The Impossible Alliance Read Online Free

tight ball, then raced across the roof, stopping to cram the chute into the first ventilation shaft he hit along the way.
    Christ, Marty!
    Jared hit the deck as the trail from a stray rocket lit up the night sky. The moment the explosion died out, he was up and running again. Marty and his men continued to pound at the northern facade of the castle as he tore into his rucksack and yanked out the waiting coils of rappelling rope. He dropped the bulk of the nylon to the roof and used one end to form his seat, threading the other through a makeshift pulley. Seconds later he scrambled over the granite ledge, his face and chest, as well as his submachine gun, front and center as he bounded down the wall Australian-style, face-first toward the now unguarded basement door at the base of the southern tower.
    He left his ropes dangling in the breeze and tore into his ruck again, this time snagging a block of C-4. He moldedthe plastic explosive to the array of dead bolts, then played out enough time fuse and pre-rigged the caps. He ripped off his night-vision goggles and glanced at his watch as he sought cover in an identical recessed doorway ten feet away.
    He jerked the ring on the fuse igniter.
    Ten seconds later, the C-4 blew the locks off the door. Jared wrenched the metal slab open and scrambled down the stone steps. He was already halfway down the main corridor by the time the smoke cleared, night-vision goggles firmly in place as he compared the doors and secondary corridors he passed against the floor plan ARIES agent Robert Davidson had managed to obtain before he was forced to evacuate Rebelia. The hair on the back of Jared’s neck snapped to attention as he passed the first door that didn’t belong. And then the second.
    He slammed the demons down as he swapped his goggles for the thermal imaging scope stashed in his ruck. A solitary heat source glowed within. It wasn’t moving.
    Morrow.
    Though the scarred slab separating them was three doors away from the one Davidson’s source had pegged, Jared’s instincts locked in. They wouldn’t budge. Unfortunately neither would the door.
    If he blew this door, the resulting internal vibrations would announce his presence within the castle with all the finesse of a fragmentation grenade chewing through a sheet of rice paper. He double-checked his watch. What the hell—five minutes from now it wouldn’t matter. He was almost out of time and definitely out of options. He grabbed another block of C-4 from his ruck, this time rigging half of it. Seconds later, the locks on the wooden door followed the explosive fate of the outer metal one. With them went his sole chance at culling enough time to execute a quick search for DeBruzkya’s cache of purloined jewels before the exfiltration chopper arrived.
    Jared vaulted into the room and shoved a set of portablehospital curtains aside. Bypassing the empty bed, he leaned over the occupied one and peered through the darkness and still swirling smoke. The man’s eyes were closed, but Jared recognized him instantly, despite the bandages and missing glasses. He leaned closer and checked the man’s breathing. Prayed.
    Razor-sharp steel kissed Jared’s throat.
    His estimation of Morrow shot up a notch. The man wasn’t unconscious, after all. Not with those eyes wide open.
    â€œName’s Jared Sullivan, ARIES. We met three months ago in a guest room in Director Hatch’s house.”
    Recognition flooded brown eyes as the scalpel clattered to the floor. Morrow’s relief was palpable. Humbling. Unlike many Jared had served with over the years, it wasn’t the adrenaline or the toys that had kept him coming back for more.
    It was that look. It made it all worthwhile.
    It made this particular job worthwhile.
    He saw Morrow’s mouth open, heard the air rip past his lips. “Where?”
    â€œLater. Can you stand?”
    He caught the man’s answering nod—and tore into his