The Kill Switch

He poked his head up and took five seconds to get the lay of the land. Their helicopter had crash-landed against the aft superstructure and on top of the rearmost cargo hold. He turned and stared down the length of open deck between him and the main bridge, studying the ship’s wheelhouse and its two flying bridges.

The first order of business was to reach there, try to take control of the ship.

There was only one problem.

Between him and the bridge stretched two hundred yards of open deck. Aside from the other four raised cargo holds and a handful of davit cranes down the ship’s midline, there was no cover.

Which meant they had two problems.

Somewhere aboard this ship was an expert sniper.

Tucker called toward the helicopter, “Nick . . . Doc!”

“Here!” the men called in near unison from inside the craft.

“Think you can make it over to me?”

“Do we have a choice?” Bukolov yelled back.

It seemed to be a rhetorical question. Both men immediately vacated the broken bird at the same time. Nick helped Bukolov, as the doctor was weighted down by the backpack over his shoulders. They ran low and fast together. Nick pushed Bukolov over the roof’s edge to the deck, then jumped down after him.

They both collapsed next to him.

Nick had brought the first-aid kit with him and passed it over. “Looks like you could use this.”

Tucker quickly fished out a winged pressure bandage. Using the pad, he pressed his ear back in place, then wound the strips around his forehead and knotted it off.

“What’s this I overheard about the ship may be blowing up?” Nick asked as he worked.

“Just a possibility. The good news is that it hasn’t happened yet. The bad news is that there’s a highly trained sniper on board, and unless I miss my guess, she’s probably looking for a decent perch to—”

A bullet zinged off the cargo hold beside Tucker’s head.

They all dropped lower.

And there she is . . .

He rolled to face the others, while keeping his head down. “Nick, you stay put with the doctor.”

“Wait! Do you feel that?” Bukolov asked.

Tucker suddenly did: a deep shuddering in the deck. He knew what that meant.

“The engines are picking up speed,” he said. “And we’re turning.”

Tucker had spent the last two days studying a map of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. In his mind’s eye, he overlapped the Macoma’s approximate position, picturing the ship slowly swinging to port. He suddenly knew why the ship was turning.

He yanked out his satellite phone and dialed Harper, who picked up immediately. “She’s here!” he said. “On the Macoma. And she knows she’s been exposed and knows the ship will never make Chicago now that the alarm has been raised. So she’s gone to Plan B and is heading straight for land, to try to run this ship into the ground.”

It also explained why her forces hadn’t overwhelmed Tucker and the others by now. She and her remaining teammates must have turned their attention to the bridge and likely entrenched themselves there to keep anyone from thwarting them.

“If Felice is truly attempting to crash the ship,” Harper said, “that might be good news.”

“Good? How?”

“It means she hasn’t had time to set up any explosives . . . or maybe she doesn’t have any. Either way, I’m vectoring all teams to you now. The State Police and Coast Guard won’t be far behind us. Still no one will reach you for another twenty minutes.”

“We don’t have that much time, Harper.”

“Do what you can to delay her. Cavalry’s coming.”

Tucker disco

“How long until we hit the coastline?” Bukolov asked after eavesdropping on the conversation. He crouched, hugging his body against the cold and snow.

“Twenty, maybe twenty-five minutes at most.”

Tucker needed to get the others somewhere safer. A bit farther up the deck was a thick enclosed hinge for the cargo hold. It was only two feet high, but it offered additional shelter both from the wind and from direct view of the main bridge’s wheelhouse, where Felice was surely perched.

“Follow me, but stay low,” he said and got everyone into that scant bit of cover.

Nick clutched Tucker’s elbow. “I was born and raised in Michigan. If this ship is heading to shore around here, that’ll put them in Grand Traverse Bay, headed straight for Old Mission Point. The rocks there’ll rip the hull to shreds.”

“Must be why she chose that course,” Bukolov said.

Tucker nodded grimly. “Doc, stay here with Kane, prep your dispersal rig, and do your best not to get shot. Felice is holed up there in the forward wheelhouse, with who knows how many others. She intends to make sure this ship stays on course for those rocks. I have to try to get to her before that happens.”

Tucker also had to assume one or more of the holds was already contaminated by Felice and her team. Back at Fort Detrick, he had trained Kane to lock on to the unusual sulfurous smell of LUCA. But before that search could commence, Tucker first had to clear the way.

He poked his head an inch above the cargo hold’s lid, aimed the MP-5’s scope at the wheelhouse, then dropped down again. The wheelhouse had three aft-facing windows. They all appeared untouched, which meant Felice had probably fired upon them from one of its two open flying bridges—one stuck out from the port side of the wheelhouse, the other from the starboard, the pair protruding like the eyes of a hammerhead shark.

Perhaps he could use this to his advantage.

“What’s your plan?” Bukolov asked.

“Run fast and hope she misses.”

“That’s not a plan. Why not go belowdecks and stay out of sight?”

He shook his head. “Too easy to get lost or boxed in, and I don’t know how many men she’s got.”

His only advantage was that Felice would be surprised by his frontal assault. How much time that surprise would buy him was the big question.

Tucker took a deep breath and spoke to the others. “Everyone stay here. When the coast is clear, I’ll signal you.” He ruffled Kane’s neck. “That means you, too, buddy.”

Kane cocked his head, seemingly ready to argue.

Tucker reinforced it with an order, pointing to Nick and Bukolov. “HOLD AND PROTECT.”

He stared across the open deck.

But who’s going to protect me?

8:04 P.M.

Tucker took a few deep breaths—both to steady his nerves and to remind himself that he was alive and should stay that way.

Ready as he was ever going to be, he coiled his legs beneath him, then took off like a sprinter, a difficult process with the snow and wind. But the darkness and weather offered him some cover, and he was happy to take it. All the while, he kept a constant watch on the wheelhouse for movement.

Clearing the rearmost cargo hold, he shifted a few steps to the left and ran across the deck toward the cover of the next hold. He was twenty feet from it when he spotted movement along the flying bridge on the starboard side. He threw himself in a headfirst slide and slammed against that next hold’s raised side.

A bullet thudded into the lid above his head.

Not good.

He crawled to the right and reached the corner of the cargo hold and peeked around—just as another round slammed into the steel deck beside his head. He jerked back.

Can’t stay here . . .

Once a sniper had a target pi

He crawled left, trying to get as far out of view of the starboard bridge wing as possible. When he reached the opposite corner, he stood up and started sprinting again, his head low.

Movement . . . the port bridge wing, this time.

Felice had anticipated his maneuver, ru

Tucker lifted his MP-5 submachine gun and snapped off a three-round burst while he ran. The bullets sparked off a ladder near a figure sprawled atop the wing. Dressed in gray coveralls, the sniper rolled back from Tucker’s brief barrage. He caught a flash of blond hair, the wave of a scarf hiding her face.