Page 2 of Echo: Burn
Montana sounds like the kind of place where a woman can breathe without permission. Where she can learn to be a veterinarian instead of a trauma nurse, because sometimes saving animals is easier than watching humans destroy each other. Where she can rebuild from ruins and learn to trust again.
Or at least learn to survive. Sometimes that's all we get.
The highway stretches ahead into darkness, headlights cutting through the night. Behind me, Chicago fades into memory. Ahead, Montana waits with the promise of mountains and distance and the kind of silence where you can hear yourself think again.
I reach over and touch the Glock through the canvas of my purse, its weight solid and real. Then I press the accelerator hard. Two thousand miles between me and Jack's hands. Two thousand miles to figure out who I am when I'm not busy surviving him.
The engine roars, and Chicago disappears in my rearview mirror.
1
KANE
Echo Base, Montana
Present Day
The Montana dawn breaks cold enough to burn.
I stand at the cabin's north window, thermal mug warming my scarred hands, watching frost patterns crawl across the glass like artillery maps drawn by winter itself. Four-thirty in the morning. The mountains are still dark, but the sky bleeds from black to deep purple, that precise moment when night admits defeat but day hasn't claimed victory. This is my favorite time. The world holds its breath, and for twenty minutes, I can pretend I'm the only person left in it.
My reflection stares back at me from the window—a ghost superimposed over the forest. The burn scars that crawl up the left side of my neck catch the lamplight, tissue pulled tight from fire that should have killed me in Kandahar. Should have, but didn't. Story of my life. The beard hides most of the damage to my jaw, but I know it's there. I feel it every time the temperature drops, phantom pain from nerve endings that don't exist anymore.
I drain the coffee and move into my routine.
Perimeter sweep first. Always first. I pull on the tactical vest, checking each magazine pouch by touch—years of drills that live deeper than thought. The HK416 comes off the rack clean and loaded, suppressor already attached. I don't go anywhere on this mountain unarmed. Not anymore. Not after Kandahar taught me that the people who sign your paychecks can decide you're too expensive to keep breathing.
The cold hits like a physical blow when I step outside. Fifteen degrees, maybe less. My breath plumes in the darkness as I move along the tree line, boots breaking through the frozen crust. Every step deliberate. Every shadow assessed. The forest is alive with the small sounds of a mountain waking up—pine branches creaking under ice, something small moving through underbrush, the distant call of a raven announcing dawn.
I check the first pressure plate. Untriggered. The monofilament tripwire is still taut at ankle-height across the cleared approach—positioned on the path humans would take, not the game trails the animals use. Tension set for a hundred pounds minimum. Rabbits and foxes won't trigger it, and anything bigger sticks to the natural routes. I move to the second position, then the third. Everything exactly as I left it twelve hours ago. No tracks except mine and the deer that bedded down near the eastern ridge. The mountain remains undisturbed, which means I get to live another day.
It's been three weeks since Morrison died screaming in that Kalispell safe house. Three weeks since they put a bullet through his skull and we crossed the line from hunted to hunters. Echo Base—our real headquarters—is built into an abandoned mine midway up the mountain behind me. Over a century and a half ago, miners carved those tunnels hauling ore down on mules via steep, twisted trails that don't exist anymore. Now the only access is the freight elevator hidden behind my stone fireplace,rising through solid rock to the main tunnel network above. To anyone looking, there's just a shallow cave entrance fifteen miles south with nothing inside but collapsed timbers and bat guano. They'd never find the camouflaged door, never suspect the armored SUVs cached in a separate tunnel with its own exit to a mountain road three ridges over.
The base houses the rest of the brotherhood. Stryker, Mercer, Rourke, Khalid, Tommy, and Sarah. My team. My responsibility.
The cabin is my cover. Anyone surveilling the area sees a hermit living off-grid, nothing more. The real war runs from the cave. But the isolation here isn't just tactical. I spend most nights in this cabin because the silence doesn't ask questions. Doesn't need answers. The brotherhood accepts that I need the cabin between operations. They don't push.
Smart people. They've all got their own demons.
I complete the outer perimeter sweep, then move to the secondary positions closer to the cabin. Motion sensors positioned at forty-meter intervals, each one disguised as natural debris. I check the batteries, test the wireless connection to my tablet. All green. The infrared cameras mounted in the trees show nothing but wildlife patterns—deer, elk, one mountain lion that passed through two nights ago.
The sun finally breaks over the eastern peaks, turning the snow from gray to gold. Beautiful, if you ignore the fact that beauty doesn't care whether you freeze to death admiring it. The mountain doesn't betray you. Doesn't lie. Doesn't sell you out for political convenience. It just is. That's more honest than any handler I've ever trusted.
I stand for a moment, letting the first real warmth touch my face. The scars pull tight in the cold, but the sun eases them. Small mercy. I don't get many of those.
Back inside, I strip the vest and hang it by the door. The cabin smells like woodsmoke and cleaning products—familiar,comforting in a way that has nothing to do with comfort and everything to do with control. This is my space. My rules. No one gets inside unless I allow it.
The cabin is small—one main room serving as kitchen, living area, and sleeping quarters. The woodstove and the large stone fireplace work together to keep the temperature comfortable, fed by utilities running down from Echo Base through conduits no casual observer would ever spot. The furnishings aren't plentiful, but they're not punishment either. A leather couch and chair face the fireplace. An enormous brass bed dominates the far corner, soft, clean sheets because sleep deprivation is tactical stupidity. The bathroom off the main room might look spartan at first glance, but the shower would make a spa jealous. Hot water, good pressure—small mercies that keep a man functional.
The weapons rack dominates the east wall. Three rifles, two shotguns, four sidearms. All clean, all loaded, all within arm's reach of anywhere I might be standing. Ammunition stored in waterproof containers, sorted by caliber. Extra magazines. Cleaning supplies. A small armory for one man who refuses to be caught unprepared again.
The kitchen takes up the northwest corner—propane stove, small antique fridge from 1930 running on power from Echo Base. Supplies for three months stacked with military precision. MREs, canned goods, freeze-dried meals. Water filtration system. Medical kit stocked better than most rural emergency rooms. I've learned that survival isn't about hoping for the best. It's about preparing for the worst and then assuming it'll be worse than that.
A small table serves as my operational planning station. Topographical maps of the region, laminated and marked with various routes and caches. Communications equipment—encrypted satellite phone, police scanner, weather radio. A laptop connected to nothing, used only for offline data analysis.The internet is a highway that runs both directions. I don't give the Committee any roads leading back to me.
Kandahar plays in my head without permission. It always does when I let my guard down. The taste of concrete dust and blood. The sound of automatic weapons fire echoing through narrow streets. Jenkins going down first, the back of his head disappearing in red mist. Matthews trying to drag him to cover, taking three rounds through the chest for his loyalty. Rodriguez bleeding out while calling for his mother in Spanish, eighteen years old and dying because our handler sold us to the highest bidder.
I survived because I was lucky. Because the building collapsed at the right angle. Because Stryker found me in the rubble and refused to leave. Not skill. Not training. Just the random chance that separates the living from the dead.
