by Krista Wolf
“Ah, here you are!” Nanise declared. “Still relaxin’?”
His trained soldier’s eye took in the room first, scanning the exits, the windows, and then finally my shattered leg. The blood was still everywhere, but at least it wasn’t as red. The wound was clotting. It might even stay that way if I were to remain still.
“I’m on my fifteen-minute break,” I grunted, holstering my weapon. “You’re interrupting me.”
“Sorry boss. Breaktime’s over.”
I coughed. “But I didn’t even finish my coffee yet.”
I squinted as another explosion roared outside, this one louder and much more local. By the time I opened my eyes again I’d already been slung across Nanise’s broad back. He did it as effortlessly as a father might lift a toddler on his shoulders. A moment later everything spun dizzily, once we were back outside.
“I— I want you to—”
“Be better if you stop talking, boss.”
A wave of nausea washed over me. I wasn’t sure of direction, or orientation, or how far within range the enemy might be. Hell, I wasn’t even sure what day it was anymore.
The blood loss was getting to me.
“Nanise…”
Everything was a red-tinged blur. I tried to focus, to look down, but all I could see was feet. My savior’s boots moved quickly, one after the other, running fast and hard.
“Nanise, see if you can find—”
KA—BOOM!
Something else exploded, and suddenly my mouth was filled with dirt. The taste was like sour chalk and coffee grinds, but at least it distracted me from the pain.
“Nanise!”
I was on the ground, sprawled against the rocks and debris, spitting so I could breathe again. The right side of my face was on fire. The eye on that side was gummed shut with blood… or worse.
“NANISE!”
I heard scratching, scrambling. Some kind of shouting very close by, in a language I could only hope was English.
Then the darkness descended. It spiraled inward from the edges like the aperture of a camera, or the intro to a James Bond movie…
… and my whole world went black.
Thirty-One
SAMMARA
It was a long flight to Vanua Levu, giving us plenty of time to plan, time to sleep. The second-largest island of Fiji was breathtakingly beautiful, especially from the air. All lush greens and turquoise blues and white sand beaches as far as the eyes could see.
Of course it reminded me sharply of Bora Bora. Which in turn reminded me of Kyle, and Ryan, and Jason…
Nine months. That’s all it’s been.
It seemed like an eternity ago now. Ages since we’d all been together in paradise, celebrating our happy union. Absently I spun my engagement rings around my finger, while staring out the window of the plane. We were on final approach now. One step closer to fulfilling my very unorthodox plan…
I couldn’t believe Dakota had gone for it, but it made too much sense not to try. Besides, the alternative was an exercise in futility. There was a chance he might’ve gotten the others back by himself, through cleverness or diplomacy or sheer brute force. But I wasn’t willing to let him try. At least not until we’d exhausted all other options.
We landed smoothly, and transitioned to a private FBO on the outskirts of the airport. Nadi was one of the smaller International Airports, but seemed no less busy than some of the others I’d seen.
“You sure you can fly this thing?” the dark-skinned man talking to Dakota said. He glanced at me sideways before going back to the conversation. I turned away and left them to their negotiations.
A half hour later we were in the air, Dakota ascending smoothly through a series of wispy cloud layers. I’d known my fiancé held a pilot’s license… but I also knew he wasn’t exactly seaplane-rated. He’d rented the aircraft for quadruple the normal amount, just to keep the owner satisfied… and quiet.
“We’ll be fine,” he assured me over the headset. I was strapped securely into the co-pilot’s seat, still gripping my seat cushion tightly with both hands. “How hard could it be?”
Once above the cloud cover, things smoothed out. Dakota set course and flipped a switch. Then he unbuckled, got up, and crawled awkwardly into one of the rear seats.
“What are you doing?” I yelped. “Dakota, I—”
“Autopilot,” he said matter-of-factly. “Don’t sweat it.”
Autopilot! I had no idea aircraft this small even had autopilot! Yet our wings remained straight and level throughout. I watched the rudder pedals move on their own, the control wheel twisting slightly left and right as whatever mechanism was flying the plane made small, tiny adjustments to account for wind fluctuations.
In the meantime, Dakota had a sleek metal case in his lap. I had no clue where he’d gotten it. He was busy plucking pieces from within a series of egg-crate nests, inspecting each piece before setting it back into its proper place.
“You know,” he called from the back seat, “the guys would kick my ass if they knew what I was about to let you do.”
On either side of me, the twin engines droned on. They changed in pitch and volume as a gust of wind drove the nose up slightly.
“If this doesn’t work,” I countered, “there won’t be anyone left to kick your ass.”
Somewhere over my shoulder he made a face. I couldn’t tell if it was a good or bad one.
“Look, this is our best bet,” I said. “Either he’ll help us or he won’t, but it’s not gonna hurt to try.”
For once Dakota didn’t answer. We both knew that last part was debatable.
We flew on for a while, and eventually he climbed back into the pilot’s seat. I couldn’t help but notice he looked hotter than hell, wearing a sky-blue headset and a pair of mirrored aviator glasses. One big hand rested sexily on the seaplane’s throttle. I placed mine over his, interlacing our fingers.
“There.”
He pointed, and I could see the outline of a crescent-shaped island with a large, central hill. There was a structure on one side — what amounted to a sprawling little compound, complete with gated walls. On the other, a long sand bar stretched out into nothingness, dissolving into the ocean.
“You sure you can land this thing?” I asked, probably for the fourth or fifth time.
Dakota just shrugged. “We’re gonna get wet either way,” he said. “Be ready. Once I set her down, we need to make the beach pretty fast. And then…”
He looked at me, and his words trailed off. I leaned over and kissed him hard. Harder and more forcefully than I’d ever kissed him before. Passion welled up in my heart, flowing through my body. Passion and love and adoration, driving away the last hints of uncertainty.
“It’s gonna work out,” I practically shouted into my headset’s microphone. “Trust me.”
I thought it oddly amusing, me reassuring him. After all this time, things really had come full circle.
We descended, lining up with the far end of the little island until we were parallel to the beach. I saw the concentration in Dakota’s eyes as he engaged the flaps. Eased off the throttle…
… and glided the aircraft’s pontoons downward, toward the smooth glass surface.
Thirty-Two
SAMMARA
I was winded from the climb, but no less worse for wear as I approached the stuccoed walls of the little compound. They were as smooth and white as the sand, stretching upward to two covered towers on either side of a large, iron-banded, oaken gate.
That gate opened as I approached, swinging wide on enormous hinges. I was open-armed, hands at my sides. Not so much for the two men who emerged to meet me, strapped with visible holsters and sporting automatic rifles which were thankfully pointed at the ground.
Holy shit, Sammara…
The gravity of the moment slammed me at once, its crushing weight attempting to trip me up. But I didn’t trip. I just kept walking, slowly closing the distance between me and the walls of the compound. Ea
ch step seemed heavier than the last, my brain screaming its danger warning as I abandoned the safety of the beach behind me.
About fifty yards from the gate I stopped. They stopped.
Time stopped.
“Markus Ladrone!” I called out. A slight breeze blew my hair into my face as I scanned the walls. More men stood in the towers, armed to the teeth. It was a good sign.
“Right here.”
A man emerged from the gate, looking shorter and squatter than the others. He had a thick mop of shiny dark hair. Hair that appeared only marginally less greasy than the last time I’d seen it.
Still, the man looked different overall. He was thinner now, and even healthier-looking. The scowl I remembered so vividly was all but gone. The lines were still there, but…
“Sammara.”
He walked between his two men and continued onward. One of them grunted something — a warning maybe — but he waved them off.
“That’s your name, isn’t it?”
I nodded, standing motionless as he approached. I tried not to look stiff. Tried not to appear nervous. The man strutting so casually up to me now could see past all that, though.
“You might be the last person in the world I expected to see today,” he grinned. His teeth were whiter than they were last time. His smile was almost… handsome.
He kept walking, not slowing his pace as he reached me. It was an intimidation tactic. I refused to back down a single step.
When he was three steps away I put my hand up. “That’s far enough.”
He took another step anyway, just because he could. I almost laughed.
“You do realize this is my island?” Markus asked. “I’ll walk where I please.”
I expected the bravado, the banter, even the smile. But I had time for none of those things.
“I need your help.”
His smile got bigger. Brighter. He even laughed.
“My help?”
“Yes.”
The ex-mercenary folded his arms. His tattoos stretched with the flexing of his tan skin.
“And so you flew all the way here,” he said mockingly. “To my island. Nearly wrecking your seaplane on that hellacious landing by the way,” he added bemusedly. “Just so you could enlist my… help?”
I stared back at him coldly and nodded. “Yes.”
His smile widened. As I expected, he was enjoying this enormously.
“And exactly why should I help you?” he shrugged. “If anything I should take you. Take you the way I almost took you last time. The way I should’ve taken you last time.”
“You won’t,” I said confidently.
“Oh no?” Without thinking, he rubbed at the scar on his chin. I realized it was the same scar Jason had given to him nearly four years ago, when he’d seized control of Di Spatia.
“No.”
“And why’s that?”
The breeze picked up again, blowing everything around us. I ignored the distraction.
“Because Dakota Bradley has his crosshairs trained on your skull right now.”
Markus tried to maintain his composure, but I saw him stiffen. His grin shrank by a quarter-inch before artificially widening again.
“Of course he does,” he said simply. “And I’m supposed to believe—”
I swung my arm downward, pointing my finger at the ground. A shot rang out, and a clod of dirt exploded between us. Not necessarily in that order.
His men jumped, raising their rifles, pointing them in useless directions. But Markus merely sighed. Resignedly, he peered upward at the rocky outcropping that overlooked the entire island.
“Next one goes in just below your left ear,” I told him. “It travels downward, tearing off your lower jaw as it exits, shutting you up for good.” I winced at my own description. “Yikes, that was graphic. Sorry. Dakota words, not mine.”
Markus growled, somewhere deep in his throat. “I should’ve known you’d never come alone,” he said. “Hell, I should’ve known Bradley was here by that shit landing.”
More men came running out from the gates, but the ex-mercenary captain stopped them all with an outstretched hand. He looked back at me again, but now his mouth was twisted with an all new respect.
“What exactly do you want, Sammara?”
“To strike a deal with you.”
He nodded appreciatively. “Is this a deal I’ll like?”
“Very much.”
“Because the last time we—”
“Markus,” I interjected. “Stop talking and just listen.”
He grinned again, this time even wider than before. Holding one arm overhead he turned it in a quick circle, and every one of his men filed back through the compound gates. Even the ones just behind us.
“You can signal Bradley to come down now,” he said. “Along with whoever else is up there.”
I watched him turn and begin walking down toward the beach, his wrists clasped casually behind him. When I didn’t move, he glanced back at me over his shoulder.
“Well are you coming or what?”
Thirty-Three
SAMMARA
The sand was every bit as beautiful up close as it had been from the air. I had the urge to shed my shoes and just walk barefoot through the gently lapping waves.
“Iraq, huh?”
Markus sighed as we walked side by side, squinting off into the midday sun. I’d told him everything — everything we knew, anyway. I’d rambled it all off quickly, trying to give him as much information as possible while watching for a reaction.
“And they’ve been non-comm for how long now?”
“Kyle and Ryan, a few days. Jason… much longer than that.”
“Briggs,” he spat, with a laugh. “I should leave him to rot. You should too. Even if you somehow get back the others…”
I glanced back, to where our footprints trailed out behind us. We looked like any normal everyday couple walking on the beach. Talking casually. Enjoying a beautiful day.
“You should help us,” I countered, “if you want what I promised.”
Markus stopped for a moment to look at me. “And what if I don’t?”
I hesitated. I didn’t have an answer for that. One that didn’t involve blackmail anyway, and I wasn’t ready to go there. Yet.
“I’ll be honest,” he said, walking again. “This place bores me. It’s quiet. Too quiet. And after the life I’ve lived…”
As much as time was of the essence, I let him talk. He seemed deeply introspective all of a sudden, even nostalgic. I knew both these things could only help our cause.
“Don’t get me wrong — it’s absolutely gorgeous here,” Markus went on. “It’s safe, it’s private, it’s got perfect weather.” He inhaled deeply through two big nostrils. “And the salt air is great for my lungs.”
“But you want back in,” I pointed out hopefully.
He hesitated. Eventually he nodded.
“I miss the life,” he admitted. “I miss the thrill, the excitement, the camaraderie of command. Hell, I even miss the desert!” He laughed to himself. “Can you believe that? I miss the fucking desert.”
I looked back again. Still no Dakota. It had been our plan though, to give me enough time. To let me soften him up, maybe gauge his reaction, before he saw one of the four men who’d taken Di Spatia from him.
“Briggs run Di Spatia into the ground yet?” Markus scoffed, as if reading my mind.
“You know he hasn’t. Even I realize you’ve still got people who’ve told you that. People embedded in the company from when—”
“Old friends embedded,” he cut in. “Yes, yes I do. And I know most of what’s going on. Even now.”
My body tingled with excitement. It was what I’d been hoping for.
“Sammara, do you know why I lost the company?”
“You were siphoning weapons from the US military,” I said frankly, “and selling them to insurgents.”
I saw Markus’s shoulders go tight. He nodded slowly.
“True. But do you know the whole story? Of how that happened?”
“Look Markus,” I said, “I don’t even care. Whatever you did back then, it’s not my—”
“I care,” he said very abruptly. The words came out sharp. Crisp. On the verge of anger. “I care very much about what happened because a lot of it was beyond my control.”
He stopped and turned toward me again. I saw the fire of resentment in his eyes now. It was an entirely different look than the haughtiness of before.
“The man I’d started selling those weapons to was a former US Marine. I didn’t realize he was acting with the insurgents. Not until I was too deep. Until it was too late…”
I kept telling myself that his story meant nothing to me. That all I cared about was Kyle, Ryan, and Jason. But to Markus, this was the end-all, be-all. It was the source of his angst, his unrest, his inability to be happy, even in paradise.
To him it was everything.
“I tried to get out. Only I got burned. Men died, Sammara — my men. People got hurt.”
“And what did you do?”
“I continued,” he went on. “I tried to minimize it. Make the most of a bad situation. I formed Di Spatia to get the jump on those who had the jump on me, only I lost it before I had that chance.”
Markus put a staying hand on my shoulder. I wanted to rip it off, but I kept it there and held his gaze.
“Jason Briggs showed up at the wrong place at the wrong time. He showed up while I was fixing things. Making things right.”
I didn’t know if he were lying, or telling the truth. But his eyes…
“Your problems are my problems,” Markus said cryptically. “Briggs is missing right now because of his timing. Because of—”
Something flew between us, moving so fast it was a complete blur. Two giant arms picked Markus up by his shoulders and slammed him downward, into the sand.