Decision Point

“I’ll get everything I need because your life—twice—has to be worth at least that,” he growled.

Faizal laughed again, and agreed to get him whatever he needed.

Bolan ran through his list and hung up the phone with Faizal before he could ask him more questions. He picked up Daniels’s picture and ran his finger along the side of it again. He couldn’t put his finger on why this mission was nagging at him until he thought about how much Peterson cared about the young woman. He sighed as he put the picture down.

Emotions got a person killed; he’d seen it time and again. He pulled his Desert Eagle out of its holster, popped out the clip and worked the slide, ejecting the bullet from the chamber. As the bullet popped into the air, he reached out and snatched it, smiling.

Maybe he was just fast enough to save them all.

THE POUNDING ON THE DOOR came earlier than Bolan had expected. He glanced at the glowing lights of the clock brightly telling him that it was a mere 4:30 a.m. He rolled off the bed and didn’t bother putting on a shirt to go with blue Navy SEAL sweatpants. He glanced through the peephole, but knew before he looked that it would be Peterson. She was motivated, he’d give her that, and he wondered if she’d slept at all.

He pulled open the door, the bright light from the hallway spilling into his dark hotel room.

“It’s about time, Colonel Stone,” she said as she marched past him and into his room. “Though I expected a military man like yourself to be dressed and ready to roll by this hour.”

He smiled at the Secret Service light outfit. Black slacks, black dress boots with a two-inch heel and a dark blue long-sleeved shirt. He had yet to meet a Secret Service agent who didn’t look proper all of the time, and he couldn’t help but notice that she filled out her clothes in all the right places.

Bolan ran a hand through his hair and walked over to the coffeemaker in his room. He could hear her pacing behind him and smiled to himself as he filled the reservoir and pressed the start button.

“We don’t really have time to mess around,” Peterson said.

“Are there armed gunmen coming down the hall?” he asked quietly.

“No.”

“Bomb in the building and it’s about to go off?”

“No, don’t be ridiculous,” she said.

“Then we have time for coffee,” he said.

He watched as she sat primly on the edge of the small love seat. He sat in the high-backed chair next to her and propped a foot up on the coffee table, rocked his head back and closed his eyes. He smiled again when she let out a long sigh.

“Listen, I hate to wake you, but I’ve got the information that we really need, and I can get us on a flight out of the country in an hour. I already have my cover documents and alternate identification. I just need to know if I’m getting cover documents for you, as well. And I have the latest intelligence from the State Department. But we have to hurry to make the flight.”

“No, you don’t,” he said, not bothering to open his eyes just yet.

“Yes, we do. I talked to the pilot on my way over. He wasn’t happy about being woken at this hour, but he owes me a favor.”

“I wasn’t talking about the flight. I have no doubt that you could have Marine One on top of this hotel in thirty minutes if you put your mind to it. I meant that you don’t hate waking me or you would have waited for the sun to rise before trying to save the world.”

She stared at him in disbelief. Her face flushed and she pulled together her purse and the stack of documents that she’d sat on the table.

“I told the President that I should go this mission alone. I should have just left without you last night…” she muttered.

Bolan reached out his hand, catching her by surprise, and pulled her back down to the love seat. Her eyes narrowed as she pulled her hand away.

“Hold on, Michelle, and take a deep breath. I haven’t seen your intel and whether you like it or not, I’m not going to go charging off into Malaysia until I’m certain of my target. That’s not the part of the world where going in unprepared will serve you. Why don’t we start with what you’ve got so far?”

She relaxed slightly and opened one of the file folders. “The local government there is still trying to get their legs after putting down the LTTE. With such a diverse population and the influences from India and the other Asian nations, they fight to hold on to what they have, so we don’t believe that there is any official government agency involved. They’d like that influx of cash, but aren’t prepared to have the Western world descend on their doorstep with this kind of action. The best lead we’ve got is a new pirating operation going by the name of the Ocean Tigers,” she began, but he cut her off.

“That’s our best lead, too, at the moment, but it’s not enough.”

“Why?” she asked.

“I spoke with some of my contacts. This Ocean Tigers group is hard-core and what I’m hearing is that if they are the ones that have Heather, it’s possible they’ll collect the ransom and kill her anyway. Worse, no one knows where their base of operations is located. The best resources in the area are hard-pressed to keep track of anything with the ever-changing political climate. For all we know it’s a dissenting faction of the government trying to wrest control and install a new leader. If we charge in there without knowing everything we can then we’re likely to get a lot of people killed, including us.”

She nodded, but didn’t show any other reaction to that news. Bolan was pleased that she didn’t respond and appeared to be taking the information in and processing it. Too much emotion in a situation like this would be deadly to them both and probably Daniels, too. If she couldn’t keep it together he would have to find a way to ditch her and go in alone. It was really his preferred method, anyway. It was tough enough to watch his own six without needing to watch someone else’s.

“You seem pretty gung ho to leave here, so where is it you intend to go?”

“Same as you do with any missing persons case—where she was last seen. Singapore. You’re shaking your head, you disagree? I don’t want the trail to get cold.”

“The trail is already cold. If that’s all we can come up with, then we could start out that broadly, but that’s like looking for a needle in a stack of needles. And Singapore is a cesspit. We’re doing some additional digging, and I want to see what that intelligence tells us. If it really is a branch of the LTTE, we’ll have a better chance of finding them if we can follow the money than we will just wandering around the Bay of Bengal and hoping we find the right island.”

“But you don’t know that the LTTE has anything to do with the Ocean Tigers,” she objected.

“I don’t know enough to think it is or isn’t anyone. I don’t have enough information to make a conclusion, but I’ve been doing this a lot of years and know to trust my gut. If their financials are barely there, then we know they don’t have the money for this kind of operation that the Ocean Tigers are running, and we’re dealing with another group. On the other hand, if their previous supporters are starting to shell out serious dough, we can look deeper.”

“According to the State Department, there are dozens of piracy operations running in that part of the world,” she admitted. “You’re right. We don’t want to end up in the wrong snake pit. Heather doesn’t have that kind of time and neither do we if these guys are planning more serious action.”

“Exactly,” he said. “We’ve got to be methodical about this or the whole mission will come crashing down around us. I know that time is critical for Heather, but the reality is we need to be more concerned about squashing any terror plots that they might be hatching.”

“Still, given how many groups there are, why are you focusing on this group?”

“This feels too well organized and finessed,” he said. “We already know that the Cayman account they want the money sent to is totally blind. A cover company for a cover for another cover, at least. Most of the groups working over there just aren’t set up that well and it doesn’t fit the typical pattern.”

“Agreed,” she finally said. “I just hate feeling this helpless. Heather is a…she’s a fine young woman. The thought of what might be happening to her turns my stomach. I know that the mission is more, but I want to get her back.”

“We’ll have to hope she’s got some of her father’s fight in her,” he said. “So, if you don’t mind, I’ll get dressed and we’ll go have some breakfast. We can review everything you’ve got and maybe by then I’ll have heard some more from Hal. Between us, maybe we can narrow things down a little.”

Bolan watched as skepticism, reluctance and finally acceptance crossed over her face.

“Okay, but I’m driving.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Heather Daniels opened the car door to a wave of despair from the camp. A group of children were sitting in front of a small metal building with a soldier pacing in front of them. The dirty faces were streaked with tears, and one little girl was sporting a bruise that took up almost half of her face. The children weren’t looking at the soldier that was set as their guard. Daniels followed their gaze across the compound to two more of the Ocean Tigers dragging the bodies of two men from the side of the building. Fresh blood still oozed from their wounds, and they tossed them onto the bed of a truck without a word.

Daniels stumbled and dropped to her knees, feeling a wave of nausea roll through her stomach. She had seen death before, but this was different. She had spent the entire car ride with Rajan telling her that she would be safe and his kindness had disarmed her. She’d not expected to open the door to such horrible visions. The air itself reeked of violence. She looked back at the children with tattered clothes and broken spirits. The girl with the bruise dropped her head into her arms and tried to muffle her sobs. Her heart ached for the horror that they’d been put through and knew that it was a long way from being over.

Taking several deep breaths, Daniels waited for the nausea to pass and when it did, she wasn’t so much afraid as she was angry. Trying to contain her rage behind gritted teeth, she rose to her feet and turned to face Rajan, her arm swinging before she even realized it. He caught her hand in midair and pulled her tightly into his body. She thrashed around and tried to pound on him, but his grip was too tight—tears filled her eyes. He grabbed the back of her hair and whispered in her ear.

“I know,” he snapped, his voice urgent in her ear. “But don’t do this here. I can’t protect you if you make a scene.”

She leaned back, stunned, and then pulled away. Something told her that Rajan wasn’t like the other pirates, but now wasn’t the time to deal with it. She turned and walked over to the group of children. The sentry that had been diligently pacing in front of them blocked her path. Daniels turned to glare at Rajan. He nodded and she turned and pushed past the sentry.

The children didn’t hesitate, instinct telling them that they had a champion. They clamored around her, their voices rising in several different languages. She reached down and lifted a little boy that couldn’t have been more than two, settling him on her hip. With her other hand, she pulled the bruised and battered little girl to her feet and brought her in close. The child clung to her leg ferociously. Daniels ran her thumb along her cheek and gave her an encouraging smile.