Lost Girls

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Gant let Golden do the summarizing of what they had just learned from Roberts and just figured out. Masterson had answered the call, but confirmed that Nero was listening in, which made Gant feel slightly better. This entire mission was turning into what his buddies back in the army would call a cluster-fuck.

It took Golden about five minutes to get the man and woman who ran the Cellar up to speed. During that time, Gant checked his GPS and noted that they were only twenty minutes out from Fort Meade.

There was a moment of silence when Golden was done, the only sound in the headsets the slight crackling noise made by the satellite feed going through several Milstar satellites and being scrambled, frequency hopped and then unscrambled.

“There is a piece missing,” Masterson finally said.

“Finley,” Golden said.

“No,” Masterson replied. “These men came to the United States on a mission. If it ends with Cranston killing the others, including Roberts, at the safe house, then they still will not have completed their mission.”

“The three other CIA men,” Gant said.

“Very good, Mister Gant,” Masterson said. “And Finley has yet to surface. Our three special operators have been targeting those who betrayed them. Finley’s focus is the four who betrayed him. He tried to get them through Roberts by caching his daughter and it failed. What would be his next move?”

Neeley spoke up. “We were wrong. Doctor Golden and I. Bringing the potential victims together played right into their hands. It’s what they wanted us to do”

“Correct,” Masterson said.

“But you let us do it?” Neeley protested, half a question, half a statement.

Gant was beginning to see the big picture and it wasn’t a pleasant one. But he kept his mouth shut. They were ten minutes out from Fort Meade according to his GPS.

“What exactly is the goal here?” Golden asked. She was staring at Gant, as if accusing him of something and he knew she thought he’d been in on this from start, not knowing he’d just figured it out himself.

“There was a reason Finley’s file didn’t have a tag,” Masterson said. “There never was one. But there should have been a flag on the DO, CDA, Roberts and his brother’s file.”

Gant, Neeley and Golden all turned and stared at Roberts in the dim light in the back of the chopper. He saw the looks and his head sunk down on his chest, his eyes closed.

“So they were the dirty ones,” Golden said, as if by saying it, she could comprehend it.

“Correct,” Neeley said.

“How long have you known this?” Gant asked.

“Mister Nero and I had our suspicions from the beginning,” Masterson said. “The entire cache angle seemed odd for a pure revenge mission.”

Gant didn’t feel too bad. He had figured out the cache anomaly on his own. “So Roberts, his brother, the DO and CDA never made an official search for Roberts’ daughter?”

“Correct,” Masterson said. “That was the key thing that got Mister Nero and I to truly suspect that we might be looking at this entirely the wrong way.”

Everyone on the radio was startled when Roberts suddenly spoke. Gant realized he must have switched frequencies on the intercom while they were discussing all this. “We did it to try to accomplish our mission.”

“Bullshit,” Gant snapped.

“No, really,” Roberts was almost begging to be believed. “When we realized we needed to really get the head of the Cartel to trust my brother, we knew we had to up the stakes.”

Nero’s metallic voice cut through his protests. “As Mister Gant just succinctly put it, bullshit, Mister Roberts. Because there is no explaining the five million dollars you and your brother have in an account in the Caymans. And the similar accounts the DO and CDA have.”

“You gave up your daughter for money?” Golden was even more incredulous than she had been.

“It all went wrong,” Roberts cried out. “We thought we could play both sides. Take the head of the Cartel’s money, find low level information and people, in order to get him to trust us, then turn on him and take him out when we were close enough.”

“But none of this was authorized,” Nero said. A statement, not a question.

Gant had his hand on the butt of his Glock, belatedly realizing they had failed to search Roberts before allowing him on the chopper. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Neeley had her hand inside her leather coat, also on alert.

Roberts head began shaking, back and forth very slowly, as if by the very act he could deny all that was being said and had happened. Suddenly he spun to his right and Gant drew his pistol. Gant was bringing it to bear as Roberts jerked open the handle on the cargo door and threw himself out of the helicopter into the night sky.

Gant slowly holstered his weapon, Neeley doing the same. He leaned across and slid the door shut.

“Mister Nero,” he said over the radio. “Ms. Masterson. Roberts just sanctioned himself. What now?”

“It’s time,” the Sniper said as he turned the van onto a dirt road.

The Spotter didn’t respond, sitting in the passenger seat, his clothes still wet from the river. They’d been driving for two hours straight since getting in their back-up vehicle. They were heading south through Maine. The two men had not talked much, the close call weighing on their minds. Or at least on the Sniper’s mind. He glanced over at his partner, uncertain what the man was thinking or feeling.

The van’s headlights illuminated a lakeside cabin. Beyond the cabin, a hundred foot dock stretched out over the water and a small floatplane was moored at the end. Just another piece in the elaborate plan they had spent months putting together.

Inside the cabin was another part of the plan and the Sniper was slightly concerned about the Spotter’s reaction to what had to be done now. They had delayed this as long as possible, the Spotter arguing that it was the prudent thing, but the Sniper had his doubts about his partner’s sincerity. The Sniper missed his Security man, a person he knew he could count on. In Colombia, it had been the Spotter who had broken first under the torture. Of course, they had all broken eventually.

The Sniper brought the van to a halt right in front of the cabin. He opened the door and got out. He waited as the Spotter hesitated, then finally exited the vehicle. The Sniper led the way to the door of the cabin and pushed it open.

“Honey, we’re home,” he called out with a smile. He noted that the Spotter didn’t appreciate his sense of humor.

“Why don’t we just go?” the Spotter asked, stopping the Sniper in his tracks, midway across the main room.

“That’s not the plan,” the Sniper said. He pointed back to the door. “Wait for me in the plane if you don’t want to be part of this.” He waited, then the Spotter nodded.

“Let’s do it.”

The Sniper walked across the main room and threw open a door. A foul smell wafted out of the bedroom. The Spotter’s wife was tied to the bed, arms together over her head, ankles bound together with a rope. Since they’d left her here she had fouled herself, contributing to the smell. But the main source of the stink was the body slumped in a chair at the foot of the bed.

The Spotter had had no problem putting a bullet through the head of the man his wife had married less than six months after he’d been declared dead. Who his wife had taken into his bed while he was being tortured and threatened with death every day.

The Sniper walked to the head of the bed and looked down at the woman. There was a gag tied tightly around her head and she stared up with wild eyes. Forty-eight hours tied here with no food or water, the body of her new husband sharing the room — the Sniper has no sympathy for her. It was nothing compared to what they had suffered in Colombia.

“You should have waited for him,” the Sniper said.

The woman nodded furiously. The Sniper laughed. “Too late.” His hand was reaching for his pistol when his cell phone rang. He pulled it out and flipped it open. “Yes?”

He listened for almost a minute. Then just said “Roger that” and snapped the phone shut. He glanced at the door where the Spotter stood. “The next phase is in movement.” He gestured at the woman. “Do you want to do the honors?”

The woman was moaning, trying to speak through the gag. Her arms and legs were drumming on the bed, a desperate and futile attempt to do something, anything.

“Remember the pain?” The Sniper asked the Spotter. “Do you remember that stinking place where they kept us? Remember how you told us the only thing that kept you going was wanting to come home — to this? To a woman who betrayed you?”

“She thought I was dead,” the Spotter murmured.

“She should have had faith in you.” The Sniper knew this would not go the way he wanted. He drew his pistol and aimed. The Spotter still had not moved. The woman was crying. The Sniper fired once, the round hitting her right between the eyes, cutting off the crying and stopping her struggles.

“Let’s go,” he said, holstering the pistol.

Emily sat in half an inch of water. She leaned over and took a careful sip. She’d forced herself not to gorge, not to over-indulge like she had when the evil man had given her the water bottle. She had all night. The water wasn’t going anywhere. The storm had been short and fierce, pelting her with large drops and she’d reveled in it.

She felt strong, refreshed. And clean. She knew the water she sat in was not the purest and there was a faint hint of sand in it from the bottom of the cistern, but she had never tasted anything so wonderful.

Re-energized, Emily peered in the dark at the shackle around her ankle.

Now was the time.

The thought came to her unbidden, but as loudly as if someone had shouted it in her ear. It didn’t make sense practically — with the water in the cistern she was in the best condition she’d been in since being kidnapped.

But it was time.

The rain was a respite, a relief, but a false one. For the dryness would come again. And the thirst. And she would grow weaker and weaker until she wouldn’t have the strength to free herself.

It was time.

Emily took the wire she had so carefully doubled and then doubled again. She slid it into the keyhole for the shackle. She ignored the pain from the un-healed cuts from her last attempt. She went to work on her last chance for freedom.