He turned and scanned the mountain one last time, but still spied nobody. The chap who saved his life must have gotten lost. Or killed.
With a shrug he walked directly up to the SatCom entry lobby and shoved open the glass door. To his surprise nobody was manning the security station. And an ominous dark stain covered the desk. Why hadn't anybody cleaned that up?
Readying his lecture, he dug out his security card and headed across toward the door to Command.
3:21 p.m.
"Let them go," Ramirez said. "We have what we need." He bent down and picked up the box.
"What about the woman?" Wolf Helling asked. "Can we work without her?"
"She'll be back." Ramirez seemed to be thinking aloud. "I'll see to it."
"But—"
"There are ways." He cut him off. "It's not a problem."
"What do you want us to do here?" Helling inquired finally, skepticism in his voice. He stepped over to look at the body of Rais, staring down dispassionately. One less amateur to deal with. He had shot the Pakistani by accident, but the kid was unreliable. And this job had no room for unreliability.