“Look man, I get it. You’re top dog. When it comes time, I’ll take orders like a good soldier,” Jordan said. “But right now is not that time. Spell it out.”
Westin dropped his arms and braced his hands on the table. “She may have caught the attention of this group because of the content of her blog and video blog.”
“It’s called a vlog, boss,” Rocco said. Westin glared at him and Rocco threw his hands up. “Sorry.”
“Why do you think that?” Jordan asked.
“Parker dug into her blog. There were a lot of deleted comments — threats, warnings to stop, general ‘death to America’ comments — that sort of thing.”
One of the computers chimed and Cash reached over and hit a key. Parker’s face appeared on the screen. “We got satellite and new proof of life. Which one you want first?”
“Proof of life.” Sugar and Jordan spoke at the same time.
“Coming up now.”
The camera was shaky, obviously hand-held. A woman sat tied to a chair. Lank, dirty hair obscuring her face. Two guards, visible from the chest down, stood behind the chair, AK-47s gripped tight in their hands. A hand reached out and pushed the woman’s head back.
The collective gasps could have sucked the air out of the hangar. One of her eyes was swollen shut. Livid bruising covered the left side of her face and blood caked around her nostrils.
A heavily accented voice sounded from the video. “This is what happens when you don’t pay. No more talking. You have forty-eight hours to send the ransom or she dies.”
The screen when black.
“Fuck!” Rage boiled up through him. He had to move. Slamming out of the room, he stood on the landing of the stairs. He needed something to punch. Gripping the cold, metal railing he shook it. When they got there, he was going to rip every one of them apart with his bare hands. Reach into their chests and tear out their hearts. The image of her tied to that chair was seared onto the back of his retinas. God, when her mom and dad saw that video… Shit.
He ripped the door open and stormed back into the office. “Please tell me her family hasn’t seen that.”
“No,” Parker said. “It’s sitting in the inbox of the negotiator’s email.”
“Kill it,” he demanded. “Her parents can’t see it. Ever.”
“Make it look like it was delivered,” Westin said. “Then erase it.”
“Copy. I’ll analyze it. See if I can pull anything useful,” Paker said.
“What’s the intel?” Westin asked.
Parker looked at the camera. “We have eyes on the compound.”
“In the building?” Jordan asked.
“Unfortunately, no.” Parker said. “But almost as good.”
One of the screens switched to an overhead view of a walled compound. It reminded him of the old PAC-MAN game grid — straight lines indicating walls, openings that were likely doorways. Distinct red dots moved around the compound. Occasionally a line would appear from the dots. An arm?
He’d never seen a sensor like this. He moved around the table, closer to the screen. “Is this satellite or UAV?”
“UAV,” Westin said.
“Where did you get this?”
He looked at Jordan. “It’s R and D.”
Research and development? What the hell? Why wasn’t this technology fielded to troops on the ground? He shook his head. Not an argument he had time for right now.
He looked at the screen again. “What are we looking at?”
Parker spoke from the screen. “The red forms are heat signatures. Looks like they’ve got some goats around the compound. There’s four guards inside the walls.” A yellow cursor appeared on the screen and hovered over the forms on the screen. “There’re three separate rooms — here, here, and here.” The cursor followed his words. “Two heat signatures in this room and this room, with one outside the door. Probably guards. Looks to be about a dozen in this room with another guard outside. There’s three signatures in this room. My guess is guards given there aren’t any outside the room.”
