The e-mail failed to immediately transmit. The attached file was huge and would take an extra minute to upload. He couldn’t wait. Jason hoped the battery pack would last long enough for the e-mail to go through.
Fearful of waiting any longer, Jason swung toward the door. He had no way of knowing where Krista had gone. He hoped she had fled into the surrounding desert. That was what he was going to do. Out there were mazes of gullies and dry washes. He could hide for days if necessary.
As he hurried toward the exit, a dark figure appeared and blocked the doorway. Jason fell back with a gasp. The figure stepped into the hut and whispered in surprise.
“Jase?”
Relief flushed through him.
“Krista…”
He hurried to her, his arms wide to take her in. They could still both escape.
“Oh, Jason, thank God!”
His relief matched hers—until she lifted a pistol and fired three times into his chest. The shots felt like punches, knocking him backward to the floor. Fiery pain followed, turning the night even darker. Distantly he heard gunfire, explosions, and more screams.
Krista leaned over him. “Your tent was empty. We thought you’d escaped.”
He coughed, unable to answer as blood filled his mouth.
Seemingly satisfied with his silence, she turned on a heel and headed back out into the nightmare of fire and death. She stopped, momentarily silhouetted against the flaming fields, then vanished into the night.
Jason struggled to comprehend.
Why?
As darkness folded over him, he would have no answer to his question, but he alone heard one last thing. The laptop in the neighboring cubicle chimed. His message had been sent.
2
October 10, 7:04 A.M.
Prince William Forest Virginia
He needed more speed.
Hunched over the narrow handlebars of the motorcycle, Commander Grayson Pierce flew the bike around a sharp corner. He leaned his six-foot frame into the curve, nearly shearing off his kneecap as he laid the bike low around the turn.
The engine roared as he opened the throttle and straightened his trajectory. His target raced fifty yards ahead of him, riding a smaller Honda crotch rocket. Gray pursued on an older-model Yamaha V-Max. Both bikes were powered by V-4 engines, but his motorcycle was larger and weighed more. If he was going to catch his target, he would need every bit of skill.
And maybe a bit of luck.
They’d reached a short straightaway through the parklands of Prince William Forest. A dense line of hardwoods framed the two-lane road. The mix of towering beech and aspen made for a handsome scenic drive, especially now, in October, when the leaves were changing. Unfortunately, a storm last night had blown most of those leaves into patches of slippery mire on the blacktop.
Gray snapped the throttle wider. Acceleration kicked him in the pants. With the slightest wobble, the bike rocketed down the straight stretch, turning the center line into a blur.
But his target was also taking advantage of the straight road. So far, most of Route 619 had been a roller-coaster ride of sudden turns, deadly switchbacks, and rolling hills. The hour-long chase had been brutal, but Gray could not let the other rider escape.
As his target slowed for the next turn, the distance between them narrowed. Gray refused to let up. Maybe it was foolhardy, but he knew his bike’s capabilities. Since acquiring it, he’d had one of the robotics engineers from DARPA—the Defense Department’s research and development branch—outfit the motorcycle with a few modifications.
They owed him a favor.
Gray’s own outfit—designated Sigma—served as the muscle behind DARPA. The team consisted of former Special Forces soldiers who had been retrained in various scientific disciplines to act as its field operatives.
One of the modifications to the bike was a head’s-up display built into his helmet. Across his face shield, data flickered on the left side, noting speed, RPM, gear, oil temperature. On the right side, a navigational map scrolled data that projected best possible gear ratios and speeds to match the terrain.
From the corner of his eye, Gray watched the tachometer slip into the red zone. The navigational array blinked a warning. He was coming at the corner too fast.
Ignoring the data, Gray kept hard on the throttle.
The distance between the two bikes narrowed further.
Thirty yards now separated them as they hit the curve.
Ahead, the rider tilted his bike and roared around the bend. Seconds later, Gray hit the same turn. He sought to eke out another yard by hugging tighter around the blind corner, skimming the center yellow line. Luckily, at this early hour the roads through here were empty of traffic.
Sadly, the same couldn’t be said for the wildlife.
Around the corner, a black bear crouched at the shoulder of the road with a cub at her side. Both noses were buried in a McDonald’s bag. The first motorcycle sped past the pair. The noise and sudden appearance startled the mother bear into rearing up, and the cub acted on pure instinct and fled—right into the road.
Gray could not get out of the way in time. With no choice, he swung the bike into a hard skid. His tires smoked across the blacktop. As he hit the soft loam of the opposite shoulder, he let the bike drop and kicked away. Momentum slid him across the moist leaves on his back for a good twenty feet. Behind him, the bike hit an oak with a resounding crash.
Coming to a stop in a wet gulley, Gray twisted around. He could see the hind end of the mother bear hightailing it into the woods, followed by her cub. Apparently they’d had enough fast food for one day.
A new noise intruded.
The roar of a motorcycle, coming up fast.
Gray sat straighter. Down the road, his target had swung around and was barreling back toward him.
Oh, great…
Gray ripped away the chinstraps and tugged off his helmet.
The other cycle rocketed up to his position and braked hard in front of him, lifting up on its front tire. The rider was short, but muscled like a pit bull. As the bike came to a stop, the rider pulled off his helmet, too, revealing a head shaved to the skin. He frowned down at Gray.
“Still in one piece?”
The rider was Monk Kokkalis, a fellow operative with Sigma and Gray’s best friend. The man’s stony features were carved into an expression of concern and worry.
“I’m fine. Hadn’t expected a bear in the road.”
“Who does?” Monk cracked a wide grin as he booted his kickstand into place and climbed off the bike. “But don’t go thinkin’ of welshing on our bet. You set no rules against natural obstacles. Dinner’s on you after the conference. Porterhouses and the darkest ale they have at that steak-house by the lake.”