Stolen Lives: A Detective Mystery Series SuperBoxset (15 page)

Each member had a small ear-piece connected to a high-frequency radio. Team A would take the van to the Homestead building to conduct a raid, while Team B—Nettles, Willis, Lou, and Detective Belmont—would take the helicopters. Their two FBI pilots, Cassie and Douglas, were suited up and ready.

Nettles and Willis were going to ride in the first copter with two SWAT team members while Miriam went into the second helicopter with the other detectives, and two other SWAT officers.

With everything in motion, the teams split up and proceeded with the plan. Miriam climbed into one of the helicopters with Lou and the two Lee County detectives, who looked eager to be a part of the mission.

“This could make us all famous,” Detective Belmont said as the helicopter’s blades began whirring. Each passenger had a helmet with a microphone on it so they could hear each other once the engine started and they were in flight. Nettles could communicate with them from the other copter as well.

The pilot steered them up off the ground while gravity pushed them to their bench seats. Miriam couldn’t remember the last time she had been in a helicopter. Her heart raced with anticipation as they jetted past the police station and across town, headed south.

“I want to make sure we’re all on the same page here,”
Nettles’s voice said through Miriam’s head phones.

“So first, everyone do a check, starting with Miriam—I mean Agent Castillo.”

“Check,” Miriam said.

Everyone followed as Nettles went down the list. The lush, green world below passed them by at twenty-five-thousand feet. They flew over dozens of large, blue bodies of water—Miriam had never realized how many lakes there were in the area. It was just past nine in the morning. The sun was out in full force, lighting the thin, transparent clouds. Then below, there was just flatland, untouched—it seemed. Acres of trees, swamps, sawgrass, and flowing water as far as the eye could see.

“We’re about ten minutes out from his property,”
Nettles said over the comm. “Everyone keep a careful eye out.”

Lou surveyed the land below with a pair of binoculars. A crackle came over Miriam’s headset. Detective Belmont gave her a curious glance. After a pause, Nettles’s voice came over the headset.
“No stone unturned people. Time to bring a career criminal to justice.”

An impasse. For a minute, everyone was quiet, until Lou, binoculars in hand, suddenly pointed toward the ground. “Structure sighted!”

Everyone turned to look. A small, abandoned-looking cabin was in the distance, open and exposed. Her heart jumped, but then something was strange about how easy it was to spot. There were no vehicles or people around it either.

“Keep going,” she said to the pilot.

“What are you doing?”
Nettles said.

“That’s not the cabin,” she said.

“Looks like a cabin to me,”
Willis said.

“Take it down,”
Nettles said.

“You guys search that cabin, we’ll get the next one,” Miriam said.

“Just like we planned, right?”
Lou added. He looked at Miriam and shook his head, covering his mic. “Damn Feds.”

“We heard that!”
Nettles said. Miriam looked out the window as the first helicopter swooped low and touched ground. She then searched out the window for the next cabin, or something resembling it. Lou kept careful watch as they flew over a large patch of trees and brush, perfect cover. Miriam remained plastered to the window when a shiny flicker of light caught her eye.

“There!” she said, pointing.

Lou turned and moved to the other window, crouched down and looked out with his binos.

“What do you see?” Miriam asked him.

“I don’t know. Nothing but trees.”

“It’s there,” she said. “I know it.”

“There’s nowhere to land
,” the pilot said.

“Find something!” Miriam said. “I saw something silver and shiny back there. You have to turn back.”

He made a turn and they circled the forest once again. Lou finally zeroed in on whatever it was that Miriam had seen.

“It’s a vehicle!” he said.

Detective Belmont lifted his mic. “Agent Nettles, what’s your status?”

Faint crackling came over their headsets followed by Nettles’s distant voice. “Surrounding the cabin now. Doesn’t look like anyone’s here.”

The pilot turned to Miriam and pointed to a clearing which seemed to be as close as he could get to the area they had identified earlier. Miriam looked closer and could see what looked like an enormous camouflaged tarp hanging from the trees, obscuring the view of whatever was under it.

Bravo Team landed with a jolt and rushed out, leaving the pilot withy the copter. About one hundred feet ahead, Miriam saw an old cabin hidden under a camouflaged canopy, with a vacant air to it—though she could feel Anderson’s presence. Her legs picked up steam as she rushed ahead, driven by sheer instinct.

As the team rushed forward, Nettles reported that their cabin was clear, all but solidifying Miriam’s hunch. When they were twenty feet from the cabin, shots rang out from the inside, blasting from the windows, shattering the glass and hitting the trees all around them. Detective Jade took a shot to the leg and fell to the ground.

“I’m hit!” he yelled.

Miriam pushed forward, moving in between the trees with her Beretta drawn. After a brief pause, more rapid gunfire surrounded them. Lou directed the team to take cover and advance cautiously. Was Ana still inside? Miriam could hardly prevent herself from running ahead to the cabin. Just when it looked as though Bravo Team was going to be pinned down for the long haul, the shooters ran out of the house and toward a muddy Ford F-250, fleeing the scene.

Miriam rushed forward and shot the tires out, taking cover on the side of the cabin. She didn’t know how many of them there were, but she saw three in the truck. They turned and started firing back. She dropped to her knees and took cover as wood chunks flew all around her. As soon as the engine started, she turned and fired at the truck, striking the driver in the head.

He slumped to the wheel as the others jumped out of the truck and tried to run. She raised her gun, but couldn’t bring herself to shoot them in the back. At that moment, a hail of gunfire blasted from behind her, taking the two fleeing men out. Their backs exploded as their heads jerked back and their hands flew into the air. They dropped to their stomachs, motionless and contorted. Miriam turned around, shocked, to see Detective Jade behind her with his rifle aimed.

“What did you do that for?” she asked. Her exhausted eyes were livid with fury.

“They shot at us!” he said defensively.

She turned from him in disgust. “Come on,” she said running to the front porch. “We have to search the house.”

She kicked the door open and ran inside, taking cover behind anything she could—a book case, table, and cabinets—making her way forward. As she passed the kitchen, she realized there was no one inside the room, and possibly no one inside the cabin. Even Ana. It looked as though it had been abandoned in a hurry, as was clearly the case. Her feet creaked across the floorboards, and she immediately focused on the basement.

“Miriam, where’d you go?”
Lou said over the headset, frantic.

“She’s here. I know it!” Miriam said. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Any minute her heart would explode. She approached the basement door cautiously, put her hand to the knob, and swung open the door with her pistol drawn. Below was a set of stairs, which was all she could see in the darkness, and nothing more.

“Ana!” she shouted, wiping her eyes. She then cleared her throat and changed to a more authoritative tone. “Philip Anderson, this is Agent Castillo with the FBI. Come out with your hands up high, or I
will
shoot you!”

There was no response. Too fearful to wait any longer she stormed down the stairs and flew to the ground at the bottom on one knee. The vest weighed heavily on her shoulders, making it harder to aim, and the helmet blocked her side vision. On the mattress, not ten feet away, a girl lay motionless with her back toward Miriam. She leapt up gasping and ran to the bed just as footsteps clamored from upstairs.

“Miriam!” Lou shouted.

She dropped to the mattress and turned the girl on her side, facing her. Somewhere under the bruises and cuts on her face was Ana. She was unconscious but breathing.

“Oh my God,” Miriam cried, cradling Ana in her arms. She kissed her face repeatedly as waves of relief rushed through her body. In the midst of her jubilation and fear of Ana’s condition, she suddenly heard a gun click.

She whipped around and saw Phillip Anderson standing in the shadows. Her mind froze along with her body. She had been taken off guard and had no idea what to do. Her pistol lay on the bed near her knee. Both her arms were around Ana.

Philip glanced at his watch while holding a pistol with a silencer attached to the muzzle. “Record time. I’m impressed.” He laughed and shook his head. “I really didn’t think you were going to make it.”

“Where are you going?” she asked, fighting the fear that was consuming her body.

“Somewhere they’ll never find me. I can assure you that.” He smiled again, and then his face suddenly dropped.

“Now stand up and get against the wall before I put one in your head and your little girl’s.”

Miriam released Ana and slowly rose from the bed. Her own pistol was in view. The minute her eyes glanced at it, Phillip spoke.

“Not happening. One wrong move and you’re fuckin’ history. Understand?”

Miriam looked away from her pistol and rose up from the mattress, keeping a careful distance from Ana with her safety in mind.

“We had a deal,” she said.

Phillip’s eyes remained on her, unblinking. “Tell that to my guys. Some of them had families too, you know. They were strapped for cash and trying to make ends meet. And none of them deserved to die.”

“They were criminals,” she said. “Now, please. I don’t care what you do to me, just let my daughter go.”

Phillip smiled. “Maybe I want to take her with me.”

“Miriam, where are you?” Lou shouted from upstairs. Bravo Team’s footsteps could be heard continuing their search of the cabin.

In that split second, Miriam lunged for her pistol. “No!” she screamed.

Phillip shot two shots into her chest without hesitation while his pistol barely made a sound. Miriam hit the ground, smacking hard against the pavement. As she collapsed, Phillip ran to Ana but froze halfway. The footsteps upstairs were close. They’d be down the stairs in second.

Phillip turned around and ran to the opposite corner of the room where a large bookcase sat. He heaved with all his strength and pushed it to the side, revealing a crawlspace that led to an underground tunnel. Hurried footsteps scrambled down the steps just as Phillip ducked inside. He pulled a rope, sealing the trap door shut, followed by an automatic pulley that moved the bookshelf back against the wall.

Lou was the first to reach the bottom, with Detective Jade behind him.

“Miriam!” he shouted.

He rushed to her as Jade went to Ana.

Lou crouched down and picked Miriam up, holding her. Her face was pale, and she wasn’t breathing.

“Talk to me, Miriam.”

He shook her as her head bobbed and her eyes closed.

“Miriam, come back!”

Dear Reader,

Hi! I hope you enjoyed my latest series. Quality story telling is very important to me. It’s my living, and I can’t thank you enough for your support and for taking the time to read this boxset. But the learning never stops, and your feedback is vital to improving each new series I explore. 

I would love if you could take a second to leave a review here: Leave a Review Here!

If you would be so kind, please leave a review showering the book with endless praise. Of course, I’m joking, but it would be great to hear from you. If there are any issues you had with the story or any pesky errors or concerns, feel free to email me and let me know. I’d love to hear your feedback, regardless. Your support allows me to do what I do, and I’m in your debt. In a way, I work for you, the reader. So let me know if I’m doing the job. Thanks again and, please, feel free to contact me or leave a review for the book at your earliest convenience.

With Gratitude,

Roger Hayden

The Abducted: Vengeance

Escape

An intricate underground tunnel stretched a mile beyond the cabin, leading to a riverbank, then past the sawgrass prairie and into the tropical wetlands of the Southern Glades. The challenge was much harder than Phillip Anderson had anticipated. On his belly, he inched forward. With each movement, one elbow dug into the unforgiving cement and thrust him forward, followed by the other.

His body was sore and exhausted. He crawled for over half a mile before stopping to catch his breath in the tightly confined cement tunnel. In one hand he held a flashlight, in the other, his radio.

Everything else he had to leave behind. His bodyguards had been killed—his hideout cabin exposed—and he was on the run again. And through it all, he didn't have Miriam to accompany him, as he had planned. She would pay, soon enough, more than she already had.

The darkened tunnel was cramped and stuffy—a nightmare to wade and crawl through. With each tiring push forward, Phillip was on the verge of collapse. At six feet, two inches, and two hundred and twenty pounds, he was a big man and could barely fit through.

If not for Miriam, he wouldn't be desperately seeking escape from the feds. With about a quarter-mile left to go, he stopped, sweaty and gasping for breath. Somehow, he had to escape. They were undoubtedly closing in on him now from all directions.

His hiking boots scarped against the hard surface, pushing him forward. The sandy concrete tore against his faded Levis. He dragged along a satchel with some emergency cash and his silencer pistol tied to his ankle by a rope. His beige Anderson Auto Salvage T-shirt was drenched in sweat. He had never felt so afraid, and yet there was a certain exhilaration to it. But there were also no guarantees that his escape plan was going to work.