The Eye of God (47 page)

Monk rubbed his palms on his thigh. “Now that’s what I call parallel parking.”

Duncan scowled. “Is that what you call it?”

They all tumbled out the door, wanting to make sure they were at the right place before unloading their gear.

Gray came running from the shadows of the tunnel, drawn by the commotion, his eyes huge at their means of transportation. He clearly must have recognized the bus from his own icy sojourn from the mainland to the island.

“What?” he asked with a grin. “You couldn’t find a cab?”

9:28
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Gray gave Monk a fast hug. It was good to see his best friend, even under the circumstances and his unusual means of transportation.

He quickly shook Jada’s hand, but he pointed his finger at Duncan. “I need you to get that Eye up to that vault. Kowalski’s back there and can show you. We found the cross, but we have no way of telling if it’s energized in any way.”

“I’ll go with him,” Jada said, offering her expertise.

Gray nodded his thanks, staring out across the ice, wondering what was taking Seichan and Rachel so long. He had expected them here before Monk and the others.

Jada stepped back toward the bus. “I left my pack—”

A sharp whistle pierced the morning, followed immediately by a massive blast of fire and ice. Jada got blown into Duncan, who caught her. The concussion knocked them all off their feet and down the tunnel, accompanied by a barrage of broken icicles.

Gray slid on his back, staring past his toes.

Outside, the bus upended, tipping up on its front grill, windows exploding. A fireball rolled from beneath it and into the sky, trailed by a cloud of smoke. The ice shelf shattered beneath its bulk, and the bus sank nose-first into the lake.

A rocket attack.

But who . . . and why?

Still, a greater question loomed. “Where is the Eye?” Gray asked, fearfully yelling, half deafened.

Duncan helped Jada to her feet. She pointed to the wreckage sinking into the lake.

“My pack . . .”

It was still on the bus.

“Everybody back!” Gray said, pointing deeper into the tunnel.

They fled away from the rage of fire and smoke—and into the cold darkness of ice and frost.

As they reached a bend in the tunnel, Gray glanced back. The rear of the bus stuck out crookedly from the ice, smoking and charred. Fire spread outward in streams of gasoline and oil. Shadows moved beyond those flames.

Who were they? Russian forces? Had someone in Moscow grown wise to their covert presence on the island?

“Monk, stay here,” Gray ordered. “Alert us if anyone starts into the tunnel.”

And they would,
he knew.

Whoever had orchestrated this attack had purposefully targeted their only means of transportation, intending to trap Gray’s group inside here. The reason
why
didn’t matter. With time running out, only one objective remained: recovering the Eye and getting it to that vault.

Gray led Duncan and Jada back to the cavern. Kowalski anxiously awaited them.

“What the hell, man?” the big man asked. “What’s going on out there?”

“Doesn’t matter,” he said and turned to Duncan. “We need to retrieve Dr. Shaw’s pack from that burning bus.”

“How?” Duncan asked.

Gray turned to Jada. “Do you think you can climb that rope by yourself when the time is right?”

She nodded. “What do you want us to do?”

Gray told them.

“You’re nuts,” Duncan said, looking around for support.

Kowalski just shrugged. “We’ve done stupider things.”

9:34
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This is becoming a bad habit.

Duncan stood again in his boxers by a body of water—only this time, at the slippery lip to a breathing hole through the ice, its edges worn smooth by the bodies of mother seals sliding into and out of the water. He pictured those same seals dropping into the water here and swimming back through the tunnel, traveling under the ice all the while to reach the open lake.

Duncan wouldn’t have to go that far, but where he was going was still a long distance in one breath. And he didn’t have the fatty insulation of a winter seal.

Neither did his swimming companion.

Jada had stripped to shorts and a sports bra.

Beyond her, Gray and Kowalski readied the two ATVs parked in the cavern, checking weapons. The plan was for them to pick up Monk on the way out.

Duncan returned his attention to Jada, who shivered next to him, but little of her trembling had to do with the cold.

“Ready?” he asked.

She swallowed and nodded.

“Stick to my heels,” he said with a smile. “You’ll be fine.”

“Let’s get this over with,” she said. “Thinking about it is only making it worse.”

She was right.

Duncan cinched the shoulder holster tighter around his bare chest and gave her arm a squeeze. Lowering to his rear, he slid down one of the worn chutes in the lip of the breathing hole. With a short drop, he plunged into the pool of water beneath the thick sheet of ice covering the floor of the cave.

The cold immediately cut through him, worse than he had mentally prepared for. His lungs screamed, wanting to gasp and choke. He forced his legs to kick, his arms to pull, and swam away from the hole. Staying under the ceiling of ice, he headed toward the tunnel leading out. The plan was to swim beneath the ice of the tunnel and get to the outside without being seen.

He twisted back to see Jada splash into the depths. Her body visibly clenched, looking ready to go fetal from the shock, but she fought through it. With a savage kick of her legs, like a stallion striking out at a barn door, she came shooting toward him.

Damn
,
she was fast.

She had claimed as much when Gray had first proposed this plan.

Duncan kicked off a wall and headed down the tunnel. Diffuse light turned the ice above a deep azure blue, illuminating enough of the depths below to see. He stroked hard to keep ahead of Jada, flipper-kicking to go faster—but also to stay warm.

The tunnel was only thirty yards long, a swim he could normally make in one breath, but in this freeze, trapped under that thick ice, it was a deadly challenge.

He tracked their progress by monitoring the light. It grew brighter with every stroke and kick as he sought the morning sunlight beyond the tunnel.

Still, the cold quickly sapped his endurance. He found his lungs aching for air, his limbs starting to quake. As he neared the tunnel’s end, pinpricks of darkness danced across his vision. He checked behind him, saw Jada struggling, too.

Keep going,
he willed them both.

Ahead, he spotted their target. It spurred him into a frantic crawl.

Ten yards from them, the bus rested crookedly on its grill on the bottom of the lake. According to Gray, its rear end still stuck out of the ice above.

With a promise of fresh air, he swam over to its side. The windshield had been blown out by the concussive blast of the rocket. Reaching through, he grabbed the wheel and hauled himself into the shadowy interior of the vehicle. He shot upward past the seats and surfaced inside the pocket of air at the rear of the bus.

Jada appeared a second later.

They both gulped air as quietly as possible, appreciating not only the oxygen but also the warmth. The recent flames had heated the interior considerably. Neither of them complained.

Outside their hiding spot, Duncan heard voices, speaking what sounded like Korean, maybe Chinese. So far no alarm had been raised at their presence. The enemy had not expected its trapped quarry to pop up inside the submerged bus.

It was a small advantage.

He turned to Jada and pointed below. She nodded and they both submerged. Grabbing seatbacks, they pulled themselves back down the length of the bus, searching for Jada’s pack.

Everything loose had fallen to the front of the bus or spilled out the missing windshield. Refreshed with oxygen, Jada swam like a seal herself, while he felt like a blundering whale. She found her pack quickly enough, and they returned to the surface.

Jada checked inside, the relief on her face expressed everything.

He offered her a thumbs-up, which she returned.

They had the Eye.

Impulsively, he reached over and kissed her. He didn’t know if he’d ever get another chance. In that small gesture, he invested so much: a wish for her safety, a thanks for her efforts, but mostly a hope for more to come.

Surprise stiffened her—then her lips softened, warming and melting into his own.

Breaking apart, her eyes shone at him. She somehow looked both more determined and more scared. But she touched his cheek and slipped back underwater.

Duncan shifted to a shattered side window, staying out of direct view. He took in the lay of the land. Ropes draped from the cliffs above. A unit of armed men in military winter camouflage flanked the tunnel’s mouth. He counted the number of enemy between the bus and the cliff.

Not good.

Freeing his SIG Sauer from its shoulder holster, he touched a throat mike and subvocalized to Gray. “The Eye is headed back,” he said. “I’ve got twenty combatants. Ten to each side. I think they’re Korean.”

Gray swore. Apparently this made some sort of sense to the man. “Stick to the plan,” the commander radioed back. “Count to thirty and begin firing.”

Duncan swung back to the window.

Their team had no hope of victory against such odds.

Instead, the plan was a simple one.

Buy as much time with their lives as possible.

Duncan glanced to the dark waters. At this moment, the fate of the world depended on how fast Jada could swim.

31

November 20, 9:44
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Olkhon Island, Russia

Jada knew she would not make it.

Fear, cold, and exhaustion had taxed her to her limit. The drag of the pack across her shoulders further hindered her, feeling like a leaden weight, compromising the reach of each stroke. But that was not her worst problem.

A trail of blood wafted behind her, streaming with each pull. She had sliced her right arm to the bone on a jagged piece of blasted metal as she had exited the bus. Heat and strength sapped out of her body with every yard gained, flowing like a crimson flag behind her. She fought to keep going, as pain became numbness.

She had to kick harder as her right arm weakened.

Her lungs screamed for air.

The way became darker—but not because she fled the sunlight behind her for the tunnel. Instead, her vision squeezed, swimming with shadows.

Distantly ahead, she could make out a brighter pool of water, where a flashlight rested next to the hole in the ice, awaiting her arrival, along with warm clothes.

Never make it . . .

Proving this, her pace slowed, her right arm useless now, dragging alongside her. She flutter-kicked, desperate, but despairing.

A rumble shook through the water to her ears.

She glanced up to see a bright light sweep past her across the translucent ice, heading for the mouth of the tunnel behind her.

She reached and placed her palm against the ice.

Help me . . .

But they swept away, abandoning her.

9:45
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Gray raced his ATV toward the morning sunlight. Monk rode shotgun behind him, while Kowalski trailed on the second vehicle. Ahead, the mouth of the tunnel grew larger. He spotted figures sheltering to the left and right.

Koreans,
Duncan had said—but Gray knew they were, in fact,
North Koreans
.

How had they found them? Fear for Seichan, for Rachel, fired his blood. Was that why the women had not shown up by now? Had they been captured? He remembered the strained and brief conversation with Seichan.

They must have held her at gunpoint.

Still, that offered one hope.

The North Koreans clearly wanted to capture him and Kowalski and would likely try to take them alive.

At least, initially.

Gray was under no such compunction.

He heard the first pops from Duncan’s SIG Sauer.

With the enemy’s attention focused on the mouth of the tunnel and the approaching roar of the ATVs, Duncan fired at the Koreans’ rear flank, catching them off guard.

Gray heard screams of shock and surprise at the sudden assault from an unexpected direction. Monk rose from behind and shot over Gray’s shoulder, adding to the confusion.

With a final gun of his engine, he took advantage of the momentary chaos as the enemy was routed, perplexed and unsure how to respond to a battle on two fronts.

A soldier ran into view, framed in the tunnel opening, pointing a rifle.

Monk dropped him with a single shot.

Gray sped to the left of the body, Kowalski to the right.

They spun out into the sunlight, letting go of their handles, spinning their bikes, pistols up and firing in all directions. Duncan shoved open the rear door of the bus, popping into view, firing from on high.

Soldiers in winter camouflage dropped to the ice—either felled or seeking to make themselves less of a target for the barrage.

But Gray knew his team was outgunned and outnumbered. At any moment, the tide would turn against them. Rounds already began to chase their skidding bikes, splintering the ice around them.

They had only one goal here: buy time.

He had warned Vigor to stay in the vault, to await Jada’s arrival, to help her with whatever she needed. The monsignor had agreed, not looking too well anyway.

With that goal in mind, Gray fired and fired, urging Jada to hurry.

9:46
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