Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73947 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 370(@200wpm)___ 296(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
The firefight lasts another thirty seconds, or maybe a few minutes. Time is hard to track when men are trying to kill your family.
Someone whistles out by the trees, and the attackers break contact.
Rhett fires once more, and Cade sends a controlled shot toward the north drainage. I keep my rifle trained on the west treeline until the shadows fade away.
Things go quiet, except for glass tinkling to the floor and wind coming through broken windows.
“Report,” Rhett demands.
“North clear,” Cade answers.
“West clear,” I say.
“Southeast clear,” Rhett says. “Wren?”
“I’m here.” Her voice is still clear, but sounds like it’s taking all her effort.
After Cade checks camera feeds and confirms no movement, Rhett knocks twice on the safe-room door. “Open.”
The bolt slides, and Wren steps out with the pistol still in both hands. Her eyes go to Rhett, then Cade, then me.
“Boone!” The color leaves her face as she quickly holsters her weapon and heads straight for me.
“I’m fine.”
“It’s like you think I don’t have eyes. Sit down.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“No pursuit,” Cade reminds us on his way to the front door.
“I know,” Rhett says.
Cade gives him a look that says he knows Rhett knows, but somebody still needs to say it. We’re all tempted to retaliate, and it would be a good way to get ambushed.
Wren shoves my plate carrier open and lifts my shirt. When air hits the graze, I hiss despite myself. Her eyes flash. “This is fine?”
“Fine adjacent.”
“Boone.” She sounds on the verge of yelling.
“It’s a graze. I promise.”
“It’s bleeding.”
“That’s what grazes do.”
She presses gauze to my ribs with enough pressure to make me see stars, and I decide to take her seriously. She’s scared and furious, but she’s alive.
I catch her wrist before she goes for more supplies. “Hey, I’m okay.”
“You were shot.”
“And I’m okay. We’re all okay.”
The terror she must have been holding back behind the safe-room door flashes in her eyes for a split second, then she swallows it down and tapes the gauze across my ribs with barely-shaking hands.
Cade comes back inside carrying something black in one gloved hand.
A radio.
He sets it on the table, and we all move in.
“One of them dropped it near the north drainage,” he says. “There was a blood trail there, too, but not enough to matter.”
“This isn’t cheap equipment,” Rhett says.
As he’s leaning in for a closer look, static crackles from the radio. A distorted voice breaks through. “—Sparrow hit. Pulling to two. Negative reengage.”
Another voice answers, half buried under encryption noise. “Federal eyes confirmed. East corridor staging compromised.”
Cade’s eyes narrow in on the device as he adjusts the dial with maddening precision.
There’s only static until, “Boss says load moves early. No delays. Start convoy prep tonight.”
The transmission dies, and none of us speaks for several seconds.
“The shipment,” Wren says.
Cade looks at Rhett. “The first week of July just moved up.”
Rhett already has his phone out.
CHAPTER 39
RHETT
“My advance team was spotted,” Novak says after I get him up to speed on the attack and the captured radio.
“You knew?”
“We suspected. Turner’s cartel contacts have been in emergency communication for the last twelve hours. We didn’t have confirmation.”
“Now you do. How long to move?”
“I need forty-eight hours to reposition the tactical team without making him scatter.”
“No.”
“Rhett—”
I’m standing in my kitchen with glass under my boots and bullet holes in my walls, and Wren is kneeling beside my brother with blood on her hands. “You have twenty-four.”
“That’s not how this works.”
“It is now.” I step away from the others, but there’s no privacy in this cabin. “Turner’s people just tried to kill us in our own home. This was not a probe. The next attempt will be heavier, or he’ll be gone before you’re ready.”
“We’ve got it covered.”
“No, you don’t.”
Novak’s voice hardens. “Careful.”
“You want careful? Use the people who know the terrain. Cade has better data than your drones. Wren knows where the men have been moving. Boone knows extraction points your medevac plan probably doesn’t include. I’ve been poring over maps for so long, I could find my way to the staging area with my eyes closed.”
“You’re emotionally involved.”
“Yes.”
The simple and honest answer stops him. I look at Wren again. Boone’s hand is wrapped around hers now, and he’s holding her in place as much as she’s holding pressure to his wound. Cade’s working over the radio, but his attention’s on the call, too.
“Yes,” I say again. “I am emotionally involved, and I’m also right.”
Novak doesn’t say anything.
“We’re going to be involved,” I continue. “This is our mountain, and we’re defending our woman.”
Everyone else in the room with me goes still for a second, and Wren’s eyes are shining.
Novak sighs like I’m aging him. “If I say that to my tactical commander, he’ll bench all of you on principle.”
“Then translate it for him. Make it palatable.”
After a pause, he says, “I can use you as terrain consultants.”