Altar Of Eden

“How?” Kyle pressed. His voice lost its angry edge and took on a more plaintive tone.

Jack picked up the Faraday cage holding the surgically removed tags. “With these.”

When the power had been cut off at ACRES, Jack had been examining one of the tags. As the lights blacked out, he had pocketed it for safekeeping, wanting to examine it in more detail later. But when he abandoned Lorna in her office, he did more than just leave her with the tranquilizer rifle.

“I planted one of these tags on Lorna. In her pocket.”

The tension in Kyle’s face softened with hope.

“My God,” Zoë mumbled. “You think we can use it to track her?”

“That’s what I’m counting on.”

The forensic expert must have heard their talk. “I think I can make it work,” he called over. “It’s definitely a form of GPS technology. If all the tags use this same technology, I should be able to find her. Though it might take a while. I’ll have to hunt satellite by satellite.” He swung around to face them. “It would be faster if I had some general idea where to begin looking.”

Jack contemplated all he’d learned from Carlton and his own suspicions. “Mexico, or somewhere off the coast,” he guessed. “Maybe the Caribbean. They wouldn’t be too far. But definitely south of the U.S. border.”

Carlton nodded his agreement.

Kyle sagged again. “That’s a lot of territory to cover. I should know. The oil company I’m contracted with has platforms up and down the Gulf Coast.”

“That’s good to hear,” Jack said. “Because if I’m right, we may need to use one of those rigs as a base of operations.”

Kyle glanced to him. His eyes lost some of their glaze, calculating and taking strength from the fact that he could be useful. Still, his main concern remained, and he mumbled it aloud.

“Is she still alive?”

Chapter 39

Lorna marched down the dock toward the villa. Behind her, the man named Connor gripped a pistol in his hand, but he didn’t even bother pointing it at her.

What was the use? Where could she go?

They’d even taken her cuffs off.

Rubbing her wrists, she followed behind Duncan. The scarred man led the way toward a covered breezeway at the end of the dock. The air was fragrant with sea salt and the cinnamon scent of the mangrove forest. She noted a few beach chairs out on the sand and a row of yellow sea kayaks. It looked like any other island resort.

Until you looked closer.

At the edge of the beach, shadowed by the palms, stood men in camouflage gear with shouldered rifles. Up higher, an elaborate antenna-and-dish array covered the villa’s roof, far more than necessary for phone and satellite television service. There was also an eerie silence here. No reggae music, no laughter, only the gentle wash of waves on the beach.

The atmosphere felt charged, as if a storm were brewing.

Maybe it was the tension in the face of the guard who met them at the breezeway. She noted a flicker of fear in his eyes as he pulled Duncan aside for a private conversation.

Waiting, Lorna stood on the dock under the baking midday sun. The ringing in her ear had disappeared, but the motion of turning her neck to scout her surroundings triggered a stab of pain from the goose egg at the back of her skull. Still, if she hadn’t stopped, she might have missed it.

A blue tarp lay spread at the far end of the beach.

It looked like it covered some beach craft, except she saw Duncan glance that way, too. Only then did she notice the black stain running from the tarp to the water, like a trail of oil. But Lorna knew it wasn’t oil.

Focused, she noted a pale white shape sticking out from under the sheet.

A human hand.

Duncan rejoined them. He faced Connor. “They had another infiltration last night. It swam in. Killed Polaski. Wounded Garcia before it was shot.”

“How could it have caught them off guard? What about the tracking tags?”

“I don’t know. I’m off to talk to Malik about that. He left word for me to join him in the lab.”

Connor pointed a thumb at Lorna. “What about her?”

Duncan shrugged. “Bring her along. Lock her up in one of the holding pens down there until I’m ready for her.”

They set off again, passing down the breezeway and across an expansive patio. The lounge chairs and teak tables were empty, except for a pair of dark-skinned men wearing lab smocks. One smoked a cigarette listlessly, holding the filter toward his palm in a European fashion. His companion sat with his head in his hands.

The villa’s main floor was all windows that faced the cove. Heavy hurricane shutters had been closed over them, giving the place a barricaded feel. Passing through a pair of tall French doors, the interior was gloomy, but plainly luxurious: ivory damask curtains, furniture constructed from rough-hewn mahogany and rosewood, probably harvested locally, and limestone-tiled floors. All the hues were muted, with splashes of vibrancy from animal-print pillows and an occasional painting on the wall.

Duncan led them through the front pavilion and down a long hallway. When the doors and windows were open, the hallway must serve as an extension of the breezeway, carrying the tropical sea breezes deeper into the house. To either side of the main hall opened various rooms, including a kitchen where a trio of cooks prepared a meal.

The smell of baking bread and a simmering garlic stew stirred her stomach, reminding her of how long it had been since she’d had anything to eat. But they didn’t stop for a snack. They headed straight back to where the hall ended at a library study.

It looked like something out of the British Museum, a tantalizing mix of leather-bound books and collected artifacts: conch shells, antique seafaring tools, including a sextant and windlass from a sailing ship. One wall displayed massive plates of fossilized seabeds, snapshots of an ancient world populated by trilobites, prehistoric fish, and sea fans.

A bear of a man met Duncan there, rising from a seat by a cold fireplace. He had been staring out a set of open windows. The man wore hiking pants and boots, along with a loose camo jacket. He appeared to be in his early sixties but remained well muscled, with salt-and-pepper hair and a face that sun and wind had polished to a tanned smoothness. He had the stamp of ex-military, probably navy from the sailing cap resting on the arm of his chair. But he carried himself with some sense of affluence, too.

Lorna guessed the man owned the villa. In fact, he seemed as much a part of this room as any of the artifacts.

He crossed and shook Duncan’s hand, swallowing the scarred man’s palm and fingers in his paw.