Gideon

by Cherry Adair

  Riva wanted both her GPS and either her SIG or her own Bushmaster 15 semiauto from her gun case, with its full clip, and spare. She presumed her clips were in Sin’s backpack; they certainly weren’t in hers. All she needed was an opportunity to help herself.

  For barely a nanosecond at the start of this long trek, what seemed like days ago, she’d weighed her chances of taking down six heavily armed men. All together? No. Couldn’t happen. Not here. Not right now. Separate them and take them out one at a time? Yeah, that she could do. She just had to bide her time.

  Problem was, they weren’t the only ones she had to deal with. They’d been followed for several clicks. Whoever was tailing them was passably good at remaining far enough away not to alert them. Her heart leapt. Maza’s people? So soon? This was going to be easier and quicker than she’d hoped. She’d been anticipating this for hours; it was almost a relief to know they were being less than subtle now. She felt a pang imagining Maza’s people killing Sin. And his soldiers. But while her vision included men dying, Sin wasn’t one of them.

  She wasn’t surprised when a heavy hand grabbed her shoulder, almost pulling her off her feet. She’d sensed the guy coming up behind her for several minutes. “El jefe quiere hablar con usted.” The boss wants to talk to you. Andrés jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Riva glanced back through the cleared green tunnel behind her. Sin.

  Not one of the men tracking them. Still. If Sin wanted to talk to her, he could come to her. She gave his messenger a blank I-don’t-speak-Spanish look. In response, he grabbed her upper arm, meaty fingers digging into her flesh, and yanked hard as he pulled her back the way she’d come.

  She was sweaty, tired, thirsty, and cranky as hell, and being manhandled for the umpteenth freaking time was the last damned straw. With both hands, Riva grabbed Andrés by his shirtfront and flipped him. He gave a very surprised and indignant shout as he spun ass over heels to land on his back in a thicket of dense shrubbery six feet away. “No grabbing, buddy. No damn grabbing.”

  Sin came alongside. His lips twitched, but he didn’t crack a smile. “I think you broke Andrés’s back, chica.”

  Riva didn’t bother glancing Andrés’s way as he untangled himself from the vegetation. “He looks fine to me.”

  Sin waved the men forward. After a feral look from Andrés, who was plucking leaves off his clothing as he staggered to his feet, the other men moved ahead without comment. He joined them, every line in his body tight and furious. She’d embarrassed him in front of his boss and coworkers. Riva hid a smile. Too bad, so sad.

  Now what? She shot Sin an inquiring look. He indicated something off to his left with a quick jerk of his chin.

  “Just wanted to check to see how you’re holding up,” he said easily as he underhanded her SIG to her. By its weight, she knew it held a full clip. So he’d observed their shadows, too. And he was trusting her enough to give her a loaded weapon?

  “It’s tough going over all these vines and wet vegetation,” he said. He gestured at the foliage, conveying a simple message: She was to go right when he went left. “Don’t want you to slip and fall.” Against his thigh, Sin flashed four fingers.

  “Let’s catch up to the others. Close the gap.” She nodded, but lifted her weapon instead of walking, looking beyond him.

  The men came out of the understory so quickly, so silently, that if Riva hadn’t known they were being followed, she’d have been taken by surprise. Their very silence made the attack the work of professionals. The susurrus of vegetation being disturbed and the men’s breathing was all the notice they were given before being converged on en masse.

  Two men headed her way and she was already gripping her SIG two-handed, more for show than intent. The second they ID’d themselves, she’d accompany them back to Escobar Maza. Riva had a twinge of conscience. She didn’t want to kill Maza’s people—a bad form of introduction—but she didn’t want Sin injured either. In no way relaxed, she held her stance, waiting to see how they were going to handle this. She watched the first man’s eyes as he approached, the muzzle pointed at his heart so there’d be no mistake that she’d shoot him if she had to.

  Out of the corner of her eye she saw three—no, four—more converge on Sin. No shots. They didn’t want to alert Sin’s men up ahead. But his men must know, otherwise he’d be calling for them. They were probably circling back.

  Not that Riva anticipated needing assistance. She had this.

  “They’ve come for me,” she shouted at Sin, wincing as a man punched him in the belly and another struck the side of his head with the butt of his submachine gun. What was that about? “I’ll go.” She held her weapon up on the flat of her hand and showed that the other was empty. “Maza sent you, right? I’ll g-“

  Wait.

  She knew these guys. Not knew, but recognized. What the hell? Hadn’t she seen the guy punching Sin walking past his window a couple of times back at the ANLF camp?

  Holy shit.

  These were Sin‘s men.

  Dropping the backpack quickly and struggling to get the heavy pack off her back, Riva spun a quarter turn to go back to help Sin, but more immediate problems distracted her. Two men came at her like rhinos across the plains. Except there was no flat ground and no open spaces as they charged her. She got off a shot, hit Number Two between the eyes. Number One kept coming, beefy arm outstretched to grab her.

  Off balance herself, with the backpack half on and half off, Riva used his extended arm as a fulcrum, spinning One around, then twisted his arm, high on his back. Ignoring his struggles, grunts of pain, and inventive swearing, she used his body as a shield against a third man.

  Number Three, heavyset, a dirty blue bandana wrapped around his head, came in from the side. Like a gangbanger, he wielded a knife and a sadistic leer. Riva shoved Number One at Number Three, and with shouts of fury the two men tangled together. They fell to the ground, but not before Number Three-Blue Bandana got the tip of his knife on her arm. Her SIG flew out of her hand. A thin slice of icy-heat seared her bicep as Bandana scissored her legs, knocking her onto her back beside him. Everything hard and lumpy in the backpack dug into an organ, knocking the wind out of her. Ow. Shit.

  He laughed as he dropped his ass on her midsection, pressing down on her diaphragm, restraining her with his superior weight and the knife at her throat. If he put his knees on her arms, as she’d done to Sin earlier, she was screwed. Fortunately he wasn’t that forward-thinking.

  Burdened by the heavy backpack, for a moment Riva was like a paralyzed turtle on her back. The trees swam sickeningly in her vision, mixing with black and sparks of brilliant white around the edges.

  Daylight was fading fast, and the smell of blood would draw animals. Where in the hell was Andrés while their men attacked their leader?

  Twisting was futile. He was just too damned heavy for any kind of movement. Kicking out was useless.

  Digging her heels hard into the ground, she attempted to arch her hips to buck him off. He was too well-seated and didn’t so much as budge. He laughed, telling her to do it again, that it made him hard when she pushed against his balls.

  The ground was hard and slimy with rotting vegetation. She tried to claw up wads of whatever the hell she was lying on to use as a weapon. His punch missed her face by millimeters when she deflected the blow with her forearm. Pain vibrated like a buzzy tuning fork through her bones and tendons.

  Managing to shift the strap of the backpack enough to free one arm—all the opportunity she needed—she used the heel of her hand in a swift palm strike to the underside of his nose, driving the bones into his brain. The crunch and spurt of blood was satisfying, but she didn’t stop to admire her own survival skills. Turning her head just in time, she avoided the splatter of his blood, then shoved his limp body off her and lunged to her feet, shaking off the backpack so she’d have both arms free.

  Number One, still trying to figure out what the hell had just happened, grabbed a thick tree trunk as he attempted to sta
nd. His swarthy face was gray with pain and beaded with sweat as he used the trunk as ballast. “¡Me rompiste el brazo, puta!”

  Yeah, she didn’t need him to tell her she’d broken his arm, judging by its angle. He wouldn’t be grabbing anyone for a while.

  “¡No le pegues a una mujer, verguita!” Don’t hit a woman, little dick, she replied.

  “Jesus, you’re just like my brother!” Sin grabbed her upper arm and hauled her the rest of the way to her feet. All the while he had his submachine gun trained on Number One, ten feet away. “You have a death wish, woman.”

  “You have a brother?” she asked, walking over to divest the guy of his weapons. She now had a cheap-shit hunting knife and an AK-47.

  “That’s the part of that sentence you picked out?” Sin shook his head, his dark gaze sizing her up from her head to her toes and lingering for a moment on her upper arm, then turned his attention to the guy clutching the tree trunk. “Who do you work for, Basto?” he demanded in rapid Spanish.

  Riva left the two lovebirds to their convo and went to retrieve the bags and her SIG.

  Shoving both arms into the straps of the heavy pack, she was careful to avoid the bloody cut on her other arm. Then she repositioned herself in the spot where she’d been standing when she’d lost her grip on the SIG and began walking in the direction it had flown, cursing the vines and leaves that seemed to have swallowed it whole.

  Breaking off a branch she used it to push back the greenery until she caught a telltale glint on the ground. Just as well; it was starting to get dark and she would have hated to lose her favorite gun. She picked it up and headed back to Sin. The wound needed to be tended to, she knew, but she didn’t have anything clean enough. Not even anything clean enough to mop up the blood. A sweaty tank top or filthy bandana would just exacerbate potential infection.

  Ignoring the blood sluggishly dripping down her arm, she wondered what had happened to the other men who’d attacked them. And where the hell were Andrés and Sin’s small, trusted dream team? She paused for a second, focusing her thoughts internally. No. Not one damn prediction or premonition. The lack of a vision was inconvenient as hell.

  She heard a shot and sped up, SIG in one hand, AK-47 in the other, as birds flew from the trees in a noisy flurry of wings and loud cheeping.

  Sin met her halfway, at a dead run. “Move!” He shoved her back the way she’d come.

  Riva moved. Hard not to when he had her by the wrist and was crashing and thrashing his way to God only knew where and almost breaking her bones. He wasn’t using the machete. Just pushing through where he could, or changing course when he couldn’t. It would be hard for their pursuers to track them in the gloom without having a tunnel of hacked branches to follow.

  Shots sounded behind them. Close, but the shooters weren’t visible. Turning, she brought up the SIG. Sin grabbed it by the barrel and shook his head.

  “You idiot,” Riva whispered furiously. “I almost shot your hand off.”

  Pushing aside a fern frond twice his height, he shoved her through it, then let it fall like a curtain behind them. “Muzzle flash. Go. Go. Go.”

  They picked up speed. Not by much. But faster than was safe in this environment. The alternative was worse.

  A volley of shots echoed behind them, and voices carried in the semidarkness. A muzzle flash. Then another. The sound set off the animals so that the understory was alive with darting creatures. Her eyes had adjusted to the low level of light, but they weren’t going to be able to see anything when it got pitch-dark, and a flashlight, when they had people hard on their tails, was out of the question. “Who?”

  “No fucking idea.” He held her upright as she tripped over a thick root, or an anaconda for all she knew. They were running. Or rather, walking as fast as possible, considering they were in dense jungle. “Almost there.”

  She didn’t bother to ask almost where? Apparently she was about to find out. Sin released her wrist, but she still felt the steel bands of his fingers circling her arm. “Stand right here,” he told her quietly. “Don’t move.”

  He melted into the trees.

  Straining for any unnatural sounds, Riva didn’t move for a good ten minutes, until she thought he’d either been killed or had decided she was a liability.

  His footfall was surprisingly light as he returned at a run. Without a word he grabbed her around the waist and ran with her. Straight for a wall of dense vegetation.

  She heard them then. Whispered voices, arguing.

  Sin had his arm around the backpack on her back, motivating her to move fast. Riva didn’t argue.

  “This is far enough. Hang tight. As far as I know nobody knows about this place. But be prepared to shoot the first person you see.”

  “I see you,” she whispered, only half joking as she turned the way they’d just come, weapon raised. It was getting dark and everything looked a mottled gray. With her attention fixed ahead, she was peripherally aware of a vast space behind her, the smell of damp earth, animal droppings, and Sin.

  There was only one smell—his—that could distract her, and it became even more distracting when he reached across her to lift the strap of her bag from her shoulder and set it down, then moved in front of her, blocking her view.

  Nudging his arm with the barrel of the AK-47, she moved to stand beside him. “Chivalrous, but unnecessary,” she whispered, inexplicably touched that he’d risk his life for someone he didn’t trust.

  In response, he slid one arm around her waist. She felt the rock-hard length of him against her back. Felt the steady beat of his heart against her shoulder blade. Felt his arm across her body, his big hand splayed, unnecessarily she thought, across her midriff. She was aware of the weight of each finger, and the promise of his thumb moving a few inches to touch her nipple.

  They both held their weapons pointed at the arch of greenery at the end of what appeared to be a rock cave, the entrance obscured by foliage. Sin pulled her more tightly against him as the voices got closer and closer. Braced, she wondered how he could be so completely relaxed and focused when she was as tense as a drawn bowstring.

  The beam of bright flashlights cut across the dirt ten feet in front of her boots. It was filtered, diffused by the leafy vines. She held her breath…

  Unless one knew where to look, the labyrinth of centuries-old, played-out emerald mines crisscrossing the mountain were obscured from view by downed trees, or—like this one—covered in wrist-thick vines and deadfall.

  Three months ago, when he figured out his life was going sideways, Sin had discovered a series of old mine entrances when scouting. He’d marked them, then returned when he was alone. He’d outfitted several bolt-holes to the south toward his hidden boat on the river, one to the south toward Abad, and several more in the direction of Santa de Porres. Four in all. Some with enough supplies to outlast a weeklong siege, others with just bare necessities.

  In case of what, he hadn’t been sure. Now, he knew his instincts were sound, and weren’t simply fears based on paranoia.

  This particular mineshaft was deeper than it was wide. The decades-old wooden support beams had long since rotted, and the roof had collapsed in places, leaving piles of rocks on the uneven ground. They could stay here for days if necessary. Although he didn’t relish being trapped here for any length of time, darkness was already blanketing the jungle. Inside would be safer than out.

  Sin realized that if he held Riva any more tightly, she’d be behind him. He loosened his death grip only slightly, enough to feel her chest expand as she drew in a silent shuddering breath. Surrounded by his arms, her back flush against his chest, she remained motionless, her SIG trained on the heavily armed men outside, her arms not wavering.

  Sin had believed them to be friends, yet their intent was crystal clear. Kill.

  Question was: Him or Riva?

  What the fuck was going on?

  He’d caught glimpses of the faces of the men pursuing them, and recognized their voices. Cesar. Vince
nte. Geosue. Men he’d worked beside for months, if not the years they assured him he’d known them. Now they appeared determined to kill him?

  He and Riva had killed Lamora, Deltz, Alejos, and Basto. Four men dead. And no answers.

  And how the hell did Andrés fit into this goatfuck? Because his friend hadn’t U-turned to come back to assist. Unless Andrés had been killed in the attack? And how the hell would Sin know one way or the other?

  The three men stood less than half a dozen feet outside their hiding place, their voices low and indistinct.

  He gripped Riva’s shoulder and pressed down, firmly, a clear “stay here” order, and crept slowly, silently, to the greenery. He moved one of the inner vines just enough to be able to see the men. Geosue rolled a stick of gum into his mouth. Clearly Sin’s admonitions that the smell of mint would tip off an adversary were for naught. Crumpling the paper, he tossed it into the foliage nearby.

  Moron.

  Sin trained the barrel of the Glock right in the middle of the man’s sweating forehead. One move toward the entrance, and he’d be dead.

  Go away. What the hell could they be discussing? They’d failed at the task. He and Riva could be miles away by now. Go. Rest up. Hit harder tomorrow. For fucksake, that’s what he’d trained them to do. Go fucking do it.

  It would serve them right if he blew them all away right now. No question he could do it without any of them being able to get a shot off. The catch was that he couldn’t be sure if there were more men with them, who’d come running, find the bodies, and start the search again. All things considered, it was better to stay hidden for now.

  Riva had a knife slice on her upper arm that needed tending, and he’d taken a hard blow to the temple from the butt of Cesar’s submachine gun. Sin blinked back a blur of blood from the corner of his eye.

  Riva had fought hard and well. Trained, without a doubt. That could prove to be an asset or a fucking liability if she turned those skills on him.