Ever Hayes - Redemption

“General.” I changed the subject. “Something’s been bothering me. How did you know—”

He read my mind. “The president was my best friend. He had a little too much to drink one night and showed me a book. There were four such books. One went down on Air Force One with him. I assume you know where another is?”

I nodded.

“And then there are two more—somewhere. As long as you don’t have the book on you—ever—you should be good,” he added.

I could feel Blake’s eyes burning into the back of my head. “Yes, sir.”

“Well, you all have about fourteen hours ‘til nightfall—fourteen hours to get the sergeant and me to the other end of this tunnel. We might as well get started.”

A circle of nodding heads showed everyone was in agreement—everyone but Kellen, of course. We gathered up our gear and began the methodical journey through the darkness—carrying Niles and Tyler—to the Hummers awaiting us at the end of the tunnel.

It was hard to walk away from Keena, from Silas, John, and the others. Even though I had Hayley with me—and for the time being we had General Niles—I felt like we’d failed. Everyone seemed to share my disappointment to some extent.

In all likelihood, Commander Boli was in the bunker now, looking for evidence, looking for a trail. He wouldn’t find one in there, and that would infuriate him. General Niles knew we had to give him a “rabbit” to chase—soon—or he’d keep hunting. The two Hummers heading south out of the mountains would be convincing, and they’d contain three of the people missing from the bunker. The only person Niles wasn’t willing to sacrifice was his daughter.

As we walked away from the doors to the bunker, Flynn held back, staring at them. I dropped back with her. “What’s going on?” I asked.

“My dad did this. He did all of this.”

“I—”

“Captain, I know this seems like the time when you need to convince me my dad isn’t all that bad—that maybe we’re missing something—but I don’t—”

“Actually, Flynn, he’s the biggest a-hole I’ve ever met in my life. And I think you’re doing yourself a disservice by referring to him as your father.” She looked at me in surprise. “You’re right though, it’s probably a time when I shouldn’t have said that—when I should have tried to find something nice to say—but that man doesn’t deserve praise, credit, or respect for anything… and he definitely doesn’t deserve to be your dad.”

She wrapped her arms around me in a big hug. I could feel her body shaking as she cried. I was sure it wasn’t for her dad—more likely for her brother, or for the overwhelming stress of this entire mess. “Flynn,” I whispered.

“Yes, sir?”

“Call me Danny, okay? You’re with me now.”

She smiled. “Yes, sir.”

“Danny, your shirt is glowing.” Hayley pointed at my chest, where a small red glow was emanating through my black shirt.

Crap . We were about to open the overhead garage doors, which would engage the hydraulic jacks beneath the floor and lift us out. I pulled the dog tag up out of my shirt and looked at it. I knew it was Damien trying to reach me for some reason, and figured it had to be important. “Give me a minute, guys. Don’t open the doors yet.” I walked a ways down the tunnel.

“What’s going on?” Blake asked over my shoulder. “I thought you left your dog tag back at the vehicle.”

“I did.” I dug through my pack for the tablet. “This was an extra. It’s the test model. It doesn’t work like the others—glitches galore—and we never figured out why, but it has direct emergency message transmission ability. I thought I might need that, but only Damien knows I have this.”

“What about the GPS?” Blake’s concern was heavy in his voice. “Does that—”

“Nope.” I shook my head. “Doesn’t work. At least it’s not supposed to. This thing is otherwise useless… but that’s good in this instance. Whether or not it’s actually Damien on the other end, if I don’t respond they won’t even know I got it. I can read the message and decide what to do from there.” I inserted the tag into the tablet. The screen flashed on, and I read the message.

“Barn burnt down* Storm coming* Cleaning house* Kaptured*”

What the hell? I looked at Blake.

“It’s four messages.” He pointed out the use of asterisks instead of periods.

True . “But barn burnt down? Hayley, come here a second.”

She joined us, and I showed her the message. “Does this mean anything to you?”

She reread it and shook her head. “No clue. Who’s the message from?”

“Damien. What barn?” I looked at Blake again. “He can’t know anything about the farmhouse we were at.”

“Only barn I know in Hawaii is—Governor Barnes?” Hayley offered.

“Maybe.” I nodded. That would make sense .

“If it’s that,” Blake agreed, “then by burnt he’s saying Barnes is the mole.”

I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck standing up. If that’s the case, my BS reader is shit . It was definitely possible.

“The storm coming is either an actual storm, or he’s telling us we’re surrounded, and not to move,” Blake continued.

“And cleaning house could mean they’re evacuating Redemption or…” Hayley paused.

“They’re getting ready to breach the house on Kauai.” I completed the alternative.

“And Kaptured?” Hayley asked.

That can only mean one thing . Coming from Damien, it wasn’t a typo. “It means Keena is not dead.” I looked at Blake. “And now everyone knows they have her.”

Blake was shaking his head. “If Damien already knows that—”

“Then he knows we made it here.” I interrupted him. “And he knows what they’re trying to make Keena do.”

“But how would they know that already?” Hayley asked.

“Because dickhead Baker has her, and he knows how to reach the Hexagon.” Blake’s voice gave away his anger. “This gets worse by the minute.”

By the second.

“But why send this message in code if only you ten had—”

I cut Hayley off. “Maybe because of Barnes and his tablet, or maybe Damien was worried about Keena having a tablet somehow. Maybe there’s another breach in the communication link I don’t know about. I don’t know for sure.”

“Do we know we can trust Damien?” Blake asked.

“In all honesty, my judgment on people has clearly been a little off, but if there’s anyone back there I trust now, it’s him.” That seemed good enough for Blake. I continued. “In any case, Damien clearly isn’t taking any chances. That—at least—is a good thing.”

No one disputed that.

“Danny, we can’t go back in there.” Hayley positioned herself to where she could see my eyes.

“I know,” I replied.

“Can Keena shut down the Shield?”

I nodded. “Pretty sure she can.”

“But would she?”

“I don’t know, Hayley.” I shook my head. “There’s no telling what someone will do when tortured enough. If anyone can get it out of her though, it’s Baker.”

“Danny, it’s my fault she’s still in there. I should have tried to run down that hallway and grab her. I probably could have.”

“Blake, that doesn’t even matter now. Baker might have already killed her, or he could have forced her to send a message to me somehow and make it look like it’s from Damien. She knows about this test model. Don’t think she knew I had it on me now, but she at least knows about it. This could simply be a ruse by Baker to try to draw us back out there, to make us do something desperate.” I knew most of that was unlikely—Keena would have resisted every bit of it—but it was at least worth considering.