Every nerve in Karla’s body was charged as she unslung her HK. Her senses had cleared, the steady beat of her heart rhythmic. Years of training took over, her brain calmly processing the sights, sounds, and smells.
Opening the door a crack, she used a mirror to check the hallway. Seeing no one, she led the way out of the supply closet where a terrified and stunned janitor now lay bound and gagged. Savage close behind, Karla started for the stairs.
A muffled scream stopped her short. Savage, cowed after having knocked the brooms over, froze behind her.
“Where?” he signed, fingers asking the question.
She cocked her head, easing forward on cat feet. The soles of her tactical boots gave off a squishy sound.
Another faint cry led her to a heavy security door. Placing an ear to it she thought she heard someone crying. The lock had a security card reader. As good a time as any to test hers. She ran the duplicate ET had made of Bill Minor’s. The lock clicked softly.
Making eye contact with Savage, she nodded, braced the submachine gun on its sling, and slowly turned the handle. Easing it open a crack, she heard a wavering voice whispering in Arabic, “Fadlak. Fadlak. Mish fahim.”
Please, please, I don’t understand.
Karla blocked the door with her foot, extending the mirror to see the backs of two men, a third bending over a sweating, naked man bound in a chair.
She gave the ready sign to Savage, eased the door open, and stepped in. She hammered the first victim on the back of the neck with her heavy HK, spun, and kicked a leg out from under the second. As he collapsed, her rising knee caught him under the chin, snapping his jaws together and knocking his head back. Even before he hit the floor, the third man was rising from where he’d obscured a second figure bound to a chair.
Karla recognized the guard who’d stood outside Gray’s door, the one who’d smirked as she and Winny had departed Bill Minor’s hotel room. Even as he reached for his throat mic and said, “Bill, I think we have a code . . .” she snap-kicked him in the face.
The man slammed backward into a metal shelf, his head impacting with a mushy sound.
Savage hadn’t even managed to close the door: he stared incredulously at her. Then he turned to the two limp men sagging in the chairs. “Holy shit,” he murmured and made a face at the vile smell of feces and urine.
Karla shifted the HK before she reached down and unhooked the electrical wires running from a battery charger. Then she removed the clips attached to the Egyptian’s nipples and genitals. The man blinked at her through glazed eyes.
“Chief Raven?” the second rasped incredulously.
It took her a moment to recognize the individual seated in his own filth. “You do manage to get into the worst messes, Dr. Farmer.”
“Kilgore?” he asked weakly. “Safe?”
“As far as I know.” She flipped out her knife, cutting the nylon bindings that tied him to the chair. “What did they want?”
“How to find Kilgore.”
“How long ago did you tell them?”
“Didn’t.” He sagged as she and Savage lifted him from the chair. Farmer grinned at her in weary triumph. “I told myself that if Chief Raven could take it, I could. All that matters is Kilgore. I love that woman. Would die for her.”
Her quick fingers took his pulse. Then she checked his eyes, shining her flashlight to see the pupils dilate. “Hell, Doc, I’d have broke the moment they tied me in the chair.”
He laughed hoarsely.
Savage was seeing to the Egyptian.
“You got a can of Red Bull?” Farmer asked. “Anything to give a guy a boost?”
From a pocket she produced a small white pill and popped it into his mouth. “We call it a ‘go’ pill. You don’t want to know what’s in it. Chew it up. It tastes so vile you can’t help but make saliva to swallow it.”
Farmer chewed, made a face. “God, that’s worse than the electrical shock.”
She slapped him on the shoulder and stood, taking in the room. Metal shelves on both sides were lined with batteries, chargers, “hot shots” for use on cattle, soldering irons, an electrical hot plate attached to a handle, an apron holding dental tools, and a couple of bundles of clothing that she took to be Farmer’s and the Egyptian’s. Coiled in the back was a short garden hose attached to a faucet, obviously for clean up afterward.
“Stand up, Reid,” she told him. “Let’s get you dressed.”
Tears beaded in his eyes as he pleaded, “But I’ve got crap and piss—”
“Ignore it. Snipers do.”
Reid Farmer was shivering as he used a filthy towel to wipe at himself, then climbed slowly, painfully into his clothes. Meanwhile, Savage told the Egyptian, “Ana asif.” I’m so sorry.
Karla asked Farmer. “How you doing?”
“Better,” the archaeologist said through gritted teeth. “Are you my rescue again?”
“Nope. We’re here to take out the machine before Gray can use it. We just stumbled on you by accident. Give us fifteen minutes. Then you take the stairs to the roof. Wait at the door until you hear—”
“Bullshit. I’m going with you.”
“You can hardly stand.”
He reached out, saying, “Chief Raven, I owe them. I’ll do anything you tell me to. Anything. As long as I can pay these bastards back.”
At that moment, someone slipped a pass card through the door, the lock clicking.
“Rock and roll,” Karla whispered, turning, and before Savage or Farmer could react, she’d grabbed the door and jerked it open.