by Cherry Adair
The fact that the men knew to search for him here, this close to the lair, indicated they knew where he was, just not how to get their hands on him.
He didn't give a continental fig for himself, but without him, Marnie didn't stand a chance.
He'd just have to show the bad guys that their timetable had been seriously compromised.
A couple of hours later he found two assassins at the cabin. After securing the area, he returned to watch their systematic search. Not a board went uninspected. Jake stood in the shadows. Rain sluiced unnoticed off his head and shoulders as he watched each man move carefully over the entire face of the small structure. So they knew exactly where, just not how to open the can.
There was some danger of them discovering the elevator entrances from the cabin, but even if they did, they couldn't activate the retinal scan without his cooperation. And in that event there was a contingency plan.
Jake adjusted the black headpiece over his head and the lower half of his face. Only his eyes were visible when he strode into the clearing.
One man turned, his hand going to the weapon strapped to his thigh, the other man continued searching.
Jake took a chance and gave a hand signal as identification. The man stepped down, relaxed.
Jake said quietly in the T-FLAC shorthand, "I've come to relieve one of you. Go back to camp."
"We've only been on three hours."
"Fine." Jake allowed impatience to creep into his voice. "You do what you want. I'll go back and get some of that coffee myself." He turned to go.
"No. I'll take the break." The shorter of the two men came toward Jake, nodding as he passed. The garb made him unrecognizable. There was nothing familiar about him. Jake watched him disappear into the trees, then strolled up to the cabin through the long, wet weeds.
His glance flickered to what could be misconstrued as a sparkling raindrop trembling on the edge of the roof. He'd forgotten Marnie could see every inch of the cabin. For half a second he considered disabling the camera craftily hidden on the eaves. Then deliberately put her out of his mind and went to work.
The second man was now on the right-hand corner of the house, tapping each board, checking every window. Jake passed the open front door. Quick glance. No one inside.
Jake seized the split-second advantage. He came up alongside his prey, put his arm around his throat, and efficiently snapped his neck.
Seconds later he dragged the body away from the cabin and hid it beneath a dense clump of deadfall.
He looped up the mountainside until he was behind the soldier he'd relieved.
The man was good.
Jake was better.
When he found the camp and calculated the size of the cell, he'd know how to handle the situation. All he had to do was follow this guy to the end of the line.
They looked, smelled, and talked T-FLAC, but something about them didn't quite ring true. It made no difference. An assassin was an assassin was an assassin.
Jake let the guy ahead of him move a little distance before he moved again.
Suddenly he found himself face-to-face with another man coming the opposite way. If the guy could count, Jake was in deep shit.
The man was cautious but not careful enough. Before he was aware of Jake's presence, it was over. It took seconds for Jake to secure, search, and hide the body. Two more down. How many to go?
He had to find their camp, but the guy he'd been following was now lost up ahead in the trees. Shit.
The strike team had used choppers to reach this side of the river. The bridges had been down when they'd arrived. He had to find their extraction point, secure the rest of them, and radio in for pickup.
If he could figure out who to call.
Jake headed in the direction he'd been going before he'd been sidetracked. Careful this time to watch where he was going. That had been an amateur stunt that could have cost him his life, and consequently Marnie's as well.
He couldn't afford to take those kind of risks anymore. Not until he got Marnie safely off the mountain.
Half an hour later he encountered another guy, busy rearranging himself after taking a leak. He knew he was headed in the right direction. Jake paused. Get the goon to take him back to mama, or off him here? One less to worry about later.
Jake stepped out of the trees. The man looked up, startled, hands busy. Jake drew the knife from the scabbard on his ankle—it flew true. The man barely gasped as it imbedded in his throat. Surprise widened his eyes and his fingers tightened on his groin as he crumpled into a rock-hard snowbank beneath a ponderosa pine. Not that his final resting place made any difference at this point.
The ticking clock in Jake's mind echoed ominously as he worked. Where the hell were the rest of them? How many of the sons of bitches were there? The dead weight of the man pulled at his shoulder muscles as he dragged him away from the small clearing between the trees. Jake wasn't big on garbage detail, but it was part of the job.
There wasn't a sound, but the texture of the air changed. Jake whirled.
In the lair, Marnie stared at the flat-screen monitor across the room, a ham sandwich halfway to her mouth. "Damn it, Jake, there's another—Oh, you see him. No, wait, he's—"
Beside her Duchess added her own warning.
Marnie, who'd been propped up in bed with a snack and a cup of coffee, abandoned her food to crawl to the foot of the bed, not taking her eyes off the screen. The sandwich clung to the inside of her throat like wallpaper paste as she stared, appalled.
Jake and the bad guy circled each other. They were on a slight incline, and rivulets of water ran down small fissures in the packed snow, making the footing slippery and dangerous.
Marnie winced as Jake's foot slid. He grabbed his opponent by the arm to stop his momentum, or to drag the baddie down with him. The two went rolling and skidding down the slope and were stopped by the base of a huge tree.
In seconds they were up again. Circling, feinting.
"Doesn't the man use a gun?" Marnie demanded, jumping off the bed to race to the monitor, where she could see them better.
They looked like two well-choreographed dancers. Rain bounced off the apparently impervious fabric of their suits and beaded on the camera lens, making visibility a challenge. Which one was Jake?
"Ah. See, girl, our guy is bigger."
Jake punched the other guy, who doubled over.
"Good one, Jake!"
Duchess leaned against Marnie, growling low in her throat.
The bad guy let fly with a kick to Jake's thigh. Marnie winced. "Ow! Sock him one, big guy, yeah, like that! Take that, and that, and that!" Her heart jackhammered inside her chest. The two men were evenly matched. For several minutes they were lost to view between the trees.
"Damn it!" Marnie snarled. She looked at Duchess, who was whining and growling. "What, girl?"
Duchess raced across the room, nails skittering on the floor, tail wagging. At the door to the elevator into the mine shaft, she stopped and looked back at her mistress.
"He's busy right now, goofus. He'll be back after work," she finished wryly, searching the gray murk for a sighting of the two men.
Duchess growled low and rough and came racing back to Marnie's side. She nudged her mistress with her head.
"Come? Come where?" There was no sign of them. She moved to another view with no luck.
The dog insisted, frantic now as she paced and nudged, nudged and paced.
Marnie dragged her eyes away from the bleak trees for a second to glare at the dog. "You don't mean out there? Are you nuts? I wouldn't be able to—Listen to me, damn it! I wouldn't be able to help him, I wouldn't!"
She spun back to the monitors. She didn't have time to argue with a dog. A man emerged from behind the trees, back into view on monitor seven. Marnie, palms sweating, braced her hands on the cool surface of the workstation and tried to see who the man was. The sky opened up like an upended watering can, and it was getting too dark to see who was who out there
.
Anxiety laid a blanket of goose bumps over her naked body. "Jake… ?"
Duchess barked a warning as a man came flying from out of camera range and took the first man down. Marnie had no idea which man was which. This was a fight to the death. Blood drained from her head as the two combatants fought beneath the driving force of rain. Fists and feet flew in a flurry of lethal strikes that left her breathless and shaking, as if she were the one fighting.
She flinched and grunted as an elbow met a chin. With each blow her own muscles tightened a notch and her stomach churned.
One of the men reached to the small of his back and withdrew a ridiculously small gun. The other guy picked himself up off the ground and didn't see it. "Did Jake have a gun there, girl? Did he? Oh, God, Jake—"
Duchess howled. The sound sent a chill of dread right down Marnie's spine.
A shot rang out.
The first man staggered. He fell against the trunk of a nearby tree.
Marnie dug her fingernails into her palm as her eyes darted from one man to the other. She couldn't tell. Her terrified heart beat so fast she could barely breathe.
Duchess's nails clicked frantically across the floor to the elevator. Back. To the elevator. Back. Urging Marnie to go topside and save her hero.
Torn, Marnie stared at the screen until the two men blurred. Who had been shot?
Another shot rang out.
The second man stumbled, fell to a knee, rose, and fired off a third shot. The first man stood for a moment as if paralyzed, then in slow motion slid down the tree trunk until he sat, legs extended and head lolling to the side. In seconds a pink stain spread in the snow beneath him.
A scream of denial rose in her throat. She gripped each side of the monitor in white-knuckled hands, squinting, trying desperately to see through the snow and identify which man was which.
"Damn it, Jake! If you're dead, I'm going to kill you!"
For several seconds Marnie stared at the tableau before her, then, galvanized into action, raced to find her clothes.
Chapter Eleven
« ^ »
Marnie tied her bootlaces in the elevator, hopping from foot to foot. Fear made her clumsy; her fingers refused to cooperate.
"Come on. Come on."
She burst through the elevator door. Lights popped on as she raced through the tunnel, her breath huffing in harsh, desperate pants. She tried to control her panic.
"He's going to be fine," she told herself. "Fine."
While she jogged down the tunnel she buttoned one of Jake's oversized shirts, zipped her jacket, zipped her pants. "Jake knows what he's doing, he'll be okay." Please be okay.
Jake. Jake. Jake.
Duchess raced ahead. Came back. Raced ahead. Came back. Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.
"Please be alive."
The next door blocked her.
Palm print.
She slapped her hand on the scanner as Jake had shown her.
"Open. Open." Open… ed.
She almost fell through the doorway into the long corridor leading outside. The air was colder here. Fresher. Her breath led the way.
She couldn't just go dashing around out there without a plan. But her brain refused to wrap around anything beyond seeing a man bleeding into the snow.
Dying in the snow.
Even if the dead man wasn't Jake, please God, both men had been shot. "Make it a flesh wound, a scratch, okay?"
She knew where the two men had fought. It wasn't far from the opening to the mine shaft. Although, as she'd seen on the monitors, it had started to get dark and the snow sifted in ever-increasing drifts on the rocks and trees.
She had to hurry.
Think. Make a plan. Go.
She wouldn't be any good to him if the bad guys killed her. The thought made her shudder. Suddenly this was all terrifyingly real. Watching Jake and the assassins on the monitors had given her the illusion of safety. It kept her at a distance, almost as if she were watching TV. But this wasn't a movie. It was pee-in-your-pants real, and men were dying.
"But not Jake. Please, God, not Jake."
The tunnel seemed to go on forever. Was this the way Jake had brought her? Had she taken a wrong turn somewhere? No, she recognized the ledge where he'd picked up the gun and flashlight.
Around the next corner. A low, fierce growl. She shrieked, then remembered. "The darn animatronic guard dog."
Hurry. Hurry. Hurry.
Not far now.
Another two hundred yards. A hundred. Fifty.
Wet, icy air blasted her as she and Duchess burst outside. Shudders of terror rippled across her muscles. Panting, she pressed her hand to the stitch in her side and leaned against a wood beam to catch her breath.
"Damn you, Jake, I wanted to work my way up to telling you I love you. I'm going to be so mad if—" She couldn't bear to complete the sentence.
Find Jake, she thought grimly. Drag him back. By the hair if necessary. To hell with the bad guys. She was pissed off and terrified enough to want to tackle them.
Duchess stopped beside her. "If one of the bad guys comes, you rip his throat out, you hear me, girl?" Marnie whispered fiercely, grateful for the heat and weight of her pet against her side. She wrapped one arm around Duchess's neck, putting off the moment when they would be outside the protection of the rocks. Out in the open…
"We'll find hi—Oh, God, Jake!" Marnie breathed, relieved beyond anything as he came through the narrow canyon of rocks toward her. The skin-tight black outfit he wore looked like a seal-sleek wetsuit. He pushed back the head covering as he walked, leaving his hair flattened damply to his skull and faint pink marks on his face.
She rushed toward him, then put her hands in the air as he aimed his gun at her.
"Whoa. I'm not armed!"
He lowered the weapon. His face appeared paler than normal. The lines on either side of his mouth seemed more pronounced. He was the best thing Marnie had ever seen.
"Judas, woman, what the hell kind of stupid move is that to make? I could have shot you. What are you doing out here?"
"I saw that man shoot you. I came to help you get back inside." He isn't dead. Thank you, God, he isn't dead.
"It's a scratch."
Marnie rushed to his side and glared up at him. She wanted to sock him for scaring her to death. She wanted to kill him. She wanted to fling herself into his strong arms and sob like a baby. She took a deep, cleansing breath and released the tension in her shoulders.
"Hmmm? Really? A scratch? Well, let's get you home and see, okay, big guy? Go on the other side, goofus," she told Duchess, who seemed unsure if being out here with the two of them was a fun thing or an in-trouble thing. She finally went on the other side of Jake and looked up at him hopefully. Marnie came around to his uninjured side and carefully pulled his left arm over her shoulder.
"I watched the whole thing. I can't tell you how insane it makes me not to be able to yell and warn you when I see you out there," she said through her teeth. Jake's hand, hanging over her chest, felt like ice. Crazy fool. She cupped his fingers firmly in her own warm hand and felt his chill.
"Planning on carrying me?" Jake's voice held a thread of amusement as they turned back inside.
"If I have to, I will." She concentrated on setting each foot as they walked. As macho as Jake was, he didn't take his arm from her shoulder. The sweet-metallic smell of blood made her swallow convulsively.
"How bad do you think it is?"
"I told you, a scratch. I've got everything I need to patch it up. Don't worry."
"Oh, I'm not worried," Marnie told him blithely, heart in her throat as she took a little more of his weight on her shoulder. If he passed out here in the tunnel, how was she going to get him down to the medical supplies? She pushed the thought away. Jake was upright and walking. She wasn't going to borrow trouble.
He let her do the palm print and the retinal scan. By the time the door to the elevators opened below into the lair, they were both bathed with swea
t. Jake, followed by Duchess, headed for the couch and sank into it, eyes closed, head back. Duchess sat as close as she dared, eyes fixed on Jake's face.
From the CD, Blood, Sweat, and Tears belted out, "And When I Die." It was eerie. Marnie blocked out the music.
"Tell me where to find what I'll need."
Jake opened dark, enigmatic eyes. "There's a first-aid box in that drawer over there—no, the next one, yeah. Bring it over here. Let's see what we have to deal with first."
She found the first-aid kit, then poured a mug of coffee. Spilling crystals all over the counter, she spooned sugar into the inky liquid with shaking hands. Sugar for shock.
She needed it herself. She gave it to Jake. "Here—you have to get warm."
She set the large first-aid box on the table in front of him, saw he had something pressed to the wound, then raced over, grabbed the silk throw off the floor at the foot of the bed, and settled it over his lap. Jake quirked a brow but didn't comment.
She went back to the kitchen area for a bowl of hot water. Dreading what had to come. Hating that he was hurt. Scared because she was the only one who could do anything about it. And unsure of her ability.
He'd been holding her flannel shirt against his shoulder. Marnie took the damp clump of fabric and tossed it on the table. It left a smear of blood on the surface of the wood. She swallowed roughly and removed her jacket, dropping it on the floor behind her.
Jake tried to pull the skin-tight fabric up his body. His face contorted.
Every drop of blood drained from her brain, leaving her light-headed and pukey.
"Here, for godsake Jake, let me do it." She climbed over his leg and sat on the trunk coffee table between his knees.
Duchess shifted. Brow wrinkled, she rested her chin on a sofa cushion and watched the proceedings with worried puppy eyes.
Very carefully Marnie started to peel the fabric up Jake's chest. The material felt slick, slippery.
Blood.
Little black dots flittered in her vision. She ignored them.
"You're bleeding pretty badly," she said calmly, keeping her gaze steady, the rusty tang of fear sharp in her mouth.
