Zeke used his charm on the doctor’s receptionist and actually managed to get to talk to the man himself.
“He sounds intrigued by Cantara’s case,” Zeke said when he hung up. “He promises to be available the moment we get her here.”
“Good to know.”
“Dulles is eighteen hundred miles,” Zeke said, doing the calculations in his head. “Even easing back on the throttles we can do it in four hours, easy.”
“Right. We’ll grab a hotel tonight and be at the base in good time tomorrow.”
“Sounds like a plan.” Zeke sat down, stretched his long legs out and planted his feet on Raoul’s desk.
“How do you manage to stay to calm?” Raoul demanded to know.
“There are colors and feelings and emotional terrain that we occupy that is ours and ours alone,” Zeke replied cryptically.
Raoul shot him a look. There was no getting through to Zeke when he went all Zen on him. He paced the length of the room repeatedly, his mind whirling, his emotions on overload. Cantara was alive! She was alive. He repeatedly looked at her gaunt image on his computer screen, becoming more agitated by the minute. Zeke, on the other hand, appeared to fall asleep, but Raoul knew he would be feeling every bit as anxious. He was just better at covering it.
Time seemed to stand still as they waited for Pool to call them back with details.
“Come on, what the fuck’s the holdup?” Raoul demanded to know.
“Red tape, a million forms, logistics.” Zeke opened one eye and shrugged. “You know how it is.”
“Don’t I just.”
Two hours later, the phone finally rang again.
“She’ll be arriving at Andrews fourteen hundred hours tomorrow.”
“We’ll be there. Get us clearance.”
“Do you need transport from the airport?”
“No, we’ll make our own way.”
“Er, Washington, don’t expect too much.”
Raoul’s body stiffened. “You know something more about her prognosis?”
“No, you know as much as I do.” That’ll be a first. “I’m just saying, that people who have been held captive for a long time, especially if they’ve experienced a head injury…well, they’re not always the same afterwards.”
“What do you know about where she was held and by whom?”
“We’ll talk in person.”
“You’ll be there tomorrow? No more sandbagging, Pool. We need some answers.”
“I’ll be there. Call me if you need anything before then and I’ll make it happen.”
“Better late than fucking never,” Raoul muttered as he input Pool’s private number into his cell and cut the connection. “Why do I still not trust that jerk?”
“Because he’s still the same old bundle of joy.”
“He knows a damned sight more than he’s letting on. He always has, and we let him cut us out.” Raoul flexed his rigid jaw. “Those days are over.”
“I hear you, pal. I hear you.” Zeke elevated himself effortlessly from his prone position and landed soundlessly on his feet. “Come on, bud. We don’t know how long we’ll be away for. We need to make arrangements.”
They cut across the back of their ranch, to the converted barn occupied by Mark and Karl, two more ex Green Berets. They ran the day-to-day side of the Clandestine Agency’s business from living quarters stuffed to the brim with state of the art equipment—some of it actually legal. They could trace just about anything that moved, and hack into almost any system known to man. Oh, and in their spare time they acted as ranch hands.
“What’s up, guys?” Karl asked as Raoul and Zeke strolled into their domain.
“We’re gonna be gone a few days,” Raoul replied.
“Okay, there’s nothing we can’t handle going on right now.”
“Going somewhere nice?” Mark asked.
“Kinda.”
Both guys looked stunned when Raoul told them. “She’s alive? Shit, man, that’s great!” Karl said, leaping to his feet and shaking both their hands. The guys were also into the ménage scene and knew what Cantara had meant to Raoul and Zeke. “Get out of here and leave the grunt work to us.”
“We’re on our way,” Zeke replied, heading for the door.
“Bring her back safe,” Mark said. “We’re here for you guys.”
“We know,” Raoul told him. “And we appreciate it.”
An hour later Raoul was in the pilot’s seat of their private Lear jet, doing the final checks prior to take off. Zeke was strapped into the co-pilot’s seat. Raoul taxied away from the hanger and received take-off clearance.
“Okay, bud,” Raoul said into the microphone attached to his headset. “Let’s go bring our baby home.”
They cleared security at Andrews by noon the following day. Pool was there to meet them. So too was Hassan and Agent Parker, the CIA spook who had sanctioned Cantara for her role as intermediary in the peace process almost four long years ago. Part of Raoul wanted to rip him apart for making that decision, even though the rational side of his brain told him he never would have met her were it not for Parker. Would it be better not to have known her, to have loved her, but have her alive somewhere in the world?
The men shook hands all around and followed Pool into a conference room.
“What more can you tell us?” Raoul asked the moment they were all seated. He ignored the coffee that was placed in front of him, unable to eat or drink a damned thing until he knew more.
Hassan’s expression was terse. “She was being held in the cellar of a private house.”
Raoul and Zeke both nodded. “Yeah, Pool told us that much.”
“Er, what he didn’t tell you was that the house belonged to her brother-in-law.”
Raoul and Zeke exchanged a loaded glance. “She mentioned that her husband had a younger brother,” Raoul said slowly. “He worked as her husband’s research assistant at the university. She described him as small, quiet, and insignificant. Far as I know, neither he nor her husband had anything to do with extremist groups.”
“The husband didn’t, but his younger brother was a different matter,” Hassan replied. “Seems he was pretty hooked on your wife, Washington.”