Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
“You good?”
A.J. groaned as Chris grabbed on to his wrist and pulled him upright from the ground. “As long as you’re real and not a ghost.” He missed Marcus, but he doubted that’d be the ghost haunting him down in the caves. “Damn, that hurts.”
“Better than killing ya.” Chris helped A.J. out of the shirt he’d changed into behind the bushes before entering the cave. He hadn’t wanted to wear a bulky bulletproof vest and chest plate while faking being a tourist.
Double protection and the motherfucking round still felt like a professional baseball player had taken a bat to his abdomen, making his insides nearly shoot out of him.
“It didn’t break the skin. Ana’s a damn good shot. One painful bruise, but—”
“Did the plan work?” That was all A.J. cared about. Was Ana safe?
The team knew the Volkovs would require Ana to prove her loyalty.
To kill in cold blood at their command. Ana had clung to the hope she wouldn’t have to pull the trigger.
Of course, if one of the Volkov guards had chosen to take an additional shot to ensure A.J.
was down, A.J.’s people were waiting in the wings to take them out. Thankfully, that hadn’t happened.
“Yeah, Dominick and Grigory, plus two guards, left with Ana. She told them she had a translated copy of the ledger, and they no longer needed to look for the key in the tunnels.” Chris helped him to his feet.
“We gave them a head start so they wouldn’t think they were being followed.
You were unconscious for a few minutes, which we didn’t count on.
The rest of the guys are on the move and filtering into their next positions. The FBI agents are on standby.”
A.J. took the clean shirt Chris handed him once he’d discarded his protective gear, groaning with each movement. But Ana needed his help, so screw the pain.
“The Volkovs are sending a cleanup team to take care of your body. They’ll be here soon.
” Chris reached into his backpack for a pint of blood.
He busied himself with staging the scene to make it look as though A.J.
had been shot, but he’d escaped. Blood on the ground. Handprints smeared on the wall.
Chris hadn’t been thrilled about carting pig’s blood around with him in his backpack, him being an animal lover and all. Even pigs. And yet he wasn’t a vegetarian. Go figure.
“Unfortunately,” Chris said while cleaning his hands and tossing the empty blood bag into his pack, “the tracking device isn’t working down here. That, or Ana hasn’t turned it on yet. Lost her on comms when she went deeper into the tunnel network.”
They had a backup plan for their backup plan, though.
“This is Echo Two, what’s Delta One’s status?” he asked, hoping to link up with the team for an update. As the guys traveled farther down into the tunnels, the chances of maintaining the comms connection grew slimmer.
“Ah, glad to hear you’re alive, and she didn’t actually kill you,” Finn popped on to the line.
“We picked up Delta’s trail. Heading to the Danube,” Roman announced. “Delta One gave us some breadcrumbs to follow, letting us know to go to the right.”
The “crumbs” Roman referred to was a type of powder Ana had stashed in her pocket that would only show up with a special light. Another backup plan in case the tracking device didn’t work.
“Bravo Two and Three are sweeping the other tunnel route to see where it leads and making sure the Volkovs don’t double back,” Chris explained.
“Echo One and Harper are waiting for us outside the main entrance on Lovas Street. We can get to the river quicker with wheels than playing catch-up in the tunnels.” Chris hooked A.J.
’s arm to help him move, then used the headlight on his NVGs to guide them out of the labyrinth.
A.J. moved as quickly as he could, allowing adrenaline to push him since he was otherwise sluggish from getting shot as well as damn sore from having been thrown from the BMX last night.
“Shit, we have a problem,” Harper said, her voice clear over the comms once they reached the stairs leading to their exit. “Hungarian police are patrolling the streets. But, wait.”
“Annnd saved by the ex-husband,” Wyatt said a moment later. “He’s distracting them. Move out now while you can.”
A.J. never thought he’d be happy for an assist from Ana’s ex, but if Kyle was helping A.J. get to Ana and keep her safe, he’d buy the guy dinner after this was over.
Chris and A.J. hurried out the entrance and hopped into the mobile unit down the street, making a clean escape thanks to Kyle.
“Hey, brother,” Wyatt said from the driver’s seat. “You okay?”
Chris removed his night-vision goggles and attached headlamp and shifted the rest of the gear in the van off to the side so they could have a seat in the back.
“I’ll be fine when Ana is safe, and the Volkovs are in custody,” he said as Wyatt drove.
Harper clutched her laptop when they hit a bump, then peered back at A.J. “Want something for the pain?” she asked, worry flashing in her eyes.
“No.” He didn’t give a damn about anything other than getting to Ana. “What’s the status by the water? If they take her on a boat—”
“Already on it,” Harper cut him off. “We’re pinpointing vessels on the river nearby. Narrowed it down to three possible yachts cruising within a half a kilometer from the Széchenyi Chain Bridge.”
Two Feds were in a speedboat waiting on the water and away from any tourist cruise boats. They were told to remain near the main road, Budai alsó rkp., which ran parallel with the water, in the event A.J. and his team needed a water assist—and from the looks of it, they would.
There weren’t many places for a private boat to dock, and the FBI couldn’t exactly sidle up next to a “pub party” on a boat, or a romantic dinner cruise.
Options were limited, which meant the situation had to be kept fluid, and they’d have to do their best not to draw the attention of nosy tourists who packed the riverbank.
A Saturday night at ten p.m., in June, in a romantic city that had its landmarks flooded with lights . . . it wasn’t ideal for a covert operation, but what choice did they have?
“The FBI task force is putting up a drone over the water and using a fiber-optic listening device. We’ll see what we can find out from those three vessels.” Harper sounded hopeful. That was a positive sign.
“We’ll get your girl. Don’t worry.” Wyatt caught A.J.’s eyes in the rearview mirror before they got off the roundabout, not wanting to actually cross the bridge.
“Honestly, if we didn’t have the FBI assist, we would have been screwed,” Harper said. “But surprisingly, thanks to Director Mendez, we have everything we could possibly need.”
A.J. never thought his team would be thanking Mendez for pulling out all the stops for them, considering he’d been such a pain in the ass on their op with him last year.
“Stuck in traffic. We’ll need to pull over soon,” Wyatt said a minute later, and damn, the cars were bumper to bumper on the main strip by the river. Not ideal. “We lost communication with the guys in the tunnel, but once we get closer to them, we should hopefully reconnect.”
A.J. had to remind himself Ana wasn’t on a solo op. She wasn’t alone down in those tunnels. His people were there, and she was smart. She’d make it out alive. He trusted her skills, but he didn’t trust the Volkovs.
“Parking here.” Wyatt swooped into a spot opposite the river when another car had backed out.
“Perfect,” he tossed out sarcastically. “Right in front of a church.” Once parked, Wyatt scooted around on his seat to face the guys in the back, and Harper radioed the Feds their current position.
A hundred feet away were three tourist boats about to unload their guests.
“Now would be the best time to move out. We can blend in with the crowd, then try and hop on board the speedboat,” Chris said, eyes on the river.
“The agents are moving into position,” Harper said once off the radio. “Move out. And be careful.” She gave the guys a stern but loving look. “I’ll be in touch when I hear more.”
A.J. stepped out of the van with Chris and Wyatt and slung a bag over his shoulder. He dodged traffic to get to the river and traversed the crowd of tourists flooding the walkways as they exited the riverboats.
He abruptly halted when static filled his line.
Roman? Ana? A guy shoulder-checked him, nearly knocking his bag off as A.J. stood still, waiting to hear who was on the line in his ear.
Were those Russian words?
“It’s me,” he said over the line, hoping he was now in range to once again communicate with Ana over comms. “If you can hear me, I’m okay,” he told her. “I’m on my way to you.” He hoped to hell Ana heard him. She’d focus better knowing she hadn’t actually killed him.
Wyatt turned in the crowd, searching A.J. out, then hurried back his way. “Come on,” he urged, but A.J. held a hand up, begging for one second.
“A boat to get to a boat?”
Ana. Thank God. And she was giving them a clue.
“They’ve already exited the tunnel,” A.J. said as if Wyatt hadn’t also heard Ana on comms, which he had.
“They must be taking a smaller boat to get to one of the yachts,” Harper chimed in. “We won’t need to wait on the drone to eavesdrop. I’ll have the Feds fly the drone higher in the sky and track the yacht they board.”
“Roger,” A.J. said, still having mixed feelings about all of this. He wished Plan A had been in play, the one where the Volkovs didn’t make Ana prove her loyalty so he’d still be with her now.
“Echo Four, what’s your status?” Wyatt asked as they put eyes on their ride, a Pershing 72 speedboat.
Two plainclothes agents were on board, pulling the boat up alongside one of the empty tourist docking sites so Wyatt, A.J.
, and Chris could quickly board before drawing attention from law enforcement.
They’d prefer to keep the local cops out of this op for now.
“This is Echo Five. Sons of bitches wired the tunnel exit with explosives. We’ll be a hot minute,” Finn announced in A.J.’s ear a moment later.
“Lucky you all caught that before exiting,” Chris rushed out.
“We’ll catch another ride out to you if we have to,” Finn added, a bit out of breath from whatever he was doing. Basically, ensuring he and Roman didn’t die.
Another ride meant stealing a boat, probably a tourist vessel, but hopefully, it would be a quick infil and exfil tonight. Their rules of engagement, per Mendez . . . try not to kill anyone. Mendez wanted every last Volkov brought in alive if possible, which would make things trickier.
A few security guards working the tourist docks began yelling in Hungarian at the presence of their speedboat, and the FBI yelled right back at them in the same language. Adding a few hand gestures for good measure. Just great. Gonna get into a gun battle with the local cops.
“We gotta jet,” the dark-haired agent said from behind the wheel. “Get below deck. There’s dive gear down there if you need it.”
A.J. and the guys stopped just before going below deck when Harper announced, “Delta One is boarding a Princess 30M yacht, and they’re already moving. Heading down river,” Harper reported. “Do you copy?”
“Roger,” A.J. said, his heart in his throat before heading for the stateroom.
Once in the cabin, he eyed the dive gear and set his weapons bag on the bed next to it.
“They must have a frequency jammer. We lost connection with Ana,” Harper said as static cut in. Reception wasn’t stellar since they were rapidly moving away from her location. “The drone can’t pick up sound either. You’re going to . . . have to follow . . . and go in dark.”
More like go in hot and fast.
“We just lost Harper,” Wyatt said. “I’ll go on deck and call her.”
A.J. sat on the full-sized bed once Wyatt left, his stomach muscles tight and sore like he’d been punched more than once by a pro boxer. “This is gonna work, right?” he asked Chris while Echo Three slipped on his suit, minus the fins. Since when do I have doubts?
They had to be ready to swim, which was A.J.
’s preference to the alternative—jumping from their speedboat onto the Volkovs’ yacht at too fast a speed.
He didn’t have that much faith in the grappling hook he’d need to toss to hold his weight.
He’d done a similar maneuver outside San Domingo back when Marcus was still alive, and he wasn’t itching to do it again.
His face had smashed against the fiberglass of the boat that night like he was a slapstick comedian, and his jaw had hurt for weeks.
Marcus had laughed his ass off about it, too.
Chris leaned forward, setting a hand on A.J.’s shoulder. “Everything will be good. No worries. And nothing like a nice little swim in the Danube to cool us off, right?”
But Chris’s humor was lost on him right now. Ana was surrounded by dangerous men, her status currently unknown.
The boat began to slow, and A.J. stood, throwing his arms out to the sides for balance. He caught sight of Wyatt rushing back their way, a panicked look on his face. “Get ready. Get on deck now!” he yelled, then turned and disappeared back up top.
“What the—” They picked up speed again, cutting through the water. Shit, this can’t be good.
A.J. hurriedly got dressed into his dive gear and followed Chris to the deck as their boat passed by the lit-up Hungarian Parliament building.
“What’s your status?” Wyatt had a hand to one ear to better hear out the other as he talked on the phone.
“We need you now. Hijack the boat if you have to. That’s an order.
” He ended the call, his rifle slung over his shoulder, a pistol strapped to his thigh and one at his hip.
His dive gear in a pile on the couch off to his side.
The boat lights were dimmed to prevent being spotted by the Volkovs. “What’s going on?” A.J. grabbed a handlebar when the boat suddenly slowed down, and he was nearly tossed overboard.
“Two more boats are joining the party.” Wyatt pointed out at the water, then his gaze cut to the FBI agents at the helm. “I think it’s safe to say someone on the FBI team tipped off the Russians.”