Authors: Vicki Hinze
A silent moment passed. Sara conceded that Rebecca Foster painted a compelling, vivid picture, but was it the whole picture? That Sara didn’t know.
Jarrod cleared his throat. “I agree, General. Everything I know of Jack Foster tells me he is exactly as Mrs. Foster portrays him.”
The general looked to Grant. “My vote goes with Jarrod’s.”
All gazes shifted to Sara. “My experiences with Colonel Foster have been different, but then I’ve been on the opposite side of the fence, attempting to get information from him that he wasn’t free to give me. I understand that. I have observed him being evasive, stonewalling, and at times, making my life a living hell. I’ve also observed him using covert tactics—some acceptable, some not—in recruiting me,
and in disclosing the true nature of his rationale for that recruitment, which he also might not have been free to tell me. So while I accept all you’re telling us, Mrs. Foster, I also must acknowledge that Colonel Foster’s respect for this flag could be attached to the fact that it was draped over his father’s coffin. A father who was killed in the line of duty. Your husband
could
resent that flag. To him, it could symbolize the life with a father that this country stole from him. And his feelings could be so strong that he would do anything for retribution.”
Scott stared at Sara—hard. But he had listened and heard her. “Thank
you, Mrs. Foster. We appreciate your insight on this matter. I’m going to have to ask you to stay with us for a time. We’ll attempt to offer you every comfort.”
“That’s very kind of you, General Scott.”
Here, Sara thought, was the quintessential military wife. One who under the most adverse circumstances retained her dignity, her faith in her husband, and grace, never faltering outwardly while inside, everyone in the room knew, she was burning with outrage that the motives of her beloved would dare to be questioned.
Sara admired Rebecca Foster a lot. And if Rebecca Foster admired and respected Jack Foster as much as she obviously did, then there had to be an enormous amount of good in the man.
Yet even an enormous amount of good in him didn’t make him innocent. Especially not in the eyes of the guilty-until-proven-innocent military.
Rebecca was escorted from the room. When the door closed, General Scott noticed the flag still on the table. “She forgot it.”
“No,” Sara disagreed. “She didn’t forget it. It’s a visual reminder of all she said.”
Scott nodded, then turned the subject. “I’ve received intel that this meeting between Fontaine and Owlsley won’t be at the Pentagon.” The general’s eyes dimmed then turned the color of steel. “They’re meeting at IWPT.”
Jarrod frowned. “Did this Intel come down through normal channels, sir?”
“No, actually it didn’t, Major.” General Scott looked pleased. “It came from an inside source. Mrs. Fontaine.”
What did that mean? Sara looked at Jarrod.
“She’s working with the AID,” Jarrod speculated.
The general nodded and sighed. “It’s a sad thing when the interests of the country come between a man and his wife, but in this case, I’m damned happy to report that Mrs. Fontaine is more of a patriot than her husband. She’s been working with the OSI for nearly a month, and when the nature of this operation became apparent, the OSI contacted the AID, who brought in Colonel Foster.”
Sara stiffened. And because Foster hadn’t reported the incident with David, the AID considered him suspicious, as well, but it lacked any evidence of actual wrongdoing. Yet if they had pulled him in, then they would have lost Owlsley and maybe the technology. The puzzle pieces were falling into place.
“I’m tagging this Security Condition Delta,” General Scott said. “And I’m assigning a Special Operations team to intercede.”
“Sir,” Sara interjected, “I want to warn you about this technology. I’ve studied it both in theory and, as we disclosed earlier, I’ve experienced its practical applications.”
“I know it’s capable of taking out an entire team short-term, Doctor.”
“Sir, it’s capable of taking out an entire battalion short-term. It’s imperative that the Special Operations team be emotionally prepared for this mission, or they will be rendered incapacitated.”
“She’s right, General,” Jarrod added, giving weight to her claim. “I was.”
“I sincerely appreciate your concern and your opinion, Dr. West.” Scott looked from Jarrod to Sara. “But there’s no proven data on that, and this is a military mission. I cannot, and will not, put a military mission in the hands of a civilian psychiatrist who lacks military conditioning. Our Special Operations teams have received the most extensive psychological-warfare training in the world. They can handle this mission.”
Hard, yes. Yet anything but fair. “With all due respect, you’re wrong, sir.”
He glared at her. “If so, I’ll accept full responsibility.”
Furious, Sara had to bite her tongue to keep her mouth shut. The man’s mind was made up, and that was that. She could waste time beating a dead horse or drafting an alternate plan. She opted for the alternate plan.
Glancing Jarrod’s way from under her lashes, she wasn’t surprised to find him watching her. When he was certain he had her attention, he blinked.
Sara blinked back. The message had been sent and received. An alternate plan was necessary and unavoidable. They would just have to pray that implementing it spared the loss of lives.
Their own, and those of Scott’s Special Operations team.
Sara looked across the front seat of the car at Jarrod. “Can we talk here?”
“Yes.” He glanced her way. “It’s been swept. No bugs.”
Sara licked at her dry lips, uncomfortable at being dressed in fatigues. “I know General Scott ordered me to stay out of this, but his team is going to fail, Jarrod.”
“Yes, it is.” Jarrod frowned at the monotonous scenery of tall, twisted pines lining I-10. “Which is why we’re going back to IWPT anyway. They need our help.”
Just hearing the name of the place had her skin crawling. They had to go. Of course they had to go. But she didn’t have to like it, and from Jarrod’s grim expression, neither did he. “How are we going to stop them?”
“Any way we can.” Jarrod cast her a look of sheer determination. “Sara, can you kill a man?”
A lump the size of Dallas lodged in her throat, and every nerve ending in her body rebelled. “If I have to, I will. But I’d rather not.”
“We’d all rather not, honey.”
“I know.” She did know. And she remembered a comment Foster once had made to her. If he had to sacrifice her, he would.
Her or many, many others. Which would she choose?
She’d hated it then, and she hated it now.
Jarrod turned onto the road leading to IWPT. It was deserted. He pulled into a Jitney Jungle store’s parking lot. At the far end of the lot stood a weatherworn blue building. A faded sign above it read “Bob’s Bar and Grill.”
“We can’t go in through the gate,” Jarrod explained, parking in the middle of a group of cars.
“No, we can’t.” The engine shut off. “How much time do we have before the Special Ops team moves in?”
“About twenty-five minutes.”
“Is that enough?”
Jarrod opened his car door. Its hinges squeaked. “It’s going to have to be.”
They walked just inside the stand of trees that acted as a barrier between the road and the training center grounds. Two hundred yards out, Jarrod cut deeper into the woods. Sara followed, praying no wildlife decided to descend upon them. She wasn’t crazy about woods in general, and the last time she had been in these woods, she had ended up in the box. Give her concrete jungles with plush carpet and microwaves. Keep the campfires and tents.
Jarrod stepped over a charred, fallen pine. “We can get in here.”
There was a break in the fence. Not a gated break, like at Braxton, but a section of ten feet or so that had been stomped down. Evidently, previous trainees who were not undergoing the noninvasive microwave-laser technology had found a way to get to Bob’s Bar and Grill on foot.
Ten minutes later, she stood beside Jarrod. Both squatted low to the ground beside the big metal building, using leafy evergreens as cover.
“They’re coming.” Jarrod nodded toward the administration building.
Fontaine, Foster, and Owlsley walked toward the huge metal building. They were surrounded by armed guards. Sara’s stomach fell. “Jarrod, how can we do this? There are so many of them.”
“Shh, calm down, Sara. I have a plan
. . .
”
Jarrod recognized
the beefy lieutenant.
So did Sara, and anger churned in her stomach. The man had been brutal and cruel to her here.
Jarrod gave her the nod, and Sara stepped out onto the sidewalk. “Lieutenant, excuse me. May I ask—” Sara got no further.
Jarrod felled the man even more quickly than he had felled Mick Bush, then dragged the lieutenant around to the back of the building.
The leashed fury in Jarrod’s body language worried her, and Sara followed him, rounding the corner to the sound of a slap. The lieutenant was holding his face. His lip was bleeding. “Jarrod, don’t!” Sara called out.
Jarrod looked up at her. “He got a hell of a lot less than he gave.” Jarrod took aim with the man’s gun and fired.
Sara nearly fell to her knees.
“What
are you doing?”
“It’s a stun gun.” He passed the gun to Sara and then ripped the rank off the man’s shoulders.
The gun wasn’t heavy, but what it represented weighed a ton. She’d better get a grip on her feelings. She couldn’t afford this. Not now. Shank, Koloski, Jarrod—all of them had had time to get used to things like shooting people. Well, as used to it as anyone human can get, and instinctively she knew they didn’t like it any better than she did. She had to focus on the purpose. On
why
they were shooting. To protect and serve.
Which is why Jarrod’s ripping the military rank from the man’s uniform filled her not with disdain, but with a sense of rightness. The lieutenant had dishonored it, the military, and the American people. Everything the country stood for. He wasn’t fit to wear the rank, and he insulted all who did. Still, the compassionate side of Sara was glad the man was out cold and oblivious to the experience of being stripped of it.
Jarrod handcuffed the lieutenant to the trunk of a tree, then joined Sara. He glanced at his watch. “We need another stun gun.”
He didn’t want to kill any of the guards, either. Sara understood why. They were following orders. No more, and no less. “The administration building. There’s always a guard posted outside.”
“Too obvious. He’ll be missed.”
They scouted and located a guard en route to the metal building. Using the tactic they’d used before, Sara distracted the man, and Jarrod attacked.
When they had the second gun, they headed back toward the metal building, walking quickly and passing no one.
Fifty yards out, Sara heard the first screams.
Two entrances.
Sara and Jarrod took the back one into the metal hangar. Chaos reigned. Owlsley stood behind the laser, sweeping it across the open expanse, hitting whoever happened to be in the red beam’s path. Men dressed in black for a surgical strike lay writhing on the floor, gripping their stomachs. Totally incapacitated. Once-armed guards lay among them. So did their weapons. None were capable of retrieving them.
In the confusion, Sara spotted Fontaine and Foster. Both stood beside Owlsley, and neither attempted to stop him or to gain control of the laser. Sara stooped behind a metal drum, aimed, and hit Owlsley. He fell to the concrete floor, bumping the back of the laser. The beam streaked up to the metal roof, then deflected back down on the men.
“Oh, God.” Sara watched in horror.
Jarrod slid along the back wall, aimed, and took down Fontaine. Foster didn’t turn off the machine.
Why didn’t he turn off the machine?
Because he was one of them. He had to be one of them.
As if sensing her there, he turned and looked at her, then skirted the red reflections of the beam and walked toward her, toward the exit. He was going to just walk out of here? Just walk out and leave?
“Stop.” Sara held up the gun with both hands, aimed it right at his chest.
Foster smiled and kept coming.
“I said stop.” Her voice shook as much as her hands. She’d wanted to believe. And maybe him leaving was normal behavior for a Shadow Watcher. Maybe he couldn’t be here when the military police and agents from the OSI arrived. Maybe—“Damn it, Foster, I said stop.”