by Bianca James
As he began to make his descent to the LZ, raw fury raged through him. If they wanted to go to war, he was ready and he knew Spider was, too. Nobody tries to shoot Spider out of the air and lives to tell the tale. They had to keep Elle safe as well and getting the bastards out of their lives once and for all was the surest way of ensuring that.
Someone had better let the new Sheriff…Sheriff Jack Raven…know that it was on and it wouldn’t be over until it was over. No one messed with his family and that included his fellow vets. They were all family up on Bear Mountain and if you messed with one, you messed with them all.
He needed to get to the LZ for an extraction by Spider so he could get home to Elle and take her somewhere safe.
Oh no! Elle…
Chapter 4
“We’re too low on fuel,” Spider enunciated his statement by tapping on the glass covering the fuel gauge. They were running on fumes.
Jarrad’s brow furrowed as if frowning angrily at the gauge might make it change its mind. It didn’t. Refueling then heading to his cabin further down the mountain was their only option. The fact that the Mi-28 helicopter the cartel were using had bugged out didn’t bode well for Elle’s safety. After all, it was Elle who brought the cartel down on them in the first place.
Despite the tension or perhaps because of it, Jarrad struggled to squeeze himself into one of the seats in the rear cabin of the chopper and started thinking about Elle and her baby bump. He still couldn’t look at her without feeling a pounding in his chest and a stirring further down. He adored her and wanted nothing more than to have babies with her and protect them all.
He pulled impatiently at the harness straps in an effort to buckle himself in. They were designed to fit normal sized people. Jarrad was far from normal. He was a well-built man and hardly anything, from clothes and shoes to safety equipment, fitted him.
It had been six months since Jarrad had rescued Elle after she came to grief on an icy mountain road while trying to outrun the cartel, carrying a suitcase full of cash and a memory card containing the details of all their bank accounts, routing numbers and passwords. The cartel practically declared war on Bear Mountain in an attempt to retrieve the SD card. They didn’t count on ‘Spider’ Webb and Jarrad unleashing hell on them and sending those that survived away with their tails between their legs.
Now they were coming back and it looked like they really meant business this time. Elle had done her smoke and mirrors financial voodoo and siphoned their ill-gotten gains to a number of veteran’s foundations, so he knew it was no longer about the money. Now it was personal and that made them even more dangerous. That thought turned the blood in his veins to ice. As if they weren’t dangerous and vindictive enough before all this.
The rotorwash whipped at the branches of the nearby trees and snapped Jarrad’s uniform against his body as he fought his way through the whirlwind of dirt and leaves to reach his cabin. It was still there. That was something, at least. Last time, they vaporized it with a Hellfire air-to-surface anti-tank missile. With a lot of sweat from himself and Elle plus a generous contribution of elbow grease from the local community, it had taken them less than six months to rebuild it to its former glory.
But where the hell was Elle? Even if she’d been sleeping, the thunderous cacophony generated by a jet powered helicopter landing in the yard should have awakened her. Something was wrong and a lump of dread too large to swallow formed in Jarrad’s throat. He turned to face Spider who remained in the cockpit, ready for a quick getaway. Despite the roguish chiseled clefts that hinted at his Welsh heritage, concern was plain on his face.
Signaling Jarrad to wait, he worked his way through the power down checklist as fast as he could. There was no way he was letting Jarrad go in there alone. Once everything had been powered down, Spider grabbed a Glock 9mm he kept hidden beneath his seat and unbuckled his harness. The Glock was a peashooter compared to the weapons the cartel brought to the table, but it was all he had. Better than nothing. Then he made a brief radio call before exiting the chopper, gun in hand.
Together, they approached the beautifully crafted cabin with its floor to ceiling windows designed to give them an unimpeded view of the rolling valley below and the pristine forest that bordered their property. Now, they served only to expose them to whoever might be lying in wait for them. Armed and extremely dangerous.
Jarrad raised an eyebrow at Spider when his eyes locked on the Glock he held at his side.
“What?” Spider shrugged nonchalantly.
“That’s all you got? You bring a 9mm to a missile fight?”
“It’s my backup gun. I don’t like to keep anything heavy duty on board. You should know that,” Spider rebuked. “Besides, it’s more than what you’re bringing to the party.” He nodded toward Jarrad’s clearly empty hands.
Jarrad shrugged. This would be the last time he was caught off guard. He needed to remember that it wasn’t just himself he had to look out for any more. He had Elle and a family on the way. It was going to take some getting used to. He swallowed hard when he thought of Elle, glowing and vibrant when she told him she was pregnant. He’d never seen her look more beautiful.
They split up and approached the impressive two story cabin from opposite sides, covering each other as they approached the front door.
It was ajar. They never left the door open. Living on the edge of the forest, there were always curious bears and cougars who would take the opportunity to enter a home with an open door. Something was definitely wrong.
Together they walked up the steps, Jarrad ready to shoulder the door open and sweep one side of the room and Spider on his six, ready to sweep the other. Jarrad help up three fingers, then two, then one…they entered the cabin in unison and immediately stopped dead.
Jarrad’s skin turned to ice. And not because of the chill in the mountain air.
The white faux-cowhide rug in the living room was stained with a bloody handprint.
Chapter 5
Jack Raven’s face darkened as the call came over his radio. Memories flooded back, raising a prickle of sweat on the back of his neck and a cold, empty feeling in the pit of his stomach. He thought he’d left all that behind. Missiles and helicopter gunships belonged in his old world. A world of scorching desert sands and radical insurgents. A world where he always had a target on his back. A world he hoped was a long, long way away from Bear Mountain, where he’d come to heal and start over. Now it was all coming back.
His hand trembled as he keyed his mike. “Acknowledged.” That was all he could say and even that nearly caught in his throat.
He knew he should warn Cassie, but he didn’t want her to see him like this. Everything had been going so well. They were getting along brilliantly. She had come to terms with him being an ex-soldier and he was slowly learning to manage the issues arising from his traumatic brain injury. The IED that earned him a medical discharge would probably haunt him for the rest of his life, but that didn’t mean he had to let the trauma control his life.
But how would Cassie react to seeing him lose control like this. Trembling and bordering on tears. Not tears of fear or sadness, but tears of sheer frustration that he no longer felt like the man he once was. No, he’d say nothing for the moment and hope for it to pass.
Besides, if what Spider had told him was true, and he had no doubt that it was, then there were bigger issues to deal with both as Sheriff of Bear Mountain and as part of the Bear Mountain community that Spider had surreptitiously orchestrated for him to join when he mentioned the job opening all those months ago. Sheriff? He should have known it was a set up. They didn’t need a sheriff here. Not in a community protected by some of the most highly trained ex-military mountain men in these parts.
He smiled to himself. If he hadn’t taken this job, he’d never have met Cassie and for that he’d always owe Spider. Big time.
“You want a refill?” asked Rosie, the elderly but still very spritely owner of the local diner and lodge as she shuff
led over to Jack’s table with a steaming coffee pot.
“No thanks Rosie, I’ve got to be on my way. Looks like we might have some trouble heading our way, if it’s not already here.”
“What kind of trouble?” Her eyes held no trace of fear. It was as if she just wanted to get ready for whatever was coming and face it head on. That was Rosie’s way.
“The cartel kind, apparently.” Jack still didn’t know what to make of that. Why would the cartel be coming here? It wasn’t exactly the drug or organized crime capital of the country.
“Elle hasn’t mentioned what happened? Not to you or Cassie?” Rosie asked, her brows rising in surprise.
Elle and Cassie had become good friends since Cassie’s arrival on the mountain and both Cassie and Jack had helped Elle and Jarrad put the finishing touches on the cabin. Rosie took it for granted that they would have been told the story.
Jack shook his head.
“The cartel goons brought their particular brand of thunder down on us a while back. Elle used to work for a bank that laundered money for them and when she found out what was going on, she hightailed it out of there, but not before she grabbed one of those memory flash stick thingies with a whole bunch of stuff on it that those guys were prepared to kill to get back.”
“I thought we were all friends. Why wouldn’t they tell us that?” Jack looked hurt at having been excluded by his new shifter family.
Rosie placed her wrinkled, spotty hand over Jack’s. “Son, they know what you’ve been through. Jarrad isn’t the most sensitive guy around, but even he knows better than to tell you that you might be living in a warzone again. I think he was just trying to protect you, in his own way.”
“I don’t need protection,” Jack snapped a little more harshly than he intended.
“I know that. Jarrad knows that, too. He’s just trying to do right is all. Cut him some slack. He’s been through a lot, too,” Rosie spoke reassuringly and patted Jack’s hand gently.
“If push comes to shove, Rosie, will you let Cassie stay here and look after her for me? If we’re going to have trouble, I don’t want to have to worry about her too.”
“Of course, dear. I’ll have Elle come here and stay, too.”
If we can find her, Jack thought grimly.
Chapter 6
Spider’s home was a nondescript, handcrafted log cabin built near a creek, on the edge of the forest. It was much like any other cabin on the mountain but for two significant feats of engineering that set it apart. One visible and hard to miss the other, completely hidden from view.
The first was a purpose built helipad, complete with landing lights for night landings and a heated deck so it wouldn’t freeze over during winter.
The second was an underground bunker below the helipad, built for a very specific and special purpose, one he hadn’t shared with anybody. There had been no need to. Until now.
“This is some ‘man-cave’. You say you built this yourself?” Jarrad asked, gesturing at the enormity of the cavernous space.
The thick concrete walls were lined with gun racks—lots of gun racks—shelves of ammunition, medical supplies, ration packs and a variety of vests, night vision goggles and other serious military paraphernalia. Enough to arm a small, actually, a large, country to go to war. Neither Jarrad or Jack had seen anything quite like it outside of an army base. And Spider’s cabin was definitely not an army base. It just looked like one.
“I brought you guys here for a reason,” Spider stated matter-of-factly, crossing his thickly muscled arms.
“And by here, you don’t mean right here, in your secret Agents of SHIELD bunker, do you?” Jack was quick to catch on to where this was headed. He’d long suspected something like this was on the horizon.
Spider nodded, a gleam in his hazel eyes, acknowledging something that didn’t need to be spoken between the two men.
“Someone want to clue me in on what’s going on with you two? I need to get out there and find Elle. Maybe you guys can finish bonding in your secret clubhouse some other time?” Jarrad was growing increasingly impatient, but he needed them both and tried to keep his feelings in check.
“All the other mountain men these parts are either family groups, related by blood or clans bonded in other ways, like the firefighter clan on the other side of the ridge…”
Spider paused, sensing Jarrad had something important to contribute.
“Those guys are a mountain clan, too?”
Spider rolled his eyes. “Yes, Jarrad. Try to keep up. As I was saying, the other clans around here are linked by blood or some other bond, but both of you are lone wolves, if you’ll pardon the pun.” He threw them a quick smile to lighten the mood.
“And your point is…” Jack motioned for Spider to keep going. He was growing impatient, too.
Spider ran his fingers across the blond stubble on his shaved head, took a deep breath and continued, “My point is that I wanted both of you to come here and join the community on this mountain so that we could form our own clan. We work well together…”
He stopped mid-sentence and turned his attention to a monitor on a desk chock full with surveillance gear. He tapped a murky black and grey image on the monitor with his finger.
“Did you see that?” He punctuated by tapping harder on the screen.
Both Jarrad and Jack looked to each other, then back at the screen before shaking their heads.
“There.” He pointed again. “The infra-red camera is picking something up. Further up the ridge, looking down on our position.”
“That could be anything. A mountain lion, wild dog. Anything at all.” Jack dismissed Spider’s paranoia.
“And when was the last time you saw any one of those sit perfectly still for half an hour?”
All three of them leaned into the monitor to take a closer look. Then Spider shrugged off his jacket, threw it on a nearby chair and made his way to the back of the bunker.
“Where are you going?” Jarrad asked, making his way to follow along.
“Wait here. Check out the inventory with Jack. I’m going out the back way to see who’s so interested in my comings and goings. At least it’s not the cartel. We’d be having the crap bombed out of us by now if it was.”
As he stepped through an adjoining door, he turned and said, with a thick Austrian accent, “I’ll be back.” Then the door bumped closed and he was gone.
Jack laughed.
Jarrad’s brow knitted. “What’s so funny?”
“If I have to explain that to you, then you won’t get it anyway.”
Chapter 7
Her breath caught in her throat. She lay perfectly still in the hope that whoever or whatever was blocking her view wouldn’t see her and keep moving.
It did move. It turned in her direction.
Erin closed her eyes as tightly as she could and held her breath.
Please go away. Please go away. Please go away. Her silent mantra seemed to be working. He or it, stepped up over her hiding place and she heard it shuffle further up the slope behind her.
She let out a breath and gasped to fill her burning lungs with fresh, mountain air as she quietly removed the night vision headset.
Then suddenly an enormous head with an open mouth and a whole lot of big, sharp teeth appeared in front of her eyes. Even in the moonlight she could see every horrifying detail. It was hard to miss anything when the warm breath of the creature was in her face and the teeth were only inches away from her nose.
Suddenly, it roared. A sickening, blood curdling, predatory growl.
And then everything went black.
“Is she one of them…the cartel?” Jack asked doubtfully as he looked her over.
Spider threw the Halloween mask he kept handy to scare nosey kids off his land across the room where it landed on a shelf looking deflated and not so scary.
“Not likely,” Spider conceded. “She wasn’t even armed. Not even a pocket knife. Just these.” He held up the night vision kit. “It
’s not even mil spec. More like home shopping channel spec, if you ask me. Cheap plastic Chinese crap.”
“Any ID?” Jack probed, ever the law enforcement officer.
Spider shook his head. “Not even a purse. She must have a car around here somewhere. I’ll take the chopper up tomorrow and try to find it. Can’t be too far away. She wouldn’t get far in those shoes.” He nodded toward the mid-heeled pumps she wore.
That’s when Spider started to take more notice of their captive. It was her ankles that did it. Her shapely ankles drew him to look closely at the willowy woman who lay unconscious on a makeshift cot in their bunker. He’d never been a big fan of the whip thin girls he met while he was in the service. Skinny things who wouldn’t know how to handle a real man if they tried. But this woman had an athletic leanness to her. From her slender ankles his eyes followed her shapely, toned legs all the way to her strong, delightful thighs, he began to appreciate how well put together she was.
Muscular calves that he’d actually be able to feel wrapped around him while he punded her relentlessly. Then he noticed her thighs looked strong enough to rid a mountain man, too. A really nice pair of ear warmers to keep him cozy on a winter’s night while he went down on her…
Jarrad snapped his fingers in Spider’s face.
“Can you stay focused for a minute? Elle, remember? We’re supposed to be making a plan to get her back. This is no time to start getting all swoony.”
Spider managed to tear his eyes away from the mysterious girl on the cot long enough to concentrate on what Jarrad was saying. A hint of a smile framed Jacks lips as he also saw what Spider had been looking at. She was one very tidy specimen. A perfect soul mate for a rugged ex-military mountain man.