Feel the Heat (32 page)

Andy’s voice came through the speaker again. “Sending his picture right now. Andy out.”

Troy looked at the photo as it unrolled on Dan’s tablet screen. It wasn’t so much that the man was ugly as that he had an oily look to him. Dark hair shot with gray framed a face that wore what Troy could only call a smirk. A look that said, “World, go fuck yourself.” The eyes that looked out through rimless glasses seemed to carry the same message.

“Living, breathing evil,” Mark said.

“Okay, everyone.” Dan’s voice cut into the air. “Let’s get our shit together here. Andy included more specific coordinates, so I’m giving the information to Kat to see what she can come up with. We need to study the specs on the crazy-ass security system and figure out which of our toys will work most effectively against it.”

“When we get that together, I’ll wake Ed. We need to do a high-altitude flyover to get visuals on the place before firming things up.” Mark was already scrolling through his tablet again.

“And we have to figure out where the fuck he’s keeping Lauren,” Troy spat out. He rubbed his hands over his face. “God, god, god. How the hell can we find her?”

“Troy.” Mike rose from his chair to face him. “We’ll do it. We always do. It’s
what
we do. Go take a shower and get your shit together. You can fall apart after this is over. Right now, we need you to be at the top of your game.
Lauren
needs that. So go. Shower and change. We’ve got this.”

Troy was torn between hovering and knowing what Dan said made sense.

“And you’ll give the new info to Kat?”

“We may have something by the time you get back down here.”

The shower actually did him more good than he expected. It rinsed away the fatigue and got his blood flowing again, especially after he turned it to ice cold for two minutes. He didn’t bother to shave. Later, when he had Lauren back with him, he’d make himself presentable. For her.

Pulling on jeans and a t-shirt, he headed toward the stairs, bumping into Faith and Mia just coming out of one of the guest rooms. Faith had apparently raided Lauren’s dresser drawers for sleep shirts for them.

“Troy?” Faith touched his arm. “It’s going to be okay. I promise you.”

“I know. I just—I know.” He hurried down the stairs.

Dan was leaning against the counter, studying a sketch when he walked into the kitchen. Kat sat at the table, a glass of orange juice in her hands, fatigue lining her face. But she managed a smile for him.

“I got you a really good image, Troy. The guys said it’s as good as a photo.”

He looked over Dan’s shoulder and had to agree. He knew Kat would have gone through a series of sketches, some of them more symbols than anything else, to finally get to this one. But what they had now was a drawing of a massive house rising in a forest, the hint of landscaping around it sketched in, and the hint of a wall that surrounded the perimeter.

Holy shit!

He could barely wrap his mind around the billions it had cost for a place like this. The Phoenix partners had seen their share of opulence and wealth, but this setup trumped everything else. This would take careful planning and they had a limited amount of time to accomplish that.

“There’s more,” she added. “I also saw a balcony and armed men. Four. Lauren’s on the second floor of the house. The rooms she’s in have that balcony, but I saw armed men on the ground below her. Two, but there may be more.” She let out a deep sigh. “I’d hoped to get you a better visual like I did with the scene in Mexico, but that’s as much as I could pull into my brain.”

Troy hugged her to his side. “Thanks, Kat.” He cleared his throat, rough with emotion. “You don’t know how much I appreciate this. And this is a lot more than we had.”

“We’re all family, right?” she reminded him.

“Yes. And the best family a person could have.” He looked at Dan. “So what’s next?”

“Now we get moving.”

Ed had joined them by then, nodding to Troy as he helped himself to coffee.

“Good day for flying. And for rescuing a beautiful lady.”

“Amen to that.”

In minutes, they were loaded into Dan’s SUV, each man with his own handgun plus extra ammo clips. Everything else they would need was already on the helicopter, locked inside it. No one said a word on the drive. There was nothing left to say. They’d do a recon flyover, land someplace to finalize plans and kick it into gear.

Every muscle in Troy’s body was tense. If this didn’t work—

Don’t even go there.

He had to believe in just a few hours Lauren would be back in his arms. Then he’d keep her there. Forever.

* * * * *

Olberman sat behind his desk, his chair turned so he could enjoy his favorite view of the sweeping lawn and thick forest. He got the same thrill from the evidence of his wealth that others derived from sex. He’d had plenty of women in his life, but none of them satisfied him the way this evidence of his achievement did.

And soon his wealth would grow larger, his influence stronger. Before long, he would be the most powerful man in the world, more than presidents, kings and sheikhs. Because he had the ultimate prize—someone who could cure the incurable. He salivated at the thought of the money that would roll in and the influence he would acquire. There would hardly be anyone in a position of power who would not be indebted to him.

It annoyed him that Lauren Cahill didn’t realize how to make her gift pay off. Or accept the fact that he’d successfully acquired her, and she was now his for as long as he chose. He’d read enough to know that while the rare occasion might occur that her healing gift wouldn’t work, ninety-nine percent of the time it did, as long as she poured her energy into it. Threatening him with anything less than that was not acceptable.

He looked forward to dinner that evening, seeing her at the table with him. He even anticipated sparring with her verbally, as long as she still remembered her place.

Vivian had given him her assessment of the woman and it jibed with his. Tomorrow, when she’d had twenty-four hours to settle in and he’d taken a fuller measure of her, he’d place the call to that island kingdom in the Pacific and move forward with his grand plan.

* * * * *

They flew in from the east, on the chance that anyone might spot them. Whoever it was would have to look directly into the rising sun and that would distort the image long enough for them to be gone. Everyone inside was strapped in, the cabin doors open on both sides, long-range cameras pointed in each direction. Ed flew the helo, Mark and Troy operated the cameras and the others crouched behind them with assault rifles at the ready.

The guns were just in case. They hoped they wouldn’t have to use them. Any kind of gun battle would send a signal to Olberman, who might decide he was better off to kill Lauren and dispose of her body. Then he could just claim a bunch of crazy men tried to shoot up his estate for no reason.

Ed had checked with the locals and knew that the weather helicopter flew over the estate sometimes, also the ones with spotters during forest fire season. So a whirlybird in the air wouldn’t be such an anomaly as to call specific attention to it. Nevertheless, those birds took care of business as quickly as possible and got the hell out of there.

He also apparently knew everyone in the United States who flew anything that could get on the ground. One of his contacts had helped make arrangements for them to set the bird down at a very small private airfield. That’s where they’d analyze the information and finalize their plan.

Through the magnification viewfinder on the camera he was holding, Troy took in every detail of the landscape below him. The house looked almost exactly as Kat had drawn it, an edifice to Olberman’s ego. It sat amid meticulously landscaped grounds, surrounded on all sides by forest. Even the driveway leading up to it cut through pristine forested land, not emerging until it was almost at the house.

He could tell there was a perimeter wall, but Mark would get that, as well as identify any places they could rappel in and ghost their way to the house. They had a great little gizmo that read heat signatures, pinpointing the location of live bodies. But they needed to be on the ground to do that. It wouldn’t work this high up and so far away.

Ed made one careful pass, then zoomed away. Part of the plan depended on not hanging around in the air long enough to arouse anyone’s curiosity. Ten minutes later they were on the ground at a well-designed little airfield. The runway was long enough for an executive jet, which was either in the air or in the hangar sitting off to the side.

As soon as Ed shut down the rotors, a side door in the hangar opened and a short, compact man in jeans and an old flight jacket headed out toward them. Ed exited the bird, jumping down to the ground and held out his hand to the man.

“Ed Romeo,” he introduced himself. “You must be Charlie Wakefield, Hy’s brother.”

The man nodded. “Hy told me not to ask questions and as far as anyone else is concerned, you’ve never been here.”

“You got it. Thanks a lot for letting us use the facility.”

Charlie grinned. “Are you kidding? Just wondering what’s going on makes my day. Come on into the hangar. I’ve got a big table you can use and I put on a fresh pot of coffee.”

“Thanks,” Ed told him. “A lot.”

“I might need you one of these days. Listen, Hy just gave me a sketch of where you’ll be flying. There’s not much traffic in that airspace but just to give you some camouflage, a few of my buddies are doing some flight time in their choppers for the next couple of hours. You can get lost in them.”

“I owe you big. You can collect any time.”

“I’m gonna take a short run to my house for a while. Let me give you my cell number. You can call me when you get ready to leave, so I can come back and lock up.”

“That’s a pretty tight fraternity you belong to,” Dan said as they all walked toward the hangar.

“We all run into dicey situations now and then. We’ve learned to rely on each other.”

“Please thank him for us.” He opened the door to the hangar. “Okay, everyone. Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty.”

They spent the better part of an hour going over every detail and reviewing the video from the cameras.

“Whatever electronic security they’ve got, we can put it out of commission,” Mike said. “You know that to get from point to point, base to site, all systems have to work on radio waves. Something as high-end as this system is bound to be is usually impervious to interference. But…”

“Yeah, but,” Rick grinned. “I’m real glad we did that favor for that engineer. He says the baby we’ve got now will jam every possible signal set to transmit to the base inside the house.”

Troy reran the video to a spot he wanted, then slowed it down to frame by frame.

“Here’s the best spot for us to make our landing. For one thing, there’s a small natural clearing here, so Ed can get down low enough for us to exit the bird. For another, it’s far enough away from the house that we won’t be seen. And Ed’s friend promised us enough cover with some choppers doing some recreational hours, so we won’t stick out like a sore thumb.”

“Just to refresh everyone’s memory,” Dan picked up, “the moment Ed gets us low enough, we’ll turn on the jammer. Once we’re on the ground, I’ll carry it in my pack and keep it on.”

“Mike and I will carry the readers for heat signatures,” Rick added, “and be able to pinpoint where the bodies are. Everyone knows what to do after that.” He turned to Troy. “We’re going to locate exactly where Lauren is. When we do, we put the rest of the plan into action and go in and get her. You’ll hold it together, right?”

As best I can.

“No worries. I know what to do.”

“Okay then.” Mike turned to his brother. “Ed, call your friend and tell him thanks for the hospitality. Everyone else, let’s get our firepower and the C-4 and test our mics. Come on, guys. Let’s roll.”

* * * * *

Olberman disconnected his call and took out one of his ever-present cigars, clipped the end and rolled it in his fingers. The conversation with the island’s ruler had gone extremely well. The man had not quibbled about the price.

“Twelve million is little enough to pay for someone who can save my son’s life,” he told Olberman.

“I’ll call you back to arrange a definite arrival time. I’ll check flying time with my pilot, but it will be sometime tomorrow.”

“Excellent. I’ll eagerly await your call.”

Now Olberman swiveled to look through the window at his favorite vista. As he did so, something in the sky caught his eye. A tiny black dot, moving swiftly from east to west. Picking up the handheld he used to communicate with his security personnel, he punched a button. He wished Reid was here to oversee things for the moment but he’d had another major assignment for him. But Greg Deluca was almost as good.

“Yes, Mr. Olberman?” Deluca answered.

“What’s that speck I caught sight of in the sky? Anything I should worry about?”

“No sir. I spotted it too and called the local tower. There’s some kind of club for chopper pilots out of Grand Junction. They requested permission to get some practice hours in today and the air controller gave it to them. That was probably one of them flying into the field where they gather.”

“I don’t like it,” Olberman growled.

“Not much we can do about it, boss. They won’t classify us as restricted airspace without a damn good reason.”

“I need to put some pressure on some of those senators whose campaigns I fund.” He sighed. “All right. Just keep an eye out for things and let me know when they’re done cluttering up my sky.”

Setting the little communicator on his desk, he pressed the intercom button to summon Vivian.

She knocked briefly and entered. “You need me for something?”

“Just checking on how our house guest is doing.”

Vivian’s lips twisted in a gesture of distaste. “The kitchen said she ate part of her breakfast. She’s a snippy little thing, isn’t she?”

Olberman smiled. “I like people with spirit.” The smile disappeared. “As long as she’s compliant and goes along with the program.”