“Sarah, it’s Neil,” he said. “Any idea what’s going on?”
“Nicolaich,” she said quietly. “There was an explosion. It blew the door off the frame and knocked you cold, but I was still conscious. He walked right into the room with other men, and they dragged us out.”
“Oh, geez,” Neil said. “Oh, shit! What about Noah and Moose, are they here?”
“Moose is here, he’s over there by you someplace. He had a lot of blood on his face, he might be hurt pretty bad. They didn’t bring Noah with us. I think—I think they killed him.”
Neil was trying to wrap his head around the things she was telling him, but the ringing was making it hard to concentrate. “But you didn’t see them kill him?”
“No, but why would they leave him behind if he was still alive?”
“Because that crazy Russian son of a bitch likes to play his games. If he took us but left Noah, it’s because he wants to play cat and mouse. Oh, shit! Moose? Moose, wake up, man! Come on, man, we need you!”
“I’m awake,” Moose said very softly. “I’m playing possum. Sooner or later they’re going to come in here and need to move us. I’m trying to look as weak as possible so I can try to catch them off guard when that happens.”
“Do you know if Noah...”
“I don’t know anything for sure, but I don’t think they would’ve killed him. Like you said, Nicolaich wants to play his games. If Noah is alive, you can bet he’ll be coming for us.”
“Do you really think so?”
“Remember what he said, this team doesn’t leave anybody behind. If he’s alive, he’s trying to find us right now. If he were dead, they would’ve killed us already anyway, so I’m pretty sure he’s alive. We just need to do everything we can to be ready when he comes, because we might need to create some distractions here in the background.”
“How bad are you hurt?” Sarah asked.
“I’ve been a lot worse. I’m not hurt bad enough to slow me down much, if I can just get my hands free. As far as I’m concerned, these maggots that are helping Nicolaich all need to die with him.”
“I second that,” Neil said. “So what do we do now?”
Moose grunted. “Sit still, be quiet and try to rest. When the time comes, we’ll need all the energy we can muster. Do your best to save your strength for when we really need it.”
*
Lasher parked outside the hotel and walked in with Noah. With his help, the hotel staff agreed to give Noah access to the room Moose and Neil had occupied. That task finished, Lasher shook Noah’s hand and walked away.
Noah went up to the room and entered it. It took him half an hour to pack all of their clothes back into their bags and load them onto the luggage cart. The last item he loaded was the big 3-D printer, and then he closed the door behind him and pushed the cart to the elevator.
He stopped at the front desk to check out, and the clerk told him how sorry she was that his friends had gone missing. Noah thanked her and then wheeled the cart out to the parking lot where the Chrysler was waiting. He loaded everything into the trunk and then got behind the wheel.
He took out his phone as he pulled out of the parking lot and pushed the button to call Parker. The old man answered halfway through the first ring.
“Camelot?”
“Yes, Sir, it’s me. The whole thing with a telephone call was a set up, and I think I’ve figured out what it was all about. Nicolaich knew that I have someone who’s good at the high-tech stuff, and figured we’d be able to trace a call back to him if we knew who he was calling. He sacrificed three men to make me believe we had that chance, but what he was really doing was having someone else trace right back to Neil’s computer. He had our location at the same time we thought we had his.”
“I’m afraid we’ve come to the same conclusion,” Parker said. “And now he has your entire team.”
“Yes, Sir, but he’s tried this one with me before. He’s going to try to use them to bait me into a trap, but I’m going to flip it on him again. Incidentally, I got your message about calling Donnie Franco. I’m assuming you were trying to tell me to call Captain Hayes from Delta Force? Enlist his help?”
“The message meant for you to call him, yes, but I’ve already enlisted his help. He’s supposed to get you out of there, get you back here to Neverland as soon as possible.”
Noah was quiet for a matter of several seconds. “Sir, Team Camelot has a motto. We say that no one gets left behind. I need to go after them, Sir, even if only to make sure they’re properly buried.”
Parker sighed deeply. “Camelot, you’re too valuable. In a situation like this, I have to conserve my most valuable assets. In this case, that’s you. If you go after them, the most likely scenario is that you’ll get yourself killed. We simply can’t afford to lose you, not right now. Your team, unfortunately, is expendable; you are not.”