ChapterTwenty-Four
Audrey described the route they would need to take as best she could without a map. They were heading into an area they’d ignored so far, as it was high on the hill above the lodge and cabins they’d explored last night, and on the opposite side of the lake from where they’d camped today.
As a remote meeting point for SEALs, she supposed it made sense. It was far from the complex of buildings and roads that provided infrastructure to the lodge, and upslope so they’d have a good vantage point to view the lodge and lake from the top of a tree. A hiking trail passed within a half mile of the area, making the area one that was usually only accessed by hard-core backcountry hikers.
Audrey figured George had provided just the general area. The odds that the SEAL team was sitting on the donkey sled were slim, but the basic direction was all they’d need, Xavier assured her. He knew how to connect with the team.
It was nearing ten p.m.—or twenty-two hundred in military parlance—when Xavier let out a birdcall that received an answer.
Even in the dark, Audrey could see the shift in his posture when the soft whistles carried on the night wind.
He raised a hand in signal to halt, and she froze in place, barely able to breathe.
A moment later, a second call came, this one different. Xavier answered, also using a new cadence.
Another response followed, and Xavier sagged back against a tree. “Thank fucking god. Flyte’s here.”
Seeing his reaction triggered the burn of tears, which she quickly swiped away. She would not be the emotional female in this reunion of hypermasculine special forces operators.
Still, she fought the burning sensation and her nose tingled as a Black man emerged from behind a tree and greeted Xavier with a handshake. “Shit, Rivera. I was braced for the worst.”
Xavier’s voice was a low whisper. “Same, Lieutenant. And I’m still afraid it might be for the others.”
She cursed her overloaded pregnancy hormones and stifled the last of her reaction as Xavier introduced her. “Dr. Audrey Kendrick, this is Lieutenant Chris Flyte.”
He’d flipped up his NVGs, so she could see his eyes, but the rest of him was decked out in full combat gear. She shook his gloved hand, then followed him into the SEAL team’s lair, Xavier and another SEAL falling in line behind them.
They’d set up a headquarters of sorts in an alcove created by a large fallen tree that draped at an angle as it was propped up by a large, thriving Douglas fir. Sheets of moss provided cover that had been embellished with ferns and forest-patterned camouflage sheets.
“We’ve got two men patrolling. One in a tree on lookout. He caught you with his NVGs ten minutes ago.” One corner of Flyte’s mouth curled up. “If I were grading you, Mr. Rivera, that would be a fail.”
She knew the official address for a warrant officer was “mister,” but it sounded odd to her ears given the military hierarchy present. This was her first time seeing Xavier in this element. She could swear his posture was straighter. He’d let her see his pained shoulder, his unpolished edges. But none of that would be on display here.
She felt a surge of emotion at the realization Xavier had let her see beneath the surface to the wounded SEAL.
She shoved her feelings aside and paid attention to the report Flyte gave Xavier. As a commissioned officer, the lieutenant held the higher rank, but it was possible Xavier was in charge here because he’d been in command of the training exercise.
She settled on a log as she tried to make sense of the jargon. Flyte’s team had found a dead body in the woods with a broken neck, and Xavier pointed to the weapons he’d acquired from that encounter. Her belly twisted when Flyte reported that one Fire Team never made it to the rendezvous and had yet to be located.
Xavier let out a low curse that was echoed by Flyte and others in the circle.
“On a positive note, we have a ghost who took out two tangos when he blew up a boat earlier.”
Never in her life had she imagined she would smile at hearing a boat explosion on Lake Olympus had killed two men, but her life had changed a lot in the last thirty-plus hours. “Good job, George,” she whispered.
Flyte did a double take. “You know the ghost?”
She nodded and met the man’s gaze. “Even better, I know where he is now and what he’s planning.”
And with that, Xavier began his report. The team gathered to strategize their assault on the lodge armed with three match guns, an assortment of Molotov cocktails, two pistols, and one assault rifle, in addition to two dozen handguns and rifles loaded with paint pellets.
Jae wasn’t a fan of going against his boss’s wishes, but he’d been getting the runaround all day from both the park hierarchy and the Navy. Luke Sevick was equally fed up with Navy brass. When both the park and the Navy refused to offer up a key to the gate, they came up with their own plan.
It wasn’t complex by any means. It was as basic as possible. An hour before the first light of dawn, Jae and Luke were going to drive to a trailhead for a loop that included Mount Olympus. One section of the trail came within five miles of Lake Olympus Lodge as the crow flies. It was a gruesome, nasty, backwoods five miles that went up and over a ridgeline before descending into the lake basin, but it was as close as they could get without road access.
With no real word on what had happened to Audrey and stonewalling from the Navy, it was the right thing to do. The superintendent admitted the lock shouldn’t have been changed, but he wasn’t doing enough to push back against the military powers that be.
Audrey’s SUV could have slipped off the road in the storm, and no one was looking for her. He and Luke would change that. Something just wasn’t right.