Christine Feehan - Street Game

Mack signaled for the others to pull down their night goggles, making it easy to see in the blackness of the night. He and Kane didn’t need them. They could both see in the dark as easily as during the day. A result of the experiments they’d lent themselves to. Stupid, but they’d done it for the good of the country and their need for a home. Yeah, he knew the psychological bullshit everyone spouted. It was probably all true too, but he didn’t much care. It was also one hell of an adrenaline rush. Still, he waited, hesitating before signaling his team forward. His men were coiled and ready. He had a bad feeling, deep in his gut, and he never discounted his instincts. Something wasn’t quite right, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. What is it, Top? Kane questioned, using the telepathic communication they had perfected as children, and which the military had enhanced when they volunteered for the psychic GhostWalker program.

Something’s wrong? Not wrong, maybe. Just not right. How the hell could he explain that strange kick in his belly?

I feel it too, but I’m not sure what’s out of sync here. There was another long moment of silence. Abort? Kane asked.

Mack took a breath. Let it out. No, but let’s all be very cautious. Of the group of them, only the new kid the sergeant major had insisted they add to their team couldn’t communicate telepathically. Telepathy had been the common denominator that had drawn them together on the streets. They were all different and they’d all recognized the psychic gift in one another. Mack had been the acknowledged leader and Kane had always, always had his back. He glanced at the man and saw that Kane was doing what he did best, searching the huge warehouse with his strange eyes. He could, if he wanted, see right through the wood and metal to the heat inside, a gift from Whitney and his experiments. Unfortunately, if he used that special gift, he paid for it with blindness for several minutes after, rendering it an extremely dangerous talent to use in the field. There were several new abilities in all of them. Animal DNA. A new genetic code. They hadn’t signed on for that kind of experiment, but when they’d woken up, they had been changed for all time. Kane kept from trying to look through the walls and used his enhanced sight to detect movement only.

Mack signaled his men forward. It took minutes to bypass the alarm on the side entrance door, far longer than it should have. The alarm was too complicated for a wharf warehouse. Who put together a sophisticated triple-alarm system so complex it took Javier, his best tech, precious time to unravel it?

We’ve got ourselves a pro system, here, boss, Javier said. One I’ve never seen before. Whoever put this mother together knew what they were doing. There was frank admiration in his tone.

No activity in the lower warehouse that I can spot, Mack, Kane said. I can’t detect heat on the second floor either, but someone’s on the third floor. Just one person? That made no sense.

Just one.

Mack moved first, his brain more reluctant than his body. He rolled inside the door of the first floor, under a trip wire, and crawled military fashion beneath the maze of track beams. The entire room was empty, deserted, with the exception of scattered building materials here and there. The sophisticated alarm system seemed ridiculous. Something was nagging at the back of his mind, refusing to leave him alone.

Where are the sentries, Kane?

I don’t know, bro, but this is all wrong.

The roof was clean, protected only by an alarm. His man, Gideon, was up there now, with a rifle and a radio. Gideon could see in the dark, hear like an owl, and shoot the wings off a fly in the middle of the night if necessary. Mack should have been feeling good, but that punch in his gut was getting stronger. And where the hell was the sentry on the ground level? Was this an elaborate trap? Had Doomsday been tipped off that they were coming?

The little band of terrorists had no cause, no politics, no religious war to fight. They were mercenaries, a brand-new type spawned by the times. They showed off their talents, sparing no country, no man, woman, or child, with one idea: working for the highest bidder. They sold their services to whoever paid, which made them difficult to track, as no one could ever figure out who they worked for and where they would be next. This was the GhostWalkers’ one opportunity to get them, by following the weapons, yet Mack just couldn’t shake it that something was wrong. Even as his mind struggled desperately with the problem, he was aware of every detail around him, aware that the newbie, young Paul, was an inch too high, close beneath one of the beams. Mack hissed and all movement ceased. The warehouse was utterly still. His cold gaze pinned Paul. Mack signaled with a flat hand. The rookie’s body hugged the cold cement. Despite the cover of darkness, Mack knew Paul flushed crimson.

The kid blushed a lot. What the hell he was doing with their team, Mack couldn’t figure out. Basically, they were babysitting, and that could get them all killed. No one on the team wanted the kid with them, but Sergeant Major Griffen had been more than insistent. It wasn’t that the kid wasn’t highly intelligent-he was. He also was psychic, although none of them had gone through Dr. Whitney’s program with him. All the GhostWalkers tended to know or at least recognize one another. Paul was an exception. Mack didn’t like question marks, and the kid posed too many. Mack rolled free of the interlocking track beams. The loudness of the freight lift was out of the question. It had to be the stairs, each one more perilous than the next. There would be two flights to get to that third floor.

Where the hell are the sentries? The question nagged at him, would not let him go.

Everyone was on high alert now, the question as disturbing to them as it was to him. He waited a heartbeat, but couldn’t find a reason not to continue. He moved cautiously. Four stairs… seven. He felt it on eight. The wire puzzled him. It was an alarm, not a mine. His mind seized on that, worried at it. Mack had done this so many times that he knew exactly how each one of his men was feeling. Adrenaline pumping, heart racing, fear choking, guns rock steady. Something was off-kilter. Wrong. The word fluttered in his head, beat at him like tiny wings. Definitely off.

Kane’s anxiety heightened his own.

Mack gained the second floor. Where the first floor had been mostly empty space and building materials, this one was packed with electronic equipment. A bank of computers was built into the far wall, the only thing completed. Everything else was in boxes, all electronics equipment, high-end.

“Bingo,” Paul’s whisper came over the radio, trembling with excitement. “Moving day.”

Check it, Kane. Maybe we’re looking at how they transported the guns. Inside electronic equipment? This is satellite tracking, cameras, stuff like that. Not guns. We’ve stumbled onto something, but I’m not certain it’s what we’re after. Mack wasn’t certain either. He shook his head, his mind screaming at him now. This was all wrong. No sentries. This type of equipment was far too advanced for the kind of terrorists that made up the Doomsday organization.

He moved up the staircase. Third stair this time. No explosives. Seventh stair. He rolled beneath the beam on the landing, came up on one knee, breathing deeply. Here! Here! His men were spreading out, back-to-back, in a standard search pattern.

What is it? What’s wrong? Find the answer! Find the answer! Mack moved carefully through the furniture.