Brothers In Arms (Matt Drake 5) (6 page)

Drake stared at her, taken by the passion in her eyes, the commitment and depth of feeling in her expression.
He glanced beyond her, at the darkness that surrounded them and what might lie beyond their insignificant refuge.

“Let me sleep on it. Give you an answer in the morning.”

And Mai responded instantly with a playful slap. “Fuck your damn Dinorock, you dense Yorkshire pudding. Now I know.” Her smile flickered again. “Now I know.”

*****

Drake drifted in and out of sleep for a few hours but was wide awake and energized when first light began to creep across the skies. The four of them checked the Zodiacs, secured them a little tighter, and then set about exploring the island. It didn’t take long. Within a couple of hours, they had traveled the entire coastline and had picked a landmark from which to venture inland. The rolling seas swept in behind them, surging across the sands and trickling in to lap at their feet as if inviting them back for another bout of
Survival
. They shielded their eyes and stared out to sea every chance they got, but a persistent fog bank hung in the distance, refusing to be burned off. A high mountain rose in the center of the island, its summit cracked and battered. From this angle, it looked like a crumpled paper bag.

“Boy, do I hope we find some food in here
,” Romero commented. “All I’m seeing as a source so far is fish.”

“Oh there’ll be bugs in the trees
,” Mai said, “insects in the ground. Plenty of protein to go round.”

She set off, leaving Romero and Smyth wondering if she was serious.
Drake followed her, not even sure himself. What little path there was wound about so sharply that they had to abandon it and make their own way. High trees, a leafy canopy and a wealth of intertwined branches raised the humidity and blocked their view. Twice, Mai was forced to climb trees to regain their bearings.

On one occasion
, she jumped back down and nodded at Romero. “A few birds up there too.”

Smyth sighed
at Romero. “We’ve eaten worse, sir. Remember Thailand? Jeez.”

They skirted a lake with high banks a
nd cool, deep water. The far side was taken up by a rushing waterfall, torrents of white water cascading down to destroy the mirror-like surface. Though the lake would provide a good place to wash and its high streams a source of drinking water, none of them paid it a second glance. They’d had their fill of water for now.

A narrow crevice in the land
caused a half-hour delay. The bottom was overgrown and treacherous, and the four soldiers were very aware that any kind of injury in this situation could be life threatening. They were careful and took their time, and came at last to the foothills of the mountain.

The slopes were barren. The dark mouths of caves dotted the rocky walls a few hundred feet up.

“Typhoon shelter,” Mai pointed out. She checked the position of the sun. “It’s getting toward midday. We should rest a few hours and then continue.”

“It’s not
that
hot.” Smyth argued.

“But we’re stopping anyway
,” Drake said. Smyth knew dehydration and weariness were substantial dangers. The marine was just playing the bad-boy role. Mai sank to the ground with her back against a stout evergreen and cracked the top of her last bottled water. Drake dropped down beside her.

“The concern is a lack of food
,” Drake muttered. “I expected some kind of animal out here.”

“It’s a small island
,” Mai said practically. “Besides we’re only half way through the interior.”

He fingered the small handgun, reassuring himself it was still there. “Be nice to eat real meat tonight.”

“We could always roast Smyth.”

“Don’t tempt me.”

Drake studied the tall trees, the green leaves, and the thick vegetation that covered the ground. Forest sights and sounds flittered intermittently past his consciousness; sunlight sparkled and spangled through drifting beams of light.

“There is no immediate shelter near the beach
,” Mai said. “Which means we’re going to have to move inland. Maybe even as far as the caves if nothing else arises. Nothing close to the lake offered any chance of shelter.”

“I noticed.”

Mai evened out the correct amount of rations. “Almost out. It’s nearly time to start thinking about snares and such.”

Drake wasn’t so worried about the food. Between them
, they were four highly proficient soldiers, trained to the highest levels. They could find food in hell if need be. What troubled him was their next move.

“We aimed north for two days
,” he said. “The current was weak. The prevailing winds were favorable. We can’t be far from the Korean shore by my estimate.”

Mai shrugged. “Might as well be a thousand miles.”

“Well we can’t
stay
here. Every day we do brings us closer to death. Survival is out of the question unless we find the mainland, Mai.”

The Japanese agent stopped chewing and placed her hand on his arm. “Relax. You don’t have to be
that
Drake. The one who makes it all better. Just sit back and we’ll see where the next hour takes us. And then the next day.”

They journeyed around the mountain and headed back into the forest.

Alicia
watched the geeks at work.

In her heart of hearts
, she wished she was anywhere but here. Preferably with her own little geek. Even more preferably with some kind of meaningful life. But fate kept dealing her the Joker card and she kept playing the role. Drake valued her, she knew, and so did most of the others in their quiet way, but life for her was a rolling road to nowhere. It sure as hell wasn’t going to stop for long with this team in Washington DC.

The security monitors showed the journalist was back. Sarah Moxley was a bloodhound. To date no one had offered up a single word
, but there she was, sniffing around, testing their commitment, chasing an errant firefly that just kept flitting out of her reach. Today, Alicia felt in the mood to give her a word, probably even two.

Still nothing from Drake. Alicia and the rest of the team had to assume their colleague had survived. The last
communication said as much. The very fact it was Drake and Mai remained the biggest factor in their favor. And poor old Jonathan Gates, despite his position as the Secretary of Defense, had become embroiled in the political mess whilst constantly banging his head against a North Korean brick wall.

Alicia sighed to herself.
The deeper the secret the harder it was to take seriously.
Their team still remained relatively unknown.

She poured another coffee, her fifth of the day
, and replaced the pot noisily. No one looked up. Hayden and her new poodle, Kinimaka, were poring over files sent from the local PD, folders containing information on the perp, Michael Markel, the thirty-five-year-old teacher, and the three people who had died in the botched assassination– the two bodyguards and the Senator’s aide, Audrey Smalls, and even Senator Turner himself.

“Problem is,” Hayden was saying
, “these nut jobs don’t need a reason to do what they do. We can’t simply put a pin in a reason and hope it sticks.”

“Turner will only accept FBI protection for another
twenty-four hours.” Kinimaka pointed to a nearby screen where an email had just popped up. “And that’s only out of deference to the other victims.”

Hayden shook her head. Alicia
tuned them out. Her gaze fell on Torsten Dahl, sat across the room. The Swede looked bored, anxious and pent-up all at the same time, probably reflecting her own state of mind.

She remembered the moment of Senator Turner’s attempted assassination with vivid realism. The blank look on the killer
’s face, the empty, shark-like eyes, the obvious competence with which the loner teacher, without any sign of a past record, handled a gun.

The answer surely lay buried in his past. Somewhere.

Alicia drained the last of her coffee, now wired up to the max, but with nowhere to go and nothing to do. Even Komodo Trevor—as she called him—had disappeared on another errand, this time without his little girlfriend. She quickly checked her cellphone—no messages. Her biker friends from Luxembourg hadn’t been in touch for a few days now. A movement caught her eye on the security camera, and again, that bloody reporter stepped into view.

Alicia smiled.
Time to have a little fun and grab a few minutes of distraction. She slipped out of the room unnoticed and padded down the short hallway to the front door, tapped at a keypad and then let herself out into the sunshine.

Immediately
, two sets of shoulders spun toward her.

“Miss Myles!” the female reporter was surprisingly quick.
“Do you have time to comment?”

Alicia took a moment to study her.
Sarah Moxley was a tall, wiry redhead. Flowing locks fell to the small of her back. Wide eyes were hidden behind thin-framed glasses. Her every movement spoke of urgency, as if she was constantly searching for that big story that continued to elude her.

A potentially dangerous adversary, Alicia catalogued
the reporter as her training demanded. Sarah was a tiger made to look like a pussycat.

“Why the hell are you people hanging around
out here? I mean, it’s not like there’s bugger all to see.”

The
reporter advanced a step. “I’m Sarah Moxley. I work for the Post.” She proffered her ID, making Alicia smirk.

“Miss Moxley, don’t play me for a foo
l. We both know who everyone is here, don’t we?” She focused on the reporter’s cameraman. “Except you, pretty boy. Anyone ever told you, you look a little like a younger Matt Damon?”

“Alright
,” Moxley said without a trace of humility. “Alicia Myles. Ex-British army. Ex rebel. New recruit. Am I right?”

“Not even close.” Alicia stepped forward so the two
of them were within touching distance. “Miss Moxley, there’s no story here. You should look elsewhere.”

“
Honey, I see ex-army, ex-CIA, and a current Secretary of Defense coming and going all the time.” Moxley jerked her head quickly at the team’s new HQ. “I somehow think I’m in the right place.”

Alicia considered her reply for a moment but then decided to go true to form. “
I’d tell you to kiss my arse, but I’m pretty sure you’d enjoy it, and then I’ll never get rid of you. So, for now”—she gave a little flourish—“farewell.”

Alicia pushed past the reporters and jumped into one of the pool cars.
A voice command turned the engine on, and by the time she merged with the steady flow of traffic, her mind was already far away from Sarah Moxley and Washington DC, centered firmly on the whereabouts of Matt Drake and Mai Kitano and what, if anything, she could do to help them.

They spotted the deer midway through the afternoon. By that time, they had established there were no other people on the island, but judging by tracks, old campfires and a broken-down structure, at some point in the not too distant past, someone had visited and stayed there.

Promising, but not positively uplifting news. They had no idea who the visitors might
’ve  been, and no way of contacting them. The foursome had decided to head back to the beach for the night and console themselves with a small portion of their frugal rations, resolving to start setting traps and hunting the next day, when Mai had held up a hand. Shocked, because of the ease of their passage so far that day, Drake had blinked and almost tripped, but soon caught himself when he spied the deer.

It stood alert,
ears pricked, nostrils sniffing the breeze. A lovely creature, it appeared far too exquisite too harm, but red meat and protein would soon become the essence of survival for them, so Drake wasted no time in ambushing and shooting the beast. They carried it back, mouths watering, and then laid its body in a patch of barren ground a good walk from their shelter.

“The blood will soak
into the ground,” Smyth had said, unsheathing his knife. “No point doing it too close to home when we don’t know what it might attract.”

As darkness fell
, they lit a campfire, erected a spit, and roasted the best parts of the deer. Even before it had cooled, they were feasting, fingers burned and dripping, mouths savoring the taste. Drake couldn’t remember the last time food ever tasted so good. When they had finished, they all sat around the dying campfire in a comfortable silence.

It wasn’t long before they were asleep, Drake lying close to Mai, wondering what tomorrow might bring.

*****

And as the night waxed and waned, Drake found himself half-waking and half-
dreaming, all subconscious thoughts centered round Mai Kitano. It all went back to the beginning, back to when they first met.

It had been his second mission as part of the British SAS, in
mid-1998. Drake had been twenty-three then, a competent, fresh, deadly special-forces soldier. Their target had been a Chechen warlord, the country’s most ruthless. Back in ’98 kidnapping was Chechnya’s major source of income, and the easy “go to” money-spinner for almost every aspiring warlord. And there were many. But Akhmad Doku ran them all—they could aspire no higher than to grace his boot with their shattered teeth. The new President Maskhadov was making things very hard for the warlords, resulting in some horrendous car bombings against official figures. Normally, the Chechen’s would solve matters from within, but Doku didn’t run his kidnapping business from inside the country; he ran it from nearby Turkey where the amenities and the lifestyle were a little more suited to his tastes.