"That's better. We'll handle our end just fine. Trust me."

Trust me, Cam mimicked in his mind. "I really shouldn't be involved in this at all."

"You've been involved from the beginning, hotshot, and don't forget it." The other's voice was insolent, before it turned to stone. "We godown, you're coming with us, you and all your buddies.''

Angry silence hung between them for a moment, stretching paper-thin before Nick's voice sliced through it, softer now, and filled with counterfeit concern. "You're worried someone's going to make you on this thing, huh?"

"It's possible."

"What kind of ship you running over there, Cam? I thought you guys keep it strictly need-to-know.''

"There's no such thing as absolute security."

"You better hope there is. One slip on this, we all go up in smoke."

Cam had been acutely conscious of the risks from the beginning, which was not to say that he had been presented with a choice. It was a question of survival, plain and simple, with the choices narrowed down to do or die. He had been forced to take a stand, and once committed, there could be no turning back.

"I'm holding up my end."

"I know you are. We're counting on you, Cam." The phony confidence and camaraderie were sickening. "How are you handling the disposal?"

His companion tried for a smile, and in the gloom it resembled a grimace that reminded him of hungry crocodiles.

"We've got our ways. They worked before."

"You've never bagged this kind of game before."

The tall man felt the old familiar tightness in his stomach, acid fingers worming upward through his chest to lock around his heart. The ulcers had been gnawing at him for a month, but he would have to live with it until the job had been carried through to its conclusion, one way or the other. He stopped himself. It had to be only one way if he intended to survive the coming storm. They would succeed, or they would die. The world would not be large enough to hide them if they failed.