Hot for His Hostage (38 page)

“Somebody frisk Doc Asshole,” he muttered. “Now.”

As Ethan performed that duty, the pontiff-perfect smirk spread wider across Homer’s
lips. “All right, so I have a confession to make. I’m not
that
surprised. And what a shame.” He glanced over to Franzen. “I love surprises. Don’t
you?”

Franzen’s lips twisted. Shay imagined he was contemplating the perfect way to tell
the guy to shut the fuck up.

He never got that chance.

The earth shook as the compound’s new lab was ripped apart by an orange and red explosion.

As he hit the deck along with Tait, Shay thought he heard his mother’s horrified scream.
Or maybe it was the ringing in his ears. Or the shock in his senses. He couldn’t confirm
it, because the bomb blast was followed by a fire storm he hadn’t experienced since
his team last tangled with a band of pissed off insurgents across a poppy field in
the Helmand Province. He jerked his head up, half expecting to see the opposition
advancing through the flowers with his head on a pike as their ultimate goal.

No flowers. No pikes. A sight much worse.

In less than a minute, the street was overrun by a small army of fighting men who
looked like shiny movie extras, some running, some tumbling out of fast-moving jeeps.
Every single one of them was outfitted in spanking-new mountain camos and classy black
battle boots. On their heads were high-end battle helmets with GPS and heat-sensing
capabilities that could see through walls.

“Start paddling, kids. We’re deep in the shit.” Franz greeted them with it as they
scrambled on elbows and knees to join him, Zeke, and Dan behind a rusty horse trough.

Dan grunted. “Our buddy Homer’s been busy with his tongue on
somebody’s
balls.”

“Not-so-wild guess?” Tait returned. “Or am I just entertaining a wild fantasy that
it’s Cameron Stock, finally within striking distance?”

Sure enough, riding shotgun in the lead jeep, was Cameron Stock.

Shay joined his brother in a dark grimace. To borrow from Homer’s knowing sarcasm,
my, my, my
. To borrow from himself,
we should’ve fucking known
.

He’d barely stabbed himself with the remorse before his attention was swerved. A second
jeep sped up next to Cameron’s, making it clear that the man in that passenger’s seat
was leader in equal standing with Stock. The guy, reeking of military might, was lanky,
grizzled, and scowling hard beneath a black beret he wore in the Army Spec Ops style.

The moment the guy got out of the vehicle, Franz swore in what sounded like Polynesian
profanity. Tait’s eyebrows kicked high but Shay only fired back, “Who the hell is
that?”

“General Kirk Newport.”

His jaw hit the dust.

“Whoa.” Zeke snarled. “
The
Kirk Newport? Like, the boss of our boss of our boss?”

Franzen’s burnished skin paled by at least three shades. “Yeah. That one.”

“But what’s he—”

“Damn.” Shay laid his hand over his rifle then dropped his head to his wrists. “During
the hijacking, he was the military representative who got on the line to try and talk
Stock down—whatever that meant.”

Franz arched one incredulous brow. “I’ll bet that’s interesting in hindsight.”

“They talked smack to each other for a few minutes before Newport disappeared, a la
your friendly car salesman ‘going to see what he could do.’ It wasn’t long before
he got back on the line, magically granting us clearance for the landing at Groom
Lake.”

“Mother
fuckers
.” Zeke’s growl was strengthened by the new volley of bullets that whizzed over their
heads. “The three of them have been in on this all along!”

Dan shook his head, appearing like he needed to borrow a few ashamed ice picks from
Shay. “I should’ve thought things out by more steps. Should’ve predicted this.”

“Using what fucking intel?” Tait rendered a chastising whack up the side of the agent’s
head. “You were flying blind, Dan. We all were. Still are.”

Dan ignored him. “We played right into their hands,” he muttered. “They didn’t just
know that we’d plan something. They were counting on it. Probably saw us jump from
that damn plane. Listened to our radio chatter, too. Dammit!”

Shay longed to join their rants but there was no time. He wasn’t just the cause of
this mess; he was the one who had to set it straight. Somehow…

Newport, still in his jeep, yelled into his head comm. The charge was like water to
ants, making half the guerillas surge toward the old Mercantile where Ethan and Garrett
were now cornered. The decrepit store was located on the same side of the street as
the clinic, where the remains of Mom’s lab seemed to burn higher than ever. Shay wondered
why the flames didn’t die down, seeming to whip higher and higher at the sky—

Because they were.

The wind had gusted embers from the blast across the narrow alley and onto to the
roof of the Mercantile—where they caught like a match on tinder.

“Holy shit,” he gritted.

“No kidding.” Zeke put the pieces together just as he did.

“Not good,” Franz growled. “Those boys need out of there faster than bodybuilders
at a romance writers’ convention.”

Shay was already halfway done scoping out the opposite side of the street. “That pile
of boulders, between the saloon and the assayers…I can make it there, given proper
cover. It’ll also break up the elephant, make this thing easier to chew.”

“And then what?” Franz demanded.

Shay cocked both brows. “You won’t have given half of them lead enemas by then?”

Franz conceded the compliment with a cocky head dip. “Fine, but half of a thousand
cockroaches is still a lot of cockroaches. You’re the one they’re here for, I-Man.
They’ll re-form and re-swarm.”

Shay unhooked a grenade from the guy’s belt. “That’s what this is for.”

“You’re going to need more than one.” Zeke pulled a pineapple off his own belt and
handed it over. “Just don’t blow up your nuts with it, okay? Apparently they’re hot
commodities these days.”

There were so many choices of how to tell the guy to go fuck himself. Shay had trouble
picking one out.

The hesitation cost him the pleasure. The words, along with his breath, were strangled
in his throat by a fist of pure panic, sporting fingers of disbelieving dread.

So this was what it felt like to hear his own mother scream. Then to watch her tear
back down the street, arms outstretched and face contorted with horror. Pretty much
sucked as bad as he’d expected.

“Stop!” Mom shrieked. “For the love of God, stop it! There are still innocent people
in there!
My
innocent people!”

Next to him, a tight groan burst from Tait’s chest. Shay’s spirit cracked for his
brother. The guy finally laid eyes on the woman for the first time in twenty years
but was locked down from doing a damn thing about it. Especially now.

Ghid’s appearance lent no more clarity to things. Though his delay was explained by
the painful contortion on his face and the hand gripping his crotch, it didn’t clean
up the confusion now on board with Shay’s amazement. What was Mom talking about? Even
if she’d been watching this shit go down, why was she coming back in the middle of
a gun battle for three experienced men like Ethan, Garrett, and Dan? But she was so
frazzed-out, she’d broken away from Ghid by going for his balls.

Innocent people.
My
innocent people
.

“Holy crap.”

He spat it as the horror hit home. As if it needed any more fuel, Mom stomped in front
of the soldiers, shoving their gun barrels toward the ground as she went. “And you
call
my
patients the monsters? Three of my nurses are still in there, you cocksuckers. Did
anyone ask about that before setting off bombs? Did anyone care?”

Her announcement clearly knocked the hired hoodlums on their figurative asses. They
pelted each other with panicked stares, clueless as noobs tossed into a hypothetical
crisis on the first day of training. Their hesitation was both a blessing and a curse.
While this was the ideal distraction Shay needed to implement his plan, Mom’s nurses
couldn’t afford another moment of delay. Hell. There was a good chance it was too
late already.

“Thumbs out of asses, kids.” While the words were pure Dan Colton, it still stunned
Shay that the agent was the first to spring to action—not just figuratively. As the
agent popped to his haunches, he nodded fast at Shay. “You handle the field trip across
the street, I-Man. I’ve got the nurses covered. The extra commotion will help Hawk
and Runway get out, too. Zsycho and Dragon, you both ready with the lead enemas?”

“Fuck, yeah.” Zeke propped his rifle against the trough and growled with gusto.

“Shit.” Franz emulated the move. “I hate it when our best option still sucks bones.”

With that send-off, Shay jumped into action at the same second as Dan.

His sprint was a blur of adrenalin, exhilaration, and fear. Past the blood pounding
in his ears, he heard a soldier yell toward him in Spanish. A bunch more joined in,
soon growing into a mob. As he cleared the last three steps before the boulders, bullets
sent up dirt clouds around his feet.

Bingo
.

“Come to papa, sweet little sheep.” He muttered it while shucking the ninja jacket,
reveling in the new freedom from his thinner, darker raglan shirt and the Kevlar vest
beneath. The words lent him the focus to ease his breathing and reassess the logistics
of all this chaos.

A laugh tempted his lips and he gave in for a second. Shit. In what other job on earth
did “chaos” and “logistics” exist in the same action plan? The realization was either
cause for celebration or compunction—or ambivalence between both, depending on the
moment.

Like this one.

He crouched on the balls of his feet, grenade in hand, opening his senses for the
right moment to lob the thing. Maybe a fast glance over the top of the rock would
help. The boulders were stacked on a small rise of earth, which would give him the
chance to study the area for about two seconds. Didn’t seem like much, but as he’d
learned so many times over the last week, moments could be turned into eternities.

Mmm hmm. Just ask a dancer trying to look sexy during a major show finale at a dance
rave pace.

“Dancer.” The whisper escaped him as the memory flared through him, a solid brick
of emotional C-4. He promised her he’d live—and he would, dammit.

Even if everything had taken yet another terrible turn for the worse.

On the bright side, he watched Hawk and Runway break free from the Mercantile, ash
flying off their shoulders but nothing else notably damaged or burned. Zeke was still
in position behind the trough but waved them beyond his location to a group of old
barrels, where they joined a trio of guys who’d originally been Homer’s minions. Shay
was certain their defection wasn’t a stunner to anyone.

That was the good stuff.

The horror show didn’t start until he did a double-take on Z’s position—the spot he’d
occupied five minutes ago with Franzen and Tait. But where the hell were they now?

“Fuck.”

Shay almost added a crap load of choice names to call the duo, synonyms for everything
from first-degree idiots to gigged-up morons, as he caught sight of them behind a
dilapidated wagon—engaging easily thirty of the guerillas in a disgustingly uneven
firefight.

“What the—”

He cut himself off, finally spotting the treasure they were all shooting to kill for.
Mom, bound by her wrists and ankles, was draped over one of the jeep’s hoods. Her
eyes were so wide, Shay swore he could see their whites from here. Ghid, who’d clearly
fought to keep the scum suckers from recapturing her, was splayed in a beaten-to-shit
heap next to one of the jeep’s tires.

Shay barely kept his stomach from punching its way up his throat. While it was a damn
righteous sight to watch his bad-ass brother and that half-Samoan warrior giving as
well as they got when outnumbered fifteen to one, it was torture to keep his ass planted
where it was. But Stock and Newport’s ploy was more obvious than a stripper spreading
her legs. If Shay raced to join Tait and Franz, he’d play right into their fucking
plan. Every visceral, vile reaction he endured right now was like dancing on their
puppet strings, but the dick wipes weren’t getting the whole puppet show.

All he could do was pray for the right chance at lobbing these grenades—and about
a hundred miracles after that.

“Help! Oh God, help me!”

The scream didn’t sound like anything close to a miracle.

Tait lifted his stare back over the rock and frantically scanned for the source of
the cry. It was female but hoarse—and raw with desperation—

There. On the old boardwalk in front of the burning buildings. A woman emerged in
soot-covered medical scrubs, every inch of her skin just as black from smoke. Her
mouth was a stark grimace against the charcoal of her face, opened on imploring sobs
as she dragged an unconscious body behind her.