She handed him the bolt cutters and he slid them back into the pack. She crawled through the hole she'd cut, fearless but careful. Marcus was right behind her.

Hold on a little longer, Gayle, he thought. I'm coming for you.

Cincinnati, Ohio

Wednesday 5 August, 11.15 P.M.

Special Agent Kate Coppola looked over her shoulder to see Marcus and Scarlett disappearing behind the wall of the compound. She silently wished them luck, starkly aware that they'd taken the more dangerous search. Back here in the forested area, there was cover galore should she need to hide, but inside the compound there was a house, its attached garage and a lot of wide-open space.

Marcus O'Bannion was here to save Gayle first and to stop Sweeney second. Scarlett's priorities mirrored his, but Kate's were reversed. Kate was here to arrest the traffickers the Bureau had been following for three years now. Her secondary priority was to make contact with and to extract, if required their agent who'd gone deep undercover. They hadn't heard from the agent in weeks. That wasn't too unusual. What was more worrisome was that they hadn't heard from the undercover's handler in several days. The handler was long overdue for his check-in.

She moved through the forest as soundlessly as possible, headed for the larger shed because it was the closer of the two. The structure was about as large as a high-school gymnasium, the walls made of corrugated metal. The roof was a big canopy that rose to a peak in the middle, like that of a circus tent. There was no foundation that she could see and the walls were of the prefabricated type that could be quickly put together and taken apart.

A temporary structure? Probably. But what were they using it for?

She heard the loud crack of a twig and ducked back into the trees. A man was approaching from the large shed, but it wasn't Sweeney. Sweeney was in his forties, with dark hair. The man walking toward her was blond and fucking huge. Nearly as big as Marcus's friend Diesel. She didn't want to have to shoot him and alarm anyone in the house, but she also didn't want to have to tangle with him hand-to-hand unless she got the drop on him.

Sliding her rifle over her back, Kate grabbed the limb of the nearest tree, swung herself up onto it, then climbed a few limbs higher until she was certain the man wouldn't see her.

She waited until he'd gotten a few body lengths away from the tree before dropping from the limb to land nearly soundlessly in a crouch. She shoved the barrel of her rifle into his back.

'Hands in the air.' Slowly he complied. 'Higher.' She dug the rifle barrel a bit deeper into his back. 'Higher, I said. On the ground, face down, Blondie. Do it,' she hissed, and he dropped to his knees, flattening his body on the ground. 'Arms spread, palms down, fingers straight.'

Once again he complied, and she snapped cuffs on while he put up relatively little resistance. 'Where's your boss?' she asked.

'Depends. Who are you?'

She gave the rifle another shove between his shoulder blades. 'I will shoot your fucking head off, make no mistake. Boss. Where?'

'Inside the house, I think. At least he was a few minutes ago. Don't shoot.' He turned his face to the side so that he could look up at her from the corner of his eye. His very blue eye. 'Who are you? Please.'

Her rifle was steady in her hands. 'Special Agent Coppola, FBI. Who are you?'

He let out a breath. 'Finally. You need to send a message to your SAC ASAP. Tell him "Pineapple under the sea".'

'"Pineapple under the sea"?' Startled, Kate went down on one knee to study his face more closely. It could be him under all that grime. Carefully she pushed up his pants leg to his knee and checked for the identifying scar. It was a match. Quickly she unlocked his cuffs. 'Well I'll be damned. Special Agent Davenport, we've been looking for you.'

Cincinnati, Ohio

Wednesday 5 August, 11.15 P.M.

Scarlett and Marcus ran from the back gate toward the garage attached to the house. There were six bay doors, with one open. Hopefully that meant that Sweeney hadn't left yet.

She figured the bastard would bring Gayle to the meet, just to get Marcus to come close enough to be grabbed or shot. Once Sweeney had gotten Marcus, Scarlett had no doubt that he'd kill Gayle next, then anyone who happened to be in his way. He'd already sprayed bullets throughout the Ledger building. He was an indiscriminate killer.

But if he hadn't left yet, they still had a chance to grab Gayle and avoid walking into what might be a trap. Although leaving his garage door conveniently open was probably a trap, too. It couldn't matter. Marcus was right. Based on the look of the cage in the video, Gayle was in the basement. They had to go in.

The house itself was simply massive. Built in the Tudor revival style so popular in Cincinnati pre-World War II, it was easily twice the size of Scarlett's house. Partly brick, partly half-timber, it had six windows across the top floor and . . . Scarlett frowned.

There was a large picture window along the back wall whose glass had been shattered. Shards of glass littered the grass, and the opening was now covered with plywood. The window had been broken from the inside out, the broken area visible against the plywood as no one had finished removing the remaining glass. The hole was large. Body-sized.

A strangled gasp caught her attention, and she turned to find Marcus staring at the corner of the driveway closest to the open garage door. Blood stained the concrete in a wide swath, as if someone had dragged a body through the open door.

Marcus's face had grown pale in the growing moonlight. 'Not Gayle,' he whispered. 'It can't have been Gayle.'

'No,' she agreed softly. 'They won't kill her until they get you. So let's find her before that happens.' She drew her weapon and started for the door, keeping her back to the wall, but Marcus hadn't moved.

He frowned. 'This feels too damn convenient,' he said, his whisper almost silent. 'The power going off just when we need to get through the fence? Leaving the door open for us?'

She'd thought the same thing. 'He doesn't know we know about this place.'

'Or he didn't. He could have seen Kate doing her perimeter check. Hell, he could have seen us approach on the main road.'

She blew out a breath, trying hard not to be exasperated. 'Entirely possible. This could totally be a trap.'

'I'll go in,' he whispered. 'You stay here.'

Ah. He was protecting her. I don't think so. 'No. You go high, I'll go low. Now.'

He closed his eyes for a second, and when he opened them, she saw utter focus and concentration. Gun in his hand, he eased around the garage corner and through the open door.

Soundlessly he crept through the enormous garage, following the bloodstain that stretched from the corner of the driveway to the middle of one of the empty bays. In the bay was a pool of drying blood. Clearly a body had been moved from the garage. The forensic guys would have to determine where it went after being dragged off the driveway.

Scarlett took a photo of the bloody swath, then used her hands to measure the width of the stain. She held them up to show Marcus that whoever had been dragged was much wider than Gayle.

Understanding flickered in his eyes, followed by relief. 'Not Gayle,' he mouthed, then grimly pointed to the van parked in one of the six bays. Scarlett recognized the vehicle from the security video taken outside the Ledger's loading bay. Sweeney had driven it to slaughter the Ledger's employees and to abduct Gayle.

The license plate was different from the one captured in the security video. Someone likely Sweeney had changed the plates. Scarlett snapped a photo of the new plate in case things went south. If Sweeney managed to get by them and escape, she'd have to call in a BOLO.

Marcus moved quickly and quietly, opening the van doors to shine his flashlight around the interior. No Gayle. There was a bloodstain on the carpet, but the blood had dried. Had it been Gayle's blood, it would have still been damp. Whoever had bled there had done so fifteen hours or more before.

'Demetrius?' she mouthed, and Marcus shrugged, then reached into the open driver's-side window and brought out a set of keys, pocketing them. Scarlett gave him a nod of approval.

Marcus proceeded to the door that led from the garage into the laundry room. Again he took high, she low. For the first time she was truly seeing the former Army Ranger at work, and she was more than impressed. She'd known he was stealthy and capable, but while she'd had to develop a relationship with her other partners, she and Marcus seemed to flow together like two streams meeting in the woods.

They encountered no resistance, the house having a too-quiet, abandoned feel. With the power out, there wasn't a single sound not a hum from the fluorescent lights nor the low drone of an AC fan. The silence was oppressive.

Marcus's lips thinned and she knew he was worried that Sweeney had already moved Gayle. She shook her head. 'Think positive,' she mouthed, and he nodded and squared his shoulders.

They moved from the laundry room into a grand foyer. Twin staircases curved upward, where they were connected with a balustrade that provided a bird's-eye view of the lower floor and the front of the property through a large window over the front door. There were bedrooms upstairs. If they didn't find Gayle in the basement, they'd check those rooms next.

They found what they thought was the door to the basement off the foyer, but it turned out to be the kitchen. Marcus went in first, giving her the sign that he'd located the basement door. Scarlett pulled the kitchen door closed behind them, covering Marcus as he opened the door to the basement. Steep stairs disappeared into inky blackness.

This would be the dicey part, walking blind down a flight of stairs, not knowing what they'd find below. This could be the trap. Scarlett pointed at Marcus to take the stairs. If Gayle was downstairs and incapacitated, he would be able to carry her. She pointed to herself and the door. She'd stay up top and guard the entrance. It would be too easy for someone to lock them in if they both went downstairs.

She listened intently, not hearing a sound as Marcus navigated the stairs as silently as he did everything else. She drew a breath and prepared to wait.

Cincinnati, Ohio

Wednesday 5 August, 11.20 P.M.

Ken buttoned his shirt, listening for any stray noises downstairs. He'd heard nothing since the power had gone out. He'd jumped from the shower and done a check of the property from the upstairs windows but had seen no one, so he'd gone to his room and quickly picked out clothes in the dark. But he wasn't dismissing the danger.

That the power had gone off now was not coincidental, and he wondered if Sean had made it happen with a timer. Or if his son had a confederate. Except that at this point there wasn't anyone left to be his accomplice.

He let out a breath. Except for Decker and Trevino, the second of Burton's two 'green' guys. Sean was supposed to have checked into Trevino. Ken cursed himself for having underestimated his son. Then he cursed himself for underestimating Reuben.

His jaw tightened. Reuben had probably laughed at Ken, knowing the video he held was a real ace in the hole. Ken thought he might be more pissed off that he hadn't thought to do the same to Reuben.

He finished getting dressed, then checked his tracking program on his cell phone. Decker was at the downtown office, just as he said he'd be. Joel was at his home, as he always was. Looked like those two would be the last men standing after Ken left for his retirement. They could keep the company, or what was left of it. At least until Alice got out of jail.

He didn't have a tracker for Trevino's phone. The guy had been too low on the totem pole to warrant his attention. Ken knew that if he ever got into business again, he wouldn't make the same mistake. Nobody would fall below his radar.

Still hearing nothing downstairs, he grabbed the suitcase he'd just finished packing when Sean had interrupted him earlier, drew his gun and crept down the stairs. He had barely enough time to go to Shawnee Lookout and get into position in the spot he'd chosen in advance. He'd have a perfect view of the park's entrance and a clear line of fire to anyone standing there. He'd do the job, get in the van and drive straight to Toronto.

He wouldn't come back to the house to feed Sean through the woodchipper while he was still alive, although that would have been immensely satisfying. He also wouldn't take the time now or later to put a bullet into poor Gayle. Instead he'd leave word for Decker to come by in a week or so. The woman would be dead by then her heart wasn't so good. Decker could return the body to the O'Bannions. After losingMarcus and most of the Ledger's staff, having Gayle's body dumped on their doorstep would be one more way to make them suffer.

He slipped down the curved staircase for the last time. He made no sound, his gun at the ready, just in case. But he heard no one. Saw no one.

He paused in the laundry room to ensure the silencer was fixed to his gun. He'd put a bullet through Sean's skull before he drove away. It was far better than the little bastard deserved, but at this point, getting away was all that mattered.

He stepped into the garage and froze.

Sean was gone.

Cincinnati, Ohio

Wednesday 5 August, 11.20 P.M.

'What's in the big shed?' Kate asked Agent Davenport after hauling him to his feet. He rose with a natural grace to brush the dirt and leaves away from his jeans, then his shirt. But some of the leaves stuck to his shirt and he had to peel them off. He dropped them to the ground, each one sticky with blood. 'Shit. Are you hit?'

'No. Not my blood. The shed is their body disposal unit,' he said tersely, and started walking back to the house within the walls. 'Complete with a woodchipper. They dig a big hole, aim the chipper at it, sludge the bodies, add a pinch of composting materials . . .' He wore an expression of disgust. 'Voil. No more bodies. When the hole is filled, they take down the shed, dig another hole, move the chipper, and put the shed back up.'

Oh my God. 'Why were you in there?'

'I was hiding someone. Do you have medical backup? Because there's a guy in that shed who will need help.'

'Two ambulances. They'll be waiting at the main road. Where's your handler?'

The large blond stopped abruptly. 'What do you mean? You haven't talked to him?'

'He hasn't checked in for two days. He's overdue.'

'Shit. Then you don't have Reuben Blackwell or Jason Jackson in custody?'

'No,' she said and his jaw went taut. 'Who are those men?'

Agent Davenport grabbed her arm. 'Get someone to 5487 Wharton Court ASAP,' he commanded. 'Agent Symmes is my handler. If he doesn't have ID for whatever reason, he's got a zipper tattoo around his biceps. The other two guys will be Sweeney's men. You don't want them walking free, trust me. If Symmes hasn't called in, something is very, very wrong.'

Kate made the call, then looked up at him. 'What's going on here, Davenport? Who are Reuben Blackwell and Jason Jackson?'

'Reuben Blackwell is Sweeney's head of security and Jackson is one of Reuben's men. If you don't have them, how do you know about Sweeney?'

'Figured it out the hard way, obviously,' she said, starting to walk again. 'If Sweeney's in the house, we need to get there too. Two of my team are in there. Rescue operation. Sweeney took a hostage when he shot up the Ledger building.'

'That's why I came back. I heard Sweeney had taken a hostage and I thought I might be able to get her out.'

'Thank you. Tell me about Sweeney's operation.'

'Sweeney's the boss of the trafficking ring. He had three partners Reuben Blackwell, Demetrius Russell and Joel Whipple.'

'Demetrius we know about,' she said. 'He's dead, isn't he?'

Surprise flashed in Davenport's blue eyes. 'Yeah. How did you know?'

'He was stabbed by the young man he tried to murder last night. Phillip Cauldwell.'