“What the hell is this place?” asked Oleg.

He shook his head. “In the end, it doesn’t matter. A job is a job—and Pichugin is paying us well for this one. Brief the team about the gear and get the steaks cooking. It might be a while before we eat again.”

“I’m getting a Last Supper vibe,” said Oleg.

“Ah. Don’t read too much into it,” said Felix before doing the exact opposite the moment Oleg stepped out of the RV.

He clicked through the attachments and reread the mission documents at least three more times before concluding that they were in for a very long night. Something was off about this mission. Pichugin hadn’t provided any indication of who or what they would be defending. The “why” wasn’t important. He didn’t care “why,” as long as they got paid. But they’d never gone in this blind about the “who” or “what,” and that bothered him.

CHAPTER 41

CHAPTER 41

Devin Gray languished under the pontoon boat canopy, the stifling heat and humidity sapping his energy and eroding his enthusiasm for anything but another ice-cold bottled water from their rapidly emptying cooler. He pulled his feet back and out of the sun, his knees now bent at a ninety-degree angle. A few hours from now, the sun’s superheated rays would fill the entire boat, adding to the misery—while dangling perilously low on the horizon. Dangerous because they were running out of time.

They’d run headfirst into an entirely overlooked obstacle this morning. With the weekend in full swing, the lake’s entire boat-rental inventory had been reserved. Every marina they’d called reported the same thing. All boats had either been checked out yesterday for the weekend or would be picked up today. When they struck out with the last marina, Rich had them hit the list again, this time offering five hundred dollars to bump their name to the top of the cancellation list—cash deliverable within the hour. Five out of the six marinas took him up on the offer, and the team split into three groups to make good on the payment. By midafternoon they had two pontoon boats, but no speedboat, which represented a problem.

Graves and Gupta needed a speedboat to launch the drone, since it had also become clear over the course of the day that their only other launch option would be a deserted stretch of rural road west of the conservation area, which would divert at least one tactical operative from the primary mission. At maximum throttle, the speedboat would serve as a stationary runway, providing the necessary lift for the drone to take to the sky. Retrieving it would be a different story altogether. Graves and Gupta could glide it to a landing on any hard, packed surface and grab it later. Or just ditch it and move on. It would all depend on how the mission unfolded.