She couldn’t imagine the barbaric mind-set that would allow someone to smash the bones of another human being…

Salmeta, Colombia

She’d have to break the sentry’s neck.

Catherine Ling moved silently down the path of the rain forest.

She couldn’t risk using even a knife. He mustn’t cry out.

No sound. Every movement had to have purpose and deadly intent.

The phone in her pocket vibrated.

Ignore it.

The other outer sentries had to be eliminated to clear the way back to the helicopter.

She was a yard from the sentry. Now she could see that he was bearded and close to middle age. Good. She hated to kill those fresh-faced kids even though they could sometimes be more lethal. Anyone who worked for Munoz was dirty, but she always had to work to get past that element of youth. Stupid. She should know better. As a teenager, she had made sure that no one performed with more deadly precision than she did.

He was tensing. He was sensing danger.

Move fast.

He was a good six inches taller. Bring him down to her level. Her booted foot sliced between his legs and hit the side of his right kneecap. He lost his balance. Before he could regain it, her arm encircled his neck.

She jerked back and twisted. His neck snapped.

He went limp.

Dead.

She let him fall to the ground, then dragged him deep into the shrubs. She’d already disposed of the other sentry guarding the path along the brook. Her way should be clear the three miles to Munoz’s encampment.

Maybe. She had learned there was nothing certain where Munoz was concerned. She had been assigned to this hellhole for the last three years and made a study of the drug dealer. He was sadistic, volatile, and unpredictable. The stories that circulated about his brutality were sickening. His vicious profile was the major contributor to the storm of anxiety surrounding his kidnapping of coffee executive Ned Winters and his fourteen-year-old daughter Kelly. He was holding them hostage until the Colombian government released his brother Manuel from prison and every day a new and bloody threat was issued.