“How?” 

“Don’t worry about it.  You’ll be at the waterfront at noon.  Call your boyfriend back up and tell him you’ll be there on time.  Don’t argue with me.”

“Madi, can you talk sense into your man?” Nicole said, exasperated. 

“No, but I also know he’s never told me he could do something when he didn’t have a plan,” Madison Gomez replied.  “Trust him.”

Nicole relented and called Mike’s cellular number back and told him that she would be there.  She didn’t know how, but that a friend was arranging transport.  She assumed it would be by boat, but even that would be tight at this point. 

Bobby walked into Nicole’s office, “Do you have everything you need ready to go?”

“I’m ready.  Do we need to head out?”

“Patience, Grasshopper,” Bobby replied. 

A few minutes later she figured it out.  Maybe not as much figured it out as much as saw it.  Duke Smythe’s helicopter landed in the parking lot.

Duke casually walked across the parking lot to the building and walked in the door.  “Hey Nicole.  We probably should be on our way.  I don’t have permission to land here,” he joked with a smile.  He turned and casually headed back out, after picking up a couple of cookies from the counter.  Nicole was on his heels. 

***

Mike Holland was reporting from the Norfolk waterfront when a helicopter swept straight in from Indian River.  It wasn’t police or news, but it was interrupting his broadcast.  He asked to send the live feed to the studio while it landed. 

As he turned to look at the chopper, Nicole Dixon stepped out of the front seat.  She took off her headset, set it on the seat, grabbed a duffle bag, closed the door and walked straight toward him.  His cameraman shot the whole thing.

The production team never stopped Mike’s feed, so live over the air he said, “Damn, my girlfriend knows how to make an entrance.”

“No doubt,” he heard over his earpiece.

He was still looking at Nicole walking toward him when the chopper lifted off behind her and accelerated back to the north again.  Nobody stopped her as she walked right up to him.  She didn’t know he was live. 

“Hi Mike,” Nicole said, very relaxed. 

“Whose chopper?” Mike said.

“A friend.  He wanted some cookies,” Nicole laughed, with no idea that she was live in a couple hundred thousand homes. 

“Mike, you’re still live,” he heard in his earpiece. 

“Folks, her cookies are THAT good,” Mike said, recovering and looking at the camera. 

“We’re live?” Nicole said, looking at Mike, bordering on horrified at how that must have come across on TV. 

Mike just started laughing.  “That’s live TV, folks.  Back to you in the studio, Sandy… and we’re out.”

“Thanks for warning me Mike,” Nicole said, giggling.  “I look like an idiot now.”

“You?  I look like an idiot.  You look like the coolest chick in Hampton Roads.”  Then they both started laughing. 

“I gotta say, Nicole, Mike,” the cameraman started, “first, Nicole, your cookies ARE that good, and second, that was priceless.  That’s getting played at the station Christmas Party.”  Then he started laughing, too. 

After a minute, Tim, the cameraman, gathered his composure and started working up a plan for them to move around the celebration.  There were a lot of food vendors, a few with some unusual foods, and lots of people.  They were now expected to have a segment every fifteen minutes or so all afternoon, until the fireworks, except during the 4:45 to 7:00 slots which were regional and national news.  In addition to Mike, Nicole and Tim, they had a production assistant, a make-up person and an intern. 

“Timo is here with a booth, Nicole.  Should we hit him up?” Mike asked. 

“Yes, but I have to tell you something…  I might have a conflict of interest.  I’m a minor investor in his restaurant.  I’d hate to have anyone complain that we promoted him out of my financial interest.”

“Really?  When did that happen?” Mike asked. 

“Before he opened.  I hadn’t been there before, but that might be part of the reason he was so excited to see me.  It’s kind of on the downlow, though.  Only a few people know.”

“Ok.  Well, as long as you don’t trash all the competition, it should be ok,” Mike smiled

***

Timo’s was their third stop.  Nicole had found the best menu items from each of the booths they visited.  She interviewed head chefs when they were available, and with the intern running ahead and giving a heads up, most of them were available during the course of the afternoon.  A couple, aside from Timo, joked about being in school with her. 

They sampled everything from Lobster Bisque to funnel cakes.  Nicole kept a running count of food on-a-stick and hit twenty-one different things “on-a-stick”.  Mike was comparing it to a State Fair in the Midwest.  By the time their dinner break rolled around, none of the six were hungry.  Nicole had spread the food around, dragging the Production Assistant, the intern, the make-up artist, and even the cameraman in front of the camera. 

“Folks,” Mike began, “standing next to me is Tim.  He’s been my main cameraman for the last six months.  If the camera is not quite as steady as it normally is, it’s because Nicole Dixon has all forty pounds of it on her shoulder and is the one doing the filming.”

“She insisted that I get to eat on camera,” Tim said nervously.  Then he took a bite of the corndog and extolled its virtues to the viewing audience.  “Hey, this is a beer-battered corndog.  I wasn’t expecting that.  It’s awesome.”  Then Tim did an interview with the owner of the booth while Mike looked on. 

Tim took the camera back and the team headed back to the remote van to drop their gear and head out to dinner, although none of them could possibly eat after their afternoon “grazing” as Tim called it.  They still went into a nearby restaurant and sat at a table for a little while and chatted while picking at an appetizer and enjoying some cold beverages. 

***

Just before the fireworks went off at 9:15, they did their last remote shot of the day.  After wrapping up, the six of them joked around for a few minutes, and signed a few autographs.  Mike was used to the autograph sessions.  Nicole was shocked the first time a kid came up and asked her for her autograph but got used to it.  Tim was the biggest surprise.  Several people came straight up to him and wanted a “Tim the Cameraman” autograph, and that was exactly what he gave them. 

After the drive back to the studio to drop the truck, Mike drove Nicole back to her shop.  She gave him a quick tour as the last of the delivery crews returned with their equipment.  He was suitably impressed with the production kitchen.  Then they had a goodnight kiss and she returned home, exhausted from a long day. 

Jack came to the T intersection at Dock Street.  He took a left.  After a few blocks the road turned into Main Street, then to Old Osborne Turnpike. 

“He’s still back there, Jack.  It’s either a huge coincidence, or he’s following us.”

A moment later, the road name changed to New Market, as the Osborne Turnpike forked off to the right.  When they passed Pocahontas Parkway, the area turned from suburban to more rural.  Jack punched up the speed to see if the Caprice would drop back. 

The speed limit was forty-five, and Jack pushed it up to just under seventy.  The Caprice dropped back at first, but as he slowed for an approaching traffic light, it appeared in the mirror once again.  A few moments later they passed I-295, and Jack let it loose.  He pushed the classic pony car up over a hundred miles per hour. 

Passing through Granville, the name of the road changed to John Tyler Highway, although it was still Virginia Highway Five.  Jack slowed for the residential areas, but otherwise kept his speeds up near a hundred miles per hour.  Each time he slowed, the Caprice appeared in the mirror once again. 

As they approached Charles City, Jack pushed the Mustang to one-forty.  The Caprice dropped back but reappeared in the distance each time the road straightened out.  As he came to the turn for Courthouse Road, the Caprice came on strong behind him.  It pulled up to only a couple dozen yards behind. 

Jack jumped over into the opposite lane and slammed on the brakes, swinging hard into the left-hand turn.  He pulled the shifter back down into third gear and punched the gas. 

The Caprice overshot the turn, spinning on the road until it could come to a stop and turn around to try to pick up pursuit. 

“Seven to Team, Seven to Team,” Ric said into the radio he’d dug out of his “go-bag.”

“Seven, this is One, go ahead,” Gunny responded a few moments later. 

“One, I am riding with Mustang up past Williamsburg and we have a vehicle pursuing us.  We have tried to shake it, and it is definitely following.”

“Roger that, Seven.  Any shots fired?”

“Negative, One.”

“How fast are you going?”

“Mostly seventies and eighties, but a few times over a hundred.”

“How’s fuel?” Gunny asked.

“How are we looking on gas, Jack?” Ric asked.

“Little over half a tank,” Jack replied. 

“Half a tank.  Using it fast when we drive hard, though,” Ric stated. 

“Are you on I-64, Seven?”

“Negative, but I think we are headed toward the Interstate.”

“Get there.  Keep me informed.  We’ll try to pick you up,” Gunny stated before getting on the phone. 

He knew everybody had their radios, but nobody was listening.  One of them was always on in case there was a problem, but he needed to call to get some of the others.  He started dialing the phone, and quickly got Ed, Bill and Duke.  They started making calls, too. 

In five minutes, he had three teams assembled.  In ten minutes, they were heading out to I-64.  Gunny would try to figure out how far up he could get them and still be in front of the chase. 

“Seven to Team, we are entering I-64 at exit two-one-four.  Heading east.  We are pushing the speed up.”

“Affirmative, Seven.  Head to the Farm.  They are expecting your arrival.  Use ALL speed to stay in front of pursuit,” Ed said into his com. 

“Stretch it out, Jack,” Ric told the driver. 

Jack put his foot to the floor, shifting up through third and into fourth gear as the speedometer passed one-forty, resting a little over one-fifty.  He looked up in the rearview mirror and saw the Caprice coming off the ramp.  It was not close, but it wasn’t falling back, either. 

The teams were speeding north on I-64, trying to get near Williamsburg before Jack and Ric got there.  It was going to be tight, though.  The four teams were spread out, with Ed and Bill bringing up the rear in Bill’s black Porsche 928.  They were going the fastest, though, bumping the one-seventy mark when they were clear of traffic. 

Gunny and Melody were in her Mustang GT, doing a consistent one-thirty at the front of the line.  Gino and Duke were in Gino’s “hot rod Lincoln” a few miles ahead of Bill and Ed. 

Each pair called out mileposts as they passed them.  Gunny and Melody were two miles east of Jack and Ric when Gunny told Melody to head the other way.  She knew that the closing speed only gave her ten to fifteen seconds before Jack passed them.  She flipped on her flashers and jammed the brakes, aiming for a police turn-around in the middle of the highway. 

She crossed the road to the other shoulder, and as soon as she made it onto the shoulder, Jack’s Mustang screamed past her.  She accelerated back onto the highway as the Caprice roared past as well.  She punched her speed up over a hundred, then past one-forty, to keep pace with the chase. 

Further along the road, Gino and Duke had made their turn, and Bill and Ed had made their turnaround, too.  Both teams were sitting on the side of the road waiting for Jack’s approach. 

At a speed of one-fifty, Jack was putting a mile under him every twenty-five seconds.  Even at one-twenty, it was only thirty seconds to transit a mile. 

Seemingly, in almost no time at all, Jack had Bill and his dad in the Porsche between him and the Caprice.  Gino and Duke were a few hundred yards behind the Caprice, and Gunny and Melody were bringing up the rear. 

“Seven,” Gunny said into his com, “left on Capitol Landing exit.  Maintain speed through the gate.  You’ll stop just after the roadblock.”

“Roger, One.”

“Exit two-three-eight,” Gunny said, just to make sure. 

Jack veered off the highway at the exit less than a minute later.  As he approached the top of the ramp, the Porsche slipped past him and slid to a stop in the middle of the road, just to the right of the ramp.  Jack downshifted into second gear as he made the turn onto Capitol Landing Road. 

The Caprice was boxed in.  He couldn’t turn right and break off pursuit because of the black car sitting across the road.  He looked at the ramp back down to the highway, but it was blocked by a pick-up truck, as was the little turn-off to the ramp on the other side of the road a couple hundred yards later.  He kept up his chase with the Mustang…

Just after flying through the gate, the Mustang slammed on his brakes after passing two military Blazers parked on either side of the road, diagonally.  When the Mustang slid to a stop, there were several soldiers pointing M16s at them.  The Caprice slammed into the front of both of the Blazers as they came together to block the road behind the Mustang. 

The two men in the Caprice were dragged out at gunpoint as the other three pursuing cars slid to a smoky stop behind them. 

Jack put his hands up to the window to show he wasn’t armed.  Ric did the same on the other side of the car.  As Ric stepped out the closest soldier looked in and saw three handguns sitting on the floor where he’d dropped them when they stopped. 

Ed casually walked up to the soldiers by Jack’s Mustang.  “He’s with me, guys.  Stand down.”

“Yes, Sir, Mr. Smith,” the one with Lieutenant’s bars on his uniform said. 

The soldiers near them lowered their weapons. 

“You good, Jack?” his father asked him.

“Yeah…” Jack replied. 

“Let’s go find out who our company might be,” the older man said, maintaining his casual attitude.

Ed, followed by Jack and Ric, walked over to the roadblock to see who’d been in the Caprice.  The two men had minor injuries, but were cuffed on the ground, guarded by soldiers pointing rifles at them. 

“They have ID?” Ed asked. 

“Yes, Sir, Mr. Smith,” a Sergeant replied, handing over their wallets to Ed. 

Ed looked through their wallets and checked their IDs.  He’d run them later.  In the meantime, the Military Police that had responded started cleaning up the mess and re-opening the road into Camp Peary, location of the CIA’s infamous “Farm.” 

When they had a moment alone, Jack asked his dad, “Why do they keep calling you Mr. Smith, Dad?”

“Covert operations base.  Almost everyone here that isn’t wearing a uniform is ‘Mr. Smith’ or Mrs. Smith’ for security reasons.”

“I’m not gonna ask,” Jack said in reply.

“Good,” Ed said, smirking. 

***

After everything was cleaned up and everyone was almost ready to head back home, two squads from the Virginia State Patrol showed up, with full lights and sirens.  The cars stopped just outside the gate.  One of the Troopers rushed toward the gate to confront whoever he thought he needed to confront. 

“What the heck is going on here?” he demanded.

“About time,” Bill replied. 

“We have reports of several of the vehicles here traveling with excessive speed on I-64.  I need licenses and registrations now,” he further demanded. 

“The only licenses and registrations you need are for those two,” Ed said, pointing back to the two men cuffed by a military Blazer.  “They were chasing another vehicle, and that vehicle had to use excessive speed to keep from being shot at.”

“We’ll need everyone to remain while we investigate.”

Ed handed over the two IDs.  “Nope.  This is what you need.  I think when you look, you’ll find these names are connected with some drug cartel.  I’ll call your post commander in a moment and let him know.”

The MPs brought their prisoners forward to the VSP Troopers while Ed headed back to the gatehouse to call the VSP Superintendent.  A few minutes later the troopers got word over their radios to bring in the cuffed men and let everyone else leave the scene.  Although the troopers were none too happy about it.

“Hey, just relax, nobody has to get hurt.  You don’t have to shoot us,” Jack said, not knowing if they spoke English, but also hoping that he was transmitting on his earpiece.

“Que estas haciendo?  Hablas espanol?” the leader of the drug carriers said.

“Ellos no hablan espanol,” Ric replied, then translated, “They don’t speak Spanish.”

“Entonces diles que se callen la boca,” the leader said to Ric.

“He says that if you don’t speak Spanish, you should stop talking,” Ric said to Madi and Jack.

“Tell him that we won’t talk then, Ric,” Jack said.

“Ya no estan hablando mas, entonces solo preguntame y yo traduzco lo que les quieras preguntar,” Ric said to the leader of the group. 

Ric kept trying to explain to the group of drug carriers why Jack and Madi were out in the middle of the desert giving water to people in order to interview them.  They didn’t seem to be buying it. 

***

“Ed, this is Ronny.  We have a problem,” Ronny Torres said into the phone to Ed Dixon. 

“What is it, Ronny?”

“I think a group of hostiles has Jack and his team held at gunpoint in the desert in Arizona.”

“Crap,” Ed said as he pulled out his earpiece and put it in.  “Can you patch me into his channel?”

“I can, Ed, but you need to be really careful.  I haven’t responded to him.  He just turned his coms on a minute ago, and if he isn’t used to having someone talk into his ear, he might say or do something to give away that he has a way of communicating.  We don’t want that.”

“Roger that, Ronny.  I’ll let you take the lead.  I’ll just listen in,” Ed responded. 

A moment later, Ed was tuned into Jack’s channel.  Ronny was plotting the location from the GPS reading he was getting off Jack’s transponder. 

“I have a location for him.  He’s near Scribner Gulch, about twelve miles west by northwest of Nogales, Arizona, and probably a hundred yards from the Mexican border.  It’s going to take about eight hours to assemble a team and get them to that location,” Ronny told Ed on the phone. 

“That means we are useless.  He’ll likely have this solved one way or another before we can even get in the air.  Can you get Border Patrol there faster?”

“Depends on what they have available, Ed.”

“Let’s get everyone together so that we can go if we get word, Ronny.  I’ll phone Bill.”

Ronny sent out word to Gunny, Melody, Bobby, Duke and Gino that they had a situation and needed to be ready to fly at a moment’s notice. 

“Bill, it’s Ed.  Jack might be in trouble at the border.  Ronny got a call that sounded like they were being held at gunpoint.”

“You have the team prepping to go?” Bill replied.

“Ronny sent out the word, but I don’t know that it will do any good.  They’re in flippin’ Arizona.  It’s gonna take eight hours to get on location.  I think we should get in the air, though.”

“I agree.  I’ll meet you at the hangar in forty minutes.”

“Ronny,” Ed said into the other phone, “hangar in forty.”

“Roger that, Bossman.  I’ll have the team there.”

Ronny opened up a radio channel to the team, “Hangar in forty minutes.  Wheels up at 7:00pm.”

Ronny went back to a discreet channel with Jack.  “Gulp if you can hear me, Jack.  This is Ronny.”

Jack, standing in the desert two thousand miles away, gulped.

“Ok, Jack.  I got your call.  The team will be in the air in forty-five minutes, but it will take until around eleven, local time, to get where you are.  Stay on coms, and try to keep your camera bag near… I’m guessing that is where your radio is.  I’m going to switch you to a team channel from my end.  We’ll all be here with you.”

***

The leader of the group started barking orders to his men.  A few minutes later another group showed up and they started transferring some of the packs, presumably drugs, to the new arrivals.  Then a cloth bag was put over his head and his camera bag taken away.  His hands were roughly taped behind his back and they started pushing him to walk.

“What’s going on, Ric?  Where are they taking us?  Why are there bags over our heads?” Jack said.

The leader of the group yelled at Ric for a moment in Spanish.

“Don’t talk, Jack, they are taking us back to their headquarters while they decide what to do with us,” Ric replied in a harsh whisper.

***

“Jack, sniff if they took your camera bag away and the radio is in the bag,” Ronny said into his Jack’s ear.

Jack sniffed loudly.

“You are walking toward Mexico.  I alerted Border Patrol of your location through some cut outs, but they won’t be there for a while, if at all.  Stay calm.”

Ronny pulled up a menu on his radio and started listening to the audio from the handset in Jack’s camera bag.  It was muffled, but he was able to pick up that they were being taken to the “outpost” near a ranch about five miles south.  He got on the com unit and told his team that Jack had just been moved into Mexico.  And he expected that they would be stopping for at least a while about five miles south of the border. 

“Jack, you are currently in Mexico.  It sounds like they are taking you to a forward operational base about five miles south of your present location.  I’m guessing that you are in for a long, hot walk.  I’ll be on the other end of the radio.  Don’t talk unless you know you aren’t going to get on their bad side, and don’t let them get the idea you have a way of communicating outside.”

With that, Ronny signed off for a little while.  He would still be able to talk with Jack, but he had his own gear to get ready and he had to get to the hangar to make the flight out to Arizona.  Bill used his contacts to secure facilities at Fort Huachuca, south of Tucson.  They had four special forces, unmarked vehicles that would be waiting for them when they landed.  Ed had arranged the company Gulfstream G-III to fly the team from Patrick Henry International Airport, where Earthworks owned a hangar, to the airstrip at Fort Huachuca.  Expected flight time would be around four hours.  After getting on the ground, they expected it to take three to four hours to locate Jack and his companions. 

***

Bill came through his front door like a hurricane.  He rushed up the stairs without a word to his wife, who was sitting in the kitchen talking with their daughter.  She had come over to visit with her mother for a few minutes, not expecting her dad to be there. 

“Bill, what’s going on?  What’s the hurry?” she asked, following him up the steps. 

“We have a situation.  I have to fly out to Arizona,” he replied, not seeing his daughter behind his wife.

“Daddy, is it Jack?  Is he in trouble?  That’s the only thing I can think of that would send you to Arizona like you’re on fire,” Amy said to her father, worry across her face.

“As much as I want to deny it, yes… Jack is in a tight spot.  I have to go,” her father said as he grabbed his tactical gear from under the bed and pulled a case from the closet. 

“I’m going,” Amy said, more a statement that any type of question. 

“Amy, I really don’t think…” Bill tried to reply before she cut him off.

“That I can handle seeing him with a bullet hole in his chest and a stab wound in his side?  I can and I have,” she told her father.

“We’re both going, Bill.  And I’m calling Sharon,” Chrissy told her husband.

Chrissy rushed to her closet and grabbed a few items, including two weapons that had been presents from her husband, and her own fatigues that she wore to the range.  She grabbed a second set for her daughter, since they were so close to the same size.  Then she picked up the phone in the bedroom and called her friend, Jack’s mother.

“Sharon, Bill just rushed in.  It’s Jack.  He’s in trouble in Arizona.”

…

“Ed is still there?”

…

“Then I guess we’ll see you at the airport.”

Chrissy hung up the phone and made her way downstairs.  Amy picked up the phone and quickly called her assistant. 

“Donna, I am not going to be back to the office today.  Not sure about tomorrow.  I’ll call you as soon as I know more.”

…

“An emergency came up… a family thing.”

…

“Thanks.  Just tell them to hold on and we’ll reschedule anything that you have to bump.”

The young woman hung up the phone and turned to her parents, “Let’s roll.  I’m ready.  I’ll have to deal with a few things later, but that will be later.”

The trio went to the garage and jumped in Chrissy’s AMG. 

“Ed, it’s Bill.  I have Chrissy and Amy with me.  They were at the house,” he said over the radio.

…

“You mean before Chrissy called?”

…

“See you in a minute.”

***

Jack walked through the desert with a bag on his head for almost three hours.  That put the time at around six in the evening.  He didn’t expect that Gunny and the team would be able to locate him for at least five more hours. 

As they approached a barn, with no other buildings in sight, the hood was removed from Jack.  He looked over and saw the hoods removed from Madi and Ric a moment later.  He hadn’t had any water during the entirety of their hike and assumed the other two had also not had any. 

“Agua?” Jack said quietly to the man holding his wrists.

“Dile que se espere un ratico,” the man said back to Jack quietly, telling him to be patient.

The three were led into the barn and pushed into a stall and left alone.  They huddled close together to talk for a moment.

“Madi, Ric, are you guys ok?” Jack asked.

“Just thirsty,” Madi replied.

“I think I have someone trying to help us get free,” Jack told the other two.

“Did someone see us before they put the hoods on?” Ric asked.

“Something like that.  But they have walked us into Mexico, so that complicates things,” Jack told the others.  “But aside from needing a drink, you guys are ok?”

Both nodded that they were. 

Jack was working on finding a way to get out when Gunny’s voice came over his earpiece.  “Jack, it’s Gunny.  Don’t respond.  I’ve been listening and I’m guessing that you and your companions have been locked away somewhere.  We have a rough location.  We are on the way, but it will be another two hours before we land.  Then we have to get to where you are, and it won’t be highway.  Probably five hours total.  Sniff if you understand.”

Jack sniffed. 

“You ok, Jack?” Madi asked.

“Yeah, I think it’s the hay in this barn that are bothering me,” he replied to her. 

“Good job, Jack.  Thanks for telling me you’re in a barn,” Gunny said on his earpiece.  “We’re coming for you.  When we get there, we are going to have about a fifty-yard circle to search within.  Hints like you just gave me might make all the difference.”

She pulled the keys to the Camaro from her purse as she walked across the employee parking lot.  When she got to her 1969 Camaro Z-28, a car she’d been driving since she got her driver’s license in high school, she slipped the key into the lock, opened the door and fired up the small-block 302 under the hood. 

Amy pulled around to the gate to pull out of the parking area and onto Industrial Parkway.  As she looked over to her dad’s office, she saw that his car was gone.  She expected that her father-in-law’s car was gone from his office around the corner, but she couldn’t see to be sure.  No matter, she thought to herself, I’ll be at the Dixons in a few minutes and they probably won’t have started.

She didn’t see the brown Dodge Diplomat that slipped in behind her when she turned onto Mercury Blvd.  It stayed a couple of cars behind her until the took the clover-leaf ramp to LaSalle Ave.  She loved running that ramp, and since there were no cars in front of her, she downshifted to second, punched the gas-pedal and pushed the RPMs up.  The racing-inspired engine loved the attention, and as she turned in for the ramp, she could feel the rear tires closing on the edge of traction.  She held the throttle steady, pulling away from the cars behind her. 

As she got to the top of the ramp onto LaSalle, the cars behind had dropped back another hundred yards.  She shifted to third and punched the throttle again.  After the momentary pause in acceleration, the car leapt forward again, almost touching a hundred miles per hour before shifting to fourth.  When she hit one-twenty-five, she lifted off the gas and the car rapidly bled off its speed. 

Amy didn’t see the brown Dodge trying to get around the cars she’d left in her wake on LaSalle as she turned onto Settler’s Landing Road.  The Dodge didn’t make the light, though, so they lost touch with her when she turned onto Armistead. 

A couple of minutes later, Amy pulled up outside the carriage house at Ed and Sharon Dixon’s house… her husband’s parents.  As she expected, both of her parent’s cars were there, as well as Jonathan’s Porsche and his sister’s giant four-wheel-drive catering van. 

Jack Dixon stepped through the back door to greet his wife, a Margarita in hand for her.  “Hey Babe.  Donna have to kick you out?” he said, laughing.

“No,” she said defensively, then after a moment admitted, “Ok, if you must know, yes.”

Jack laughed and leaned over to kiss his wife as he handed her the drink.  When she saw the mirth in his eyes, she laughed, too. 

“I love you, Jonathan Dixon,” she said to him as she looked him in the eyes. 

“I love you, too, Amy Dixon.”

Amy set her drink on the table, wrapped her arms around her husband’s shoulders and gave him the kiss she thought he deserved. 

“I like it,” Jack said with a grin as Amy finally pulled away.  “We need to revisit that later… but dinner is about ready.  And I have an announcement.”

“What is it?” she asked, excitedly.

“You’ll know in a few minutes,” he replied with a smug smile.  Jack turned on his heel and stepped back through the door, holding it for his wife. 

A few minutes later everyone was gathered around the table for their weekly ritual, Taco Tuesday.  Nicole had been cooking tacos for her family since high school, almost every Tuesday.  Over the last few months, as things had gotten busier, it had become a ritual to drop everything so that they could hang out. 

“No date tonight, Honey?” Sharon asked her daughter, Nicole.

“No, Mom,” she replied with the beginnings of exasperation.  Any time she didn’t have a date, she was asked about it by her mother. 

“Hey, Nicci,” her father started, “have you kept in touch with Rolf at all?  I kind of miss him.  He was a pretty good guy.”

“No,” she replied, a touch sad at the thought of Rolf, “he just kind of dropped off the planet a while back.  He wrote back a couple of times, but I haven’t heard anything from him in a couple of years.”

The conversation lightened up a little after that.  Amy was working on a couple of new titles for the video game company.  They expected to have several ready for the show in October.  Then, all eyes turned to Jonathan “Jack” Dixon to hear his announcement.

“I have been asked to go to Arizona next month to shoot a human-interest piece on illegal border crossers.  I’ve been assigned a writer, and we’re going to spend a week near Tucson working on a piece for a couple of big-name magazines.”

“That is awesome,” Amy said as she turned to give her husband a kiss of congratulations.  Everyone at the table nodded their approval. 

“Excellent work, Jack,” Bill Prince, Jack’s father-in-law said, from across the table.  “Seeing your past work, I know that you will kill it and it will lead to even more great things.”

There was a round of conversation around the table about Tucson and what he might find there.  Everyone was terribly excited for his opportunity. 

“There is one thing, Jack,” Ed Dixon said as the conversation started to die down, “you need to be careful.  I was talking to Gunny this afternoon, and his KnR business is skyrocketing.”

“KnR?” Chrissy asked.

“Sorry, kidnap and ransom,” Bill replied to his wife.  “It isn’t just the border either, but there is a lot of activity in those areas.  Unsavory characters will kidnap someone, especially an American they think might have family with money, and ransom them back.”

“Exactly.  Gunny mentioned that they have had an uptick in work related to that threat, even here in the US.  As a result, they have been doing more training on hostage rescue.  They have all but dropped their government work to concentrate on KnR, hostage rescue and general security,” Ed said.

“Wow, Dad, I had no idea,” Jack replied, “but I’ll do everything I can to stay safe.  The magazine suggested hiring a local guide.  They have some feelers out for suitable prospects.”

As dinner wound down, Jack and Amy headed home.  Jack in his 944 and Amy in her Camaro.  Fifteen minutes later, Jack was punching the security code into the home alarm as Amy retrieved her purse from her car before heading up the stairs into the beach house from the drive-under garage. 

***

At the end of the street, the brown Dodge sat in the dark.  The two men in the front seat making a note of the other car that pulled in… her husband… and the time.  They had been shadowing her for a couple of days to see when she was most vulnerable. 

“She’s easily a million-dollar payday, John.  You saw her in-law’s house, and her parent’s house.  She runs a very successful company, and both her dad and her husband’s dad run big operations, too.  We might even be able to cash out higher than that.”

“Seems all well and good, Meeks, but something doesn’t feel right.” 

John couldn’t find anything on Ed Dixon’s or Bill Prince’s backgrounds.  That bothered him.  And even in just a couple of days watching her, they had noticed a few of her friends that looked “military” as John liked to say.  Meeks always countered that with as many military installations as there were around this area, almost everyone looked “military.” 

“I’m just sayin’ that I think we are missing something.  We need to be patient.  Like that brown-haired lady she had lunch with yesterday.  She screamed FBI or somethin’ to me.  It was like she saw everything and everyone around them the whole time.  And we don’t know nuthin’ about her family, aside from they got some money.”

“John, you are such a wuss.” Meeks said as he shook his head.  “We’ll watch her for a while longer, but I think she’ll be an easy mark.”

“It’s now or never,” Gunny said into his radio, prompting both pairs of men to begin their trek forward.  If they could run, even with the weapons and gear, it would only take them about seventy-five seconds to cover the ground, but they couldn’t just stand up and sprint.  They needed some stealth if they hoped to get to the house without being noticed.  Instead of heading straight in, they spent as much time as they could keeping a screen in front of them. 

Four and a half minutes later Gunny was at the back door, Gino at the front.  “Ding, dong, Avon calling… Bitches,” Gino said into his radio as the charges went off removing the door from the frame and flinging it inward.  At exactly the same time, the rear door did the same thing. 

The guards downstairs were both stunned by the explosions.  The one in the kitchen, at the back of the house, was knocked unconscious as a large chunk of the door slammed into his head.  The guard in the living room stood up, but before he could pull out his gun, he saw the masked man that was first through the door had a rifle trained on his chest. 

Upstairs, Thompson Walters leapt from his bed and made straight for the room in which the girl was being held.  He unlocked the door and rushed over to where she had been sleeping on the floor.  It was obvious that he wasn’t going to be able to make a break for it.  Whoever had come through the door downstairs wasn’t going to let him run away, he thought, unless he had leverage.  His intent was to use the girl as a shield to get out of the house. 

Downstairs, both guards were secured with zip ties.  Gino wasn’t gentle at all with the man he’d taken.  He’d barely been able to breathe as Gino knelt with one knee almost on the back of his neck.  As Bobby cleared the rest of the downstairs area, Gunny called in Duke for their evac. 

“The girl must be upstairs, and there will be at least one more with her,” Bobby said as he took the lead on the stairs. 

“I’ve got two heat signatures to the left at the top of the stairs.  It looks like they are huddled together,” Ronny said into his radio before he headed up the stairs, bringing up the rear. 

“Roger that, Three,” Bobby replied.  At the top of the stairs he turned left.  Gino, right behind him, swept right just to make sure.  None of them expected it, but if they had the technology to mask heat signatures, the kidnappers might also. 

As Bobby approached the end of the hall, the last door was wide open and even before he got there, he could see the kidnapper holding the teenage girl in front of him as a human shield holding his revolver to her head.

“Stop, or I’ll shoot her,” he yelled, frantically looking from man to man. 

Both rescue team members could see the girl was obviously scared out of her mind.  She sobbed loudly and screamed through her gag as her kidnapper manhandled her to keep the gun at her temple.  They could see the tears streaming down her cheeks and soaking into her gag.  It broke Bobby’s heart that she was going through this, and he could feel his anger welling up inside.

He stepped into the room with his M16A2 trained on the forehead of the man holding the gun.  Hitting him in the head would not be a problem, but if the kidnapper had a nervous twitch, the gun could go off and the girl could die.  That was not an acceptable outcome.  “What’s your name?” Bobby asked.

“Put down your gun,” he yelled back.

“No,” Bobby replied flatly, “what’s your name?”

“Put down your gun, or I’ll kill her,” the man yelled again.

“And then what?  If you shoot her, you don’t have a shield anymore.  So, shooting her would be the worst thing to happen to you in your miserable life.”

“I mean it, man, I’ll kill her,” he repeated. 

The girl was almost in hysterics.  She’d been kidnapped two days before in Chicago.  Her father was a prominent politician, and wealthy.  They’d called and demanded a five-hundred-thousand-dollar ransom.  Gunny’s team had been called in after the ransom demand.  When the kidnappers called again to tell them where to drop the money, which was supposed to happen later on that day, they had traced the call back to this farmhouse, a hundred and fifty miles from Chicago. 

“Tasha,” Bobby said calmly, “he’s not going to hurt you.  We are here to take you home.  If he hurts you, he knows that he doesn’t have any leverage left.  Do you hear me?”

The girl nodded weakly, still sobbing. 

“Here’s the deal,” Bobby said calmly, “we already have your guys downstairs.  We know who they are, and they are going to prison.  You aren’t leaving this room a free man.  I don’t give a crap about your threats.  But before you do anything, think about this.  We are NOT the cops. 

“If you hurt that girl, I will put a bullet in your head.  After that, I’ll figure out who you are and who you held dear.  I will take out revenge on them.  Mother, sister, daughter, girlfriend… whatever.  THEY will suffer for your poor decisions.  And I will tell them exactly why, too.  They will know all about you.”

Ronny had moved back down the stairs and gotten the name of the kidnapper from the man that was still conscious downstairs.  He radioed it to Bobby. 

“Do you understand me, Thompson Walters?” Bobby finally asked.  

Hearing the intruder use his name shook his confidence to the core.  In the movies, the good guys always laid down their guns.  He thought that was some sort of unwritten rule.  He would be able to push the girl outside and get in a car and get away.  But these guys weren’t playing by the rules. 

“I want an exit,” Thompson Walters said to the man standing in front of him. 

“You drop the gun and let go of the girl, and you might be able to get out of here alive before the cops arrive.  Until you do that, you don’t have an exit unless you’re dead.”

Outside he could hear the helicopter setting down in the back yard, between the house and the barn. 

“What’s that?” the kidnapper yelled.

“That’s my ride.  Your time is about up,” Bobby replied.  Gino slipped from his spot just outside the door in the hallway into the room behind Bobby and moved off to his left, his rifle also raised and pointed at Walters. 

Walters looked around.  His decision was whether he would set the gun down or just shoot the girl, knowing he would die a moment later. 

“On second thought, I might not shoot to kill.  I might maim you.  If you pull the trigger, your gun hand will get a bullet before the echo dies.  After that, I will subdue you, roughly.  In the end, when the ambulance picks you up, you will have suffered multiple wounds and by the time you go to prison you will be a eunuch.  You are going to be a VERY popular man in prison, Thompson.  And I might still visit your family, just to let them know what kind of man you are,” Bobby said with a grin. 

Thompson Walters moved the gun away from the girl’s head.  As soon as he did, Gino Bell moved in and removed the gun from his hand, dropped him to the floor and zip tied his hands behind his back.  He pulled the zip ties as tight as he could and drew blood from both wrists of the kidnapper. 

Bobby rushed over to Tasha and removed her gag.  “You’re ok, Tasha.  We’re here to take you home.”  Then he cut off the bindings on her wrists.  As soon as she was free, she wrapped her arms around the man in front of her and started crying into his shoulder. 

Bobby scooped her up and started carrying her from the room, down the stairs, through the back door and outside to the waiting chopper.  Gunny and Gino did a final sweep to make sure they hadn’t left anything, while Ronny started checking the girl over for hidden injuries.  They knew that the police would be there any minute, and they didn’t want to be there when they arrived.  That would require too many explanations, and stealth was required for their continued success.

Gino jumped into the front and Gunny hopped into the back and slid the door closed. 

“Take it up, Five,” Gunny said into his radio. 

***

The helicopter set down on top of a high-rise in downtown Chicago.  Franklin Johnson walked over as the side door slid open.  His sixteen-year-old daughter, Tasha, jumped from the helicopter and ran to her father.  When she leapt into his arms, both were in tears.  His little girl was all he had left after her mother had passed away a few years before from cancer. 

Without a word, the chopper took off again and headed to a private airfield just south of Gary, Indiana.  They dropped off the helicopter and boarded their plane to head back to Virginia. 

“Bobby, you are a stone-cold badass,” Gino said as they settled into their seats.  “Man, you scared me, and I know you’re a big teddy-bear.”

“You were in his head, no doubt,” Gunny confirmed.  “He didn’t know how to react because you changed every rule he thought he had to go by.  Good work, my friend.”

“Thanks, guys,” he responded. 

“That bit about his Momma and his sister, dayum,” Ronny exclaimed, “if I didn’t know better, I’da thought you meant it.”

“I guess I missed the fun part.  I mean, I heard it on the radio, but the front row seats were likely better,” Duke chimed in, “but what I heard was epic.  You think they got away?”

“Nah,” Gunny said, “I think the police were only a couple of minutes out.  They’ll get a tip that the guys were involved in that kidnapping and the girl will be able to identify them.  Her father already knows to try to tamp down any conversation about us… and she wouldn’t be able to identify us, anyway.”

They continued to talk and laugh about the successful rescue until the plane set down at Patrick Henry Airport in Newport News, Virginia.  Then the group disembarked, packed their gear back into their various vehicles and headed home.  The after-action report would be tomorrow morning at 0900.

Next up will be some parts from the third book in the Dixon-Prince series, You Don’t Know Jack. In this book, Jack runs into an issue, and it drags the team in as well. Later in the book, Amy and Nicole have their own problem to solve.

It is set a few years later, and Jack has become a successful photographer, while Amy is rocking things as President of a video gaming company. Nicole has launched all out in to the world of catering.

There are lots of stories between the Broken Path and You Don’t Know Jack, and some of those are chronicled in Who, What, When, Why? I have previously published a couple of those here, as well, and i’ll link those below, too.

Planning Vengeance excerpts:

• Planning Vengeance excerpt 1
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 2
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 3
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 4
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 5
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 6
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 7
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 8
• Planning Vengeance excerpt 9

Links to stories in Who, What, Why, When?

• The Proposal 1
• The Proposal 2
• The Proposal 3
• The Proposal 4
• The Proposal 5
• The Hacker 1
• The Hacker 2
• The Hacker 3
• The Hacker 4
• The Hacker 5
• The Hacker 6
• The Hacker 7
• The Hacker 8

I’d love to hear what you think about them!