He nodded.
Karie and four members of her team positioned themselves in the smoke a few feet from the door. A sixth man stood next to the handle.
“Everyone ready?” Karie asked.
The men standing with her raised their guns, each pointing at a different target they could see with their special gear. Karie lifted her own pistol.
“On three. One. Two. Three.”
As she spoke the last word, the man at the door pulled it open, and the five holding guns opened fire.
“Hold,” Karie said three seconds later, but it was unnecessary. None of them had had to take more than two shots. The guards, unable to see the shooters because of the smoke, had no idea they were being targeted.
With Karie still leading, Murphy and the strike team entered the detention area, the last through shutting the door to keep the excess smoke from billowing in.
Karie pulled her goggles off and looked at Murphy. “Which one?”
“Over here. Number eleven.” He led her to the door of cell eleven. “It’s open.”
“Wait here,” she told everyone, and pulled the door open.
Olivia sat on the edge of her bed, watching the cell door. For the longest time it remained closed, but she was patient. She knew these kinds of things took time.
The question running through her mind was who, exactly, was coming. She knew for sure someone was. She’d been left a message telling her that much.
When she heard the guard standing outside her cell slam against the wall and slide to the floor, she allowed herself a smile, but when the door opened a moment later, her face was once more neutral.
The light from the outer area was brighter than it was in the cell, so at first all she could see was the silhouette of a woman. It wasn’t until the door closed again that her visitor’s face emerged from the darkness.
“Hello, Karie,” Olivia said.
“Olivia.” Karie took a few tentative steps into the room, then stopped. “Have…have they treated you well?”
“Three meals, a bed, TV when they’re feeling nice. Well enough, I guess.”
The women silently studied each other.
“So,” Olivia said. “Who sent you? The directorate? Dr. Karp?”
“Dr. Karp is dead.”
Olivia cocked her head. “When?”
“Last spring.”
“NB7?”
Karie’s brow furrowed slightly. “Yes. How did you know?”
Olivia shook her head like it wasn’t important. So the help she gave Ash
“I’m…no longer with the Project.” Karie gestured at the door behind her. “None of us are.”
It wasn’t often that Olivia could be surprised, but she was now. “So, you’re here to….”
“Once you were gone, the Project lost its most important voice. We all mourned your death. Some of us more than others. Then, a few months ago, word got around that you were still alive. We thought the directorate would immediately attempt a rescue, but they did nothing. There were several of us who found that unacceptable, and decided to do something on our own.” She held out her hand. “So we’ve come to get you out. After that, whatever you want to do, we’ll follow.”
“You sure about that?”
“One hundred percent.” There was no hesitation.
Olivia took Karie’s hand and pulled herself up. “Then I guess it’s time to go.”
9
Pax was waiting next to an old station wagon at the Ranch’s private airfield when the jet carrying Ash and his kids rolled to a stop and the door opened. Ash zipped up his jacket and scooted his kids toward the exit.
“Hey, Uncle Pax,” Brandon said as he bounded down the stairs. He was starting to grow out of the hugging phase, but allowed Pax to give him a hearty handshake.
“How ya doin’, Brandon? Great to see you.”
Josie was next.
“My God, girl. Your dad’s going to have to lock you up soon to keep the boys away,” Pax said as he gave her a hug.
She scoffed and shook her head, but her dad, who was following right behind her, knew she loved every word of it.
Pax held his hand out to Ash. “Good to see you, Captain.”
“You, too.”
Ash had tried for a while to get Pax out of the habit of calling him Captain, but it had been less than successful. Now Ash barely noticed.
Once Tom and Pat secured the luggage to the station wagon’s roof rack, all six of them jammed inside.
As they rode to the Lodge, Ash asked, “How long do you think we’re going to be here?”
Pax shook his head. “Oh, I don’t know. That would be-”
“-a Matt question?” Ash finished for him. It was one of Pax’s stock answers.
“If you knew that, why did you ask me?”
Ash shrugged. “I’m hoping one of these days you’ll actually tell me something.”
The older man looked over, his brow furrowed, and they both chuckled.
After a few seconds of quiet, Ash said, “Seriously, the kids have school, you know? I don’t want them missing too much.”
“Don’t worry. Rachel’s lined up someone who will make sure they don’t fall behind.”
“That doesn’t sound like you’re planning on this being a short stay.”
“Didn’t say that. A little help never hurts, no matter how much time’s involved.”
Pax was a master at playing the runaround game when he wanted to, so Ash decided it was best to wait until he saw Matt.
“I thought there’d be more snow,” Brandon said.
Ash glanced outside. Here and there were patches of the dirty white stuff, but most of the ground was bare.
“It’s a little late this year,” Pax told him. “But don’t worry, we’re supposed to get some in the next day or two.”
Brandon leaned forward. “Really? If we’re still here, can we have a snowball fight?”
Pax scrunched up his face. “This time of year, snow’s usually not wet enough to make a snowball.”
“What do you mean, wet enough? It’s frozen water.”
“You’ll see.”
Soon the main part of the Ranch came into view. Closest and just to the left was the dormitory. It was two stories tall, with stone surrounding the bottom and pine above that. When Ash had stayed there the first time he was brought to the Ranch, he’d felt like he was the only one in the whole building. This time he could see half a dozen people outside near the main door, and more through windows of some of the rooms.
Beyond was the Lodge. It made the dorm look like an outhouse-five stories aboveground, and four below that Ash knew of. With a bit of snow still clinging to the shaded spots in the valleys of the massive roof, the Lodge looked even more like it should be sitting at the base of a ski run instead of here in the middle of…
Well, Ash still didn’t know where the ranch actually was. Colorado or Wyoming was his best guess. The nearby mountains in the west looked very much like the Rockies, but every time he’d flown in or out of the Ranch, the automatic shades had been closed on the jet’s windows during most of the flight.
