Chapter 4 - The Hunt Begins
By 02:00 hours, we had crossed into the pine forests of Moore County.
The rain had intensified, drumming a relentless rhythm against the roof of the Tahoe. We steered clear of the primary highways, sticking to logging roads and two-lane state routes where the only light came from the occasional sodium-vapor lamp outside a closed general store.
My destination was an old property my father had purchased in 1974: eighty acres of scrub pine, wiregrass, and swamp bordering the Uwharrie National Forest. There was no paved driveway, no municipal water connection, and no internet access. The cabin had been built from rough-hewn oak timbers with a sheet-metal roof and a deep well driven sixty feet into granite bedrock.
Dave Harris turned the Tahoe down a sand road obscured by overgrown blackberry brambles. The undercarriage scraped against high roots, but twenty yards past the tree line, the road opened into a clear turnaround behind the cabin.
“Engine off,” I ordered. “No lights.”
We sat in the dark for two full minutes, listening. The forest was alive with the hiss of rain on pine needles and the distant rumble of thunder to the west. Nothing else. No approaching headlights. No engine drones.
“Hector, take the perimeter,” I said. “Check the trip wires along the creek bed. Dave, clear the interior.”
“On it, Colonel,” Miller said, stepping out into the dark with a flashlight covered in red tactical film.
I helped Katherine out of the vehicle. Her fever had broken, but the emotional exhaustion had set in with crushing weight. Her limbs moved like lead weights; she leaned against my shoulder, her breath coming in ragged, shallow sighs.
Inside, the cabin smelled of dried cedar and cold stone. Dave had already drawn the heavy blackout curtains across the three small windows and struck a match to an oil lantern on the rough pine table.
I laid Katherine on the iron-framed daybed near the wood stove. Hector returned through the kitchen door, shaking water from his shoulders.
“Perimeter is green,” he reported. “Trip lines from last winter are intact. If anything heavier than a possum crosses the creek trail, the bells will sound.”
I pulled a ruggedized Panasonic Toughbook from my go-bag—a non-networked machine I used for personal field writing—and inserted the micro-SD card via a standalone USB adapter.
The directory loaded slowly.
There were thousands of files: scanned bills of lading, customs declarations bearing forged stamps from the Port of Charleston and the Port of Wilmington, private bank transfers routed through Zurich and George Town, and encrypted email threads between Julian Vance and a senior civilian deputy within the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Sustainment.
“Look at this,” I said, pointing the screen toward Hector.
The sergeant major leaned down, his eyes scanning the spreadsheets. “Mother of God. That’s Lot Number 44-Bravo. That was the batch of cefazolin delivered to Fort Liberty’s Womack Army Medical Center last November. We had eight surgical patients develop post-operative sepsis within forty-eight hours.”
“They knew,” I said, scrolling down to an internal memo marked *Confidential / Vance Global Internal Audit*. “Julian received the laboratory purity report showing forty percent contamination by industrial solvents. He signed the delivery authorization anyway because the delay penalty in their DOD contract would have cost them twelve million dollars.”
“Julian doesn't care about people,” Katherine’s voice drifted from the bed. She was staring up at the dark timber rafters. “To him, soldiers are just… line items on an inventory sheet. He used to laugh about it at dinner parties. He’d say that patriotism was the easiest commodity to sell in America because fools would buy trash if you wrapped it in an American flag.”
Suddenly, a faint, rhythmic metallic ping echoed from the woods behind the cabin.
Hector’s head snapped toward the north window. “Creek trail. Wire three.”
Dave Harris drew a customized Glock 17 from his chest rig with a soft, practiced click. “Vehicle or foot?”
“Foot,” Hector said, already moving toward the back door. “Too light for a truck. They’re moving slow.”
I closed the laptop and handed the micro-SD card back to Katherine. “Slip this into your sock. Under the heel.”
“Mom—”
“Be quiet, Katie. Stay on the floor behind the wood stove.”
I unholstered my military-issue Beretta M9 from my bag, checked the chamber, and released the slide. The metallic chambering sound was the only noise in the room.
I blew out the oil lantern. The cabin plunged into pitch-black darkness, save for the blue-gray moonlight filtering through the seams of the blackout curtains.
“Dave, hold the rear door,” I commanded in a whisper. “Hector, take the crawlspace access. Do not fire until they cross the threshold of the porch. If Vance’s people brought local law enforcement, we do not engage police officers. Confirm targets before any trigger pull.”
“Understood,” Miller breathed from the floorboards.
Outside, the rain slackened to a fine, cold mist.
Through the heavy oak logs, I heard the faint crunch of wet pine twigs. Then, a voice—flat, professional, speaking through a throat microphone:
*“Team One in position at Entry Point Alpha. Heat signature confirmed in the main room. Two adults seated, one moving. Authorization to breach is green. Vance wants the girl intact; neutralize the older woman.”*
My grip on the Beretta did not waver.
They weren't Charlotte police. They weren't federal agents.
May you like
They were Vanguard Security: Richard Vance’s private mercenary contractors, hired to execute a mother in the dark and drag her daughter back to a padded cell.
***
