Page 1 of Hidden Ascent

Chapter1

Isla walked low,stepping heel to toe in silence as she inched forward. When the man in front of her stopped, she stopped and straightened.

After adjusting her grip on her weapon, she gave her bulletproof vest one last tug into place. While cumbersome at times, it had saved her life more than once. Today, she wore it because it was part of the required uniform, not because she would need it. Tonight was a simple assignment. They wouldn’t get any resistance. But the rush before entering a building was the same.

A hand tapped her shoulder, and she reached forward, tapping the man in front of her. She’d only known Greg for about a month, but she liked him. He was dependable and solid in a crisis. An excellent addition to the team.

She leaned forward and whispered in his ear. “How about candles? Does she like them?”

He twisted around. “Last week you gave me nothing, and you want to talk about it now?”

She smirked. “I work better under pressure.”

The week before, Greg had shared with her that he wanted to propose to his girlfriend, then proceeded to ask for her advice on how he should go about it. But without a romantic bone in her body, Isla had little to offer besides a scene from a romantic comedy a friend had forced her to watch. It had been torture. Greg had agreed.

He turned back around and followed the man in front to the open door of a giant warehouse. She followed behind, along with the rest of the team.

They were a specialized team. Highly skilled. Too skilled for this operation. But Supervising Special Agent Ian Fogarty wouldn’t let anyone else in on it, so it was up to them to get in and get out. The intel was theirs and theirs alone. They knew how many people they would find relaxing in the back room, unaware that they were about to be taken into custody for a drug operation they’d been facilitating. Isla’s team even knew the competence of their quarry in combat. Those they would capture tonight were the brains of the operation, not the brawn.

It was hard to take a job like this seriously, but it was easy to fall back on training. This was a job they could do in their sleep. And in a few more hours, they’d all get to go home to their loved ones. Those who had any.

* * *

The room was dark, but they moved through it quickly and efficiently, spreading out to clear it as they went.

After the main part of the warehouse was clear, the team leader, Hugo, signaled them to head for the back. As soon as the team moved forward, the bang of a gunshot filled the room.

Everyone dove for cover except Hugo, who dropped to the ground where he stood.

Isla, trained too well to stare in horror at her fallen leader, crawled on her belly to conceal herself behind a pillar before checking for any other casualties.

Besides Hugo, she couldn’t see that anyone else had fallen. She checked on him again, but he remained still.

Leaning on the pillar with her knees tucked up and ready to push off from her position if needed, she spoke into her radio to call for backup, but the only response she got was static.

It was too dark to make out much in the room, but she could see the outline of two more of her teammates taking cover. She signaled with an exaggerated movement that they were cut off. One of them motioned that he was going to try and make it to the door. She responded that he should hold his position, but he stood anyway as another shot exploded, and he slumped to the ground.

Isla scrambled to the other side of the pillar. She’d seen the muzzle flash, but it was in a different position than the first that had taken down Hugo. Either the sniper could easily move around from above, or they were being stalked by more than one. Either way, they were all exposed.

She stared at the rafters, trying to make out any movement from above, but the ceiling was shrouded in total darkness.

“Where are you?” she whispered as she pressed herself against the concrete at her back.

Something caught in the corner of her eye from above, and she dropped lower as a bullet embedded in the pillar where her head had been. She would have scrambled to find more cover, but an instinct she didn’t recognize—the same one that had caused her to move away from the gunshot moments ago—had her droop in position as though the bullet had hit its mark.

She forced herself into stillness even when she heard another of her team shot. Closing her eyes, she controlled her breathing. She was in the middle of a nightmare with no way out.

When the room went still, she focused on her hearing. Their assailants wouldn’t stay in the rafters forever. But after counting the number of shots and checking off her teammates, she realized it could be only her and one other that was still alive.

“Don’t shoot!”

Isla’s eyes opened wide when she heard the shout. She could see a figure moving slowly across the room with his hands up. It was Greg.

“Greg, don’t show yourself,” she muttered. He should know better. Everything about this mission made it clear that this was a setup. None of them was meant to make it out of the building alive. All the secrets they had about this group would die with them. Then she thought of the other two men who had been part of the operation but weren’t here, Ian Fogarty and their Department of Homeland Security contact, Harris Baker. It was impossible to warn them. They could be dead already.

Greg continued slowly to the center of the room.

Get down!Isla yelled to him in her mind.

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