by Amy Lane
Several savaged sea lions lay rotting on the shore, and Glen swallowed angrily. Dammit—boredom and weak minds and plain old meanness could make people do such monstrous things.
Grimly, he hoped he’d broken the nose of every guy on the floor of the wine cellar and left them all with concussions as well. Spencer’s idea of assassination looked better and better; he couldn’t even pretend it didn’t.
He stood for a moment there in the sun, taking a deep breath and wondering if he was up for this next part. From his utility belt, the sat phone gave a squawk, and he hit the button.
“The fuck you doing up there?” Spencer hissed.
“Giving you some cover,” Glen said.
“You can’t shoot the bad guys!” And Glen was relieved to hear that Spencer actually sounded horrified. The bigger portion of his amorality was a front, and that was good to know.
“I’m going to be a distraction,” Glen said. “And so’s Cash. ’Cause they’re getting curious. In fact….”
Yup. First goon was sticking his nose out the front door of the mansion, looking curiously for the acolytes. From his position, Glen could see most of them clearly. Spencer was leading a portion of them toward their camo netting, and the rest were seated, lotus position, faces toward the sun.
Well, that was a whole host of people he couldn’t hit, but the most important one was waving to him from the west side of the house. Glen gave a grim nod and waved back.
“You got everyone who’s coming with you?” he asked into the phone.
“Yeah. Other dumbshits think this thing is for real.”
“Good—they can free the mercenary fuckheads from the wine cellar in about an hour. Get your kids up the mountain. Cash and I have a distraction planned. Hang on to your shorts!” A set of noise-canceling headphones sat on the porn shelf, and Glen picked them up, used a tissue to wipe them off, and put them on. Then he looked down the gunsight to a spot beyond the tip of the cove’s crescent—on the side Spencer wasn’t leading a dozen freed prisoners toward—and let out a spatter of fire that would be banging around his brain for a good long time, headphones or no.
That was Cash’s signal. He went running toward the beach and the first boat, his limbs obviously functioning better than they had been when Glen had freed him. He dragged what looked to be the fastest boat into the water, hopped in, and started the motor with the key left in the ignition.
They’d assumed the key would be there because who was going to steal boats from a private island with gun towers and a James Bond wall?
Cash Harper, that was who. Cash Harper who had been bloodied and bruised but not beaten when Glen arrived. Hearing him bait John Barron—and play for time—while he waited for rescue was one of those things Glen would never forget. Cash had been expecting Glen—hadn’t doubted he’d show up for a moment. Glen’s stomach clenched with the worry that he could someday let that kind of faith down. But God, he’d die trying to serve it, wouldn’t he?
Cash started to maneuver toward the opening of the cove, looking behind him to see if the bad guys were going to catch up.
Well, yes and no. They were torn between running across the sand and staring fearfully up at Glen, and Cash was all but taunting them to follow him.
Well, shit. With more care than he could have imagined possible, Glen aimed the gun at a strip of land between the house and the beach, glad that Spencer’s billy goat and any other stray farm animals seemed to be on the other side of the house at this time of day. He fired off a couple of shots, his shoulder aching as he mastered the damned gun, and watched with some satisfaction as the group of goons got a move on again and headed for the other boat to chase after Cash. Cash stepped on the accelerator, enough to get a lead but not enough to lose them entirely, and sped over the wall. He maintained that distance—too far to be a good target, too close to give up on—while Glen continued to spatter the sand with fire to keep the bad guys from thinking about coming to shore.
Still, they weren’t going that fast as they approached the Dr. Evil Wall of Doom, and just when Glen thought, Cash, now, it did its thing.
Popped out of the water about twenty feet ahead of the speedboat trying to catch Cash Harper.
They turned hard—hard enough for their momentum to keep carrying them sideways right into the wall, and Glen heard the damned boat scrape and crackle as its hull caved in.
All the bad guys bailed, guns sinking to the bottom of the cove, and floundered, shouting, next to that damned silly wall.
Glen checked beyond the wall, seeing Cash circling around toward the other side of the island, where he’d have to look very carefully for a hidden cove, and he had strict instructions to stay away from the fucking snake.
Glen’s job was to follow Spence overland and meet in the cove, but he had some shit to do first.
Using his knife and a few quick blows from his pistol butt he managed to disable the turret gun, and fifteen minutes later he was on his way across the yard to the second tower, cursing the grandiosity of power-mad con men.
He was halfway up when the first shot pinged past his hip. He looked down in surprise to see John Barron, barefoot and bloody, trying to climb the tower and wield a small pistol at the same time.
Glen gave him a look—the sort of look you could only give a man who was too stupid to kill you when he had the upper hand—and said, “You could wait until I get to the top, or I can shoot you now—what’s it going to be?”
Barron leaned back and aimed, his bloody hand shaking, and Glen could see he’d peeled most of the skin off of it in his anxiety to break free.
“Buddy,” he said frankly, “we were going to send someone for you. You didn’t have to do all that. We’re not mercenaries—we’re rescue workers.”
“We worked on this for months!” Barron screamed. “You think we bailed on Nayarit and just showed up here? This was my dream!”
“That weird little spring-loaded wall was your dream?” Glen asked dubiously. “Buddy, you need a better dream.”
Barron’s mouth worked, and Glen took the opportunity to get higher above him. Barron couldn’t hold that pistol well, and he was going to have to tuck it into his belt in order to climb. Glen was betting on option B, and he wanted to be in position before Barron got his shit together. He thought about swinging to the other side, so he could look down at his assailant, but decided he’d lose too much time since he’d have to do that twice. Instead, he ignored the twinging of his overworked shoulder and put all those hours he and Damien and Spencer spent running up and down the hills of San Francisco to good use. Barron had been a civilian too long and had obviously enjoyed himself. While he outweighed Glen by a good thirty, forty pounds, John Barron didn’t have as much muscle as he needed if he wanted to hunt and kill someone better trained and more active.
But Glen didn’t want to shoot the guy either.
Ugh. He glanced down behind him and saw he’d put some distance between them—maybe enough for him to disable the turret gun before Barron got to the top.
Glen sure hoped so, and he sort of hoped Barron had a thing about heights. It was a lot harder to fight balls-out when you were afraid of a forty-foot drop to the bottom.
And the whole time his brain was running on the clock. Cash would be at the cove now, and Spencer would have the kids most of the way up the mountain. The diversion seemed to have worked.
Glen heard a clatter below him and looked to see the rest of the freed mercenaries in the front of the mansion, gazing restlessly around.
From this height he got a glimpse of the true believers, bound and gagged and struggling furiously, right at the entrance to the mountain scrub. It would be a while before the mercenary guards got to them, particularly when they were running toward the men in the water first.
Everyone was present and accounted for and safe.
Except Glen, who was being pursued by a turkey with more guns than brains.
Excellent—at least when Damien met him in hell, Glen could argu
e it wasn’t for a blowjob.
Stubborn
CASH hated this plan. He hated that he was safe—mostly safe, because oh my God, he’d gotten a glimpse of that snake, and it was terrifying—and Glen was still in danger. He hated waiting for Spencer and the rest of the captives of Tranquilo Paz. And he hated knowing that Brielle was back on the mainland with Preston and didn’t know if Cash was alive or dead.
But mostly he hated knowing Glen was still in danger.
He paced the beach until he couldn’t stand it anymore—the voices above came right when he was seriously thinking about going after the snake with a pointy stick.
He looked up and saw Spencer talking a girl in a white robe into stepping into a jury-rigged rope seat. He apparently had wrapped the rope around a tree or something, and from Cash’s vantage point, it looked like he had help from some of the other escapees to lower the girl down.
“I’m right here!” he called. “I can steady her as she comes down!”
“Minute,” Spencer muttered, and in another moment a secondary rope came down, and Cash realized it would help steady the girl from above as well.
Oh thank God, something to do.
The first girl was the most frightened… and the least helpful.
Everyone else had some climbing skills—or at least weren’t terrified of heights—and the last two people actually spotted the pitons and started climbing down themselves.
Spence made sure they were doing okay before he rapidly rappelled down the cliff himself, landing with a thump in time to grab a guy’s arm as he started poking around the cleft in the rock face.
“Wait—why didn’t we just go through…?”
“Easy there, junior. She’s not friendly.”
The snake thrust her massive head out of the crevice, and the young man—native to Mexico, probably, and maybe even Jalisco, judging by his accent—turned ashen and took two steps back. “I have to pee,” he said weakly. “What is that snake even doing here?”
Spence and Cash both hid smiles. “She’s just here to fuck up our day,” Cash told him gently. “I’d pick a corner and go for it.” He looked at the two craft—Spencer and Glen’s little skiff, and his faster, flashier Zodiac, and wrinkled his nose. “Even if you take the Zodiac back, it’s going to be about an hour.”
The kid nodded and headed to the cliff face to do his business, and Cash turned to Spencer. “Any word?” he asked. “You saw what we did, right?”
“Got everyone’s attention—yeah, that was a good plan.” Spencer grimaced. “Unless you’re Glen.”
Cash’s stomach thumped. “It was his fucking plan.” He strode to the cliff face where Spencer’s rope still hung. “That’s it. I climbed those limestone peaks all the time in Guadalajara—I can get up here!”
“The hell you can!” And for the first time Spencer looked ruffled. “Glen Echo can take care of himself—”
“I’m not leaving him!” Cash snapped. “And I’m especially not leaving him if—”
They both heard the distant sound of a pistol crack, and Cash gasped. Spencer frowned and cocked his head. Another crack sounded, and then, nothing.
“Glen!”
Spencer caught him around the waist as he headed for the rock wall, and Cash found himself pushed into the sand.
“No,” Spencer said calmly, like he hadn’t just thrown a body tackle.
“But Spencer! It’s Glen!”
“Glen can take care of himself,” Spencer repeated patiently.
“But he shouldn’t have to,” Cash panted, spitting out sand. “He has me! Spencer, I can’t leave him! That was a gun, and he needs me!”
Spencer grunted and stood up, letting Cash scramble to his feet. “We need to get these people off the beach,” he said calmly. He looked at the gathered former acolytes. “Any of you know how to steer a boat?”
“I do.”
The young man from Jalisco—who really didn’t like their fer-de-lance friend in the crevice—stepped forward. “I can get that skiff to the mainland—but I don’t know how to run that fancy one. The inflatable one.”
Spencer swore. “Well, you’re a start—everyone who doesn’t mind a fishing boat and this guy driving, all aboard.” He took the young man—his name was Alexander—aside and gave him landmarks and basic directions to their beach near La Paz, and half the group splintered off. “There’s a radio on board,” Spencer told him harshly, “but I wouldn’t use it. Listen, though. There are authorities waiting for you up the coast. We’ve got some friends there who can help you give a statement and find your families. You’re not in any trouble, you understand? As far as everyone is concerned, you were kidnapped and held against your will, so don’t be afraid to use their help. We can get you to safety—you just have to find your way to the beach.”
Alexander nodded, and the lost—and scared—young people jumped into the little craft and putt-putted northeastward, keeping the big previously industrial island to their right until they were past it, and then veering to the shore.
“Who’s going to take us?” a girl from the remaining group asked. “And where’s the guy—the guy who told me to find you?” She turned to Spencer. “He said he’d be here. I don’t want to leave without him.”
“See?” Cash’s eyes burned, and he resolved to hold it together. “He needs us! Dammit—”
“Shut up,” Spencer said casually. “Just….” He paused, and in the space between his words, they all heard it.
The whup-whup-whup whine of a very small helicopter.
“The fuck is that?” Spencer asked, staring at the mosquito-sized aircraft buzzing in from the mainland.
“Damien!” Cash said happily. “That’s Damien!”
“Is not!” Spencer argued, horrified. “Damien wouldn’t be caught dead in something that small. Those things are fuckin’ death traps!”
“He’d do it for Glen,” Cash said, all certainty. “He’d ride a bicycle with wings if Glen’s ass was on the line.”
“Fuckin’ heroes, man. Oughta be a law.” Spencer grimaced. “Okay. I’m gonna climb the cliff again. Do me a favor and catch the rope when it comes down.”
Cash tore his attention from the approach of the helicopter to stare at Spence blankly.
Spence gazed back. “Trust me,” he said, and without waiting for an answer, he turned, took three steps, used the side of the crevice as a push-off and leaped for the piton about twelve feet off the ground. He caught it one-handed just as the fer-de-lance realized he’d had a foot in her turf and sprang out of the crack. The remaining escapees gasped, one girl let out a little shriek, and Cash kept watching as Spencer scaled the side of the cliff with the agility of a spider.
“Oh my God, look at him.” The young woman who said it was a little younger than Cash, her face browned by genetics and a healthy dose of sun, and her black hair sadly butchered under her straw hat. But she had nothing in her eyes but admiration and a certain tired relief. “He’s really something.”
“Totally gay,” Cash said unrepentantly.
“Goddammit.” She sighed. “It never fucking fails. You were my second choice—but the way you’ve been calling after that other guy, I’m thinking—”
Cash glanced at her and grinned. “Yeah. Struck out with all of us. Sorry.”
She smiled back. “All of you?”
“There’s five of us—you’ll meet the other two when you get back to shore.” He turned to the top of the cliff, where Spencer was doing something super tricky with the rope. “What in the name of little green goats….”
“He’s making a ladder,” the girl said, puzzled. “What does he think he’s going to do with that?”
But Cash had an idea, and then he had another one. “He’s going to get me a ride to go help Glen,” he muttered.
“You can’t go!” she countered. “Look, not that I don’t want you to help your friend, but we’ve been living on… on drugged tea and lettuce greens and nothing else, you understand? No protein in our diet, no
carbs—we’re exhausted. We can’t run, and one of you needs to pilot the boat.” The tired cheer of her voice frayed. “We need your help!”
Cash nodded. “Don’t worry. I’ll go, Spence’ll stay and help. This only needs one of us.”
Yeah, he knew Spence was the action hero—Spence, Glen, Damie—they could all fly and pilot boats and use guns and all the hero stuff. But Cash could rock-climb, and he could fight, and he was stronger than he looked.
He could grab that rope as Damien flew past.
He watched, heart in mouth, knowing what to expect but impressed still as Spencer spoke briefly to Damien on the sat phone and then finished the final knot on what looked to be a lasso. Damien approached the island almost as if he were planning to fly over it, but instead of buzzing over their heads high enough to miss the foliage on the top of the cliff, he slowed the tiny craft down and hovered there, bobbing lightly in the breeze.
“That thing takes passengers?” The girl next to him voiced the little knot of terror in Cash’s chest.
“Well, if Damien says it does, it does,” he told her loyally, remembering the first time he’d ever seen Glen’s best friend, flying that wounded Black Hawk. “If it even remembers flying in a past life, Glen and Damien can fly it.” He also remembered Damien’s insistence that he and Glen fly together, given that shit only went south when they were apart.
And the way Preston’s only worry was whether or not Damien and Glen would come flying home.
“So I guess we lucked into the A-Team,” the girl said, and it was like the joke steadied her.
“Or the Gay Team,” Cash said with a smirk, and she smiled back.
“Which one are you?”
Cash grinned some more. “I’m the face man,” he said, and together they watched some more as Spencer threw the lasso into the air. One try, two, a pause to knot the base of the lasso again, below the slip knot, probably for weight. Three and—whoop! Right over both runners on the bottom of the helicopter. Cash tensed. This was his chance to do right.
