“It’s locked,” he said. “Wanna give me a hand here, Shields?”
“One second,” she said, the furious clicking of a keyboard clattering in the background. “Almost there.”
The door came ajar, and Black grabbed the handle.
“Your voodoo with these security systems never ceases to amaze me,” he said in a hushed tone.
He pulled open the glass door and eased inside.
“All the hostiles are congregated in a room near the back on the right side of the hallway,” Shields said. “They’ve been making the rounds every fifteen minutes or so but just finished the latest one.”
“Roger that,” Black said as he crept past the front desk.
The loud voice of a man from the other side of the room startled Black as a monitor in the waiting area flickered to life.
“Welcome to TenTrack Industries,” the man said, “where the future is today.”
Black sighed in relief as he sank down with his back against the front desk.
“What the hell is that?” Blunt asked.
“It looks like some kind of welcome video,” Shields said.
Then she let out a slew of expletives.
“What is it?” Black asked.
“You’re about to have company,” Shields said.
Black scrambled behind the desk as he heard footfalls approaching his location.
“I thought we turned that damn thing off,” one of the guards groused.
“Me too,” the other man said. “Maybe you just moved the switch to motion control activation instead of—”
The conversation ended abruptly before the doors creaked opened.
“Be careful,” Shield said over the coms. “You’ve got two hostiles.”
Black smiled at his good fortune. Both guards in the same room as him and unaware of his presence.
Like shooting fish in a barrel.
Black rose and fired at the two men. He hit the first one in the head and the second guy in the neck. They both collapsed. Black put another round in each of them to ensure the job was completed before heading toward the back.
“We’ve got a problem,” Shields said.
“I don’t like the sound of that,” Black said.
“The third heat signature just left the building.”
“What are you trying to say?” he asked.
“It’s not the package,” Shields said.
“How many times do I have to tell you that her name is Morgan?” Blunt said with a growl.
Black raced toward the back and hit the door only to find it locked.
“Uh, Shields, I need a way out of here,” he said.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
Black stared at the contraption in the middle of the room with enough explosives to annihilate a small town.
“There’s a bomb in here, set to blow in one minute,” he explained.
“What’s the situation with the doors?” she asked.
“They all have a key pad along with a retinal scanner.”
“The retinal part is easy now,” she said.
“I need the other part thirty seconds ago,” Black said as he sprinted to the lobby.
He dragged one guard’s body over to the front door near the security panel.
“Still accessing,” she said.
“Please hurry. I’ve got thirty-five seconds remaining by my count.”
“Almost there,” she said. “Got it.”
She rattled off a long series of digits that she found on the TenTrack Industries mainframe, numbers designed to act as a master code. Once he finished that, a yellow light started blinking on the pad just below the scanner. Black hoisted up the guard’s body so his head was even with the device and then peeled back his eyelids. The machine on the wall whirred and beeped.
“Come on,” Black said.
A click released the lock and Black wasted no time, dropping the body and sprinting outside. He was only about twenty feet clear of the building before an explosion rocked the ground. The blast sent Black diving to avoid the heat and shrapnel that flew out of the front doors.
Black rolled to a stop and took cover behind a nearby truck. He glanced around the side of the building and saw a car racing out of the parking lot. Black took a few shots at the driver but didn’t hit him.
“Want the good news first or the bad news?” Black asked.
“If you don’t have Morgan, nothing you’re going to say is good news,” Blunt said over the coms.
“In that case, I’ll just spell it out for you,” Black said. “One of the guards got away, but Morgan is obviously still alive.”
“Like I said,” Black growled, “if you don’t have Morgan, there’s no good news. But at least you used her name this time.”
Black exhaled before hustling to his feet. Sirens wailed in the distance. He didn’t want to be around in five minutes when the place was crawling with local law enforcement officials.
* * *
BLUNT LOOKED AT SHIELDS before slamming his fist down on the table. “I thought you said that’s where she was,” he said as he glared at Shields, his lips quivering. “You assured me that—”
“I know you’re upset,” she said, “but I only promised you that the call you received which gave you proof of life was made from that location. They’ve obviously moved her.”
“Have they? Or have they already killed her? Are we going to hear in a few hours that Miami officials recovered Morgan’s body from the carnage of that explosion?”
“I hope not,” Shields said. “And I doubt that’s the play Sinclair would make. If your niece is dead, he has no leverage with you.”
“Then where is she?” Blunt asked. “We don’t have much time. If the president meets with that mastermind, we have no idea of knowing whether any decision Young makes in the future will be one that is made in the best interest of our country’s national security. If Young is compromised—”
“He’ll probably handle it like you have,” Shields said. “Look, you can’t beat yourself up about this or worry about what’s going to happen next. This mission has become intensely personal for you, but we can’t let that distract us from what we need to do next.”
“Which is what?”
“Find Morgan,” she said as she patted Blunt on the arm.
Moments later, Blunt’s phone buzzed with a call. He repeated the numbers on the screen to himself before answering.
“Yeah,” Blunt answered.
“Emotionless, I like it,” Sinclair said. “Your
