The Revelation of Eden Pruitt, page 19
The knots in her stomach wrenched tighter. She couldn’t think about the plan going sideways. The prospect of failure was too terrifying. Too overwhelming. Too debilitating. She couldn’t give it any space. She shoved that possibility aside and focused on the three-dimensional holographic map hovering over the circular table. She was sitting in the war room along with every other person involved in the prison break. They were together virtually, separated physically.
Manny was in Annapolis. Nairobi was with him. Amir and Emmett were in Bethesda. Harlan, somewhere in Colorado. Cleo, Dayne, and Asher remained in Alexandria. Eden, Francesca, Jericho, Lark, and four others from Bunker Three were in a safe house in Chesapeake. The eight of them had arrived at the safe house inside steel shipping tanks marked hazardous, lined with black silicon, supposedly on their way to the Port of Virginia. The truck was stopped twice. Each tank was scanned before the driver was sent on his merry way.
Eden took a deep breath and focused on Asher, who was walking them through their carefully choreographed plan. According to Amir, the prisoners would be loaded into a high-security transport vehicle and taken five hours south, to an undisclosed location outside the small town of South Mills, North Carolina. Nairobi would be stationed on a moped outside the prison grounds, watching for the convoy, reporting to Asher as soon as it left. A portion of the route would wind along the edge of Great Dismal Swamp—a state park and wildlife refuge. This was where the ambush would unfold.
There would be four vehicles in the convoy. Manuel Van Cooper was going to mount tracking devices to each vehicle’s fuel injection system. The devices came with a remote, which was currently in Jericho’s possession. Push the right button, and the trackers would emit a small EMP that would temporarily stun, and thus disable the vehicles.
Which led to the trickiest bit of their plan—the dead zone.
This had occupied the bulk of their attention, as it involved the greatest potential for error. The zone was made possible by an illegal device called an Atax. They were only sold on the black market, and could absorb radio frequencies, block tracking systems, and jam signals within a given radius. They’d spent several days alone figuring out ways to increase that radius. Currently, they were discussing what to do should surveillance drones come into play. They couldn’t have one flying into their dead zone. As soon as its signal dropped, the red flags would wave.
Asher studied the holographic map, twirling his queen around his thumb. “If this dead zone is the square we want, and a drone is threatening that square, then we need to lure the drone away.”
Cleo’s attention dropped to his revolving chess piece. “With a sacrifice.”
He clicked his tongue and shot her a wink, their gaze connecting and holding. “Precisely.”
Francesca looked between them with a scowl. “And who is going to be this sacrifice, exactly?”
“We don’t need a who,” Cleo said. “We already have a what.”
Asher brought a handful of holographic vehicles into play like game pieces on a board. Each one was a newly minted, all-terrain Faraday Force—the crown jewel of off-roading. Thanks to Harlan, they had four of them.
“There are eight of you. If all goes according to plan, we’ll have eight more before the night is through. We can fit six into a vehicle.”
“That’s a tight squeeze,” Francesca said.
“Eden will sit on Cassian’s lap,” Cleo replied with an impish grin.
Heat pooled in Eden’s ears.
“They will expect this road to be deserted.” Asher slid one of the Faraday Forces into a quadrant northwest of the dead zone. “We put this vehicle here and have it self-start at a specified time.”
“Creating a signal,” Cleo said.
“They’ll send their drones to check it out,” Asher continued. “Just as their convoy is hitting the dead zone.”
They continued their run-through.
Once the convoy came to a stop, the drivers would radio for help. But without a signal, none of those messages would go through. The group in Chesapeake would be lying in wait, surrounding the convoy on all sides. Much to Lark’s chagrin, their guns would not be loaded with bullets. They would be loaded with tranquilizer. They needed the guards’ retinas and fingerprints to carry out their plans and none of them were sure whether dead retinas and dead fingerprints would work.
They would tranquilize the guards the moment they stepped out of their vehicles. By the time they freed the prisoners, the vehicles will have had sufficient time to recover. They would re-program the convoy to resume its course toward South Mills. When the convoy arrived, the tranquilizer would wear off and the prisoners would be secure in their Chesapeake safe house, waiting to stuff themselves into steel shipping containers so they could make their way to Alexandria.
All of it was too neat.
Too tidy.
If Eden understood anything by now, it was how rarely plans went off without a hitch.
Hence their backup. Hi-tech, black-market explosives. The same weight and shape as a grenade. With pins like a grenade, too. Only, unlike their predecessor, a pulled pin didn’t have to mean detonation. One could hold on to the button indefinitely to keep the blast at bay. Everyone taking part in the ambush would be armed with several.
The bombs were a last resort, for emergency use only. They didn’t want anything or anyone to explode. The goal was stealth. They didn’t want to draw attention. An explosion most certainly would.
Eden wiped her virtual hands along her virtual pants and clamped her teeth tighter, her nerves quadrupling.
Tomorrow was the night.
If this worked—and it had to work—Cassian would be free. She would be in his arms.
30
They tromped through dense brush with semi-automatics strapped around their shoulders, their breaths escaping in puffs of white. They were phantoms in the night, marching in a single-file line with black helmets and black fatigues and black army boots and black tactical vests, each one loaded with an encrypted satellite radio, high-tech explosives, and night-vision goggles.
Eden didn’t need the night vision goggles. She could see everything perfectly fine without them. She could hear everything, too. The heartbeats of her comrades. The rhythm of their breathing. Every broken twig. Every rustling leaf. Every slithering, crawling, flying creature in the dark as they high-stepped their way to the ambush site.
All eight of them were miked, connected via radio to Nairobi, who was lying in wait outside the prison yard in Annapolis, and Asher, with his team in Alexandria. They had turned the IDA boardroom into a control center. They were monitoring the tracking devices Manny had placed on each of the prison vehicles.
“The gates are opening,” Nairobi said. “Bird in the sky. Over.”
A drone.
Eden’s nerves solidified into a brick.
“Just one?” Asher asked.
“Affirmative,” Nairobi replied.
She gave him her exact coordinates. Eden could hear the tapping of computer keys. Her palms went sweaty as she gripped her semi-automatic and continued her trek through the wildlife refuge.
“There are only three vehicles. Over.”
Eden stopped.
So did the tapping. “Where’s the fourth?”
“It’s still in the prison yard,” Cleo replied in the background.
The brick in Eden’s stomach doubled in size. There were supposed to be four prison vehicles. This was what Amir had reported, and this was what Manny had confirmed. He’d planted EMPs inside all four. So why were there only three?
“What do you want me to do?” Nairobi asked.
“Stay in position,” Asher answered. “Wait for the fourth.”
Nairobi was supposed to tail the convoy from a safe distance. Improvisation this early in the game didn’t bode well. Eden and the others continued forward. Her mind was abuzz. Did someone discover the tracker? They were almost there now. She could sense the change in the environment ahead. The break of trees. The belt of highway. Were they—the ambush team—walking straight into an ambush?
“Three of the vehicles are en route,” Asher said. “ETA, four hours, two minutes.”
It all came down to this.
In four hours and two minutes, their carefully laid plans would either succeed or fail.
Eden stretched her cold, numb fingers as they reached the edge of the tree line. In front of them, Highway Seventeen stretched from north to south. There wasn’t a car in sight. Asher began directing Jericho, who made quick work of planting the Atax on the east side of the road. They traveled a predetermined route to verify the radius of the dead zone. Then they waited on the perimeter, just outside the zone, to maintain communication.
There was no sign of the fourth vehicle.
Nairobi remained in place, watching should it appear.
Asher monitored the convoy through the drone.
Lark identified the tree she would scale when it was time to move into position, which wouldn’t happen until t-minus twenty minutes. They wanted to mitigate loss of communication for as long as possible. As soon as they moved into the dead zone, they would lose all contact with Asher and Nairobi.
Eden took deep, slow breaths and settled in for the wait as the chatter across their comms continued.
Cass waded through the warm pool toward a woman floating face-down in its center. Her hair undulated in the water like pale strands of gossamer. The honey blonde color made his heart thump. Dread stretched like a yawn as he reached out to take her arm. She flopped face-up—her blank, unseeing eyes a familiar mixture of blue and gray and green.
He shook his head.
No.
It wasn’t possible.
She couldn’t die.
He clutched her shoulders.
Her head lolled, her wet hair streaked with red. Blood red.
He spun in a circle.
The pool was filled with blood.
“I pulled out the monsters,” Mona said, perched on the edge with her feet submerged. “I pulled them out for you.”
The yawning dread turned into a horror that tore up his throat and shot forth in a guttural cry. He charged across the ring.
The monster shouted, “I didn’t kill her!”
Cass swung. Again and again. Wildly. Recklessly. Blindly as the monster cowered with his hands over his head.
“It wasn’t me, I swear!”
“Who was it, then?” Cass roared.
“It was you, son. You killed her.”
His rage combusted into a consuming fire that burned and burned and burned as he tackled the monster to the ground and pummeled him. He landed blow after blow until the bell rang and the crowd cheered and the referee dragged him away from the dead man lying in a puddle of crimson.
Then Eden was there, clutching the dead man to her chest.
She was alive. She was hugging the man. Rocking him back and forth as she cried and screamed. The man wasn’t the monster. The man was Eden’s dad.
With a long, sharp gasp, Cass bolted upright.
His cell was dark.
His heart crashed in his ears. Cold sweat trickled down his spine.
It was a nightmare.
Eden wasn’t dead.
He hadn’t killed her father.
But you did kill someone’s father.
He shut his eyes, wishing he could block out the accusation. But the accusation was true. He had killed someone’s father. He dug his fingers into his hair. He squeezed his head as though he might squeeze away the truth.
I lost my mind.
The monster’s words clung to him. No matter how many push-ups and dips he did in his cell. No matter how furiously he scrubbed when he showered, those words refused to go. Because they were also true. Cass had lost his mind, too. In a fit of rage, he had killed an innocent man.
Which made him no different from the monster.
His cell door swung open. The small space flooded with light. A guard marched inside. Not the one with the bum knee. Not the one who cracked his knuckles. Not the one with the rattling Tums. Not the one who smelled like a different perfume every morning. This guard was new. He didn’t make eye contact or explain his sudden, intrusive presence. He simply pulled Cass to his feet, cuffed his hands behind his back, and pushed him out into the corridor, where a second guard waited, as unfamiliar as the first.
They led him away.
Not toward the showers or the interrogation room.
“Where are you taking me?” Cass asked.
Neither answered. They just pushed him forward. Up a set of stairs. Through a wider corridor and out into the night. Fresh air. He inhaled deeply. It felt like the first drink of water after a day spent in the desert. Up above, swollen clouds roiled in a jet black sky. A few paces in front of him, several vehicles idled, their rear lights glowing red as exhaust escaped in puffs of white that dispersed with a gust of biting wind.
A door slammed.
Beneath the lights of the prison yard, a woman strode in his direction. Lady Justice. Only she wasn’t wearing her usual attire. No business suit. No blazer with a brooch. Instead, she wore khaki slacks and a navy rain jacket with yellow lettering, clearly labeling her an employee of the United States government. Cass hadn’t seen her in days. Maybe weeks. He’d lost all sense of time. Their last interaction had been after the visit from his father, when she confessed things didn’t add up—an admission that had clearly agitated her. Ever since, he’d wondered about her safety. He’d wondered if nosing around had numbered her days. But here she was, speaking into a walkie-talkie as drops of rain began falling from the bruised sky.
“Get them into the truck,” she commanded.
Them.
He looked over his shoulder and squinted through the thickening rain.
Prudence Dvorak was being pushed toward him, flanked by one guard instead of two. He surveyed the surrounding grounds, but his sight refused to extend beyond the prison lights. He had no way of knowing what kind of security waited ahead.
The rain fell harder.
Cold drops drummed against the tops of the vehicles as a guard shoved Cass into the back of a van. The guard pushed him onto a bench, where his ankles were shackled and bolted to the floor. Dvorak was pushed inside after him, her ankles shackled and bolted, too. Then the guard left, and it was just them, sitting across from one another. Her dark eyes were alert, her hair rumpled from sleep.
Outside, doors slammed shut.
A cacophony of voices mingled with the chattering rain.
“Where are you going?” a male voice called.
“I will ride in the back,” Lady Justice replied.
“With the prisoners?”
She stepped into view, framed inside the opened doors, her navy blue rain jacket wet. Her copper hair, too. A male guard stepped beside her, watching dubiously as she climbed aboard. This obviously wasn’t protocol.
“You heard the command. These two require the highest level of security. We can’t have any funny business.” She sat on the bench beside Dvorak and cocked her rifle. “Now if you please, officer, take your position behind the wheel.”
31
Time passed like a snail as the night sounds chorused. The peeping of frogs. The chirping of crickets. The yipping of coyotes somewhere in the distance. Interspersed with the occasional lonely hoot of an owl.
Eden began to shiver.
“ETA, thirty minutes,” Asher said.
And then, “The fourth vehicle is on the move.”
The observation came from Dayne, his voice recognizable in the background.
It was quickly followed by Nairobi’s and the pitter-patter of rain through her walkie-talkie. “Gates are opening. Fourth vehicle is leaving the yard.”
Eden stopped breathing.
“What do you want me to do?” Nairobi asked.
“Tail it,” Asher commanded. “Make sure to stay out of sight.”
Eden forced herself to inhale. She could do nothing about the fourth vehicle. She could only focus on the task at hand. A task that was now only twenty-four minutes away.
“Fourth vehicle is merging onto Highway 450, due west,” Cleo said.
“I’m on it,” Nairobi replied.
Asher prepared for the diversion.
With twenty-two minutes to go, he gave his throat a clear. “Sending the signal in three … two … one.”
Eden squeezed her eyes.
Please work, please work, please work …
“Bullseye,” Asher said.
The bird in the sky had received an incoming command. A moment later, away it flew. Toward the Faraday Force parked on an access road that should have been deserted.
Jericho snapped his fingers and waved them into the dead zone. “Team is moving into position. Over.”
He remained where he was, outsize the dead zone, with the remote that would detonate the EMPs. Eden and Francesca crawled on their bellies beneath a large bush. Two of the survivors from Bunker Three did the same thirty-five yards south. Between them, Lark crossed the road, slung her gun over her back, and scaled a tall tree with the nimbleness of a tightrope walker. The remaining two crossed as well and spread out beneath a copse of bushes.
Eden propped the semi-automatic on the ground in front of her. She aimed it at the road and curled her finger around the trigger, doing her best to block out the flashback. She was not on the roof of The Sapphire. She was not being controlled by the enemy. She was not aiming her gun at her mother or Cassian. She was in her full and right mind as she detected the rumble of engines, as she calculated their distance and speed.
Her heart thudded violently beneath her ribcage, punching a bruise against her sternum. Beside her, Francesca’s heart did the same. Any second, the three vehicles would crest the hill. Did Manny do his job? Had he set up the EMPs correctly?
