Parker sighed, then quickly grabbed his gun to point it at the client’s head.
Before the barrel came to rest, the weapon was wrenched from his grasp and pointed back at him. No one had ever done that to Parker before.
Trying to hide how impressed he was, he said, “Okay, so you have a skill. That doesn’t mean you won’t get in our way.”
“My decades in the SVR say differently.”
Parker’s eyes narrowed. “You’re SVR?”
“I am.”
“Prove it.”
“You expect me to be carrying around some kind of identification card or letter of recommendation? That’s not how being a spy works.”
“So, I’m just supposed to believe you?”
“How about this? I will double your fee.”
Parker scrutinized him. “And ifIthink you’re dragging us down, you go back to the vehicle.”
“But only if I’m a real problem, not something you’ve made up.”
Parker considered it, then nodded. “Deal.”
An hour later, the teamreassembled, everyone now clothed in black, with matching rain gear.
Parker passed out radios. After each man had donned their earpiece and performed radio checks, they made their way to the cargo van out front.
The rain that had started that afternoon had yet to show any signs of letting up. Many of the puddles alongside the road had grown large enough to bleed onto the asphalt, forcing the van to swerve around them where it could and to slow where it couldn’t.
Approximately a mile and a half from Barrington’s property, the van turned down the driveway of a house that Parker had earlier determined was unoccupied.
After everyone exited, Parker directed them down a path through the woods, then waited for his client, who was bringing up the rear.
“If you can’t keep up, come back here,” he said. “Don’t try to find us.”
“Don’t worry about me,” the client said.
“I wouldn’t have to if you’d stayed behind.”
“Then I guess,doworry about me,” the client told him and headed after the others.
With a grimace, Parker followed.
Ed Rawls was in hiskitchen, finishing off the blackened salmon he’d made for dinner when one of his perimeter alarms went off.
He shot out of his chair and hurried into his study. On hiscomputer monitor were feeds from several of the cameras he had covering his property. At the moment, one of the feeds was highlighted by a strobing red box, indicating that an alarm had been triggered.
Ed saw nothing in the live feed that could have set off the alert, so he rewound the footage to the minute prior and let it play.
For the first ten seconds, all was still. Then at the far reaches of the image, a blobby-looking figure moved on-screen from the right, then off on the left, followed by another, and another. By the time the procession had finished, seven blobs had passed through.
While it was possible it had been a small herd of the white-tailed deer that lived on the island, Ed had little doubt it had been a group of men. And they were heading in the direction of Stone’s house.
He called Stone’s cell, and after four rings was sent to voicemail.
“It’s Ed. Trouble coming your way. Seven men, maybe more I didn’t see. I’ll be on their flank.”
