In Between Dreams (27 page)

Rodney grabbed Daniel’s arm forcefully to pull him away from Bailey. Daniel wouldn’t budge. “You’re going to freak out the kid,” Rodney mumbled harshly.

“She should be freaked out,” Daniel said, and looked directly at her. “This is real life, Bailey. You deserve to know that. If we don’t save these people, there might not be any hope.” Daniel seemed to be hyperventilating. Bailey covered her mouth in shock; his reaction was incredibly uncharacteristic.

“Shut up, Daniel,” Rodney barked.

Daniel turned to Rodney, his breathing erratic. Bailey gulped as Daniel’s eyes watered. “
You
shut up, Rodney. She’s my—”

Rodney slapped Daniel across the face. Bailey let out a high-pitched noise and put her hands over her mouth. She had never seen Rodney physical with anyone. “This is why I didn’t want you coming here. It’s too personal for you,” Rodney said in a rough voice.

Daniel turned to Rodney slowly, his hand over his cheek, his mouth open in shock.

“Don’t give me that look. You needed it.”

Daniel dropped his hand from his face and gave Rodney a curt nod. “Yeah,” he breathed. “I was out of line.”

“Apologize to the kid,” Rodney said, and pointed his thumb at Bailey. “I’ll meet you in the coffee shop.”

As Rodney walked away, Daniel turned to Bailey. “I’m not going to apologize, Bales.”

“I know,” Bailey murmured.

“How’d you know that?”

“You never apologize.”

Bailey pulled her thoughts out of the memory. She looked at Sam, who nodded along to what Halene said.

“Okay.” Sam hung up the phone. Bailey’s sobs were now barely whimpers. “Halene is putting together a plan,” he said, nodding positively. “It’s going to be okay. We’re going to get them out of this.”

She silently thanked God for Sam and his ability to comfort her.

Hui handed Bailey a paper bag. She grabbed it with one hand and put it to her mouth. By the time the bag was to her mouth, she no longer needed it. She dropped it and looked at Sam.

Bailey’s cheeks were wet with tears. She had bags under her eyes. She looked exhausted and hopeless. Her breathing was calmer, though still shaky. “O-okay,” Bailey stuttered.

Sam put his hand on either side of Bailey’s face and wiped the tear tracks from her cheeks. She stared past him, still trying to pull herself together. Sam stood up and offered his hand to Bailey to help her up.

“Do you know any old friends in Hong Kong?” Sam asked Hui. “Anyone who would be willing to help us get an innocent woman out of an awful situation?”

“Who did you say girl was?” Hui asked with his eyebrow raised.

Sam explained in Mandarin. Hui knew exactly who he was talking about. “I know what we need do.”

Bailey and Sam sat down on the couch, and Hui explained every piece of the new plan. They listened intently, and Bailey took notes for Halene. Planning helped Bailey get on the right track. She felt useful and vowed not to let herself fall apart again.

“It’s four in morning now,” Hui explained. “If we hold until midnight, Arlene be here. We have our guys too, and we able do this.” The
fact that Hui butchered Halene’s name uniquely every time he tried to pronounced it might have been funny had the situation not been so dire.

“What do you think?” Sam asked Bailey. “You think it sounds okay?”

“I think it’s the closest thing we have to a real chance,” Bailey whispered. Knowing they had something comforted Bailey. But knowing it was their only chance terrified her. She took in a ragged breath. “Let’s get to work.”

nineteen.

B
ailey, Sam, and Hui spent the next eighteen hours making plans, talking over options, and bringing the needed resources and people into the group. They took turns attempting to sleep, Bailey slept the least amount. It was strange waking up in Sam’s arms in Seattle knowing that his consciousness was in China. It couldn’t be. It was his body, but it wasn’t him. He was still in China, where he’d been when she went to sleep.

Knowing the reality of the consciousness transfer process enabled Sam and Bailey to move more freely between the two locations. They still had questions, more questions than they could count. But the deep dive into the minutia would have to wait until Mei and Daniel were safe. If Daniel died in China, where would he actually be? Would his consciousness die with him? Bailey supposed Halene knew, but the duality of it was too new to understand the complexities that were still hidden.

Bailey thought of Rodney, her mentor in the dream world. He had known the truth but chose not to disclose it. Was he trying to protect her? If he was, from what? All of these thoughts brought up emotions that only clouded the already chaotic situation.

One thing seemed clear. Time was not altered. They were in China in the same time continuum. As Bailey thought back over the missions, that time concept seemed to line up. She would be in Seattle in the late afternoon and in China in the early morning of the next day.

Hui’s value had really shown through. It was amazing to them how resourceful he had become. He seemed to be totally vested in the
mission now. Before, when Daniel was calling the shots, he helped but only to a point. He had overcome his fear and wanted to help the group. He too had questions. But he was going to do his best to get them where they needed to go, which was in the basement of the apartment building they were in. He helped Sam and Bailey with multiple connections that turned the possibility of the mission from a possible positive outcome to a probable one.

The biggest unknown were Daniel’s and Mei’s conditions. If Daniel was able to convince 14K that he worked alone, it would minimize the amount of concern the gang would have on a second attempt to get to Mei. Daniel would surely have told them that his death would trigger a response from his group. The problem was, there was no way of knowing if he was alive. Hui tried to get some current intelligence, but as of yet, his information was days’ old.

It was almost ten p.m. when Halene and Katherine got to the apartment. They were wet from the rain and had stern looks on their faces. Sam and Bailey were in the apartment alone. Hui had left a couple hours earlier. Daniel had been missing for over twenty-four hours.

“I’m so sorry I never told you the truth,” Halene said as soon as she spotted them. She reached and hugged them both. “I know you have questions, and we’ll all have a long talk after we get Mei and Daniel back.” Bailey and Sam knew that getting into a Q and A right now wasn’t a possibility.

Katherine stood idly by, watching the exchange. She knew she needed to stay arm’s length away. She didn’t want to hurt or confuse the situation any further. She felt the need to apologize to Bailey for being so blunt with her in Paris. Katherine didn’t realize Bailey was so blind to the reality of these missions. Still though, Katherine was glad she was honest with her. Katherine truly believed it was what Bailey needed to hear.

Bailey shook her head, tears filling her eyes again. “It’s okay. I don’t understand it completely. Not yet. But at least I know there is something to understand.”

“Daniel and I will explain everything to you,” Halene said, and looked at Sam. “Both of you, I promise.” She moved her gaze from
Bailey to Sam, nodding to both in a sort of unsigned contract to tell all she knew, when the time was right.

Bailey felt her nose tingle and a tear fall down her cheek. “So he knows.” Her voice was riddled with oncoming sobs. “He knows this is real?” Bailey knew that Daniel must have caused her to go back to Seattle midmission. But she was convinced he had pulled her and Sam out for reasons yet obscure.

“He was trying to protect you, Bailey,” Sam said, trying to comfort her by placing his hand gently on her shoulder. Bailey sidestepped away from Sam, moving her torso so his hand fell away. She didn’t want to be comforted. She wiped her face and thought of the mission at hand. She couldn’t be emotional anymore.

This is why Daniel had gone so crazy
, she thought.
He didn’t want me to get hurt
.

Bailey had always been aware that there was more to Daniel than met the eye. He was more than he let on. And she always knew, to an extent, that he cared for her. But until this moment, she hadn’t realized how much. It was more than just an attraction. He wanted to protect her.

“Fuck it,” Bailey said to herself, and turned around. “Let’s get on with this.” Her voice was strong and resigned to the case at hand. She was ready to do what needed to be done.

“We’re going to get him back,” Halene said, and pulled at Bailey’s arm. She turned to Halene and nodded with conviction.

“Damn right we are, Hales,” she said, the determination in her voice was overwhelming. The side of Sam’s lips curved up as he looked at her. This was the Bailey he had fallen for. The girl who knew what needed to be done and did it.

“Let’s go over the plan again,” she said. The group sat on the floor around the coffee table. Sam passed out two-way radios.

Katherine pulled off her heels and stretched her feet. “What channel do we need to be on?”

“Six to talk to each other during the operation,” Sam explained. “Eight to talk to Bai. He’ll be working the command post. He’ll be monitoring both channels. Eight is command only or if Bai asks you to switch. You know the drill.”

“So you
met
Bai?” Halene asked with wide eyes. “How was he?”

“We didn’t exactly meet him,” Bailey explained. “It was more of a phone meeting with Sam and Bai. But we met his Vanguard.” She looked at Katherine to explain. “His second-in-command. He came and dropped these off for us,” Sam said. He pointed to a box of weapons and electronics. “There are also two of their soldiers across the street. They’ll act as backup when we’re getting Mei and Daniel out.”

“This is too intense,” Katherine said bluntly. “I’m glad you’re not my normal crew.”

“Normal crew?” Bailey asked immediately. There was so much about these missions Bailey still didn’t understand. She looked at Katherine with shock. Another dimension of this had surfaced.

“There are more teams like us?” Sam followed up, his expression mirrored hers.

Halene shook her head. “No, we’re
not
getting into this now,” she directed. “We’re sticking to the plan. We’ll discuss this later.” Halene was focused and wanted to make sure the discussion didn’t wander. As Bailey and Sam looked at each other, Halene shot Katherine a “seriously?” look. Katherine shrugged in the familiar “oh well” face.

“Explanations later,” Bailey said out loud, reminding Sam as well as herself. “Okay, so Sam and I are the inside operatives. Hui gave us a basic rundown of what the inside looked like. Hui gave us a lot of good information.” Bailey pulled out the homemade map and pointed to a small room at the end of the hallway. Having a former 14K member turned out to be very useful for them. They explained the information they got from Hui to the group. “This is where prisoners would be. That is where Mei and possibly Daniel are bound to be. They may have split them up so they could be controlled.” Bailey gulped before continuing. She didn’t want to say what needed to be said next, but they needed to go over the plan. She looked down at her shoes as she continued to speak. “If Daniel didn’t make it, they would’ve moved him to another room.” The eyes of the group moved from face to face. That factor was a reality they all knew was a possibility. Daniel had known it going in as well. Bailey pushed back her emotions as best she could. Sam noticed her eyes filling with tears. He moved to comfort her, but she shook her head.

“Keep explaining,” she requested.

Sam pointed to another room farther down the corridor. “Money skimmers and enemy captures are questioned here.” Sam’s finger circled a room on the map like a target tapping on the center of the drawing. “They won’t have an English speaker on hand; they’ll have to find one. They can’t get just any translator down there. They need someone who isn’t going to rat them out. So it probably took them most of the day to get one. Daniel is probably getting questioned now,” Sam explained. “That gives us hope Daniel might be still with us. Chances are he is pretty banged up or even unconscious. If that’s the case, we can either try to call him back somehow or drag him out. But hopefully that won’t be the case. This is why we might need the two soldiers to slow the possible pursuit down.”

Sam’s eyes went over the plan in his mind again while the others stared at the map. This was going to be rough, and he worried about Bailey. But he wouldn’t dare try and keep her out the extraction.

“Daniel is probably being stubborn,” Sam said, venom in his voice. Sam didn’t want anything to happen to Daniel. He’d never wish harm on him. But he felt anger toward him. He was making the mission that much more difficult on them. They were down a person, and they had to get out two people, over one. “They will only have one guard at the door, but once Bai comes in, all the men will move to the front, eliminating any problems with guards. There will only be the translator to deal with, and chances are, the translator will duck and cover not having any feelings of loyalty to the group. He’ll probably be easy to get past.”

“What if there’s a guard?” Katherine asked.

“He’ll need to be neutralized,” Sam explained.

“Bai’s men also brought us this,” Bailey said, holding up a Taser stun gun.

“Why are you two going in?” Katherine asked in her snarky tone.

“I promised Bai that I would be the one to get Mei,” Sam explained. “I’m the only one who speaks her language, and she knows me.”

“And
you
?
”
Katherine pointed at Bailey.

“I can’t be the distraction,” Bailey explained. “There are members of the 14K that have seen Sam and me.”

“So go over this again for me,” Halene requested. “From start to finish.”

“The first part is simple,” Sam started. “Katherine, you need to create the diversion by the old ‘go to the wrong building’ routine. Act drunk and flirty, whatever you need to do. They won’t do anything to you, because you’ll appear harmless, but you’ll be able to see when Bai’s men arrive. Have your mace can at the ready for extra security. But I don’t think you’ll need it. Once the men arrive, you need to meet Halene in the getaway vehicle, which will be parked a block down the street.”