Kill List (Special Ops #8) (7 page)

He chuckled softly. He had been trying to do just that. He was heading back out for what he knew was going to be another hard mission, going in hot and hoping to come out alive. He didn’t know how long the mission would take. It wasn’t as if they got a call one day and finished the job in eight hours. He knew he could be out for a long time, and he also knew that if they only had a week of down time that he might not make it back to the States before the next mission called them to duty.

Chogan took the duffle out to the taxi that was waiting for him. He waved to both of his parents before getting in and asking the man to take him to one of the rental car places that Autumn had arranged a vehicle for him at. No tracking devices included,” she had said. He would still check to be sure before he got too far on the road.

“You’re heading out?” The cabbie looked up in the rearview mirror. Chogan didn’t trust people in general, but his radar was top notch and this man had the hairs on the back of his neck on edge.

“Yeah, I can’t stay here. I have to get away,” he said. “For a little while anyway. I hear Maine is good this time of year. And until I can go back on active duty getting out of this God forsaken city seems fine by me.”

“Ah, yes,” the blue eyed blond haired young man nodded. “I read about your sister in the paper. I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” he said as he looked out the window and hoped the man would shut up soon.

“The cops find the other girl yet?”

“No,” he heard the harshness in his tone and welcomed it. This man would think he was angry because the cops hadn’t found her. He wasn’t exactly silently trying to think of a way to shut the man up. He could think of several ways to shut him up. Cutting out his tongue seemed like an option. But no, he couldn’t do that—yet.

When he got to the rental place he gave his name and an older man came out, talked friendly as he led him to the car and then talked seriously once they were out of earshot of other employees.

“It’s exactly what you need, Marine. I’ve added a few things while I was at it.” He popped the trunk and showed him what appeared to be an extra spare tire. The man laughed, probably knowing what he was thinking. “That’s the only spare. It’s on top because your weapons are on the bottom. Godspeed,” he handed him the keys.

“Thank you,” Chogan nodded and shut the trunk before going around and checking out the car. He saw the man smile and nod his approval of the fact that Chogan hadn’t taken him at face value. Once Chogan was satisfied the car was in proper order without any possible threats to him and his mission, he got behind the wheel, started the sleek engine of the Chrysler Hybrid and took off. The car ran smooth but somehow he still wished he had received an SUV or a truck. Still, this would do for now.

He got back to his place, pulled into the garage and made sure to get the clothes for Olivia inside. She didn’t look thrilled to wear a dead woman’s clothing but she didn’t protest. When she came out from the bathroom wearing the yellow sundress he knew what his mother meant—his sister was taller, more voluptuous in the breasts and the hips. Still, Olivia looked pretty good in yellow.

He helped her onto the back seat and draped his blanket over her. “Stay undercover until I give you clearance to get up.”

She nodded and pulled the covers completely over her body. He adjusted the top to make sure all of her was covered after he stuck a smaller pillow under there for her head. He tossed the bag he packed for her and the bag of clothes he packed for himself in the trunk and then put the bag with the snacks on the front seat. He secured everything, rerouted the alarm feed and upped the garage door before pulling out onto the street. Yeah, his house was the epitome of perfect for his needs, but he couldn’t do what he needed to do here. The place Autumn had acquired for him in Montana should do just fine.

He went north before heading west because he needed to be sure anybody watching him thought he really was going to Maine. Autumn had already told him she would arrange for a switch car at a local shop. She had arranged everything where he could pull in and transfer the goods, including Olivia, without being seen and then he could pull out in a new vehicle while somebody else wearing the same type of black shirt with BDU inspired pants but not the real BDU uniform parts drove out in the old car. Wearing their BDU off base wasn’t really permitted anymore, so in this he had to make some changes to Autumn’s original plan. He understood why she wasn’t up to date on it, but he felt if somebody was at a higher level than just a crooked cop they might recognize the misstep.

He made sure he kept it simple. He would have preferred to just put on regular pants instead of this cheep version of a uniform, but this would be fine. He had a full BDU in his bag because he knew he would need it once he found out who this guy was and where he was located. The idea of Autumn’s plan and his was that if anybody was following him they would stalk the new driver thinking it was him and he and Olivia would then go westward to Montana. And at the end of the day, if somebody with extensive knowledge on their uniforms was linked on this assassin’s payroll then they would be smart enough to know the pants weren’t real uniform. They would just assume he was a dick waiting to find a hole to enter and using the pants as a pickup tactic. Win-win for him because they would underestimate him in more ways than one and that would work to his advantage in the battle.

“You kept talking about rules the other night.” He heard her voice from the back. He knew she wouldn’t be able to stay quiet for long. It wasn’t that she was a chatterbox as Mike Riggs used to call some women, it was just that Olivia couldn’t really sit still so asking her to lay in back with the blanket over her was like asking her to lay in a bed of roaches. The woman just couldn’t handle either. Although he would say she was doing better at this than she would do with the later of the option.

“Yep,” he said as he shifted lanes once again.

“What are all these rules about your uniform about?”

He chuckled. “Not important, Liv. BDU,” he said as he made another lane change. “That’s Battle Dress Uniform. These pants kind of resemble them, but they’re not quite them. Somebody in the know will know that. Somebody not in the know won’t but they’ll know that I’m not in full uniform so I’m not breaking any rules either.”

“Oh…you’ll have to tell me about this rule and BDU thing one day.”

He resisted laughing. “Not even worth talking about, honey. Now stay put back there. Don’t go moving around.”

“I’m bored.”

“Go to sleep and you won’t be,” he said sternly. He meant what he said; she had to stay covered until he made the final change of the vehicles. Well, technically she would have to stay covered at least another hour in there too. He was going to do this covert and do it well because any mistake could get them both killed.

“I’m not sleepy,” she said. “But I will try.”

“Good,” he said as he checked his rearview again. Was that a car following them? He couldn’t tell just yet. A few more subtle lane shifts and he would have more clarity of what was going on. He was ready to go on the hunt, but right now he had to make sure that he cunningly led anybody following them on a not so easy trip. He would prefer to shake them before he got to the next pickup, but he knew that might not happen.

One more shift and then another and he noticed the same silver Ford Focus shifting just the same. Yeah, they were being followed.

“We have a tail,” he said just to let her know and to remind her just how important it was she stayed low.

“Oh joy,” she mumbled. “I hope they fly off a bridge or something.”

He chuckled. “You do pick some interesting ways for people to go, Liv. Last time you were angry with somebody I distinctly remember hearing you say you hoped flying monkeys ripped their face off and ate their brain out.”

She laughed. “Yep.”

“I don’t think they really need to rip the face off, Liv. The brain isn’t behind the face. They should just go for the head—if there were such a thing as flying monkeys.”

“I figure go for the face and make it painful for them. Then they can get to the cranial part and eat the brain matter. Besides, since I have found out about spider monkeys and flying snakes I won’t say that flying monkeys don’t exist.”

He shook his head. The woman watched a lot more PBS nature and science shows than he would have expected, but then again maybe he should have expected it. She was the one who wanted to be a vet once upon a time. Of course she would enjoy the science shows involving animals and things related to them.

“Flying monkeys,” he sighed. “If I meet any when I’m back on duty I’ll mail you one.”

“Ooh, now wouldn’t that be a cool gift.” He heard the serious nature of her voice. The woman wasn’t kidding while he was. Cute, sexy, and crazy—yep, he had hit the jackpot of wonderment with this one. He couldn’t imagine they would ever have a dull day together at this pace.

He checked his rearview again. He could shake this guy but doing so would alert them too swiftly that he knew what was going on and he didn’t want to give them that message. He wanted to hang on to his advantage right now because right now they didn’t know he was primed and ready for the hunt. Right now they just thought he was a grieving forced on continued military leave big brother. The longer they thought that the more he could get done without interruption. Sure, they would figure it out eventually that he wasn’t the guy who would be sleeping in that Bar Harbor hotel without leaving it for a day out anywhere, but until then he could work, investigate and stalk his prey without them even knowing that he was watching just like a blackbird watched from above, eyeing its prey, Chogan would be doing the same thing. He chuckled inwardly; he would say his father was right, his name was befitting of him. Chogan had the meaning of blackbird just as his father’s name Mingan meant gray wolf. They were both fittingly named, only for Chogan he was a military warrior ready to execute the threat in whatever way was needed.

The exchange went off smoothly and from what Jensen Braddock, the car contact, had told him the Ford Focus definitely had followed off behind his decoy. So it was time to go and he had Olivia hide out the same way but this time they were in a very roomy Range Rover that he was able to transfer all of his added weapons gear from the other car to and sit it comfortably within grasp. And as they cleared more and more land he told Olivia she could sit upward if she wanted and she had done that swiftly, rearranging her disheveled clothes and trying to cover up some of the parts that were not fitting in the best of ways.

“I kind of like having a view of your nipple,” he winked at her as she finished situating herself in the front seat that she had climbed onto. Thanks to his dad and other instructors that he had long ago had he could multi task while driving otherwise he would have driven them off the road with that uninhibited view of her commando nether regions.

“If you hadn’t ripped up my last undergarments, and my dress, I wouldn’t be flashing you so much.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “Then I guess it’s a good thing I ripped them off ya then huh,” he chuckled and her lips split into a smile, one of the first he had seen since finding her in his basement.

She sighed, going back to that sullen look. “Did my description of this guy help at all?”

He wished he could say it did but right now he didn’t have anything and his guys wouldn’t be in Montana for days. They, too, were going the scenic route landing in different states and getting on the road heading in different directions until they made it to White Sulphur Springs, or more like the nicely secluded home Autumn had set up for them just outside that area. But one thing he hadn’t planned on, that he hadn’t thought to have his mother pack for Olivia was some serious winter gear.

“Yeah, there would be snow still falling up here, Chogan.”

“I see that,” he mumbled.

“I’m in a sundress.”

He looked her over out the corner of his eye. “I see that too.”

“I’ll freeze to death. No mad killer necessary,” she sighed.

“You will not freeze to death,” he enunciated those words sharply. He would fix this; she didn’t need to doubt that he could, or that he would.

She sighed. “It’s pretty up here though. When I was in school I was thinking of trying to home front here and work as a vet for my internship maybe on a ranch or something close to one. But I had South Dakota on my mind too. I didn’t want Texas. No way did I want to go to Texas.”

“Why not? Texas has cattle ranches.”

“Texas has a lot, but nothing I want so badly that I would move to that state. Let’s just leave it at that.”

He nodded. It wasn’t that important. He figured she wasn’t moving anywhere now that she wasn’t in school and on the veterinarian track anyway, but what was she planning to do now that she wasn’t likely to go back to work at that hotel. No, scratch that; if he had to tie her to his bed she would not be going back to work in that hotel.

“You like it up here,” he watched the expressions on her face flick between awe and fear. She liked what she saw, but their reason for being here sparked fear in her heart.

“It’s pretty. It looks super cold, but it’s pretty. I could envision a small house in the woods, spectacular tree coverage…yeah, this could be peaceful, but I would have to seriously adjust.”

“Because it’s colder than New York and your blood thinned down in the desert southwest?”