Edge of Defiance Read online

  She settled in and began to make out the conversation.

  “We have him guarded well. Why are we doing all these extra patrols?” one asked.

  “Because Pak shi is worried the Americans will try to rescue him. You know this. Are you questioning his decision?”

  “No. Of course not.” Their feet crunched the dried leaves close by. “I was just curious. No need to report my question.”

  “Make sure you don’t say anything disloyal again. If it was anyone else, they’d report you and then you’d be a prisoner here.”

  Their voices drifted away with their steps. She carefully climbed down the tree. Once on the ground, she breathed deeply, trying to still the driving sense of panic that pricked at her. She forced herself to move slow and steady, always scanning for movement. It wouldn’t do to get caught now. She made it back to her cave without spotting any other patrols.

  Inside, she sat on her sleeping bag and dug into her daypack to grab the sat phone. The pictures on her camera were on a memory stick. She only wanted to send the one picture right now. The one of Dr. French.

  She put in Derrick’s number and ignored the fact that she’d memorized it from his company’s website. So what if she’d Googled him after Rose had? She needed to know as much about him as she could, but only because Rose might one day want to talk to him.

  She waited for the call to go through. Derrick was the best person she knew to give the information to. His super-secret team would do something, or at least he’d know who to tell. She waited and hoped. The call didn’t connect. Was that number on his site fake?

  “Shit.” She tried again and again. It didn’t connect. “Shit. Shit. Shit.”

  If she couldn’t get through to him, then she’d have to find a different way. One that she’d been hoping to avoid.

  She dialed her home number. Her daughter answered, her voice actually making Cassie ache inside.

  “Hi, Rose.”

  “Mom? Are you okay? Are you safe? I’ve been so worried.”

  “Sweetie, I don’t have much time to talk. I’m sending a picture and coordinates to you and I need your grandmother to give it to someone for me.”

  “Who?”

  Crap. Of course Rose would ask that. She drew a deep breath. “Your father.”

  “Why? I thought he was just a security dufus.”

  “No,” she said. “I think he’s still in the military. If nothing else, he’s got connections. He’ll know what to do with the picture.”

  “Fine. Send it to me. And Mom? I love Gran, but she won’t be able to get this done for you.”

  Cassie hated involving her daughter. But at least she was safe in Canada. All she had to do was get the picture to Derrick.

  “You can email it to him,” she said. “You don’t have to go to him.”

  “I know, Mom.” Rose didn’t say anything for a long time. “It’s important for him to see the picture?”

  “More important than you can imagine.”

  “I’ll make sure he gets it.”

  Warmth welled up inside her, filling her and pushing out the fear that had dogged her all day. “Send him the picture as soon as you can. I love you, Rose.”

  “Love you too, Mom. Come home.”

  “Soon, sweetie. Soon.”

  They hung up and Cassie sent her daughter the picture of the scientist and the coordinates of Hwasong.

  Derrick sat at his desk with a pile of intel reports he had to review. His phone rang. “Blackwell,” he answered.

  “Mr. Blackwell, you have a visitor at the front desk,” Ms. Waters said. The other Edge operators called her the Dragonlady because she guarded the door to their inner sanctum and she guarded it as fierce as if she had claws and fangs.

  “I’m not expecting anyone,” he said.

  “You’ll want to see her, sir.”

  “And why is that?”

  “Because she says she’s your daughter.”

  Daughter?

  Derrick stood frozen for a moment, unable to process the word the receptionist had used.

  “Excuse me?” he said. “Did you say—”

  “Daughter,” she said. “I did. She’s a teenager. You’ll want to come now. She dropped off a package and is getting ready to leave.”

  Alarm shot through him. “Keep her there.” He ended the call.

  Daughter? What the actual fuck? He didn’t have a daughter.

  He strode to the lobby. What was this package? Had Edge been compromised? Was someone sending a kid to deliver a bomb? He didn’t have a kid. He sure as hell didn’t have a teenager.

  He flung open the door to the lobby. Ms. Waters sat at her desk, her eyebrows raised. She nodded toward the elevator.

  A young girl with long dark curls stood there with her back to him. She pushed the elevator button again and again.

  He walked up to her, crossed his arms and put on his game face. Yes, he planned to intimidate a young girl in order to get a quick confession about what the fuck was going on. If he had to be an ass to get to the bottom of this, he would. “In a hurry to leave?”

  She glanced over her shoulder and her eyes widened before she turned back to the elevator. “My grandma’s waiting.” She jammed the button again.

  “She’ll have to wait a bit longer. Who are you?”

  She turned to him and the contempt in her face caught him off guard. It wasn’t the typical teenage contempt that society dictated teens wear around adults. This was personal. This girl, whoever she was, was pissed. At him.

  But that wasn’t what made him pause. She looked…familiar.

  “You can’t keep me here,” she said with a hard edge in her voice, an edge that only barely covered her fear. Anger and fear. Of him. What the fuck?

  He took a step back and raised his hands, no longer wanting to play the bad guy with this girl. “Just tell me who you are and why you have a package for me?”

  “My mom asked me to bring it ASAP.”

  “And why didn’t your mom bring it herself?”

  The girl’s gaze darted beyond him, finding the security camera in the ceiling near the receptionist’s desk, before she looked back at him. She licked her lips. “She’s out of the country at the moment.”

  He frowned and the girl reached behind her to press the elevator button again. Ms. Waters had already sealed off the floor so the elevator wouldn’t come until she’d released it. The girl didn’t suspect it yet or her panic levels would be higher. He took another step back and tried to smooth away his frown.

  “Before the elevator comes, why don’t you tell me what was so important that your mother sent you here?” A thought came to him. “She does know you’re here, doesn’t she?” He didn’t need the police being called on him because a mother was worried about her wayward daughter.

  “Of course she knows.” Her gaze darted around again and he frowned. What was the girl hiding? “She wanted me to give you the package.”

  “Did she ask you to hand deliver it?”

  The girl hesitated. Gotcha. So the mom didn’t know the girl was here. “What is it?”

  “Just a photo and coordinates that my mom sent me. She said they’d mean something to you.”

  He walked back to Ms. Waters, who handed him the plain brown envelope. He brought it back to the girl, who now stared at the elevator suspiciously and then at him. Smart girl.

  He opened the envelope while watching her reaction. She crossed her arms and sighed, realizing she had to wait and showing him she was put out. That he could handle. But she wasn’t nervous about him opening the envelope, which was a good sign. It meant the envelope didn’t hold anything dangerous or she’d be desperate to get away.

  He slid out an eight-by-ten picture of a blond man in a dirty white shirt and khakis. He stood about a head taller than the Asian soldiers, North Koreans by their uniforms, surrounding him. The man had been caught just as he was turning from the camera, but he could still see most of his face.

  It was Dr. French,
the aerospace engineer who’d gone missing. On the back of the picture was a set of coordinates.

  “When was this taken?” he bit out.

  “Yesterday.”

  “Ms. Waters, call in Bravo team.” He looked at the girl. “You’d better tell me your name now.”

  “Rose Kwon.”

  His heart stopped. Cassandra’s daughter.

  Rose. That had been his grandmother’s name. It was also the name of his uncle’s pub, the one where he and Cassie had met. No. Cassandra wouldn’t name her something so sentimental. The girl wasn’t his. He’d seen her father years ago. The memory of that day was a wound that still hadn’t healed. He’d seen Cassie welcome a little girl and a man—her husband, he’d found out later—into her house. The little girl had called the man, Daddy.

  “Where’s your father?”

  The girl flinched from his harsh question. Then she straightened and lifted her chin. Oh, he could see Cassie in her.

  “You’re my father.”

  His world stopped for a heartbeat. Two. Three. He shook his head. “I saw your father when you were little. And I’m definitely not him.”

  “Then why would my mother tell me you were? Why did she say my father died a hero when I was little? And then it turns out you were alive all this time.”

  Her voice echoed his for harshness and the light in her almost black eyes had him reconsidering. Could she…?

  He shook his head again. He didn’t have time for this game. He had a scientist to rescue. Why would Cassie send this girl here? Why… He sucked in a breath. “Where is your mother?”

  Rose didn’t cower from him. “Apparently I didn’t get my brains from you.”

  His throat closed up and he couldn’t get air—to speak, to demand explanations, to breathe. What the actual fuck? Cassie was in North Korea?

  “Yes,” Rose said calmly.

  Apparently he’d shouted his words.

  “Sir?” Ms. Waters said from the desk, asking with one word whether he needed help.

  Fuck yes, he needed help. He not only had a scientist to rescue but a stubborn, rogue reporter and on top of it all, he might have a daughter who was looking at him as if he were sludge she needed scraped off her shoe.

  He sucked in air. “Call your grandmother and ask her to come up. I’d like to speak with both of you.” He turned to Ms. Waters and handed her the picture. “Call in Charlie team as well. Get this to Koven. Tell him…”

  “That you have a family matter to attend to?” Her disapproving gaze seared him.

  He didn’t have a family! Or did he?

  It didn’t matter. “Tell him I’ll be there shortly.”

  He turned to the girl, who finished a text and then slid her phone into her jacket pocket. “My grandmother will wait outside. If I don’t come out in thirty minutes, she’s calling the police.”

  He clenched his jaw to stop himself from cursing. The girl’s glittering eyes and attitude screamed defiance.

  He studied her a moment. She had Cassie’s wild curls and chin. But those eyes…

  “How old are you?” he asked softly.

  “Thirteen.”

  He did some mental calculations and swallowed hard. Unless Cassie had been fooling around on him, and he knew that wasn’t the case, then this girl was his daughter.

  Damn Cassie for not telling him.

  “We need to talk. How about…” What did kids drink? “How about a hot chocolate?” Surely Ms. Waters could dig that up.

  Her eyes rolled so far back into her head he thought they were going to stay there. “I’m not a child.”

  O-kay. “How about a coffee?”

  Her narrowed gaze surveyed him and then Ms. Waters. She nodded. “But we sit out here.”

  As long as they talked. “Fine.”

  Moments later, he brought a hot mug to her and sat on the couch. She’d taken the armchair.

  “I added cream and brought sugar if you want,” he said. She didn’t move to take the sugar packets, instead just nodded thanks for the coffee. Creamy but not sweet. It was how he liked it. He drank his coffee black when he needed to, but if he didn’t, he saw no reason not to indulge when he wasn’t on an op. Seeing the girl…Rose… Seeing Rose like her coffee the same way did something to him. In what other ways was she like him?

  He’d never thought he’d have kids—

  “Twenty-five minutes left,” she said.

  He almost smiled, liking her directness, but he suspected she’d take the smile the wrong way. Time to be direct back. “Tell me what you can about your mother’s assignment.”

  8

  Cassie jerked awake. Sweat drenched her back and she panted. Another damn nightmare. She sat up in the dim cave and checked her watch.

  One in the afternoon.

  She’d waited in this cave all last night and all day today. Her night had been plagued by nightmares of either being captured or missing her ride with her guide. She couldn’t afford to do that. So today she’d dozed on and off, only going outside when she had to pee. Her alarm was set for two. If she set off at two thirty, she’d have plenty of time to make it to the meeting place before sunset even if she ran into patrols. No patrols had come this far from the compound but it was better safe than sorry.

  She rolled up her sleeping bag and packed it into her pack, along with the rest of her supplies. She eyed the gear a moment before deciding to leave it. All of it was expendable. She took only the small daypack with the hydration camel, a couple of energy bars, the sat phone, and her camera. Without the extra gear, she’d be able to get up a tree a lot faster if a patrol did come by.

  She didn’t need to leave yet, but she didn’t think she could sit in this cave any longer.

  At the entrance, she scanned the woods. Nothing moved. She ran for them.

  Time to go home.

  By five thirty, impatience ate at her. She sat in a tree near the meeting site, knowing she couldn’t wait on the road, but oh, she wanted to. She just wanted out of here. Her back itched with the need to leave. She wouldn’t feel safe until she’d made it across the border.

  Only hours now.

  She passed the time thinking about a shower and real food. A cold wind spoke of coming winter and she shivered in her jacket. It would be a long and hot shower.

  Darkness was only beginning to settle when a truck approached and slowed down. It parked and idled on the side of the road. She couldn’t make out the driver, but who else would stop here?

  She climbed down the tree and made her way closer to the road. The sounds of the forest died the closer she got. Her skin tightened and her heart rate started to beat faster, like a slow building wave. She stopped and scanned the area, feeling like a deer being stalked and unable to tell where the hunter was.

  Was this her imagination? Had she been on edge too long? Or was there something out there? What if she missed her guide because she was too scared to leave the woods?

  She bit her lip and slowly removed her daypack, leaving it in the vee of a tree by a fallen log. If all was well, then she’d run back and snag it.

  If this wasn’t her guide…well, it’d be best not to have pictures of the prison and a sat phone on her. She didn’t want to be mistaken for a spy.

  She crept out of the woods, looking for anything suspicious. The man in the truck stared straight ahead. She moved farther from the trees. The man shifted slightly and the last of the dying light struck his profile. It was Kyung.

  She breathed out long and slow and steady. Her muscles loosened as she straightened from her unconscious crouch. She waved to get his attention, wanting to let him know she was there before he took off on her.

  He turned to her and she saw the other side of his face. His eye was swollen shut and dried blood etched down his cheek. His gaze was that of a drowning man, desperate and willing to do anything to live.

  She froze.

  “Don’t move, spy,” a deep voice shouted in Korean from her left. “You are surrounded.”

&n
bsp; A dozen soldiers came out of the woods on both sides of the road, their rifles pointed at her.

  No! No! No!

  She held up her hands, not daring to step back. “I’m not a spy,” she shouted back in Korean, trying to mimic Kyung’s accent. “I’m just lost. My…my car broke down and I’ve been searching for a ride.”

  The man who’d spoken, the only one without a weapon, pointed at her. She took that to mean he was in charge. He was also the only one smiling.

  “You are an American spy and you will be dealt with accordingly.”

  Panic seared her insides. She gasped. “No. Please. I’m not a spy.”

  “Search her.”

  Two soldiers appeared beside her. One held her arms while the other ran his hands over her limbs, chest, and back. He even tugged them through her hair, jerking her head with his roughness. She didn’t even consider struggling. There were too many of them.

  She was caught.

  Oh my God. Her blood seemed to drain to her feet and she shivered uncontrollably. What was going to happen to her? She started to pant. How was she going to get out of this?

  She was caught.

  She’d known she would be on her own if she came seeking the truth, but to face the reality of it made her brain short-circuit in terror. Her gaze darted around, seeing only soldiers, rifles, and smug smiles. What would happen to Rose?

  She was caught.

  Cassie shifted on her toes, trying to relieve the burning ache in her shoulders. They’d bound her arms behind her and attached them to a chain from the ceiling, raising it and her arms, until she had to stand on her tiptoes to relieve the pressure.

  She was alone in a simple room with a table and two chairs off to one side. Various brown stains splattered the cement floor. The metal door had a small opening at eye level. She couldn’t see anything in the hall beyond. She suspected they’d brought her to the same concrete building they’d taken the scientist to. She’d been hooded within moments of capture. Every now and then, a moan or scream echoed down the hall.

  It took everything in her not to cry. Crying wouldn’t help. She had to stay calm, to think. She’d missed her check-in with her family. They would be reporting her missing to the news station and maybe the government. Surely, the Canadian government would act fast and do something. Wouldn’t they?