Chapter Twelve

How long till Coercion Ten arrived?

The tracking screen in the boat’s main cabin calculated in knots and minutes. Mitch calculated in specifics. Answer— Never, if he had anything to do with it.

He might not have all the specifics on this case, but he’d already figured out this was no ordinary Coercion Ten versus OPAQUE. So far, only Drake held all the answers.

Answers Mitch planned to have soon. Real soon. “Reese, get this boat moving, stat. Buzz our Navy contact for rescue. Tell them we’ll be running south till further notice.”

“Got it.”

“We’ll need a chopper. Two line drops. Two guys to steer the boat in the wrong direction.”

“Got it.” Reese grabbed a couple of guns from a wall rack then pushed past the others and climbed the stairs. The sound of his footsteps had barely hit the wheelhouse deck before the engines kicked into high gear.

Mitch braced his feet wide apart as the boat arced into a turn, heading south. “Liz, finish getting dressed. There are extra shoes in the locker. Find a pair that fits you.”

“I know. Get tie-ons.” Steadying herself against the side of the table, she bumped into his chest.

“You learn fast.”

“Can you give me ten minutes?”

“Ten minutes. No more. Drake still needs to bring us up to speed on this.” He jerked a nod in her direction, and she headed to her stateroom.

She stopped at the doorway then caught his attention as she waved her finger up and down in his direction. “You might want to get dressed, too. Unless you plan to run around in your skivvies all day.”

He glanced down, then rolled his eyes and walked back to his own room. Without thinking, he threw on some clothes, strapped holsters in place on his shoulder and thigh, and stuffed extra clips in his pocket. Shoving the knife and gun into place, he grabbed his other Glock. And a pair of shoes. Tie-ons.

Stepping back into the main cabin, there was no sign of Drake. He’d probably already headed up on deck.

From the hard bump of the hull hitting the water, he had no doubt the boat was running flat-out. Mitch paused at the tracking screen for another check on radar and satellite. Looked like they had a good hour lead time on Coercion Ten’s chase boat and PWCs and were steadily increasing that lead.

“Hurry up, Liz,” Mitch shouted as he headed up the stairs, out of the cabin.

“Don’t rush me. I’ve still got two more minutes.”

If she wasn’t on deck in two, he’d go down and pull her upstairs. The conversation with Drake had to happen, and Mitch wanted her to be part of that talk. Her reaction to whatever the boss said would tell him a lot about how much she’d known all along. Plus, he wasn’t sure if she and Drake had had a chance to talk about paternity.

He found Drake leaning back against the side rail of the boat, staring out at the Gulf. He’d strapped on his gun, too. Hung his binoculars around his neck. And plopped on one of his three favorite baseball caps. Anyone not familiar with him would see a harmless, early-fifties man with tinges of gray streaking his once dark brown hair.

That might be their last mistake. Not only was he six foot with eyes that seemed to stare right through a man, he also worked out every day. He might not be as fast as he used to be, but he’d fight as hard as he had thirty years ago. He’d put you down or die trying.

Since the drone had appeared, Drake had stayed off to the side for the most part, quiet and watching. He might be the Director of OPAQUE, but once the chopper escape became their only option, the control of the assignment had shifted back to Mitch.

“She about ready?” Drake asked.

“Not long,” Mitch replied.

“You got everything you need?”

“Yeah. Except for the answers.” His implication hung in the air.

Drake glanced up at the sky. “Beautiful day. Got a few clouds on the horizon. Might even get a little rain tonight. Maybe a storm.”

Mitch didn’t see any clouds. Neither did Drake. This was just one of his ways of softening what was to come. None of the agents had figured out if the softening was meant for them or for Drake.

The noise from the boat engines notched downward and then finally silenced. The boat slowed, and once it came to a slow float, Reese came down from the wheelhouse. “Chopper should be in the vicinity in less than thirty. Let me know when I should call them in close.”

Reese focused across the deck. A slight widening of his eyes was his only outward sign to whatever had grabbed his attention.

“Good. That should give us enough time to…” Drake stared toward the stairs leading to the boat cabin, his eyebrows pinched together.

Grabbing the gun from his holster, Mitch was ready for whatever waited behind him. He spun around. Straightened his arm. Aimed. Jerked it back down, pointing the gun at the deck. He gulped and swallowed, as his core took in what he was seeing. “Oh, Liz…”

Standing in front of them, Liz looked determined, defiant, and drained. She’d cut her hair finger-length short all over her head. And, it was streaked with what looked like a light desert-sand color.

He walked closer to her and stared. Gone were the straight bangs. The overly neat smoothness. The soft shoulder-length strands he’d wrapped his hand around as he kissed her out on the Q40.

“Back at the beach house, Cat showed me all the ways you can change your appearance. When I told her no one would ever make me cut my hair, she told me hair can grow back. Dead is dead,” Liz said as she gently dabbed the short strands of hair. “I can make this even lighter if I need to.”

“You didn’t have to do this.” He brushed his fingers through her hair.

“Cat’s lying in a hospital because of me. The least I can do is cut my hair,” she said softly. “I had a little trouble with changing the color.”

He glanced at his palm covered in a coating of the light desert-sand color. “Is this camo?”

Nodding, she appeared quite happy with herself. “I was searching for a pair of scissors in the kitchen drawers when I saw the camo face paint. I figured, why not give it a try until I can get to some tinted spray.”

“There’s just one—”

Drake loudly cleared his throat. “You did a good job, Liz. Next time I talk to Cat, I’ll tell her.”

“See? He says I did a good job.” Liz nodded as she took a seat in one of the chairs, then glanced up at Mitch. “You scowl.”

Before long, she’d be the one scowling enough for both of them. Getting camo face paint out of hair was no easy job.

To change her look had taken guts, and that defiant little lift of her chin as they’d all first seen the new her had been powerful. An expression he wouldn’t soon forget.

The one thing he didn’t like was the way she seemed to be inching her way into his psyche. No one had permission to go there. No one.

“I hate to break up this moment”—Reese pointed to his earbud—“but, the chopper’s ETA is now twenty.”

“Got it.” Mitched turned toward Drake. “I want some answers. Now.”

“Bottom line, OPAQUE can’t get a handle on what’s happened to Liz’s dad, Russ,” Drake said. “This isn’t like one of his usual call reports.”

Isn’t like one of his usual call reports? This time was different? Mitch didn’t need a brick upside the head to pick up on the insinuation. “He’s one of ours?”

“Not exactly.” The boss caught each of their gazes with his own then stared at Liz. “About nine years after her family went into WPP, a couple of representatives from Coercion Ten showed up at their front door. Russ fought to keep them outside.”

Liz’s expression paled as she stood up. “Oh, for all that’s holy. That had to be when my mother dragged me through a doorway behind the bathroom linen cabinet. There was a room I’d never seen before. No windows, just a dim light. A couple lawn chairs, a cot, a small table in the corner with an even smaller fridge underneath.”

The look on her face and tone of her voice was all Mitch needed to know for certain she’d had no idea what this case was about. Or anything else that involved OPAQUE or CT all her life.

“My mother locked the door and told me to stay quiet. She was trembling as she sat me at the table and handed me a coloring book and crayons.” Liz’s forehead scrunched into furrows, her lips parted, and she blinked repeatedly, but still tears formed. “I was so afraid. But she wrapped her arms around me and whispered it was only a game. A hide-and-seek game.”

Drake looked at Mitch. “Russ was able to keep them out long enough for Liz and her mother to hide in the safe room I’d helped him design. Just in case.”

Mitch zeroed in on his warning—just in case. Every OPAQUE agent knew the term for safe room and just-in-case situations. Especially the agents who were married. They all had taken that precaution in their homes. Single agents like him usually didn’t bother with that safeguard. He always figured he’d face CT down, be captured, or die at their feet. There’d be no hiding for him.

Reese pointed skyward. “Ten minutes.”

“Needless to say, the two CT operatives shoved their way inside the house and overpowered Russ.” Drake quickened his speech. “They said they knew he was in WPP. That they weren’t there to kill him. And then they told him the job they needed him to do for CT. He said no.”

“My dad wouldn’t help people like that,” Liz raised her voice with her answer.

“No, he wouldn’t usually.” Drake bit his lip. “But all that changed when they pulled him into the bathroom, yanked the cabinet out of the way, and tapped on the locked hidden door.”

Liz sucked in a loud breath as she steadied herself against the railing. Panic seemed to roll across her entire body. “The knock on the door scared me, and before I thought, I yelled out, ‘Dad?’” Liz wiped her cheeks free of her tears. “My mother yanked me against her and clamped her hand over my mouth.”

Mitch reached out to comfort her, but she stop-signed him with her hands. She turned away for a few seconds, and when she turned back, she’d gained some control.

“Russ agreed to work for them. He had no choice. Took him almost a month before he felt it was safe enough to contact me or the WPP,” Drake said. “That’s when I came up with a plan to use his involvement with Coercion Ten to our best advantage. Your dad agreed.”

Liz shook her head. “I’m still confused. You mean to OPAQUE’s advantage.”

“OPAQUE. CIA. FBI. There were a lot of times he worked for all of us.”

Reese stared at the open sky. “I used to be an undercover agent with the CIA. Your dad furnished good intel for us on the front line.”

“You said this time was different. How?” Mitch grabbed a life preserver and headed toward Liz.

Drake shot a look at the notepad-sized tracking screen hanging by the ladder to the wheelhouse. “We’ve always had a system for contact. Re-contact. Code words. And finally, follow-up with direct communication. Since Russ’s first contact this time, nothing else has happened. Either he’s found a hidey-hole—”

“Or they got him?” Liz asked.

Mitch motioned for her to put on the life jacket. “If they captured him, they’d have made contact by now. And, if CT wants her so bad, why didn’t they walk into the Mariner’s and take her before we got there?”

“How would they know I was there?”

“I don’t know. But they were waiting for us.”

Drake’s eyes narrowed. “What are you saying?”

All Mitch had was a gut-ache feeling. The kind he got in dark cover assignments on his own without any backup. The kind that wormed its way into his worst thoughts, and said “Hey, there’s someone worse out there. Something that will kill you if you don’t figure this out.”

The kind that called for out-of-the-box thinking—crazy outside the box.

Willing to put everything on the line, Mitch needed to make sure his reasoning hit the right spots. “Whether CT’s got her dad or not, I don’t think they needed him to do anything. Without even knowing, he completed the job the moment he contacted you and Liz. Has it crossed your mind CT could be simply using her as bait?”

“Bait? What the hell are you talking about?” Drake asked, seeming mildly insulted. “Bait for who?”

“You? Me? OPAQUE? What if they figured out Russ was feeding us info? Decided to use him?” Mitch didn’t much like where his brain was taking this. “Hell, you’ve brought most everyone on the Shades of Leverage team into this mess. What if that’s what they wanted? Take down OPAQUE’s elite team. Think of the hole that would leave.”

He glanced in Reese’s direction and could tell from the expression on his face he was intrigued by the idea. An idea that could provide a lot of answers to this assignment or open a whole different set of what-ifs.

Drake set his jaw, his nostrils flared. “You better be able to back that up.”

“Coercion Ten already knew about Russ and the WPP. Somewhere along the line, they figured out the OPAQUE connection.” Mitch knew once this conversation ended, they all needed to head for safer places. “I figure all their connecting lines on people, places, legal, illegal, they hit upon you and Russ back in college. From there it was an easy—”

“An easy trail to me as head of OPAQUE.” Drake shook his head. “I should have seen this coming.”

Liz reached out and touched Drake on the shoulder. “There’s no possible way you could have known. Besides, you care about my dad and me. You’d do anything to keep us safe.”

“That’s the problem,” Drake said. “Evidently, a lot of people know that.”