She moved toward the tunnel and was nearly at the entrance when something caught her eye. She turned, and on steps that led nowhere a young man stood. Her Indian, she thought. A red band wrapped his head, his body still painted, and a spear in his hands. Across the distance he met her gaze, his attention moving to the rocket, then to the powder.
He’s confused, she thought and shooed him back. “Go deep into the caves,” she said in Spanish, but that didn’t seem to register. She shooed him again and smiled. He turned and pushed an icon on the wall. Rock on stone scratched softly and he slipped between the layers of granite.
She moved back to the entrance, ready to detonate.
Mike’s heart pounded wildly when Clancy disappeared into the caves. I swear… But he couldn’t drag her ass out of there and kept his attention on Alvarez. The man was jumpy and sweating, and while the face didn’t match, the voice and manner sure did. The more he spoke, the faster his accent faded.
“It’s already gone,” Alvarez said. “You can’t stop it.”
Mike went still, the cold metal of his rifle near Alvarez’s cheek. Jesus. “Drop the gun.”
“That’s the second shipment,” he said, nodding to the truck on the hill, smiling and smug.
“Now I know what to look for,” Mike said. “Drop the weapon!”
“Not unless you can make a plane in—” Alvarez looked at his watch, swinging the gun. “Eleven minutes.”
Oh, shit. Mike knew it was useless to even ask. “Which airport?”
“Now, that’s the tricky part.”
The shot rang out, and Mike stepped back. In his line of vision, he saw Richora with a clean hole in his head. A knife lay inches from Mike’s foot. Sniper. But it was enough for Alvarez to grab his wife.
“Put the gun down or I’ll shoot her!”
Mike believed him; he’d already tried once. “Take it easy. Okay.” He bent to lay the gun at his feet, releasing it slowly. “Easy, let her go, Neil. She’s—”
Alvarez fired at Mike’s hand, the bullet hitting the pistol and knocking it away. Toasted, Mike thought, with a glance. The trigger was shattered.
“She’s my wife.”
“Mother of your children?” Mike said. Get them where it hurts.
But he didn’t falter. “All part of the big picture.”
It was a cover. All of it. To hide from his crimes. Mike knew the moment his wife understood. Her hand moved toward his crotch.
The woman slammed her fist back into his nuts. Alvarez buckled with a scream, and the woman twisted away as Mike grabbed a kilo of powder, punctured the plastic with his fingers, and threw.
It hit Alvarez in the face, covering him in a fine dust. He froze. His gaze darted to the water and he inched back. “No!”
Then Mike heard the slide of several weapons. From the river, men appeared, armed to the teeth and aiming at him. Shining Path, he realized. Alvarez smiled and brushed at the dust, his eyes looking large in the chalky face.
“You didn’t think it was just me alone, did you?”
The woman scrambled far back till Mike couldn’t see her behind Richora’s truck. Beyond him, Clancy stood at the entrance to the cave, then moved sideways away from it.
She didn’t see the man on the rise above her, aiming at her back.
Oh, Jesus.
“Kill him,” Alvarez ordered. “Now!”
“Behind you!” Mike shouted and dove into the river, then instantly turned, driving his hand across the water and shooting a spray at Alvarez.
Clancy twisted and saw only the barrel of the rifle. She bolted downhill from the cave toward the water, toward Mike. Before she hit the water, she pushed SEND and crashed into the river, muddy brown liquid swirling around her like coffee. She swam deep as bullets discharged into the water around her. But her buoyancy brought her back up and more bullets pierced the water.
Alvarez screamed, his skin shrinking, and Mike dove under, strong arms digging, and he barely felt the tremor under the water. He punched through the surface.
The cave didn’t explode.
It ruptured like a breaking wound. Thousands of gallons of water shot out the entrance like strip mining, taking rocks and debris to the edge of the ground and pouring into the river. The strength of it pushed rebels off their feet, the sweeping current cleaning the slate of Shining Path. But there were more men firing at nothing, a wild spray of dangerous bullets. Alvarez writhed on the ground, clawing at his face as it shriveled. The powder emulsified on his face, sucking in his skin, and he inhaled it. With the moisture in his lungs, they collapsed in seconds.
Mike looked for Clancy as the cave, in one indrawn breath, imploded in on itself, corking the entrance and sealing it. He felt a grip on his shirt and grabbed it. The small wrist bones told him it was Clancy. He yanked her to the surface. The moment was lost at the crack of gunfire. Clancy dove again and Mike saw a man drop to his knees, then his face, a hole in his forehead. He looked for the shooter, ducking when gunfire sparked again. He saw movement underwater and grabbed Clancy, yanking her up. A bullet hit the tree and Mike twisted away with her.
“I thought I got them.”
“Most of them,” he said, then kissed her hard. “That was brave, honey. Now stop it.”
Bullets chipped at the tree and, Mike’s back to it, he kept Clancy in front of him and wondered where Krane and Sal were. Mike had nothing, his gun under gallons of water, his pack thirty yards away. “We have to run.”
“No, really?”
“Alvarez said there was a shipment leaving now.”
“How long before it leaves?”
“In eleven minutes. Three minutes ago.”
“Oh, man.”
“Hell, isn’t it?” he said, then moved behind the crushed building. Hip deep in water, his legs dragged, but Mike could see his pack. At least he had explosive in there. He hoped.
“We need that truck.” He pointed.
Clancy looked at the souped-up man-truck, black with giant wheels. Lots of chrome. Boy, Richora was really countering for something teeny.
But it was in the open and everyone wanted them dead.
Hank Jansen didn’t wait for a meeting of the Joint Chiefs, nor for Cook to point fingers at Miss McRae. He went straight to the top. If heads were going to roll, it better start there. Hank passed through three security checks. Even with his face and name listed on the wall, he appreciated the thoroughness of the Marine guard.
He stepped into the Office of the Secretary of the Navy. The older man was behind his desk, standing, reading, his glasses low on his nose. He looked over them. “Hank, it’s good to see you.”
They shook hands. “Did you read over the information I sent you?”
“I was wondering why that didn’t go through channels. You thought because she’s my daughter I’d smother it.”
“No, sir, because what she’s created is sensitive. That she’s your daughter never occurred to me.”
Daniel smiled slightly and gestured to the seat.
He stared across the wide desk and said bluntly, “We have a viable threat, sir, but we have pieces from three agencies.” He held out a file.
“And you’re trying to fit them.” He reached for the paperwork and read, leaning back in his leather chair till it creaked. “These photos are digital. Who took them?”
“Interpol, Antone Choufani. He checks out, and he’s seen my team, line of sight with them in Peru minutes ago.” Within inches of a skilled killer. Hank thought the photo of a dead Dehnwar was suitable for framing right next to Saddam Hussein.
The SecNav looked at him over the glasses. “The four lost? The UAV?”
“UAV was destroyed, as well as the Hellfires, and the chopper. Two men dead, and the rest survived.”
“Because of this technology Clancy created.”
“Quite possibly.”
“God, she’ll be hard to live with now,” he muttered, and Hank chuckled. “Cook’s part in this confirmed?”
“Yes, s
ir.” Gantz had come in handy for more than just some lousy passport photos. The phone records off the hitter’s cell gave them all they needed. “Cook might have made a call from Yates’s lab, but it wasn’t the first one and Gantz traced it.”
Daniel McRae tensed and Hank could tell underneath the cool exterior was a father furious someone tried to hurt his little girl. He sat up sharply and reached for the phone. “Let’s get the troops back first. Then we’ll sort it out.”
“No, sir, there isn’t any time.”
The SecNav looked up.
“It’s going to be in Peru airspace in a few minutes.”
“Let them shoot it down.”
“We can’t.”
Daniel frowned.
“It’s more than just pieces that create the weapons. It’s the fuel.”
McRae listened. Halfway through an explanation that was vague at best, he stopped him. “He needs to hear this now.”
He dialed the Secretary of Defense and hoped today the channels opened. Alerting everyone from Secret Service to Homeland Security and the Border Patrol would send people into a high alert. America needed to be notified and the Peru Air Force needed to scramble jets. Now.
While he waited for the pickup Daniel glanced at the photo of his daughter on the corner of his desk, shaking his head. “Troublemaker,” he muttered, then spoke quickly to his boss.
Marianna inched under the truck, kicking off her shoes and pulling her body toward the driver’s door. Bullets hit around her and she chanted a prayer as she rolled out from under the truck. Alejo’s face was inches from her and she bit back a yelp, then grabbed the knife left on the ground. She rose to her knees, pulling open the door, and was relieved the keys were still in the ignition. She climbed up, stabbing the seat with the knife for leverage, and got behind the wheel. A bullet hit the glass and the windshield fractured. She ducked, and turned over the engine.
The door jerked open and the American jumped in with a woman.
“Hi,” Clancy said. “Mind if we borrow this?”
The woman didn’t say anything, quickly moving out of the seat. Keeping low, Mike slid across her, forcing her back, and shifted behind the wheel. Slumped in the seat, he put it in reverse and stepped on the gas.
The truck wheels spun on the wet ground, then shot backward, climbing up the hill.
“Your men!”
“They’ll be all right. Look for a phone. That plane can’t leave the ground.”
The truck hit something, and Mike shot upright into the seat, cursing. The other truck had been blown to pieces, and a body hung on the door. He shifted gears and gave it gas, then turned the truck sharply to the left. The big wheels bucked, pushing it nearly on its side, and Clancy leaned as if it would help. The truck landed hard and Mike accelerated, plastering them to the seats.
“Duck!” he warned before he punched the cracked windshield, pushing away shattered glass. Wind beat inside the truck as Clancy searched the vehicle. She met his gaze. “No phone.”
“Then we have to stop the plane.”
“How long do we have now?”
Mike glanced at his watch. “Three minutes.”
“Pull over, we’ll call. Okay, okay,” she said when he put up three fingers. She grabbed his pack, zipping it open. “Your GPS thing, it sends text messages, right?”
“Yeah.”
She worked it with her thumbs with lightning speed, and Mike told her what to write. She sent it and confirmed.
“Keep sending it.”
“You’ve got a message from Gantz.” She read it. “It’s Renoux’s plane.”
“There it is.” He nodded ahead and didn’t wait for the airport gate to open and plowed through it. Hard metal and link fences smacked the truck. “You have to drive.”
“Oh God,” she said.
Mike bounced the truck over a band of landing lights and onto the flight deck. The cargo jet was on the end of the runway.
“That? You want to stop that! It’s as big as a C-130.”
“If it gets over Peru airspace and they shoot it down, then what? That powder will rain on every living thing for miles. And if the wind takes it, the people in San José de Lourdes won’t have a chance.”
“Shoot it over international waters, then.”
“God knows what that would cause. A waterspout? Tidal wave?” He shook his head. “Our guys can’t cross Peru airspace without permission, and that will take too long. They wouldn’t be here in time anyway. No one knows about it. No one but us.”
He kept his foot on the gas and a hand on the wheel as they switched places and Clancy sank into the big seat. She could barely see over the dash.
“Maintain speed.” Mike ripped into the pack, pulled out the explosives.
“What are you doing with that? Oh no. No. Mike, you can’t.”
But he’d already set it. The green numbers glowed.
“Do you think throwing that at a speeding plane will do the trick?”
“No. I have to get closer.”
“How much?” She was right on its tail.
“Lots.”
She glanced at him and understood the choices. None. “Tell me what you need.”
“Stay right of the jet engines and under the wing. I’m going for the landing gear. Go, go!”
She pushed harder on the gas and thought of several reasons not to do this, but with no way around it. The plane was moving too fast to catch up and then jump, and crashing it into the plane would explode them and the aircraft. He was right. It was taxiing and gaining speed, a gray elephant loaded to the gills with crates of weapons—and the powder.
Clancy tightened her grip on the steering wheel, her foot straining on the gas pedal. “Mike, the timer.” She nodded to it on the seat beside her.
“It’s a remote and already set.”
“It only has ninety seconds!”
“Clancy.” She looked at him sideways, speeding toward the moving plane.
“I know,” she said over the noise, her eyes tearing.
He held her gaze for a second, memorized the wind pushing at her hair, the way her one look let him see her heart. Part of him was glad for the moments they’d had, but he was dying inside. This was a fine time to fall in love with her, he thought, then crawled over the dash and out the broken front window of the truck, squinting against the wind. He rose to stand like a hood ornament and knew he had to get higher.
Shouting over the noise of the jet was useless, and he waved to her to keep up the speed. He tried to stand, even the small dips in the tarmac making him struggle for balance. The roar of the engines was deafening and the heat of the jet wash scorched his face. She drove under the wings, then jerked the wheel when Peru fighter jets came over the tops of the mountains and swooped into the valley.
When she broke a hundred miles an hour the truck shook. Mike concentrated on the hole around the wheel hub as they moved closer. Closer. He drew a breath, bent to squat, and hoped this damn nano shit worked. He jumped, grabbing onto the undercarriage, and he slipped, hanging from one arm for a moment, wind and speed batting him like a scarf. The truck faded back as he hooked his leg on the wheel hub, the vibration rattled his teeth and eyesight.
Peruvian fighter jets came in for the attack.
The aircraft’s nose tipped up, the engine straining to lift. Mike stretched his reach, slapped the explosive pack on the gear, then jammed in the detonator.
But the plane was already lifting off the ground.
Twenty
The truck rolled to a stop while the plane sped toward the end of the runway. Peruvian fighter jets crisscrossed overhead to keep it from leaving the ground, riddling the wings with bullets.
Clancy couldn’t think beyond he’s in there.
She looked down at the timer and blinked back the hot rush of tears. This is so unfair, she thought, watching the green numbers tick off the last seconds. The plane lifted off. It rose a hundred feet per second.
Still, no Mike.
The door threw open and Nathan stuck his head inside. “He didn’t, oh shit, he did.”
“It’s got seconds,” she said. “Stop it, Nathan. Please.” She held out the timer. “Abort it.”
Nathan glanced between her and the timer, then grabbed it. “There’s no fail-safe!” he shouted over the scream of jets. “Damn him!”
The last three seconds ticked off.
The explosion ripped through the aircraft, tearing the belly. The jet went down and Clancy jerked back at the bright flash. The nose of the aircraft dragged on the runway. Then the impact ignited the fuel as the fuselage collapsed, pulling in and destroying the sleek shape.
“There’s no air,” Nathan said. “There’s no air!”
It scraped along the trees, knocking them down like matchsticks and gouging the hillside. It jerked to the right, its nose plowing into the mountain. The impact buckled the metal, stopping it as flames licked at the walls, at all of it.
“The fire’s eating the air and there’s no water to make the powder work,” Nathan said.
Clancy didn’t hear him. She understood words like stricken. Devastated. She forced herself to get out of the truck, then step away from it. The wind pushed at her clothes as she stared at the flaming aircraft. Then she sank to the ground, her head in her hands. She choked on her tears, tears for the man, for the lover, for the scattered moments in this intimate danger they might have made into more. Any man she felt she loved, well, she didn’t. I barely got the chance.
She sobbed, needles of pain racing over her body and she couldn’t draw in enough air. “Oh, Michael.”
She pushed to her feet, yet couldn’t take her eyes off the wreckage. A scream bubbled in her throat, the agony of losing him too much to bear.
“Damn you, Michael!” she said to herself and couldn’t watch anymore. A luxurious car slammed to a stop and emptied. They all stared at the wreckage. Clancy couldn’t bear it. There was no way he could have survived, and that he gave up his life, just pissed her off.
The woman who’d hidden in the back of the truck climbed out.
Clancy leaned against the truck, the engine hot and smoking as she cried.
Intimate Danger Page 31