“That display is visible from my house,” Lieutenant Burns—the junior lieutenant who would move into Chris’s position when he moved up to OIC—said. “I was going to have the team over for a barbecue, then stay and watch the show.”
Captain Huang nodded. “The technicians are legit. We’ve researched the contract thoroughly and the team slated to be on the barge during the display. None of them would throw away their life’s work for a payoff. But we do believe the barge is a target. The specs on the show—which we got from the planning committee an hour ago—say the show will be thirty-five minutes total, with the finale clocking in at seven minutes.”
“Analysts think they’ll wait for the finale?” someone asked.
“Seven minutes. Lord, what they could do under cover of that noise,” Kramer said.
“Do we think the display is the target or is it just a target?” Chris asked. “Because I don’t think Laskin would be content to hit a civilian target when the base is right here, and there are the two contractors with base access here and at Dam Neck.”
“We agree with your take, Lieutenant,” Huang said. “Either they’ll also go after the display itself, or they’ll use it as cover for the real target. In fact, we’re fairly certain this building is one of the primary targets.”
Several men shifted in their seats. Being targets was nothing new. They’d all been deployed to hot zones. It was different when it was on American soil, though. Chris—and Teague sitting next to him—knew that particular pain, but not in advance.
Not like this.
“We need to develop a plan to protect the firework display,” Commander Gleeson said. “Canceling it will tip our hand. We want to catch these guys.”
“The fireworks are set off from a barge,” Burns said. “It’s towed into position before the sun sets. But once the show starts, where are the pyrotechnicians? On the barge or on land?”
An analyst who must’ve spent the last few hours learning all there was to know about fireworks rose from her seat at the table, as a graphic appeared on the screen. “This barge has a platform for all the mortar rounds in precise order. A thirty-five-minute display requires a large platform. Two metal Conex boxes provide a barrier between the platform and the technicians, to protect them if something goes wrong—a mortar fails to launch and explodes on the barge, which is the nightmare scenario.”
“Why are they on the barge instead of launching the shells remotely?”
“This group likes manual launch so it can be timed to music on the radio. It’s impossible to sync a show with streaming music, given delays. Radio is…radio. No delay.”
“So we need inspectors watching every part of setup, and a team on the barge during the show,” a SEAL lieutenant from another team said.
“Yes. But we don’t want our presence to be visible. We want Kulik and Laskin to believe their plan is in motion. Undetected.”
It was the first real break they had since getting the names of the five conspirators who’d been coordinating with Kinder. But it wasn’t enough.
Laskin was coming for Little Creek. Chris knew it. Every person in this room knew it.
“What time is the finale supposed to start?” he asked.
“Sunset is just before 2030. The show is scheduled to start at 2050. The finale will begin twenty-eight minutes later at 2118.”
It was now just after one in the morning.
They had twenty hours until the bombs began bursting.
Kira was beyond thirsty. It was time to start exploring. Perhaps there was a spring or mold growing on the cavern walls.
Slime mold. Yum.
She unfurled from the ball she’d curled herself into and thought of the spider drone. How long had it been gone? Had it found an escape? Had it broken a leg or gotten stuck? Was it eaten by a bird?
She’d had a lot of time to think in the last few—hours? days?—and she was going to tell Leah if she ever got to meet her that the drone command should be changed to “E.T. Phone home.” Appropriate and fun.
When one faced the prospect of dying in a crypt next to the corpse of a Russian spy who’d pretended to be the long-lost step-nephew to a father who wasn’t really her bio dad, fun was the missing ingredient.
Well, that and food. Food was also a missing ingredient. Unless you count slime mold.
Kira did not count slime mold as food.
She sent a thought prayer to the tiny spider that traversed the blistering hot unknown surface world so she didn’t have to. Although she would, gladly, if she could. Even in the midday Maltese sun.
She wouldn’t even complain about the heat.
She considered starting a dialogue with Cousin Andre. Pull a Hamlet and find his head and ponder life and death. But his body was too fresh for touching. She was a fan of Shakespeare, but in this instance, she needed more E.T.
Flying bicycles. Hope and resurrection. A rescue from above that would take her from this alien landscape.
She discovered she wasn’t fully dehydrated because she still had tears. Damn, she really should have told Rand she loved him when she had the chance. At least she had the memory of his touch, and he would remember hers. How she’d traced the contours of his body, worshipping it like the work of art it was. Her love had been in her touch. He had to know that.
She’d sunbathed topless for him. That was something she’d never imagined she’d ever do. He made her forget the box she held herself in. Shy. Awkward. Anxious. She was none of those things with him. Rand made her feel like a Valkyrie. Like a siren. Valkyra.
God, but she wanted to be that person. For him. With him. There was something about his presence that drowned out all the little voices in her head that told her she was less than. She saw herself through his lens and liked what she saw.
Dammit. Reuben couldn’t take this from her.
She ignored her aches and pains and crawled across the uneven floor of the impossibly dark crypt. It was time to go down the stairs and see if she could find something to drink or something she could use to pry open the locked door.
Chapter Fifty-Six
