Rough Edges (9 page)

Bella reached for the latch on her harness. Victor grabbed her hands before she could do something stupid like parachute out of the chopper over farm country with no idea where she was or where she was going.

“The truck is too far away already,” Victor said. “You can't reach it on foot. We stay put until we can do some good.”

“Don't tell me what to do,” she snarled.

“Then don't be an idiot. This is Gage we're after. He needs us. We do this the right way.”

“
Right
would have been keeping that truck in sight.” She glared at the back of Payton's head. “I swear that if we lose that transport, I will make you pay.”

“We won't lose it. Norwood has it on satellite. It's not going anywhere we can't find it.”

She took a deep breath. Then another. After two more, Victor felt like she was steady enough to face their next move. “What's the plan?”

Payton turned in his seat enough to look at them. “We wait to see where they stop, then we move in.”

“Why not act now?” Victor asked. “We could get ahead of it. Set up a roadblock.”

“No. This is bigger than Gage. If there are more of Stynger's men at the rendezvous, then we owe it to them to find them, too. The more people we save, the better.”

Bella let out a long breath. “He's right. Someone loves those men the way I love Gage. We go after all of them, but once we hit the ground, it's my show. Agreed?”

Victor was too busy wincing at her mention of loving Gage to follow the rest of what she said. He didn't know why it should bother him that she felt that deeply for a man who was as good as they come, but it did.

Payton nodded. “Agreed.”

“And when we're done and Gage is safe,” Bella said, “you're going to turn in your resignation. Norwood can work with me or Victor directly from now on. Or he can fuck off.”

“We're old friends, Bella. He trusts me.”

“He also trusts Victor or he wouldn't have put him in this position. Your resignation isn't optional. I can't work with you. Not after what you've done.”

Payton nodded slowly. “Fine. Once Gage is home safe, I'll give you what you want.”

“Promise. I don't know if you're the man of your word I always believed you to be, but if you are, then prove it. Promise me.”

Payton bowed his head in defeat and regret. “I promise. Once Gage is safe I'll resign.”

The pilot waved to the left. “Satellite shows the truck turning off onto a gravel road. It leads to only one structure. A house. No heat signatures inside. Looks like the truck is early.”

“That's the meeting point,” Payton said. “Head that way, but stay low.”

Bella was planning something. He could see it in the way she began to look around the chopper with that calm, determined expression she wore right before going into a dangerous situation.

“What are you up to?” he asked.

She grabbed a rappelling harness and began strapping it on. “Getting a closer look.”

No way was anyone stopping her now, and he sure as hell wasn't letting her go down there alone.

Victor grabbed a second harness. He attached the line onto the helicopter's frame and slid his gear on his back.

“There's the house,” Payton said.

“Don't get too close,” warned Bella. “We'll go in on foot and radio you when we're in position.”

Payton saw she was ready to jump. And if he saw her determination the way Victor did, it was clear that no one was going to stop her short of knocking her out.

“Take us down,” Payton ordered the pilot. “Be ready to take off once they're on the ground.”

“You're going to have to get close,” Victor said. “We can't risk you getting injured further.”

“I'll be fine,” she said.

The chopper was still several yards too far off ground when Bella slid the door open and stepped out into the night sky.

B
ella moved over the ground as fast as she dared. Tall grass and weeds parted under her feet, leaving a clear path. She was still at least a mile from the house and Gage, but pushed herself to go faster, despite the cuts on her legs. Victor was right behind her, keeping up with her brutal pace the way he always did.

She admired the hell out of him for that. And truth be told, she was so very grateful that he had her back. He'd proven himself capable over and over again, and of all the badass men she'd worked with, his ass was the baddest. And the firmest and most lickable.

She was nearly to the top of a rise when he grabbed her around the middle and pulled her to the ground in a soft tackle. Rather than question his motives, she trusted him to have one and stayed put where she landed on the ground, waiting for an explanation.

While she waited, she couldn't help but notice how good his weight felt on top of her. He didn't crush her, but there was no doubt that she had a solid piece of prime male flesh pinning her down.

Her body reacted with a hot wave of want that started in her womb and slid down all the way to her toes. As it passed, it took with it all the lingering pain of her injuries.

Thank God for those lovely endorphins.

Victor put his gloved finger to his mouth, indicating the need for silence. Then he pointed over the hill and began crawling on his belly to the top of the rise.

Bella did the same, ignoring the tickle of weeds and grass on her face the same way she ignored how much she missed having his body atop hers.

The moon was bright overhead, giving her plenty of light to see by. As soon as her path was clear, she saw why Victor had gone all linebacker on her.

In the valley below sat the small farmhouse. Its roof was sagging under the weight of years of neglect and exposure to the elements. The columns holding up the front porch had rotted out and now lay toppled against the warped boards leading to the front door. Weeds grew up all around, without even a path of tire tracks to show someone had been here recently.

In the distance was a barn that had given up and collapsed completely. The gravel driveway had been all but reclaimed by nature, giving the incoming truck only the narrowest path to follow.

The truck stopped. The back opened. A metal ramp was shoved out the back. Down it came two men holding a third, who had a heavy pair of metal restraints around both his wrists and ankles. There was a hood over his head. He was built like Gage, and was wearing the same clothes and worn cowboy boots he'd had on the day he'd let Stynger take him.

It was Gage. He was safe, but those fuckers had him.

Not for long.

Bella's hand was on her tranq gun before she had time to think. Victor's hand settled on the small of her back, silently telling her to hold. Wait. Be patient.

None of those were her forte. All she wanted to do was rush in, kill the bad guys and take back her friend—the one she'd let walk into the belly of the beast, hoping to give it a fatal case of indigestion.

Victor's voice brushed past her ear in a soft tickle. “He's alive. That's enough for now. We need to plan our next move so he stays that way.”

She knew he was right. Forced herself to take several deep breaths rather than attack the men escorting Gage.

He was alive, and until this very moment, she hadn't realized just how worried she'd been that she'd never see him that way again.

Tears of relief stung her eyes, but she swallowed them down and cleared her vision.

Victor's hand swept over her shoulder, an offering of comfort. She soaked it in, pretending like she couldn't feel it through her armored vest and gear.

She activated her mic. “We have eyes on him. Two guards.”

Payton's voice came through her headset after a pause. “We have four on thermals. Three in the house. One in the truck. Another vehicle is closing in on your position. ETA three minutes.”

She started to push to her feet to close in and rescue Gage before reinforcements arrived, but Victor's hand held her down.

He kept his voice low. “That's not enough time to get there and free him.”

“It is if we hurry.”

“He'll get caught in the cross fire. And while most of our ammo is nonlethal, theirs isn't. He's not wearing a vest.”

Bella cursed under her breath and stopped trying to squirm out from under Victor's hand. No matter what she did, she couldn't risk getting Gage shot. They were nowhere near a medical facility, and she'd seen more than one man bleed out before they could reach aid.

That wasn't going to happen to Gage, no matter how much she wanted to rush down there.

“What do you suggest?” she asked.

“We wait until the handoff is complete. Once we're down to only one set of guards, we move in.”

“What if we lose him?”

“We won't. Norwood's got our back. I trust him with my life.”

“What about helping as many of Stynger's victims as we can?”

“We will. We'll keep eyes on the second set of guards and take them as soon as Gage is secured.”

She heard the rumble of another truck crunching gravel, and moved in to investigate. There was a driver in the first truck, still sitting behind the wheel with the engine running. The second truck's trailer doors opened and two more men jumped out. They were both heavily armed and carried themselves like they knew how to use the firepower they were toting around.

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.

F
ear 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 pushed 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.