AFTER being stripped of their weapons, radios, and gear, Eddie, Mike, and Ski were dumped into adjoining cells in the block the Zimbabwean soldiers were using to guard Moses Ndebele. Geoffrey Merrick had been taken by a group of civilians who matched what Eddie thought a bunch of environmentalist fanatics would look like. You couldn’t discern their gender by judging hair length alone. The stench of patchouli oil barely masked the odor of marijuana that permeated their clothes.

Eddie massaged his jaw where Susan Donleavy had sucker punched him after her friends had woken her. A guard who’d seen the blow walked by his cage at that moment, saw what he was doing, and smirked.

Eddie estimated there were about a hundred armed men in the prison, and now that the adrenaline had been flushed from his body and he’d had time to think through his situation he understood why there were so many. Moses Ndebele was seen by many as a potential savior of his country — the ruling regime would do anything to silence him. If they held him in a prison in Zimbabwe, it would become a rallying point for his followers. But out here nobody knew where to find him. They could hold him indefinitely.

He wondered about Merrick and Ndebele being here at the same time and assumed there was a connection but couldn’t see what it was. Daniel Singer must have made some sort of deal with the government of Zimbabwe to use the old prison or vice versa.

A couple of hours had passed since they’d been discovered. Because Linc hadn’t been brought to the cell block, that meant the former SEAL must have gotten away on one of the bikes. Eddie was relieved. The officer in charge of the garrison had announced that the Corporation team would be executed at dawn. There was no sense in Linc sacrificing himself needlessly if he had a chance to escape.

But with the chairman stuck out in the desert, Lincoln on his own except for Tiny Gunderson and Doc Huxley, and the Oregon more than two hundred miles away, Eddie conceded the chance of rescue was slim. They would need a fleet of helicopters to pull off an aerial assault and the only vehicle currently aboard ship was Linc’s Harley, so crossing the desert was out.