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“Yeah, some of them were laughing while our Marines bled and died.” He took a breath. “While the people they considered traitors also died,” Hazard said, the memory of that day haunted him—the heat, the thirst and hunger, the fatigue, the smell of blood, sewage, and rank, unwashed bodies. They’d had front-row seats to the Taliban’s brutal violence against innocents. There had been warnings the previous day and into the morning. But the chaos at that point was complete and no one, not even the SEALs, could get clearance to act. It had been galling, traumatizing, and as far as he was concerned, criminal. “We could do nothing.” Hazard walked over to Kodiak and squeezed his shoulder. “You keep listening, brother. That’s all we can do for her.”
Kodiak nodded. “Yeah, I will.”
Long after the lights had gone out, and he’d checked to make sure Panda hadn’t left another rubber snake in his bed, Hazard tried, but couldn’t seem to diminish the memories. Maybe he didn’t want to forget because the world had moved on and the whole debacle was now part of history…a sad and guilt-ridden part as was the pull out of Saigon that had such an eerie echo. Maybe he wanted to remember to honor the men, women, and families who had believed in the US, had aided them, some for all of the twenty years the US had been there. They had been sacrificed to ill-conceived and delusional rhetoric, and a callous and weak administration. Even now, Americans were trapped there, and he and his team had done as much as they could to assist the efforts of special operators, intelligence operatives, retired military officers, and numerous government officials in an unofficial capacity who participated in their own “off the book” operations. They had saved thousands of allies who would have been stranded otherwise.
Yeah, he was okay with losing a little sleep over it all. He could only wonder how much, if any sleep, the government he was pledged to suffered…back then, and now.
As the next day dawned, and they headed back to the AFP station to resume their hunt for the men Mickey Jones had named, the memories were with him. When they arrived at the station, Kaiya wasn’t there to greet them like she had been the previous two days.
His normally calm and in control teammate, Kodiak, got increasingly agitated as the morning progressed and no Kaiya. Finally, he called her, but the call went straight to voicemail.
Then their concern turned into action. They piled into the vehicles and drove over to Kaiya’s home.
They found it empty, and even more chilling…Kaiya’s sidearm and keys were found at the edge of the walk. Someone had taken her, and it looked like Kodiak was going to lose his mind.
* * *
Kaiya had regainedconsciousness moments after she’d blacked out. The car she was in had already been moving, taking her to Lenny Cox, her head throbbing and spinning from the blow to the temple. She’d recognized Allambee Mitchell just before the hood cut off all sight. She was sure the person who had immobilized her from behind was Allambee’s sidekick, Billy Coen.
So, they had stirred up a viper’s nest in their search for Archie Baker, and Cox had the audacity and disregard for the law to assault and kidnap one of the federal police. He must be out of his mind. Her department didn’t tolerate this kind of blatant attack against one of their own.
Currently, she was gagged, tied to a chair and had spent an uncomfortable night that way while the two “criminal masterminds” had argued back and forth about taking her. Clearly Billy was the leader of the two of them, Allambee a little slower in speech and thought.
Her wrists were raw from her attempts to get out of the bonds, but it was no use. She was in a cavernous warehouse she suspected was in one of Sydney’s numerous industrial parks on the outskirts of the city. They had driven for a while, leading her to think she was now quite a long distance from headquarters.
They wouldn’t miss her until morning, which had dawned several hours ago.
The warehouse was alive with activity from several workers and crammed with goods, boxes, cartons, and containers—all of it haphazardly organized. Kaiya saw lots of electronics: flat-screen televisions, home theater components, computers, game consoles, and everything in between. There was a whole fleet of Mercedes-Benz sedans parked on the east side and racks of petrol barrels. Two large refrigerator compartments held more contraband, and there were stacks of crated caviar and wines, cigarettes and cigars. This was Lenny’s hub of business, making Kaiya more nervous. There was no way those two idiots would have brought her here with any intent of ever letting her leave.
This place chock full of Cox’s inventory would be her tomb.
She was currently in an open office of sorts with a couple of desks.
“The boss will be here any moment. I still think we shoulda talked to him before we snatched a copper. He's going to be mad.” Allambee’s voice trembled. It was clear he was afraid of Lenny and rightly so. The man was a brutal bastard with a short fuse.
“He was the one who told us to find Baker. We failed. She might know where he is. The boss will be happy about that.”
“I don’t know. Those guys who hired him told him to keep it under the radar. No footprint, whatever that means. Kidnapping a copper isn’t keeping it under wraps, Billy.”
“Shut up,” Billy said as the large hangar door started to whir and after a few seconds it started to open, rolling on its frame into the ceiling. Dread snaked through her. She looked around the warehouse again, desperately seeking a way out and not seeing a damn thing.
A black Mercedes pulled in, and Kaiya's skin went clammy cold. Cox was here and things were going to go from bad to worse real quick. The car pulled to a stop in one of several parking spots that had been carved out of the chaos. The driver got out and opened the door.
Out spilled a pit bull, his coat a chocolate brown, his chest and lower legs, from the paws to about center, were a creamy white. The dog stilled, his amber eyes, looking almost yellow with a malevolent, feral glow fixated on her.
This was his territory, and he was well aware that she was a stranger in it. She had no idea what that signaled to him. Right behind him, Lenny Cox emerged, the light from outside illuminating him.
His face was as familiar to her as her own, and it was one that often conjured up nightmares. Handsome at first glance, almost in an anime way, but with each successive expression instilling fear in the heart and a chill down the spine.
He had black spiked hair, the tips almost looking golden as if he’d had them frosted. The short cut accentuated his finely chiseled features. His smile was wide, revealing absurdly white teeth. His nose was aquiline, his charged blue eyes wide and even spaced, and would have made him look innocent if it wasn’t for his slashing eyebrows and the frantic energy that seemed to glow there and spill out of the pores of his body.
He was thin, almost emaciated, dressed impeccably in a dark blue suit with a pale blue tie and a stark white silk shirt under a blue cashmere overcoat, and even in the dust and grime of the warehouse, his shoes reflected the lights in a distinctive shine.
The dog turned to look back at him, and she swore they communicated in a dark, silent language, the pit feeding on Cox’s energy.
Kaiya had been to one of the worst places on earth and endured untold terror and risk, but even with the threat of suicide bombers, the Taliban a stone’s throw away, she had never experienced this kind of evil.
He sighed heavily, and the dog followed on Cox’s heels without any instruction to. “Who is this?” Cox asked, his electric gaze focusing on her, and she felt like a bug beneath his microscope.
