“What happened?” asked Graves.
“Fucking took off like a rocket!” said Gupta. “Like it was pissed! If I had tried to hold on to it, I’d be in the drink right now.”
“Outstanding. Now we have another trick up our sleeve. We could do the same from a car,” said Graves.
“Damn! We’re like the drone master DJs,” said Gupta. “Add some motorcycle launches to the mix. Maybe a WaveRunner. Have drone, will launch, baby!”
“Okay. That’s enough,” said Graves. “Voices carry over water.”
“We’re still like two miles from the southern tip of the conservation area,” said Gupta.
“I don’t want to take any chances,” said Graves. “How does everything look on the laptop?”
Gupta grabbed the open laptop from the rear seat and sat down next to him in the cockpit. He clicked around the dimmed screen for a few seconds before answering.
“She’s climbing high on her way to the first waypoint, north of the conservation area. Everything looks good.”
The drone’s first glide track would take it due south, directly over the primary infiltration site, before turning left to search the dock area referenced by William Barber. If sentries had been posted in that area, they represented a threat to the team’s left flank while approaching the camp. Once that surveillance run was completed, the drone would fly east across the river and climb again, positioning itself for a long east-to-west glide over the suspected camp area. Their first glimpse behind the curtain.
CHAPTER 43
The western shoreline, a long darkened mass barely discernible from the night sky, passed down their port side, roughly five hundred feet away. They’d kept to the starboard side of the lake on the trip up, blending in with the scattered traffic on the water. Bull Shoal Lake felt more like a river, long and narrow as it wound through the Ozark Mountains, dipping in and out of Arkansas shortly after they departed the staging area. The hour-long trip had been unremarkable so far, the height of excitement coming from the powerboats that had burned past them at ungodly speeds, presumably headed toward the Branson area—and civilization. Devin still couldn’t get over how little existed out here. His earpiece chirped.
“RIFFRAFF. This is OVERWATCH. Primary infiltration site appears clear on IR and visual night vision scan. Dock site shows two heat signatures. Marked as hostile. We’ll check them on every pass to make sure they haven’t moved.”
“This is Rich. Copy your last. River looks clear. We’re headed in.”
The pontoon boat veered sharply to port and pointed directly at the shoreline. He adjusted his position on the couch to face forward, rifle still lying flat on the cushions behind him, next to a night vision–rigged ballistic helmet. Marnie did the same, settling into place within an arm’s reach beyond the aluminum gate that opened to the bow platform. A look behind him at the cockpit revealed Rich’s barely illuminated face, his eyes alternating from the muted map screen on the satellite phone in front of him to the rapidly approaching shoreline.
When Devin turned his head, Marnie had already donned her helmet and flipped the night vision goggles down into place over her face. He followed her lead, and they started scanning the brush along the shore. About a hundred feet from the tree-packed shoreline, Jared cut the speed to idle, and they glided quietly across the smooth water. He nudged the engine a few more times, until the front of the pontoon boat gently nestled into a snarl of thick scrub under a canopy of low-hanging branches.
As the boat floated back a few feet, Devin opened the gate and jumped down, landing in thigh-high water. He took the coiled line Marnie had tied to one of the bow cleats and slogged through the brush to reach the nearest tree trunk, where he secured it the best he knew how. Marnie joined him a few moments later, undoing and redoing his work without saying a word. Rich and Jared pushed past them once she was finished and disappeared into the bushes.
“Jared and I are heading about fifty feet inland, due north, to secure the area.”
No response was required, unless acknowledgment was a request. This group worked together smoothly, saying very little, which suited him fine. He and Marnie had agreed to stay out of their way, and talk over the radio net only if it were absolutely necessary. The less of a distraction the two of them provided, the better chance they had of getting out of this unscathed.
The second boat arrived a few seconds later. Devin and Marnie grabbed the line on their bow and tied it to a solid tree. With the boats secured, the nine of them fought through the thicker shoreline undergrowth until they reached a more passable forest floor. They knelt in a tight 180-degree perimeter centered on Rich, while Devin and Marnie covered the far-right side.