Page 166 of To Catch a Sub

Landon leapt to his feet, pulling a knife from its sheath. Rage made his skin prickle, and his vision narrow. Fuck recon, and making a plan. She was right there and someone was touching her. Hurting her.

Rolf and Andrei grabbed him, forcing him down. They’d had a vicious, silent fight as Landon tried to throw them off, but Rolf was fuck-all massive, and managed to pin him. Andrei’s cold, whispered reminders that he could only help Colette if he was alive allowed Landon to wrestle himself under control.

He promised not to run in, and together they peeked over the top of the hedge once more. For a moment his heart stopped, thinking Colette was gone, before he saw the shadows at the bottom of the window, partially obscured by the angle. Colette was now sitting on the floor, her arms still pulled above her head, the long rope or chain that bound them making a vertical shadow. She leaned to one side, head against her arm.

“We know where she is,” Andrei said. “That’s good.”

“I have a plan,” Rolf declared. “And explosives.”

Rolf had explosives, a drone, a remote-control car, and a rifle with tranquilizer darts in his bag. Landon would have preferred a gun that shot bullets, but those were hard to come by.

Then again, a tranquilizer gun should have been hard to come by, too…

Andrei’s supplies were various electronic gadgets, including a portable EMP generator, and several knives.

Landon and Rolf slipped their phones into metal-lined bags Andrei handed them. The bags acted like a portable faraday cage, protecting the phones from the electromagnet pulse.

Andrei turned on the pulse generator and set his watch to count down until the battery that powered the device ran down. Rolf flew it up onto the roof with the drone.

No one would be calling for help, or backup.

Including them.

Rolf strapped a small block of C4 to the remote-control car, attached a detonator, and drove the toy under the white van parked in the circular driveway of the hotel.

“Everyone knows what to do?” Rolf said as the toy bumped over the gravel.

Landon nodded, watching to see if anyone in the hotel heard the whine of the remote-control car.

His part of the plan was simple, because Rolf and Andrei planned around him. More accurately, they’d planned to handle everything and everyone, leaving Landon to run directly for Colette.

He was terrified that once the explosion happened, someone would slit her throat as a precautionary measure.

Rolf shoved in some ear plugs, Landon and Andrei doing the same.

Landon got up on his toes, crouched like a sprinter. He watched the white panel van explode, a fireball shooting into the night air.

Beside him, Rolf grinned like a kid.

He had only a moment to see the grin before Landon was running. They’d picked their entry points during recon, and Landon shot straight for the side door that let out onto the garden. He cracked a pane of glass with the butt of his knife, stuck his arm in and opened the door just as men started to shout in Russian.

He’d looked through pictures of the interior of the hotel on the real estate listing on the drive up, and Landon followed his mental map to the stairs.

He was near the top when a man came around the corner at a run, nearly plowing into Landon.

Landon didn’t hesitate. He grabbed the man by the shirt and yanked, throwing him down the stairs. His body made heavy thudding sounds.

Rolf had stressed the importance of not killing anyone, so Landon hoped the man knew how to take a fall.

Counting doors—he’d counted the windows from the outside—proved unnecessary. The room Colette was in was the only one with light spilling out around the edges of the door.

The door handle had a card reader rather than a key lock. Andrei had given him something to help open a card-locked door, but it was complicated to use and slow.

Landon gripped the handle, prayed, and turned the lever.

Unlocked.

He opened it slowly, naked knife in his right hand, the blade resting along his forearm.