Chapter 8
EIGHT
Archer was out the door and in motion before his body caught up with his mind.
The alarm cut through the heat coiled in his gut and the sharp pull of the woman who’d been coming apart for him just seconds before.
By the time he skidded into the locker room, the team was already hustling to gear up.
“Where’s your shirt, Monk?” Rome called out, strapping his body armor in place.
He grunted and reached for a stack of clothes.
Their commanding officer strode through the room like a live current, his tone clipped. “Load hot and move fast. Possible hostile movement twenty minutes out. I want eyes open and heads clear. We debrief in the chopper.”
Boots thumped and weapons rattled as they kitted up, the open space filling with the familiar throb of urgency. Men moved around each other with practiced speed, every motion stripped down to muscle memory and efficiency.
Archer shoved his arms into a clean shirt and dragged it over the skin that still burned from the imprint of Jolie’s hands. His body hadn’t caught up to the fact that their heated moment was over, and he was just glad Rome hadn’t brought up the obvious bulge in his pants.
He locked all of it down. There wasn’t room for his own thoughts or feelings.
Archer shrugged into his vest, his pulse cold by the time he checked his sidearm. He slammed a magazine into place, shifting from man to operator.
“Move,” Cannon barked.
They moved.
Through the tunnel, they charged one by one, guided by a single bare bulb swinging from the ceiling. Rome reached the heavy metal door first and punched in the code. The door swung open with surprising silence considering the steel and concrete of their surroundings.
They breached the second tunnel leading away from base. A hundred yards out, the soft thunk of the chopper blades could be heard. By the time they scrambled out of the side of the mountain into the open, the noise was deafening.
The last man out slammed the door. Archer had only seen it one other time in the daylight and it was cleverly camouflaged to blend into the mountainside. Even an expert hiker would walk right past it if they ever reached this remote side of the private property.
In minutes, they were lifting off, the ground below a deep blue sweep of snow.
The flight out was swift, with all of them locked on Cannon’s voice in their ears.
Armed insurgents were believed to be using an abandoned outbuilding as an outpost for weapons trafficking.
The op turned out to be strange from the get-go.
A jittery lookout from a side position opened fire first, spraying rounds wide before ducking for cover.
A handful of armed men returned fire from inside, their aim too sloppy to hit any target.
“This is chaos.” Rome pitched up beside Archer in a crouch. “They don’t have a plan of attack.”
“They’re not military,” Archer muttered to his team as he rushed in with Rome on his six. He reached a door and pressed his back to the wall. Rome set the charge. Archer held up three fingers, lowering them one by one.
As the third dropped, the charge detonated and the door blew inward. Archer rushed in, weapon raised.
He dropped one hostile and then advanced on another as the team swept the small structure and they neutralized the threat in heartbeats.
The ring of gunfire gave way to silence broken only by the crunch of boots over debris. Archer scanned the room, gaze moving over cheap crates and discarded rations. A makeshift radio setup sat in one corner.
He strode over to where Townie had a man pinned. Younger zip-tied his wrists behind his back and hauled him ruthlessly to his feet. The man reeked of body odor.
“Christ, he stinks.” Younger twisted his face away as he led the man to the wall and forced him to sit with two of his friends.
O began a deep dive on the computer equipment.
Archer walked to the man he’d dropped and began searching him. First he picked up the man’s weapon and released the clip, pocketing it.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Cannon approach. “Anything?”
He swept a look at the man’s clothing. “Gear’s military. No insignia.”
“Probably bought it at the local surplus store.”
“His pockets are clear too. No ID. Nothing to point to any organization.”
Rome didn’t glance away from the man he was guarding. “Looks like a bunch of assholes playing soldier.”
“Maybe.” Younger toed a fallen weapon out of the way. “Or maybe someone wanted it to look that way.” He walked over to the other prisoner slumped against the wall. “What are you doing here?”
The man stared back through a split lip, saying nothing.
Younger’s expression didn’t change. He repeated the question in Spanish, calm and precise.
Still nothing.
He shifted seamlessly into Russian, the harder consonants cutting through the room.
The prisoner’s eyes flickered, but his mouth stayed shut.
Cannon took in the exchange, then walked straight out of the bunker, far enough that the prisoners couldn’t overhear him reporting to command that they had three live prisoners who appeared to be Russian speakers.
Archer stepped away from the body, his boot hitting a loose cartridge that skittered across the old wood floor.
He crouched and picked it up between two fingers.
The brass was dulled with age, but the headstamp was still clear enough beneath the grime.
Old military issue. He slid it into his pocket, a cold suspicion forming in his mind.
They waited around for Homeland Security to take custody of the prisoners and the body. When they lifted off again, Archer sat with his weapon between his knees, eyes on the night.
The blizzard was finally dying down, just as predicted. What had been a white wall of fury for days had softened to a vast stillness, the snow below glowing white-blue under the moon.
In the distance, the mountain peaks rose jagged and black, beautiful and deadly.
The storm had passed…which meant Jolie could leave.
After they touched down on the landing pad, they moved into the tunnel system, boots striking concrete in a steady rhythm as they headed deeper into the base.
“What the hell was that?” Rome asked. “Random terror group?”
“Maybe some splinter cell,” Townie added. “Local radicals. Anti-government nuts love to hole up in these mountains.”
O snorted. “You’re giving them too much credit. That setup was messy as hell.”
“Messy doesn’t mean random,” Archer said. “But there didn’t appear to be any reason for them being there. They didn’t have cases of weapons or explosives. It just looked like they were having a meeting. Why are we here instead of local authorities?”
He noted that Cannon didn’t speak, his back stiff as he led the way out of the tunnel.
The guys threw out more possibilities, but nothing pointed to a clear objective, and every route circled back to why Blackout was called in. There had to be some connection they were missing—or weren’t privy to yet.
“DHS will make them talk. We’ll find out soon enough,” O said.
Archer slipped a hand into his pocket and found the bullet he’d palmed from the scene. He pulled it out and rolled it between his fingers. It was too dim in the tunnel to see more than the worn sheen of the brass.
“Only thing that links up so far is the ammo. Artillery’s all American.”
Cannon stopped. “What do you have?”
Archer pushed past the other guys to hand it over.
For a second Cannon just stared at it. Then his whole demeanor changed. His shoulders went rigid as he pulled inward.
“What is it?” Archer asked.
Cannon turned the bullet over once, and his silence made Archer’s gut coil.
When Cannon finally spoke, his voice had gone flat. “We’ll finish this back at base.”
By the time they reached the door leading inside, tension had settled over all of them like a second layer of gear.
The first thing Archer noticed when they stepped inside was the smell—warm spices and meat and sweet chocolate mixed with something buttery.
His stomach remembered real food and came alive with a tug of hunger.
His mind, however, went straight to Jolie.
He started toward the common area.
Cannon cut him off. “War room. Now.”
Archer changed direction with the others but an ache settled behind his ribs. Jolie was here, safe, waiting for their return. And she’d made food.
Inside the war room, the team spread out around the table. Cannon stopped in the doorway. “Don’t move.” He pulled the door shut behind him and the room throbbed with loaded silence.
Then Rome inhaled deeply and groaned. “Whatever she made, I’m in love with it.”
Townie glanced at the door. “Could be spaghetti.”
“Or lasagna,” Rome threw out.
Younger tapped a finger on the table. “We don’t have lasagna noodles.” He would know since he handled all the supplies for the base.
“Could be stew,” Rivers said.
“Could be heaven,” Rome finished.
The door flew open hard enough to rattle the hinges, cutting off conversation.
Cannon strode back in, his expression carved from stone. He didn’t bother sitting. He came straight to the table and lifted the ammo between two fingers.
He held up the bullet. “This came from old stores.”
He set it down in front of O. “I want the lot number tracked. Every piece of the chain of custody history you can find.”
O straightened. “On it.”
Cannon planted both hands on the table and looked at each of them in turn. “There’s something the government never told anyone.”
The room went dead quiet.
Cannon didn’t look away. “After Echo team went down in that chopper crash…their base was turned into an ICE facility.” He paused. “Then someone bombed it.”
No one spoke. They all knew that part.
“I led the team sent in to clear what was left,” Cannon went on. “But when we opened the armory…” He dragged a hand over his mouth. “It was empty. Not damaged. Not looted in a rush. Emptied. Every weapon. Every round.”
The tumblers in Archer’s head locked into place, slow and mechanical.
Rome leaned forward. “How? That facility had cameras. Somebody had eyes on it.”
Cannon’s jaw tightened. “We thought so too.”