And then Magic’s words made too much sense. “The trackers are internal,” Shane realized. They wereinsideof Campbell. Some beautiful counter-agent had fed him…What? A cupcake with trackers in the icing? And five of them had managed to not get crushed by his teeth.
It ranked up in un-fucking-believable-land, along with Shane trashing his ankle on a relatively easy jump.
But it meant that they’d just been reduced from a team of eight to six. Or, realistically, even fewer. Son of abitch. The pain in Shane’s ankle was now the least of his worries.
“What did you eat?” the senior chief asked Slinger. “Or maybe the more pertinent question is,wheredid you eat?”
“Approximately twelve to fourteen hours ago,” Rick chimed in. “Judging from its placement in your lower intestines.”
“What the fuck kind of trackers are these, that they could survive stomach acids?” Slinger wondered as he yanked his pants back up.
“Can you somehow jam or alter the frequency of the signal that’s being sent out?” Shane asked.
Slinger shook his head. “No, sir. I mean, yes, if it was only one tracker, but I’m pretty sure these have five different frequencies.” He looked over at Owen, who still held the device. “Check my math, Effen.”
“Five trackers, five frequencies,” Owen confirmed for Shane. “Sir, we’d need five different jammers.”
And they only had two. Two is one and one is none. It was a Navy SEAL saying from way back, when the Teams had gotten their start during the Vietnam War. Carry two of everything, so that when a piece of equipment failed, the team would have a backup. But here and now, two was as good as none, since two wasn’t even close to five.
“Did you have a late lunch in town?” Rick asked, back to trying to figure out where Slinger had gotten tagged.
“No, I had lunch on base.” Slinger fastened his belt. “Dinner, too. I didn’t eat or drink anything between meals. Water. I had water. Out of a bottle that I got, also on base.”
So much for the cupcake with icing theory, which meant…
“I think maybe the question that needs answering is notwhereorwhat did you eat,” Magic said, on the same page as Shane, “butwho.”
Slinger swiftly turned to look hard at Magic, then swore pungently. “Seriously?” he asked as he pulled his T-shirt back on, his movements jerky with his anger. “Youseriouslythink …?”
“Hells yeah.” Magic turned to Shane. “Yesterday afternoon, while you were having your daily high-maintenance damage-control phone call with Ashley, we went over to the Schnitzel Haus. We’ve been having these epic pinball battles—me and Sling. They have an old-style machine with the real metal balls and—”
“Get to the point,” the senior chief interrupted for Shane, right on cue.
“Yes, Senior, sorry, Senior. The point. Is that Sling got his internally tracked ass, here, picked up by a woman who was gorgeous. Unnaturally so. I’m talking A-list movie-star worthy. Well, maybe more like B-list. I mean, considering it was the middle of the afternoon, and Slinger looks, well, like Slinger. No offense, man.”
Slinger just shook his head in disgust.
“Are you sure you didn’t eat anything in the bar?” the senior asked. “Peanuts, pretzels—”
“I’m very sure, Senior Chief,” Sling said grimly.
“So what are you saying? That she took you to her hotel and …?” Owen’s voice trailed off as Slinger turned and just looked at him.
“Oh,” Owen said, as light dawned. “Right. Sorry. Wow. I mean, not wow but, whoa. I mean—” It took a kick from Magic to shut him up.
Slinger sighed heavily as he looked at Shane. “Sir, I’m truly sorry.”
“This is a new one,” Shane told him. “For all of us.” He turned to Rick, who was sifting through his medical bag. “Is there anything you can give him—”
“I was thinking the same thing, sir,” Rick replied, “but…” He shook his head. “I mean, what’s worse? Having him traceable or having him stop every few minutes with explosive diarrhea? And even then, I can’t guarantee all five trackers will be expelled.”
That was good to know. Well, it wasn’tgoodto know, but it was important information.
“Sir, we need to move,” the senior reminded Shane. “With your injury, our pace is going to be significantly slower than planned.”
No shit. Shane looked from the senior back to Slinger. “Sling, I need you to trade equipment bags with Owen.”
Slinger sighed again as he nodded. He knew what was coming. “Yes, sir.”
