Fallen Angel (20 page)

MOYER WASN'T THERE FOR
her. He was lying on his back in wet grass in a forgotten, empty part of eastern Siberia. He should be home. He should have been there to protect his daughter, to hold his wife, to guide his son. But no. One more mission. One more sudden trip to a place no one has heard of to do work no one will know about.

"Daddy! Daddy help!"

The words were real. They didn't enter his mind through his ears. It was his imagination that uttered the words; it was his imagination that painted vivid pictures of Gina being held in some dank place, being harmed—

He wouldn't allow the thought; wouldn't give it a place to grow roots in his gray matter.

Moyer moaned and shut his eyes. In the course of his service, he had been shot at, barely escaped capture by swimming to a submarine, fought off Afghan rebels who outnumbered the team ten to one, endured a situation-close bombing in which explosives were dropped a few feet over his head, made high-altitude jumps, disarmed bombs, lost men . . . The list was too long to recite. Of all the wounds and injuries he received, this hurt the most; of all the terrifying situations he faced none undid him as the message he just read.

"Oh, God, oh God, oh God." Moyer opened his eyes to the sky above, hoping God would answer. Instead, he saw the eagle and the powered parachute—

He blinked. "What the—?"

"Eric . . . Look man, I don't know what to say."

Rich was staring at the ground, fiddling with a long blade of grass.

"Shaq?"

"They'll find her, man. We gotta believe that."

"Shaq, look up."

"Looking up is good, Boss. I mean—What?"

Moyer pointed to the sky. "Check me. Is that what I think it is?"

Rich craned his neck. "Well, I'll be . . ." He reached for his binoculars and trained them skyward. "It's a powered parachute of some kind. It looks like a small dune buggy hanging from the silk."

J. J.'s voice came over the earpiece. "Shaq, Colt. We've spotted some airborne craft. They're landing on the other side of the river, one, maybe two klicks from the village."

Rich keyed his mike. "We see 'em, Colt. Any idea who they belong to?"

Moyer reached for his binoculars and, still on his back, pointed them at the small craft. With the unaided eye, Moyer could see three parafoils. Through the high-magnification tactical binoculars, Moyer could see what looked like two men in a dune buggy.

J. J.'s voice came over the earpiece again. "I can't be sure, Shaq, but I have a good idea."

"You gonna share it or make me guess?"

"I'm eyeballing one chute now. Two men aboard . . . aboard whatever that thing is. One is packing what looks like a QBZ-95. If I'm right, then those guys are a long ways from home."

"So are we, Colt. Bottom line it for me."

"A QBZ-95 is an assault rifle. A Chinese assault rifle."

CHAPTER 23

MAJOR SCALON SHIFTED HIS
eyes from one corner of the large display screen in the communications room at Offutt Air Force Base to the image of the nation's highest-ranking civilian. The large screen was electronically divided to allow Scalon and Captain Tim Bryan to see the other members of the teleconference. Facing them were the larger-than-life images of Colonel MacGregor and Admiral Gary Gaughan.

"Telemetry shows atmospheric insertion in three, two, one." Scalon did his best to look and sound interested but unemotional. It was a hard thing to do. Angel-12 was his baby and it was about to plunge to earth in a fiery display, be gutted by Moyer's team, then destroyed. Life wasn't fair. Of course, he was safe and warm in STRATCOM. Moyer and his men had a much rougher go of things.

"How long before they can see it?" Huffington asked. The audio system made it sound as if he were in the room.

"Three minutes, sir. People in the UK, the Baltic states, and much of Asia will be able to see it but only for a moment. They'll call it a meteor."

"And it's on track to hit the bull's-eye?" Admiral Gaughan said.

"It should be close."

"Close. What do you mean close, Major?"

Tim answered. "Begging the admiral's pardon, but no one can predict with great accuracy where an object from space will fall. We have data from several hundred space junk reentries so the coordinates we gave, we gave with high confidence."

"I detect a 'but' coming." Gaughan leaned closer to the camera.

"But, factors such as object tumble and the physical shape can change things. We have good photos of the damage done by the Chinese attack satellite and have factored that portion in, but chaos theory—"

"Chaos theory, Captain?" The president looked suspicious.

"Yes, sir, it's the old story about a butterfly in Africa beating its wings and through a long chain of events, causing it to rain in New Jersey."

"Meaning?" the admiral said.

Scalon took over. "Meaning, Admiral, we've accounted for everything we can, but we can't account for everything. Still, I believe Angel-12 will land right where we say it will."

The phone on the table behind which the two Air Force officers stood beeped. Scalon snatched up the receiver. "Scalon." He listened. "Feed it in." Scalon turned to the tech sergeant operating the controls of the video conference. "Recon is sending us taped images. Put it on the screen, Sergeant."

"Yes, sir."

The bottom right quadrant of the screen lit up. A time code on the video revealed the image was less than five minutes old.

"What do you have?"

"One moment, Mr. President." Scalon quickly added, "If you don't mind, sir."

Scalon watched the blurry images of five men and a truck on the side of a large hill not far from a sinuous river. Something much too large to be a bird swept by. The satellite operator, perhaps alerted by the quick movement, pulled back on the zoom. Three powered parafoils came into view.

"Mr. President, our men have company."

"I GOT SMOKE," HAWKEYE
said. "Looks like a jetliner of some kind trailing black smoke."

Moyer pushed off the ground and stood. "You hear that?"

Rich turned his head to the side. "I hear a distant roar. Sounds like . . . like . . . jets."

Moyer snapped his head around. Two dark objects were approaching from the northwest. He raised his glasses. "PAK FA T-50. Russian stealth."

"Not good." Rich raised his glasses, then keyed his mike. "Incoming aircraft. Take cover. Repeat, take cover." He put a hand on Moyer's shoulder. "We need to beat feet, Boss."

"I don't think they're here for us. They banked south. Isn't that where Hawkeye saw the airliner?"

"Roger that. I still think we should spread out and hit the ground."

Moyer removed the binoculars from his eyes and moved up the hill to an area of low-lying brush. He and Rich crawled beneath the cover. Moyer crawled forward to the edge of the foliage and took a visual bead on the jets. Rich inched to his side.

"Still got 'em?"

"Yeah, they're definitely chasing the airliner."

"You don't suppose the big plane and the Chinese guys are connected."

Moyer looked at Rich. "You mean that they somehow drove their toys out of the plane?"

"We've done stranger things."

Moyer had to agree. "So our Chinese friends haven't given up on our satellite."

"They did go through a lot of trouble and expense to knock it out of the sky and try to steal it. Who can blame them?"

"I can."

"Boss, Colt. Incoming target off our left, ten o'clock high."

Rich shook his head. "Man, for a backwoods area, there sure is a lot going on."

Moyer searched the area J. J. indicated. A white streak crossed the sky on a descending angle. He tried to follow the streak with his binoculars, but it was difficult to track. He did get enough of a view to know he was watching Angel-12 become a Fallen Angel.

It hit in the distance, sending a tremor through the ground. Moyer guessed the impact area to be a half-dozen klicks away. "Junior. Get on the horn and let the folks at home know we have earth-fall, then stand by. They should be able to give us an exact fix."

"Got it, Boss."

"Boss, Hawkeye. The airliner is continuing south. The T-50s have taken escort positions. The airliner continues to descend, but its rate of fall has decreased. All three aircraft are moving away from us. They're almost out of sight."

"I'm starting to like that kid, Boss."

Moyer rolled to his side and stared at his friend.

"What? I shouldn't like the new guy?"

"Shaq, I may be compromised. My brain is mush; my emotions are boiling over. You may have to take command."

Rich moved his head back and forth. "No way. You have always led this team. I know I questioned your decisions a few times, but you were always right."

"Shaq, I'm not kidding. If need be, you push me out of the way. The mission is too important. Don't let me screw things up. Don't let me slow things down."

"No matter how bad things get, you can go on instinct better than anyone can with every brain cell firing at once."

Tears rose in Moyer's eyes; something that had never happened on mission. "Shaq, I'm giving you an order."

Rich looked angry and heartbroken at the same time. "Yes, Boss."

Moyer nodded and wiped a tear from his face. In the last few minutes, he saw a disabled craft, Russian fighter jets, a Chinese Spec Ops team, and all he could think about was his daughter. Every action required additional focus. His emotions swung like a pendulum. One other thought percolated in his mind:
I am no longer fit to serve.

CHAPTER 24

GINA'S HEAD HURT. HER
eyes hurt. Her stiff neck throbbed. The space between her shoulder blades cramped. Her vision was blurred and a gray mist seemed to fill the space in front of her.

More pains: her fanny, her feet, her hips. She closed her eyes, then opened them again. It was dim.

What time was it?

Where was she?

Thoughts, questions, confusion swam in her head. She felt ill. For a moment she was certain her stomach would empty.

She leaned forward. No, she couldn't lean forward. Something held her in place; something wrapped around her chest. Another restraint over her bare thighs kept her from rising.

Her mind began to clear and with it, her vision. She shook her head as if trying to fling the fog from her brain. The action made her head ache and she tried to bring a hand to her temples. Her arm wouldn't move. More restraints.

Bare thighs?
The thought returned, this time with a truckload of emotion. She looked down. Lit by a small incandescent bulb—a bulb similar in size to a refrigerator bulb dangling from wires overhead—Gina's legs came into focus. They were bare. Hadn't she been wearing jeans? Yes. She was sure of it. She put the pants on before walking to Pauline's house. Surveying herself, she learned her thighs were not the only thing bare. Her blouse was gone. Gina sat in a dark, closet-sized room wearing nothing but her underwear.

Had she been . . . ? She couldn't complete the question. The thought was too horrible, too frightening. Tears rose. Her limbs began to shake. The nausea she'd been fighting climbed in her throat.

I'm alive. Focus on that. I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive.
She inhaled deeply. Then again. And again. Her stomach settled; the tears trickled but the flood did not come.

I'm alive. That's a good thing. I hope.

She didn't feel beaten, couldn't detect any sensation she had been molested. It might be a false comfort, but she would take it.

As her thinking grew sharper, her fear grew. Who would do this to her? Why would they do it?

Panic is everyone's enemy.
She heard her father say that several times. He learned that in the Army. "I had a drill sergeant who made us recite that fifty times a day. 'Panic is everyone's enemy. Panic will get you killed. Worse, it will get the men in your unit killed. If you panic, you die.'" Her dad smiled. "That may be the greatest bit of wisdom the Army ever taught me. Calm thinking beats out screaming like a Girl Scout every time."

I will not panic. I will not panic. I will think. I will be calm.

She repeated those words until she beat the fear back. What else did her father teach her? Why hadn't she listened more?

His voice became almost audible again. "Don't deny fear; use it. The man who denies fear is a fool; the man who uses fear is its master." He was talking to Rob then. It was two or three years ago. At the time it was funny. He sounded like a teacher in a kung fu movie.

Okay, I'm afraid. I admit it. But I am fear's master
. It sounded good, but the thing she most wanted to do was cry and scream for help. She wanted her father, needed her mother. Still, she remained calm despite the storm of terror lashing her insides.

Gina did what she was good at: compartmentalization. In her mind, there was a room for school, one for family, one for friends, and one for herself. Neat. Tidy. She overheard her mother bragging to a friend: "The only thing more organized than Gina's room is Gina's brain."

Use that. Think. Think. Think.

She drove back the persistent urge to panic by cataloging her situation. She was in a chair. An old-looking dining room chair with arms. Oak. Nylon ties bound her wrists to the arms, not so tightly as to cut off circulation. That meant something: They were worried about hurting her.

She could feel the same kind of nylon ties at her ankles. A canvas belt bound her thighs and a similar one was across her chest, just above the bottom of her ribs, again not so tight as to restrict her breathing. They wanted her alive.

There wasn't much to see in the room. Directly across from her was a metal door with a wired-in glass window in it, similar to what they had in some rooms at school and in hospitals. A dingy, white pull-down shade attached to the other side of the door kept her from seeing through the glass.

A vague light reflected off the glass in the door. It was the shape of a rectangle set on its short end. A window. There was a window behind her, but the glass wasn't clear. She tried to turn and face it but couldn't. The chair wouldn't move. She didn't know how, but the chair was anchored to the floor. She suspected brackets of some kind.

The floor was concrete; the ceiling, plaster. While examining the ceiling she noticed something. A small, black cylinder was mounted above the door, where ceiling met wall. She blinked several times, then strained her eyes trying to focus her attention. A lens. A camera. A video camera. Next to it was a small white speaker.

She was being watched.

Next her gaze traveled along the baseboard and lower part of the wall. Two things struck her. First, everything looked new; second, there were no electrical outlets. The room had been designed for her. What did a captive need with outlets?

She paused in her thinking and fear filled the void. No matter how much she tried to act like an adult, to follow the firm, even attitude exhibited by her father, she couldn't. She wasn't her father, hadn't been Army trained. She was fourteen, just starting her teen years. Some days she was more little girl than young woman.

Although Gina willed herself not to, she began to cry, and crying turned to weeping and weeping to sobbing. She could only whisper one word:

"Mommy."

DESPITE THE COOL AIR
outside, it was stuffy in the FedEx truck. The men returned to their seats. Lev listened from the driver's seat. He kept wiping at his mouth, a clear sign he was jonesing for a drink. Moyer couldn't bring himself to feel sorry for the man.

"Okay, ladies, listen up." Moyer's eyes felt full of sand, his ribs had turned to concrete, and the skin around his chest constricted like a straitjacket. "I'm only going to say this once. I doubt I could say it twice." He dropped his gaze, waiting for the words to line up in formation. "You know about Gina . . . the situation with Gina. Naturally, I'm having trouble thinking about anything else. But we still have a mission. Other lives depend on us. We have brave men to rescue."

He leaned back on the small, anchored chair. "Shaq is under orders to take over the mission if I falter, if for any reason I become more detriment than help. If that moment comes, you will obey him as you obey me. There will be no argument; there will be no discussion; there will be no hesitancy. Is that understood?"

"Boss—"

"I asked a question. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Boss." They spoke in unison.

"Good. Now let's get down to it. We have to assume the Chinese air circus that just landed is after the same thing we are. It can't be anything else. We also know a group of Russian dissidents have taken the surviving original Spec Ops team captive. We have to assume they've tortured the men and that one of them cracked. If so, then we may be facing a bunch of armed Russians too. There isn't anything I like about this mission."

Moyer continued. "If we get in trouble, then we are on our own. We're too deep in country. We can't call in air support, can't call for artillery, and can't call for an extraction team. It's been a tough trip getting here; it's about to get a whole lot worse. Are we clear on that?"

Another chorus. "Clear, Boss."

"Junior, get me a map on Connie."

"On it, Boss." A moment later Pete handed the device to Moyer.

"Lev, I see several small towns along the road beyond Nov Arman. Are you familiar with them?"

"No, but they are probably farm settlements like this one."

"Would our truck stand out?"

"People would notice it, but I know deliveries are made this way. I checked that out before I arranged for the truck."

"Really, FedEx delivers all the way out here." J. J. sounded skeptical.

"Yes, young man, they do. So does UPS. Not often, but at least once every couple of weeks."

"All right then." Moyer made eye contact with his men. "Are we good to go?"

"Hooah!"

"Lev, kick it in gear. The Chinese are making ground on us."

"Through the backwoods. We'll use the roads."

"Fine by me. We have a package to pick up."

GINA WAS UNCERTAIN HOW
long she had been crying, but the tears ceased coming, even though the scorching fear still raged and the black despair still blanketed her. Her body ached from the physical exertion of sobbing. She could feel mucus hanging from her upper lip.

Desperate, she pulled against the nylon straps binding her wrists to the chair. The sharp edges dug into her skin. Blood began to ooze.

Despite the pain, she tried again, hoping that if the strap wouldn't give, the arm of the dining room chair would. Then she noticed the threaded rod that ran from the chair's arm to the solid oak seat. She pushed her right arm out as much as she could and saw the round, smooth top of the long bolt. It had been countersunk deep enough in the arm that Gina's arm didn't rest directly on it. They thought of everything. That realization frightened her all the more. Intelligent, calculating bad guys were more dangerous than simpleminded hoods. At least they were in the movies.

Panic welled up in her. She pulled at the bindings, shook her arms and legs, moved in any way she could on the impossible hope something would give way.

"You will only hurt yourself."

She froze. A voice. From overhead. She looked up. A small, round, perforated metal cover painted the same color as the ceiling was situated just a short distance from the dangling incandescent bulb.

The voice infuriated her. She pulled at the straps again trying to free herself. More blood.

"If you want to feel pain, I can arrange it."

"Who are you?" The question erupted as a scream.

The soiled shade on the other side of the window snapped up. Even through the door Gina could hear it smack the top of the door.

She gasped.

Through the glass she could see a figure. His face was covered by a black knit mask. Not even his eyes could be seen. It was like looking at a three-dimensional shadow, solid, thick, animated.

The man—she assumed it was a man because of the voice she heard a few moments before and because of the observer's size.

"Let me go."

He opened the door and stepped inside as casual as a man entering his own home. "No."

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because I can."

The voice was deep and smooth, FM radio smooth.

"I want to go home." Gina jerked at the restraints, which dug deeper into her flesh.

"Of course you do. That's the idea."

The observer moved closer, walking around Gina, circling her. The motion made her think of a shark. He stopped behind her. She turned her head but he remained out of view.

"What are you doing?"

"Look up, Gina. Look into the camera."

"How do you know my name?"