Cherry Adair - T-flac 03 (37 page)

"You don't have to warn me. I'm already scared."

"Scared is good." He didn't smile. "The men know to look for Lauren. If she's anywhere on Izquierdo, she'll be found and brought to you."

His thumb caressed her lower lip and she tilted her face. He kissed her softly on the mouth, his lips lingering before he rose, pulling her up to stand beside him. "We've got plenty more talking to do, jungle girl. Keep yourself safe until I come for you."

"I won't do anything stupid. I promise." Delanie paused. "What exactly are
Bangkok
rules?"

Kyle grinned. "There aren't any."

Three thirty-three A.M., pitch dark and dead quiet. No lights on, inside or outside the house. Kyle observed the quiet compound from behind the chain-link fence and the cover of the trees just outside the clearing. In the green glow of his night-vision goggles, he scanned each building and the wide gravel areas between them for signs of life. Something wasn't right. There wasn't a guard in sight. His sixth sense kicked in big time.

Standing motionless, every sense alert, he heard the imperceptible—more a feeling than a sound—

whop-whop-whop
of the choppers as they came in from east and south. The sound faded in and out, too far away for someone not on the alert to hear. Right on time, he thought with satisfaction. Through the lenses of the NVG he saw more of his men melt into place along the perimeter.

Jungle noise, a few chirps and clicks from birds and insects, the rustle of something moving through the low vegetation deeper in the jungle. He walked carefully, narrowly missing an olingo only because he'd seen the red glow of the furry creature's eyes glaring at him just before he stepped on it. It ran like hell, its soft tail trailing it like mist. The air was dead still and hot, the humidity its usual ninety percent.

They all wore voice-activated radio headsets with lip mikes. Through his earpiece Kyle heard the Mossad check in, then the DEA, Interpol, the Europeans, and finally the two T-FLAC teams on the far side of the compound. That done, they'd maintain radio silence unless absolutely necessary.

Everyone was in place. Party time.

He restrained himself from checking on Delanie one last time before he went in. She was as safe as she was going to be, and well away from the action.

Behind him two T-FLAC men set up a squad automatic weapon on its bipod, canvas ammo pouch unzipped on the ground beside them. The SAW's two hundred rounds were ready, and several other pouches lay next to the first.

Kyle switched his headset to T-FLAC's frequency. "Alpha team, close in. Doc, over."

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Click-click
. The signal heard and executed by the others.

Michael took point, moving like smoke toward the fence. Kyle only knew his brother was there because it was where he was supposed to be. Michael had the uncanny ability to blend in with his surroundings like a chameleon.

Three meters away, Kyle spotted a sentry standing on the other side of the fence, his back to the jungle.

He was smoking a cigarette, and the pale smoke drifted straight over his head like a specter. Out of the corner of his eye, with the help of his NVG, Kyle spotted the identifying firefly attached to the shirt of one of his men. He motioned him forward, indicated he could take the soldier, then left him to it, creeping behind the two men quietly in the dark. He heard a sharp but faint grunt and then a thud as the body hit the dirt behind him.

As ephemeral as vapor, the rest of his team materialized beside him. He gave the signal to scale the fence.

The house was over five hundred yards away, all of it in the open the moment they cleared the fence.

Other than the half pergola roof over one end of the pool and the rock waterfall, they would be as bare as a baby's butt for a good two and a half minutes as they crossed the brick patio to the hacienda.

Heaven
, Kyle thought with a grin as he joined the others on the compound side. Enjoying the hell out of the adrenaline rush, he pivoted his head and saw the same intense concentrated expectation on his men's faces.

They were on the north side of the house, almost directly opposite the boardroom. Every room in the house opened up to the patio with French doors. It hadn't occurred to Montero just how vulnerable his impenetrable hideaway was. In sign language Kyle indicated for the others to fan out as prearranged.

There were too few operatives in this phase of the operation to provide backup. Until individual assignments had been achieved each man was on his own. According to the T-FLAC sentries posted, no one had left the compound all day. Everybody was snugly in bed inside the main house.

Kyle stepped from the gravel onto the brick patio, his booted feet silent as he crouched low, stealthily and rapidly crossing the open area. He heard the sibilant whisper of voices. Three soldiers were shooting the breeze, taking a smoke break in the deep shadow close to the house. The glow of their cigarettes made them prime targets in the dark.

Pushing up his goggles because they tended to blur anything close up, Kyle removed the knife from the leather sheath on his wrist. Holding it loosely in his right hand, he crept up behind the least vocal of the men. He applied the knife with deadly intent high up, into the kidneys so the guy dropped without a sound. The second the body dropped, he had the attention of the other two. The soldiers looked at him in dumbfounded surprise as he vaulted over their friend, arms outstretched. His momentum carried him between the two soldiers, still fumbling for their weapons.

"Hey,
amigos
, remember me?" he asked, colliding with them at the same time he hooked an arm around each thick neck. Holding them cradled in the crook of his elbows, he exerted pressure with his biceps and shoulder muscles to bring their heads together with an audible thump. They dropped like stones to the ground. He dragged the bodies deeper into the shadows and opened the French door into the dark, quiet conference room.

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A protracted burst of automatic weapon fire broke the silence, slicing the night with noise and light. Half inside the room, Kyle froze in his tracks.

Someone swore ripely in his ear through the bone-conducting headphone. He dittoed the sentiment.

What the hell were they firing
at
?

"Hell," Kyle snarled under his breath as gunfire erupted, closer this time, lighting up the room. He spun to check outside and saw one of the good guys hanging limply over the chain-link fence, yards from where he and his men had gone over. Another burst of fire caused the body to jerk and fall back on the jungle side.

Like a frigging sunrise, the floodlights sprang on around the perimeter, blinding anyone wearing NVGs.

The element of surprise was gone. The cameras would track every movement now. He quickly stepped inside, closing the door behind him.

Those men who hadn't already entered the compound were now neatly trapped beyond the fence.

"Alpha leader. What the hell happened? Doc, over," he demanded, holding his finger over the earpiece as he stepped to the side of the French door, observing the reigning pandemonium through a twelve-inch square of glass. The headset attached to the satellite radio, and the signal went twenty-two thousand miles to a geosynchronous communications satellite in less time than it took to make a telephone call. The satellite radio was encoded. The algorithm, based on the timed transmissions from NAVSTAR satellites, was on computer disc so that no one could break the security or duplicate it. Which was all moot at this point. The shit had hit the fan, and they might as well goddamn
yell
instructions to one another.

The radio crackled in his ear. He repeated himself, watching as half-dressed men tumbled out of the barracks several hundred yards away from the main buildings. The gravel crunched under their boots as, blinded by the floodlights, they fumbled for their weapons. They might have been alerted, but they still moved around like frantic half-awake ants. Kyle shifted his M4 into position. After several seconds of static, he heard Dare reply through the earpiece as something exploded behind the house, sending up a shower of sparks and rocking the ground. Christ, the Interpol team was covering that quadrant, and there weren't supposed to be any big explosions until the house had been secured and cleared of people and all the evidence as well as Montero's extensive collection of stolen artwork had been removed.

The hacienda was now lit up like a Christmas tree. He could see some of his men outside although most blended with the vegetation.

"The assholes from Interpol decided to go in early. Tin Man, out." Jake. Where the hell were Dare and Michael? He didn't have time to find out. While the early attention wouldn't degrade what was to come, it was damn irritating that the other team hadn't followed the directives from their last briefing.

"God damn it!" There was another short burst of gunfire. More lights went on. Doors slammed.

Footsteps pounded on the slate floor of hallway. Shouts.

The gunfire outside was erratic, Montero's soldiers shooting more to hear themselves than at any target.

In his headset he could hear the soft commands of the team leaders urging their people in.

The Mossad team called in their confirmed capture of Kensington, Sugano, Danzigger, and the cook, Dr. Montgomery.

Now, where the hell were the Monteros?

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Another steady burst of fire, this time directed at the house as more soldiers poured from the barracks, fanning out across the compound. They were too skillfully deployed to be the goons Kyle had seen playing at training all week.

It was two hours till dawn. The throb of the choppers got louder. Activity escalated as the soldiers started randomly shooting at the lights in the sky.

Trusting his people to take control of the situation, Kyle made his way around the koa table, smelling the thick scent of old cigar smoke and greed. Montero was going away for a long, long time, and his pretty face was going to be a real liability where he was going. Sanctimonious bastard should be sweating about now, Kyle thought, weapon ready. Ramon and Isabella must know there was no way they were going to escape.

Overhead he heard the first call for surrender. Choppers flew low over the compound. Floodlights strafed the buildings. A megaphoned voice repeated in Spanish and English for everyone to come outside with their hands up.

Every light blazed inside the house; the corridor crawled with uniforms. Ducking back into the doorway, Kyle ditched his headset and NVG, then tucked the knife back into his wrist sheath before stepping casually from the boardroom and sauntering down the wide hallway. Two soldiers outside the library straightened, almost saluting as he strolled by. Neither stopped him as he gave them a half smile and opened the door.

Taking in the room at a glance, Kyle's eyes found Delanie across the room where she stood in the shadows, Montero directly behind her.

Shit.

The man who stepped into Montero's library was different from the one she'd parted from in the jungle a few hours ago.

With his face painted, hair loose about his shoulders, he looked a hell of a lot scarier in the light than he had in the dark. But it was neither his clothing nor his face paint that sent a primitive shiver up Delanie's spine.

Not a scrap of softness touched him, no latent tenderness in his eyes, no compassion, no spark of humor. This was Kyle Wright, soldier of fortune. Hard, silent, and lethal. She didn't realize how relieved she was to see him, until she felt her shoulders drop with the taut expulsion of air from her lungs.

Kyle shot her a quick molten look before closing the door behind him. "Jesus, woman, you sure as hell know how to get into trouble." He stepped away from the door, an extremely nasty-looking gun in his hand.

"Some of his soldiers grabbed us on the way to—"

Montero goose-stepped her farther out into the room, his arm hooked around her throat, his mother's branding iron in his other hand. The tip had cooled enough to go from bright to dark red. One wrong move, he'd promised her, and he'd burn her until she begged to have her neck broken. She believed him.

Kyle's eyes narrowed as they flickered to her face for a second. "All right?" he asked, the words belying
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the brutal indifference in his voice.

"Not really." She could barely hear with the blood pounding so hard in her ears. She wasn't quite sure if she wanted to throw up, wet her pants, or just faint. She swallowed and had to lock her knees as she felt the fiery heat against her right cheek. The wound on her ankle pulsed painfully in tandem with her frantic heartbeats. She stared dry-eyed at Kyle.

"Put the gun down,
amigo
," Montero said silkily. "I have a much more effective and immediate weapon right here."

Her nostrils flared as the sweet smell of heated iron moved closer; then she flinched as she heard, then smelled, the sizzle of her hair. Sweat prickled her scalp and underarms, and she clenched her teeth on a scream.

"Just shoot him," she said through dry lips. The hole in the end of Kyle's gun rose so she could practically see down the barrel.

"Let her go. Now."

Fascinated, Delanie couldn't take her eyes off Kyle's finger on the trigger. She knew he'd go for Montero the second he had a clear shot. And as the man was the same height as she was, she'd better not flinch.
Do it
, she thought urgently.
Oh God, please just
do
it
.

She braced herself.

"Whatever the hell you think you can negotiate for, forget it."

Behind her she felt Ramon tense. His arm tightened around her throat. She could smell his nervousness through the overpowering sweet smell of his cologne. Her dry eyes burned. All she could think about was the branding iron an inch from her face. A drop of sweat trickled down her temple. She didn't know which was worse, Montero with a steady, sure hand, or Montero with a nervous twitch.