“No, everything was calculated. You don’t think I knew exactly what I was doing?” she sneered, twisting around to look at me. “I planned this perfectly, down to hacking your emails six months ago. Saw the communications with your lawyer. Hacked him, too. Found out what Mitch did and why you were divorcing him. I used your pain to blind you all to the truth.”
Now Rhett’s comments to me back in Trevor’s office at the lodge made sense. I’d assumed the only way he could’ve known about the divorce was because Mitch had told him.
I drew every last bit of strength I had, thinking about my son and my future with Alejandro. “That’s the thing about traps and illusions,” I said softly as gunfire sounded outside the hangar, which meant help had arrived. “Eventually, you find out you weren’t really behind the curtain. You were just part of the show.”
Chapter Fifty-Six
Alejandro
“Alpha, come in. This is Delta One. Status update?” Ryder asked as we geared up inside the bird, preparing for infil.
“Alpha Two,” Gray replied, his voice tight over comms. “We’re in position. We had resistance en route here. Hostiles neutralized. We’re moving in now on the final target. We’ve got eyes on a jet on the tarmac. Engines hot.”
“Do not let them leave the ground,” Ryder ordered. “We’re two mikes out, approaching from the north.”
Delta Shield, along with Hollis, were packed into a modified Black Hawk—one Hollis had arranged personally. Apparently, she could pull helos from thin air like one of the owners of Falcon Falls could.
We’d lifted from the hotel landing zone just before local law enforcement swarmed the site.
“We’ve got a plan to prevent them from flying out,” Alpha Two shared. “We’ve got it covered.”
“We’ll get to her,” Hollis reassured us as she strapped a Glock to her side. She’d changed from her dress into pants and a tee on board when our backs were turned.
The rest of us remained in our suits but lost the jackets and swapped our loafers for boots. We now had chest plates and helmets on, same as Hollis.
“Echo pulled Eden. Now it’s our turn to get Audrey,” she continued, talking over the mic attached to the helmet.
Something told me she was reassuring herself of that as much as she was us.
But she was right.
Two miracles had already happened tonight: The charges didn’t detonate, and Eden was safe. We needed one more now. A fourth tomorrow to get to the real vault in time before that evidence fell into the wrong hands.
“We will, you’re right,” I said, locking a mag into my HK416. “But she’s still out there alone, which kills me.”
“This is Audrey we’re talking about.” Hollis gripped my arm. “She’s stage-trained, remember? Performers adapt. Even pianists. She’s got this.” She let go of me and lowered her night vision in place.
Rhett didn’t know we’d figured out the rest of his plan, and Audrey was going to do her best to act surprised when he didn’t take her to the vault in Arrowtown like he wanted us to believe he’d be doing. Thanks to Gwen and Hollis’s brother earlier this evening, we’d learned the truth.
We now knew Mitch had never set foot in New Zealand. It was all deepfake AI. The vault he’d planted the evidence in wasn’t here. Tasmania, one of the three locations Gwen had originally ID’d from the inscription in the ring, was the real target.
“Alpha One to all units,” Carter Dominick’s voice cut in, punctuated by gunfire. “Boots on the ground. Engaged with perimeter tangos.”
“Status on the plane?” Ryder demanded.
Gunfire crackled. Then Gray answered, “Alpha Two. Runway’s compromised. We blew the asphalt. Aircraft is immobile. HVTs and hostage are still on board.”
Ryder gave me a look.Let’s finish this.He keyed his mic. “Delta advancing northwest. Four friendlies dropping down in thirty seconds.”
“Copy that,” Carter returned. “Perimeter’s still hot. Watch your flanks.”
“Delta Shield on-site,” Ryder confirmed, nodding to us as the helo dipped low. “Fast-roping now.”
We were lowered to the ground under cover of rotor wash. Gunfire erupted to our left as we advanced in diamond formation, Hollis protected at center.
“Three tangos, northwest fence line,” Carter warned. “They heard your bird. Coming fast.”
“Copy. Engaging,” Ryder transmitted back, then went to one knee, sighting in.
