Falling Hard

by HelenKay Dimon

She made a face. “You sound like a child.”

  The expression on Benton’s face went from pathologically friendly to fury. His features fell and the underlying anger punched through. “Do not talk to me about children.”

  Interesting. West stored that away for later. And there would be a later. He knew Lexi performed a mental countdown as she waited for whatever this guy had in store for them. Now that West had met him, he knew the chances of them surviving had increased. There was no way this unimpressive piece of garbage could outsmart Alliance. He might be ahead now because he’d had privacy on his side, but that was over.

  Lexi continued to stare at Benton. “What is wrong with you?”

  But he had to keep her alive long enough to get them out of there. He put a hand on her shoulder. “Lexi, stop.”

  “You should listen to him.” Whatever bond Benton thought he’d make with her disappeared. He dismissed her the same way he seemed to dismiss everyone else. “I know our spy is injured but he’s proven very resourceful. Tie them both up.”

  Raheel reached for Lexi, and West’s hand shot out. He grabbed the other man’s arm and squeezed, letting him know that even torture hadn’t sapped his strength. “Do not touch her.”

  “This is no longer interesting to me. Tie them up.” Benton looked from Raheel over to Pearce. “Well?”

  The clicking of computer keys stopped as Pearce left the monitor to join them. He had a gun in his hand and aimed it at Lexi’s head. “Is it time to start killing people?”

  He sounded far too excited by the prospect. Whatever soul he’d once had was gone now. Traded for toxin and cash. But so long as the gun stayed on Lexi, West knew his moves remained limited.

  “Torture the woman,” Benton said.

  Raheel’s hands came down on her shoulders and she tried to squirm away from him. “No!”

  “She means nothing to me.” West forced his body to remain still as he delivered the information. Kept his voice and expression neutral. They only wanted her because of him. This was to punish him.

  “Then you won’t care what I do to her.” Benton slid his case off the table.

  “My men are on the ground.” West knew the ploy wouldn’t work. This was all about keeping her as safe as possible while he stalled. His strength inched back and he silently worked on an exit strategy. He just needed time . . . and Raheel’s gun.

  “They won’t find us.” Benton’s voice remained strong, but the fact that he kept talking meant something.

  “I found you.” West figured this guy had to fear something. West might even respect Benton if he were smart enough to connect the dots and realize he’d come up against the one intelligence group that would stop him.

  Raheel bound his hands with a zip tie. The dumbass. West conducted drills seeing how fast he could shred one and get free.

  Benton’s gaze lingered for a few extra seconds before he turned to Pearce. “Take them away. We have work to do.”

  Raheel walked them back toward the cell. Lexi could almost hear West thinking. There was no way he was going to let them get trapped deep within the caves.

  She’d watched him confront Benson and mentally write off Pearce. Injured or not, tortured or not, West was the man in control of that room back there. She just hoped his body could deliver after all it had been through. He should not be standing, let alone planning an attack of some sort.

  And that was what he was doing. She could see the wheels spin. She decided to help by taking her own shots at Raheel. “How can you do this?”

  He waved her off. “Shut up.”

  West glanced over his shoulder at the armed man behind them. “Is your friend Javed in on this, too?”

  “He told you to be quiet.” Pearce turned to the left instead of the right.

  Lexi didn’t have to search her memory. This hallway led them straight back to the torture chamber. Her body reacted with a complete shutdown. Her muscles tightened and her mouth went dry. She tried to move her fingers but they’d gone numb.

  “I have nothing left to lose,” West said as they turned the corner.

  “We’ll see about that.” Pearce gestured to Raheel, then to that horrid piece of fence. “Put her in the chains.”

  The words hit her like a shot to the chest. “West.”

  Raheel grabbed her from behind as Pearce kept the gun turned on West. “No smartass comment now?”

  West stayed silent. Her insides whirled. She heard a screaming in her head and was surprised not to hear it echo through the caves.

  “That’s a shame.” Pearce motioned for two guards in the hallway to come inside. “Tie him to the chair so he has a front row seat for this.”

  Raheel stepped forward with his hand still clamped over her wrist. “We should torture him, not her.”

  She hated that idea. Hated Raheel. Right now she agreed with West and hated this country.

  “Watching this happen to her will torture him.” Pearce grabbed the wire and handed it to the guard behind West. “See, West here has a savior complex. I’m sure there’s some psychological reason behind it having to do with his fucked up childhood, but the point is that watching her bleed will be worse for him than ripping his own skin off, though that will happen eventually.”

  West stood there with his arms tied behind his back. “When did you get so fucking sick?”

  Pearce just smiled. “I’m going to need a bigger knife for you.” He headed for the door, but not before giving his guards new orders. “Shoot his other shoulder if you need to subdue him.”

  “Where are you going?” Raheel called after Pearce.

  “I have something special in mind for West.” Pearce stepped into the hall. “Get them ready.”

  Once he was gone, Lexi looked to West. He gave her a short nod and jerked his arms. The zip tie went flying. Then the room erupted in chaos. Something whizzed by her head. She didn’t know what it was until one of the men behind West grabbed his neck and dropped to the floor. Her gaze flipped back to Raheel where he stood in a knife throwing with an empty hand where his blade should be.

  In a blur of movement, West swung around and leveled the other guard with a punch to the head. The man stumbled back but stayed on his feet. The guard reached for his radio just as West nailed him in the chest with a kick. He made a half-choking, half-gagging sound as he hit the wall. West was on him a second later. Bent down only long enough to remove the knife from the other man’s throat and plunge it into this one.

  The flurry took only a few seconds but moved in slow motion in her head. She heard the grunts and saw the flashes of movement. When the world spun back to regular speed again, Raheel was beside her and West stood a few feet in front of her with fresh blood seeping from his wound and a knife in his hand.

  West took a step forward, fury obvious in every line of his body. After a quick visual check of her and the cut of her binding, he aimed his homicidal glare at Raheel. “I should kill you.”

  “I saved her by throwing the knife.” He visibly swallowed. “Saved both of you.”

  West nodded. “That is the only reason you’re still breathing, but I can make that stop.”

  With their arms freed and men on the ground, the power balance had shifted. She saw one problem, despite the hammering of stress through her. “We’re still stuck in here.”

  “I can get you out,” Raheel said.

  Before they could move, Lexi asked the one question that buzzed in her head, weighing down everything else. “Javed?”

  “He was watching over the garage and saw you taken here. He found me and asked for help to get you out.” Raheel’s gaze flipped from Lexi to West. “That’s why I’m here today.”

  “You seem pretty comfortable walking around,” Lexi said. “No one is trying to kill you.” And from what she could tell, the people manning this group liked to kill.

  Raheel’s attention never left West as he bent down and removed the weapons from the two dead men on the floor and pocketed them both. “The general I worked for
brought me here.”

  That made sense in her head. She couldn’t pin down the nationalities of the people here. She heard English and no accents, so maybe they were American. The few Pakistanis seemed, like Raheel, to have been recruited. This was not a homegrown operation. It didn’t even feel like a terrorist cell. The Pakistani army would want this group out as much as she did.

  Maybe this was nothing more than one man’s insane crusade. She just knew from the look of the guards that they’d had military training and would not be easy to get around.

  None of that absolved Raheel, and she reminded him of that. “You’re in on this.”

  “I didn’t know this was about chemical weapons.” He shook his head. “I thought this was a secret army assignment.”

  No, he had wanted to believe that. She could see the truth in his eyes. He probably got extra money and looked the other way when confronted with the obvious clues. “I don’t buy it.”

  “Hey.” West glanced out the doorway then back to Raheel. “Get us out of here and I won’t kill you. That’s the best deal I have for you right now.”

  “There are too many guards.”

  West aimed his gun at Raheel. “You have ten seconds.”

  20

  WARD AND Josiah made their way toward the compound. They got beyond the fence without trouble and now had to get through a wall of men. They needed to get far enough so that when the diversion came they could capitalize on it and sneak into the caves.

  For now, they hid between two trucks. The next stretch of this run would take them into the open. With his messed-up hand, Ward could shoot but not with anywhere near the accuracy Josiah could. That left one option for how to go forward.

  Ward pulled out a second gun. He’d been practicing shooting with his left hand and now was the time to use his new skills. “I’ll draw fire.”

  Josiah’s concentration didn’t break. He continued to scan the area. “No.”

  Running Delta, Josiah possessed a leadership mind-set. He made decisions without hesitation. Ward appreciated that but he was in charge.

  “That’s the only choice. You get to the edge of that rock ledge.” He didn’t give Josiah a chance to argue. He took off. Slipped out just far enough for anyone watching to pick him out.

  At first nothing happened, but Josiah didn’t wait. Keeping low, he slid around the hood of the truck and darted out. Took off at a dead run.

  He got ten feet out and the shooting started. Men fired from above.

  Zigzagging, Josiah got to the next waiting place then turned and fired. He picked off the gunman at the end, then the one next to him as Ward ran across the open span. His sharpshooting skills hadn’t lost their accuracy.

  The sound of gunfire brought men running from every direction. An alarm sounded and bullets pinged around them. Trucks started and the open yard broke into chaos.

  Josiah dropped down and pushed his back against the wall as he caught his breath. “I think we have their attention.”

  “Did you notice the men? Not Pakistani.” Ward needed to get closer to take photos and check IDs. He had no problem killing them first.

  The techs back at the Warehouse could run the facial recognition programs and lock down identities. Give them an idea where this stream of mercenaries originated from. There seemed to be an endless supply of guns for hire. They had no loyalty. They loved their paychecks and killing.

  “Americans?” Josiah asked in his British accent.

  “Some.” Ward expected he’d know more once he got closer and heard voices. Right now the yelling morphed together with the banging and shooting into a dull roar. “Time check?”

  Josiah fired then looked at his watch. “We’re on countdown.”

  Men moved in from two sides. They were pinned down by fire and needed the diversion. But with the communications blackout, they were stuck with the hard start time and had to survive until then.

  “To your right.” Josiah kept up a constant barrage of shots. He aimed and fired and men fell around them.

  Ward glanced to the right and saw men pile into a truck. They signaled to each other and weapons were drawn. If the truck rammed the rocks, which is what he would do in their position, he and Josiah would be trapped. “We need to move.”

  “Nowhere to go.”

  Ward ducked and fired. One out of every three of his shots hit a target. Thank God Josiah’s percentage was near perfect. But that wouldn’t help if a truck ran him over. “This is about to get messy.”

  “We thrive on messy.” A bullet ricocheted off the rocks and zipped across the side of Josiah’s head. He grabbed his ear. “Shit.”

  “You hit?”

  Josiah lowered his hand to a palm full of blood. “Just grazed.”

  Ward knew Josiah would play through it. But they had another problem. “I’m running out of ammo.”

  “Same.”

  Ward was about to call a second time check when the truck started rolling. Men hung out of the sides shooting. The rapid gunfire cut off all other sounds. Shots kicked up the dirt all around them and kept them hiding behind the rocks.

  “Fuck me.” Josiah reached for the weapon by his ankle.

  “Time?”

  Josiah shook his head without looking. “Not yet.”

  An engine rumbled and tires rolled. Ward knew the truck headed directly for them. The gunfire was meant to lock them in for when the hit came. Smart move. He was reluctantly impressed.

  That didn’t mean he’d give in. He lifted up, peeking around the rock. They had to jump out at the last minute and run. Then keep running.

  Men closed in. A line of guards stood only twenty feet away, ready to pick him and Josiah off as soon as they moved. That cut off most of their options. He tried to work through a new one.

  A huge boom cut off his thinking. One minute the truck headed straight for them. The next it flipped and burst into a ball of fire. Men on the ground dove out of the way. Bodies flew through the air and pieces of debris rained down.

  “What the fuck?” Josiah pushed up beside Ward.

  As they watched, men ran around on fire and the focus on the ground switched from attack to rescue. Smoke billowed and flames crackled. The wind caught the fire and flames jumped from the vehicle to a tent.

  Around the side of the chaos came a figure, running bent low and headed right for them. Josiah lifted his gun but Ward pushed the barrel back down.

  “This one’s with us.” He would have recognized that cocky walk anywhere.

  The fire roared, and the men were too busy screaming at each other as they tried to drag bodies away from the explosion. The fire dragged everyone’s attention away from the caves, but they still had to find West and get out before the flames closed off access.

  Mike slid in beside them in a cloud of dust. “How was that for a diversion?”

  “Needs some work.” Josiah took the extra ammo from Mike’s outstretched hand. “You were early.”

  “You’re welcome.” Mike smiled as he glanced at Ward. “Nice shooting.”

  The men knew this was a sensitive subject. Ward appreciated the humor. “I hit stuff.”

  “Like Josiah?” Mike’s question had Josiah reaching for his ear again.

  Ward reloaded. “Thought about it.”

  “Thank Harlan for this light show. The guy is good with a stinger missile. Who knew?” Mike balanced on the balls of his feet. “He’s ready for round two, so it’s going to get fucking loud.”

  Josiah nodded. “Time to grab West.”

  “Let’s go.” Ward was already moving.

  The three of them formed an inverted vee pattern as they jogged. Men poured out of the entrance to the caves. Josiah and Mike took them out one at a time. Something burned across Ward’s forearm and Mike grunted at one point. But they kept moving.

  “Where do we look?” Mike asked.

  Josiah took out his knife. “Knowing West, he’ll find us.”

  Ward hoped that was true.

  The boom shook
the ground. Raheel slammed into the cave wall. West put his arm around Lexi’s head and tucked her against him. The pain in his shoulder pounded but he blocked it out, as he had been for hours.

  The rocks muffled the sound but West recognized it. An explosion. Not just any explosion. One that sent people running. That could only mean one thing. Alliance had arrived.

  Raheel steadied his body with a hand against the wall. “What is that?”

  “The cavalry.” The best group of operatives on the planet. The finest men West knew.

  He should have guessed they’d blow Pakistan apart and risk an international incident and the higher-ups’ wrath to bring him out. They wanted the intel and the information on the weapons. That was their job. But Ward made it clear that they would not leave bodies behind. Ever.

  Raheel frowned. “What?”

  “My team is here.”

  “Thank God.” Lexi closed her eyes and whispered the comment against his chest.

  Footsteps sounded behind them. West turned, ready to shoot, but Raheel grabbed his arm. He pulled them deeper into a side tunnel, tight against the wall in a claustrophobic space that should barely hold two of them, let alone an extra person and one at West’s side. They squished in and waited.

  A few seconds later a group of men rushed by. This time West picked up accents. Eastern Europeans. These were the nasty guns for hire. Looked like Benton had some interesting contacts.

  As soon as the group passed, they stepped out of the small enclosure and Raheel started talking again. He kept his voice low but the urgency was unmistakable. “How do you know the explosion was for you?”

  “No one knows how to make noise like the men of Alliance.” And this was intentional. If Josiah wanted to go in quiet, he would have. They lit up the day for a reason. Possibly as a signal to let him know it was clear. West didn’t care so long as they were going.

  Ooh-rah.

  Lexi pushed her hair back over her shoulder. “Let’s hope they know who to shoot and who not to.”

  The sexy woman had a point. His team wouldn’t shoot unarmed women for fun, but it was hard to tell the hostiles from the nonhostiles in this type of situation, with smoke billowing all around. With the men scurrying and the firepower in the building, not to mention the chemicals spread around, they had to exercise extra caution.