Her Rogue Alpha (X-Ops Book 5) (20 page)

“Have any of you guys ever fired a weapon before?” he asked softly.

Layla couldn’t help but notice that there wasn’t a trace of concern in Jayson’s voice. How the hell did he do that? It was like he was asking them if they’d driven a car or kissed a girl.

Dylan shook his head, but Mikhail nodded. “Yes, but not one like this. It was an old AK-47 that my father had. I’ve never fired anything but that.”

Jayson shook his head in the dark. “No problem. You may not have known it, but you picked a good weapon for you three to use right out of the box.”

“I did?” Mikhail asked, surprise clear in his voice.

“Yeah,” Jayson told him. “The Makarov is a simple, rugged, fixed-barrel, blowback-operated automatic. It’s never going to win any marksmanship awards, but at short distances—which is the only distance I want you three shooting at—it’s as accurate as you need it to be.”

“Is it hard to shoot?” Dylan asked.

“Not once you get the hang of it.” Jayson held up the weapon so the glow coming from the lights outside the house shone on it a little. “Nothing fancy, though. I’ll just cover the stuff you have to know right now, okay?”

They all nodded.

“First thing’s first. This is the safety.” He pointed at the flip switch on the rear of the slide. “Push it down to fire. Remember—down is dead. Say it.”

“Down is dead,” the three teens said in unison.

“Good.”

Layla stood there and watched as Jayson showed them how to unload the weapon, slip bullets in the ammo clip, then reload the weapon and chamber a round. He talked slowly, letting them see what he was doing. Then he had them do it. Maybe it was the Special Forces training in him coming out, but in five minutes, he had them handling the 9mm pistols like they’d been doing it for years.

“Nothing fancy with the shooting, either,” he added as they each chambered a round and put their weapons on safe. “If you have to do it, square up on your target, wrap both hands around the gun like I showed you, and shoot for the center of the chest, then get the hell out of there.”

Dylan said something in reply, but Layla completely missed it as a very distracting scent suddenly wafted past her. Even as her head started shuffling through memories to identify it, she found herself instinctively spinning around, reaching behind her back to pull out her 9mm as she did.

Jayson was at her side in a flash, his assault rifle on his shoulder and aimed into the deeper forest behind them. The teens were right there with him, chambering rounds in their weapons as they moved.

Half a second later, her nose finally figured what the heck she was smelling—or whom to be more precise. She opened her mouth to tell Jayson and the kids that everything was fine when a gruff voice drifted to them through the forest. If she hadn’t known who it was, the disembodied growl coming out of the rain-misted forest would have been kind of freaky. Okay, even knowing who it was, it was still a little disconcerting.

“Good to see they finally let you off the range, Jayson. Although I gotta say, the DCO must be getting desperate for field agents if they’re sending out kids now.”

Just then, a pair of glowing, yellow eyes appeared from behind a tree and started moving toward them.

“What the hell?” Mikhail said, his voice filled with alarm as he lifted his pistol higher and took a step forward.

Jayson lowered his weapon and put a hand on the Russian kid’s shoulder. “Relax, Mikhail. It’s our backup.”

“Yeah, relax, Mikhail.” The words were more of a growl than anything. “I know Jayson just got finished teaching you how to use that weapon, but I can promise you it won’t work nearly as well after I shove it sideways up your ass.”

“That’s enough, Clayne,” Danica said as she slipped out from behind his very large shadow and moved up to stand beside him.

Mikhail gave Jayson an uneasy look but lowered his gun. Beside him, Dylan and Olek did the same.

“I’m glad you guys finally got here,” Jayson said. “Did Kendra fill you in on our plan to hit Zolnerov’s place?”

The wolf shifter exchanged confused looks with Danica, then turned his gaze back to them. They looked at Jayson like he was speaking a foreign language.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Clayne demanded. “Were you two going to hit Zolnerov’s place on your own with three kids for backup?”

All three teens opened their mouths to say something, but Clayne cut them off with a growl and a glare that made them take a step back.

“Wait a minute,” Clayne said to Jayson. “Before you answer that, how did you guys even know Kojot was here? Danica and I were too busy trying to keep up with him to ever get a chance to call the DCO and tell them the piece of shit was on his way to the Ukraine.”

Layla’s jaw dropped. “Kojot is here? Right here—in Zolnerov’s house?”

Clayne looked so exasperated that Layla thought he might go into full wolf mode. “Yeah. Isn’t that why the two of you—make that the five of you—are here? To take down Kojot and stop Zolnerov from getting the weapons the arms dealer is bringing in?”

“No.” Now Jayson was the one who looked confused. “We’re here to rescue Anya and the other girls. Didn’t Kendra tell you guys anything?”

“Who the hell is Anya?” Clayne asked.

Jayson—who looked like he was on the edge of losing it too—started to answer, but Layla interrupted. “Look, we don’t have time for this. But if the two of you insist on talking it out, maybe we should pull back into the woods a little in case one of Zolnerov’s guards comes this way?”

“Agreed,” Danica said, taking Clayne’s hand and pulling him back into the forest.

Layla did the same with Jayson, leaving Dylan and the other two teens to follow. Once they’d gone a few dozen yards into the woods, they all stopped. Jayson immediately began to explain who Anya was and why they were breaking into Zolnerov’s estate to get her, but Clayne stopped him before he could get very far.

“Hold on,” Clayne said. “You and Powell came here to rescue Dylan, but now you and Layla are rescuing Dylan’s girlfriend. Why the hell would John send you here with a jackass like Powell, and where the hell is that walking asshat of a so-called DCO agent now that the shit is about to hit the fan?”

Jayson looked at Layla as if to say,
You wanna help me out with this?

Layla quickly brought them up to speed.

“How did you get involved?” Danica asked.

“I was worried about Jayson, so I convinced Kendra to send me here to help,” Layla said. “John doesn’t know, of course, and will probably have a cow when he finds out.”

She paused, trying to see if she’d left anything out, then decided she’d hit most of the high points. “So now we’re going in to get Anya and the other girls Zolnerov kidnapped. We don’t know what he wants with them, other than the typical creepy reasons why a man like Zolnerov would hold a group of teenaged girls captive.”

Layla braced herself for another barrage of questions, especially about the hybrid drug Jayson had taken. As much as she didn’t want to get into that in front of Dylan and his friends, she was going to have to tell Clayne and Danica enough to satisfy them. Maybe she and Jayson could talk around the subject and still get the critical details across.

“So, Powell’s dead, huh?” Clayne said conversationally. “Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.”

“Clayne,” Danica rebuked sharply.

Layla knew how she felt. It was like men had no filter at all between their heads and their mouths.

“What?” the wolf shifter growled. “The guy was a total dickweed. The only reason no one capped him before now is because he was usually smart enough to keep his ass out of the field. Serves him right for trying to off Jayson.”

Danica just shook her head. “I think we can help you fill in the blanks on why Zolnerov kidnapped Anya and the other girls.”

“You can?” Dylan stepped closer. “Why?”

“They’re payment,” Clayne said.

Layla got a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“Payment for what?” Dylan asked.

“For the weapons Kojot is giving him,” Clayne said, then added, “Kojot will take just about anything as payment as long as it’s valuable. In this case, it seems he’s okay with taking those girls.”

Jayson frowned. “That doesn’t make any sense. What kind of weapons could Kojot offer that Zolnerov doesn’t already have? We’re in a frigging war zone. There are more weapons here than he could ever shoot.”

Clayne shook his head. “Not like this he doesn’t. We just followed Kojot in from the Kurgan region of southern Russia. He left there on a private cargo aircraft with a large shipment of crates delivered to him from a Russian military facility called Shchuch’ye. He loaded the crates on a big truck and came straight here.”

“Shit,” Jayson muttered.

“What is it?” Layla asked. She didn’t know where the Kurgan region even was, much less want kind of weapons the Shchuch’ye facility made.

“Russia has been destroying their stockpile of chemical agents for years, but the Shchuch’ye depot still stores plenty of it,” Jayson explained. “I don’t have a clue what kind of delivery platform we’re talking about—rocket warheads, artillery rounds, who knows?—but if he brought a shipment of weapons from there, you can pretty much guarantee it’s some kind of toxic crap.”

“Oh God,” Mikhail murmured. “The colonel is going to use chemicals on the pro-Ukrainian forces to try to end the fighting all at once.”

“Maybe,” Danica agreed. “But based on what we know about Zolnerov, we’re thinking his plan is a little more twisted. It’s possible that he could use the weapons somewhere here in Donetsk against his own people, then blame the pro-Ukrainian forces for it.”

“That actually makes sense,” Layla said. “There’s still a lot of fighting going on right now, but the borders have essentially stabilized. If Zolnerov is able to convince everyone the Ukrainians used chemical weapons on them, all that will change. It would rip the top off this whole region and destroy any possibility of a negotiated peace settlement. As one of the most senior military leaders in the area, people would naturally look to him to take charge.”

“We have to stop him,” Mikhail said urgently.

Clayne regarded the Russian teen for a moment before turning his attention back to her and Jayson.

“Kojot’s cargo truck with the weapons is in one of those outlying buildings on the south side of the compound,” the wolf shifter said. “If I know him, he’s going to be close to his weapons until he gets his payment. Since it seems like he’s getting paid in human cargo, I’m guessing he’ll use that same truck to get the girls out of here. Danica and I didn’t have enough intel to come up with a plan, other than killing Kojot in the most violent method I can think of. If you two have a better idea, we’re listening.”

Layla blinked in surprise. Clayne had always struck her as the make-it-up-as-you-go type. She never thought he’d be willing to go along with someone else’s plan. Then again, Ivy had told her that Danica was a good influence on the wolf shifter.

She and Jayson quickly outlined their plan to Clayne and Danica, from the teens creating a distraction to her tracking down Anya. Since Dylan and the others were there, Jayson avoided any mention of using Anya’s scent on the scarf to find the girl, but Clayne and Danica were experienced enough to read between the lines.

“What kind of distraction do you have planned?” Clayne asked Mikhail.

“I have some friends bringing in a car that we’re going to ram into the gate and blow up remotely. The trunk is full of old ammo, so the guards are going to go flip out when the vehicle catches on fire.”

Clayne looked impressed. “That should do it.” He looked at her and Jayson. “The plan sounds good. You two rescue the girls. Danica and I will target Kojot and those chemical weapons.”

“Whoever gets their part done first goes and helps the other,” Jayson added.

Clayne nodded. “Agreed. Be careful in there. With Kojot here, there are probably even more soldiers around than normal.”

A soft buzzing sound came from Mikhail’s back pocket. He pulled out his cell phone and looked at the display.

“My friends are here,” he said. “We need to meet them around front. It should only take us about ten minutes to get everything set up and ready.”

Dylan looked at Jayson. “You want us to text you before we’re ready to let the car go?”

Jayson shook his head. “No. We’ll go when we hear the boom.”

“Those kids are pretty ballsy,” Clayne remarked softly as the teens disappeared into the woods.

“Yeah,” Jayson agreed. “Hopefully they don’t do anything too ballsy and get themselves killed.”

Layla silently agreed.

“We’re going to move around to the south,” Clayne said. “We’ll go over the wall at the boom, too.”

“I’ll call you on the satellite phone if we need you,” Layla said.

Danica arched a brow in her fiancé’s direction. “I’d say that’d be great, but Clayne smashed the sat phone to pieces three days ago.”

He shot her a glare in the dark. “It kept ringing all the time.”

“Phones have been known to do that on occasion,” she said. “Some people have even been known to put the crazy things on vibrate or silence them altogether. But you decided to slam it into a brick wall, then throw it in the river for good measure. Both approaches work I guess.”

Clayne growled.

Danica shook her head. “If you need us, yell really loud. Clayne will hear and we’ll come running.”

A few moments later, the other two DCO agents were gone, leaving Layla and Jayson alone in the forest with the occasional thud of artillery in the distance to keep them company.

“We’re going to have to figure out a quiet way to get over the wall,” Jayson said. “Maybe you can show me how to do one of those shifter jumps of yours so I can see if I have it in me.”

Layla bit back a groan.
Crap
. She couldn’t put off telling Jayson about Zarina’s antidote any longer. He seriously thought he might have the ability to jump up and grab the top of a fourteen-foot-high wall. She had to tell him the truth. She couldn’t let him go in thinking he had some kind of miraculous abilities he didn’t. She had to tell him, no matter how much it hurt him to hear it.