Part 17 (2/2)
Skylar knew what that meant.
”So your sister was murdered when he didn't. And it wasn't because he was afraid. He couldn't. He was not allowed to make himself available.”
Her chin dropped slowly to her chest. ”Why didn't they come after me?” she asked softly.
”You were already in the military,” Baxter answered. ”And as further protection, you were fast-tracked into special forces, into a very dark sector of special forces.”
She glanced up. In fact, she hadn't asked for the promotion. It had been thrust upon her. ”To make me hard to find.”
”No,” Dorn said, ”to make you impossible to find.”
”Then, of course, there is that matter of that young man falling off that cliff in Denali.”
Skylar's gaze raced from the president back to Baxter.
”It would be unfortunate if you were implicated in the death of that-”
”I don't think there's any need to dredge up an unsolved mystery,” Dorn said. His eyes s.h.i.+fted smoothly from his chief of staff to Skylar. ”Do you, Commander McCoy?”
She said nothing as she stared back at him.
”I didn't think so.” Dorn gave her his most sincere smile. ”Now, what should we call your unit, Commander McCoy?”
”I-I hadn't given it much thought, sir.”
”Well, I have. You know, I've always believed in that old adage of imitation being the highest form of flattery.” Dorn chuckled. ”So let's call it Kodiak Four. I like the sound of that.” He hesitated. ”Once word of your unit leaks, as it undoubtedly will, everyone will obsessively try to find Kodiak One, Two, and Three as well. But they won't, because they won't exist. What do you think, Commander?”
She was thinking two things. One, the president had been calling her ”Commander” for the last few minutes, not Skylar. So, apparently, both Dorn and Baxter were acting the part of the bad cop now.
Second, she was thinking she'd just been hit with a cla.s.sic one-two punch by two very experienced Was.h.i.+ngton insiders. The carrot had been dangled. She would see her father if she succeeded, possibly even get him his freedom. And the stick had been wielded though not applied. Somehow they knew what had happened on the Denali cliff. And they would release that information if she didn't cooperate.
”Kodiak Four,” she murmured. ”Okay.”
”I a.s.sume you're ready to go now. I a.s.sume we've satisfied your concerns.”
Skylar took a few seconds to answer. ”Yes, sir, I'm ready.”
”Excellent.”
”I'll need a place to start,” she said.
Baxter held out a piece of paper. ”Here.”
”What's this?”
”It's a list of all RC7 agents, Commander. I think it will provide you with an excellent place to start.”
Skylar's eyes narrowed as she took it. Effectively, she was about to initiate what amounted to civil war. How had her life come to this so fast?
”Skylar,” Dorn said quietly as he rose from his chair and moved to where she sat, ”I understand why this is a difficult mission for you to accept. You've been trained to kill this country's enemies, not other members of its protective forces. I know it must be difficult for you to think about soldiers of this country as enemy combatants, particularly soldiers who are much like you.” He paused. ”But they are enemies. The agents of Red Cell Seven are trying to kill me, and you must help me. I am your commander in chief, and you must protect me.”
She stood up as the president held out his hand. It was as if he could read her mind. ”Well, I-”
”Will you help me?”
Skylar gazed at David Dorn for several moments. He was right. He was her commander in chief, and he was the president of the United States. If she disobeyed his order, she would be ignoring everything she had sworn to protect.
”Yes, sir,” she finally agreed. ”I'll help you.”
”Then I order you to destroy Red Cell Seven. Do you understand?”
”Yes, sir.”
She swallowed hard. But did she really? How could she know who was right and who was wrong in all this?
”HOW DID you choose Leigh-Ann as your stage name?”
As far as Shannon could tell they were in the back of another van. At least she was being allowed to sit up on a seat this time. When they'd hurled her into the back of the van outside the club in Nashville, she'd been roped and tied like a calf at a rodeo as the van sped away. And her abductors had forced her to lie on the hard metal floor that way until they'd gotten to the house she'd escaped from a few hours later-until the dogs had cornered her at the edge of the field and she'd been recaptured.
She was sitting this time, but she still wasn't comfortable. Her wrists were bound behind her back by metal handcuffs that dug into her skin no matter how she sat; her feet were shackled; and the blindfold was, well, blinding. At least they'd removed the gag. She'd felt herself drooling all over her s.h.i.+rt, and she was parched.
”May I please have something to drink?” She hated the way the man kept stroking her face and sniffing her neck. His breath was awful. ”Some water, maybe.”
”Don't ignore me, d.a.m.n it.”
”Leigh-Ann is my aunt's name.”
”Bulls.h.i.+t, Shannon. I doubt there's anyone in the city of Boston named Leigh-Ann, probably not in the entire state of Ma.s.sachusetts. Not anyone who's from Ma.s.sachusetts, anyway, which you most definitely are.”
The man was right. Her aunt's name wasn't Leigh-Ann. It was Carol. But Aunt Carol had been the one who'd inspired Shannon to sing when she was just a little girl. And she had been the one who'd told Shannon she ought to use a stage name after she'd won a huge talent contest at eleven years old.
That evening, still basking in the glow of victory, she and Aunt Carol had decided on Leigh-Ann as the name she'd use when she sang.
Carol had died two nights later in a horrible car accident on a snowy night. Every time Shannon sang for an audience after that, she'd silently dedicated the first song to her aunt Carol.
”May I please have some water?”
”Maybe in a few,” the man said gruffly as the vehicle slowed down. ”We'll see how I'm feeling.”
When the van stopped, he pulled Shannon up off the seat and guided her to the open double doors, where two more men grabbed her and lowered her to the ground. Each man took her by an elbow and escorted her down a hallway and into another room, where they guided her onto what felt like a couch.
She sat there for a few minutes, alone, as far as she could tell.
And then, out of nowhere, she was being lifted off the couch again and hustled back into the hallway by two men holding her by the elbows. After a short distance, they turned her roughly from the hallway into another room, where they forced her face-first against a wall and secured her tightly to it with clamps up and down her arms and legs, one around her neck, and two around her torso. She couldn't move at all.
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