Chris didn’t think it had been the master chief petty officer, but the boat had been too far away for him to be certain.

He and Huang had returned to the rendezvous point with tools and several gallons of gas. They were facing the prospect of attacking the lodge armed with Molotov cocktails and Simunition tipped with nails.

It was a ridiculous plan considering the lodge grounds were too wet for anything to burn and the tangos had guns that could fire .45 caliber rounds, but they couldn’t let this standoff last another twenty-four hours. One local was dead. Six trainers and four SEALs were unaccounted for. Plus, the park archaeologist could also be missing. They were potentially dealing with eleven hostages and an unknown number of tangos.

They’d debated sending two men to hike out, but they were stretched thin as it was with the need to maintain a presence at the rendezvous point, search for the missing team, and scout the lodge grounds for intel. Not to mention that they’d never gone over the maps outside the lodge area to determine best possible escape routes because this was meant to be a fricking training exercise and not the real deal, and without satellite connectivity for their GPS units they didn’t have maps of anything except the lodge basin, so they’d be sending two men on a twenty-mile hike—at minimum—in a storm-drenched wilderness with no clue how to navigate.

As an alternative, they’d spent hours this morning poring over the maps they did have, trying to guess where the signal blocker had been placed. They’d managed to narrow the options down to a half dozen based on terrain and road access—the signal blocker would almost certainly be a vehicle of some sort—and would send a team at dusk to check out the most promising locations.

If they could contact NSWC, they could end this nightmare and rescue the hostages before more people died.

Chris just had to hope it wasn’t already too late.

Rain drizzled down in icy fits, prompting Undine and Jae to agree to go to her house to hear the results of Luke’s phone calls to NSWC. It was a short drive up the hill on the western edge of town to the newly built four-bedroom house on acreage that had a sweeping view of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. On a clear day, she could see Vancouver Island from her living room window.

The house was hers and Luke’s dream home, and she still had trouble believing she was living out her every fantasy with a man she loved more than she’d ever dreamed possible.

Her dog, a sweet black-and-white mutt of unknown heritage, came rushing out to greet her, while their orange tabby cat watched from the window.