"Not much. It looks like storage of some kind. A few big crates and some boxes pushed up against the wall. It might give us cover if we got behind them."
"On three, you make a dash for the boxes," Nick said. "Get behind them and I'll give you covering fire. You see anything move in there, you shoot it."
She nodded. Her heart was trying to pound out through her ribs. She gripped the MP-5 tight. Nick saw the tension. Adrenaline was good, but adrenaline could get you killed.
"Take a deep breath," Nick said. "Another."
"Better," she said.
Nick held up three fingers and counted down. On three, Selena sprinted into the building toward the big crate she'd seen from outside. Nick reached around the doorway and began firing into the space beyond. Answering fire came from somewhere inside the building. The bullets splintered the doorframe and thudded into the wall.
"I'm there," Selena yelled.
Nick heard her MP-5 open up. Ronnie reached around the door frame and fired toward the back of the building. Nick ran across the floor to where Selena crouched behind a wooden crate. He got down beside her.
The box was marked FRAGILE ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT in red and black block letters. Another burst of automatic fire came from the back and smashed into the wooden slats. Nick heard things breaking inside the crate.
"From what I could see there's nothing in here but more boxes and a door to the other building."
"And whoever is shooting at us," Selena said.
"He's trying to keep us pinned down. We have to get into that other building before his buddy does whatever he's trying to do."
"To hell with this," Selena said. Before Nick could react, she stood and began firing. She let out a wild yell and began running and shooting toward the back of the building.
"Damn it," Nick said.
He jumped up and ran after her. He saw movement in the back corner. He flicked the selector switch to full auto and pulled the trigger. The 30 round magazine emptied with a sound like ripping cloth. The rounds tore into the last security guard.
Selena saw him go down. She veered toward the door to the other building and kicked it open. She ran down a short passage. The door at the other end was open. Nick was right behind her. She could hear him swearing as he ran.
The room was filled with electronic equipment. The man Ronnie had described as geeky sat before a computer screen and keyboard. He stared at her as if she were an apparition from hell.
"Don't move," she yelled.
He made a sudden grab for something on the desk, his eyes desperate. Selena couldn't see what he was reaching for. She opened fire.
The rounds stitched a bloody pattern across his chest and smashed into the computer and monitor behind him. The body fell back out of the chair onto the floor, legs splayed at an awkward angle. Sparks and smoke came from the computer. The monitor was shattered.
Selena walked over to the computer. The dead man had been reaching for a phone. She looked at him, at the sparking equipment on the bench. Nick came up beside her. Her face was chalk white.
"It's over," he said.
"I told him not to move," she said. "I told him. I thought he had a gun."
Nick rested his hand on her shoulder. "It's all right," he said. "You did the right thing. Don't worry about it."
Ronnie came into the room, one arm held tight across his chest.
"You all right, Ronnie?"
"Yeah. It hurts less if I hold everything tight."
Nick turned to Selena. The color had come back in her face. "That was a stupid move," he said, "jumping up like that. What the hell were you thinking?"
"It worked, didn't it? I don't know what I was thinking. Something came over me."
"You could have been killed."
"Well," she said, "it's not like it's the first time."
"All the same…aahh, never mind."
"What were they doing here?" Selena said.
"I'm not sure," Nick said. "That dish on the roof is a directional antenna. They were going to send a signal."
Nick looked around the room. It was a utilitarian space, the walls lined with workbenches and pieces of electronic equipment. The man Selena had killed had been sitting in front of what was obviously the main control console. It was in pretty bad shape. A burst from an MP-5 tended to wreak havoc wherever it went. The computers and monitors were no exception. Bits of shattered glass and jagged shards of metal covered the work table. The computer case was full of holes.
"Maybe the hard drive is still intact," Nick said. He reached behind the computer and pulled the plug.
"Selena, help me get this open."
With the inside of the computer exposed, Nick saw the hard drive. He found a screwdriver lying on the bench, undid the screws holding the drive in place and slipped it out of the smashed computer.
"We'll see what Stephanie can make out of this," he said.
"Here's a logbook of some sort," Ronnie said. He held up a black binder notebook and flipped through the pages. "Looks like our friend on the floor was running tests. It doesn't make much sense to me."
"Something else for Steph to look at," Nick said.
"I'd better call Sam for pickup," Ronnie said.
"Right. By the time he gets here we should have found anything else worth checking out."
"What about the guy we tied up in the woods?" Selena said.
"I forgot about him." Nick ran his fingers through his hair. "We can't just leave him here. I guess we have to take him back with us. Harker will know how to handle it. Ronnie, you and Selena go get him while I look around in here."
They left the room. Five minutes later they were back.
"He's dead," Ronnie said. "Looks like he threw up and choked on the gag."
"Bad luck. I wouldn't wish that on anyone," Nick said.
"I went through his pockets. He had a wallet and civilian ID. There wasn't anything else."
"We need to check the others," Nick said. "Call your friend and tell him to come get us."
"Already did it. He should be here in a little over an hour."
CHAPTER 23
It was Thursday night in Alexandria, Virginia, not far from the Capitol. General Westlake sat at home in his favorite chair, reading the Iliad, the epic poem about the war between Greece and Troy. It was Homer who had inspired him with the name for the operation that was about to begin.
Westlake sighed. He had been denied the opportunity to lead vast armies. His enemies in the Pentagon had made sure of that. They would soon discover the mistake they'd made by shutting him out from important command in the field.
His secured phone signaled a call.
"Westlake."
"We have a problem." The caller was Senator Martinez. Westlake felt his good mood begin to dissolve.
"What kind of problem?"
"There was a raid on the Alaska facility. We were unable to complete the test. "
"What happened?"
"Thorpe was about to activate when some kind of special ops force showed up. We ran a satellite pass. The helicopter that brought in Thorpe and the security team was destroyed. There are bodies outside the buildings and I can't reach anyone on-site. We have to assume the equipment was taken off-line by whoever hit the site."
"CIA?"
"My sources say no. I can't find any official operation, covert or otherwise. My guess is we're dealing with Rice's group, the Project. They have the balls to pull off something like this."
Westlake could feel his blood pressure rising, an instant band tightening around his forehead. The failure of his attempt to eliminate the Project had come back to haunt him.
"Those people have more lives than a cat," he said. "It's a setback, but that's all."
On the other end of the connection, Martinez said, "We've lost Thorpe."