One stopped and peered across the landscape, his gaze sweeping by Bella and Victor’s location. She froze, praying the grass obscured her face enough to keep her hidden. He kept looking back in their direction, like he thought he saw something, but didn’t make any kind of move.
A few seconds later, he spoke to the second guard, who was standing on the run-down porch. She couldn’t hear what they said, but the second guard nodded and went inside.
She waited until both guards had moved into the run-down farmhouse before she holstered her tranq gun and brought her rifle around to get a better look through the scope.
Victor pulled out binoculars and scooted lower to help obscure them from sight.
Through the broken windows, Bella could see a faint glow, like someone had turned on a lantern. Shadows moved across the opening, giving her a clear view of Gage being shoved into a chair. He was secured in place with several layers of duct tape, struggling the whole time to free himself.
His back was to her. They ripped off his hood, revealing several bloody gashes and bruises across the back of his head and neck. His shirt was torn at the collar, and blood soaked through in several places.
Bella had gotten his name in the secret Santa gift exchange at work last Christmas. She’d bought him that shirt knowing it would match his faded denim blue eyes perfectly. He’d worn it enough times for her to know he really did like it.
She couldn’t see his face, which was probably a small blessing. There was no telling how battered he’d be by now. They’d had him for so long. She only hoped that whatever had been done to him was something that would heal.
One of the guards slugged him in the gut.
Bella’s stomach did a swooping dive. She had to look away and take a couple of deep breaths before she could face seeing more abuse.
“Easy, honey. He’s tough,” said Victor. “And he’s almost home.”
She called people honey all the time, yet on his lips it sounded different. More intimate. “I really want to go down there and bash in a few heads.”
“So do I, but that’s not going to do him any good if he gets shot. Every one of those men is armed. Even the drivers.”
She’d been so focused on Gage she hadn’t even bothered to look at the drivers. When she did, she saw the unmistakable outline of automatic rifles visible through the windows.
Her attention went back to Gage. He was slumped over, his shoulders heaving with pain from another blow.
“It looks like they’re interrogating him. Why would they do that now?” she asked. “Why not do that when he’s safely behind locked doors?”
“Something’s not right here,” said Victor. He began scanning the area.
Bella couldn’t take her eyes off of Gage. She needed to get down there and free him. He was tough, but he looked like he had already been through hell. Each blow those men struck seemed to weaken him.
“We need to move in,” she said. “He can’t take much more of this.”
“Don’t you dare go down there,” said Victor in a tone of absolute command. “I think that’s what they’re hoping for.”
“What?” She had no idea what he meant.
“I think they know we’re here.”
Before she could so much as open her mouth to question him, a twig snapped behind them.
Bella spun around to deal with the threat, but the barrel of her rifle caught on the long weeds, slowing her down. An armed man was right behind them, his rifle aimed at her head. She couldn’t bring her own weapon around in time to stop him.
She saw his finger tighten on the trigger and knew there wasn’t a thing she could do to stop it.
Chapter Thirteen
Fear flooded Bella’s system. In a fraction of a second she sorted through all her options and discarded each of them as useless. Even if she dropped her rifle and went for her nonlethal sidearm, she’d never get a shot off in time. Rolling aside in an effort to dodge a bullet was also a futile effort.
All she could do was hope the man hit her body armor and not her skull.
She was vaguely aware of Victor beside her, moving too fast for her to track. He had rolled onto his back, lifting his weapon as he went.
Gunfire exploded, ringing in her ears. She jerked, certain that she’d been hit. There was no way she couldn’t have been at this close range.
A dark spot bloomed between the man’s eyes. It was the only skin showing beneath the matte black fabric covering his body. He went still, blinked once, then fell backward.
Victor had killed him and no doubt saved her life. Again.
Payton’s voice was a frantic buzz in her ear. She stopped questioning what was going on and reacted to the events happening around her. They weren’t out of the woods yet.
There was movement on her left. She abandoned her rifle and pulled her tranq gun from the holster on her thigh. By the time she had the weapon aimed, the movement had solidified into the shape of a man in a skintight suit. Only his eyes were visible beneath the matte black fabric he wore, and they were camouflaged with dark greasepaint.
Bella fired her gun at the same time the man did. She felt his bullet graze her calf, adding to the pain of the wounds she’d already sustained. He grunted and flinched back under the force of her hit to his shoulder. The dart stuck, but he didn’t go down.
She fired again, and this time, Victor added his own tranq dart.
The man fell back. Transparent yellow fluid spewed from the skintight suit, arching up to catch the moonlight. He landed on his ass. His gun fell from his limp grip to clatter on the rocky ground as he finally passed out.
“What the hell is going on down there?” barked Payton over the headset.
Bella responded. “We were ambushed. It’s a trap.”
“Get out of there!”
She scanned the area, searching for more signs of movement. A quick glance at the pool of liquid forming under one of the men told her it wasn’t blood.
“Coolant,” said Victor. “Their suits are filled with coolant so we can’t see them on thermals.”
“Hold on,” said Payton. He came back on the line a second later. “Norwood switched the satellite feed. It’s too dark for a clear picture, but there’s nothing visible from our end.”
“Watch my back,” ordered Bella. “I’m checking on Gage.”
She rolled back into position, taking up her rifle in her hands again. There was no way the men below hadn’t heard all the gunfire. She just hoped that they hadn’t managed to haul Gage off before she could stop them.
Through the scope she saw two men exit the house and take up covered positions. They were armed with automatic rifles. There was still one man left inside guarding Gage.
One of the trucks backed up toward the farmhouse. The rear doors were still open.
The men were going to get away. With Gage.
“Like hell,” she spat as she leveled her rifle and took aim. This time the ammo was one hundred percent lethal.
Her shot tore through one of the truck’s tires. A volley of automatic gunfire erupted from the porch as the men defended their means of escape. Bits of grass and weeds rained down on her, tickling her cheek.
She ignored the sensation in order to take out another tire. Just as she was about to pull the trigger, a strong hand closed around her ankle and dragged her down the hill.
She realized it was Victor right before she did something stupid, like shoot him.
“I almost had the shot,” she said.
“You certainly did.” He pointed to the shredded weeds that had been mowed down by the men at the house. She’d been in that exact spot only a second before.
Her armor might have held at this distance. Then again, it might not have.
“Your muzzle flash gave you away,” said Victor. “We have to move.”
She nodded and pu
shed to her feet, keeping below the ridgeline. They skirted around the hill and took up position several yards away. The house was a bit farther away, but she had a clear shot. Assuming they didn’t locate her again quite so fast.
“Can you hit tires from here?” she asked Victor.
“I can.”
“Start at the front. I’ll start at the back. We’ll only get one shot before we have to move again.”
He nodded and they both crawled up the slope to take their shots.
She found the window again to check on Gage. He was still tied to that chair, facing away. Part of her was glad she couldn’t see his face. He wasn’t the kind of man who showed fear, but if she saw he was afraid now, it would have made it only harder for her to focus.
“They’re on the move,” said Victor. “Two men heading for the truck.”
As he said the words, the man in the house lifted his pistol and fired a round into Gage’s head at point-blank range. He slumped in the chair where he was bound. The chair tipped over in slow motion, but he didn’t so much as twitch to stop his fall.
Gage was dead.
Bella screamed in denial. Her friend of more years than she could count—the man who’d saved her life over and over—was dead.
It couldn’t be real. He was too good a man to die like that.
Her roar of grief and rage exploded out of her chest. She shot to her feet and charged the man who’d taken her friend’s life. She was going to kill that bastard, even if it was the last thing she ever did.
Chapter Fourteen
Victor realized what had happened the second he heard the single shot below followed immediately by Bella’s tormented scream.
Gage was dead.
She burst from their covered position. He wasn’t quite fast enough to let go of his rifle and grab her before she could bolt. His only option now was to keep her alive long enough to yell at her for being so reckless.
He laid down a steady stream of cover fire while she raced to the farmhouse. The men below stayed pinned down, but there were too many of them. One of them was going to take her out, even if it was with a lucky shot.
He was almost out of ammo. She was almost out of time.
Bella emptied her rifle as she ran. Her shots tore through a rotting support post, hitting the man hiding behind it. He fell and didn’t get back up.
Another man darted from cover toward the back of the open truck. Victor didn’t want to kill the man, but at this range, he had no choice. His tranq gun wouldn’t work at this distance, and once that man reached the truck, he’d be in the perfect position to kill Bella.
Victor aimed for the man’s right arm. His hit was good, but the man didn’t stop. He snarled as he turned, tossing his gun to his left hand in a move worthy of Hollywood. The look of hatred on his face as he spotted Bella was more than enough proof that he thought she’d fired the shot.
The man raised his weapon. Victor shifted his aim and fired.
The man fell where he stood, dead.
So much for saving the lives of the people Stynger had hurt.
Before Victor had time to think about what he’d been forced to do, another man flung the farmhouse door open and started firing at Bella.
She fired back, but her rifle was empty. As she ran, she pulled a pair of tranq guns from her holsters and fired.
Another man popped up from his concealed position, taking aim at her.
Victor’s gun clicked. Empty. He was useless from here now. He had to get closer.
He broke through the weeds, running as fast as he could to close the distance between him and the men below.
Shots rang out from everyone. Bella must have finally realized the danger she faced and dove behind a low stone wall around what had once been a decorative planting. The men who remained started retreating for the truck at the same time, playing a deadly game of leapfrog as they covered one another.
One of them spotted Victor in the dark. He called out a warning to his buddies, who turned to face the incoming threat.
There was nowhere for Victor to hide. The best he could do was hit the ground and hope that the shallow depression in the earth and his body armor would keep him from being injured, or worse.
As he dove for the dirt, one of the bad guys fell. Bella rose from her hiding place, wielding a pistol in each hand.
“You will not kill another one of my men!” she screamed as she fired.
There was no calm in her anywhere. He could see the frantic flurry of emotion rioting through her shaking frame, hear it in her wavering voice. Still, her guns were steady as she fired, felling another man.
The last one dove headfirst into the truck and yelled, “Go, go, go!”
The truck took off, gaining speed as it went.
Bella kept firing into the back. The man inside returned fire, and based on the dirt flying up around her feet, it was only a matter of seconds before she took a hit.
Victor sprang up and tackled her to the ground, covering her body with his as the truck and its occupants fled.
She fought against his hold, but he kept her pinned down safely until the sound of the engine was too faint to be heard.
By the time it was safe to let go, her body was shaking with sobs of grief.
Victor turned her over, and the emotional devastation lining her face was enough to break even a strong man’s heart.
“They killed him,” she said between hard, heavy breaths. “Shot him in the head at close range.”
He didn’t ask if she was sure. Every tear that fell told him she was. And he sure as hell wasn’t eager to let her go in that house and see the damage that had been done to their friend’s body up close.
“Confirm what you just said,” Payton said.
“Gage is dead,” she said, then shoved off her headset.
“We’re coming for you now,” Payton said, but only Victor heard it.
All he could do was hold her while the emotional storm raged through her, so that’s what he did. He wrapped his arms around her and held on tight. Their weapons and armor made the hug awkward, but no less potent. He would have rather felt her body’s softness against him, but even this—with the tough plates of armor blocking the feel of her—was good. It struck some chord deep inside of him, creating a kind of harmony he’d never before experienced.
He hated her pain, but felt like he’d been born for this very moment—born to hold and comfort her when no one else could.
Victor kept his senses open, making sure none of the enemy was left behind. He stroked her hair and face, giving her every bit of solace he knew how to offer.
After a few minutes, her tears dried up and she began closing herself off from him. He could feel the process happen in the way she went tense, in the way she began peeling herself away from his embrace.
He let her go grudgingly, wondering if he’d ever again have the chance to hold her while simultaneously hoping he’d never have a reason quite so gruesome. Suffering was the last thing he wanted for her.
She got to her feet and scrubbed the wetness from her face. She put fresh magazines in her weapons and dusted the dirt and weeds from her clothes. By the time she looked at him again, she was wearing her game face.
“I’m going in there to get him,” she said.
“Let me do it,” Victor offered.
“He’s my man. My friend. I’ll do it.”
“I’m not letting you go alone. I don’t care if you scream at me or hit me or draw a weapon. I’m going in there with you.”
She swallowed hard and nodded.
Victor walked beside her to the house, letting her set the pace. He kept his body between her and the dead men lying nearby. They hadn’t been her friends, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t be hurt by their deaths, too. As tough as she was, she still had a heart—one he was just now learning was vuln
erable to pain and grief like everyone else.
For some reason, that made him like her even more. It also made him want to protect her, which for a woman like Bella, was practically a sin.
She paused in the doorway. There was a battery-operated lantern still glowing inside. They couldn’t yet see Gage’s body, but even knowing it was there was enough to give the house the feel of a tomb.
Victor put his hand at the small of her back, offering what support he could. He didn’t push or hold her back. He simply waited beside her until she was ready.
Bella stepped inside the threshold and stopped. Blood lay splattered across the dusty wood floor in a pattern that reminded him of fireworks. The body lay slumped, still tied to the chair. The back of his head was a pulpy crater where the bullet had exited his skull.
The sound of her breathing through her mouth was loud in the quiet house. She let out a faint whimper that Victor studiously ignored.
He couldn’t let her see more. It wasn’t fair to let the sight of Gage with a gunshot wound to his head be the last memory she had of him.
“Stay here,” he said, using the same tone he did to order men under his command.
He stripped out of his armor and shirt. The armor went back on, but the shirt was going over Gage’s head to hide it from sight.
Victor stepped around the body to cover his face and stopped dead in midmotion. He tilted his head to get a better view.
“It’s not Gage,” he said.
Bella blinked twice and frowned, confused. “What?”
Victor looked again to be sure. He didn’t want to get her hopes up, but there was no way he was wrong. This man’s nose was too large, his face too wide. “It’s not him.”
“But I was so sure. The build, the clothes . . .”
He lifted his gaze, hating that he had to ask her to do this. “I was sure, too. But come see for yourself.”
She stepped around the body, giving it a wide margin. The dead man stared lifelessly at her boots. “His eyes are brown. Gage has blue eyes. It’s not him.” The sound of relief in her voice was palpable.
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