Caribbean Gold

CHAPTER THREE

Alicia exploded into a flurry of action. The coordinates, when entered into an app on her cellphone, pointed toward Montego Bay, on the opposite side of the bloody island. Hours to drive it.

Alicia processed it all in just a few moments. Her soldier’s mind wanted to fight, to strike out; the old impulses hard to quell. But this was a highly unusual situation. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had to face something like this alone.

And alone she was.

You didn’t trust the locals in an unknown city, and her own team were too far away. In short then, there was only one option. Alicia flagged down another cab and took it all the way back to the airport. She used her other team’s SPEAR credentials, approved at the highest level by the US government, to finesse access to the private hangers and runways and took a quick wander around. The sun glared, the hubbub clamored at her, the sweat popped across her brow and shoulders, but nothing broke her focus. In the end there were only two real possibilities.

Alicia studied them closely. The one she chose was just that bit younger, that bit greener, that bit more… likely.

“Hey, I need your help.”

“Ma’am,” the young chopper pilot said. “Is there a problem?”

“Oh yeah. You call me ma’am again and I’ll box your friggin’ ears.”

The pilot looked blank. “Excuse me?”

“Look mate—” she moved beside him and put an arm gently around his shoulders “—the powers-that-be say I have to go to Montego Bay. They say now. I’d be willing to throw a little extra at the flyboy that helps me out. Whaddya say?”

Alicia took out her wallet.

The pilot blinked. “Oh, I can’t. I—”

“Yeah,” Alicia flapped the wallet as if it was a winning lottery ticket. “You can.”

The man’s eyes were hungry.

Alicia let him see the wadded notes. “An hour there. An hour back. Easy money.”

“Well, it’s a bit more than that.”

“But you get my company too.” Alicia gave him the wide-eyed grin. “That’s gotta be worth something.”

“Oh, of course.” The pilot was nothing if not polite. “I didn’t mean anything by that.”

“Hey, loosen up.” Alicia gave him a friendly punch on the arm. “Sorry, hope that doesn’t bruise up too much.” She saw the uncertainty in his eyes and tried another tack.

“I wonder if that other guy over there could help me.”

A minute later and their deal was done. The pilot’s name was James and, despite his nervousness and clear reluctance, he soon had the ultra-modern bird in the air. A quick flight plan had been filed and Alicia was heading toward Healey’s last coordinates — the port at Montego Bay. For the first time she began to feel a little lighter — she was on her way to help her friends and less than an hour had passed. The sun outside was inching down the horizon, the heat slowly fading, but that was good too. Alicia preferred to arrive with the shadows.

Which also brought her back around to the situation she was approaching. Alicia had no weapons and no knowledge of the area save for what she could scavenge from the Internet. It appeared to be a relatively flat and open port, one side tasked to the docking of boats and the other a jumble of containers. At least one large gantry crane ran up and down one side. Alicia saw no real cover apart from the containers themselves, but still couldn’t put her trust totally into the hands of a map app.

James tried to make small talk as they skimmed beneath the clouds. “So what do you do over in Montego Bay? PR?”

Alicia almost chortled, but managed to stop herself at the very last moment. “You think I’d be good at PR?”

“I do. You have all the right moves, miss.”

Was that a little bit of flirting? Alicia missed those days — hadn’t seen them in so long she’d forgotten how it went. She managed to curb the crudity that was about to slip from her mouth and turned it into a half-true comment.

“My company needs me. Help them out of a bind.”

James nodded. “Well, settle back. We’re an hour out.”

Alicia nodded and began to prepare.

The chopper started to dip, then glide down. Alicia steadied her thoughts and imagined the possible outcomes. She combed her memory, ran through ideas. She fixed the main objectives firmly at the forefront of her mind.

Crouch. Russo. Caitlyn. Healey.

James landed sweetly and took his money with a grin, more confident now that his risks were over. Alicia considered inviting him on the next leg of her mission, but only for a private joke. It wouldn’t be right, and she was trying to change.

She made her way to the port of Montego Bay, stepping out of a cab near the entrance and into the shadow of the biggest cruise ship she’d ever seen. The area behind her along the dock was a hive of motion, too many bodies moving to get a bead on any one person. The area before her, however, as the dock turned more industrialized and less public, appeared almost deserted.

Alicia scanned the horizons. The sun was slipping low. Shadows were seeping free. It had been a very long day.

She had no weapons. But she didn’t need one.

Alicia Myles was the weapon.