Surrender (18 page)

He was still rock hard, but he’d deal with that. He ate, planned out their next moves. Made a quick call right before the sun came up and they got closer to shore, and then paddled them there.

Chap
ter Thirty

A
s d
awn approached, Dare steered the boat toward shore and Grace realized they were only half a mile away from the shore and had been the entire night. No doubt Dare had been scoping it out to make sure it hadn’t been compromised.

When they hit shore, Dare dragged the boat up and out with her still in it. He gently set her down, bare feet and all, while he hid the boat under some brush covering.

“Hop on,” he told her, turning his back to her. She did so, her hands on his shoulders as he walked, weapon drawn. She wasn’t sure how far he walked, but it seemed like miles. Finally, they approached a car parked to the side of a trailer. He let her down from his back, opened the car door for her.

“Stay down,” he told her, and she did as he asked as he got into the driver’s seat.

The car rolled silently down the road when he released the brake. When they were more than halfway down the dusty road, Dare bent down and pulled a plastic piece away from the bottom of the steering compartment. He stripped the plastic from the ends of the battery and starter wires and touched them together, and the car started.

“No way we’d be able to walk the rest of this,” he told her. They drove for twenty minutes and then abandoned the car and walked for another ten. In front of her in the soft rising light loomed an old plantation house, still somehow stately despite the disrepair. She wasn’t even sure the porch could hold her.

The flooring creaked, and Dare held her close until they got inside.

There was spare furniture, old and dusty. No one had been here for a long while. But there was electricity, at least, and it was better than spending another night on the bayou.

Although that wasn’t all that bad. She blushed thinking about the things Dare had done to her in the dark on that boat, and her body hummed with the memory.

“If there’s a broom, I can sweep up some of this dust,” she said, but he was motioning to her to follow him.

“Don’t bother,” he said, pointing to the inside of the closet. When she looked in, she saw an open door and stairs leading down.

She wanted to back away. Felt her throat tighten up. Secret rooms hadn’t been kind to her.

“I promise, it’s okay. You’ll like it much better than the cabin. And I’ll give you the combination—you can come up here at any time.”

“I don’t know, Dare . . . I don’t know if I can do this.”

“Go halfway down—look for yourself.”

She did, slowly.
Breathe, Grace, breathe,
she told herself. She ducked her head and saw the modern conveniences surrounding her. Carpet. Hardwood floor. Stainless steel appliances, a bed and tons of light, none of it very fluorescent looking. And a wall of computers, full color, that showed the outside of the house.

If she stared at it long enough, it could give her the illusion of being outside. “I think I can do this,” she said out loud, more to herself than to Dare, and she went down the stairs all the way and looked around.

It was clean down here. She noted that it was steel reinforced along the ceiling and the back of the door when Dare closed it.

“How is this possible in the bayou?”

“All these houses are raised off the ground. This is built into that space, but you’d never know it. It’s concrete and steel, double reinforced,” he told her, then warned, “I’m going to activate the locks—it’s going to be loud.”

She nodded, and it was loud, with steel slamming down. She drew a deep breath and stared at the cameras, her link to the outside, as Dare said, “We’re completely safe.”

There was the slightly dank smell of the bayou down here, but he put on some kind of air circulation system, and the smell was alleviated almost immediately.

He went to the computers and pulled out a sat phone to call Gunner, told him where they were. Then she listened while they talked for a while about their next step.

When they hung up, she asked, “Do you think Rip knows where we are?”

He wanted to be honest with her, to share that maybe Darius was alive. But he couldn’t, and instead told her, “No idea. But Jem and Key are coming to get us and bring us to Gunner’s. And if Powell’s men are out there, we’ll grab them too. Maybe one of them will talk.”

He knew that was wishful thinking.

“And then what?”

“Jem and Key’s apartment was searched. Someone tried to break into Gunner’s too, but the alarm scared them away before they could do anything. We’re sticking together and we’re all getting the hell out of town.”

* * *

After h
e spoke with Dare, Gunner pulled up a camera feed that focused on another bayou house, this one a dilapidated plantation house. It didn’t look like it could stand up to any assault, until Gunner explained about the secret room built into the foundation.

Key had gone upstairs for surveillance, to make sure that nothing had been touched. Even though they’d monitored the cameras all night, they couldn’t be too careful.

“They’re okay, Avery,” Gunner repeated to her.

“I know.”

“You look like you’re going to faint.” His words weren’t unkind, but they were a reminder that she needed to pull herself together. Put up or shut up—this was the time to prove she could be a part of this mission.

Key looked off when he came back downstairs. He sat heavily in one of the chairs and stared at the computer screens, which showed the heavy rain that had just started to pour down, while Avery helped Gunner clean some weapons and check other equipment. She needed to do something to get through the day, until they could finally take some action against Richard Powell and his men.

Key and Jem were planning on hiding in the bayou with sniper rifles, because they had the edge, knew the land like they knew themselves. Avery watched the brothers outfit themselves in what would look like hunting gear to the average bayou dweller before they left the relative safety of the tattoo shop.

Avery and Gunner would be right behind them. But they wouldn’t go into the bayou. They’d stay in a tricked-out van and scope out the scene from the security feed set up long ago by Darius so they could survey the safe house, direct the brothers and back them up if necessary.

“The house is completely isolated,” Gunner told her as she stepped into borrowed camouflage gear. “The safe-house part is impenetrable.”

“Not if they throw grenades.”

“Place is steel reinforced. It’s a bomb shelter. Ground is set to blow around it too.”

“So Dare and Grace will be fine. It’s Key and Jem who’ll be in major danger.”

“Yes, but they love this shit,” Gunner told her.

“Jem does, not Key,” she said, too softly for Gunner to hear.

“Dare won’t let you get involved beyond this,” Gunner said, handed her the mic. “I think I’m going to need your help. So don’t screw this up and prove me wrong.”

She wouldn’t. She’d been weapons trained, knew self-defense. She knew thugs, wife beaters and thieves. But strategy like this . . . military grade . . . lives depended on it. “Gunner, I’m—”

“I’m here—go with your gut. We’re looking to get their voices on tape first and then finish them. Powell needs to think they’re all alive and we need enough of their voices—and their equipment—to fake that. Jem and Key can do this.”

In less than an hour, Jem and Key would be in place. She scrubbed her hands together and refused to take her eyes from the screen. “What now?”

“Now we take a nice ride into the Bayou Teche,
chère
.”

* * *

Key and Jem to
ok a cab to the edge of the bayou and walked the rest of the way in. Their guns were hidden in their fishing bags, with poles hanging out the ends of them. Wearing the camouflage of fishermen and poachers alike, they looked no different from any other Cajun in the bayou.

It wasn’t the first time Jem had been in a combat situation with his brother, but it was definitely the most serious. Both men were sufficiently tense for battle, didn’t talk as they wound their way close to Dare’s safe house.

Once they were within half a mile, they slowed their roll, walked carefully so as not to make noise. For the last leg, they crawled along on their bellies.

“We are not alone,” Jem muttered.

“Are you seeing aliens again, or are there guys in the woods?” Key asked. “Because with you, I’m never sure.”

Jem snorted. “Two guys in the trees. Snipers. Here long before us.”

Key took a quick look through the binoculars and spotted the men, their rifles aimed at the plantation house. “We could take them down and question them, and let Gunner grab Dare and Grace.”

“It’ll take them too long to get here. We’ll have to knock them out, grab Grace and Dare and bring everyone back to Gunner’s.”

Key scanned the area and shook his head. “Something doesn’t feel right.”

“Like the fact that this guy is always several steps ahead of us.”

“I don’t think the snipers are the only muscle.” Key looked at him. “We can take them.”

Jem didn’t need to hear another word, was prepared to move forward; then the snipers left the safety of the trees, dropped to the ground and headed toward the road. Jem and Key followed, saw them preparing to get on an ATV.

“That’s not a great sign,” Jem said, and Key agreed.

“We best get Dare and Grace outta there now, before we lose the chance.”

“I say we get them first.” Jem pointed his rifle, but it was Key who fired first, hitting one man in the chest. “How’re we going to talk to a dead man?”

“I’m guessing the other one will spill to keep his life,” Key told Jem.

He raised his gun and called, “Drop your weapon,” to the other man, who held up his hands in a show of surrender, but then bullets rang out over their heads. Key and Jem ducked behind the trees and the guy took the opportunity to run.

“Where’re they coming from?” Jem called over the firing.

Key pointed to the other side of the house, and they headed that way to take on the newest threat.

* * *

While Dare wat
ched through the cameras, Jem and Key killed one man and stalked the others firing on them, and Grace began that incessant pacing again, the way she had at the house before the fire. He didn’t bother to tell her to relax, because he knew he couldn’t preach what he couldn’t practice.

Jem texted him about the snipers. They’d already been set up in the trees. Because they were out of camera range, Dare hadn’t seen them set up, but in his mind, there was only one way they’d known about this place.

Darius.
His father was alive. He was sure of it.

But it didn’t matter how Powell’s men had found this place. Dare and his team still had to execute the rest of their plan. And even though he’d been prepared for the shooting to begin, he still started with the violence of it. He hadn’t heard that much fire power since the night in the jungle, and this was not bringing back any fond memories. Key and Jem were firing. They took out two of the three men Dare could see and were advancing on the third one, in the hope of keeping him alive for intel.

He had faith in Key and Jem for this mission, but Grace was tugging at his arm, her face pale. “We’ve got to get Key and Jem in here.”

“The plan is—”

“Rip’s plan is bigger than bullets.” She was panicked, and he tried to reassure her with, “They know what they’re doing,” because he knew how intense it looked out there. How violent it had sounded. But it was quiet now, save for Key yelling at the final man to stand down.

But she persisted. “They know what they’re doing in any situation but this. Something bad’s going to happen out there—they’re not prepared. They need to come inside or they’ll die.”

Dare lived by his gut, but he wasn’t used to trusting someone else’s. This could be the moment they’d discover everything.

“Key and Jem—come inside now,” Dare ordered.

“We’re clear,” Jem argued. “Come out while you can.”

“No,” Grace told Dare, her tone still urgent.

“Bomb,” she whispered.

He wanted to ask how she knew, but there was no time to waste. Especially because, as she spoke, the lone man Key and Jem had their weapons trained on turned the gun on his own head and shot himself.

Grace turned away from the screen, and Jem and Key stopped arguing. Within minutes, the two men, in black gear and guns, were down the steps and the security perimeters were set behind them. As the lockdown measures clicked in around them, they heard the
whomp-whomp
of the chopper blades. And then the earth shook from the bomb that Dare and the others hadn’t known about.

“You knew—motherfucker,” Jem muttered at Dare. “You knew the bastard was going to try to wipe us out.”

“I didn’t, no,” Dare said, his gaze locked on Grace now. She was holding her hand over her mouth, staring at the blank computer screens as the comms were wiped out by the explosions. The shelter shook a little, and she looked up as if expecting it all to come down on their heads.

It wouldn’t, even with a bomb like that. But if Powell knew about the bomb shelter, he wouldn’t have tried to kill them aboveground. He would’ve sent men in to get them.

“Then who knew?” Jem demanded, his gaze settling on Grace.

“I knew.”

“How? Because you were in contact with Powell?”

“No.”

“Whose side are you on?” Jem demanded, and Dare found himself wondering the same thing.

“Yours,” she told Dare.

“She just saved our lives,” Key reminded them. “Why do that if she’s not on our side?”

“I wouldn’t betray all of you, not after what I’ve been through.”

“Then tell us how you knew his plan,” Jem demanded. “Because it sure as shit feels like a setup, all around. You save us, we trust you. And then boom, we’re dead.”

Grace shoved away from Dare. “I will never be on Richard Powell’s side. Never.”

“Guys, let’s discuss this later,” Key urged.

“We’ll discuss it now,” Jem said.

“While you guys talk, I’ll head out and take out the men who are, no doubt, coming this way to check for bodies,” Key told them as he slung his gun over his shoulder.

Dare glanced at the nonworking cameras and then the glint in Key’s eyes. “Forget it. They don’t know we’re here—and you going out there is a death wish.”