The Kill Switch

Their quarry must have stopped.

Tucker pulled out his phone, checked the map screen.

Two hundred yards away, a narrow canal cut through the forest, a part of the dockyard’s old layout when it had belonged to the Russian Navy. His quarry was former naval infantry, smart enough to have pla

But was that the plan?

According to the map, there was also a major road on the far side of the canal.

What if the man had a vehicle waiting?

Decide, Tucker.

Would his quarry flee by land or sea?

He let out a soft tsst, and Kane turned to look at him. Tucker held up a closed fist, then forked fingers: Track.

Kane took off straight south.

Tucker headed southeast, hedging his bet, ready to cut the man off if necessary.

As he ran, he kept half an eye on Kane’s position using the GPS feed. His partner reached the canal and stopped. The blip held steady for a few seconds—then began moving again, paralleling the canal and rapidly picking up speed.

It could only mean one thing.

Their quarry had boarded a boat.

Tucker took off in a sprint, darting and ducking through the last of the trees. He burst out of the forest and into an open field. Ahead, a tall levy hid the canal’s waterway. To his right came the grumble of a marine engine. He ran toward the noise as Kane came racing hard along the top of the levy.

Tucker knew he couldn’t hope to match the dog’s speed. According to the map, the canal was narrow, no more than fifteen feet.

Doable, Tucker thought.

He shouted, “TAKE DOWN . . . DISARM!”

The shepherd dropped his head lower, put on a burst of speed, then leaped from the levy and vanished beyond the berm.

Kane flies high, thrilled by the rush of air over his fur. Here is what he lived for, as ingrained in his nature as the beat of his heart.

To hunt and take down prey.

His front paws strike the wood of the deck, but he is already moving, shifting his hind end, to bring his back legs into perfect position. He bounds off the boards and toward the cabin of the boat.

His senses swell, filling in details.

The reek of burnt oil . . .

The resin of the polished wood . . .

The trail of salt and fear that lead to that open door of the cabin . . .

He follows that scent, dragged along by both command and nature.

He bolts through the door, sees the man swing toward him, his skin bursting with terror, his breath gasping out in surprise.

An arm lifts, not in reflexive defense, but bringing up a gun.

Kane knows guns.

The blast deafens as he lunges.

10:33 A.M.

The gunshot echoed over the water as Tucker reached the top of the levy. His heart clenched in concern. Fifty yards down the waterway, a center-cabin dredge boat tilted crookedly in the canal, nosing toward the bank.

Tucker ran, fear firing his limbs. As he reached the foundering boat, he coiled his legs and vaulted high, flying. He hit the boat’s afterdeck hard and slammed into the gunwale. Pain burst behind his eyes. Rolling sideways, he got to his knees and brought the Makarov up.

Through the open cabin door, he saw a man sprawled on his back, his left arm flailing, his legs kicking. His right forearm was clamped between Kane’s jaws. The shepherd’s muscled bulk was rag-dolling the man from side to side.

The Russian screamed in his native tongue. Tucker’s grasp of the language was rudimentary, but the man’s tone said it all.

Get him off me! Please!

With his gun trained on the man’s chest, Tucker stepped through the cabin door. Calmly he said, “RELEASE.”

Kane instantly let go of the man’s arm and stepped back, his lips still curled in a half snarl.

The Russian clutched his shattered arm to his chest, his eyes wide and damp with pain. Judging by where Kane had clamped on to the man’s forearm, the ulna was likely broken and possibly the radius as well.

Tucker felt no pity.

The asshole had almost shot his partner.

A few feet away lay a revolver, still smoking in the cold.

Tucker stepped forward and looked down at the man. “Do you speak English?”

“English . . . yes, I speak some English.”

“You’re under arrest.”

“What? I don’t—”

Tucker drew back his right foot and heel-kicked the man squarely in the forehead, knocking him unconscious.

“More or less,” he added.

2

March 4, 12:44 P.M.

Vladivostok, Russia

“You owe me a new windshield,” Bogdan Fedoseev boomed, handing Tucker a shot glass of ice-cold vodka.

He accepted it but placed the glass on the end table next to the couch. He was not fond of vodka, and, more important, he didn’t trust his hands right now. The aftermath of the shoot-out at the shipyard had left Tucker pumping with adrenaline, neither an unfamiliar nor unpleasant rush for him. Even so, he wondered how much of that rush was exhilaration and how much was PTSD—a clinical acronym for what used to be called shell shock or battle fatigue, a condition all too common for many Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.

Compared to most, Tucker’s case was mild, but it was a constant in his life. Though he managed it well, he could still feel it lurking there, like a monster probing for a chink in his mental armor. Tucker found the metaphor strangely reassuring. Vigilance was something he did well. Still, the Buddhist in him whispered in his ear to relax his guard.

Let go of it.

What you cling to only gets stronger.

What you think, you become.

Tucker couldn’t quite nail down when and where he’d adopted this philosophy. It had snuck up on him. He’d had a few teachers—one in particular—but he suspected he’d picked up his worldview from his wanderings with Kane. Having encountered people of almost every stripe, Tucker had learned to take folks as they came, without the baggage of preconceptions. People were more alike than different. Everyone was just trying to find a way to be happy, to feel fulfilled. The ma

Enough, Tucker commanded himself. Contemplation was fine, but he’d long ago decided it was a lot like tequila—best taken only in small doses.

At his feet, Kane sat at ease, but his eyes remained bright and watchful. The shepherd missed nothing: posture, hand and eye movements, respiration rate, perspiration. All of it painted a clear picture for his partner. Unsurprisingly, Kane had picked up on the anxiety in the air.

Tucker felt it, too.

One of the reasons he had been paired with Kane was his unusually high empathy scores. Military war dog handlers had a saying—It runs down the lead—describing how emotions of the pair became shared over time, binding them together. The same skill allowed Kane to read people, to pick up nuances of body language and expression that others might miss.

Like now, with the tension in the room.

“And the side mirror of the limo,” Fedoseev added with a strained grin. “You destroyed both windshield and mirror. Very costly. And worst of all, you could have killed Pytor, my driver.”

Tucker refused to back down, knowing it would be a sign of weakness. “At that distance and angle, the rifle I used didn’t have enough foot-pounds to penetrate the limo’s ballistic glass. Maybe if I was standing on the hood of the car, Pytor might have had something to worry about.”

Stymied, Fedoseev frowned. “Still, very expensive things to fix on limousine, yes?”

“You can take it out of my bonus,” Tucker replied.