Hot as Hell (Deep Six 0.5)

Hot as Hell (Deep Six 0.5)

Julie Ann Walker



CHAPTER 1


United States Embassy

Islamabad, Pakistan

Booooom!

Harper Searcy’s eyes rounded as she grabbed the edge of her desk. It shook in rhythm to the rattle of the bulletproof windows in the large office across the way, and the wheels on her rolling chair chattered against the tile floor like teeth in a bony skull. For a moment, her brain blanked. Just…full stop. Nothing. A big, honking nada. And there she sat with her jaw slung open while the whole world did the shimmy-shake.

Then her synapses started firing—rapid-firing, more like—and she snapped her mouth closed, quickly glancing around the small anteroom that was her workspace as the secretary and all-around right-hand man…er…woman…for the U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan. A loud snapping sound preceded the appearance of a huge crack zigzagging its way up the plaster wall to her right. It rained salmon-colored paint flecks onto the floor. The metal and glass in the overhead light fixture jangled ominously. Then the closed door leading from her office to the third-floor landing above the grand central staircase suddenly swung wide, its hinges creaking eerily as if opened by ghostly hands.

Her heart froze solid—no easy task considering the average temperature in Islamabad in July was 95°F.

Gas main explosion? Or…earthquake?

The latter was certainly possible. The city was built atop five major fault lines. Yup, that’s right. Five! And good gracious! Who the hell decides to construct a capital above somethin’ like that? Of course, the question was purely rhetorical, and she didn’t bother answering it as she pulled open the bottom left-hand drawer of her desk and snatched her purse from inside. Cell phone, cell phone. If she was about to be buried alive—hopefully alive—under a mountain of rubble it would be good to have her cell phone on her, right? Right.

“Sir!” she yelled in the general direction of her boss’s office as she kicked out of her chair. It slammed against the back wall, causing the framed photograph of the president of the United States to hop off its nail and the glass to shatter against the tiles. She didn’t give it a passing thought as she slung her purse over her shoulder. “Mr. Ambassador!” she called again. “We need to evacuate the building as quickly as—”

Rat-a-tat-tat! Rat-a-tat-tat!

The words died in the back of her throat when the unmistakable sound of automatic gunfire slammed into her eardrums. It was then she realized the rattle and rumble had suddenly ceased. So…not an earthquake? A…bomb, perhaps? Was the embassy under attack?

Her heart was no longer frozen. The thing had turned into a hot fist pounding against her ribs, making it nearly impossible to breathe. Every single one of her hair follicles hoisted their charge upright—could a person get goose bumps on her scalp?—until she felt electrified from head to toe.

“Sir!” She scrambled around her desk, banging her knee—ow!—against the edge in the process. Then she was racing into her boss’s office.

And holy frick! The silly sonofagun was standing at the window, watching in wide-eyed horror whatever was happening out in the embassy’s courtyard. The constant rat-a-tat-tat was more pronounced here. And as her dear ol’ Georgia born-and-bred momma would say, that man’s ’bout as smart as tree bark. The glass was bulletproof, but what were the odds it was also bazooka proof?

“Get away from the window!” she yelled, ducking beneath the line of the windowsill and crouch-walking her way toward her boss. When he turned to her, his wrinkled face was slack with disbelief.

“That Intel from the Department of Defense was right after all, Harper,” he wheezed, his left eye twitching. “The TTP is attacking us. I never thought they would actually—”

“Get down, Mr. Ambassador!” She grabbed his hand and yanked him into a stoop beside her. “We have to get to the panic room!”

“It’s too far away.” His aging blue eyes were wide and glassy as he shook his head. The soft yellow light from the overhead chandelier glinted off his cue-ball crown, and while Harper deeply respected Ambassador Douglas O’Leary for his diplomatic acumen, it was obvious the man wasn’t much when it came to quick, rational thinking outside the negotiation chambers and inside a life-and-death situation. The shock of the raid had already gotten to him. As if to prove her point, when he gestured out the window she saw his finger was shaking. Nope. Correction. His whole arm was shaking. “We’ll never make it to the basement before we’re overrun!”

Chancing a quick peek above the sill, Harper’s breath whooshed from her lungs like she’d taken a one-two punch to the gut. The scene that pierced her eyes was pure chaos…

The high iron gate leading into the compound was completely obliterated, as was a good portion of the fifteen-foot concrete wall surrounding the embassy. What appeared to be the remains of a large truck, the armored kind used for hauling cash or gemstones or some other high-value whatnot, sat smoldering in the breach, nothing but an ugly heap of twisted, scorched metal. A mass of bearded men in pajama-like pants and sporting pakol hats swarmed over the rubble and through the thick black smoke like bloodthirsty locusts. Ambassador O’Leary was right. It was the Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan—the Pakistani Taliban—otherwise known as the TTP. And with machine guns held tight against their shoulders, they kept up a constant barrage of death-dealing fire while advancing on the outnumbered contingent of Marines tasked with guarding the embassy.