Code Name: Bikini

CHAPTER ONE

Northern Afghanistan

Winter

DARKNESS.

Wind and death.

Trace O’Halloran didn’t move. Cold dug under his Kevlar vest as he watched the rugged road below him.

Something moved over the snow-dusted ground near his feet. Another rat.

Red eyes glowed in the faint green light of his night-vision goggles. Only rats could survive in this godforsaken mountain pass in winter.

It was Christmas Eve. Back in the States, families sang hymns and parents assembled dollhouses to surprise wide-eyed children while snow fell in the soft hush.

But here on a rugged plateau in Afghanistan, the cold was merciless and wind cut with icy fingers. Frostbite was unavoidable if he didn’t find shelter soon. But the mission came first.

Trace leveled his gaze on the road three hundred feet below his hiding spot. He didn’t think about the fresh wounds across his left wrist or the blood that darkened his forearm, courtesy of a difficult high altitude, low opening—HALO—jump.

Abruptly he felt movements in the night. Leaning forward, he read a change in energy patterns. A three-truck convoy crawled through the darkness. Their Korean-made trucks were guarded by soldiers wielding Soviet RPG-7 shoulder-launched missiles.

An equal-opportunity war, he thought grimly.

And this was his target. The convoy carried covert German communication technology extorted from a weapons designer based in Singapore. Not surprisingly, the man had disappeared before he could reveal his blackmailer. In the hands of a trained technician, the new device could track a massive quantity of U.S. communications. Through the application of mathematical predictive models, government assets could be located and areas of vulnerability tapped within minutes. In enemy hands the system could inflict catastrophic damage, and Trace’s job was to see that the hardware never reached its destination.

Truck lights carved the darkness. The convoy stopped with a screech of brakes. Agitated voices cut through the cold, still air.

The men in the Korean trucks were ruthless and well trained. They would shoot anything suspicious on their trek to an isolated mountain stronghold sixty miles to the north. But Trace didn’t intend to be noticed until he was ready. As he glanced at his watch, his skin burned. Frostbite was setting in.

Ignoring his pain, the SEAL fingered a button on the device in his left pocket.

Something moved down on the road. The first truck pulled sideways and two soldiers jumped out. Arguing loudly, they pointed to a paper flapping in the bone-chilling wind.

Right on schedule, Trace thought. Nice to see technology working right for once. His maneuver had lured them exactly where he wanted them.

Dark fur brushed his arm. Ears raised alertly, a black Labrador retriever held his down position behind a rock, awaiting Trace’s next order. The big dog had trained with Trace for months to prepare for this mission, and Trace sensed the dog’s eagerness to go to work.

Not yet, Duke.

His hand settled on the dog’s head. The Lab watched every movement, waiting for the next touch command.

As the wind keened over the rocky slope, Santa Fe and Christmas cheer were a universe away. Trace couldn’t even remember his last Christmas at home. His last two leaves had been cut short because of security alerts. As part of a top-secret government team, code-named Foxfire, Trace trained hard and kept personal attachments next to nil. That was the price of admission for special operations work, but the conditions had never bothered Trace, not when the stakes were so high.

Other people might call him a patriot. But for Trace the job boiled down to very personal terms—protecting family, friends and a way of life from enemies without honor or scruples. If doing his job meant taking a bullet, he was more than ready to pay that price with his own blood.

A silent alarm vibrated at his wrist.

Showtime.

Silently, he pulled a small box from his Kevlar vest. The dog sniffed, then gripped the box’s metal handle between his teeth. When Trace touched the Lab’s collar in a pre-arranged command, weeks of training kicked in. Duke skirted the rocks, turned and then headed for the road below.

Be safe, Trace thought. Stay low and move fast. He didn’t have to project the commands. Duke would do exactly as trained.

Trace leveled his scoped assault rifle and measured his target. A third hostile soldier jumped down, shouting at his teammates. Trace took out the nearest truck’s tires and front windshield with a four-second burst.

The insurgents scattered. Gunfire hammered the air above Trace’s head. His next volley drilled the middle truck’s gas tank. Under the explosive flare of an orangered fireball, he jumped a boulder and dropped into a narrow wash that snaked toward the road.

Hidden by walls of sand, he followed the curve of the wash, a shadow swallowed by the greater darkness of the night. One short tap on a small transmitter alerted his backup team that the encounter had begun. Now he had only minutes to complete his objective and head for the extraction point.

He sprinted to the bottom of the wash and found the big package exactly where he’d left it a day earlier, buried beneath a foot of sand. In seconds Trace had opened the canvas to reveal a blood-spattered body dead for barely ten hours. He rechecked the uniform pockets, then hefted the dead weight over his shoulders.

Hidden by the mayhem of the explosion, he carried the body closer to the road, placed it in the sand and then raced along a second trail barely visible in the light from the burning truck.

It was time to draw fire and alert the convoy to the body. If all went as planned, the insurgents would find the communications gear and codes planted on the body and begin using them. Everything they picked up from U.S. sources would be carefully constructed disinformation.

Trace wasn’t crazy about using human remains for a mission, but their local allies had provided unidentifiable bodies of insurgents killed in a violent skirmish earlier that day. Now they were dressed and outfitted as American soldiers.

Automatic weapons fire punched the air to his left, and a tracer round whined over his head. For every round he could see, Trace knew there were three others invisible in the darkness. The SEAL followed the rocky slope away from his service dog, who bounded toward a nearby overhang. Once Trace was certain the body had been discovered, he turned into the open and made a clumsy run toward the highest ridge, his movements calculated to draw maximum fire.

The maneuver worked. Down the hill, dark shapes raced toward him, rifles level.

Kevlar was good, but it wouldn’t stand up to repeated bursts from an AK-47. That’s where the ceramic plates in his vest took over. But a glancing blow hit him with deadly force and knocked him off his feet.

Calculating the speed of his pursuers, he primed a grenade and lobbed it over his shoulder. Rocks shot up, clawing at his back and neck while gunfire burned near his face and tore through his glove. His excited pursuers clustered at the top of the slope below, shouting in delight when they saw Trace fall.

A second burst of fire drilled up his arm, but he didn’t move, feigning a fatal wound.

His heart pounded.

Sweat streaked his face.

Footsteps raced behind him. He calculated strike force, distance and probable accuracy as the wind howled over the rocks, and then his fingers closed around another grenade. He yanked the pin and lobbed the deadly metal sphere hard, generating a wall of noise that masked more enemy fire.

The blast was deafening. Sand flew into his eyes and mouth. Another round tore through his right deltoid.

Trace’s vision blurred. More shrapnel from enemy fire tore into his chest and neck. He stumbled and then plunged forward, the wind in his face as he hit the cold sand. A chopper crested the mountain, the whine from its engines blessedly familiar.

Another explosion ripped through the night, and the lead truck vanished in a red fireball.

The big Lab had accomplished his mission, planting his C-4 charge under the last truck while the insurgents were distracted by Trace’s clumsy run.

Nice job, Duke.

Pain raked Trace’s chest. He stumbled as blood gushed thickly over his Kevlar vest, every muscle stiff, every movement strained. Over his head the mountains seemed to darken, blurred between cold wind and night sky.

And then he died.

CHAPTER TWO

SOMETHING WAS wrong.

The air was too clean, too calm. There was no acrid smell of cordite and no rumble of distant artillery.

White curtains danced slowly in a warm wind. The smells of bleach and floor wax filled his damaged lungs.

Wounded. Hospital?

Nice to see you’re finally awake. The voice was vaguely familiar. You look pretty good for a dead guy.

Trace cracked open one eye. Even that small movement hurt.

Hell, everything hurt, but he couldn’t remember why.

Very funny. Trace managed to lift his head. You look like shit, Houston. He smiled slightly. Maybe life with my sister doesn’t agree with you.

Kit, hell. I wish I’d been home with her. Instead I flew overnight from Singapore to get here.

Trace tried to sit up and grimaced. "Where’s here?"

His superior officer, Wolfe Houston, stared at him thoughtfully. Military hospital. Germany. You’re in ICU, pal. Ryker has been spitting bullets waiting for you to come around.

Ryker. The head of his top-secret government operations team. That much Trace remembered.

He didn’t move. His throat felt raw, as if he’d swallowed a convoy’s worth of gasoline fumes, which he probably had. Slowly the fragments began to return. He’d used all his grenades, and then he’d stumbled across the ridge in clear sight, drawing fire to the location of a second, cached body left where they were meant to be found. More false codes were planted on that second body.

As AK-47 bursts followed a blast from a shoulder-launched missile, Trace had gone down, knocked out cold. Duke had to have jumped the rocks, dragging him to safety while the helicopter drew fire. A second chopper would have shot in low to pick up Trace and Duke.

Otherwise the SEAL wouldn’t be here in one piece.

As the rest of his memories returned, his head began to pound. When he sat up, his left arm felt too heavy. How’s Duke?

Your dog is A-Okay. He just ate two steaks and ran a mile before breakfast. I wish I could say the same for you. Houston’s expression sobered. You were in cardiac arrest, completely flatlined when our people got you aboard. It took almost two minutes to revive you. Duke didn’t leave your side once.

Trace managed a lopsided grin. Duke did good. He saved my butt after that last volley. I remember he dragged me to the extraction point, not much after that. But…something’s different.

You were dead, O’Halloran. Of course you don’t remember much.

No, something else was wrong. Trace shook his head. My reflexes are off. I can’t pick up any energy trails. Everything is quiet.

Your chips are all disabled. Precautionary measure, according to Ryker. He told the medical team to close down all your Foxfire technology until you’re fully recovered.

Trace stared at the ceiling, trying to get used to the deafening silence inside his head. I like knowing who’s behind me without having to look around. When will I be reactivated for duty?

Get well first.

In war, soldiers fought with all kinds of ammunition. Recently the array of weapons had changed drastically. As part of the Foxfire team, the two men used focused energy as a tactical weapon. Thanks to mental training, physical conditioning and selective chips developed in a secret facility in New Mexico, their seven-member team had changed the definition of military combat.

Only a few people knew that the success rate of the covert Foxfire team was unmatched anywhere in special operations. Trace excelled at psi sweeps, spreading energy nets and reading changes made by anything alive in the area. The more difficult the terrain, the better.

Usually, he could have communicated telepathically with his commanding officer. Now there was only silence. Trace was stunned by the difference. With his extra senses closed down, he was locked within the narrow space of his body. The experience made him realize how much he had taken his Foxfire gifts for granted. Now he was flying blind, moving through a world that felt like perpetual twilight.

But chips took a toll on the nervous system, and even good implants could malfunction. Better that his hardware be disabled until his body recovered from the beating it had taken in Afghanistan.

As a test, Trace tried to set an energy net around the small room. Usually he would have succeeded in seconds.

But now nothing happened.

Wolfe Houston watched him intently. Tried an energy net, didn’t you?

Trace shrugged.

You okay with this?

No way. Trace felt out of balance and irritated, and he chose his words carefully. I’m used to my skill set. Being without any energy sensation is damned unnerving. How do people live like this?

I’m told they manage pretty well, Wolfe said dryly.

Trace shifted restlessly. How bad was I hit?

Let’s just say you won’t make Wimbledon this year.

Hate tennis. Stupid ball. Stupid shorts. Trace hid a grimace as pain knifed down into his shoulder. "Now how about you cut the crap? How bad, Houston? When do I get back on my feet, and when will my chips be reactivated?"

Silence.

He stared at Wolfe Houston’s impassive face. No point in trying to read any answers there.

You’re here for a patch job, which you’ve received. Air evac will transport you to a specialized hospital stateside within the hour. If you do everything right, you’ll be back in action inside six weeks.

Trace made a silent vow to halve that prediction. What about the bodies? Did they take the bait?

Swallowed it whole. They’re already using the communications unit you secured inside the uniform. That hardware will generate permanent system deviation in the parent programs. Hello, major static.

Trace smiled slowly. Goodbye, security problems.

Ryker is thrilled. You’ve earned yourself some solid R&R. So what will it be, Vegas or San Diego?

Forget the R&R. Get a rehab doc in here. I need to start building up my arm. Trace tried to sit up, but instantly something tore deep in his shoulder. He closed his eyes, nearly blacking out from the pain.

A shrill whine filled the room—or was it just in his head?

Idiot. What happened?

I’m just—just a little dizzy, sir. Trace blinked hard at the ceiling. Pale green swirled into bright orange. Did they paint hospital ceilings orange?

…you hear me?

The orange darkened, forming bars of crimson.

Trace…hear me now?

The room was spinning. Trace had felt the same sensation back in Afghanistan before Duke had roused him, licking his face furiously.

His vision blurred. He tried to stand up, biting back a curse as the whine grew. Chip malfunction? Can’t be. They’re all disabled.

Have to stand up. Have to find out what’s wrong.

The room spun faster. Trace didn’t see a medical team crowd around the bed, equipment in hand.

He was back in Afghanistan, fighting brutal cold and a hail of tracer rounds.

DOES HE KNOW?

Not yet.

Two men stood at the end of the deserted hospital corridor, their faces grim. In front of them a fresh X-ray was clipped to a light box.

Trace’s surgeon frowned. He’s still groggy from the last surgery. The tall Johns Hopkins grad tapped the black-and-white image. Torn ligaments. Bone fragments—here, here, here. We cleaned up everything we found. After rehab he should recover full use of his elbow and wrist, which is a near miracle. You saw him on arrival. I’ve seen a lot of trauma cases, but nothing like that. What did you people do, shoot him out of a tank? He didn’t wait for an answer, rubbing his neck worriedly. If he’d lost much more blood, he wouldn’t have made it out of surgery.

The other man took a slow breath. His dark, sculpted features bore a resemblance to Denzel Washington’s, except his eyes were colder, making him look older than his age. Tell me about his shoulder, Doctor. I don’t like the bone damage here…. Ishmael Teague traced the gray lines radiating across the X-ray. Will he regain full mobility in his right shoulder?

We don’t read crystal balls, Teague. With your medical training, you know how risky predictions can be. All I can say is that this man was in excellent shape before this happened, and we’ll give him the best support for his recovery. The rest is up to him—and to far higher powers than mine.

Izzy Teague didn’t move, studying the network of lines spidering through the X-ray. I want hourly updates on his condition and round-the-clock monitoring by your best people. Notify me at any sign of change.

All things considered, he’s recovering well. Give me a week, and he’ll be starting phase one rehab.

Something crossed Izzy’s face. You’ve got twenty-four hours, Doctor.

"That’s impossible. This man needs rest, close observation and at least two more surgeries. Maybe after that…"

You have twenty-four hours. Izzy’s voice was cold with command. I have a plane inbound. We’ll prep him for travel.

You won’t find a better medical facility anywhere in the country. The surgeon scowled. Don’t play politics with me, Teague. He could end up with a ruined joint if you move him now.

Not now. Twenty-four hours, Doctor. Izzy pulled the X-ray down from the light box. Orders are orders. His voice was flat.

You know this is wrong. Fight it. Pull rank.

Izzy looked at the closed door down the hall. My clout doesn’t stretch as far as you think. There are other…factors.

The surgeon glanced at the unnumbered door, which was guarded by uniformed soldiers. The rest of the hospital floor had been emptied. Only this one room was occupied. I knew something was up when you moved all my patients, but I won’t play along. By all rights this man should be dead, considering how much blood he lost. In spite of that he’s recuperating in minutes, rather than hours. I don’t suppose you’re going to explain how that’s possible.

Both men knew it was a rhetorical question.

The surgeon made a sharp, irritated gesture. You won’t let me in on your secrets, and you want me to risk a patient because of a whim.

Teague’s handsome features were unreadable. Orders, Doctor. Not whims. We’ll be sure he’s stable before he’s moved. At that point he’ll be out of your hands. He rolled up the film and slid it carefully inside his briefcase. And for the record, John Smith was never here. You never saw him, Doctor. You didn’t see me, either.

Is that an order?

Damned right it is.

The grizzled military surgeon pulled a cigar from the pocket of his white coat and sniffed it lovingly. Had to give the damned things up last year. I’ve got a desk full of these beauties, and this is the closest I can get. Life’s a real bitch sometimes. He stroked the fine Cuban cigar between his fingers and then tucked it carefully back into his pocket. Do what you have to do. I never saw either of you. His voice fell. And just for the record, Vladivostok is the capital of Michigan.

You never know. World politics are turning damned unpredictable these days. Izzy looked down as his pager vibrated. Hold on. He pushed a button and scrolled through a data file, his eyes growing colder by the second.

Is there a problem with John Smith? the doctor asked.

Izzy slid the pager back into its clip. Do you remember Marshall Wyckoff?

Senator Wyckoff’s daughter? Sure, we saw her—what, two years ago? I heard that she’d recovered from her kidnapping. She was an honor student, head of her debate team.

"Was, Doctor. They just found her body floating under the third arch of Arlington Memorial Bridge. Three witnesses say she jumped."

Suicide? The surgeon looked back to the guarded room down the hall. Trace was the one who brought her out. What are you going to tell him?

The truth. It’s what we do.

Tough bunch, aren’t you? Never take the easy way.

Izzy squared his shoulders. Easy doesn’t get the job done.

Neither man noticed the glimmer of light in the quiet corridor outside Trace O’Halloran’s door. When the scent of lavender touched the air, they were halfway down the hall, arguing about bone reinforcement techniques.

Neither guard looked up as a faint, spectral shimmer gathered near the door and then faded into the still air.

TRACE DRIFTED SOMEPLACE cold, halfway between sleep and waking, his pain kept at bay by a careful mix of medicines too new to appear in any medical reference books or on pharmacy shelves.

But his mind kept wandering, and none of his thoughts held. He was back in the frigid night again, waiting for an armed convoy to draw close. Distant gunfire cut through the air, and he felt the energy change even before he saw the first glow of illumination rounds.

Three trucks. Ten men. They had no clue anyone was watching them.

Trace strengthened the net, feeling the sounds and invisible movements in the night, his specially adapted senses humming on full alert.

Time to come out of the shadows.

Move fast. Head low, course uneven.

Present no stable target.

In sleep his body was tense, his breath labored. Eyes closed, he ran up an exposed ridge, drawing enemy fire beneath an orange-red fireball. His legs moved, carrying him into a world drawn straight out of nightmares.

CHAPTER THREE

THEY WERE coming.

Gina Ryan heard tense voices echo in the hall. She scanned the big wall clock above her commercial double oven. Twenty minutes early?

Unbelievable.

She took a deep breath and rubbed the ache at her forehead, checking her last row of desserts. What was the point of having a schedule if you ignored it? Didn’t people realize that a wedding reception with formal seating required split-second timing and no distractions?

Silver trays laid with white linen napkins?

Done.

Spun-sugar flowers arranged at each seat?

Done.

Mini rum cheesecakes plated?

Ditto.

Three-tier chocolate ganache wedding cake decorated with edible flowers?

Perfect.

Gina straightened the marzipan figures of two Olympic speed skaters, which the bride and groom happened to be. Through a porthole she saw clouds skirt a gleaming row of waves. Another glorious day at sea on a top-rated cruise ship, but she’d be too busy to enjoy it.

Laughter spilled into the room. A door opened and the bride appeared, radiant in a chiffon halter gown with vintage lace that clung at her hips and neck. At her side, the groom stood tall in an elegant black tuxedo. A smile stretched over his happy, sunburned face.

This was it, Gina thought. This was love, exactly the way it should be.

Exuberant and gracious. Taking risks. Staying vulnerable. Not jealous and demanding, calculating selfish returns. And didn’t Gina know all there was to know about that kind of love?

She pushed the thought deep, buried with all her other sad memories. A wedding was no time to dredge up the past. Besides, the champagne was chilled, waiting to be poured into Waterford crystal beneath a display of Orange Beauty tulips.

Her staff was flawlessly efficient, the menu a perfect mix of classic and trendy for the young, excited bride and groom.

She felt a knot form at her forehead. This was her second wedding that day. On a big cruise ship, weddings were the top guest request, and Gina was known for creating the best wedding cakes on any cruise line.

The bride and groom held hands, flushing as eighty-five guests offered cheers and catcalls. At her nod, Gina’s skilled staff poured the first chilled champagne and circulated with tempting desserts.

Music filled the room. Slow and soft, the notes tugged at Gina’s heart as she watched the bride and groom exchange lingering kisses.

The dancing began and the regular waitstaff took over. Her team was done.

As she straightened a silver urn of flowers, Gina had a quick impression of wary eyes, short cinnamon hair and a stubborn chin.

Her eyes, her chin. A face too angular for beauty, and eyes whose strength made most men uneasy. Right now pain circled behind her forehead, vicious and swift.

She was getting worse.

The thought filled her with panic. She needed more time.

Hey, Chief, you okay? One of her staff, a slender ex-kindergarten teacher from San Diego, studied her anxiously. You’ve got that look again. It’s like last week when someone smashed your thumb with their heaviest marble rolling pin.

Gina forced a smile. Hey, it’s called resting, enjoying the sight of a job well done. She hid her embarrassment with casual dismissal. Anything wrong with my taking a rest?

"Not a thing. But you never rest. And for someone trying to enjoy her success, you looked too worried."

Gina made a noncommittal sound and cleared the last serving tray. What was the point of dwelling on what you couldn’t change?

Her vision was going. End of story.

It wouldn’t happen in a day or a week. Maybe not even in a year. But the deterioration was noticeably increasing. Despite the newest medicines, her vascular problems were eating away at her vision neuron by neuron, robbing her of the career and future she’d planned with such care.

Put it away.

Shrugging, she headed to the kitchen door. I’m not distracted now, so let’s move. We’ve got another event in four hours.

She took one last look at the bride and groom, who had joined hands to cut the first wedge of her exquisitely iced white chocolate cake with trailing sugar roses. The pair didn’t look back, oblivious to the world as they fell into another slow kiss.

Gina wasn’t really jealous. In a world of bad luck somebody deserved to be happy.

She’d believed in love, dreamed of it, felt certain the right man would appear. When he did, she’d know him instantly.

Nice dream. Stupid dream.

When the man had appeared, she’d chosen wrong. He’d robbed her of many things, the most important among them her innocence and trust. He’d taken her job and her reputation. Now she had no dreams left.

One more line item to cross off your day planner, she thought wryly. No Rose Garden wedding with a formal arch of swords. For some reason she’d seen that vision ever since she was twelve.

She blew out an irritated breath and gathered her equipment. At least she’d made a lot of people happy. With every new event she worked harder, pushing her skills. On the days when her headaches and dizziness were too intense, she’d pull out the bottle of pills hidden inside an empty package of Kona coffee and swallow two.

The pills were working for the moment. But they weren’t a cure. Worse yet, they created side effects.

Without a word her brawny Brazilian sous chef slid the tray from her hands. No one said a word, but Gina