State of Emergency

CHAPTER 51


Quinn stood beside Thibodaux under a drizzling rain along the edge of the pavement, a satellite phone pressed to his ear. What had been bare, skeletal rock from the Altiplano to Cumbre Pass was now covered by a lush skin of green cloud forest. Towering peaks vanished into the clouds in every direction, blocking the horizon and making it difficult to get a signal. He had to turn every now and again to stay connected.

Bo and Aleksandra had walked ahead a little, passing the line of trucks and buses to see if they could get a feel for how long the road would be blocked. It was eerily quiet but for the gurgle of newly formed streams and waterfalls that tumbled down through the foliage. Drivers and passengers alike dozed in their seats.

Palmer answered on the third try.

Quinn brought him up to speed quickly about Aleksandra’s tracker. Few details were as important as the fact that they were about to lose the only link they had to the bomb.

“He’s moving north,” Quinn said. “We believe he’s trying to get to a place called Rurrenabaque.”

“Dammit,” Palmer said. “It had to be Bolivia.”

“Sir?”

“Since Evo Morales shut down cooperation with drug enforcement, we’re pretty slim in the way of resources in that part of the world.”

Quinn could hear the click of a keyboard in the background and imagined Palmer sitting behind his expansive wooden desk in the study of his Virginia satellite office away from the White House. “I may have somebody,” Palmer said. “What kind of a vehicle are they in?”

“Not sure,” Quinn said.

“Okay,” Palmer sighed. “You realize you’re asking me to call a seldom-used asset and ask him to look for two Hispanic men coming into a town of eight thousand or so people who look just like them in a vehicle you can’t describe?”

“Bolivian police then?” Quinn offered. “Someone has to stop this guy before he dissolves into the jungle. Maybe regular military.”

“That wouldn’t go well,” Palmer said. “In one scenario they kill Zamora and we are no closer to the bomb. In the other, they find the bomb and Bolivia suddenly becomes a nuclear power.”

“We are losing him, sir,” Quinn said. “Can you destroy the road? Box him in until we catch up?”

More keyboard clicks.

“The George Washington is off the coast of Brazil with the Fourth Fleet,” Palmer said. The line was silent for a long moment. “But that’s a no-go. They’re too far out to do you any good.”

Aleksandra came trotting back up the hill with Bo right behind her. He looked mortified at the thought of being beaten by a girl in a footrace. Their chests heaved under the flimsy clear plastic rain jackets Adelmo had given them.

Bo stopped beside Quinn, bent forward with his hands on his knees. “We found a way around,” he said between panting breaths.

“Gotta go,” Quinn said into the satellite phone.

“I’ll put our Bolivian contact on alert. Call back as soon as practical.”

“You have got to be shittin’ me,” Thibodaux said when Bo explained his plan. He shook the now dog-eared tourist pamphlet at Quinn for emphasis. “We’re talkin’ about the Road of Death here, beb.”

“He’ll soon be out of range.” Aleksandra looked up from her phone. Rain plastered red hair to her forehead and cheeks in thick locks. “I cannot see another way,” she said.





Bo ran back down the hill while Jericho and Aleksandra threw on fleece jackets and shoved their gear into Quinn’s daypack. Quinn sighed at the Spartan nature of it all—two pistols, an extra pair of socks for each of them, and the heavy Severance blade.

Bo and Thibodaux had the battered Yamaha 250 dirt bike off the back of a rusted bubble-topped Mercedes truck by the time Quinn and Aleksandra made it down to them. The driver stood at the side of the road, counting his surprise windfall. Adelmo stayed back with his van, unwilling to be a part of such foolishness.

There was only one bike, and since Quinn was the better rider, it was understood he’d go. Aleksandra refused to be left behind, stressing the fact that she was the only one who knew what to do with the bomb once they found it.

Quinn threw a leg over the little blue bike and braced himself for Aleksandra to climb on behind him. An ATGATT man when he was on a motorcycle—all the gear, all the time—he felt naked in the flimsy raincoat and 5.11 khaki slacks. Looking ahead at what he could see of the snaking road and steep drop-offs, he consoled himself with the fact that a leather jacket and helmet weren’t likely to save him anyway.

Leggy as it was, the Yamaha wasn’t made for two riders. Quinn found himself thankful that Aleksandra was built like a forest sprite. Snugging down the pack on her shoulders, she wrapped her arms around his waist and scrunched up tight against his back, her thighs running parallel with his.

Quinn could see the headlines. UNITED STATES AIR FORCE OSI AGENT PLUNGES TO DEATH IN THE ARMS OF BEAUTIFUL RUSSIAN OPERATIVE....

Jacques stood by with a big hand planted flat on top of his head, looking like he might throw up. Rain dripped down Bo’s face, curling his shaggy head of blond hair. His lips pursed in a jealous line.

“You be careful with her, Jericho,” he muttered.

“Are you kidding me?” Quinn glanced over his shoulder at Aleksandra, then back at his brother, before shaking his head. “That old witch was right about you two.”

Aleksandra gave him a rough squeeze around the ribs, planting her doubled fists in his midsection. Her voice was flint hard next to his ear. “Let’s go,” she said. “Monagas is getting away.”

“You mean Zamora,” he said.

“Of course,” she said over the blatting engine. “That is what I mean.”

Quinn toed the bike into first and released the brake, beginning their seventy-kilometer downhill roll. With the angry Russian woman breathing revenge in his ear, the Road of Death was about to grow more deadly.