Relentless (Option Zero 2)

Iowa City, Iowa

The night was dark and peaceful. A distant train and the closer noise of a howling coyote were the only sounds to compete in the stillness. Houses lined up in rows, filled with sleeping families who were unaware that danger had arrived in their city, on their street. A danger no one would see until it was too late.

Blueprints of the house had been easy to obtain. They had been studied and memorized. There would be no escape, no way out. The family consisted of parents and three children—an older teen girl, a boy of about fourteen, and the youngest, a girl of about eleven. The youngest was their target.

The team was set. Two women would enter the house. The goal was to take the girl without anyone knowing. If they were discovered, two men waited on the outside. They would come in and handle the situation. Killing them all was an option that had been given to them, but he hoped it wasn’t necessary. Making it more complicated often caused issues. Simple was best.

Get the girl, get out. That was the goal.

The man spoke into his mic: “A and B, are you set?”

A female voice answered: “A and B ready.”

“Go.”

He watched from a safe distance. He wouldn’t participate unless things went awry. They shouldn’t. He had trained these people. They knew what to do.

Two barely discernible shadows slipped in through the garage door. Surveillance had revealed that the family, though apparently safety conscious enough to have a security system—which his people had easily dismantled—the lock on the garage door leading inside the house was a standard one. His people could quietly break that lock within seconds.

Confirming his thoughts, B whispered, “We’re in.”

That should be the end of communication until they had the girl wrapped up and brought outside. He would drive past the front of the house and stop, open the cargo door of his van, and the girl would be deposited inside. The same routine had been accomplished over a dozen times with no difficulties. He expected nothing different this time.

Two minutes later, he heard a slight but unmistakable pop, pop. Apparently someone in the family had woken and the threat had been handled. Now the whole family, with the exception of the youngest girl, would die.

“C and D,” he said into his mic. “Go in.”

“Copy,” D answered.

Two more shadows, bigger and bulkier than their predecessors, ran across the yard and through the open side-door of the garage. Tense now, he waited.

Another pop, pop sound in his earbud told him all he needed to know. Four family members, four pops.

“Get the girl and get out,” he said softly.

“I don’t think so,” an unfamiliar voice said beside him. He barely had the chance to turn, and his mind had no chance to register another ‘pop’ before excruciating agony went through his head.

A big hand reached into the van and grabbed the man’s head before it could fall onto the steering wheel and possibly sound the horn. No need to disturb this quiet, peaceful neighborhood with the obnoxious blare of a car horn.

Pushing the dead man over into the passenger side, the shooter got into the driver’s seat and started the engine. Pressing his mic, he said, “We ready to roll?”

“Yes,” a voice answered. “We’ve got them loaded up, and the house is locked down.”

“Let’s go.”

Two dark vans, one filled with four dead bodies and the other with one dead body, drove silently down the quiet, peaceful street, waking no one. The house they’d left behind would tell no secrets. No one was home. In an unexpected windfall, the family who lived there had won an all-expenses-paid trip to Disney World. In two days, they would return home, refreshed, tanned, and happy, never knowing that death had struck inside their home. They would go on with their lives, completely unaware that danger had been only a breath away.

Cyprus

The gently swaying yacht sat upon water so smooth and calm barely a ripple moved. Skies, clear and cerulean blue, looked down upon the serene setting.

Dressed in swim trunks and glistening with tanning oil, Marc Antony Ferante stood at the helm of his boat. This was just what he’d needed. The sea air invigorated him like nothing else. He would take a few days for himself. Get the sun he needed, the rest he required. Then he would have his newest acquisition brought here. She was being retrieved at this very moment. And soon, very soon, she would be his.

Ferante smiled. Yes, he was no longer bored. Life was once again interesting.

The massive explosion came without warning, shooting from the boat toward the sky. Only the squawking seabirds witnessed the giant eruption that flung fiery pieces of wood, iron, and steel a mile into the air.

Barely a minute later, the sea was calm once more. Remnants of what had once been a grand yacht floated along the peaceful waters. The rest of the wreckage, including Marc Antony Ferante, sank to the bottom of the sea.