“If this was meant to be some sort of mental challenge, they could have saved a lot of money and just sent us to an escape room,” Phelps said. “No need for the fricking HALO jump and cold swim. Or being out in icy rain at all.”

It had taken them hours to traverse the forest, making their way slowly up and around the north end of the lake, skirting Kaxo Falls and crossing the creek upstream where the valley was narrow and the water ran fast and deep. Rain had pummeled them along the entire journey in an unrelenting downpour. Why couldn’t this rainforest be the sultry tropical kind?

Just his luck that when the Navy sent him to a rainforest, it was in the Pacific Northwest. In January.

This was rapidly becoming one of his least favorite places.

“I dunno, man. This shot-up vehicle… It doesn’t feel right,” Jonas said. “It doesn’t fit the scenario we were given on Whidbey.”

Jonas had a point. Their orders were to infiltrate the lodge and extract two hostages, one female, one male, no further description. It didn’t matter if they killed guards in the process. The only thing that mattered was getting in and out with the unharmed hostages without anyone sounding an alarm.

This wouldn’t be easy, as they would need extraction via Sea Hawk—which required time. They had to radio for the helicopter and wait for it to fly in from a ship off the coast. No word on whether or not they could expect a real Sea Hawk in this exercise, but Chris doubted it. It would be damned expensive to have a ship and helicopter staged off the Pacific coast for the entire five-day training.

The fact that this was a hostage rescue mission had Chris wondering at Rivera’s planning here. Few people knew what had really happened in Belarus on that horrible day twenty months ago.

But Chris knew, and he’d filled in the gaps in Rivera’s memory for the hours after he was shot.

Was this crazy training Rivera’s reaction to that nightmare? Was he running a simulation looking for a better outcome?

That really wasn’t possible. And Rivera wouldn’t waste Navy resources. Naval Special Warfare Command would never sign off on such a thing.

But still, one of the hostages was a woman.

What did this shot-up SUV have to do with the hostage scenario? They couldn’t take the hostage out by road, rendering the vehicle useless to them anyway. The mission commander had been specific on that point—exfiltration had to happen by air.

Chris snapped a photo of the license plate of the SUV. Could be important for the test. A clue for the murder-party game.

A gunshot sounded. Distant, but close enough to be heard over the pounding rain.

What the hell? The shot had sounded real.