Chapter 17
The Phoenix tarmac shimmered with heat waves as their plane touched down, the desert sun beating mercilessly through the small aircraft windows. Todd’s fingers were already moving across his phone screen, typing out a message to Sadie.
When will she see it? Is she safe? How soon before she gets this message?
The questions churned in his mind as he and Cole made their way through the small terminal, their footsteps echoing in the afternoon crowd.
At the car rental counter, they moved with practiced efficiency, splitting up to handle their respective missions.
As Cole headed toward the hospital, Todd felt the weight of his own responsibility settle heavily on his shoulders.
Sadie is alone. Until I get there, she has no backup.
The drive to Ajo stretched before him, but he barely registered the desert vista. His rental car hummed along the empty highway as red rock formations and endless scrub brush blurred past his windows. Each mile marker brought him closer to her.
The few hotels in Ajo squatted low against the desert landscape, one-story buildings that looked like they’d been carved from the surrounding stone.
The Sonoran Desert Hotel and Conference Center dominated the small cluster, its stucco walls weathered by years of relentless sun and wind.
Without a conference in session, the parking lot was nearly empty, dotted with only a handful of vehicles baking in the afternoon heat.
Todd pulled into a spot just outside Timothy’s room and next to his fellow Keeper’s rental.
From the room, he’d be able to keep an eye on the vehicles and anyone nearby.
The desert air hit him like a furnace when he stepped out, dry and scorching, so different from the mountain coolness of Montana that it felt like stepping onto another planet.
The hotel’s architecture was purely functional, with rooms opening directly to the outside.
When Mary had made Timothy’s arrangements, she’d secured one of the larger units complete with a kitchenette, understanding that a Keeper might need to maintain surveillance or communication equipment that required space and privacy.
Todd’s universal key card slid through the reader with a soft beep, and the door swung open to reveal a scene that made his chest tighten with concern for his fallen teammate.
Timothy’s room gave evidence of illness and a hasty departure. The bed was unmade with sheets twisted in a way that spoke of someone who’d been too sick to care about his usual meticulous standards. Towels lay crumpled on the bathroom floor. Jesus, Tim. You must have been in agony.
Todd pulled out his phone and typed another message to Sadie. Hotel. The single word felt inadequate for everything he wanted to say, but practicality was needed at this time.
Unable to sit still with nervous energy coursing through his veins, Todd rolled up his sleeves and began the methodical process of erasing the evidence of Timothy’s ordeal. He gathered the scattered towels into a neat pile by the door, stripped the bed, and bundled the linens together.
Through the window, he spotted one of the hotel’s service attendants making her rounds, her cart loaded with fresh supplies. When he waved her over, her weathered face creased into a smile. She was probably relieved to find a guest who wasn’t demanding or difficult in this small desert outpost.
“Fresh linens? Housekeeping?” she offered in accented English, her hands already reaching for crisp white sheets.
“Just the linens, thank you. I’ll handle the rest myself.” Todd gratefully accepted the bundle, along with packets of coffee and tea she pressed into his hands, with the generosity of someone who understood that small comforts mattered in a place like this.
He tipped her probably more than she usually saw in a week, but insisted on maintaining his privacy. No one needed to enter this room, lowering the potential security risks he had to worry about.
The next hour passed in a blur of methodical activity that helped calm his restless energy.
He made the bed with military precision, scrubbed the bathroom until it gleamed, and then began the careful process of sweeping the room for surveillance devices.
Timothy would have done a thorough check upon arrival, but twelve hours of an empty room was twelve hours of opportunity for someone with less-than-welcoming intentions.
His hands moved with practiced expertise, checking outlets, light fixtures, the underside of furniture, anywhere a listening device or camera might be concealed.
The small electronic detector in his kit remained blessedly silent, but Todd’s dedication to safety had kept him and his teammates alive too many times to count.
His phone buzzed with a message from Cole. Timothy’s out of surgery, doing well, and pissed as hell.
Despite everything, Todd found himself chuckling.
Of course, Timothy was pissed. Having to bug out in the middle of a mission due to a medical emergency would rankle him worse than the physical pain.
The Keepers lived and breathed for the work and for the sense of purpose that came with protecting people who couldn’t defend themselves.
Todd typed a return message. Good. No problems here.
Cole’s follow-up confirmed that Timothy would be discharged tomorrow, and Cole would fly him back to Montana for proper recovery. Now if I could just hear from Sadie…
Timothy had managed to secure his laptop before the ambulance arrived.
Even in a medical crisis, the man was a professional, but all the relevant mission data had already been transferred to Todd’s systems. He pulled up the files now, reviewing surveillance reports, guest lists, facility layouts, anything that might give him insight into what Sadie was facing.
Timothy had planned on using the drone today to get a close-up of the cameras on the perimeter. Deciding he needed to do something now, he gathered the equipment Timothy had ready and headed back out to his SUV.
The Arizona sun beat down mercilessly on Todd’s shoulders as he carried his equipment bag across the desert scrub, the dry heat unlike anything Montana had ever thrown at him.
Even at four in the afternoon, the temperature had to be pushing into the upper nineties, and sweat already darkened his shirt despite the arid climate that should have wicked moisture away instantly.
He’d driven his rental car as far as the rutted dirt road would allow, then hiked another half mile through a landscape that looked like the surface of Mars with red rock formations, scattered sage brush, and endless stretches of sand punctuated by cacti that seemed designed by nature to inflict maximum damage on unwary humans.
His boots crunched against the hard soil with each step, the sound unnaturally loud in the vast silence.
This was reconnaissance at its most fundamental level—eyes on target, gathering intelligence that could mean the difference between mission success and catastrophic failure.
More importantly, it could mean the difference between Sadie’s safety and her disappearance into whatever nightmare Serenity Dunes might be hiding behind its facade of luxury wellness.
Finding a position with clear sightlines to the spa’s perimeter while remaining invisible to their security apparatus had required careful study of topographical maps and satellite imagery.
Todd settled behind a cluster of red sandstone boulders that rose from the desert floor, their weathered surfaces providing both concealment and elevation advantage.
From this vantage point, Serenity Dunes spread before him like a mirage of civilization in the hostile wilderness.
The main complex gleamed white against the desert backdrop with a series of low, elegant buildings connected by covered walkways that created the illusion of flowing water across the landscape.
Pavilions and gardens dotted the immediate grounds.
But it was the perimeter that demanded his attention.
According to the facility’s marketing materials and building permits, Serenity Dunes spa sat in the middle of twenty acres.
What those sanitized documents didn’t reveal was the true scope of their isolation—miles of empty desert in every direction, creating a natural prison where wealthy guests with no personal vehicles were limited in their ability to leave if they desired.
Todd unpacked his drone with methodical precision.
The quadcopter was civilian grade on the surface, the kind of device any photography enthusiast might use for landscape shots, but Bert’s modifications had transformed it into a sophisticated surveillance platform.
He added high-definition cameras, infrared capability, encrypted transmission that couldn’t be intercepted by casual eavesdropping, and most importantly, nearly silent operation that wouldn’t alert security personnel to its presence.
His laptop opened to display the control interface, and with a few keystrokes, he established the secure connection to LSIMT. Within seconds, Logan’s face appeared on screen, followed by the familiar forms of Dalton, Cory, and Casper clustered around the conference table.
“We’re receiving your signal clearly,” Logan confirmed. “Proceed when ready.”
Todd’s fingers moved across the drone’s controller with practiced expertise, sending the device spiraling upward into the sky. The machine climbed steadily, its cameras automatically adjusting to capture maximum detail while maintaining the illusion of casual aerial photography.
“Visual contact established,” he reported, watching the spa complex shrink to miniature proportions on his screen. From this height, Serenity Dunes looked even more like an island of artificial perfection in an ocean of desert.
The drone’s first pass traced the facility’s outer boundaries, revealing details that ground-level observation could never provide.
The perimeter fence was more substantial than promotional materials suggested.
It was eight feet of steel mesh. But more concerning was the gaps Todd’s trained eye immediately identified.
“I’m seeing camera coverage,” he announced, his voice steady despite the adrenaline flooding his system. “Motion sensors integrated into the lighting system, probably triggered by anything larger than desert wildlife.”
The drone continued its systematic survey, mapping blind spots with precision. Each camera position, each sensor cluster, each potential observation post was cataloged and transmitted back to Montana, where the team could analyze angles and coverage patterns.
But it was the western perimeter that offered hope.
Here, where the fence line approached a dry creek bed carved by centuries of flash floods, the terrain created natural concealment.
A maintenance shed squatted near the boundary, its position suggesting it serviced infrastructure that extended beyond the fence line.
“There,” Todd murmured, adjusting the drone’s position for a closer examination. “Western boundary, approximately two hundred meters south of the main complex. The wash creates a natural blind spot, and that maintenance shed blocks direct camera coverage.”
Through his earpiece, he could hear the team members discussing angles and distances, their voices overlapping with the kind of tactical enthusiasm that meant they’d found something useful.
“Can you get closer?” Casper’s voice cut through the chatter. “We need to verify the camera coverage gap.”
Todd guided the drone lower, his pulse quickening as the machine approached the potential meeting zone.
The maintenance shed was larger than it had appeared from altitude.
It was big enough to provide substantial concealment for two people having a brief conversation.
More importantly, the creek bed offered multiple approach routes that would keep anyone moving through the area below the sight lines of the perimeter cameras.
“Confirmed,” he said, satisfaction warming his voice. “There’s a dead zone here, approximately thirty meters wide. Someone could approach from the creek bed, meet at the shed, and withdraw without appearing on their surveillance system.”
The team’s excitement was palpable through the connection, but Todd’s attention was already shifting to other concerns. The drone’s cameras had captured evidence of recent vehicle activity in areas that should have been pristine desert, making his blood run cold.
“I’m seeing tire tracks,” he reported, his voice tight with new tension. “Multiple vehicles… recent. They lead away from the facility toward those hills to the north.”
The implications hung in the air like a weight. Vehicles leaving Serenity Dunes in directions that had nothing to do with guest transportation, heading into wilderness areas where bodies could disappear forever.
“Document everything,” Logan directed with grim authority. “We need a complete record of those tracks.”
Todd spent another twenty minutes guiding the drone through systematic documentation, his camera capturing tire patterns, direction of travel, and most disturbingly, what appeared to be disturbed earth in several locations miles from the spa.
Someone had been working very hard to erase traces of their activities.
As the drone returned to his position and settled onto the ground, Todd felt the weight of discovery on his shoulders. They’d found a way for him and Sadie to meet safely, but they’d also uncovered evidence suggesting that Serenity Dunes’s operation could be beyond the facility.
The sun was setting behind the western mountains as Todd packed his equipment, painting the desert in shades of copper and gold that should have been beautiful. Instead, the dying light felt ominous, like the last moments before darkness claimed another victim.
Somewhere in that pristine facility, he knew Sadie was playing her role to perfection, surrounded by some who may have viewed wealthy guests as nothing more than test subjects and potential profit centers.
The knowledge that he’d soon be able to meet with her face-to-face provided some comfort, but the drone footage had revealed threats that went beyond anything they’d anticipated.
As he hiked back toward his vehicle, Todd’s mind was already racing ahead to contingencies and extraction protocols. Because if his worst fears proved correct, getting Sadie out of Serenity Dunes alive might require more than careful planning.