for his rejection. No one said no to Sying Li Ma.
She waited until she had graduated from Caltech and claimed her place in China.
And then she had his wife and daughter murdered and left enough open questions for him to know who was responsible.
29
LUKE FOCUSED ON the objective ahead. He pushed his vehicle to the limit, narrowly missing three deer crossing Hwy 99 between Blackcomb Mountain and Pemberton valley.
“Slow down Cowboy! Killed by deer, not a noble way to go bud.” The boys laughed, some of the tension they’d all been feeling eased away.
Pemberton Valley had to be one of the prettiest places on earth. The lakes shimmered in the morning light. Pink snow-covered peaks circled the valley town. Early morning golfers unpacked clubs from pricey SUV’s ready for a day of chasing bears off the Big Sky golf course. Native tribes from the reservation to the North lived in harmony with farmers, yuppies and ski-lift operators from Whistler Mountain. This was as far away from the violence that anyone could imagine.
Luke eased into a parking garage at Pemberton Regional Airport. He and the boys grabbed their duffels from the back of the Range Rover, secured the lock on their garage, and walked to the far end of the runway towards a lone barnlike structure.
After key codes and fingerprints were entered, a small door opened allowing access to the three operatives. Although there were no signs of illegal entry, the boys were vigilant. If it was Sying, and she’d found the compound on Blackcomb, did she also know about this building and what it housed?
“All clear, Luke.”
Parked at the center of the building was one of only two S-97 Raiders. Sikorsky’s new attack helicopter was a seriously sexy beast. Luke paid double the projected cost to secure this “damaged” prototype. He then had her skins re-designed to read the surrounding environment and camouflage with the skies. This building also had an inner core that prevented satellite detection. To the best invasive eye, this building held tools, various airplane parts, and junk. Luke was confident of this; he’d designed the Sat-block himself.
“Yeah, baby!” Israel loved his fighting flying machines. George preferred hand-held weapons; and Raven loved choppers, all speed machines, and fighter jets.
“This baby rocks out at almost 300 mph. We will be at our destination at the Boeing airfield in under an hour.”
Luke unlocked a section of the wall in the far corner, put in a code and the roof retracted. Speed was of the essence. The roof was designed to open once known satellites had passed over the coordinates. If they were not out of the terminal in ten minutes, it retracted automatically.
Rising towards the clear skies, George called out.
“South perimeter, vehicles approaching north Highway 99 at top speed. Move it, Luke, get her up and out of range.”
Israel computer-focused the built-in weapons, not yet tested in real-time, and unleashed a volley directly aimed at the tires of two turbo-charged GMC trucks. They smashed into each other and bounced off a fully loaded logging truck coming from the other direction. The vehicles plunged deep into a lake surrounding the golf course. It’s unlikely that anyone survived the poisonous gas attack created when Israel shot out their windows.
“That should end their racing careers permanently.” The boys laughed out loud. Luke adjusted the plane’s cloaking and raced up above the cloud cover.
“Luke, you’re going to have some explaining to do with the Canadian Government!”
“I’ll worry about that later. We’ve got things to do in Seattle.”
30
THE PARTY BOATS from Puerto Vallarta disgorged hundreds of passengers on the pier at Las Caletas. A water taxi stopped alongside the massive catamaran, Zach, and Samaar hopped off.
Gripping their canvas backpacks, they blended in with the crowds. They made their way upwards along the pathways into the jungle. Families smiled and took photos while others chose the lower path to go kayaking and swim in the azure waters of the Bay.
“We’re going up this trail, hiking in two kilometers where we will meet the highway. Drink lots of water.”
Samaar and Zach climbed upwards and occasionally stopped to listen for any sounds that seemed out of place.
Samaar slowly raised her hand to warn Zach of impending danger. A gigantic West Coast Rattlesnake hissed at her presence. Before Zach could react to the problem, she had thrown her knife right between the eyes of the viper.
“It’s nothing,” she whispered wiping the blood from her weapon on the moss at her feet and replacing it in her boot. They continued up and over the mountain past trickling streams and small raging waterfalls that would eventually dump their deluge into the emerald sea. They stopped for water.