No more doubt. The boat that had taken the hostages landed in Cuba—a communist stronghold, a country supportive of terrorism and a transshipment point for the drug trade. She pulled out a map of Cuba and located the southeast part where the boat had dropped anchor. It was east of the U.S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay and south of the city of Baracoa in the middle of nowhere. The terrain was extremely mountainous and rugged, plenty of dangerous places for terrorists to hide. And with terrorist training camps in Cuba, such a remote area would be an attractive location, especially given the region’s history of guerilla warfare.
“Our plane won’t get us close enough and would draw too much attention. You have access to a boat, or will we need to supply that?” she asked.
He looked at Joe and without a word spoken between them, Kinkaid turned back to her, and said, “We got a boat. What else?”
“We’ll be linked to Garrett via tracking beacon and a SAT phone. We’ll have additional resources at our disposal. Garrett will make sure of that. And a backup team can be within range if we need them. We’ll also have GPS and spare batteries, but depending on how dense the jungle, we could still lose our satellite signal. That’ll mean we do it the old-fashioned way, using maps and compass. You good with that?”
“Fine.” He nodded. Although his expression softened, he was still all business.
“The terrain will complicate things, especially if we have to hunt them into the mountains.” She spoke more for her benefit than his and made a mental checklist of her supplies. “We’ll pack water in CamelBak hydration packs, but not nearly enough if this takes more than a few days. That would be too much weight to haul. If necessary, we’ll have to purify what we find. And we’ll have field rations to supplement what we can’t forage on our own. Tracking these bastards, we won’t have time for hunting.” She rested a hand on her knee and stared at him. “We brought extra food and water for you and Joe.”
“Good,” he said. “Sounds like you’ve got things covered, but Joe will stay with the boat and handle getting us out. Does that work?”
Alexa nodded her approval. “You never asked for weapons. Do you have what you’ll need?”
“Yeah. Plenty.”
“Make sure you and Joe are ready first thing. We’re leaving at dawn.” She leaned back in her chair. “We’ll pick you up. You’ll meet the team and take us to the boat.”
“We’ll be ready. Anything else?” He was done talking and was giving her cues it was time for her to leave.
“There is one more thing. And it’s not good news, I’m afraid,” she said. That got his attention. “Garrett is tracking a tropical storm that’s forming in the Atlantic. It may hit Cuba and mess with our timetable.”
Kinkaid dropped his chin and let out a sigh with his eyes shut. He looked tired. It was the first time she’d seen a chink in his machismo armor. Whoever Kate was, she was a lucky woman to have someone like Jackson Kinkaid as a dark guardian angel. Lucky, that is, if you discounted being abducted by terrorists.
Kinkaid’s moment of vulnerability came and went.
“Shit happens. We’ll deal with it.” He stood and waited for her to do the same, not bothering with idle chitchat or pleasantries. He’d provided his part of good intel. Now he doled out the bum’s rush. No mixed signals. He wanted her gone.
He turned out the lights and opened the door for her to leave. When she walked by him, he touched her arm, and the scent of his warm skin mixed with soap carried on the faint breeze.
“I want to…” His handsome face was outlined by a streetlamp behind her. “…thanks for everything, Alexa. What you’re doing…I won’t forget it.”
“Let’s hope you still feel that way when this is over.” She touched his cheek and stared into those green eyes but didn’t linger. She walked away and heard him close the door behind her.
Jackson Kinkaid might have distracted her by the sudden display of intimacy, but it didn’t stop her from wondering what else he was hiding. When it came to details of their mission, he was very forthcoming. Yet so much had gone unsaid. Gut instinct told her that.
Whatever he was hiding, she had a feeling she wouldn’t like it.
After Alexa left the motel room, Kinkaid collapsed onto the mattress and stared at the ceiling. The room was spinning, and he shut his eyes. When that didn’t help, he opened them again to find Joe staring down at him.
“This isn’t gonna work, Jackson. You can barely stand,” his friend protested. “How are you gonna tackle mountains in Cuba and a fuckin’ hurricane?”
“Like I said, I’ll pull myself out if things go bad.” After Joe backed off, he propped pillows behind him and sat up. “I’m gonna need pills from your doc. Antibiotics, no pain meds. I gotta think straight. Can you swing that?”
Joe pointed a finger. “Yeah, but I’m not happy, just so you know.”
“Duly noted. And thanks.”
His friend got on the phone to arrange for the boat and the antibiotics. Kinkaid shut his eyes again, knowing his mind wouldn’t let him sleep. He had too much to do before dawn.
Most of all, he worried for Kate.
Kate had been right before, when she said she was surprised he remembered the day they met at the hospital. In truth his memory back then was not much more than Swiss cheese, riddled with holes that only merged together in a jumbled mess. What he had recalled might have been more attributable to what others had told him later, but one memory held firm.
He had remembered the heat of the sun on his face and the sudden rush of coolness when her shadow blocked the light and she sat next to him. She was a soothing touch when he needed someone to care. The world had carried on without him in shades of black and white—absent any color and mind-numbingly empty—until one day he heard a woman’s voice.
She had engaged his muddled brain, even after he had given up.
Later, he learned that she sought him out each day. She read to him and talked with him as if they were old friends. It hadn’t mattered that their conversations were one-sided. Little by little, he began to listen to her. And one day, he said the first words he’d spoken in a long while.
It had been a start.
There were days since then that he wondered if her efforts had been worth it. His cynical nature made for a tenacious adversary. But as relentless as Kate had been with him back then, Kinkaid wouldn’t give up on finding her now. In his mind, her life tipped the scales in importance when compared to his. Any lifeline she’d given him years ago, maybe it had been for a reason.
He owed her his life, such as it was. The least he could do was return the favor, even if it meant risking any future he had.
Southeast Cuba
With the strain of the day, Sister Kate felt her body shutting down. Her throat was parched and her mouth bone dry. She had climbed rugged mountain trails through a dense, bug-infested jungle. And despite the stress her body had endured, she noticed her sweating had stopped and muscle cramps in her legs and back had grown more painful.
She knew the symptoms. Dehydration had hit her hard. And yet her captors had no mercy. Only now, after a full day of climbing, had they gotten any water at all. She shared her tin cup of water with the children, giving them the rest after she’d taken a small sip and held the moisture in her mouth.
Hunger made her stomach growl as she watched the men eat in front of them at the campfire. On the trail they had discarded their masks and she’d been shocked to see their young faces. Most were under twenty. They looked Middle-Eastern, but she had no more understanding than that. Dark-skinned boys with the hardened eyes of hostile men, obsessed with ideologies she would never comprehend.
Kate held the children. Listening to the sounds of their breathing, she knew Andre and Daniel were asleep while Faye and Joselyne kept their eyes on the men near the fire. They clutched at her tunic with their small hands. Firm, tense grips. She felt their bodies tremble and could do nothing about it. The ordeal was wearing them down,
