by Steve Hadden
“That’s good.” The footsteps moved toward the stern.
The door of the head slammed shut. Startled, Kayla’s body quaked and she squeaked. Harrison covered her mouth. The footsteps stopped. In an instant, a wave of heat overwhelmed her and her body felt numb. She wondered if this was the last moment of her life as a free woman. Harrison hugged her tighter.
“Sorry. Big breakfast,” Sergio said.
His comment hung in the air. Then the officer let out a laugh.
The footsteps restarted and the boat shook twice as the men left the stern. She heard the snaps being reconnected and breathed. Harrison relaxed his arm.
In seconds, the boat was gently rocking down the road. Then it stopped and Kayla heard Sergio get out. A motor whined and it sounded like a door was rolling shut. Quickly, Sergio was back in the boat and opened the storage-compartment door. The light burned Kayla’s eyes, but Sergio grabbed her hand.
“Let’s get you up.”
He pulled her out of the compartment and Harrison followed them. As she stood at the stern of the trailered boat, her eyes quickly adjusted. She scanned the room. It was a miniature version of the facility they’d just left, except there were no boats under construction. Two cabin cruisers, a Boston Whaler and another large open-bow inboard were in various states of disrepair. Harrison and Sergio climbed down and Kayla followed.
For a moment, Kayla’s gaze locked with Harrison’s and she still saw the sting of rejection in his eyes—but also a glimmer of their old life together. She promised herself she wouldn’t beg him to try again. If he’d moved on, she’d move on—but it sounded easier than it felt.
Sergio pointed to a large office tucked in the corner of the shop. “We’ll wait here till dark.”
CHAPTER 17
Artemis knew her rage was her nemesis. The shrink had told her that her anger was always there. Her father had brutally beat it into her long ago. But it was also the nuclear power that had propelled her to the top of her profession. One thing and one thing only could relieve it. That one thing was killing Kayla Covington.
Covington was supposed to be dead. Instead she was on the run with the help of an unknown Marine veteran. Her location was a mystery, but that wouldn’t last. Artemis leaned against the fender of the ambulance and watched her team at work. The space was filled with seven ambulances now, three of them functional. Others were under some type of maintenance or repair. All the vehicles sat in bays, some on their hydraulic lifts. Tools were carefully positioned so they could be utilized in seconds to further the ruse.
She’d selected her team members based on their combat skills and intelligence. These were some of the deadliest and most cunning men and women on Earth. Their weapon of choice today was a laptop. In their hands, it was as deadly as any gun, knife or explosive. That was the state of warfare these days. A man and woman worked two laptops connected to two large monitors on the table in front of her.
Off to the right, tucked neatly in the corner, the small office held monitors that were carefully watched by one of the three men she’d assigned to security. Five monitors displayed the images from the cameras they’d placed around the perimeter of the facility and on the chain-link fence lining the only road in and out of the place.
They’d just finished a briefing where they’d run through the knowns and unknowns. The knowns were straightforward. Covington was now working with Harrison Clarke. Clarke was formidable, as demonstrated by Forrest’s cracked rib caused by the bullet Harrison had put into his vest. The pair had escaped in Harrison’s car, which DMV records had as a Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat. While the car had over seven hundred horsepower, it would be of little use to them since the FBI had the same information and would be scouring the West Coast for the vehicle. That meant they had to ditch it. While they could steal or borrow a car, they still wouldn’t escape the dragnet coordinated by the authorities. So, most likely, they needed help. Covington’s network was small and only consisted of one person: Clarke. The task before Artemis and her team was to scour Clarke’s network and find the most likely candidate.
“Look at this,” the man on the right said, pointing to his screen.
Artemis pushed away from the ambulance and eyed the screen over his shoulder. It was Clarke’s Facebook feed.
“He comments and likes this person’s posts four times more frequently than anyone else’s. Based on the language used, I’d say they served together.”
“Name?”
The man manipulated the mouse, and after a few clicks he had the Facebook page of a Sergio Martinez on the screen.
“Scroll down,” Artemis said.
The posts included pictures with friends involved in various outdoor activities: running, rock climbing, hiking and rafting. But boating seemed to be a favored activity. Artemis noticed the prosthesis that replaced the man’s right leg. Clarke appeared in several of the posts. What looked to be family members—a mother, father and sister, along with a yellow Labrador retriever—littered the other posts.
Artemis turned to the woman at the next laptop and pointed back to the screen in front of her. “Sergio Martinez. Get me everything on him.”
Artemis heard footsteps behind her and pivoted. Forrest was returning from the makeshift galley with an ice bag strapped against his bare chest. He had one of the secure sat phones in his hand.
“You have a call.”
Forrest’s gaze swept across the men at the tables. His expression betrayed his confident façade. Based on the uncertainty in Forrest’s eyes, Artemis immediately knew the caller. She grabbed the phone from him and marched into the office, chasing the man from the monitors, and closed the door.
“Go,” Artemis said.
“Terms are agreeable, but we have a condition.” The English was perfect.
“No conditions.”
“Then no deal.”
The caller remained silent. Artemis was stuck. The amount agreed to would be ten times what the current client offered. That kind of money bought anonymity. She and Forrest would disappear. At the same time, she’d prove the point she’d been trying to prove all along. She was better than those assholes who’d scorned her and assured her failure. They’d all pay. Just as her father did. With their lives. This was literally the once-in-a-lifetime chance—and she was running out of time. She’d invested six months in the planning and in the next instant it could disappear. She had to give in a little.
“What condition?”
“The package must be delivered alive along with the materials.”
Alarms rang in Artemis’s head. The level of complexity of the mission had just tripled. Getting a clear shot was one thing. Capture without death required a level of planning she hadn’t anticipated. Still, it was nothing compared with everything she’d gone through to get to this moment.
“The amount doubles.” This time Artemis waited patiently.
“Done. Instructions will be delivered to the drop point.”
Artemis hit the end button on the phone. She looked up and saw Forrest eyeing her from the shop. He had a sheet of paper in his hand and raised it over his head. She left the office and rejoined him.
“What was that about?” he said.
Artemis smiled and leaned in to whisper. “New client. Take Covington alive and you and I buy our own island.”
Forrest peeked over his shoulder, then nodded to Artemis and handed her the printout. “Sergio Martinez. Tied to Donnelly Marine. Fabrication shop in Miramar. Bayside facility in La Playa.”
The lead weight of certainty settled in Artemis’s chest. She always trusted that intuition. “La Playa. That’s it.” She checked her watch. It was 10:34 a.m. “They can’t go in daylight. Get ’em ready.”
Forrest began to bark orders and the entire team snapped into action. Artemis headed to the weapons locker and began to formulate her plan. A plan they’d never see coming.
CHAPTER 18
Mason Reed sat in the driveway of his home in Carmel Valley and watched the
morning sun crest over the Laguna Mountains. He’d been in front of the house awaiting any sign of his family stirring. The sunrise glowed red and Reed wondered if it was a warning. A cold black emptiness filled his gut as he thought about Ashley Reynolds’s death. He never thought he’d have to make this call.
He’d known Mike Reynolds since they met in grade school in Oceanside. Both their dads had been career Marines assigned to Camp Pendleton. Twenty-six years ago, Reed had stood next to Mike as his best man while Michelle walked down the aisle two days after their high school graduation. Eight months later, he’d shared their joy when their first and only child was born, and he’d watched Ashley grow into a bright young woman. Mike returned the honor as Reed’s best man when Reed married following graduation from UCSD before shipping out to the Helmand Valley in Afghanistan with the Marines. While Reed started his family much later, after leaving the Marines and joining the FBI, they both shared the common bond of fatherhood and regularly exchanged stories and advice. Reed had advised Ashley on her path to the Bureau. And while he wasn’t the San Diego SAC when she was hired, he was the SAC when she’d taken the assignment at the lab. He’d assured her and her father that the assignment to the Covington Lab was low risk. Now he’d have to give his best friend condolences for his daughter’s death. If that wasn’t bad enough, the same leaden dread he’d felt when he’d called the parents of his two Marines killed in Afghanistan years ago echoed deep in his mind.
His wife, Mary, and son, Jackson, were getting up soon and his privacy would be gone. He pulled the phone from his pocket and found Mike’s number. His finger shook as he pressed the button to initiate this awful call.
Mike answered on the first ring. “Hello?” Mike sounded weak. Reed guessed that the sleepless nights would continue to take their toll for a while.
“Hi, Mike.”
“Mason. How are you holding up, my friend?” Reed wasn’t surprised that Mike was concerned about his well-being.
“It’s terrible, Mike. I’m so sorry about Ashley.” Reed waited as Mike seemed to gather himself for a reply.
“It wasn’t your fault. We can’t believe she’s gone.” A sniffle escaped and Reed pictured his six-foot-five friend choking back an ocean of tears.
“I can’t imagine what you and Michelle are going through,” Reed said.
“I’m devastated,” Mike said in a whisper, “but Michelle is hysterical. I finally got the doctor to give her something, but it just slows her pain.”
Reed tried to relate to their pain, but he couldn’t. All life and any will to live had been stripped from his soul when Reed had lost his men, but Mike had helped him get his life back before he joined the Bureau. He eyed the front door of his house and a bitter ache took root in his chest when he tried to imagine losing Jackson. Michelle’s pain had to be a thousand times worse. And it was his doing.
“If there’s anything Mary and I can do, we’re here for you,” Reed said.
“Mason, there is one thing you can help us with.”
“Of course. Name it.”
“They’re not telling us anything. Just that she was killed in the attack. The news says domestic terrorism. But we’re waiting to see her at the morgue and no one is telling us shit. Just that the medical examiner is still doing her investigation.”
Reed remembered how Ashley’s lifeless body had been devoid of any trace of the energetic young woman he’d known. The bullet hole in her head had amplified her violent death. He didn’t want his friend to see her that way, but he knew it would happen.
“I’ll call them and see if they can get finished. It’s a crime scene, so the entire area had to be preserved. That slows things terribly.” Reed listened to his own words and knew they offered no solace. He gently shook his head in recognition of his inability to help his friend. Mike stayed silent.
“Mike?”
“I’m still here.” He paused. “There is one more thing. What the hell happened at the lab?”
Reed was stuck. He couldn’t relay any information about the investigation, and the fact that he had no idea where the prime suspect was reinforced his desire to remain silent and hide behind the “can’t comment on an ongoing investigation” statement. But this was his best friend. The one who’d pulled him out of the bar and back to his family when his world had been shattered.
“This is off the record and cannot be repeated,” Reed said. “Between you and I.”
“All right.”
“The lab was attacked by a team of mercenaries, we think. The explosion destroyed most of the lab and they killed everyone inside.”
There were ten seconds of silence that seemed to go on forever. Then Mike said, “Not everyone, according to the news.”
“You’re right. We believe the head of the lab survived.”
“Where is she?”
“We don’t know.”
“Was she taken?”
“That’s a possibility.”
Reed could almost hear Mike’s mind grinding through the analysis.
“That means there’s another possibility?”
Reed didn’t answer.
“Was she behind this? Did that bitch kill our daughter?”
“She’s a person of interest. We’ll apprehend her. I have all the resources at our disposal on this along with a dozen other agencies. Mike, please don’t run with this. Let us do our job.”
“Okay—okay. You do your job. Just get the person that killed my daughter.”
The call abruptly ended. Reed dropped his phone into his lap and tried to rip the steering wheel from the column. He’d track Covington to the ends of the Earth to get her to justice. And if she gave him the opportunity, he promised himself he’d deliver that justice himself.
CHAPTER 19
Reed entered the kitchen and saw the hope in his son’s eyes. Jackson was seated at the white granite island, cupping his cereal bowl in one hand and holding an oversized spoon midstroke with the other. Reed hadn’t seen him since he left for the office twenty-four hours ago. Mary leaned against the counter, observing the father-and-son moment. Reed had texted overnight to keep his wife updated, hoping not to wake her, but she’d kept the phone by the bed and packed his bag in advance. She muted the SpongeBob SquarePants rerun on the flat-screen TV on the far wall.
Reed could see that Jackson thought his dad was there to see him, but in reality Reed was there to get his bag. As the SAC for the San Diego office, he never got this involved in investigations and had no clothes at the office. But this one was different. The conversation with Ashley Reynolds’s father had amplified the need to be personally involved in the tracking down and apprehension of Covington. Betraying his son’s joy sank his mood further. Jackson was everything to him. He fought off the familiar guilt that made him choose between his mission and his son. It solidified in his throat, and he tried to swallow it.
Reed smiled at his wife, walked to the island, kissed the top of his son’s sandy-blond hair and inhaled the fresh innocent smell of baby shampoo. At five years old, Jackson wouldn’t understand his father’s need to hunt down a killer. And Reed wanted to keep it that way. Jackson didn’t need to know that world even existed.
“Daddy, are you coming tonight?”
Reed glanced at Mary, hoping she had a better answer than he had. She didn’t. His icy disappointment was reflected back to him in her eyes. He’d miss his son’s first school performance. He’d been working with Jackson for a week on the three lines he had in the skit. Reed had never wanted to be that father. He had high standards and wanted his son to see him meet his obligations. Reed bent his knees and dropped to be face-to-face with Jackson. “I want to, but you remember what we said about my job?”
Jackson dipped his head momentarily but then stuck his chin out and proudly said, “Sometimes you need to help other people who are in worse shape than we are.”
His son’s recital of the job description he’d given him swelled his chest with pride. “That’s right. And today is one of th
ose days.”
“Are they bad guys?”
“Yes. They are.”
“Did they hurt somebody?”
“Yes, they did.”
Jackson paused. “It’s okay, Daddy. I understand.” He resumed shoveling the cereal and watching TV.
Reed smiled at Jackson, let out a long, slow breath, and rubbed the top of Jackson’s head.
He moved to Mary and they hugged. She’d been with him through it all. They’d met at the University of California, San Diego. She’d been studying biology and he’d been working on his bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering with a Navy ROTC scholarship his father had helped him earn. They’d married five days after his graduation. That same week, he was shipped off to active duty, and his career in the Marines included tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. She’d been there to pick up the pieces after the debacle in Afghanistan and was the driving force behind his decision to join the Bureau. He’d wanted to leverage what he learned about leadership from his military experience along with his strong desire to protect people who couldn’t and uphold the constitution. In Afghanistan he’d learned that he could delegate authority but never responsibility. That lesson had come at a cost that nearly destroyed him, but it created a touchstone he’d never forgotten. Stops in Oklahoma City, Seattle, Miami and Washington, D.C., followed. Then he’d got what he thought was his dream job, back home in the San Diego area. But the dream had just become a nightmare that he wanted to end.
They moved into the hallway where Jackson couldn’t hear them.
Tears filled Mary’s eyes. “It’s terrible about Ashley. I’m so sorry.” She buried her face in his chest.
He held her and pushed down the lump of cement in his throat. “They executed her. They executed all of them.”
She pulled back. “Who? Who would do that?”
“We don’t know, but we’re trying to find the head of the lab. She was there and either escaped or ran. She’s still running from us.”