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“Looks like a male around five-ten. Smoker. Husky, probably around two-fifty. I’m a hundred percent certain it’s the same person. Hey, Wolfe? You getting this?”
First, there was silence.
Then Gage’s voice came through. “Yeah. I let John and Benarld know, so they’re sending some guys to check it out. As for us, we don’t have time. The kids are where we expected them to be. The problem is, Julien and Dez have been watching the scan for the last few minutes, and there’s been no movement in that room.”
They’d prepared for suicidal madmen. However, they’d onlymentallyprepared for showing up and having to rescue lifeless bodies rather than live hostages. While the worst-case scenario was never far from their minds, it was the last place they went when kids were involved. If they’d showed up too late and the kids were harmed—or worse—only one of them would have to go in.
Giorgio could wipe out a continent under the right circumstances, and hurt children was one of those circumstances. They’d joked several times that if more teams like theirs existed anywhere, they would always lack a sixth man. Imitations could try, but there was no other Giorgio Pozza.
Gage didn’t have to give the command; with this new information, the plan had changed. In seconds, the rest of the unit would enter the building. Hopefully, they would leave with all the children alive, shielding their innocent eyes from the carnage.
Mike went one way.
Joel went another.
John and Benarld’s men surrounded the structure but remained on guard of the exterior. When it came to stealth missions, the smaller the team, the better.
“In position,” Joel announced.
Mike’s command followed.
Then, he waited.
Because of their earpieces, he heard the clicks and clinks of their equipment as the rest of the team navigated the building, voice after voice announcing when they’d cleared a room. He didn’t hear any doors open, but he heard the faint noise of metal rolling over a hard floor—a smoke canister.
One word followed, from Dez.
“Go.”
On cue, Joel turned around and leaped from the edge of the window off the side of the building.
CHAPTER6
Joel and Mike stormed the rear entrance.
Childlike coughs rose around them.
Unlike the others, this area appeared to be multiple rooms joined together. The places where the walls had been knocked out remained incomplete openings with jagged cinderblock edges.
Through the smoke, they funneled the children toward the entrance, where John and Benarld waited with a unit of soldiers.
“Pozza’s in motion,” Gage said. “Me and Hunter’ll cover him. Focus on extraction.”
There wasn’t much chaos for a room full of smoke and kids. The children didn’t appear to need to know who they were and why they were there; all they needed to trust them was a path to the exit. John and Benarld speaking to them in Portuguese and the region’s native dialect likely also helped. Nearly all the kids in the area spoke Portuguese and at least one native dialect, while some understood a bit of English.
“Você està seguro,” Benarld said.
You are safe.
“Não estou aqui para te machucar.”
I’m not here to hurt you.
Joel reached for a little girl cowering in the corner, and she scurried further against the wall. To help ease her fears, he removed his goggles and lowered his mask.
“Você està—”
He barely got the words out.
