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“Glad to have you.”
Knute Thayer had been on one of Harper’s teams earlier, and she had met him before but introduced himself to her anyway. Others step forward, including Paul Taylor.
Harper gathered them together all in one room and took the time to give a little speech.
“Well, ladies and gents, welcome to my house. Consider this a beach bonfire before a mission. You know what I mean.”
The group laughed. Lydia knew the routine, the beach outings with the wives and kids before an important mission.
“I want you to know that both Lydia and I are incredibly grateful for you being an important part of our security, for coming together as this team. As you know, in two days’ time or less, the authorities are going to come pick up Lipori, and we’ll be given the location of the couple we’re to intercept. Once we find out where they are, we will stage a pick up. Now we have to be conscious of the fact that they may be tipped off to what we’re doing, and maybe they’re gone already. We haven’t heard from them in, what, five days now?”
He looked around the room, and several nodded their agreement.
“So from now on, I want you to keep your comms on day and night. I want you to sleep with them. I want you to make sure all your batteries are charged and your cell phones stay charged. I want you to make sure all your equipment is loaded and you have plenty of ammunition. If you need anything, if you all of a sudden run out of something, let me know, and we’ll get it for you. You medics make sure you stay prepped in case we need you; you know the drill. We’re going to try to keep everybody checked in for the handoff so you’ll hear it as soon as we will, and that’s going to start the clock ticking. Once he gives the address out, we’ve probably got no more than about five hours to get them. He has told us they are living nearby, but we are prepared for the fact that perhaps they’re somewhere else. My intuition says they’re close by.”
The crowd agreed.
“I want you to keep Venom inside, so if he wanders out of a doorway, somebody grab him. He cannot go outside to the front, just a reminder, and in the backyard, I want him on a leash. I don’t want to take any more chances. If he starts to alert, I want you guys to treat that as a warning sign and immediately fall into full action. He does not alert unless he has something to tell us. The other thing is, he is not to be fed off the table. We’ve trained him not to eat out of anything but his bowl. I had to train him so he doesn’t pick up some kind of poison like he did the last time. Everybody clear on all that?”
“Are we allowed to use cell phones to call our families?” Sam Hobbs asked.
“Of course, Sam. You’ve got family down in Coronado, and some of you have family here. Make your calls tonight, just let them know you’re not going to be available for a day or two, and give them the happy talk, okay?”
He paced the floor, adding one more point.
“If something should occur, we have all of your families numbers, and we will make sure they are informed right away if we have to leave the area. I’m thinking we’re going to stay here. If we have to chase them, though, and apprehend them elsewhere, we will do that. This is a no-fail mission. We will find them. No excuses.”
The pies were consumed, and Lydia along with Sally cleaned the kitchen and stacked meats on plates covered in foil so that guys could come in and help themselves to something or make themselves a sandwich during their shift. Sally had made five loaves of beautiful herb bread, and they left plenty of soft butter out in the kitchen.
It was late when Lydia decided to head to bed. Harper needed to coordinate a few things and call the admiral back east, so he promised he’d meet her later on upstairs.
Sally went home with the two guys who were living with her. She texted the all clear as did her two helpers, so the team didn’t have to worry about her position being compromised. One by one, Lydia heard the check-in. The check-ins occurred once an hour. After the third one, she showered, slipped on a nightgown, and then removed her comm to prepare for bed. She set it on the night table.
Not much later, Harper came in, followed by Venom.
“You must be exhausted, Harper. It was a good meeting, but man can they pack it away.”
He was focusing on undressing. “They’re good guys, Lydia—the best I’ve ever worked with.”
“You’ve thought of everything. All these monitors and recording devices. You have them patrolling as well?”
“Yes, ma’am. In addition to that, the guys that do patrol around the edges, they record as well. So we’re like Fort Knox, Lydia.”
He turned around on the bed and looked at her.
“And you’re the prize. You’re not bait, Sweetheart. You’re the prize.”
“I want to hear more.”
“Let me take a shower, and then I’ll tell you all my secrets.”
“Oh, I can’t wait.”
Chapter 16
The handoff wasperformed just outside the prison gates in Murphy, Virginia. The guards, who were Patterson’s Special Agents, confirmed it was indeed Lipori. The two Italian Federal Police officers were dressed in plain clothes, and after they presented credentials and took possession of Lipori, they had him handcuffed and secured to one of the agents. The guard reported the leg shackles were removed. That had not been in the agreement.
There was a black, unmarked car waiting to take them to the airport. Lydia knew he had a nonstop flight to Rome and then a puddle hopper to Florence. The two special guards informed the team the transfer was complete. As soon as he sat down in the car, the Italian policeman next to him in the backseat, he asked the guard to pull out a piece of paper in his shirt pocket. He had been dressed in street clothes, like the Federal Police, to keep the passengers on the flight calm, but the handcuffs would be obvious.
