And a scenario—a catastrophic one—immediately popped into Tasha’s head. One in which Thomas had been badly injured and just managed to crawl back to the pod and through the bulkhead door, only to fall unconscious once inside.
She opened the door.
It was heavy, but she wrestled it ajar enough for her to peer out and up the stairs. The dim lights were still on but the landing was silent and empty. So she pulled the door even further open—enough for her to slip through.
But before she did that, she stopped again to listen for a moment, and again heard nothing. No labored breathing, no regular breathing.
God, did she even remember how to do CPR?
She shrugged off the blanket that she’d wrapped around her shoulders, and went out the door and up the stairs, as swiftly and silently as she could manage.
Thomas wasn’t lying on the landing, thank God. He wasn’t standing there, either. He wasn’t there at all.
But his rifle was.
It was on the concrete floor, close to the bulkhead door, as if he’d opened the hatch only to put the weapon inside. A baggie he’d used to carry extra ammo in his raincoat pocket was beside it.
Tasha felt the blood drain from her head so swiftly that she had to sit down, right there next to the rifle.
Because now other possible catastrophic scenarios flashed through her head.
He was dying, and he knew that he couldn’t make it inside, but he’d managed to give her this gun and these extra bullets.
But there was no blood anywhere. Not on the rifle, not on the floor, not on the baggie, not on the bulkhead.
So maybe he’d been spotted, was being chased, and was on the verge of being captured so he’d come back here to give her this weapon.
No, wait, that didn’t make sense. Protecting her—he’d told her just last night that he still saw himself mainly as her protector. If he was being chased, there was no way he’d lead his pursuers to this bomb shelter. He’d definitely run in a different direction, leading them away from her.
Unless...
Thomas had said there were around twenty men in that camp he’d discovered. It was one thing to evade a handful of wannabe commandos, but twenty? And if they were all closing in? Thomas was a SEAL, and SEALs were good, but no one was that good.
Tasha suddenly knew, quite clearly, what this rifle meant—what Thomas had done.
With that large of a group of men chasing him, his chances of evasion were less likely, although not impossible. Except, he knew that if he suddenly, mysteriously vanished—i.e. went through the hatch—those men would search this area hard until they found the bulkhead. And then Thomas and Tasha would be trapped. So instead, he’d dropped off this weapon, and now was purposely going out into the woods, unarmed.
But...
“Oh, hell no!” She pushed herself back to her feet and scrambled down the stairs to grab her jacket and her hat-towel, this time wrapping it around her throat like a scarf as she raced back up to the landing.
Outmaneuvering the small army of men wasn’t going to be enough. He’d look at the logistics and realize that he’d need to let those men catch him, so that they didn’t find the bulkhead.
This nightmare scenario kept spinning out—because it didn’t end there.
After he let them catch him, he’d try to bluff and tell them she’d died. They wouldn’t believe him, so they’d torture him to force him to reveal her hiding place. Which he’d eventually do, except he’d lie and intentionally mislead them, again, far away from her.
And when they didn’t find her, they would kill him.
Tasha picked up the rifle, scooped up the extra ammo, and popped open the hatch.
The admiral was bullshit.
Rio could hear it in the man’s clipped tone as he relayed the bad news over the phone.
“The young woman—Kayla Conway, she’s still back with the queen, at their safe location. But she says his name’s Jeff Willems. He got into an argument with the prince, who wanted to go back to the ski lodge and look for Tasha, but Willems refused. He did, however, agree to pose as Tedric and take the jet—I’m assuming he’s got a pilot’s license?” Francisco’s voice got slightly muffled as he no doubt turned to ask that question of whatever bearer of bad news was likely standing at attention in his office.
Back to louder: “Not that it matters, but yeah, he does.”
Back to muffled. “Keep him in police custody. One rich idiot floating loose is all I can handle.”
Back to louder: “Willems is gonna go into local lockup—he’s no longer our responsibility, thank God. Kayla—our twenty-something definitely inebriated source of intel—reported that the prince’s plan was to use his pal to make everyone believe that Tedric was flying back. Instead, the prince started driving. He’s alone, he’s armed—”
Oh, good. Rio glanced at Dave who sat shotgun in the SUV.
“—and he’s using Willems’s phone,” the admiral continued. “We’ve just tracked his GPS, so we know where he is right now—assuming Kayla’s not lying to us—but cell service has been spotty, and we expect to lose his signal again, soon. Details are being sent to you because—”
“Aw, hell, no,” Rio heard himself interrupt the admiral, so he quickly slapped on a “Sir,” even as he gripped the steering wheel more tightly.
“Yup,” Francisco grimly said. “You’re it, Rossetti. You and Patterson. You’re closest. And I need both of you on this, so don’t mess around. Find him, get him to Burlington—”
“But, sir, if this is just another diversion,” Rio started. This was going to take a solid twelve hours—if they were lucky. And it would take longer if they weren’t.
“I’ve seen a video interview with the girl,” the admiral said. “She’s a friend of Tasha’s, too—Tash likes her. And trusts her. She’s drunk, but it looks like liquid courage, so she could bring herself to ask for help. I think Tedric’s smart, but he’s not that smart. He’s got his buddy’s phone. Find the phone, we’ll find the prince. And if you haul ass, you can still intercept him before he leaves his vehicle and becomes harder to track, on foot in the goddamn mountains.”
“Tracking coordinates received, sir,” Dave reported, pulling open the paper map to have at the ready for when their SAT signal failed—which it would do, probably soon after they started moving toward those same goddamn mountains. “Out to the main road, then north,” he told Rio.
Rio jammed the SUV into gear and floored it. “Hauling ass, sir.”
“Keep me updated, and as tempting as it might be, do not kill the idiot, and do not let him get himself killed,” the admiral ground out, before he hung up.
“And... we just lost GPS,” Dave told Rio as they sped northward into the night. “But it’ll be back.”
“I fucking hate this,” Rio said.
Dave nodded. “I know.”
Chapter Twenty
Thomas was moving fast.
With a four man patrol hot on his heels, he had to be thinking fast, too. He had to be four steps ahead.
Mere evasion would’ve been easy.