Her Selfless Warrior (Omega Sky Book 1), page 7
“But no matter how much of a snowstorm they were in, they couldn’t have gone another eighty kilometers in the wrong direction and stumbled on this installation,” Sebastian spoke up.
“No,” Kostya said slowly. “You’re right, Seb. But there would have been surveillance cameras along the Russian side of the border. If the cameras didn’t see them, there probably would have been guard towers that very well could have picked up the satellite phone signal.”
Commander Clark nodded. “That’s the theory.”
“Well, the good news is, we have a place to start. We get to play in the forest, in the snow,” Ryker grinned.
Oh, joy.
“The US Division of the Intercontinental Wolf Center is bringing us in six days too late. But, I have to tell you, men, I have a bad feeling about this one. Not bad like they’re all dead, but bad like this is going to be a goatfuck.”
Kostya’s head jerked from the satellite image on the screen to look over at his boss. In all the time he’d worked for Simon Clark, he didn’t think he’d ever heard his boss say something like that.
Simon gave him a wry smile and shrugged.
“When Gideon gets here, all of you kit up. There’s a plane that will get you immediately out to Ramstein Air Base in Germany. The closest Finnish airport to the Nature Reserve is Joensuu. It’s not closed at the moment, so come hell or high water, that’s where you’ll be flying into. None of that bullshit that you end up flying into Helsinki. I’ll make sure the Prime Minister is called.”
Simon flashed another map on the screen, showing where Joensuu was. Kostya looked across the ready room and took a moment to look at each of his team members. Every one of them knew the truth—if this was the blizzard of the century, there wasn’t a chance in hell they’d be flying into any damn Finnish airport but the big one…if that. But nobody was going to burst Clark’s little bubble of sunshine.
Kostya watched as his men nodded, then his phone rang. It was Gideon.
“You missed it,” he answered. “How far out are you?”
“Fifteen minutes, I’m coming from downtown.”
“I’ll get everything you need, then we’ll meet at the airfield. I’ll fill you in there.”
“Got it.”
Kostya watched his commander pull together his files and close up his laptop. Something was up. Simon Clark was a realist; he’d been Kostya and Max’s lieutenant for a million years back when they were both young and before Simon’s hair was the color of steel. Kostya had never known the man to spew bullshit like he just had, saying that the Joensuu airport would be open. He needed to talk to Max and see if he’d noticed anything.
6
Kostya looked out the window of the truck as they passed yet another mind-numbing kilometer. All he could see was a canvass of white. He hated snow with a passion. Thirty-five years later he could still remember what it felt like when that bastard Fedor had forced him and his brother and sister to go on even when it was obvious that Roman was burning up with fever.
Kostya shoved that memory aside and concentrated on the here and now because it was his job to deal with it, so he did. It was something he learned how to do when he was seven years old and he’d had no other choice but to focus on putting one foot in front of the other and carry Irina so they had a chance at living. Even when it seemed like his world had come to an end.
Stop being morbid! It’s just snow!
His lip curled up as he took joy in the fact that he wasn’t driving, Lincoln was. The weather was absolute shit, but Linc was doing an amazing job. There was only one fly in the ointment.
Landon Kelly.
“If I shove him out the door, we can make it look like an accident,” Nolan murmured to Kostya. He was the SEAL closest in age to Kostya, and on certain things, he could often read Kostya’s mind. Like, for instance, the fact that Landon hadn’t shut up for the last two and a half hours and was sorely in need of a muzzle.
“Linc asked the kid to talk, remember? He said listening to somebody helped him drive since he can’t get a radio signal, which makes no sense considering the fact that the SISU truck is the pride of the Finnish military.”
“You gotta admit, the seats aren’t that bad,” Gideon said from his left. Kostya grimaced like he gave a shit at this point.
“I can pull up songs on my phone, for God’s sake,” Nolan practically groaned under his breath. “I’d even listen to whatever god-awful music Landon has on his phone if I didn’t have to hear his inane chatter anymore. Does anybody in their right mind actually watch the Headless Singer?”
“It’s the Masked Singer,” Kostya corrected quietly. “Unfortunately my niece does, so I hear about that shit from her too. It makes my ears bleed.”
“But Landon knows who has been screeching in it each season. How? How? Next, he’s going to tell Linc he plays with Barbies.”
Ryker snickered from across the aisle.
“Who wants to bet that he starts spouting his Call of Duty scores?” Mateo asked, careful to keep his voice down.
“Nah, that’s a total given,” Sebastian sighed. His Cajun accent was strong which meant that he was at his wit’s end too.
“Agreed,” Kostya nodded. He squinted at Mateo as he assessed him. The man might not have been with his team as long as the others, but he had Landon’s number, that was for damn sure. “Man who guesses closest to his C.o.D. scores wins the pot. What do you say, fifty each?” Kostya proposed quietly.
Gideon outright chuckled. “Oh, I’m in.” He rubbed his thick winter gloves together in glee.
Kostya’s head jerked around to look at his second-in-command. “Keep your voice down. Also, I don’t like the sound of that at all, Smith. Have you been checking his stats? You creep around online far too much. You need to get laid more often.”
All the men in the back laughed.
“Whatchya laughing about back there?” Landon called from the front.
“I call foul. Sebastian’s laughing too fucking hard. Apparently married life with Giana is agreeing with him,” Ryker said as he nudged the man with his shoulder.
“I can’t help it if my life is perfect,” Sebastian smiled.
Kostya liked hearing that. After all the shit Sebastian had gone through with his grandfather and uncle he deserved some happiness.
“Ryker tried to tell a joke, then couldn’t remember how it ended. So pathetic,” Nolan called out to Landon.
“Oh,” Landon responded. Then he started talking to Linc again.
“I have not checked out Landon’s or anyone else’s Call of Duty statistics for that matter,” Gideon whispered. “That’s a little too juvenile for me. But I do like the idea of making educated guesses on statistics—that’s right up my alley, so count me in.”
“Ah, he just thinks he’s some kind of logical Mr. Spock, therefore he’s going to blow it,” Ryker grinned. “I vote for upping it to a hundred. This is going to be one long drive.”
Every man nodded, then Gideon shoved his elbow into Kostya’s ribs.
“You okay?” he whispered really low, making sure that Nolan, who was on Kostya’s other side, couldn’t hear him.
Kostya appreciated, yet didn’t appreciate Gideon’s question. It sucked having friends who knew so much of your history.
“Fine,” Kostya muttered.
Gideon gave him the side-eye. Kostya shook his head a minuscule amount, and Gideon got the message.
Or he damn well better have!
“I say Gideon has to put in two hundred since he can come up with educated guesses on stats,” Ryker chuckled as he put quote marks around the words educated guesses. At least Kostya assumed that’s what he was trying to do with his heavy gloves.
“McQueen, that’s a damn fine idea.” Sebastian smiled broadly as he turned to Gideon. Gideon didn’t even frown. The man was just too damned sure of himself.
Kostya looked over at Nolan. “You keeping tabs?”
“Yep. The pot’s at seven hundred.” Nolan bit the glove off his right hand and pulled out a notepad.
Kostya liked it. After two hundred kilometers of Landon’s incessant chatter, they needed something to keep them from scooping out their eardrums with spoons.
“How lame, you have to actually write this shit down? You can’t remember?” Gideon scoffed.
Nolan pulled out a notepad and pencil from his backpack. “Give me your guesses, gentlemen. And for being a sarcastic asshole, you go first, Gideon.”
Mateo snickered; that was the worst position to be guessing.
“We’re not falling for that, O’Rourke. You’d end up being last, because you’re holding the paper. We’re on to you,” Gideon mocked quietly. “Tear up the paper into pieces, pass the pencil, we’ll all write our guesses with our names, and you’ll hold them.”
“You know, at this rate, you might have to put three hundred dollars into the pot for being an annoying prick,” Kostya said evenly. The laughter started up again.
“What’s so funny back there?” Landon asked again from the front seat.
They all laughed harder.
“Just reliving your story about the Masked Singer,” Nolan prevaricated.
Landon turned farther in his seat so he could see everyone. “I know, right? Wait until I start telling Linc about that one episode of the Bachelor. I bet some of you remember it, it was epic!”
“You should save some for when Ryker’s driving,” Nolan responded.
“Good idea,” Landon said as he turned around to look out the windshield.
“I will get you back,” Ryker growled at Nolan through gritted teeth.
“It’s going to be hard to top that,” Kostya noted.
Nolan collected everyone’s guesses.
“Okay, we’re still not even close to where we need to cross into Russia, so let’s see if we can get some shut-eye,” Kostya suggested. “We’re still fourteen hours out before we’re going to get to the Joensuu airport, and that’s only if we can actually stay on the road and continue on at a reasonable rate of speed.”
“I say we bet on that,” Ryker piped up.
“Shut the hell up, McQueen. We never bet on parts of the mission, don’t be an asshole.”
Kostya decided to get some sleep when Ryker took over driving, which was possible since the man didn’t need his co-pilot to talk to him. Instead, he and Sebastian sat up front in companionable silence.
Kostya glanced around the back of the SUSI. Almost all of his men were in some stage of relaxation, but most importantly Landon was asleep, so all in all, he should be able to finally get some shut-eye. With that pleasant thought, he let his mind drift and found himself with Lark Sorenson in his arms. This was odd; in the many years of his career, he could count on one hand the times when a woman occupied his thoughts like this.
He shook his head to clear his mind. He needed sleep and thinking about Lark was not the way to get any.
Kostya employed a technique that he’d learned very early in his career, even before BUD/S to get to sleep fast, a technique he’d taught Lexi and Roman when he’d babysat them as hyperactive children.
He relaxed his entire face, forehead, jaw, and tongue. He dropped his shoulders, letting them relax, then began slowly inhaling and exhaling to relax his chest. He continued to relax his body, ever downward—pelvis, thighs, knees, calves—all the way to his toes. He pictured lake Coeur d’Alene in Idaho at sunrise the week he’d camped alone after his divorce. It took three renditions before he could sleep because a beautiful blonde reporter with silver-blue eyes kept roaming around in his thoughts. Finally, she departed and he slept.
He even managed to stay mostly relaxed when Mateo and Nolan took their turn, even though it was boring as hell. After six hours of their driving, Kostya drifted off to sleep again.
When the all-terrain vehicle slowed, Kostya opened his eyes, immediately knowing it was his turn to drive. He glanced around the back and noted that Landon’s eyes were open. Gideon was supposed to be with Kostya during his turn up front, but he was still asleep, so Kostya decided to forego a navigator for the first bit of his drive. When the truck actually stopped, everyone’s eyes opened.
“You ready?” Gideon immediately asked Kostya.
I should have known.
Kostya shook his head. “Rest. I’ll call you up when I need you.” He’d seen Gideon working on his computer during Ryker’s turn at the wheel and when Mateo was driving.
When Kostya and Mateo met outside of the truck to do the switch, Mateo shook his head and yelled over the wind.
“It’s a bitch,” Mateo told Kostya. “The visibility is next to nothing, we were doing about ten klicks an hour.” Nolan nodded disgustedly in agreement.
“We’re finally close to Joensuu here in Finland,” Mateo explained. “According to the GPS, when it decides to work, it shows we’re about another five klicks from the outskirts of the city.”
“How are you staying on the road?” Kostya asked.
“Carefully,” Mateo answered. “That’s the reason we’re going so slowly.”
“Good call,” Kostya praised his men. “Now get back there and relax. At the rate we’re going we’ll be trading off driving a few more times before we get to Koivusuo Reserve.”
“You got that right,” Nolan yawned as he headed to the back of the truck.
Kostya planted his ass in the driver’s seat and checked out the fuel situation. Mateo and Nolan had filled the tank before they’d started out, and he still had almost a full tank of fuel left. This SISU that the Finnish colonel had loaned them was a Godsend.
He looked out the windshield at the shards of snow pelting the window.
I hate snow.
Kostya took off the brake and started forward. His men were right; ten klicks was the fastest he could go, and it took all of his concentration to keep it on the road.
“Jesus,” Gideon breathed as he pushed himself into the front passenger seat of the truck. “No wonder the Joensuu airport is closed. Is there even a town somewhere past our windshield?” he muttered.
Kostya glanced at the truck’s clock and realized he’d been driving for almost a half-hour. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his second-in-command fiddle with the navigation system that every driver had been relying on. It was the best GPS system the military had, they’d been upgrading it and using it for years. Not that it was doing any of them much good in this once-in-a-lifetime blizzard.
“It’s time to break out the new toy.” Kostya could hear the glee in Gideon’s voice.
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ve got something that is going to get you and the rest of the team harder than two bottles of Viagra.”
“I’ll bite. Whatchya got?”
“A GPS system that will actually work.”
“You mean something that will show me that Lake Pyhäselkä is actually there to the south of us, that this GPS isn’t managing to show on the screen?” Kostya asked sarcastically.
“How’d you know about the lake?”
“I’m old school. While you were reading some technical journal or figuring out how to take over the world, I was studying the regional maps of Finland on the plane.”
“Damn right you’re old. You’ve been driving for thirty minutes, isn’t it time for your nap?” Gideon grinned.
Asshole.
Gideon was only four years younger than Kostya, but he sure liked rubbing it in.
“Toy. Now,” Kostya grumbled.
Gideon pulled his backpack onto his lap, then took out a block of plastic and aluminum, with two rubber stubs coming out of its sides. He flipped a switch on the side and the obligatory green glowing screen appeared.
“So that brick is actually going to help us? How in the hell is it going to do that?”
“Cosmic rays, my man.”
Kostya rolled his eyes, then something triggered in his brain. Shit, he’d been briefed about this at least a year ago. It was after all the goatfucks in the Kandahar mountains in the middle of Afghanistan when they couldn’t get any GPS signals.
“This is the one that means we’re not dependent on radio signals from satellites. Instead, it uses whatever the fuck a muon is that is made from cosmic rays.”
“That’s the basics,” Gideon nodded. “But it gets better. Muons are a natural source of radiation that can pass through rock and be used at high altitudes.”
Kostya felt his spine tingle. “Water too?”
“Yep, they’re testing it now in submarines. Kostya, this is going to be a game-changer. This blizzard, it’s nothing.” Gideon pointed to the screen. “There’s your lake. Let’s see if it can find the Loch Ness Monster.”
Kostya slowed to less than seven kilometers an hour and glanced over at the screen. “Dumbass, that’s in Scotland, not Finland.”
What Gideon was holding in his hand was downright magical. “Zoom in, I want to see the road.”
Gideon did, and Kostya finally had a clear idea of where he was going despite the fact he was almost at zero visibility with the snow coming directly at them.
“Is that a semi I see damn near crossways on the highway coming up?” Kostya slowly took his foot off the accelerator and lightly tapped the brake.
“Dammit, looks like it to me,” Gideon answered.
The truck came into view, but they stopped meters before they would have hit it. “Magical,” Kostya breathed.
“You and your maps suck ass,” Gideon grinned.
“The day’s going to come when you and your computers just don’t cut it. You’re going to have to depend on your gut, and you are going to be so fucking screwed.”
“Not going to happen,” Gideon assured his friend. He turned to the back of the truck. “Up and at ’em. We’ve got work to do.”
Kostya glanced back and saw that all of his men were already awake and ready to rumble. Of course they were, that’s how they operated. All of them knew that when their truck stopped, they were needed.
“Throw on your headgear and turn on your comm systems, we’ve got trouble outside,” Kostya said.
