Travis Justice (17 page)

Kai's anger slipped behind a charming smile that didn't move anyone, including Takeo. “She lied to me, Takeo. And two of my men are missing.”

The ugly silence was more resounding than the former argument.

O
utside, Zach unsnapped the Velcro pocket where he kept his badge. “Look, I didn't set this agenda. Dad, you know I never wanted to be a Ranger. I did it to keep you safe. I know we're a few days early. I know we haven't had time to properly plan. But a lot of our usual raid protocols won't work anyway, because this Kai SOB obviously has backup to his backup. But if we can catch them now, when they're not prepared, we'll have plenty of evidence and finally they'll be neutralized.” He punctuated his plea by offering his badge to his father.

John glared and ignored the gesture. “You can't quit now. Especially because of a—a—”

“Female? Woman? Inappropriate match for the scion of the Travis family?” Zach stepped up to his father and put his badge in his dad's jacket pocket. “I think your best term for her is
ninja chick
. They all fit, but they don't go deep enough.” He stepped back again. “But now's not the time for this.” With a reckless grin reminiscent of Hana's, Zach looked at Ross and the seven troopers around him. “So, you with me, or agin' me?”

In unison, all eight men, Ross included, looked at John Travis.

Blowing a bitter breath between his teeth, he nodded. He used his radio. “All available units, converge on . . .” and he gave the GPS coordinates. “When you arrive, if I'm not here, wait for instructions from Captain Ross Sinclair.” He clicked off and looked at his men. “Okay, we have all of about fifteen minutes to plan our op before reinforcements arrive. First, weapons assessment.”

While the troopers checked their weapons and extra ammunition, he looked at his son. “Do you know where the main power line comes in? At least we can force him to his first backup and perhaps get past the fence before he can rearm it.”

Ross looked around. “And how do we know they're not watching us right this minute? I see a helluva lot of surveillance equipment.”

Zach responded, “We're in a black zone; that's why I chose this post. My guys took the closest camera back to the lab. But Kai knows we're here because of his missing men. All the more reason to act fast.”

Per his father's instruction, Zach led John to the transformer he'd found on a corner post. While they were apart from the others and out of earshot, John held out Zach's badge. When Zach hesitated, John said evenly, “Resignation declined. No badge, you're a private citizen. Then I can't allow you to be involved. Your choice.”

Zach stuck the badge back in his pocket. Using a metal spike he'd found, he finished the digging he'd started earlier, revealing a large, buried cable.

Inside the house, Kai broke the silence by the simple means of snatching Takeo from his mother's arms. For a moment Hana resisted, but rather than have Takeo be hurt in a tug-of-war, she was forced to let Kai take him.

Takeo cried, but Kai merely looked at the three men he'd summoned by radio and said, “Guard them.” He carried Takeo back to his room, set him down inside it, ignoring his son's pleas to stay with his mother. One of his guards went into the room at Kai's gesture.

“Protect him with your life, but don't let him leave with anyone but me. You know where the hatch is.” Kai locked them in with a key he took from his pocket.

Hatch? Ernie and Hana exchanged a quick glance.

Kai was back in command again. “Nothing on any of the cameras?”

The man shook his head. “Control says a motion sensor was tripped, but the camera in that section has blown.”

“Check it manually,” Kai ordered. “And send the drone with night-vision equipment to that segment so we have fresh eyes. And bring me the UV flashlight.”

Hana and Ernie were both mystified at this last order, but the lieutenant soon appeared again with a heavy UV flashlight. He handed it to Kai.

Then Kai tilted his head to the side and eyed Ernie, up and down, and back again. “I still think it odd that such a gifted athlete could wound himself so clumsily,” Kai said softly. At his look, the lieutenant caught Ernie's unwounded arm, shoved back Ernie's sleeve, and held his hand palm up.

Every muscle in Hana's body went rigid as Kai flicked on the flashlight. Bright half moons appeared on the fingertips of Ernie's right hand. Kai clicked off the flashlight, hefted it in his hand, and without changing tone or expression, clubbed Ernie on the side of the head.

Ernie didn't have to pretend to stagger this time, but he straightened quickly. When he looked back at Kai with a rueful smile, he had a bump and a growing bruise on his cheekbone.

* * *

Since they didn't have time to task a satellite or drone to get up-to-date imagery, John Travis was relegated to using Google Earth to try to get their bearings on where best to station his forces to maximize their attack and cut off potential retreat. They were all gathered around his laptop, which he'd set up on a tree stump, viewing the house's metal roof from above, when they heard a slight buzzing. Several of the troopers looked puzzled, but Zach knew instantly what it was. They'd used many of them in his special-ops missions.

Grabbing a machine pistol from a surprised trooper, Zach waited until the drone cleared the trees and sprayed it with gunfire. He missed because it zipped sideways. The red eye beamed down on them intrusively.

* * *

Inside the house, Kai appeared genuinely disappointed this time as he looked at his old sensei. “Just a little precaution of mine. I routinely have the inside control-room keypad dusted with an invisible power that only shows up under UV light. It clings to everything.” He lifted the flashlight again like a club, but Hana caught his arm.

“Please. Don't. He only came here to protect Takeo. You'd fault him for that?”

“My son needs no protection from me, only his lunatic mother.” Kai tossed the flashlight back to one of his men and gathered control around himself again as he tightened the black belt that held his
tanto
. He wore his night garb, as if expecting trouble.

Then he bit off, “We'll settle this later. What I have in mind will take too much time.” Kai shoved Hana between the shoulder blades. “Move. You know the way. Down to the basement.”

“But Takeo . . .” Hana protested.

“He'll be fine. One of my men is watching out for him.” Kai shoved her harder, so hard she stumbled. “You? Not so much.”

She glared at him. “If you'd let me go, they wouldn't have acted. I only wanted to set up our exchange—”

“You have. I like this better anyway. I'd rather take it from them than you. Let's see how much your rich pretty boy loves you. You for the sword. I'm itching to try out the katana on a real body, anyway. I've seen him. Six feet plus. He'll make a great target.”

Hana's heart flip-flopped as her worst fears seemed to be coming true. She knew what Kai was doing. If the sword was delivered while she was in custody, he'd have no reason to let Takeo go . . . and he wanted to kill Zach as gruesomely as he had the Taylors.

“But they don't know where I hid it . . .” was the only protest she could think of.

“I'll let you use your phone for one text. Easy.”

After that, she couldn't think of any more excuses or delaying tactics.

Opening the heavy metal door leading below, Kai jerked his head at Ernie to follow. With a worried glance at Takeo's door, Ernie obeyed, the lump on his cheek beginning to turn blue.

Hana's hands were clenched so hard her knuckles were white as she listened to her son's crying, but then they were climbing down the circular metal stairs into darkness lit only by dim fluorescents, The slam of the heavy metal door muffled all sound from above. Kai heaved a very heavy metal slide over the door. It would take a battering ram to break it, Hana reflected grimly. And so far as she knew, this was the only way into the cavern.

Then she remembered: What had Kai meant when he mentioned a hatch?

* * *

Zach's second burst of fire smashed the drone into smithereens. Grimly, he handed the machine pistol back. “So much for the element of surprise. I'm sure they got a good view.”

Ross smiled. “Yeah, of ten men.”

As he spoke, an armored van pulled up. Heavily fortified officers, some from the Ranger reconnaissance team, others wearing Travis County Sheriff's Department uniforms, spilled from the side door.

Ross smiled more widely, his white teeth gleaming as the earliest shimmers of dawn illuminated the horizon. “Make that thirty.”

The entire team gathered around as the hasty plan Zach, Ross, and John had hashed out a few minutes prior was relayed. As directed, the first order of the day was simple: Get rid of the surveillance as much as possible. Several men went in opposite directions around the fencing, systematically shooting out every camera they spotted.

* * *

Down below in the cavern, Kai had a wireless receiver attached to his head as he bent over a laptop one of his tech guys had open on a folding table. For now, he ignored Hana and Ernie, but since AK-47s were pressed against their backs as they were marched down the corridor by two different gang members, they could only obey orders. As instructed, they climbed into the martial-arts ring.

Hana strained to hear Kai's muttered imprecations as she passed and she caught the technician saying, “Every one of them. Out. The drone too. We're blind.”

Then she was past them and could hear no more. The entire cavern bustled with activity. Boxes and equipment were being ferried out of the chemical room down a long dark corridor. The workers inside followed close behind.

Black bags went onto carts from another alcove, but this one had a heavy vaulted door. They too were wheeled down the same corridor.

Kai 's stash of cash?
Hana wondered.

That's all Hana had time to see before she and Ernie were handcuffed, back-to-back, and shoved down in the center of the martial-arts ring. Lights illuminated them from every corner, leaving shadows on the edges of the cavern, where Kai's men lurked. Hana knew why they were put on such public display: They were staked out like bait to draw a tiger. Anyone coming into the cavern from any angle would see them first.

Inside the martial-arts ring, while Kai was conferring, Hana muttered to Ernie, “Okay, ragin' Cajun, what now?”

“Kiddo, I'm fresh out of ideas. Unless you have a knife they missed or something, and even then we might as well be on Broadway with all these lights.”

Hana whispered, “Just in case, I brought a pick with me. They didn't find it because it's in the sole of my boot. Like you taught me, teach.”

“Be sure you send your brilliant teacher a shiny, gorgeous apple when we get out of here.”

“OK, new MacBook Pro my treat, but we have to take Takeo with us.”

“Deal,” Ernie shot back.

“Problem is, with my hands behind me I can't reach it. If I can turn sideways a bit, do you think you can reach my boot? The heel snaps off.”

Ernie glanced into the shadows. “Sure. But they'll see.”

Indeed, Hana's skin crawled from the feel of the scopes sighted on them from so many different quarters. She gnawed so hard at her lip that she drew blood. For the first time, she wished she'd taken a moment to confer with Zach about what she was doing. She'd confirmed Takeo was okay, and whether Zach realized it or not, she'd also tried to abort the very raid that was about to happen because she feared what Kai would do to him. But at what cost? Ernie would have been discovered eventually anyway, but Kai had been better organized than she'd expected.

If the Rangers didn't come soon, there wouldn't be any evidence left.

Even worse, Hana suspected the minute Kai heard any sounds of a raid, she and Ernie were dead.

* * *

Outside, each man had an assigned task. They'd come fully armed, including a cutting torch. The man who wielded it was standing over the exposed main power line while Zach assisted. His phone rang when they were about to cut the main power line. He almost jumped out of his skin because he'd turned off every call but Hana's.

John, standing next to him, saw his reaction and raised his hand to indicate a halt. The man with the torch shut it off. Every tense eye fixated on Zach's face, dimly lit in the growing dawn.

“Hana. Why the—” Zach choked back his question, his expression going cold and fixed. “How nice to chat with you too, Kai. Why don't you simplify things and put out the welcome mat? We won't stay . . . long.” Zach put his phone on speaker so they could all hear.

On the other end, Kai's very slightly accented voice said, “I usually don't invite breakfast guests who have armored trucks and automatic weapons . . . but in your case I might make an exception. Still, twenty to thirty men are a lot to feed.”

John and Ross exchanged a grim look. So much for the element of surprise.

Kai continued as casually as if he really were inviting them to breakfast. “Just know the price of entry: If you force your way in, Hana and Ernie will be the first casualties. Bring me the sword, Zachary, and I'll let you, and you alone, in.”
Click
.

Zach's gaze was unfocused with rage when he rammed the phone back in his pocket.

John asked, “Did Hana tell you where she left the blade?”

Zach was shaking his head when, a minute or so later, a text buzzed in his phone. He pulled it out and read the message aloud: “Hana's phone again. She says:
katana in Ernie's secret safe room at his place, a false panel in his living room bookcase opens
.” He read off the combination. “That's it.”

Zach sliced his finger across the phone as if he wished it were Kai's throat, shutting off the text. “If we delay long enough to get the sword, he'll be long gone,” he said grimly.