Rogue

by Laura Marie Altom

  Having reached the expert level on the If Only game, he knew the drill. A killer headache typically set in, followed by hours of nausea-inducing guilt. He’d down a half-dozen beers, sleep it off, then wake to a new day.

  Here, with Maisey’s safety his responsibility, he didn’t have the luxury of nursing his pain. He needed to snap out of it and get his head back in the game. But that was kind of hard, considering Maisey’s baby bump constantly reminded him of all he’d lost.

  Was he jealous that her son was still alive? Hell, yeah. But he was also that much more determined to keep him that way. He’d already lost one woman and child he had promised to protect, and it would never happen again.

  As for the personal history between Maisey and him? Old news never to be revisited.

  Nash forced himself to focus on his projects.

  The insect chatter had a rise and fall rhythm to which he matched his inhalations. Slow breathing helped get his runaway emotions in check. Hope and their unborn son were in a better place, being looked after by a power far more capable than him. As for Maisey, she’d soon be back with her mother—although not in their hometown of Jacksonville as she’d planned. Until Vicente was dead or locked behind bars, Nash feared Maisey and her son might never be truly safe.

  But then realistically, could anyone ever be one hundred percent safe?

  Lord knew, he’d been a fool for thinking they could.

  6

  “I’VE GOT TO rest.” Maisey hated being physically weak, but two hours into their trek to the backup boat Nash had hidden, every inch of her body ached. Muscles she hadn’t even known existed screamed for relief—even better, a soak in a nice, hot bath.

  “You’ve got five minutes,” Nash said. He presented her with the plastic tube from which she’d seen him drinking. Silly, but sharing the mouthpiece struck her as overly intimate.

  The last time her lips touched his had been in high school.

  She drank, but in the process, inadvertently locked her gaze with his. To her over-sensitized nerves, the sensation was akin to a kiss. Sharply looking away, she drank her fill, then returned the tube.

  With her cheeks flushed from the brush of his fingers against hers, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to use the fan Nash had made her.

  “Eat this.” From the fathomless pits of his cargo pants pockets, he took a protein bar. While it was misshapen and partially melted, never had food tasted so good.

  “What about you?”

  Kneeling alongside a decaying log with his back to her, he fished for an insect that his pose kept her from seeing. Popping it in his mouth, he chewed.

  Fighting not to retch, Maisey asked, “How can you do that?”

  “It’s called survival. Don’t knock it. If we’re out here much longer, you might also be dining on grubs.”

  “Never,” she assured with a shudder, fanning all the harder.

  “Watch what you say, or you’ll jinx us.” His smile lit his eyes—gray and crinkled at the corners from time in the sun. She couldn’t imagine the kinds of things he’d seen. Didn’t want to. But because of him, she was alive. Uncomfortable, but safe. She owed him everything.

  Extending her his hand, he helped her back to her feet—no easy task this far into her pregnancy. As if protesting her sudden motion, her baby jolted.

  She grimaced.

  “What’s wrong? You okay?”

  Nodding, she said, “This little guy has a way of kicking my ribs that seriously hurts. Wanna feel? He’s really on the move.”

  He reached out, but then drew back. “I’m good. Thanks for the offer, though.”

  “When your wife was pregnant, did you ever watch her belly?” Realizing that regardless of Nash’s answer, the question could be construed as cruel, she covered awkward silence with more of her own chatter. “A few months ago, before learning the kind of man I’d married—correction, thought I’d married—Vicente used to be fascinated with studying our son. Sometimes our baby’s tiny foot would arc all the way across my belly and Vicente would stare as if he’d never seen a better show. I don’t get it. How a man can be two people at once. To me—at least before I’d told him I was leaving—he’d been kind and gentle and caring. Upon realizing I’d not only witnessed him killing his associate but intended to tell police, he transformed to a monster. Sounds corny, but when we married, I’d never felt more vibrant and alive. Now, I feel like the ghost of someone I used to know.”

  “Ready?” Nash tapped his watch.

  “Seriously?” Maisey wasn’t sure what she’d expected from Nash after she’d poured out the most intimate details of the life she’d once shared with a madman, but acting as if she’d merely commented on the weather wasn’t it. “That’s all you have to say?”

  Using his machete, he slashed a path for her to follow through thick vegetation. “Sorry for what Vicente put you through, but I asked you last night to stay out of my personal business. Asking me about my dead wife’s baby bump?” He slashed harder at the vines blocking their course. “Not cool.”

  “For what it’s worth,” she struggled to keep up with his powerful pace, “the second the question left my mouth, I regretted it. Please don’t be angry. I—”

  “I’m not angry.” He stopped alongside a water oak. Arched his neck. He wore a heavy helmet with night vision goggles on top. Sweat dampened his tan complexion and she could only imagine how hot he was under his equipment. Regret weighed heavy on her conscience for making what was already a bad time, worse. “What burns me is how you, my mom, my so-called friends—even your mom—all feel entitled to talk about a private, painful part of my life I’d rather lock in a vault.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “That’s another thing—” his renewed slashing took on a desperate feel “—I’m sick of folks telling me what I mean. How I should feel. Get it through your head, what happened to Hope and our unborn son is something I can’t even begin to process—don’t want to. They meant everything to me, and . . .” He froze.

  “What?” she whispered, fearing another snake.

  “Listen . . .”

  From an impossible to judge distance came unmistakable baying. Dogs. “Think they’re out here for us?”

  “Can’t say for sure, but if I were a bad guy, tracking my pregnant woman through an impassable swamp, seems like a reasonable way to go.”

  7

  JUST WHEN NASH thought his day couldn’t get worse . . .

  With hounds baying from what couldn’t be more than a mile away, he surveyed the bullet-riddled aluminum jon boat. Stomach fisted, he eyed Maisey who barely had strength to stand. With Vicente having ruined their last best hope of a quick escape, this supposedly simple in-and-out mission had become infinitely more complex.

  “Y-you have another backup plan, right?” Her complexion had turned unnaturally pale.

  “Sure.” Of course, he had a plan, he just hadn’t voiced it yet—or, even thought of it. But for sure it was germinating. He hoped.

  Removing his helmet, he used his forearm to wipe sweat from his brow. The day’s heat and humidity were brutal. Had he known they’d face this dilemma, he’d have taken the day to rest, opting to travel by night.

  “Mind sharing?”

  He glanced her way. “What?”

  “The plan? Those dogs sound awfully close.”

  True. “Sorry, but to mask our scent, we’re gonna have to hit the water.”

  Nose wrinkled, she asked, “The black, mossy, foul-smelling water we’ve counted six hungry gators eyeballing us from?”

  “One and the same.”

  The dog’s barks grew more frantic.

  Nash took the camo netting from the useless boat, then stood alongside Maisey, wrapping it around them both. “Let’s go.”

  Spying a clump of alligator weed, he broke two lengths of the hollow stems.

  Handing one to Maisey, Nash said, “If I give you the signal, as quietly as possible, duck underwater. Use this as a snorkel.”
/>   She folded her arms and scowled. “I can’t put my head under water. You know that. Remember Allysa Franklin’s thirteenth birthday? She had a pool party and Johnny Preston dunked me? I almost drowned.”

  “Stop the histrionics. And for the record, I saved you.” Judging by the frantic baying, the hounds couldn’t have been more than a quarter mile away. Nash considered himself unflappable, but his usual companions were SEALs. Without question, they did what needed to be done. Maisey was a delicate unknown. He not only had her to worry about, but her baby. The closer the dogs came, the more he feared he might not be up for this challenge. Palms sweating, pulse racing, he shook off his nerves. This was no time to fold. “When I say, you will put that stem in your mouth and duck. Not only your life, but your baby’s depends on you following my instructions to the letter. Understand?”

  Her doe-eyed stare left him regretting his rough demeanor.

  Hand on the small of her back, he led her slowly into the water. When he’d initially covered the boat, he’d laced the camo netting with reeds and grasses. Honestly, he was surprised Vicente hadn’t assigned hired guns to wait for them at each boat. It would have been a logical move. The fact that he hadn’t made Nash wonder just how adept his team was at hunting human targets. “This waterway looks like it has a slight current. We’re going to ride it with this mini-island over our heads. You’ll be able to breathe, but I'm not gonna lie—it won’t be pleasant. To Vicente’s men, we’ll look like debris.”

  The barking and baying was near enough to raise the hair on the back of Nash’s neck.

  “The bad guys are close, Maisey. This is basic snorkeling. Piece of cake.”

  Though her eyes read pure panic, she again nodded. With her teeth already chattering, Nash placed their odds at about fifty/fifty in making a clean escape. Toss in the gator/snake/hypothermia/wild-card factor and it was shaping up to be a seriously lousy day.

  Having reached the center of the narrow channel’s flow, Nash adjusted the net in time to spot a hound alternately baying and lapping at the algae-covered water’s edge.

  Maisey whispered, “He doesn’t look like he wants to kill us, does he?”

  “All he wants is to find our scent.”

  Crashing foliage and a deep, Southern drawl alerted Nash that the dog’s master wasn’t far behind. “Stupid mutt. Told Vicente to search with a heli, but he said it would draw too much attention.”

  “Ask me,” a new voice sounded through tall grasses, “Vicente’s pretty little thing is long gone. This search is a waste of time.” Approaching a second frantically barking dog, the man patted him between his ears. “What’re you all excited about?”

  “Got your snorkel ready?” Nash whispered in Maisey’s ear. The current was painstakingly slow in clearing them from danger.

  Fingers trembling, she held it for him to see.

  “Good girl. On the count of three, we’re both going to slowly descend. Got it?”

  “Uh huh . . .”

  “One . . .”

  “Hey, there, fella. See something?” one of the men called to his dog.

  A bald hulk of a man sporting full sleeve tattoos and a goatee, stared right at them. Nash had taken special care weaving plants through the netting and knew to the men onshore they looked like a floating isle of weeds, but that didn’t stop the event from being unnerving.

  “Two . . .”

  Having entered upstream of where their hunters had emerged from dense undergrowth, Nash and Maisey were ten yards from being dead even with them. If his pulse raced much faster, he feared passing out. On his own or with his team, there was no emotion—only adrenaline in its purest form, something that sharpened frayed nerves. Now, he was consumed by what if scenarios and concern for Maisey that he couldn’t control.

  “Popcorn, what the heck are you—”

  Before Nash could give Maisey her signal to duck, an eight-foot gator erupted from the shoreline’s thick algae, snapping off the nearest hound’s right front leg. Before the dog’s handler fully grasped what was happening, the gator returned to finish his meal, dragging the howling canine into the water until the swamp fell eerily silent.

  “That slimy fucker killed my best hunting hound!”

  “This is voodoo. I’m out of here.”

  Breathing shallow, Nash could only imagine the riot raging in Maisey’s chest. He wanted to comfort her, but couldn’t risk the movement. No matter how distracted Vicente’s men might currently be, there was no guarantee they might not look up to discover their intended targets right before them.

  Maisey silently cried. Lips pressed tight, silvery tears streaked mud on her cheeks. He admired her for holding her emotions in check, but he’d be lying if he said he didn’t wish for the right thing to say to calm her.

  “I’m gonna kill you, stupid sumbitch!” The dog’s owner used an M16 to shoot wildly at the water.

  Though mini-explosions formed a wake and turned algae into projectiles, Nash held firm to Maisey. She, in turn, clung to him so tightly he wouldn’t be surprised to find bruises. Which was all right. Whatever she needed to get her through.

  Over and over the guy fired his weapon, not stopping until running out of ammo.

  Ten feet upstream, the gator rose belly-up to the surface.

  What remained of the dog followed.

  Maisey tensed alongside him. Little convulsions told him she wasn’t in a good way.

  “Relax,” he whispered in her ear. “Everything’s going to be fine.

  “No. No, it’s not.” Though she’d spoken so softly he’d hardly heard her words, the panic in her eyes and complexion’s pall said more than she ever could to describe her terror.

  “Shh . . .” Temporarily releasing her to bracket her face with his hands, he begged, “Trust me. We’re almost home free.” For a moment, he lost himself in her achingly familiar blue gaze. They were no longer in a swamp, but on her mom’s back porch, on the verge of sharing a kiss. What was wrong with his mind that it had chosen now for a trek down memory lane?

  “Nash?” She licked her lips. Her pupils widened, and if possible, her eyes grew even wider.

  “Yeah?” He didn’t even know the asshole inside him who couldn’t look away from her plump mouth.

  “In case we don’t make it, thank you for trying.”

  “Stop. We’ll be fine.” Assuming I forget the way things used to be between us long enough to focus on the task at hand.

  Then, the unthinkable happened when the dog’s owner crashed into the water. The dog’s body had floated into the current and was now a mere five feet from Nash and Maisey.

  “Leave him!” The guy still on shore urged.

  “No! He was a good dog and deserves a decent burial.” Who knew? A thug with heart.

  Nash’s adrenaline spiked. “I need both hands. Think you can hold on to me?”

  Maisey’s answer was to hug his chest.

  “Good girl . . .”

  Hands free, with their hunter fifteen feet away and the dog practically on top of them, Nash withdrew his Glock that he’d already outfitted with a sound suppressor. Given luck, the goon would be too focused on his dog to inspect floating grass.

  “Stupid waste of life,” Vicente’s man mumbled on his approach to his dog.

  Nash pushed past his latest swell of nerves.

  “He was a good boy.”

  The dog was now three feet from Nash.

  Maisey tucked herself behind him.

  His pulse thundered in his ears.

  The guy was now in water over his head. His thrashing strokes surged the dog’s body against the grass-covered mat. Unless the man was fully focused on his pet, there was no possible way he and Maisey wouldn’t be discovered.

  “Sorry, boy. You shouldn’t have—”

  In his struggle to tread water, the guy kicked Nash. Time froze for the instant it took him to realize he wasn’t alone. He tossed the netting aside, shouting to his friend on shore, “Hey! Found them!”

  Bullets r
ipped the water.

  With no way to escape, Nash did what he’d been trained to do—double-tap the forehead of the man shooting at them from shore.

  Maisey screamed.

  The guy in the water grabbed for Nash, but lacked the swimming strength to stay afloat. Nash lunged for him, but the guy had been smart enough to swim underwater for shallower ground. Once able to stand, he sloshed for shore, snatching up his weapon with one hand and radio with the other. Simultaneously, he radioed for back-up and shot wildly at the water.

  “Duck!” Nash shouted to Maisey.

  The guy had lost it, firing dozens of rounds to the accompaniment of his own roar. When he was forced to stop shooting long enough to reload, Nash made his second kill of the day.

  Maisey had floated further downstream and now cried hysterically. “You killed him!”

  “What else was I supposed to do?” Nash shouted back. “It was us or them, and sorry, but I’m not in the mood to die.”

  Having reached her, he tried lightly grasping her in a lifeguard-style hold, but she wasn’t having it. “Let me go! I can’t take this anymore!”

  Ignoring her protests in favor of getting her safely ashore, Nash grabbed the back of her shirt, dragging her as best he could.

  From over the dead guy’s radio, a tinny voice asked, “LeFlour, copy? You there?” Was that Vicente on the other end? “Did I hear right and you caught the intended targets? LeFlour? Come in! What’s your location?”

  Once Nash delivered Maisey to the muddy shore, he started to gut the radio, but then thought better. Information could be gleaned from chatter.

  Nash put his hand over his mouth to muffle his voice. “False alarm. I repeat false alarm.”

  “We heard shots.”

  “Wildlife kill. No sign of your lady, sir.”

  “Keep looking!”

  “You’re no better than Vicente.” Maisey sat up, hugging her massive belly. Rocking and crying with her hands over her face. “You shot those men right between their eyes.”

  “Woman, are you crazy?” Searching the dead for usable equipment, Nash could scarcely contain his rage. “I killed those two men for our safety—your baby’s. They shot at us first. Dozens of rounds. It’s a miracle we’re even alive.”