18. Phae
Phae
“H as Marc lost his everlovin’ mind?”
To my right, Jez’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “We flew halfway around the world to rescue your boyfriend, and he wants to stay kidnapped. You couldn’t make this up.”
“He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Whatever you say.”
“In fact, I’m tempted to murder him at the moment. What the hell is he thinking?”
“Guess those tarsiers made a big impression.”
“Ugh.”
I wanted to toss my kit into the tangle of vines, scrub the camo paint off my face, and walk to the airport. Okay, hitchhike. But instead, I had to watch from a hillside two hundred yards away as Heath got in close to assess the situation.
And the situation was fucked.
Emmy spoke from my left. “Well, this is a fun trip to Stockholm syndrome.”
“Shut up. And think of Serena—she clearly wants out of there.”
Although I could still hear her faintly over the airwaves, reminding a literal kidnapper that ninety percent of men were lying snakes, and they shouldn’t let Lonnie McDonald wriggle out of his promise. She thanked KD politely for bringing water. And she didn’t exactly sound distressed.
“Eh, she’s right about Lonnie. He’d backtrack in a hot second if we didn’t have him by the short and curlies.”
“Not that short,” Jez said. She’d seen the video and obviously found this little trip amusing. “He could use some manscaping down there.”
“Very true. So, are we rescuing them? Once Priest and Mimi get here, that would put us six on six, worst-case scenario, assuming the hostages don’t take up arms against us. Does Marc know how to fire a gun?”
When we were kids, he used to go hunting with Booker and me, although as we’d gotten older, he’d grown to hate the killing part.
Sure, he still plinked away at targets in the yard with Huck, so Kitty told me, but only with an air gun because Huck didn’t like loud noises.
As for me, I still hunted for sport, but now my targets had two legs rather than four.
“Yeah, and he’s a good shot.”
“Super. Mimi, what’s your ETA?” Emmy asked via her satellite comms unit.
“Thirty minutes.”
She’d said that forty-five minutes ago. Then she and Priest had to take a detour because part of the road had gotten washed away in a storm, and now they were stuck in traffic along with everyone else taking the same diversion.
“Can you turn around and try a different route?”
“We already did that. A truck tipped over trying to avoid a cow and blocked the road.”
A cow.
A fuckin’ cow.
We could call for a helicopter, but then we’d get Kopassus in a two-for-one deal, and nobody wanted to do that yet, not when Marc and Serena clearly weren’t in imminent danger.
Emmy claimed Sinaga’s squad was competent, but we had less confidence in his boss.
Recent bad press meant the brass needed a good-news story, and nobody wanted this to end in a blaze of glory when we had a chance of resolving the issue quietly.
“Fingers crossed for third-time lucky,” Emmy said. “Any chance you could pick up a pair of bolt cutters on the way?”
“Where? There aren’t exactly many hardware stores around here.”
Down in the clearing, Marc turned the page, then glanced toward Heath.
Nothing moved but the leaves on the trees and the occasional bird.
We were in a holding pattern, and I hated it.
I mean, things could have been worse—I could have been Heath in a jungle-style ghillie suit—but now I had nothing to do but play voyeur through the scope on my takedown rifle and think over my past mistakes.
I squinted again at the chain around Marc’s ankle. “The padlock isn’t anything special.”
“How fast could you pick it?”
“One minute for the padlock, another ten for the interrogation about what the hell I was doing there.”
Jez snorted. “Only ten?”
“Shut up.”
“Can you pick a lock?” Emmy asked her.
“Why is that even a question?”
“Okay, so we have three people who can pick locks and didn’t manage to sleep with a hostage, but Heath’s a little slower at it than I am.
” She said it matter-of-factly, no insult intended.
Not to Heath, anyway. “And we’ll need to create a distraction, preferably one that doesn’t risk starting World War III. ”
“So that means breach charges are out?” Jez joked, even though nothing about this was funny.
“We could just drive in through the old front gate.”
“Ha-ha.”
“No, I’m actually serious.”
“No, you’re actually crazy.”
“Think about it—the place is a rental. If we show up with a suitcase and say ‘oh gee, there must have been a mix-up with the booking,’ I don’t think they’ll shoot us.
I mean, Marc’s over there catching some rays with a novel, and he’s a fucking hostage.
They shot blanks on Malati. These people are a bunch of chancers who got lucky, not hardened criminals. ”
“So we get in close, check out the weapons sitch, and then incapacitate them?”
“I have plenty of zip ties. C’mon, there are three and a half of us, and if we can’t outwit half a dozen climate activists, we should all quit our jobs.”
“We don’t know where the weapons are,” I tried.
“Kamryn wasn’t carrying,” Jez pointed out.
The girl who’d run over to talk with Marc was Kamryn Delacort. Echo had begun ferreting out the goods on her the moment we left the Hotel Metrolux, and she went by KD online.
Emmy scoffed. “And what do we have? Water pistols?”
“We’d rather avoid shots being fired.”
What if a stray bullet hit Marc? Or Serena?
“I’m not suggesting we go in all guns blazing. I’m saying that these people won’t shoot us on sight if they don’t think we’re a threat, and we can make a better assessment of the situation if we’re in the middle of it.”
“What if Serena flips out and begs you for rescue?”
“She won’t, not with Heath there,” Emmy said. “As far as she’s concerned, her brother’s come to save the day, and she won’t risk jeopardising that. She trusts him far more than two idiot tourists. Same for Marc.”
“Will Marc recognise you?” I asked her.
“I doubt it. He’s only ever seen me in formalwear, and he was mostly looking at my boobs.”
And…I was back to wanting to punch her.
“Well, I’m not going down there.”
“I’ll go. Jezebel can be my backup.”
“I’m not gonna be your backup,” Jez bitched. “You can be my backup.”
“So you admit my plan’s reasonable, then?”
Oh, she’d walked right into that one.
“Heath, what do you think?” Jez asked. “Click once for go, twice for ‘my boss is batshit crazy.’”
Click.
I waited for the second click , but it didn’t come.
Fuck.
A pinprick of pain, and I slapped at another creature on my arm. Marc was probably getting bitten to death too, and I knew from personal experience that the bug spray wouldn’t help. What if he caught malaria? No pill was one hundred percent effective, and?—
Jez and Emmy were both looking at me.
“Okay, fine. I’ll take the overwatch.”
* * *
This was why units like the Choir and Emmy’s Special Projects team existed. The regular military couldn’t do what we did. We were agile, unconventional, and willing to take calculated risks.
Emmy and Jez had returned for one of the rental jeeps, changed out of their custom camo into civilian clothes—shorts and a loose T-shirt for Emmy, wide-legged pants and a tank top for Jez—and now they were trundling slowly along the driveway toward the clearing.
I’d burrowed deep into the undergrowth, only the muzzle of my rifle visible as I surveyed their progress through my scope.
Priest and Mimi’s ETA?
Thirty fucking minutes.
Echo had booked the stilt house on Couch2Castle for the same date as today—November tenth—but for next year.
Then she’d doctored the confirmation email by altering the date and forwarded it to Jez and Emmy.
We knew the procedure—the landlord or their representative was supposed to meet us there with the key on check-in day, and if we wanted the optional maid service, that cost extra.
We’d skipped it, just as the hostiles would have done.
The jeep stopped.
Jez climbed out of the driver’s seat and stretched her arms over her head, working the kinks out of her back. Emmy followed suit with a pair of oversized sunglasses covering most of her face.
Logically, I knew this plan should work.
The evidence—and Marc himself—suggested Wild Roots weren’t a bunch of bloodthirsty paramilitaries.
Containing them should be well within Emmy and Jez’s capabilities.
Jez had once taken on an armed gang barefoot in a bikini, and rumour said Emmy destroyed an entire Syrian army base on what should have been a suicide mission. This was a cakewalk.
So why did I feel especially antsy?
Why couldn’t I shake that niggling fear that something was wrong?
Marc.
It had to be because of Marc.
“Wow, it’s real basic.” Now Emmy’s accent was Californian, her pitch an octave higher than usual. “You sure this is the right place?”
“Satnav says it is.”
“Well, damn. I told you we should have gone for the one with the pool.”
“We blew the budget in Thailand, remember?”
Emmy let fly with a high-pitched giggle as the door to the stilt house opened.
“But we had fun, right?”
While we were prepping, KD had returned to Marc twice, once with the bug spray and a second time with the water. Now she emerged again, this time on the heels of an older man. Frank?
We had a likely ID for him too—Frank Mastrado, forty-seven years old from Norfolk, England. He’d lost a lot of weight since he quit working for Big Oil and switched sides.
“Who are you?” he demanded as Emmy put her hands on her hips and looked around with disdain.
“Uh, your new guests?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You’re here to meet us with the key, right?”
“No, we’re not.”
“But the booking confirmation said?—”
“We have the place this week.”
Jez took a step toward the smaller building. “Oh, maybe we’re in one of the others.”
Marc and Serena didn’t move. Heath had very quietly told them not to, and they took the hint.
“No!” Frank blocked Jez’s way. “This is one property, and we booked the whole of it.”
“Then how did— Oh hell, we got scammed?”
“Or do we have the wrong place?” Emmy raised her eyes to the heavens. “Please, say we have the wrong place.”
“You have the wrong place,” KD told her.
“No, we don’t.” Jez let annoyance creep into her tone. “We used satnav, and the pictures match the website.”
Frank tried to smooth things over. “I’m sure there’s been a misunderstanding. Perhaps a technical glitch?”
“If there has, we’d better not get charged for this.”
Emmy began thumbing through her phone. “We have a booking confirmation; see? Today is November tenth.”
“There has to be some mis—” Frank peered at the screen. “Oh, I do see. That’s very odd. They must have double-booked the place.”
“Really?”
“We’ve been here for three weeks already.”
“So? Maybe you should have left yesterday, huh?”
“We’re here for another week. If you just call Couch2Castle, I’m sure they’ll help you find another place to stay.”
“My phone lost signal miles away. And why should we do all the work? Where’s your booking confirmation?”
Jez faked a yawn. “I’m too tired to drive anywhere else today.”
Frank glanced at KD, and she shrugged. “Why don’t you come inside and have a cup of coffee while we get this ironed out? We have a satellite hotspot you can use.”
“I guess we could do that.”
KD broke away and headed for Marc while Frank led the way toward the stilt house. She didn’t have a weapon. Once Jez and Emmy had neutralised Frank and anyone else in the building, Heath could handle KD. Then everyone could finally go home.
It’s almost over.
That was when I heard the cough.