Deep Rising (An Outside the Lines Novel) (Entangled Select) (21 page)

Lana’s report detailed how scientists currently operated research facilities beneath the extinct portion of the volcano in underground tunnels that burrowed over two kilometers straight into the mountainside. Shit, but this was a mess. He didn’t know jack about calderas or fault lines of volcanoes, but he knew explosives. Taking out a large target, be it natural or manmade, was nothing more than a mathematic equation to calculate the necessary explosive load.

“God have mercy,” Jared whispered.

A large enough bomb set and detonated in such a vulnerable area would create the calamity he so desperately hoped to avoid. One footnote estimated that
half a trillion tons of earth
would crash into the ocean. Shit, he had to stop and count on his fingers for that number of zeroes.

As he read on, Lana’s predictions caused his stomach to knot and a tight feeling to spread across his lungs. One section described the mega-tsunami impact: the waters along the eastern coast would draw back like a bowstring, Then, a veritable wall of water would appear on the horizon. A hundred feet high. He couldn’t fathom a wave so large, so vast, reaching over a thousand miles from end to end. When it hit, the water would push onto the mainland for miles.

It wouldn’t be a single wave, but rather a train of consecutive tsunamis, slamming into the shores, offering no respite, destroying everyone and everything in its wake.

Why didn’t anyone listen to you sooner?

Thinking of Lana left a burning in his gut, and Jared forced the thoughts aside.

Prioritizing, casting immediate judgments, possessing the insight to make hard decisions, these traits had earned him his rank and kept him alive to this point. He’d made his choice as far as Lana was concerned, and he intended to stand by it.

Still, he couldn’t get her out of his head.

…

Lana thrashed violently. Her nose burned. Blinking rapidly, her surroundings came into focus. She immediately recognized Jared’s mother.

“What happened?”

“Easy now.” Annabelle tossed aside the ammonium carbonate stick. “These are just some good old-fashioned smelling salts.”

Memories flooded her. “The bastard!” Lana shouted.

He’d choked her, restricting the supply of blood to her brain, and had rendered her unconscious. She could’ve died or suffered brain damage. The logical side of her brain protested that Jared would never hurt her, but Lana had surpassed rational reasoning.

“I’m going to kill him!”

Annabelle laughed. “I’m fond of the boy, so I’d rather you didn’t.”

Lana probed along her neck; she failed to experience any sensitivity. “How could he?” she wondered aloud. “How could he do this to me?”

“To protect you,” Annabelle said, softly.

“You thought to bring the smelling salts along,” Lana argued. “So obviously you were in on the plan too? How could
you
?”

Annabelle’s mouth kicked up on one side. “For the very same reason.”

“You fight as dirty as he does,” Lana grumbled.

Annabelle smiled.

“Can you drive me to the main terminal?” Lana asked.

“Why?”

“Because I’m going after him.”

Annabelle’s hands tightened on the steering wheel until her knuckles turned white. “Why?”

“There is more than one location. I don’t have any way of contacting Jared. What if he goes to the wrong one? What if the people sent to help him are compromised too?” Lana climbed over the backseat into the front of the truck. “Damn it…” She frowned. “I don’t have any money.”

“Check under the seat.”

Lana reached beneath the passenger seat and withdrew a box. Annabelle climbed into the cab and handed her the key.

Opening the small safe, Lana’s gaze darted to the other woman. “Are you serious?”

Annabelle shrugged. “Jared’s been sending me money for fifteen years. The fool boy should’ve realized I got on fine before he was born, and as much as I appreciate the gesture, I wasn’t about to live the high life while he slogged through the trenches risking life and limb.”

Lana had to concede the difficulty of reaping the rewards of Jared’s hard-earned labors—especially if he’d suffered or died while she did so.

“I deposited most of the money into a high-yielding CD. So my boy will be coming home to more than a million, on the books. I kept that box on hand. My shotgun’s in the trunk, but I doubt it’ll clear airport security.” She shrugged. “We’re a bit of a cash-and-carry kind of family.”

Lana recalled the box of cash and giant bag of guns that Jared had recovered from his sister’s attic. She smiled.

“I appreciate you helping my son.”

Lana swallowed hard. “You might want to reserve your thanks.” She shifted to face Jared’s mother directly. “You see, it was my research that encouraged this attack.”

“Lana, you didn’t do this. It isn’t like you’re responsible for starting the waves.”

“You don’t understand, Mrs. Caldwell. I shared my findings with my half brother. He was the one responsible.”

The woman remained quiet for a moment, her lips compressing into a thin line as she processed this startling information. Lana watched myriad emotions play across the older woman’s face. At any moment she expect Jared’s mother to take a swing at her.

“I’m truly sorry,” Lana maintained. “My brother was crazed. He blamed Americans for killing his family. This entire scenario is a series of tragic events.”

“If he hated Americans, why would he target that Italian island I saw on the news? What do they have to do with us?”

Capri. Twelve hundred–plus innocent people. The explosion on Ischia that sparked it, and more innocent lives lost. “I don’t know.” Lana rubbed her hands over eyes. “Do you want my honest opinion?”

“Yes.”

“For practice.”

Annabelle’s features contorted with disgust.

“I understand if you don’t want to help me. If I were in your position it would be difficult for me to see past the circumstances. If it’s any consolation, my brother’s dead. Jared killed him.”

Annabelle drove off the tarmac toward the main building without commenting on Sergei’s death. “We received special clearance when Jared showed his identification to airport personnel,” Annabelle explained. “But I’m not about to test the patience of airport security.” She kept her attention on the road rather than Lana. “I appreciate your honesty. And I’m sure you’ve heard the adage of not punishing the son for sins of the father.”

Lana nodded.

“Considering everything you’ve done to help thwart these madmen, I think I can apply the proverb to you and your brother. Besides, Jared told me about your courage in Hawaii. I know you saved my boy. If you’re willing to try to do so again, I’d be a bitter, ignorant old woman if I tried to stop you.”

“You’re not old.”

Annabelle snorted. “Just bitter and ignorant, eh?”

“That’s not what I—”

“Let’s get you on a plane.”

“I don’t have my purse. I have no ID.”

Annabelle pulled Lana’s wallet from her jacket pocket. “This is the passport Jared’s boss sent. I palmed it from his pack when he told me his plans, just in case.”

“Wow. You’re good. A bit weird to have hit on everything so accurately. How did you figure it all out?”

“I know my son,” she said simply. “And”—she smiled—“you seem a lot like me.”

Arranging a flight to La Palma Airport proved a nearly impossible task.

Of the approximately forty thousand dollars nestled in the safety deposit box, Lana utilized half to convince a pilot to fly her across the Atlantic. During this time, she paced the waiting room at the edge of the terminal like a rabid animal. Every second wasted here on the ground meant another moment in which something could go wrong. The wave could’ve been triggered already. For all she knew, death could be devouring the distance across the ocean at this very instant.

Lana thumped her hand against her head, forcing her brain to focus. An endless list of possible scenarios paraded across her psyche, stripping her nerves bare.

The Cumbre Nueva side of the island was riddled with tunnels. Detonating a bomb in any one of them could send a flank of the active volcano, Cumbre Vieja, right into the sea. Whoever sought to create a transatlantic tsunami might decide to pass through the Barranco de las Angustias into the caldera itself. Or they could hike the west face of Cumbre Vieja and set the incendiary device directly into the ridge. Several crevasses existed along Cumbre Vieja’s flank; a couple spanned twenty feet or more across with maximum depths ranging from a few meters to a hundred feet. Lana chewed on her lower lip. A thousand possible scenarios existed, each more disturbing than the first.

“Ma’am.” The pilot waved as he approached. “We’re ready now.”

Lana hugged Jared’s mother.

“I’ll pray for you both,” Annabelle promised.

Lana couldn’t speak because of the lump in her throat. She clasped the small bag containing her ID and money and followed the pilot to the jet.

“I’ve heard La Palma is breathtaking. Are you traveling there for business or pleasure?”

“Business.” Lana squared her shoulders. “Unfinished business.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

October 19 - 3:15 pm

La Palma, Canary Islands

Several hours elapsed before Randall instructed Jared to take a seat and buckle up. In that time, Jared scoured every documented inch of the island. Sewers, ditches, faults, tunnels, caves, drains, and water pipes. He considered every angle.

If he wanted to kill, to trigger that cataclysmic wave, what was the best way to do it? He needed to enter a terrorist’s mind. He grabbed the maps. He traced the fault lines. He studied the vulnerable flank.

As a demolitions expert, he grasped where to position explosives in order to generate maximum impact. Considering the logistics on La Palma from this focal point, the details coalesced before his eyes.

“We’re here,” Randall told him.

“What are your orders, Randall?”

“To follow your instructions and assist in any way you deem necessary.”

“I need a driver.”

Randall shrugged. “I’m at your service.”

…

Jared packed the ammunitions and weapons into two suitcases, and Randall secreted those suitcases in a hidden compartment that could only be opened utilizing CIA codes. Immigration, accustomed to catering to wealthy socialites and celebrities, sent a customs agent to the jet to personally process their passports. The representative made a cursory inspection of the plane’s interior and neglected to inquire about their belongings. Whether Gordon called ahead to arrange this clearance or the island official’s oversight indicated the type of treatment they would provide any other high roller, Jared couldn’t say and he didn’t care. But when all of their belongings passed through customs, none were opened or given more than a passing glance.

He and Randall hauled their luggage to a small car rental agency located within the airport’s parking deck. It boasted an assortment of convertibles, sports cars, and vans. Jared selected a navy-blue sedan. He could’ve obtained a Company vehicle with a simple phone call, but he opted to arrange for his own ride. With security already compromised, he would not court additional attention.

They drove to a quaint seaside hotel. Both he and Randall spoke Spanish. They booked a room and shared a smile over the check-in. They had both provided the hotel manager with fake IDs.

“Is there anything else you want me to do?” Randall asked, once they situated themselves within the far-from-fantastic room.

“No,” Jared replied at a length. “Everything is set.”

Recognizing that the transport of a major weapon would not take place during the day, he decided against racing up the mountainside as he had originally intended. Rather than alert the terrorists to his presence, he prowled the hotel room, much as a fabled vampire might anticipate the night.

The younger man’s eyes followed his movements, and Jared resented the sensation. In no mood for an audience, he peeled off a couple of large bills and handed them to Randall. “Go and scrounge us up something to eat.”

The man’s reluctance to leave led Jared to believe that Randall planned to stick around in hopes of somehow assuming a more vital role in the mission.
Why?
He wanted to ask, but he didn’t care enough to bother. He refused to include this man any more than he had to. Jared didn’t trust him on principle.

Keeping Randall around essentially ensured a plane on hand and an extra set of trigger fingers should he need them. Randall still operated under Company guidelines and orders, but Gordon had been the one to send Randall, thus Jared trusted him to some degree. If the lines got crossed, Randall could pose a potential threat and Jared therefore elected to function under the old axiom of keeping friends close and enemies closer.

The briefing file mentioned SEAL teams off the coast, along with surveillance on and around the isle. But what good did this pose if they were unreliable or compromised?

He was altogether on his own.

Jared heard the door slam. He crossed to it, locked it, and slid a chair beneath the knob. Ambling into the bathroom, he poured a cup of water from the sink and carried it onto the balcony.

The room, on the third floor of the hotel, faced inland, which likely explained the vacancy. The majority of guests would prefer a panorama of the water. Jared required an unobstructed view of the mountains. The peaks impressively dominated the landscape, reaching nearly eight thousand feet.

The sharp glint of sunlight on metal allowed him to follow the flow of traffic along the mountainside. Houses had once nestled among the volcanoes. When Cumbre Vieja erupted back in the early seventies, the families there fled and stayed away, or so the files suggested.

He sipped the water.

His body transitioned into full attack mode. Adrenaline replaced anxiety, anticipation eradicated all fear. Training took over where breeding left off. It had never occurred to him before, but he’d been born to this, fashioned to shoulder unfathomable pressure.

It presented an obligation he could not shirk.

There were loose ends to tie up, other degenerates to dispose of before he could finally lay down his arms. If he died in the process, someone would take up his cause, of this much Jared was certain. The thought of death brought only acceptance. He had Lana to thank for this he supposed. She had brought him peace.

On a gut-deep level, he understood that his betrayal likely surpassed her capacity to forgive. But if he actually managed to pull this off, he would try to contact her. He would ask for a second chance.

He washed the thoughts away.

It wouldn’t be long now.

The sun began its descent across the sky in a timeless parade of heat and light. He watched the sunset, savoring it. How many warriors throughout the millennia had gazed at this same sun and pondered what would come next? His soul was old, he realized, weary. Perhaps the spirits of fallen comrades in lives past would aid him before he joined them.

The sun passed over the roof of the hotel.

He loaded each gun and secured them in holsters on his legs, ankles, waist, and back. The kit for dismantling bombs, he tucked in his back pocket. He also carried a versatile Swiss Army knife that could prove considerably more facile than the elaborate bomb dismantlement kit he’d been instructed to use. He shoved the bricks of Semtex, an assortment of wires, and ready-made remote-operated blasting caps into a shoulder pack.

Someone pounded at the door.

He slipped on a light jacket to conceal his weapons and approached. He kept a gun in his hand and his finger on the trigger.

“It’s me, Randall.”

Removing the chair, he cracked open the door.

Randall looked at him oddly. Jared let him enter. The overly enthusiastic man wheeled in a tray covered with food and a bottle of Spanish wine.

“Don’t drink,” Jared told him.

Randall shrugged. “It was only a thought. Do you want me to drive?”

“No. If I need you to pilot me home I’ll call the room.”

“And if you don’t call?”

Jared brushed past him. “Then there is no home to return to.”

Taking the stairs to the lobby, Jared waved at the hotel manager before weaving his way through the entranceway and out the revolving doors to the hotel drive. Once outside, he hailed a taxi. He could have driven to the peak himself, but he would achieve greater stealth on foot.

An older model Mercedes-Benz sliced across two lanes of traffic to reach him at the curb.

“
Parque Natural de
Cumbre Vieja, por favor
.”

The darkly tanned driver nodded before swerving back into traffic. As they navigated through a maze of crowded streets, Jared could see the extent of the island’s thriving tourism industry. He couldn’t decide whether to lament or celebrate the influx of people. Typically, more people meant more eyes trained to report something out of the ordinary. However, trained individuals, professional terrorists, and criminals knew to utilize the crowds and unsuspecting masses to their advantage.

The driver cruised along the main strip, following the highway parallel to the beach. At the pier, he turned up a winding rise onto the woodland thoroughfare that would ultimately send them toward the crest of the park.

The scenery changed, the thick, shadowed trees yielding to jagged, mottled protrusions of volcanic rock. They drove onward, half a mile closer to the access tunnel.

Jared had progressed as far as he dared. The headlights from the vehicle would draw notice, and to challenge the winding hillside of the mountain without them would have been impossible. Suggesting such a feat would alert the driver to the abnormality of the situation.

“This is far enough,” he told the driver.

The man met his gaze in the rearview mirror.

Jared handed the man money and exited the car.

The driver did not offer to stick around. He sped back down the mountain.

Jared adhered to the edge of the road, utilizing the scattered brush as camouflage. He kept low to the ground as he crept along the mountainside. He didn’t notice any sign of enemy scouts or monitoring devices. Jared took this observation in stride. He didn’t see any indication of American troops either, but it didn’t mean they weren’t stationed here. Far too much could go wrong to chance half measures. Jared felt confident that counter-teams were in place and could be called upon at a moment’s notice. His life, hell, life for half of North and South America, depended on it.

A barbed wire–topped gate marked the entrance to the tunnel. Miniature bolt cutters, compliments of his bomb dismantlement kit, made quick work of the fence. Snipping through twenty chinks, he peeled up the flap and rolled beneath.

A passing glance assured Jared that he remained alone in the area. A small parking lot to the left of the tunnel contained a Subaru and a late-model Japanese hatchback. A newer hybrid SUV parked beside it. The cars likely belonged to the scientists. At the far end of the open space, Jared noticed a large cargo truck. Glancing around to determine if the cars were somehow monitored, after a minute, he decided they were not. No guards. No security posts on the adjacent hilltops. He didn’t detect any surveillance cameras. Giant floodlights illuminated the yard. Someone, some company or division of the government, should’ve arranged for surveillance cameras. In this day and age, average homeowners could equip their houses with them. Leaving the flank of an unstable stratovolcano with the potential to generate a mega-tsunami unmonitored proved completely unacceptable.

He retrieved the tracking disks from his pack. He shoved the chemically laced magazine of bullets into the Glock strapped to his thigh. Carefully opening the case of disks, he peeled off the adhesive backing of the individual tabs. The tiny units resembled the type of bandage one might use to cover a blister. He stealthily approached the parking lot and crouched between the cars. He applied a disk to each vehicle, and two to the cargo truck. He drew his weapon, positioning his finger on the trigger as he approached the entrance to the tunnel. A large concrete door barred his path.

An electronic key required a code for entry.

Spinning his bag so he could access one of the compartments, Jared yanked on the zipper. He seized a handheld computer. He ripped off the number plate at the tunnel entrance to expose the wires beneath and spliced into the security system. It took him about thirty seconds to hack the mainframe. Like a fixed lottery, the numbers popped onto his screen.

Typing in the code, the massive doors silently parted.

The vaulted tunnel looming ahead of him boasted twenty-foot ceilings and an overall width of at least forty feet. A track of overhead lighting provided light along the length of the tunnel. The two bands of lights dotted the opposite walls of the tube until they appeared to converge in the far distance. The bulbs produced a familiar, incessant humming sound.

Jared activated a personal GPS device, instantly relaying his position to Gordon, who would probably send the information to Randall. That punch of a button on the tiny unit would trigger a call to the Company and all American firepower within the area. They could track his movements now, and if he pressed the yellow button on the gauge, they would know he required immediate assistance.

Jared jogged down the tunnel. The stakes had never been higher. He couldn’t afford a single miscalculation. So much rode on this mission. He
had
to succeed.

Failure equated death…for everyone.

…

“Listen, lady,” a man mumbled from within the hotel suite. “You have the wrong room!”

The alien voice frayed her temper. “I don’t know who the hell you are!” Lana pounded on the door. “But I’m here to see Jared Hawthorne!”

The door cracked open.

Lana noticed two things simultaneously. First, this man bore no resemblance to Jared, and second, he aimed a gun at her head.

“Go away,” he told her.

Lana swallowed hard. She’d been shot. She knew firsthand the pain a bullet inflicted.

“I need to see Jared.”

“He isn’t here.”

Jared had called his mother to check that she had awakened from her “faint.” Bless Annabelle for covering for her. Lana was even more impressed with the woman for ferreting out the hotel and room number from her son. Lana hadn’t counted on dealing with another operative though. And certainly not one who was willing to shoot her.

“I recognize you,” she said carefully. “You’re the pilot. Where is Jared?”

“Out.”

This man could and would shoot. With more bravado than brains, she slowly extended her hand and dared to push the weapon away. He lowered his gun, but it wasn’t much insurance. A flick of his wrist would have her sighted again. As close as they stood within the confines of the narrow hotel corridor, he wouldn’t miss.

“May I?” she asked, stepping over the threshold.

The man made to block her path, then offered a facetious bow. He closed the door behind her.

When she turned back to him, he lifted the gun and trained it on her heart. “You aren’t too smart, lady.”

“If you kill me you’ll seal your own fate. Shouldn’t you at least hear what I have to say before you get trigger-happy?”