Sandstorm (Sigma Force 1)

Cassandra continued to stare across the seas toward the lights of the other ship. Her eyes narrowed, picturing the men again.

Kane stood at her shoulder. “Orders?”

She glared across the seas as a stiff rain began to pelt the deck. She barely felt its sting on her cheek. “Detonate the mines.”

The radioman startled but knew better than to question. He glanced at Kane, who nodded. The man clenched a fist and ran back toward the pilothouse.

Cassandra rankled at the delay in snapping to her orders. She had noted the radioman seeking confirmation from her second. Though Cassandra had been assigned to lead this operation, these were Kane’s men. And she had just condemned three of them to death.

Though Kane’s face remained stoic, his eyes glass, she elaborated. “They’re already dead,” she said. “The new signal is false.”

Kane’s brows drew together. “How can you be so—”

She cut him off. “Because Painter Crowe is over there.”

2:12 A.M.

C ROUCHED WITH the others, Painter checked the straps snugged around the bare chests of Omaha and Danny. The dead men’s heart monitors seemed to be functioning fine. The device on his own chest blinked regularly, transmitting his pulse to the hidden assault ship out there.

Danny wiped the rain from his glasses. “These things won’t electrocute us if they get wet?”

“No,” Painter assured him.

Everyone gathered on the stern deck: Kara, the Dunn brothers, Coral. Clay had been revived enough to stand. But the steep rolling of the ship in the higher seas kept him weaving and needing support. Steps away, the four Omani border patrol fired off rifles periodically, mimicking a continued standoff.

He didn’t know how long the ruse would hold. Hopefully long enough for them to abandon ship. Captain al-Haffi had rallied the crew. The ship’s motorized launch had been untied and was ready for boarding.

The other lifeboat was being swung out, ready to drop. The fifteen-man crew was now ten. With no time to spare, the dead would have to be left behind.

Painter watched the ever-growing seas from a shadowy vantage, not wanting to be spotted by the patrolling Jet Skis. Waves had climbed to twelve feet. Winds snapped sails while rain swept in bursts over the deck. The aluminum launch knocked against the stern as it hung free now.

And the full brunt of squall had yet to strike.

Painter spotted one of the black Jet Skis fly over a tall wave, hang in the air, then race down the far face. He instinctively ducked lower, but there was no need. The pilot of the Jet Ski was angling away.

Painter stood. The Jet Ski was heading away.

She knows…

Painter spun around. “To the boats!” he screamed. “Now!”

2:14 A.M.

S AFIA WOKE out of blackness to the crack of thunder. Cold rain spattered her face. She was on her back, soaked to the skin. She sat up. The world spun. Voices. Legs. Another burst of thunder. She cringed at the noise, sinking back.

She felt rocking, heaving. I’m on a boat.

“Tranq’s wearing off,” someone said behind her.

“Get her below.”

Safia’s head rolled to stare at the speaker. A woman. She stood a yard away, staring across the seas, some strange scope fixed to her face. She was dressed in black, wore her long ebony hair braided away from her face.

She knew the woman. Memory came flooding back. A shout from Clay, followed by a knock at her door. Clay? She had refused to answer, sensing something wrong. She had spent too many years at the edge of panic not to have built up a thick layer of paranoia. But it made no difference. The lock was picked as easily as if they had a key.

The woman standing before her now had been the first through the door. Something had stung Safia’s neck. She reached fingers now and felt a tender spot below the angle of her chin. She had scrambled to the far side of the cabin, choking, panic narrowing her vision to a laser point. Then even this sight vanished. She had felt herself slumping but never felt herself hit the floor. The world had slipped away.

“Get her some dry clothes,” the woman said again.

With shock, Safia recognized the voice, the disdain, the sharp consonant strikes. The rooftop of the British Museum. Tell me the combination. It was the thief from London.

Safia shook her head. She was in a waking nightmare.

Before she could respond, two men hauled her to her feet. She tried to find her legs, but her toes slipped on the wet deck. Her knees were warm butter. Even holding her chin up took all her will.

Safia stared beyond the metal rail of the boat. The storm had struck. Seas rose and fell in dark hummocks, like the backs of whales, slick and smooth. A few whitecaps flashed silver in the meager light. But what drew her eye, kept her head strained up, was the fiery ruin a short distance away.

All strength left her.

A ship burned atop the rough seas, masts now torches. Sailcloth fanned out in swirls of fiery ash, carried by the gusting winds. The hull lay gutted. All around bits of flaming flotsam decorated the seas like so many campfires.

She knew the ship. The Shabab Oman.

All air squeezed from her lungs. She strangled between a scream and despair. The roll of the seas suddenly sickened her. She vomited across the deck, splattering the shoes of her guards.

“Fucking Christ, man…” one of them cursed, yanking her cruelly.

Still, Safia’s eyes remained fixed across the sea. Her throat burned.

Not again…not everyone I love…

But a part of her knew she deserved this pain, this loss. Since Tel Aviv, she had expected everything would be taken from her. Life was cruelty and sudden tragedy. There was no permanence, no safety.

Tears ran hotly down her cheeks.

Safia stared at the fiery ruin of the Shabab Oman. She held little hope of survivors—and even this hope was dashed with her captor’s next words.

“Send back the patrol,” the woman said. “Kill anything that moves.”

2:22 A.M.

P AINTER WIPED the blood from the cut above his left eye. He kicked his feet to keep himself above water as the seas heaved up and down. Rain fell heavily out of low skies, flashing with lightning. Thunder grumbled.

He glanced back to the overturned launch as it rose and fell in sync with him. Around his waist, a length of towline secured him to the skiff’s bow. Immediately around him, the seas remained dark, as if he were floating in oil. But farther out, fires sputtered in the rolling seas, appearing and disappearing. And in the center, the fiery bulk of the Shabab Oman loomed, half sunk, burning down to the waterline.

Swiping blood and rain from his eyes, Painter searched the waters for any threat. A vague worry about sharks fluttered across his mind. Especially with the blood. He hoped the squall would keep such predators deep.