James Rollins - Altar Of Eden

Jack should have known that the assault team wouldn’t leave their rear flank unprotected. They had posted some man at the entrance, someone with serious firepower.

This all flashed through Jack’s head as he watched the rocket launcher fire, exploding with a spat of flame and smoke.

A SPATTER OF thunder woke Lorna-so loud it felt like nails hammered into her skull. She cried out, as much in pain as confusion. She tasted blood. Her body was being thrown about as if she were on a boat in a storm.

It took her a long agonizing moment to realize she was in the backseat of an SUV. The thunder was gunfire, coming from a shooter standing next to her, halfway out an open moonroof.

She tried to lift her hands to her pounding head, but found them tied behind her back. She was thrown against the passenger window as the truck made a sharp turn onto the levee road.

Memory flooded back to her.

The attack, the bloodshed, the ambush in the clinic…

She stared out the window toward ACRES. Another truck barreled up the entry road, coming straight at them, looking ready to T-bone right into the side of this vehicle.

Lorna recognized the other truck. “Jack…”

Then flames flashed by the side of the road, drawing her eye to a soldier standing there with a smoking weapon.

Jack’s truck exploded. The front end jackknifed into the air, riding a fireball. It flipped onto its rear fender and toppled over onto its cab. Glass and fiery metal rained down.

The blast was so loud she didn’t know she was screaming until it was over. Someone grabbed her shoulder and shoved her back into her seat. A hand slapped her face, momentarily blinding her.

“Shut the hell up!”

Through tears, she glanced one last time out the window. The SUV was speeding down the levee road. She could not see Jack’s truck any longer. But a moment later, a muffled detonation erupted farther away from the road. A massive swirl of fire climbed into the dark sky.

ACRES.

She closed her eyes, too numb to scream. She pictured her brother and her colleagues. She prayed they’d gotten out-but even that hope was dashed with the hoarse words from the driver.

“Connor, order Daughtery to do a final sweep of the area before he takes off. Kill anyone still alive.”

Deaf, Jack lay on his back in prickly brush. He had trouble focusing his eyes. The world swam in and out of focus.

Fires raged to one side. Smoke rolled over him, smelling of oil. He turned his head enough to see the fiery wreckage of his service truck on the road.

He remembered the soldier with the rocket launcher.

Jack had reacted on pure instinct as the weapon fired. No thought, just action. He had popped the door and thrown himself away from the truck. The blast wave still caught him and flung him like a rag doll through the air into the weeds.

Must have blacked out a bit.

He lay a moment longer, unsure if he could move. It hurt to breathe. Busted a rib at least.

Then he heard the heavy tread of boots, rushing his way.

Jack pawed around him for his pistol, but he had lost it. He struggled up despite the complaint from his beaten body. He would not die on his back.

A figure rose up before him. The soldier had traded his rocket launcher for an assault rifle. The weapon pointed at his face.

“You are one tough bastard to kill,” he growled.

Jack lifted his arms. He knew there would be no mercy, no use begging. Not that he would. Instead, with his arms up, he flipped the guy off with both hands.

This earned a respectful sneer. Still, the man leveled the rifle.

Jack kept his eyes open, ready for what was to come.

A loud crack sounded.

Jack frowned as the gunman fell face forward, blood spewing out his nose, and almost landed in Jack’s lap.

Behind the soldier stood a wet dog of a figure. “Randy…?”

His brother tossed aside the thick tree limb he’d used to club the gunman. He glanced around, swiping a hand through his soaking-wet hair, then turned his attention back to Jack.

“So where’s Burt?”

A HALF HOUR later, Jack and his brother still combed the woods around the burning building. They had to move with care. The fire-bombing had turned the research facility into a blazing torch. Lit by flames, shadows danced throughout the woods, making the search all the more difficult and nerve-racking.

Randy had explained about the attack on the road, being forced into the river. But you couldn’t drown a Cajun that easily. He swam downstream a fair spell and crept back when he heard all the gunfire.

Traipsing the woods now, Jack couldn’t ask for a better partner. The two brothers hadn’t hunted together for years, but they fell into an easy and familiar stride with each other: one taking the lead, then the other, silently signaling, sticking to the darker shadows. Over the past years, a wall had grown between them, built by secrets and Jack’s self-imposed estrangement. As they traipsed the woods, Jack recognized how much he missed the simple camaraderie of family, how quickly that wall could drop if he’d let it.

But for now, he had a job still to do. It wasn’t just Burt whom the two hunted. They watched for any straggling members of the assault team.

Jack had confiscated the rifle from the mercenary Randy had clubbed. Unfortunately, his brother had hit the man with all his strength and caved in the back of the guy’s skull, killing him instantly.

“I was pissed,” Randy had explained. He told Jack about the roadside ambush, the crash into the Mississippi. “Fuckers almost drowned my ass.”

The death was unfortunate. Jack would’ve liked to interrogate the man, to discover where the others had taken Lorna. With the soldier dead, he had hoped to find another replacement out here. But with the sun now rising, their search came up empty-handed. They had circled the entire facility. The attackers must have evacuated the area following the firebombing.

“Now what?” Randy asked.

“We find Burt and get the hell out of here.”

With the area secure, Jack cupped his mouth and whistled sharply. Randy did the same, calling out Burt’s name. The fire’s roar fought to drown their efforts. Jack circled out again, whistling and calling more boldly this time.

Halfway back around, a loud crunching and snapping erupted from the deeper forest. Jack tensed, raising his rifle in that direction.

Instead of the dog, their calls drew four others out of the woods.

Lorna’s brother and her colleagues came stumbling forward. They looked haggard and ragged, but happy to see them.

That is, all except one.

Kyle came at Jack as if he was going to attack. His eyes searched to either side, then toward the smoldering fire. His voice was a tearful croak. “Lorna…?”

“No,” Jack assured him, but he didn’t blunt the truth. “She got out, but the others took her.”

“Took her?” he echoed.

Before Jack could explain, a baying howl rose from deeper in the woods to the west.

Randy brightened. “Mon Dieu! That’s Burt!”

His brother set off into the forest. Jack followed, leading the others. He wasn’t about to leave the hound here. With the sky brightening, someone would quickly spot the column of smoke pouring into the sky. An emergency response team would be closing down on the place with sirens blazing. By that time, he wanted everyone together-and on the same page.

As they crossed through the forest Kyle kept step with him, cradling his broken wrist. “Why did they take my sister?”

“To interrogate her,” Jack said bluntly. “To cover their tracks. They’ll want to know how much was learned about those animals.”

Kyle grew pale. “Then what?”