They called them ghost towns for a reason.
Black Hills Search and Rescue Specialist Deke Cunningham
wasn't afraid of anything. Not anymore. But the late
afternoon shadows spooked him. They moved with him, reaching
out like gnarled fingers across the empty, dusty main street
of Cleancutt, Wyoming. He tried to shake off the feeling,
but it wouldn't shake. Probably because today he wasn't
working a routine assignment to rescue a deserving but
nameless innocent.
Today he was searching for his ex-wife.
He glanced at the GPS locator built into his phone, then at
the two-story building with the letters H E L
barely readable above the door. The O and the
T had long since faded.
This was it. The location where BHSAR computer expert Aaron
Gold had finally managed to triangulate Mindy's last cell
phone transmission.
Mindy. She didn't deserve this. She hadn't deserved
anything she'd gotten for loving him.
And he'd never deserved her.
Deke approached the two-story building, doing his damnedest
not to swipe his palm across the nape of his neck, where
prickles of awareness tingled. He was being watched.
No surprise there.
He even knew who was watching him. The same person who'd
kidnapped his ex-wife. Well—who'd ordered her
kidnapped, anyhow.
Novus Ordo. The infamous international terrorist who'd
already targeted another member of the BHSAR team, Matt Parker.
We 've got your wife, the obviously disguised voice
on the cell phone had said.
Alarm bells had clanged in his head and his gut had clenched
with worry. Still, he'd had to smile a little. Whoever the
kidnapper was, he had no idea what he'd gotten hold of when
he'd grabbed Mindy Cunningham.
"Ex-wife," he'd muttered, working to sound bored and
uninterested. "And be my guest. You can have her."
"This is no joke, Cunningham. We've got her and we'll kill
her if you don't do what we say."
"The only thing I think you've got is her cell phone and a
death wish."
The kidnapper had taken the bait. He'd put Mindy on the phone.
Deke Cunningham, don't pay them one red cent! It's a
trap—
Tough words. Exactly what he'd expected from her.
But beneath her brave words he heard fear—a soul-deep terror
he'd never heard in her voice before. And that, more than
anything the kidnapper said, scared him to death.
Something was wrong with her. Something beyond being
kidnapped. While that alone would be enough to terrify any
woman, his Mindy was made of stronger stuff.
In the twenty years since he'd first spotted her hanging by
her heels from the top rung of the elementary school jungle
gym, he'd never seen anything she couldn't handle.
Except him.
Her tight, strained voice, cut by static, still echoed in
his head as he paused at the bottom of the dilapidated
wooden steps of the only hotel in Cleancutt, Wyoming.
He'd heard about the ghost towns of Wyoming all his life.
Eighty years ago, Cleancutt and other coalmining camps had
been booming towns. But by the 1950s, underground coal
mining had given way to strip-mining, so today Cleancutt was
a ghost, a dying piece of history located near the city of
Casper.
A vibration started in his breast pocket. Damn it.
His phone.
As he retrieved it, he glanced around him, in case he could
catch someone watching him, waiting for him to answer. But
the display read Irina Castle, his boss, not Mindy. He
pressed the talk button without saying anything.
"Deke, where are you?" Irina asked.
"I'm busy," he said quietly.
"You did it, didn't you? You went after Mindy alone. I told
you to wait until I could arrange a meeting with Aaron Schiff."
"Irina, do not get the FBI involved in this. It's
too dangerous for Mindy. I'll handle it. Besides, you know
the drill. They threatened to hurt her if I brought backup."
"And you know the drill. My specialists never take
unnecessary risks."
"This one was necessary."
Irina blew out a sigh of frustration. "You told Aaron not to
tell me where you are." Her voice was accusatory.
"It's for your own good, and Mindy's. You can't know. It's
too dangerous for you. Besides, there's nobody alive who's
better trained to run a covert rescue mission than me." He'd
meant the comment to be reassuring, but it hung in the
sudden silence between them.
Irina's husband, Rook Castle, had been the best until he'd
been assassinated by Novus Ordo two years ago.
"Aaron and Rafe have my projected timeline," he continued.
"They know what to do. You've got to trust me, Irina."
"I don't like it."
"You think I do? I should have known what was going to
happen as soon as Matt told me he'd been followed back here
from Mahjidastan. I should have anticipated that Novus would
go after Mindy."
Novus Ordo was desperate to find out why Irina had suddenly
called Matt Parker back from assignment in Mahjidastan and
announced to her employees that she was ending her
two-year-long search for her husband—or his body.
"It's not your fault, Deke."
"The hell it's not. I should have taken care of her, put her
in protective custody." He shook off the feeling of failure.
He'd let Mindy get captured. Now he had to rescue her.
"Don't worry, Irina. I know more about Novus than anyone
alive. You listen to Rafe and Aaron and Brock. They each
have their instructions. Their primary mission is to keep
you safe." He paused. "And Irina, don't leave the ranch
without one of them with you. Make sure all three of them
know where you're going and who you're going with."
Irina sighed in frustration. "You sound like you don't trust
your own team."
"My helicopter was sabotaged. I don't trust anybody but you
and me."
"You mentioned your timeline. What is it?"
"I plan to be out of there with Mindy in less than
twenty-four hours."
"What's your drop-dead time?"
"Seventy-two." He had his timeline. He wished he knew what
Novus's was.
"Be careful, Deke."
He hung up and started to pocket his phone, then hesitated,
looking at the display.
Two days ago, the BHSAR recovery team, along with the FBI,
had found the body of the man who had tried to get his hands
on Matt Parker.
Papers and a prepaid cell phone found on the dead man proved
his involvement in terrorist activities, with ties to Novus
Ordo. It was bad enough that it took only a couple of hours
for Novus to find out that Irina had recalled Matt. What
made it so much worse was the ruined helicopter rotor on the
floor of Deke's hangar that proved his bird had been
sabotaged. The grounded helicopter had caused Deke to miss a
critical rendezvous point and had almost cost Matt Parker
and Aimee Vick their lives.
There was only one explanation for those security breaches.
Both the sabotage and Novus's intel had to have been
engineered by someone who had unrestricted access to Castle
Ranch. They had a traitor in BHSAR. Someone who was working
for Novus.
Deke had put his most trusted specialists to guarding Irina.
He just wished he could trust them without reservation.
But there was only one man in the world, other than himself,
whom he could trust with Irina's life.
Trying to ignore the fact that his fingers were shaking,
Deke dialed a number he'd thought he'd never call.
Irina's innocent action had negated everything Rook Castle
had done to keep her safe.
Deke listened to the electronic message, hoping he was doing
the right thing. He spoke quickly, quietly, then hung up.
It was done. Two years ago he'd made a promise to his best
friend, Rook Castle. Today he'd broken it. But he'd had no
choice. It was time to raise the dead.
Deke carefully climbed the crumbling steps and put his
shoulder against the weathered front door of the abandoned
hotel. He stopped dead in his tracks when it creaked loudly.
Clutching his weapon in both hands, he listened.
Nothing. Not a scurrying rat or the buzz of a disturbed insect.
He'd expected Novus to come after him. He'd hoped the
terrorist wouldn't be savvy enough to go after his ex-wife.
Hell, they'd been divorced over two years.
It disturbed him that Novus knew that much about him. Mindy
was his weakness.
His only weakness.
The air force had done what nothing else ever had—it had
made a man out of him. He could fly a helicopter. He could
shoot a housefly off a general's lapel at two hundred
yards—hell, he could take that shot while flying a
bird.
Being a Special Forces Op had taught him there was nothing
he couldn't face and conquer.
But with one disappointed look, and the sparkle of a tear,
Mindy could reduce him to his pathetic, arrogant high-school
self, trying to bully his way through school and drink his
way through life.
He stood outside the hotel's door and wondered what kind of
traps Novus had set for him. He'd have preferred a
face-to-face confrontation, but he already knew the
publicity-shy Novus wouldn't do that.
There was a reason the terrorist wore a surgical mask in
every known photo. An excellent reason. And only a few
people knew what that reason was.
Yeah, he was walking into a trap. But Novus had baited it
with the only lure he couldn't resist.
His ex-wife.
All those thoughts swirled through his mind in the two
seconds it took for him to flex his fingers, retighten them
around the grip of his Sig Sauer, and take a deep breath.
Here goes.
He nudged the door another inch and slipped through.
The hotel lobby could have been lifted out of one of the
Western movies his old man had watched when he wasn't passed
out from cheap vodka.
When Deke stepped inside, eyeing the ornate desk and curved
staircase, glass crunched under his boot. Shattered prisms
from a broken chandelier.
Then something moved at the edge of his vision.
Startled, he swung around. His finger tightened on the trigger.
A raccoon. It scurried across the room, claws
clicking on the worn hardwood floor like faraway machine-gun
fire.
Deke's breath whooshed out and his trigger finger relaxed.
He took another step, eyeing the dark room beyond the arched
doorway. He figured it was the dining room.
What was the raccoon running from? He crossed the lobby and
angled around the arch so his back stayed to the wall.
Heavy curtains revealed only slivers of the late afternoon
sun. The smell of mildew and rotting wood tickled his
nostrils. He held his breath, resisting the urge to sneeze
as he moved silently across to the shrouded windows and
reached up to push the drapes apart. Too late, he saw the
flash and heard the report.
Something stung the curve of his cheek. He whirled, ready to
shoot, but whirling turned out not to be such a good idea.
Things got real hazy real fast. A fuzzy shadow loomed in
front of him. He aimed, but as hard as he tried, he couldn't
make his fingers hold on to the gun, and he couldn't make
his legs hold him up.
As the room tilted sideways, the haze before his eyes turned
to black.
Damn, he hated the waiting. He liked to be the one
making the phone calls. When he had to wait to be called, he
couldn't control who might be listening. He paced back and
forth in front of the big picture window, with its panoramic
view of the Black Hills, until he couldn't stand it any
longer. He yanked the blinds shut. He despised those
desolate looming mountains. He'd seen enough of them to last
him the rest of his life and beyond.
The prepaid cell phone hidden in his shaving kit rang.
Finally.
"Everything's in place here."
"No change here."
"There better be a change soon."
"I'm working on it. Do you have any idea of the level of
security around this place? It's tripled since—"
"Do you have any idea of the time constraints we're
facing?"
"I think I'm close—"
"You think? You'd better know! We 've only got one
chance. I'm guessing you remember what'll happen if you fail
me."
"Why all the mind games? It'd be a hell of a lot easier
to just go in and get it over with."
"Are you questioning my methods? Because you're not
indispensable. Nobody is."
Something soft rocked against his side, rousing him. His
mouth felt stuffed with cotton and his stomach clenched.
Beneath the nauseating smell of mildew and rotten wood, he
noticed a sweet, familiar scent.
He tried to push through the drowsiness, but whoever had
filled his mouth with cotton had put lead weights on his
eyelids. He wanted to turn over, but he was too tired.
The unmistakable supple firmness of a female body rocked
against him again. "Eee!"
"Mindy, sugar," Deke mumbled. "Move over."
Whoa. A sharp blade of reality sliced through his
mental fog. That wasn't right—on so many levels. For one
thing, his tongue wasn't working, so all he'd managed to do
was grunt unintelligibly.
"Eee, ake uk," she retorted.
What was she saying? Maybe she was dreaming. Maybe he
was.
"Okay," he whispered, smiling drowsily to himself. "You know
what happens when you don't move over." Anticipating her
giggles and kisses, he turned—or tried to.
He couldn't move.
He wasn't in bed. He sure wasn't in bed
with Mindy. That hadn't happened in a long, long time.
So where the hell was he?
More shards of reality ripped through his brain. The flash
of gunpowder. The biting sting in his cheek.
He forced his eyes open. It was dark. Totally dark.
Danger! His heart rate skyrocketed and his Special
Forces training kicked in.
Judging by the way his head wobbled like a bobble-head doll,
he figured he'd been drugged. He clenched his jaw and worked
to gather his thoughts.
The gunpowder. The sting. He'd been shot with a tranquilizer
gun. Ah, hell.
He bit down on his tongue, using the pain to clear his
brain. Giving in to drugs—or fatigue, or torture—in combat
rescue missions could be fatal. Not only to the rescuer, but
also to the innocents depending on him for their safety,
their protection, their very lives.
Before he could help anyone else, he had to assess his own
condition. He needed to take inventory.