Chapter 5
The rain came down sounding like machine-gun fire. Water poured through gaps in the corrugated metal, creating rivers across the concrete floor that glowed in the beam of Willow's flashlight.
The guards had retreated to the far corner, huddled under a section of intact roofing, smoking cigarettes that glowed like fireflies in the darkness. The storm gave her and Levi a bit of a buffer from constant surveillance.
Willow moved to her plane, using the noise as cover to pop open the cargo bay.
The supplies were still strapped down. Just crates of medical equipment, vacuum-sealed food packets, and water purification tablets.
All legitimate. All explainable. Unless you found the false bottoms of the crates, which contained communication equipment for the CIA outpost she was ferrying them to.
Her encrypted radio was hidden beneath a map and duct tape. She'd installed it herself, routing the antenna through the existing comm system so it looked like standard aviation equipment. It had fooled cartel inspections three times already.
She glanced back at Levi. He'd managed to pull himself upright against the wall, demo pack within reach, watching the guards with the casual alertness of someone who'd spent a lifetime in hostile territory.
His hand rested near the pack's side pocket.
He had easy access to whatever he kept there.
A weapon, probably. Or something that went boom.
Their eyes met across the hangar, and he gave her the smallest nod.
Make the call.
She climbed into the cockpit and powered up the radio.
The LED display glowed green in the darkness, automatically hopping through encrypted channels at a preset frequency.
She pulled on the headset, adjusted the mic, and keyed the transmit button twice.
The signal that she was secure and ready to receive.
The response came within seconds.
“Eagle, this is Overwatch. We've been trying to reach you for three hours. Status report.” The voice was clipped, professional, unmistakably CIA. Her handler, Mike Reeves, sounded more annoyed than concerned.
“Sorry I made you late for dinner. I had some complications,” Willow said, keeping her voice low. Rain hammered overhead, but she still checked the guards. They were still keeping dry and smoking. “A cartel patrol intercepted my supply run. I had to divert.”
“Shit. They need those components. You’ll have to fly at night. Get them the equipment.”
“No can do. It’s storming here.”
There was a pause. “Are you compromised?”
“Negative. But my plane was damaged. Multiple bullet strikes, possible engine trouble.”
A pause. She could almost hear Reeves calculating, weighing options. “Can you complete the mission?”
“Which mission? The supply run or the primary mission?”
“The primary mission. We’ll get the equipment to them another way.”
Oh, great, she’d risked her life today, and there was an alternate means of getting the equipment to the site. Perfect. Thanks. That helped. Really.
“You are to locate the target’s central command, confirm his location, then dispatch the extraction team. I will bring him back to the States for trial. For justice and accountability.”
Which meant “We need him alive for intelligence, and I’m taking credit.”
“I'm working on it,” she said. “But I've got a new variable.”
“Explain.”
She glanced at Levi again. He was checking his leg wound, rewrapping the bandage she'd applied. Efficient. Practiced. Like he'd done it a hundred times before. “Picked up a civilian during the firefight. He was being pursued by the cartel’s men.”
“Disposition?”
“Currently patching him up. He's …” She hesitated, choosing her words carefully. “He's got skills. Military background, maybe contractor work. Definitely not a civilian.”
Another pause, longer this time. “Does he pose a security risk?”
Yes. Absolutely. Unquestionably.
“Unknown,” she said instead. “He's carrying demolition equipment. High-grade stuff.”
The silence on the other end was deafening. Then, “Demolitions?”
“Shaped charges. Det cord. Professional grade.” She’d seen into the pack while she was acting like his human crutch.
“Christ.” Reeves's voice dropped, gained an edge. “Willow, listen to me carefully. We've had chatter about a Guardian asset being assigned to the area. Intel has it that he’s destroying Morales’s infrastructure, hitting supply lines to draw him out. “
Her stomach dropped. “Guardian? As in—”
“Yeah. Big money, big operations, and we weren’t read in. If your civilian is Guardian, he's probably not there to bring Morales in. Catch my drift?”
The rain seemed to suddenly fill her head with white noise. She looked at Levi, at his easy grin, his sunshine demeanor, the way he'd blown up a bridge with surgical precision to cover his escape.
“They don’t operate that way.” She knew for a fact Guardian didn’t skirt any legality.
She’d worked with teams overseas before.
They were one thousand percent above board.
Her handler was trying to mindfuck her into being paranoid.
“What are my orders in regards to him?” she asked, though she already knew.
There was silence for a moment. “Keep him close. Use him if you need to. As far as we’re concerned, he’s expendable. When we move on Morales, you make sure you leave him in the dust. Whatever this guy’s mission is, it isn’t in line with ours.”
You mean yours. She drew a steadying breath and said, “Copy that.”
“And Willow?” Reeves's voice softened, just slightly. “Watch your back. Guardian doesn't always play nice with others.”
The transmission cut.
She sat in the darkness, headset still on, listening to static and rain.
That, too, was bullshit. She’d worked with Guardian in Sudan.
They not only played well with others, but they also made sure her ass didn’t get dusted more than once.
Reeves, her handler, was a prick with a capital P.
She detested him and his relentless pursuit of glory, praise, and promotion.
Still, she had her orders. Her hands were shaking with adrenaline, exhaustion, or maybe just the weight of what she'd learned. She had a Guardian operative bleeding in her hangar, trusting her to patch him up, proposing a partnership while planning to do God only knew what to the one target she needed alive. If, in fact, he were going after the same target. She didn’t know that for sure.
However, considering he was in this part of the country, it probably had something to do with Morales.
Fantastic.
She powered down the radio, replaced the false bottom, and climbed out of the cockpit.
The rain had intensified, water now flooding across the hangar floor in sheets.
Lightning flashed, turning everything white for a heartbeat.
Everything was brightly illuminated. The guards, the old plane, Levi watching her with those impossibly blue eyes.
She walked back to him, each step splashing through water that soaked her boots. The smell of rain mixed with oil and blood, creating something almost nostalgic. The stink was the same as every other godforsaken mission she'd ever run.
“Everything all right?” Levi asked.
“Fine.” She dropped down beside him, back against the wall. The concrete was cold, damp, and uncomfortable. Perfect. “Your turn.”
He studied her for a moment, something unreadable in his expression. “I already contacted them.”
“How?” She glanced around, and he patted his bag.
“Just talked to myself. Mumbling, really. The guards didn’t even budge.”
She could see the rectangle shape in the pocket of the bag. An expensive sat phone, no doubt. “Subtle,” Willow said.
“I do my best.”
“So,” Willow said carefully. “Morales doesn't know you're here?”
“Not yet.”
Well, that answered that question, didn’t it? They were here for the same person. She still needed to figure out his goal. “But he will.”
He nodded his head. “Eventually. He knows someone just blew the shit out of one of his airfields.” Levi turned to look at her, and the shadows under his eyes seemed deeper, darker now. “That's kind of the point.”
“Which is?”
He smiled—sharp, dangerous, nothing like the sunshine grin from before. “To make very loud noises until he comes out of hiding. Then make one final, very permanent noise.”
Kill shot. Execution.
She'd suspected that could be the case. Morales was evil incarnate. He deserved to die. But not without a trial, without facing his crimes. But hearing what she expected confirmed, seeing the cold calculation behind that easy smile of Levi’s … Well, it made it real.
“You're going to kill him,” she stated the obvious, and it wasn’t a question.
He made a humming sound and barely opened his eyes. “I prefer 'eliminate.' Less dramatic.” He shifted, wincing as his ribs protested. “You got a problem with that?”
She should. She absolutely should. Her mission was to capture, gather intelligence. Justice through proper channels. Everything Levi wasn’t going to do. If he were going off grid like this, he couldn’t be Guardian … Could he?
She'd also spent six months in this hellhole watching Morales's cartel spread like cancer through trafficking, murder, and corruption. She'd seen the bodies. The refugees. The villages burned to the ground because they'd refused to cooperate.
“No problem,” she lied. “As long as you help me get to him first.”
Levi's eyes narrowed. “Why do you need to get to him?”
“Because I'm not just running supplies. I need information from him, which means I need him alive, according to my directives. I'm gathering intelligence. Mapping his network. My people want to know how deep the corruption goes.”
“Your people.” He let the words hang. “Who exactly do you work for, Willow?”
“I’m a private contractor. Like you.”
“I call bullshit.”
“Says the man who claims to be a freelance engineer.”