“I tracked down Djokovic. He’s on the move.”
“It can’t be a coincidence. He’s part of another buy right after Shay was about to be auctioned.” Sykes building burning down wouldn’t have slowed anything down. It just moved its location.
“He obviously doesn’t want to leave empty handed. What’s the plan?”
“I’m working on it now. It’s already nighttime so you’ll have the cover of darkness to help. Looking on the map it’s in the middle of nowhere. Not even near a main road.”
“That’s unusual.”
Tell him about it. Something felt off about this op, but if there was a chance to apprehend Shay’s kidnappers and save those women, they had to do something. “We’ll take every precaution. I’m pulling you, Barry, and Greg from your previous assignments to check it out. I’ll run surveillance from here.”
“Got it.”
“I’ll text you and Barry the address. I’ll work on a plan and give you lookout points before moving in. Tell everyone not to move until I give the word.” Drew took his ear from the phone to forward the text on. “You should have it now.”
“I’ll head to my house to gear up.”
“Be sure to pack body cameras. I need eyes on the place.” He didn’t like going in blind. Too much could go wrong.
“Will do.” Jack hung up leaving Drew to plan and he didn’t have much time to do it. Greg said the buy was going down in an hour. It would take at least thirty minutes to get there. He didn’t know the layout of the area. He was planning based solely on the map grid.
He took a seat at the dining room table and studied the layout. His mind instantly flipped to leader mode. His eyes took in the terrain zooming in and out of the map. There was a ridge on the north side but other than that it was flat. His team would be exposed to the enemy. Darkness would conceal them but if something happened, they wouldn’t have a clean exit.
“What are we looking at?” Shay asked, taking a seat next to him.
He sat back from the laptop to show her. “The terrain.”
“What about it?”
“I need to study it so I know what my team is walking into.”
Shay scooted closer to her as she looked at the map. His body instantly became of aware of how close she was but hismind was more focused on the mission than remembering how soft her body felt against his. “I just see desert.”
Drew smiled despite the urgency riding him to make a plan. “I see places for my team to do reconnaissance. I see there is only one main road in and out. This ridge here.” He pointed to the north ridge. “Will give the best vantage point to see who comes and goes.” He saw a lot more but he didn’t want to bore her with that. Years of missions he could see these kinds of terrains in his sleep. That didn’t mean all the missions ended successfully but he knew how to read land.
“Are your friends going to be okay?” She asked, looking up at him. Her face was pale and concerned.
“This is the kind of thing they were trained to do. We’ve done missions like this before.” That didn’t stop the unease settling like lead in the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off. He’d had the same feeling when he had his accident. He’d ignored it then too. Was this a sign of a bad omen? “Trust me, everything is going to be fine.” He gave her a reassuring smile that he didn’t feel.
Chapter 22
With plans set Drew watched everything unfold on his laptop while sitting at the dining room table. Shay sat next to him her hands ringing in her lap. He thought about reassuring her again, but his main concern was on his men. All the men were wearing body cameras so he could see what they saw. IT was his only set of eyes on the situation.
Drew didn’t like not being with his men and leading the op on the ground, but he swore to protect Shay. He could run things from afar. All the men had done ops like this before, they could do it in their sleep.
He just felt helpless running things thirty miles away. If something went wrong, he’d never get there in time. He’d debated for half a second to bring Shay with him, but that would be exposing her to those that were looking for her. If Djokovic was the buyer, it would be like dangling a piece of meat in front of a wolf. It was safer to work from his home.
“It doesn’t look like anyone is here.” Jack’s voice came over the comm. He was stationed on the southside of the property.
It was a small structure off a dirt road. Drew didn’t know what kind of business used the place. From the body cameras all he could see was a building and overhang structure held up by four posts next to it. Tall light poles were set up around the buildings casting that area in perfect lighting while his teammates hid in the darkness unobserved.
“I can’t see anyone from the north ridge.” Greg agreed.
“Nothing from the west.” Barry added.
Drew checked his watch. It was a few minutes before the buy was supposed to go down.
“What’s wrong?” Shay asked concerned.
