Operation Summer Storm (20 page)

Tate’s feet touched the bottom before hers did, and he dragged her from the water, both of them panting with exertion, and Summer let out a small whimper of relief as her wobbly legs touched solid ground.

Maloney, having helped Tupper through the water, left him on the sand next to her, and ran to help Del drag a well hidden, inflatable boat, from its hiding spot, just beyond the high tide line. Within minutes, they returned, dragging it between them, and Summer joined Tate to help pull it into the water. Del hastily mounted a small motor to the rear that he’d retrieved from the bottom of the boat, carefully wrapped to protect it from the elements.

These guys were prepared for anything.

The thought unsettled her. For eighteen months they’d been living on the edge, prepared for the worst at any time, and her heart ached for them. How hard had it been for them to live like this for all this time? It was unsettling, she was discovering a side of these men which frightened her—and she was in far too deep, to turn back now.

With only the intermediate flashes of lightening to guide them, they paddled the first few yards out to sea, gliding through the loud raw of the ocean, until they cleared the shallow water of the beach, then started the motor. Darkness swallowed them, and Summer’s heart beat anxiously, in her chest. They hadn’t made it yet. If they were spotted leaving the island, the bounty hunters boat, a lot faster than this one, would easily catch up to them, even if they had to run back to the other side of the island to retrieve their boat first.

An explosion tore through the dark sky behind them. Summer looked back over her shoulder, to see a bright glow, amongst the trees, further in from the beach.

“Guess they found the cave,” Del called over the noise of the motor.

Summer shuddered. The thought of those men being, where she’d left not so long ago, terrified her. She looked over at Tate and saw that he watched her with deep brooding eyes. They shared a look, which spoke volumes. She read the message as clearly, as if he’d spoken the words. “Trust me.”

Rolling black clouds began to move across the darkened horizon. The small boat wouldn’t be much good in a full-blown storm. By the time this one hit, they hoped to be on a nearby neighboring island and out of harm’s way. From there they’d have to try to get in touch with Sparky, still not back from flying Willow out the day before, to figure out a way to get them out of the area. If they’d managed to convince the men following them—if any had survived the booby trapped cave, that they’d also perished, it would at least buy them some time. Time, it seemed, was becoming a precious commodity.

* * * *

They holed up in a small hut by the wharf, to wait out the worst of the storm. Summer watched through the window as lightning cracked like a stockman’s whip, lit up the trees as their branches and fronds where whipped around by the howling wind.

Tate came up behind her as she stood watching the storm in all its glory. “Scared?” he whispered near her ear softly.

“Look at it,” she whispered. “It’s almost as though it’s alive.”

Tate glanced at the storm raging outside, and realized that big old storm and he had a lot in common. It pretty much summed up the way he was feeling. Wild, mean, and willing to bring down anything in his path. He itched to get his hands on someone to make them pay for the predicament he’d been living in for over a year and a half. He was sick of it. Tired of running and continually looking over his shoulder. He wanted to confront the enemy—deal with it on his terms—In his way. However, this enemy was one they’d have to bring down legally. There was too much that needed to be exposed. It couldn’t be covered up and buried out of sight.

For now though, he needed to keep his head, and concentrate on staying alive—concentrate on keeping Summer alive. He winced thinking back earlier in the cave and the harsh tone he’d used toward her. She just seemed to bring out the worst in him when he was worrying about her safety. He’d always been renowned for his clear head in a crisis—hard to believe looking back over his less than spectacular record of late—enter Summer Sheldon in to the equation and his focus, not to mention his good sense, went straight to hell.

Sighing he left her at the window to watch nature vent its fury on the small island and tried to get some sleep. They still had a long way to go.

* * * *

It felt safer in the fishing boat, than in the small inflatable boat they’d just left behind. Below in the sheltered cabin, Summer curled up on the floor, wrapped in a blanket—her head resting on a life jacket. She’d tried to go to sleep, knowing it would take a good five hours to reach the undisclosed airstrip. The men had arranged with Sparkie to meet them, but as soon as she closed her eyes, she was consumed with blinding panic and opened them again to find Tate.

Seated with the others, he was busy pouring over various maps trying to figure out the safest place to flee. Seeing him nearby forced her fears to subside, and she relaxed once more but sleep continued to elude her.

They docked at a small village, just one, of the other seven thousand, odd islands that made up the Philippines. Fishing boats, like the one they’d hitched a ride on, were busy unloading their morning catch, and children ran and played on the beach, happily.

Summer bent down to retrieve a ball that had rolled to a stop by her feet, after disembarking from the small, rickety wharf. Tossing it back to a bright-eyed, dark skinned child, no older than five or six years old, she received a shy smile, and looked up to find Tate watching the exchange with an unreadable expression on his face.

She waited until he jumped lightly from the dock, to the soft sand below, and came to a stop beside her. “We need to keep moving, can’t risk our unexpected visitors, finding us out in the open here.”

With a wave to the little boy with the ball, she followed Tate up the beach and along a wide, well-worn track, which wound its way through the vegetation.

A deserted, over-grown strip of dirt, streaked in a straight line, leading out towards the ocean. A small plane, with four doors sat nearby.

Tate glanced at her face and sighed, “I know, you don’t have to say it…it looks bad, but it’s the best we can do on short notice, and I can assure you, it’s perfectly safe, despite how it looks.”

Summer chuckled, and saw his surprised double take. “Actually, I was going to say how impressed I am; you guys just keep on finding a way out of every single impossible situation we find ourselves in.”

“Oh,” he said, uncertainly. “Well, it kinda goes with the territory.”

“I think it’s more than that, but I’m grateful.”

“Don’t thank me yet; we’re a long way from being out of this mess.”

“But you’ll get us out. I trust you.”

Chapter Fourteen

They boarded the plane and Summer paused at the top of the small set of steps. “Just to be clear—I’m not going to have to jump out this time am I?” she asked as she looked down at Tate.

“Not if you do as you’re told,” he tossed back at her.

She gave a un-lady like grunt, before ducking inside the doorway. With a sigh, she slid into a seat and sat down wearily, wondering what was in store for her on this trip. She almost shuddered to think. Geography had never seemed important when she’d been at school—little did she know back then, just how useful it would become later in her life. If only she’d paid more attention so she could get an idea of where they were heading and in which direction.

“Dare I ask where we’re going?” she asked once Tate sat beside her and the plane made its way to the end of the airstrip.

“Do you really want to know?” he asked impassively.

“Does it involve stinking hot jungles?”

“Not exactly,” he hedged. “We know someone who has a safe place to stay for a few days till we figure out what the hell’s been going on.”

“I can’t handle any more surprises tonight,” she sighed.

“Get some sleep,” he told her, making a pillow with his jacket and tugging her down to rest her head on his lap.

She felt his hand smooth her hair and it lulled her into a dreamless sleep of exhaustion. She realized at this precise moment, she had everything she needed. She was dry, had a full tummy and she had Tate. It was strange how little she needed to be content these days.

* * * *

Samuel Tréago answered his mobile, with a distracted air, frowning as he searched the stock page in the newspaper, and discovered that the share price of his portfolio had just dropped, to an all time low, on the NASDAQ.

“We lost them.”

Clenching his eyes and teeth with equal amounts of frustration, he took a deep calming breath, lowering his newspaper, slowly. “You have state of the art equipment—they have nothing. How did you manage to lose them?” he shouted unable to keep hold of his temper a moment longer.

“We’ll find them again. They have to surface somewhere.”

“For your sake, I hope that it is very soon,” he emphasized. “Do I make myself clear?”

The man on the other end paused. “Understood sir.”

Tréago snapped the phone shut, with a controlled rage.

Crossing the nondescript budget motel room in a middle-class neighborhood, he fumed. He didn’t belong here—thanks to Tate Maddox, he was now homeless and hiding out in dingy motels, forgoing the usual room service and finer things, being filthy rich, entitled him to—and fighting the paranoia which was rapidly closing in on him. It had all gone haywire, his faultless plans, sabotaged by a journalist he thought he’d already taken care of, in a plane crash over six months ago.

Unlike the sanctioned missions he’d worked on—his undisclosed ones—provided him with the adrenalin rush and excitement he craved. He had contacts, ways to get around difficult problems. He’d just have to make certain this time that nothing was left to incriminate him. If they caught him, they could put him on trial, but they would never be able to convict him—he’d covered his tracks far too well.

* * * *

North Pacific Ocean

Acapulco islands

Summer awoke, laying still and enjoying Tate’s warmth. His arm rested across her hip. She looked up and traced the thick column of his neck, exposed to her greedy gaze while his head tipped back and his eyes closed, but at her slight movement, he opened them and looked down at her with a lazy smile.

She was content to simply drink in his nearness and bask in his smoldering gaze, but before she was anywhere near ready to surrender it all, she heard the plane’s engines start the screaming descent and they prepared to land.

Summer uncurled her stiff body from the seat, and sat up. “Now you’re positive we’re going to land like normal human beings this time, right?” she asked.

“Just keep your head down and you’ll be fine,” he assured her.

She opened her mouth to ask what he meant, but as they touched down, the aircraft had barely rolled to a stop, before she was heaved from the plane to the ground from the step-less air craft, and tugged forward, with an urgency that belied the quiet surroundings. The airstrip seemed deserted.

The plane revved its engine from behind her and Summer turned, dismayed to see it headed back down the runway, picking up speed and lifting up into the sky. Just then a burst of gunfire peppered around their feet from somewhere nearby. Her heart fell to her feet as all around her guns fired alarmingly close. The firing continued as they sprinted across the open ground to hide behind a small storage shed.

“I thought you said you knew this person!” Summer yelled, covering her head with her hands, as the noise went on around her.

Tate, pressed her against the shed wall, protectively covering her body, with his. “I said we knew them; I didn’t say they liked us,” he called back.

Great. Summer thought wildly.
W
ere these men capable of going anywhere, without being shot at, by someone?

There was a let up in the shooting. Summer noted the men had not returned any fire. In the break, Del swore loudly at the unidentified shooters and Summer groaned. As if these people weren’t angry enough, throwing insults at them was hardly going to improve the situation. An answering insult flew through the darkness, followed by a challenge to come out and show themselves. Del told them they had dropped their weapons, and were coming out. With a small protest, Summer allowed herself to be towed out from behind their shelter.

Bright floodlights came on, blinding them and it was impossible to see anyone beyond the bright light. “Well, well, well. Look who’s here? Ox and his sorry-assed bunch of Marines,” the speaker declared with a hoot of triumph, “I heard you guys were dead…can’t say I’ve ever seen a ghost, run like a
muchacha
,” he sniggered.

Tate remained calm—seemingly unruffled at the insult and stepped forward, still shielding Summer’s presence from the unknown gunmen. “Duffy,” he acknowledged with barely concealed dislike.

“What the hell are you doin’ here Ox?”

“We need a place to hole up for a while,” Tate called back.

There was a moment of conferring behind the light and Summer held her breath, wondering what they were going to do if they didn’t let them stay.

“It’ll cost you. We don’t owe you any favors,” the man snarled back defiantly.