by Cindy Dees
She reached out tentatively to touch the floor and started as it gave way, viscous beneath her touch. She withdrew her hand, and her fingertips stuck to the gooey surface hard enough that she had to yank her hand back, leaving a little skin behind.
That was a powerful epoxy of some kind. The entire floor was coated with glue! Had she stepped in it, she doubted she’d have been able to walk across the floor without sacrificing her shoes, and then her socks, to the glue. Who in their right mind lived in a house like this and poured glue all over their foyer?
A trap.
This was a trap.
Adrenaline surged through her veins, screaming its warning at her. She froze, only her gaze roving quickly in all directions. She saw no cameras. No microphones. No other surveillance equipment. Her gut said she wasn’t missing anything. The threat she sensed was more human than machine.
Holy sh—
Was she alone in here or not?
Was this why the H.O.T. Watch had seen no hostiles outside? Were they already inside? Was their ambush about to be turned on them? She eased her hand down to her belt and pressed the transmit button three times fast, three times slow, and three times fast, sending out a clicked S.O.S.
Jeff’s response was immediate in her ear. “Are you injured?”
Two clicks for no.
“Are you in danger?”
One click for yes.
“Are you under attack?”
How was she to answer that? She wasn’t yet, but if there were hostiles in here, she very well could be soon. Did she want the Medusas to come roaring in here with guns blazing, or sneak in and possibly catch whoever else was in the house?
She gave two clicks for no.
“That was a long pause before you answered. Are you about to come under attack?” Jeff asked quickly.
An quick, emphatic single click.
“Do you request backup?”
Again, a single click.
Jeff gave the Medusas a flurry of orders to move in and enter the house through various doors and windows. Jennifer Blackfoot came up on frequency and ordered Bravo 51 to stand by to hit the house with all it had, jamming all electrical function of any kind within the mansion.
And then Jennifer said, “We’ll have a Predator drone on sight in two minutes. It’s equipped with structure-penetrating radar. Stand by for insertion, Medusas.”
Jeff acknowledged her.
Kat hunkered down in the hallway, thinking fast. She couldn’t stay here. She was completely exposed and had no cover if this turned into a shoot-out. She glanced around for options. With nothing but the glue-filled foyer before her and an empty hallway behind her, she didn’t have much to work with. And then she looked up. Time to use her secret weapon and go vertical. She eased back into a shadow and quickly pulled out her climbing claws, donning them over her shoes and on her hands.
She climbed the hallway wall first, and then eased around the corner into the foyer nearly ten feet up. As soon as she entered the open space, she worked her way higher, crawling up the wall, spiderlike, until she was well above the sight lines of anyone looking from the adjoining rooms into the foyer. She headed for a shadow and awkwardly resumed her game of twenty questions with Jeff.
She laboriously tapped out the Morse code to spell, “Trap. Foyer.”
He replied immediately. “Should we avoid the foyer?”
She clicked an affirmative, and he amended Karen’s point of entry to the dining-room window instead of the front door.
Kat double-tapped a negative to that. If Karen came into the dining room, she’d have to cross the foyer to get to anywhere but the kitchen.
Jeff understood immediately. “Will it work if Python comes in through the living room?”
Isabella was already scheduled to come in the living room window. That would put two Medusas in there simultaneously. Kat’s best guess was that would be where the hostiles would be hiding. They’d surround the painting that the Ghost was after.
Kat clicked a yes to Jeff’s suggestion that Karen enter the living room.
Astutely, Jeff asked, “Should I concentrate more force than I already am on the living room?”
She clicked a relieved affirmative.
Yet another adjustment to the entry scheme was made, and all the Medusas were massed outside the windows.
Then Jeff asked, “Where are you now, Cobra? I don’t want your teammates shooting you.”
She looked down at the foyer. Up here, she’d be clear of any bullets flying into the foyer. She reviewed the house layout quickly in her mind. But if she wanted to join the fight at all, she’d be squarely in her teammates’ fields of fire. She had to move.
She tapped out, “Foyer. Moving to living room.”
Jeff’s response was quick and sharp. “Don’t go in there by yourself! Wait for backup!”
He didn’t understand where she was at the moment, and although his advice was sound, she needed to ignore it. She sent one last message. “Am on ceiling.”
That caused a stir as Jennifer Blackfoot and Aleesha came up simultaneously to ask what the heck she meant by that.
A chuckle was evident in Jeff’s voice as he explained. “Cobra straps claws to her feet and hands and can crawl upside down along a ceiling like an insect. Medusas, keep your field of fire at eye level or below and you won’t hit her. She’ll be overhead when you enter the room.”
Jennifer retorted, “Are you kidding?”
Jeff answered, “Nope. I’ve seen her do it. It’s for real.”
A male voice interrupted. “The Predator is approaching target. Switching on cameras now. Stand by for real-time photo intelligence analysis.”
Kat didn’t know if the analyst would be at H.O.T. Watch Ops or sitting on the nearby helicopter, but she didn’t care either way, as long as the analyst knew his stuff.
A female voice came up. “I have eyes on target. I show one human heat signature…” A long pause. “Near the ceiling of the foyer, moving down the wall toward the living room entrance.”
Jeff murmured, “That is correct. Continue.”
“I paint two human signatures in the dining room, one to the right of the foyer entrance, one under the far window.”
Bingo. As disconcerting as it was to know she was, indeed, in the middle of an ambush, Kat was relieved to know that her instinct had been right and all this fuss wasn’t for naught.
The analyst went on. “I paint four humans in the living room, two on each side of the fireplace on the far wall. I paint one more human in the kitchen—he’s on the move, heading toward the butler’s pantry.”
Kat reviewed the house layout quickly. That guy would be circling through the back side of the house to come into the living room if she had to bet. After all, these guys couldn’t use the foyer any more than she could. Misty was slated to come in from that direction. She could drive that guy toward the living room if need be.
The analyst concluded, “That’s all. Seven tangos and one friendly doing a Spider-Man.”
Jeff came up. “Copy. Medusas, prepare for radio failure. Go on Bravo 51’s call of systems activated.”
All five Medusas acknowledged in turn, with Kat clicking hers.
Then Jeff said, “Bravo 51, light it up.”
“Roger,” came the electronic warfare man’s voice. “Here we go.”
Kat swore she could actually feel the radio waves bombarding her. Static abruptly filled her ears, but she wasn’t in a position to turn down her radio volume at the moment. She started crawling, heading for the dining room. Jeff was going to deal with those two guys, and she didn’t like those odds. As glass crashed from a half-dozen windows at once and shouting broke out around her, Kat planted a piton at light speed, clicked her rope onto it, and let go of the wall. She swung downward, dropping upside down until her head and shoulders cleared the dining-room entrance. More importantly, her pistol cleared the archway. For tonight’s work, she’d chosen a high-caliber handgun with enough stopping power to drop a
man. Thankfully, she routinely practiced shooting from odd angles like this, and she took in the scene before her in an instant. Jeff had just crashed through the window and was rolling across the floor while two men in black turned, startled, and were bringing their weapons up to bear on him.
Jeff was situated to nail the guy under the window, so she aimed at the man closest to her, double tapping a pair of shots into the guy before he ever knew she was there. Gunfire erupted from the living room as Jeff efficiently dropped his man. He jumped up and started toward her.
“Stop!” she cried.
He skidded to a halt.
She bit out, “There’s epoxy glue all over the foyer floor. You’ll have to go around.”
He nodded and took off running toward the kitchen. Quickly, she curled into a ball, caught her rope, and righted herself. She took off, crawling crablike around the foyer toward the shoot-out now in progress in the living room. The space was huge—easily fifty feet square, and crammed with furniture, cabinets, tables, and any manner of good cover. At a glance, all the shooters, both friendly and hostile, looked pinned down and at a stalemate. She glanced over at the doorway Jeff would have to come through. He’d be a sitting duck if he tried to get in there.
She had to do something to tip the scales and fast. He’d be here in a few more seconds.
She climbed up to the twelve-foot-high ceiling and commenced crawling stealthily across it. There. Below her. One of the hostiles. She pulled her pistol and shot down at him, burying a round in the top of his skull and a second round in the back of his neck as he fell.
Her shots elicited a round of gunfire, but none of the hostiles spotted her. She held her position, unmoving. She was completely exposed up here. If any of the bad guys looked up, she was dead meat.
Jeff spun into the room, and the hostiles seemed to realize that the stalemate was breaking against them. They commenced running around, shooting wildly. Although they didn’t hit any Medusas, they did effectively foul up everyone’s field of fire. Kat saw Aleesha and Isabella draw knives and move out, easing around the perimeters of the space.
Two of the hostiles drew together in the middle of the room, back-to-back behind a giant armoire in a highly defensible position. They were going to be hell to reach. Anyone who came into their line of sight would be shot.
And then she spotted Jeff moving toward them.
He was going to be a hero, dammit.
Swearing under her breath, she scrambled forward. From her vantage point, she saw Jeff pause around the corner from the hostile pair. He shoved a new clip of bullets home and tensed to move. A quick glance showed her the worst. The tango was sighting down the barrel of an AK-47, right at where Jeff was going to emerge, finger poised on the trigger. The second Jeff came around the end of the wet bar, he was going to be blown away.
Desperate to stop him from diving straight into the commando’s hail of lead, she scrambled the last few feet. And let go of the ceiling.
Chapter 18
Jeff’s heart skipped a beat as Kat’s dark shape hurtled down from the ceiling directly in front of where he was about to shoot.
Dear God. Had she been shot?
Pure, unadulterated panic ripped through him, a sick wash of heat that all but knocked his legs out from under him. Roaring in rage and terror, he charged around the corner, heedless of any danger waiting for him. He’d charge the jaws of hell itself for her.
He made out a writhing mass of arms and legs that he dared not shoot at, so he continued to sprint forward, the panic blurring his vision until he could hardly see.
And then a petite figure rose to the top of the pile.
Kat. He’d know her anywhere.
Blindingly fast, she gave a vicious yank. The figure beneath her went limp and thudded to the floor. A second, bigger figure jumped on her from behind, a knife glinting dully in the gloom.
Jeff’s weapon swung up to his shoulder. Time ceased, and his mind went to some strange place it had never gone before. A state of suspended animation descended upon him. He became one with the gun, and with the lead slug resting in its depths. He took the shot almost without conscious thought. It was as if his mind directed the bullet’s path, guiding its flight unerringly a hair past Kat’s temple and into the left eye of her attacker. The guy’s head snapped back, and Kat whipped around in his grasp, striking him an open-handed blow that leveled him long before Jeff’s bullet dropped him.
As he ran forward toward her, a single thought crossed his mind. He’d never seen another human being move as fast as she just had.
“You okay?” he bit out as they sank to the ground, back-to-back as their attackers had just been.
“Yeah. You?” She panted.
“Fine.”
The gunfire in the room was winding down. One more burst of gunfire, he recognized the sound of an MP-7—standard issue for the Medusas—and then it went quiet. The silence was intense after all the shots in an enclosed space, and his ears rang fiercely.
“Report!” he called.
One by one, the Medusas reported in. Misty’s voice sounded strained, as if she were injured.
“Mamba,” he called.
“I’m on it,” the medic replied, already running toward the last sound of Misty’s voice.
He stood up cautiously. “Clear the space by standard quadrants. We’ll meet at the fireplace.”
Kat stood up behind him and it was all he could do not to spin around and snatch her into his arms, to run his hands over her to assure himself that she wasn’t hurt. But now was not the time. Not yet.
He methodically checked his portion of the room, verifying that the two hostiles he and Kat had taken out were, indeed, dead. A few minutes later, the team converged by the fireplace, Mamba holding Misty’s left arm and still binding a splint into place. For her part, Misty’s face was drawn in pain.
“What have you got, Mamba?”
“Bullet in the upper arm, lodged near the bone. Gonna have to dig it out. Bleeding under control. She’s ambulatory but not combat capable.”
He nodded briskly. It was weird to let a woman suffer with a gunshot wound like this, but if he’d ever doubted it before, he didn’t now. These women were soldiers of the first caliber, every bit as good as his own men. They’d worked like a well-oiled machine, in spite of the close confines, the lack of radios and determined resistance by the hostiles.
Kat looked up from the body she’d just searched. “Russian. What do you want to bet our frisky oil minister sent them to get his movie back.”
Jeff nodded. “That movie’s gonna cost India a big oil contract or a whole lot of egg on that Russian minister’s face. The State Department’s gonna kiss your feet when you give that disk to them.”
Kat made a face. “That’s okay. I’ll settle for a decent foot massage. No kissing required.”
He grinned and spoke off frequency. “It all depends on who’s doing the kissing and how. You’re gonna like what I do to your toes.”
Kat’s eyes popped wide open, clearly imagining the possibilities.
The static in his ear stopped abruptly. Hallelujah. In the chaos of battle he hadn’t noticed it, but it had really been starting to get on his nerves the last minute or two.
“Say status,” Jennifer Blackfoot ordered.
She sounded tense. Which was saying something for her.
He replied, “All hostiles down. One friendly injury. We’ll need medevac to a hospital, but it’s not life-threatening.”
“Well done, Maverick, ladies.”
He started. That had been General Wittenauer’s voice. He’d had no idea the Old Man had been monitoring this op.
“Let’s move out,” Jeff ordered.
They headed for the back of the house. Bravo 51 was being directed to move in and pick up Misty and Mamba and fly them back to the H.O.T. Watch cave. Aleesha would remove Misty’s bullet in their operating room, where there wouldn’t be any awkward questions asked about how Misty’d been shot.
The helicopter lifted off, and the Medusas hiked off through the trees to recover the surveillance gear they’d abandoned when he’d ordered them to rush the house. Kat hung back with him, since she’d carried all her gear with her when she broke in to the mansion.
She gazed up at him in the starlight beseechingly. She did not speak, but then, she didn’t have to. Her eyes said everything. She was hurt. Missed him. Wanted to talk to him. Wanted him to understand that this was who she was.
“I—”
A dark shape hurtled out of the trees and barreled into Kat just as a gunshot rang out.
Jeff dived for Kat and the prone figure on top of her. Before he could do a thing to help her, Kat had moved like lightning, slipping the grip of her captor and reversing their positions.
Another shot rang out, and a foot-long divet of grass flew up a scant inch beyond Kat’s head. Jeff jumped to his feet, grabbing the attacker by one arm as Kat took him by the other. The three of them sprinted across the lawn, zigzagging for cover.
A French-accented voice panted. “One shooteur. In the woods that way. I show you.”
“Ahh. We meet again,” Kat answered warmly.
The Ghost? Jeff’s jaw dropped as he ran. The guy had literally run right into his grasp? Exultation shot through him.
They dived into a stand of fig trees and the shooter paused for the moment.
“This way!” The Ghost took off crawling on his hands and knees, with Kat in tow.
“You’re not going to follow him, are you?” Jeff demanded in a whisper.
“Of course I am.”
“You’ve already walked into one trap tonight. Are you going to dive into another one?” Jeff challenged.
“He just saved my life. He’s not a killer.” And with that, Kat turned away and rose to a crouch, running after the thief.
Jeff closed his eyes for a moment in sheer exasperation and then gave chase. The pair had paused at the edge of the fig grove. He drew close in time to hear Kat murmur, “Can you point him out from here?