Then when the smoke cleared again, she saw Cal Harris securing the hijacked helicopter. No Sasha. “She went east from the road?” She was already heading in that direction. “We have to find her, Korgan.”

“I know,” he said quietly as he took her arm. “I told Gilroy to keep on searching. I just came to get you so you wouldn’t be alone. You were a target, too, the minute they knew you were the one who set off that missile. That was necessary, but very showy, Alisa.”

“And it caused all this damn smoke!”

“We had to get rid of that truck and soldiers. They were setting up a Browning .50-caliber machine gun in the back of that truck, but even without that firepower they were too close. Once they joined with Masenak and Reardon, they would have been like a wolf pack hunting down a doe. We might not have had time to reach Sasha from the heliport before they caught up with her.” He grimaced. “Look on the bright side. At least the smoke is hiding her, too.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. I thought I’d be able to track Sasha from the minute she got off the access road and go after her.” Alisa realized how futile that sounded now, but it was true. The plans they had made had been simple and streamlined, and Korgan’s absolutely lethal team should have had no trouble accomplishing every detail. They were to take out Masenak’s guards at the heliport, electronically isolate the entire area from the castle, and then wait for Sasha to come down that hill. When she was off the hill and safely out of Masenak and Reardon’s range, they’d move in to take them out.

Alisa’s own part had been to hijack Reardon’s livestock helicopter right before his men could depart for his horse farm in Marrakech. She’d provided backup, additional firepower, and the “surprise” Korgan had thought might be a necessity.

It was a plan that should have worked, but when did any plan work perfectly? They hadn’t counted on the truck full of soldiers with all that firepower trailing so closely behind Masenak. “The only way I’ll feel better is to piss off Masenak and Reardon by finding Sasha before they do.”

“Which we’re on our way to doing.” He checked his watch. “And they’re soon going to have an even better reason to want to send us both to hell. You told me Novak is very efficient, and that means three drones will explode in the racetrack, military, and guard barracks in exactly four minutes. They’ll do enough damage that when Novak’s and Vogel’s teams go in afterward to do clean up, I doubt if Davidow or any of Masenak’s men will still be around.”