Edge of Courage (Edge Security Series Book 5) (22 page)

He set her down. “No time. Go to the roof. Wait for me.” He ran down the steps faster than before, jumping steps.

“The roof?” she called.

“Trust me,” he yelled, praying she actually would. He had one chance to save them both and he wouldn’t fail.

Dylan sprinted down the stairs, slowing only marginally when he opened the door on the first floor. He turned right to head to the kitchens and the back door there. Soldiers rushed past him, carrying rifles. He nodded at them, but kept striding along, acting as if he belonged here. He was just another soldier.

He didn’t see anyone else and jogged until he hit the back entrance. He threw back his shoulders and pushed the door open. Double the usual amount of soldiers patrolled the outside of the building. He and Sarah would never have made it together. The guards checked in on radios.

Without looking in either direction, he strode across the parking lot, his gaze on the hollowed-out building at the back.

S
arah watched
Dylan speed down the steps. The roof? Why did he want her to go up there?

Trust me.

Did she trust him? Even as she asked the question, her body turned and she started back up the two flights of stairs to the roof. Her feet screamed and her blood thundered in her ears. But apparently she trusted him.

Logic and all of her training told her to go down. To escape the building due to be bombed in mere minutes. Instead, she found herself headed for the roof, as if to meet the drone strike coming.

Why was she doing this? She shook her head and urged herself to go faster. Did it really matter why she was heading to the roof, to her possible doom?

Admit it.

No. Dammit. She had no time to be distracted by this. She used the railing to help haul herself up, her breath almost sobbing as she ran up the steps. The alarm cut off somewhere on the trip up. She made good time. A piece of wood held the access door open. She stopped and listened in the silence.

Voices.

“A man and woman, they said,” a man shouted in Arabic.

“Can you see them?” another voice shouted back.

Fuck. Soldiers on the roof.

She took stock. She had the two knives and the gun she’d picked up from Yusef. Only one knife was balanced for throwing at any distance. They had rifles.

She needed to get rid of them quietly and quickly. But she had to get close enough before they fired a shot or reported on their radios.

What the fuck was she doing going to the roof?

No. That wasn’t the question. She trusted Dylan. The question was how was she going to get on the roof.

She pulled both knives and gripped them each differently. One to throw and one to stab. She would do this as quietly as possible. She slipped through the door and nudged the piece of wood out, easing it shut, and making sure it was locked. She crouched in the shadows nearby, blending in with her dark robes.

The two soldiers leaned over the edge of the roof, one at either corner. Each covered a section of wall, their gazes trained on the ground. At least the alarm had helped with that. The soldiers were looking for her fleeing the building, not coming up behind them.

She took the soldier closest to her. Moving with slow, quiet precision, she got into position to throw her knife. She raised her arm and exhaled, concentrating on the back of his neck. She threw.

“Watch out!” the other soldier yelled.

Her target turned and her knife sliced his jaw as it passed by.

Fuck. The far soldier had seen her.

They both raised their rifles. She hid her other knife back in her sleeve and put her hands up.

Well, Dylan, she thought, I’m on the roof. Now what?

D
ylan skidded
to a stop by the edge of the burnt-out building. He took a quick peek around the concrete wall.

Bingo.

The Black Hawk wasn’t there, but the Kiowa sat in full view. The pilots hadn’t put it in the makeshift hangar yet. Dylan prayed the engines were still warm, which would quicken the takeoff. The Kiowa worked better for him anyway. He’d been taught to fly on a Bell 206 JetRanger, which was just a different version of the Kiowa Warrior. Also, unlike the complex twin engine Black Hawk, the Kiowa only had one engine. Meaning a shorter time to get into the air.

One pilot walked around the outside of the bird, studying it. The other sat in the pilot’s seat with a clipboard in hand. They were doing a pre- or post-flight check.

He approached the first pilot, the man outside of the helicopter. As the pilot bent to look at something in the engine, Dylan drew his weapon and held it along his leg.

It was almost too easy to creep up behind him and use the butt of his gun to hit him behind the ear near his jaw. The man thudded to the ground. Dylan left him and, keeping out of sight of the other pilot, he approached the cockpit. Both cabin doors had been taken off. The other man sat, looking at his clipboard, oblivious to what had happened behind him.

Dylan tapped on the polycarbonate sheeting of the window. The pilot looked right into the barrel of Dylan’s weapon.

“Get out,” Dylan ordered in Russian.

The man’s eyes widened, but he didn’t move.

Fuck. He didn’t speak Russian. Dylan was acutely aware of time ticking away. He waved the pilot out with his other hand, keeping the weapon trained on the man’s head.

“Out,” he repeated.

The pilot put up his hands and eased out of the cockpit. He said something in Arabic when he saw his friend lying unconscious on the ground.

Dylan kicked the man behind the knee, dropping him to the ground beside his friend. As the man turned his head to look back at him, Dylan swung the butt of the gun again and struck the pilot. His head snapped to the side and he toppled onto his prone friend.

Dylan didn’t have time to do a preflight check. He just made sure the rotor wasn’t tied down before he hopped into the pilot’s seat and pulled on a helmet. He turned the battery on. The fuel gauge read full. He hit the starter button and the rotor blades began to turn with a slow whine. They gathered speed quickly. He buckled in and then wound up the throttle to a hundred percent and slowly pulled up on the collective with his left hand, while holding the cyclic steady in his right.

The bird lifted gently into the air. He hovered it for a moment to get a feel for it, before pulling harder on the collective and zooming straight up into the sky.

He pushed on the cyclic in his right hand, moving the bird straight and using the foot pedals to turn him toward the rooftop where he’d told Sarah to meet him. At least she should have an easy go of it once she made it there. It hadn’t been guarded the night he and the team had rescued the CIA agent.

He tilted the stick to bring the bird closer. His heart stopped. Muzzle flashes lit up the night. There was a firefight on the roof.

“
G
et on your knees
,” the soldier bellowed at Sarah.

She eased herself down, cringing when the skin on her feet stretched as she moved. She kept her hands up but lowered her head, though she still watched the soldiers through her lashes.

They both approached; one of them reported in on the radio.

“Who are you?” the lead soldier asked.

Sarah didn’t say anything. She needed them closer.

The lead soldier scowled and obliged. He held his rifle in one hand and raised the other to strike her. “Tell me who you are,” he demanded.

The other soldier swung the muzzle of his rifle away from her as his friend stepped in front, his fingers clenched into a fist.

Perfect. She palmed the hilt of the hidden knife.

He swung at her. She grabbed his forearm and yanked him down onto the knife she thrust up into his gut. He gave a strangled cry, but she dismissed him and focused on his partner.

Sarah surged to her feet. She grunted at the pain before she leapt at the other soldier. He swung his rifle toward her and she grabbed it, pushing the barrel away from her. She kicked him hard between the legs. He groaned. She didn’t wrestle for the rifle, because she was in too close for him to use it on her. She gripped her knife and stabbed at his throat.

He blocked her strike with his other arm and her knife cut a line along his neck; blood streamed down.

“Bitch!”

He tried to step back to open up space between them so he could use his weapon. But she stayed close. She whipped her elbow across his jaw. He grabbed the arm using the knife, pulling her with it. Sarah grabbed his face and dug a finger into one eye.

He screamed, dropped his rifle and pushed her back hard.

She went with it, rolling backward toward the fallen soldier.

She landed in a crouch, just as the man dove for his rifle. She snatched up the fallen soldier’s rifle and took the split second to aim. Head shot. She pulled the trigger.

The soldier dropped.

She took a gulp of air and slowly stood, swaying slightly.

That was when she heard the pounding on the access door. Reinforcements had arrived.

The man she’d stabbed in the gut lay on the ground near her, blood pooling around him, his radio clutched in his hand. He spoke into it.

“She has killed us.”

She made sure he didn’t have any more weapons before turning her back on him. The pounding on the door had turned into rhythmic thumps. They must have a door breacher. It wouldn’t be long before they busted through.

She shuffled as quickly as she could around the perimeter of the roof, checking for climbing ropes or some other access to the ground. Why had Dylan wanted her up here?

There was nothing to help her escape. She was stuck on the roof of an office building that was about to be bombed by a drone strike. This was not the plan of champions.

She checked the magazine on the AK-47 she’d taken from the soldier. Almost full.

The door gave an ominous squeal.

She ripped off her
hijab
and
abaya
, throwing them into the wind. If she was going to die on this stupid roof, then she was going to die as Sarah Ramirez, not as the cover she played. The wind tugged at her hair, releasing some of the strands from her braid.

She took the mag from the other soldier’s weapon and stuck it into her pants pocket. She faced the door and held the rifle up, her finger light on the trigger.

The door burst open and soldiers ran through like ants defending their hill. She pulled the trigger, doing three-round bursts, trying to conserve ammo and yet suppress the soldiers coming out the door.

Three—no, four—fell. The others stayed inside. She could hear someone yelling orders to take her down.

She sprint-shuffled to a new position and crouched, cursing her swollen feet, before aiming once more at the door.

Where are you, Dylan?

The soldiers tried again to burst through, spraying bullets at the spot she’d been. She fired one round at each soldier who came through, trying to conserve ammo even more. She took out another three before they pulled back. She immediately dashed to a new location and crouched again.

A loud thumping echoed behind her, moving fast toward the rooftop.

Fuck. They’d called in a helicopter. She’d need cover fast.

She tensed, prepared to run, but no bullets ripped through the night toward her.

Could it be?

She chanced a glance. The bird hovered just above the roof. There was no door and she could see the pilot. He jerked his head at the empty seat beside him, as if to say, what the hell was she waiting for?

What was she waiting for?

She had to trust that he’d hold the bird steady, that she wouldn’t get mowed down by bullets as she ran for it. But this was Dylan, the man who’d come back for her again and again. He’d never left her, not once. If she couldn’t trust him, then she would never be able to trust anyone.

She sent another burst of bullets at the doorway, before she stood and ran for the helicopter, her stride shortened by the agony searing her feet. She panted through the pain, focusing on Dylan. She just had to keep moving.

Almost as if they sensed she was running, the soldiers piled from the doorway, firing at her and the helicopter. Sparks flew as bullets pinged off the metal of the fuselage. Dylan kept the bird steady in the midst of the fire. His helmet was turned toward her and she knew even though she couldn’t see his eyes that he watched her.

Five more steps. The six-story drop loomed. She’d have to leap only a few feet, but any jump seemed far with her abused body. Her blood pumped and adrenaline ripped through her. She pushed herself to go faster, harder.

Two steps. Her heart thundered in her chest. Wind from the rotor blades whipped her hair back and made her squint, but she didn’t slow. She kept her gaze on Dylan.

She leapt, aiming her body for the cabin door and seat. She landed heavily; the bird jostled with the impact, making her clutch at the seat, but Dylan corrected quickly.

Her breath whooshed out of her. She’d made it.

Dylan wore a shit-eating grin. “Told you I had a good idea.”

She grinned back. She couldn’t help it. He’d come back.

For her.

Scrambling upright, she tried not to kick any instruments. A bullet pinged off metal near her. Her heart leapt. They weren’t out of danger yet.

Her stomach rolled as Dylan zoomed the helicopter away. She turned, grabbing the harness to steady herself, and shot at the men on the roof.

Then she swore. One of the soldiers ran out with an RPG on his shoulder. The rocket propelled grenade could take them down if it hit.

“RPG!” she screamed as loud as she could over the deafening roar of the rotors and wind.

Dylan must have heard her or read her fear. He pushed on one stick and pulled the other; the helicopter swooped in another direction. An explosion boomed off to their right.

Within seconds, they flew high above the city. Dylan grinned at her and nodded at the helmet lying near the copilot’s seat. He didn’t take his hands from the controls. She squirmed her way into the harness, finally buckling in, before she placed the helmet on her head. Immediately the noise from the rotors lessened and her ears thanked her. She turned on the headset.

“Hey, gorgeous,” he said. “Need a lift?”

“Seriously?” She answered his grin with laughter. “That’s the line you’re going with?”

D
ylan set
the bird down behind a knoll, about fifty kilometers northeast of Mosul, where E.D.G.E. had designated the exfil location. Two armored Jeeps waited off to the side.

The bulk of the Peshmerga, the Kurdish forces fighting ISIS in this region, waited in a camp not far from the location. He’d spoken with Jake on the radio and confirmed that they’d hand over the bird to the Peshmerga and take their own helicopter to Baghdad and then catch a flight to Germany and then stateside.

He shut down the helicopter. Sarah smiled beside him, almost bouncing in her seat, still high on the adrenaline rush. The tension that had been riding him for so long drained out of him with each slowing sweep of the rotors, leaving him exhausted, but he smiled too. It was over. He’d have to check in with Rakin ASAP to make sure Jalila and the girls had gotten out okay, but for now, it was over and they were safe.

“We did it, Dylan.” Sarah’s eyes shone as she took off her helmet. “And I wanted to thank you.”

“For what?”

“For coming back for me,” she said. “On the roof.”

His chest tightened at her words and a sinking sensation went through him. He frowned. “Did you think I would send you to the roof and leave you there? Like some kind of diversion?”

“No. I…” She looked down at her lap.

How could she think that of him? “But you weren’t sure, were you?” He shook his head. “No, don’t bother answering that. I don’t want you to lie to me.”

Disappointment churned inside him. Nothing had changed. She hadn’t changed. And whatever connection he thought they’d had while escaping disappeared; she still didn’t trust him.

“Dylan, that’s not what—”

He held up his hand. “I’m tired of fighting with you, Sarah. I don’t want to do this anymore.”

Their team still waited in the Jeeps, as if giving them time to adjust to being safe. But really, he knew, it was to keep themselves out of the dust storm the bird had kicked up.

“You don’t want to do what anymore?” Sarah asked quietly.

“Us,” he said. “You’re right. We don’t have anything beyond good sex. And I want more.”

He wondered whether they’d see much of each other after this. He shut down the systems one by one. Of course she wouldn’t want to talk. She was so closed off from her emotions that she probably wasn’t feeling anything right now. And he was too tired to try to pull them out of her.

Normally, he’d be celebrating right now, whooping it up with whichever team member he’d just rescued from a rooftop. But with Sarah, he sat, feeling hollow inside as he waited for her to speak.

She still hadn’t said anything by the time the rest of the team got out of the Jeeps. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. Time to end it for good. A clean break was what he needed.

“Look. I’m not going to mention anything about us in the report and I certainly won’t tell anyone. So you don’t have to worry.”

Her head snapped up. He held up his hand to forestall any argument on her part. “I don’t want to fight, Ghost. Let’s just go home.”

He got out of the bird and walked away.

S
arah watched Dylan leave
. A strong, proud man who’d tried to connect with her. A man she’d rebuffed time and again. A man who had been there for her, had come back into hell for her.

And now he’d had enough. Her heart wrenched at the sight of him walking away, but she had no words. Had no idea what to say to him now that the mission was over. She wanted to call him back and explain that she did trust him, but her throat tightened on the words. He’d just told her he was done.

She unbuckled her harness. Her body ached, her feet throbbed, and she desperately needed a bath, food, and sleep. Though sleep seemed to be taking priority right now. She slid off the seat and gingerly put her feet on the ground.

Dylan strode to the people by the Jeeps. She could just make out Jake, Rhys, and Cat, Dylan’s sister. Marc stood there as well, a little apart from the others, his arms crossed. Jake strode out to meet them.

Sarah took a deep breath. She was Sarah Ramirez. Ghost. An E.D.G.E. operator. She just had to hold on a little longer before she could be by herself and collapse.

It must have been because she’d been off her feet for the last fifteen minutes, but they seemed to throb worse than before. With the first step, she almost stumbled and had to force herself upright.

Jake’s keen gaze caught her misstep even in the dark; he turned his trajectory and aimed straight for her.

But Dylan got to her first.

“Dammit,” he muttered. “I’m sorry, Sarah.” He swept her up in his arms. “I totally forgot with everything going on.”

“What’d you forget?” Jake asked quietly as he came up to them. The rotors had almost stopped turning now and they could speak normally.

“They whipped her feet,” Dylan growled, even as he tightened his grip on her.

Sarah shook her head at him. “I can wal—”

“No.” A muscle in Dylan’s jaw twitched. “Just let me help you. I’ll be out of your life soon enough.”

His words tore something inside her. “I…Thank you.”

He frowned but didn’t reply. He carried her over to the Jeeps, with Jake walking beside, while he gave a verbal update without even a hitch in his breathing.

“The drone strike had direct hits on the ten locations,” Jake said after hearing of their escape. “It sounds like you two just made it out. Next time I want you both out
before
the final countdown on an airstrike.”

“Sure thing, College.” Dylan carefully set her on her feet.

Cat, her expression fierce, grabbed Dylan and hugged him, before pulling back and punching his arm. “You scared the shit out of me, Dylan.”

“Couldn’t be helped, sis,” he said.

Cat glowered at him. “Pain in the ass.”

“Love you too.”

Their easy banter emphasized to Sarah how much of an outsider she was. A feeling she knew well.

“It’s good to see you, Ghost.” Cat stepped forward and gave her a quick hug. “I’m glad you both made it out okay.”

“Thanks,” Sarah said. “Me too.”

Dylan scowled and turned away. Her insides twisted as he strode with Marc and Jake to the first Jeep.

“Come on.” Cat wrapped Sarah’s arm over her shoulder. “Let’s get you back to the base where we can have someone take a look at those feet.”

Sarah let herself be led to the second Jeep. She sat quiet in the back while Cat and Rhys updated her on Rakin and the girls. They’d made it out of Mosul and to the Peshmerga, east of the city. Rakin had promised to see the girls settled with their families before he went back to Britain.