“I told you she wasn’t worth—” His phone was ringing. He looked down at it impatiently. “It’s Sergeant Rosaro at the helicopter pad.” He pressed the ACCESS button. “What the hell is wrong, Rosaro?” He listened. Then he began cursing, low and vehemently. “That stupid asshole. I can’t believe it. I’m going to break his neck. I’ll be right there.” He cut the connection and turned to leave. “Baldwin just showed up at the camp helicopter pad stinking drunk and telling everyone he has to see me. After I find out what he’s been up to, I’m going make him sorry he ever caused me all this trouble.”

“I told you he was either drunk or eaten by a python. I would have preferred the snake.” She added quickly, “Can I stay one more hour with Jeanne?”

“I don’t give a shit.” He was striding out of the prisoner tent; his attention was clearly focused only on Baldwin. “I might feed him to that python myself…”

Sasha gave a profound sigh of relief. That had been incredibly close. It was one thirty-five. Ten minutes to go until—

“That scared me,” Natasia whispered. “It’s going to be all right, isn’t it? It’s still going to happen.”

“I was scared, too,” Sasha said. “Eight minutes. It will happen in eight minutes.” She reached over and broke the chain link binding Natasia to the post. Easy, brittle…It was like snapping a pretzel. “Don’t do anything until you hear the explosion. Then you can start making sure the girls are loose and ready for the team to get them out of here. I’ll go to the back of the tent and start in the last row and work forward.” She frowned as she glanced at Jeanne. “You’re in charge of getting Jeanne out of here. She’s not going to know what’s going on. Call me if you need me.”

“I won’t need you.” Natasia’s cheeks were flushed. “We’re really getting out of here, Sasha?”

“We really are.” She felt like crossing her fingers as she said the words. It seemed to be too good to be true after all that had gone before. “Just get those girls in both tents loose and keep them quiet for the next seven minutes.”

*  *  *

Masenak’s Helicopter Pad
1:43 A.M.

“I’m here.” Baldwin’s voice was slurred as he saw Masenak stalking toward where he was sitting by the fire. “Are you glad to see me? It was all your fault I left, you know. Everything is always your fault. You treat me with no respect.”