Chương 14
“You also sold extraction routes.”
“To maintain access.”
“You abandoned teams.”
“To protect larger operations.”
“You certified living people dead.”
“To prevent retaliation.”
“Against whom?”
He did not answer.
Harper looked at her own false death certificate.
“Against you,” she said.
Transmission: eighty-five percent.
Sloane disconnected.
Hollis was already on the secure phone with the tactical commander. The live feed provided a layout, guard positions, and confirmation of a hostage. State officers and federal agents were converging on the compound, but Sloane would not wait.
Onscreen, guards moved toward the loading vehicles.
Thomas was pulled to his feet.
“They’re leaving,” Maddox said.
Harper studied the compound map.
One SUV headed toward the front gate. A second moved to a rear loading bay facing the river.
“Diversion,” she said. “He’ll use the river.”
Hollis relayed it.
The tactical commander reported no marine unit in position. The nearest patrol boat was twenty minutes away.
Transmission: ninety-one percent.
Harper looked toward the dark water below the property.
The collapsed dock remained, but a narrow aluminum skiff was tied beneath the reeds.
Thomas had prepared more than a server.
“He knew,” Harper said.
Maddox followed her gaze. “Knew what?”
“That they’d take him to the river.”
Hollis ended his call. “The assault team is five minutes out.”
“Sloane leaves in two.”
“You are not taking that boat.”
Harper descended the ladder from the trailer.
Maddox followed.
Hollis followed both of them, swearing with each step.
The skiff had a small outboard motor, fuel, navigation lights, and three flotation vests. Thomas had taped a laminated river map beneath the center seat.
Harper untied the rope.
Hollis caught the bow line.
“I cannot authorize this.”
“Then don’t.”
“I can arrest you.”
“After.”
“This isn’t a movie, Ms. Reed.”
“No.”
She looked toward the compound’s lights upriver.
“That’s why five minutes matters.”
Maddox climbed into the skiff.
Hollis stared at him. “You have no jurisdiction, no equipment, and no weapon.”
“I have a life jacket.”
“This is not helping.”
The trailer laptop chimed.
Transmission complete.
Copies of the archive had left Thomas’s server. Sloane could no longer erase the whole record by destroying one machine or killing one witness.
The central leverage had changed.
Harper looked at Hollis.
“He doesn’t need Dad alive now.”
Hollis released the rope.
“I’m coming.”
The skiff’s motor coughed twice before starting. Harper guided it into the current without lights. Maddox sat in the bow, watching for debris. Hollis used his phone to update the tactical team, though the signal cut in and out beneath the trees.
The river smelled of mud and decaying leaves. Rain dimpled its surface.
For several minutes, nobody spoke.
Then Maddox said, “My wife’s going to kill me.”
Hollis looked up from the phone. “Get in line.”
Harper kept her hand steady on the tiller.
The compound appeared beyond a bend, a long industrial building surrounded by chain-link fencing. White lights washed the loading yard.
A black rigid-hull boat waited at the rear dock.
Two guards brought Thomas from the building.
Sloane followed with the pistol close to Thomas’s back.
Harper cut the motor.
The skiff drifted into reeds forty yards downstream.
Hollis whispered, “Tactical team is entering the front gate now.”
A distant explosive charge sounded.
The compound’s front doors burst inward.
The guards at the dock turned.
Sloane shoved Thomas toward the boat.
Harper entered the water.
It rose to her waist, cold enough to seize her breath. She moved along the reeds, using the dock pilings for cover.
Maddox followed before Hollis could stop him.
The first guard climbed into the rigid-hull boat and started its engine.
The second faced the building, rifle raised.
Harper reached the dock ladder.
Thomas saw her.
His expression did not change, but he shifted his weight and stumbled against Sloane.
The pistol moved away from Harper’s direction.
She came over the dock edge.
The rifleman turned.
Maddox struck him from the side with a loose dock board. The guard fell against a cleat, and the rifle discharged into the water.
Sloane fired.
The shot hit the dock beside Harper’s hand.
Thomas drove his shoulder backward into Sloane’s chest.
The second shot went upward.
Harper crossed the distance before Sloane recovered. She caught his gun wrist with both hands, turned it away from Thomas, and forced it against the dock railing.
Sloane was stronger than he had been nine years earlier and less controlled than he believed. He struck her face with his left hand. Light flashed across her vision.
She did not let go.
He twisted, trying to bring the pistol between them.
“You have no idea what you released,” he said.
Harper drove her knee into the outside of his thigh.
His leg buckled.
“You keep saying that,” she replied.
He hit her again.
Behind them, Hollis ordered the boat operator to show his hands. Maddox wrestled the rifleman away from the weapon.
Thomas had fallen beside the dock ladder. Blood ran from his temple, but he was conscious.
Sloane tried to pull Harper toward the edge.
She let him.
His balance shifted.
At the last moment, she released his wrist and stepped aside.
He went over the railing into the river.
The pistol fell onto the dock.
Sloane surfaced, gasping.
Harper kicked the weapon away.
Hollis aimed down at him. “Hands where I can see them.”
Sloane looked toward the dark opposite bank.
For one second, Harper thought he might swim.
Then tactical officers flooded the dock from the loading yard, rifles trained on him from three directions.
Sloane raised his hands.
It ended without a speech.
That surprised Harper more than it should have.
She knelt beside Thomas.
He looked at the bruise forming along her cheek.
“You look terrible,” he said.
“Nora said the same thing.”
His eyes closed briefly. “She’s alive?”
“Yes.”
“Mercer?”
“Yes.”
Thomas breathed out.
Harper examined the blood at his temple. “Can you move your legs?”
“I’m seventy-one, not furniture.”
“Move them.”
He did.
May you like
“Hands?”
He lifted both, then winced.
