by Ty Patterson
‘You shit, all you had to do was bring her out of the back of the truck and into the open where we could question her. Now we have to chase her tail in the darkness.’
‘She kicked me in the nuts and took me by surprise. Once I get my hands on her–’
‘Shut up. Stop. Do we even know which direction she’s gone?’ the other hissed angrily.
Zeb drifted closer, a hundred feet away from them, and could hear their harsh breathing as they tried to listen over themselves. It was too dark for him to make them out clearly, but they seemed to be about five feet seven in height, dressed in dark clothing and obviously out of shape.
He turned his attention to the woman they were chasing, laid the map in his mind, calculated time and distances, and visualized how it might have gone down.
Four hundred feet away was an open patch where a truck could come in, and he guessed that was where it was parked now. The woman had given the two pursuers the slip there and headed toward the denseness of the park.
Maybe two minutes of wrestling with the men, five minutes of running through the open patch… he turned a full circle and set out cautiously in the two o’clock direction.
He stopped every ten feet and listened, and at his third stop he felt her.
A presence at first, different from the surrounding park, and as he went closer, he could feel her moving softly away from all of them.
Her movement became faster as the pursuers stepped up their chase, and then she gave up the stealthy movement as the two pursuers heard her.
‘I can hear the bitch now,’ one of them grunted to the other.
‘Wait, we just want to talk to you,’ Steve called out.
That will make her stop. Zeb almost laughed.
He was in the middle angle of the triangle formed by the three moving parts, and he stepped it up and closed the gap on the woman.
Zeb had worked out three things about the men chasing the woman.
At least one of them had a silenced gun, which meant a degree of professionalism.
They weren’t out to kill the woman. They might molest her, but not kill her. If they wanted to kill her, they’d have done that by now.
The one who had berated Steve was the leader of the two, though it was highly unlikely he was the one behind all this. The one-who-was-not-Steve turned on a flashlight and aimed it ahead, trying to catch the woman in its glare.
One moment the woman was fleeing in panic, darting rapid glances over her shoulder, and the next a hand was clamped firmly over her mouth; she was lifted in the air and carried sideways, twenty feet away, behind a dense thicket.
The pursuers didn’t see anything. All they heard was her rushing through the park and the next moment, silence.
Zeb felt the woman draw a deep breath, and he squeezed, one hand an iron band around her waist, trapping her hands, and the other pressed deep against her mouth, not allowing her lips to move. The deeper she breathed, the tighter he squeezed, till she relaxed finally realizing that screaming was not only futile, it was impossible.
He held her there, made sure her pale face wasn’t visible, and watched the flashlight disappear along with the soft thudding of the two men. He hoped they didn’t come across the bears.
He didn’t want to be the one to wipe their remains off the park.
Three hours later, they were still there waiting silently and saw the flashlight come back swinging in short movements, the anger and frustration in the two apparent in their tread.
He waited till he heard the vehicle start in the distance and drive away.
They’d be back in the daylight. He’d known hunters of their kind before.
‘Will you scream if I remove my hand?’ he asked the woman softly.
She kept stubbornly silent.
He waited patiently. He could outwait the Sphinx. After ten minutes he felt her nod.
He still didn’t remove his hand. ‘If you scream, chances are they’ll hear and come back, and then you’ll be in deeper trouble.’
She nodded again, and he removed his hand.
He stepped in front of her and looked at her closely for the first time.
She was a young woman, black or brown haired – too dark to make that out – and about five feet seven. She was slimly built, but he thought he could detect athleticism and muscle structure in her build.
‘Who are you?’ he asked.
‘Who the hell are you?’ she countered, her voice trembling but strong.
‘I am the man who saved you,’ he answered her simply.
She went silent for a long while.
‘I don’t know who I am.’
He waited for her to elaborate.
She said finally, in a small voice, ‘I’ve lost my memory.’
Chapter 2
Zeb stood there silently, as he digested it. Didn’t see that one coming.
She read his silence correctly and mocked him scornfully. ‘Of all the zillion reasons I could toss out, don’t you think there’s a reason for me to give the most outlandish one? It’s true.’
She waited a few seconds for his answer and, when none came, said, ‘Thank you for stepping in. I need to go now.’
She turned away in the darkness, and he shot out a hand and held her upper arm.
She whirled; her right hand came up in an open-palmed strike, aimed for his open throat, her body coiled tightly behind the blow.
She met open air and stumbled as her simultaneous groin kick cut through the air.
Some Krav Maga moves there. Self-defense classes probably. He’d seen her body telegraphing the move in the minute movements of her head and shoulders, and had taken a long step backward.
He stood there silently; his hands loose at his sides, and watched her recover and met her wary glance.
She gazed at him for a few seconds and turned and ran.
He made no effort to stop her and called out, ‘Not that way. Not unless you want to meet a grizzly.’
He heard her curse, but she swerved and changed direction.
Her sounds muted as she started moving more stealthily, probably realizing that he could follow her progress. Stealthy was fine with him.
Four hours and frequent stops and starts – her way of checking her back trail – later, they reached the edge of her camp. In the distance, he saw her hunkered behind stunted trees as high as her, as she peered cautiously at the camp.
The sky was tinged with the first streaks of gold, a vast mural stretching from horizon to horizon, painted every day regardless of whether those below appreciated it or not. Whether it had an audience or not.
The camp was empty but for a solitary tent.
That section of the southeast corner saw traffic – hikers and campers passing through – and the camping ground was well located, with a watering hole not far away and enough open space for tents or sleeping bags to be laid out.
He saw her pale face flash as she looked back, and he detached his mind, let it roam free and become part of the earth, the air and the sun. It took an exceptional operative to detect his presence when his ki, his life force, was this low.
She was probably lifted from this place and now is making sure the men haven’t returned.
He nodded mentally in approval. She was no tenderfoot.
He studied the camp in more detail. Just the one tent there, which begged the obvious question – a young woman alone in the park?
Nope. Tent’s a standard two-person one. So where’s the other person?
The woman rose from cover and made her way cautiously to the camp, a stout branch in her hand as a weapon.
He heard her call out something, the words indistinct, and saw her brace herself for a fight-or-flee move depending on the response to her call.
There wasn’t a response. The tent lay still.
She waited for some more time, and when the tent showed no sign of speech or movement, abandoned all caution and ran to it. She jerked it open, poked her head inside, then withdrew it and looked around.<
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She walked around the camp in small circles, calling out loudly. She went in the tent again and came out with something in her hand. She held the phone to her ear for a few moments and put it down in disgust when she didn’t seem to get a signal.
He drifted closer to make out who or what she was calling out for.
Brown flash. Edge of his vision. Too late.
‘Don’t move. I have a gun trained on you.’
He moved, though, the slightest turn of his head to take the speaker in.
He stared, and for once his impassive face deserted him.
The person pointing a gun at him was a young woman. Brown haired, five-foot-seven tall, with a slim build that was athletic and muscular.
Identical to the woman he had rescued and had been following.
He saw her face tighten as she looked behind his shoulder, and her eyes widened.
Her twin’s ahead of me. Someone else behind me!
‘Down,’ he shouted and dropped to the ground. He twisted his body to land on his shoulder, just in time, as a bullet split the air where his head had been. A second one buzzed angrily a couple of inches above him.
His Glock came up without conscious thought, became an extension of his arm, his eye sought and found the sight, the sight found the attacker.
His first shot went wide, the second made the attacker duck, his third creased his shoulder, and the fourth killed him. His shots rolled like thunder in the cloudless sky.
He flowed to his feet, approached the fallen man warily, at an angle that would draw any return fire away from the women.
No return fire came. No other attackers came.
He didn’t move.
He relaxed after a long moment when nothing pinged his radar. He holstered his gun and searched the body.
Nothing on it. No papers that said John Thug. He found a phone, but it was dead. He slipped it in his pocket and picked up the attacker’s gun by its barrel
A Sig Sauer P226. A professional’s weapon.
He dropped it and turned to the women.
Their gun was pointing at him.
Chapter 3
‘I’m the one who saved you from that dead guy. Helped her, as well.’ He gestured in the direction of the woman he’d followed.
The two stood together, both of them clad in jeans and outdoor boots, the one with the gun in a flannel shirt, the one he’d followed wore a pullover. They styled their hair similarly and were of the same height and build, with green eyes under dark brown hair, and were healthily tanned. Probably in their late twenties. Their nails were trimmed short, neatly, and they didn’t wear any rings or jewelry of any kind. Nothing that was visible.
They weren’t exactly identical, but only a close study revealed their differences.
The one he was pursuing had fuller lips and her nose flared just a bit more than her twin’s. Details that a quick, casual glance wouldn’t spot.
The twin he’d followed nodded briefly at her sister, confirming what he’d said. They studied him in silence. He was tall, a shade over six feet, brown eyes, brown hair cut short, a lean athletic build, and moved with a fluidity that they had never seen before.
‘Why did you follow her? Who the hell are you exactly?’ gun woman asked him. Hostility edged the wariness in her eyes.
‘I’m a hiker like you. I was woken up at night by the sound of shots, followed them, saw your sister was in trouble, rescued her, then followed her to make sure she’d reach your camp safely.’
Gun woman laughed incredulously. ‘Hiker like us? Man, no hiker or tourist I know handles a gun like you did, or acts the way you did. You certainly aren’t a cop on holiday or else that’s the first thing you’d have told us. You’d better start talking.’
Zeb curbed his impatience. They’ve no reason to trust me.
‘My name is Zeb Carter. I was in the Army, which is where I picked up those skills. I work as a security consultant in New York now.’ He paused. ‘If I wanted to do both of you harm, do you think we’d be standing around talking like this?’
‘Can you prove who you are?’
He reached slowly for his wallet and extracted his card and tossed it to them. The girl he was following caught it, read it, raised her eyebrows silently and held it forward for her twin to read. Gun woman skimmed it swiftly, looked back at him, and lowered the gun slowly.
He caught the card when it was tossed back and, after putting it away, asked them, ‘What’s this all about?’
Their body language, the way they half turned to each other, told its own story. The walls were lowered but not so much that they trusted him fully.
‘We don’t know,’ admitted gun woman. The other woman started to speak and closed her mouth when gun woman nudged her.
Zeb said patiently, ‘I am who I said I am. You can call the Army’s liaison office and confirm my details on that card I showed you. I totally understand that you can’t trust me fully. In other circumstances, I would have left you two alone and minded my own business. But these are not ordinary circumstances. It’s not every night that I come across a woman being chased by some hoods at night in the middle of the most famous national park in the world. However, we don’t have much time. If I knew what shit I stepped in, it would help me understand what to expect.’
He stopped, surprised by his own verbosity.
‘She’s telling the truth,’ pursued woman said. ‘We really don’t know who those guys are or why they attacked us–’
‘Why did you say we don’t have much time?’ gun woman cut in.
‘This guy was part of the group who chased her, I presume?’ Zeb looked at them, and when they nodded, he continued. ‘In that case, don’t you think the others will be coming back? Don’t forget your sister evaded them at night, and they’ll want to set that right. No loose ends.’
Gun woman whirled round and strode to the tent. ‘He’s right. Let’s get outta here, Beth,’ she called over her shoulder.
‘Wait,’ Zeb said.
She paused and turned back. The tone of voice he’d used made most people wait.
‘Call the park rangers. We need to close this or else we’ll be swimming in it deeper than we are now.’
She returned his gaze, and he could see her working it out, her twin too. ‘Once the rangers are here, those other guys will keep their distance?’
He nodded. ‘Yeah. We have some time. Dead guy’s companions will be waiting for his call, maybe for another hour or so, since it’s still early. They won’t risk calling him, since they know he’s supposed to be following you. A call to his phone might give him away.’
They fidgeted for a while as they pondered it. Gun woman squared her shoulders after a moment and headed back to the tent.
‘Phone’s dead. I have it here.’ Pursued woman stopped her.
‘Then we’re screwed,’ gun woman muttered. She looked at Zeb. ‘You have a phone?’
Zeb slid the backpack off his shoulders, reached inside, and handed her a phone.
‘Never seen such a phone before,’ gun woman said, examining it briefly.
She dialed 911, explained the circumstances and hung up. ‘They’ll be here as quick as they can. They asked us not to leave the scene.’
He rested his backpack in the shade, took a swig of water from his canteen, and offered it to them. ‘You ladies have names?’
Gun woman pointed at her sister – ‘Beth’ – and at herself – ‘Meghan.’
He looked at them, awaiting more, and when none of them said anything, kept on watching them. Patience was second nature to him.
Beth finally broke the silence. ‘Beth and Meghan Petersen. Sisters obviously. Meg’s older but not by much. Meg runs a design consultancy in Boston, and I work with her.’
‘Just the two of you camping?’ No parents, friends, boyfriends, husbands?
Meghan answered his unasked question. ‘It’s the twenty-first century, in case you haven’t noticed. Besides, we can look after ourselves.’
He’d noticed they hadn’t flinched at the firing, hadn’t reacted at the sight of the man dying; she’d held the gun in a firm, sure grip. They’ve handled weapons, know self-defense, and have been in some heavy situations. How come?
‘What kind of security consultant are you? Software? Viruses and hacking, that kind of geek stuff?’ Beth asked him.
‘Nope. I work with companies and people, advise them on personal security.’
‘A bodyguard?’
‘Sometimes.’ He didn’t elaborate.
Zeb was an ex-Special Forces operative who worked in an agency that didn’t exist and reported to a boss who answered only to the President.
A boss who held the nebulous title of Director of Strategy. Clare, his boss, had founded the agency to undertake exothermic missions that no other Special Ops or deep black ops agency in the country’s defense and intelligence setup could or would undertake. These exothermic – their term for extremely high risk, high threat, deniable – missions included infiltrating terrorist gangs, retrieving stolen nuclear or biochemical weapons, taking out rogue heads of state, neutralizing threats that sheltered in friendly nations.
When Clare became the first female director of the agency, she’d overhauled the agency to make it smaller, completely deniable, have the smallest possible administrative footprint, yet have the best operatives.
The agency worked with handpicked private military contractors, whose first allegiance was to the agency. They could take on other assignments when they weren’t on agency assignments, as long as those missions didn’t conflict with the national interest or jeopardize any agency mission.
This structure was born one evening when she’d gone for a drink with her closest friend in downtown Washington D.C.
Cassandra and Clare had studied together at Bryn Mawr and had ended up working in the political jungle that was D.C. Cassandra had started her career as a Foreign Service specialist in the State Department and had ended up being the aide to the Secretary of State before retiring from politics and pursuing a career in academics. Clare had started her career at the agency as an analyst.