wrong, we can track her.”
“Rubin.” Diego injected caution into his voice. He glanced at Luther.
Luther held up his hands. “Don’t mind me, boys. I don’t hear nothin’. Got to uncover my stash of weapons anyway.” He began to make his way back down the tunnel.
“Her body will just render them useless. You know that. She already told us it happened when a tracking system was tried before.”
“Apparently you weren’t listening when Mordichai explained to everyone how these worked,” Rubin answered. “No one wanted Whitney to accidentally pick up on a signal and be able to track the girls. This doesn’t look like a regular signal. You have to know what you’re looking for.” He sighed. “Just get it in her. I’ll warn her you’re going to shoot her and not to treat it as anything other than a bug bite.”
“You’re the boss, but we’ll get her back, Rubin,” Diego assured. “Let’s go see what Luther has in his stash.”
Rubin shouldn’t have been surprised that Luther’s weapons were up to date. Just the fact that Luther was worried that someone was going to come immediately for his body, even in the middle of a fight, should have tipped him off that Luther was being monitored. He had to have fought in the Vietnam War. If he’d been in more than one war, did that mean he’d run missions in Iraq and Afghanistan? His age alone should have prevented that from happening, but if Luther was considered a weapon, just as the Ghost-Walkers were, would the military use him? Most likely.
Luther painstakingly drew out every detail of the camp the soldiers had set up at Huntington Falls. He added in those guarding the machinery and their routes and times and the roving sentries.
“This is the one you have to get to, Rubin,” he pointed out, using the tip of his knife to show an unseen leader who often went from one of the boulders near the falls to the trees in the woods. “He’s running the show. He’s most likely one of your squirrel men. The others are very alert when he’s around and they defer fast to him.”
“Have you seen him move?” Diego asked.
Luther shook his head. “No, but I was surprised when I had him in my sight on the boulder at the falls and I turned my head to look at another soldier. The next time I spotted him he was in the trees. I knew then he was something different. I pulled back to study the rest of the soldiers just in case they were like he was.”
That explained why Luther hadn’t engaged with them immediately. He had sabotaged their equipment without their knowledge. Until they went to use it, they wouldn’t know.
“You’ll have to find the leader’s location first. If he sees you and you don’t see him, you’re as good as dead,” Luther reiterated.
“I’m going out first,” Diego said. “I’ll put eyes in the sky before I go.” He didn’t look at Rubin, knowing his brother would object.
“Diego.”
“I’m better than you out there. You’re still not one hundred percent. Try to reach Jonquille while I’m sending the birds.” Diego refused to look at him, but began to make his way to the front of the very narrow tunnel.
The entrance leading outside by Huntington Falls was natural. This was how Luther had first discovered the cave system. The tunnel sloped gently uphill, and all three of them had to stoop as the roof overhead was low. Rubin’s and Diego’s shoulders scraped on the walls of either side. There was a rock blocking most of the entryway, with grasses growing over and around it.
The vegetation was thick in the area and particularly right where the rocks were. Grasses grew from every crack, creating a seemingly impenetrable wall. If anyone did look at what appeared to be a small hole, they might think it was an animal’s den. Luther had encouraged the brush to grow and added the appearance of small animals living in the area. Nothing big enough to hunt, but if anyone was curious, it would explain the cozy little nest in the dark space. Very few would explore beyond that. Rubin couldn’t help but marvel at the man’s ingenuity.
He watched as Diego sent his birds into the air to find the leader of the soldiers as well as to find the location of as many of the other soldiers as possible. Diego had switched from the early morning songbirds to hawks. He sent the sharp-eyed raptors