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level, he hated the
location. The road was narrow and flanked by thick jungle on both sides. It was
the worst place to be caught. He dismissed the idea as paranoia, but then again
paranoia was in his job description.
    Still, before going out to gather bamboo he
looked at the carcass in the middle of the road. It was a tapir and just when
he was about to turn away from it he noticed something odd. The animal was in
good shape save for a red blotch on its side. It occurred to him that the wound
was too clean for it to be road kill.
    It was a gunshot wound.
    A million thoughts zoomed through his
head. If the tapir had been shot then it had been placed in the middle of the
road deliberately. That was a basic ambush technique.
    His heart racing, he lifted his shirt up and
reached for the pistol holstered in the small of his back. But it was too late.
He heard movement behind him. As he turned to look, he saw five men in
camouflage battle gear emerge from the jungle.
    Kathleen saw it too and Palmer heard her
scream out a warning. He didn’t have time to draw his weapon before a rebel hit
him square in the face with the butt of his rifle.
    He collapsed in the mud and all his
strength vanished. He glimpsed shadows going to the truck and pulling out Kathleen
as she kicked and screamed. It was gut-wrenching and a second later he passed
out.
     

Chapter 7
     
    It was still raining when Palmer woke up.
He had the mother of all headaches but he was glad to be alive. In his
experience, aches and pains only served to remind you that you weren’t dead and
that counted for something.
    He was relieved to find that although he
had a bump on his forehead, there was no blood, but he was devastated that this
hadn’t been a nightmare. This was real. The pickup truck was empty and Kathleen
was gone. They had snatched her so fast that they hadn’t even taken his gun.
    There was no time for feeling sorry for
himself. He had a job to do. He brushed away his worry and bruised ego and ran
back toward town. This had happened because he had let his guard down, had
softened around that woman. It might have very well cost Kathleen her life.
    It took almost an hour but he finally
reached the village. The locals looked at him with curiosity, the expression on
his face almost frightening. He ignored them and ran into his house where he
got his satellite phone.
    He was on the line with Greenbrier for
less than ten seconds when he said the phrase he’d never wanted to say. “Principal
is echo kilo.”
    Echo kilo stood for the letters E and K
which in turn meant express kidnapping . The term was usually reserved
for short-term abductions, often where the bad guys forced the hostage to do
something quickly like get money out of their ATM. However, at Greenbrier
speaking this code was standard operating procedure before they knew they had a
genuine kidnap-and-ransom situation.
    Palmer had no doubt it was the case,
though. Kathleen’s father was worth several billions and the Burmese jungle
teemed with rebel groups looking for a quick payout. Given the importance of the
client, he requested a rapid deployment team and it was granted on the spot.
    While he broke out his tactical gear and
got dressed for battle – even though his men wouldn’t join him for about 12
hours – he started thinking like an investigator. This wasn’t some random snatch-and-grab.
Everything about the event, from the impressive manpower to the road being
blocked, screamed professional planning.
    How could they have known Kathleen was going
to drive on that road today?
    Palmer was already sweating under the
tactical vest when the answer smashed him in the face. He holstered his pistol
and cracked his knuckles before leaving his house. He was about to turn to one
of the elders and ask to rent his horse for the day when fate finally smiled at
him.
    He spotted Bryce sitting under a lean-to
and smoking a bong. The young man started to fidget before remembering to
smile.
    “Hey, man. I