Page 129 of Blue Moon

“But I’m trained for this.”

“And you think they’re not? Look, Luna’s your girlfriend, I get that. But Pale’s team is more than capable of handling the situation, and do you really want to wait another couple of hours while we faff around in traffic and get acquainted with the area?”

No, he didn’t want Luna in a madman’s hands any longer than necessary, but he also wanted the operation to go smoothly.

“They ever rescued a kidnap victim before?”

“Fun fact: Tulsa was the youngest woman ever to make it onto the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team. You know how tough that is?”

“If she’s so good, why isn’t she still with the HRT?”

“Because after her father got killed in the line of duty, she didn’t think they handled it very well and quit. The FBI’s loss was Pale’s gain.” Emmy turned her attention back to the screen. “Oh, hello…”

The new picture on the screen was crystal clear and steady, moving slowly as it approached the apartment building. They were using a drone?

“Apartment 602 is at the rear,” Echo said, surrounded by three laptops, two cups of coffee, and a platter of snacks. “East side of the building. I found the development plans in public records. It’s a small unit—entrance hallway, one bedroom, bathroom, living room, kitchen. Only the living room and bedroom have windows.”

The camera moved in that direction, but Ryder didn’t see a drone appear on either of the two external feeds.

“How big is the drone?” he asked.

Pale held up a thumb and finger three inches apart. “About that size. Looks like a hummingbird. We have smaller models, but those sacrifice speed and range in favour of miniaturisation.”

The hummingbird flew to the first window. Ryder leaned forward to peer at the scene and saw…nothing. The apartment was dark. Then the scene lit up, and at first, he thought somebody was home, but then he realised there was something wrong with the picture. The overhead light fixture was still turned off.

“Full-colour night vision?” It was the best he’d seen.

“Nice,” Emmy said. “I could do with one of those.”

Priest laughed softly. “Come and work for me, and you can have one.”

“I’m pretty sure my darling husband would have a few words to say about that.”

The hummingbird was looking over a small balcony and into Hebert’s living room with the kitchen beyond. The space was painfully neat, and while most modern bachelor pads were dominated by a flatscreen, there was no TV in evidence here. Instead, there were books. Shelves and shelves of books, and…

“What are those tanks? Fish?”

Dice was the one who answered, rising as she did so. “No, reptiles.”

“You should head over there,” Priest told her, and she left without a word. “If Dice hadn’t gone into special ops, she would’ve been a zookeeper. She likes animals better than she likes people.”

After the events of the past few months, Ryder couldn’t blame her for that.

The hummingbird headed left and found a couple doing unmentionable things on a couch. Wrong apartment. To the right, a blind covered the window, no glimmers of light around the edges, no signs of life. If anyone was inside, they’d be in the bedroom or the bathroom.

“The lock on those balcony doors isn’t worth shit,” a voice said. Ryder wasn’t sure who it belonged to.

“Don’t forget he was military,” Emmy warned. “It’s possible he booby-trapped the place.”

“Plus he’s reasonably competent when it comes to technology,” Ryder added. VPNs, the security system at the Nile Palace—Mark Antony knew his way around them. “Expect cameras or an alarm system.”

“Relax, we’ll be careful.”

When Tulsa, Spider, and Dice climbed down from the roof and let themselves into Anton Hebert’s apartment forty-five minutes later, moving as quickly and as carefully as they’d promised, cameras was all they found. Well, camera. It was trained on the reptile enclosures. No sign of Luna, Kobie, or Mark Antony.

But they’d only just missed him.

“The kettle on the stove is still warm,” Tulsa said once they’d checked for any unexpected surprises and dismantled Hebert’s spying eye. “He was here recently.”

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