Voices.
Not loud, but not hushed either.
A man.
And a woman.
They were coming his way. Caspian eased forward, just enough to peer through a gap in the foliage. He spotted two people moving along the pathway where he’d been seconds ago. From a distance, they could have passed for a couple out on a leisurely hike. They weren’t trying to be covert. If anything, they seemed comfortable.
But the way they walked—not quite side by side, but staggered, maintaining just enough distance for maneuverability—felt off to Caspian. The man was tall and solidly built, mid- to late thirties, with blond hair and ashort, trimmed beard. He wore loose cargo shorts and a gray windbreaker, which was identical to the one the driver of the dinghy had been wearing. The woman, slender but toned, had long, tanned legs beneath a pair of black athletic shorts. She wore a gray fitted tank top that showed off her lean shoulders. Slung across her back was a black waterproof pack.
Caspian’s gut told him they weren’t just tourists, but if the two of them had any suspicion they were being watched, they weren’t showing it.
This means they haven’t seen me.
Then, without warning, they veered off the trail.
The man led the way, cutting directly into the brush, stepping over rocks and ducking under low branches. Caspian wondered where they were going, because there was no path there. No obvious reason to leave the trail.
He tensed.Or maybe they did see me. And I’m about to get flanked.
But no, they continued down, not even looking in his direction. Earlier in the week, Caspian had briefly studied the map, and while he hadn’t memorized it, he remembered that there was another path lower down, closer to the shoreline, that led to a small beach. If the man and the woman knew the area well enough, it was possible they were cutting through to reach it.
Or maybe they just don’t want to be followed.
Caspian adjusted his position, wanting to keep an eye on them. He moved carefully, slowly, not to draw attention. He waited until they had both disappeared behind the thick brush before getting into a crouch. He checked his phone. Still no signal.
Shit.
He wished he could contact Liesel, the local authorities, or even Samantha Ranger—his boss at the Strategic Support Unit—to report what he had seen. But if he was to leave now and move closer to town to get a signal, he feared that by the time he got the message out, by the time someone responded, the Azimut would be gone, and with that, his chance of figuring out if whoever was on the Azimut represented a threat to Florence. And of course, there was also the journalist, who might not be alive by then.
The authorities would eventually intercept the yacht, of that Caspian had no doubt, but what if the kidnappers disposed of Hobb before anyone boarded the vessel?
Caspian didn’t have the luxury of time. He had to act.
You know how to do this.
This wasn’t the first time he found himself in such a situation. For ten years, he had been Elias, the cryptic assassin persona he had taken on as an Onyx operative—a black program buried deep within the Department of Homeland Security’s Investigations Division. During his decade with Onyx, he had completed what he thought at the time were thirty-four sanctioned targeted killings. His very last one being Leonard Aldrich, Florence’s father.
Keeping his distance, Caspian moved after the duo. The terrain was unforgiving, the slope steeper here than it had been earlier. Dry soil and loose rocks made footing treacherous, making him wish he was wearing hiking boots instead of his running shoes. He crouched lower, using the natural cover of the brush to stay hidden as he carefully picked his way down, watchful not to send an avalanche of dirt and stone downward, something that would surely betray his presence.
The man and the woman, who weren’t worried about the noise they made, moved steadily downhill, weaving between rocks and patches of thick undergrowth much faster than Caspian could. Still, he shadowed them, making sure to pause when they did, and pressing himself against the hillside whenever they turned. Though he knew they were talking to each other, he was too far away to hear what they were saying.
They were still one hundred or so feet above the sea when the path Caspian had seen on the map emerged from the vegetation. The man took it, and the woman followed a few steps behind. When Caspian reached it, too, he paused for a beat to scan his surroundings. Once he was sure his targets weren’t doubling back, he stepped on the trail. A few minutes later, the vegetation began to thin, revealing the small rocky beach he’d seen on the map.
Caspian picked a hiding spot with a clear vantage of the beach. A Jet Ski, identical to the one he’d seen strapped to the Azimut’s swim platform, sat at the water’s edge, half on the beach, half in the shallows. A weathered rope extended from the Jet Ski’s front cleat and ran across the beach. The other end of the rope was securely tied to the base of a tree just beyond the rocks. The man unfastened the rope and threw it to the woman, who was waiting next to the Jet Ski.
“I need to take a leak,” the man shouted to her. “Gimme a minute.”
The woman barely acknowledged him, focused on whatever was in her waterproof pack.
The man veered off toward a natural alcove. The alcove, which was partially shielded from view by an outcrop of jagged rocks, was about fifty feet from Caspian’s position.
With the woman facing away from him, Caspian slipped from his hiding spot and started making his way toward the man.
Then he stopped.
Between him and the rocks was an open stretch of beach. Thirty feet of exposed terrain. No cover. No foliage. The woman, who was only sixty steps away, was still distracted by the pack, but if she happened to glance back at the wrong moment, she’d see him.
