by Elle James
Rebecca and Mary Beth helped shove the others up the wall, one by one. Lana straddled the wall and pulled with all her might to get each one up to the top and over.
Each time, the ladies balked at dropping down into the gasoline-fed flames.
Lana assured them they had no other choice. “Drop and roll,” she instructed each. “Now, go!” If the woman didn’t go immediately, she gave her a shove. She didn’t have time to be nice. Not if she wanted to get all the women out before the building burned to the ground.
The last one in the building was Rebecca.
Lana held out her hand. “Take my hand. I’ll pull you up.” Flames licked at her feet. They had seconds before the flames consumed the hut.
“I’m not going,” Rebecca backed away.
Lana stared down at the woman, her heart breaking at the desperation on Rebecca’s face.
“If I live, he’ll find me. He’ll make me come back to him.”
Lana held out her hand. “You have to live to get your children back. They deserve a better life than what your husband will give them.”
“I’m tired. I can’t do this anymore.”
Smoke filtered into the building as flames ate through the other side.
Rebecca coughed and covered her mouth.
“If you don’t come up here, I’ll be forced to come down and get you. I’m not leaving here without you.” Lana swung her leg over the side, back into the hut.
“No.” Rebecca raised her hand. “You can’t sacrifice yourself for me. I’m not worthy.”
“Bullshit. You’re worth more than that sack-of-shit husband of yours, who left you to die. Get your ass up here now, or I’m coming down after you.” The smoke stung Lana’s eyes and threatened to choke her. She coughed and pulled her shirt up over her nose.
Still, Rebecca hesitated.
“Coming down,” Lana said.
“No. I’m coming up,” Rebecca held out her hand.
Lana shifted her leg to the other side of the wall, grabbed Rebecca’s hand and pulled as hard as she could.
Rebecca clasped her hand and tried to swing her leg up to the wall’s ledge but missed. She fell, losing her grip and dropped to the ground.
“Go,” she said. “Save yourself.”
“I told you, I’m not going without you.” Lana dropped to the ground beside Rebecca. “Get up there.” She cupped her hands. “Now!”
Rebecca placed her foot in Lana’s hands and pulled herself up onto the ledge. “But now you can’t get out.”
“I’ll get out. Go on. Help the others hide in the woods.”
“But—”
“Go!” Lana said and coughed. “Just go!”
Tears streamed down Rebecca’s cheeks.
Lana pushed at her leg. “Please. I’ll get out of this. I promise.”
The next moment, Rebecca slipped over the ledge and dropped out of sight.
Alone in the hut, fire burning all around, her eyes stinging so badly she could hardly see, Lana wondered if she’d be able to live up to her promise. If she would live.
Her lungs burned, and she struggled to breathe the smoke-laden air. She couldn’t give up. Trevor was out there somewhere. Her chance at a happy-ever-after life would not slip through her fingers this time, damn it!
She ran toward the wall and threw herself at it with all the determination of a climber on Mt Everest.
The busload of women and children left the compound before the Trevor and his team reached the outer perimeter.
The men were piling into trucks rumbling toward the road leading out.
Hank, Taz, Kujo, Chuck and Boomer set out to head off the trucks attempting to leave.
Swede stayed with Trevor as they raced for the burning building where Lana’s beacon still blinked green on the tracker screen.
The hut was fully engulfed in flames. That didn’t stop Trevor. He ran for the door and flung it open.
The heat burst from inside, nearly knocking him down. Trevor pulled his shirt up to cover his face, ducked low and ran into the flames. Smoke hit his eyes, making him blink. The room was empty, but there was a door with a heavy wooden bar locked in place.
Rage burned hotter than the inferno around him. Bastards! Trevor ran for the door, pushed the bar up and ripped it open.
At that moment, the wall on one side of the hut buckled. Trevor knew he had to get out, but not without Lana.
The inner room was filled with smoke.
“Lana!” he called out, inhaled a lungful of smoke and coughed. He dropped to his hands and knees and looked around at the floor. No one was in the room.
Still on his hands and knees, he crawled through the smoke and fire out into the night air.
Swede stood with his arm around a woman’s waist, his other hand holding his rifle. “Damn it, Anderson. That has to be the stupidest thing you’ve ever done.”
“She…” he coughed, “wasn’t…in…there.”
“Oh, thank God.” The woman in Swede’s arm dropped to her knees. “She told me to get the women into the woods. I did, and I came back for her.” She sobbed into her hands. “She got out. Sweet heaven, she got out.”
Gunfire sounded behind them where the rest of the team dealt with the men leaving the camp in the loaded trucks.
Trevor lurched to his feet. “If she got out, where is she? Lana!” he yelled.
“Looking for her?” a male voice called out. A tall man wearing a leather bomber jacket and carrying a submachine gun stepped into the open, holding Lana by her hair.
Joy rushed through Trevor. In the light from the flames, he could see the soot smeared across Lana’s face. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and her clothes were black with dirt and soot. But she was alive.
His joy faded as he noted the submachinegun pressed to Lana’s temple.
Anger sent a wash of red across Trevor’s vision. How dare this man threaten Lana’s life? She was a good person and deserved to be treated better than this. He clenched his fists, ready to charge the man and beat the living shit out of him.
“Trevor, don’t worry about me. I’ve got this,” Lana assured him.
She was trying to make him okay with the fact she could be murdered in front of him? Trust her to worry more about others than herself. This was the woman meant for him.
Trevor wasn’t going to let this lunatic ruin his second chance with the woman he loved.
“Drop your weapons,” the man said, “and maybe I’ll let her live.”
“Don’t do it,” Lana said. “This sorry ass is Huntley Powell, my boss at the Department of Homeland Security. He’s a traitor to our country, and he doesn’t deserve to live.”
“Shut the hell up,” he said and yanked her hair so hard, she stumbled backward. “I should have killed you myself. That bumbling idiot botched all of this, letting you get to the FBI before we had a chance to carry through on our plan. I should have killed him sooner.”
“Sooner?” Lana shot a glance toward Powell. “What did you do to Peter?”
“What I should have done as soon as he failed to take care of you.”
“You killed him?” Her teeth bared in a snarl. “He might have been salvageable, unlike you.” She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the man holding the machinegun to her temple. “What gives you the right to take the lives of other human beings?”
He snorted and tapped her temple with the muzzle of the machinegun. “This gives me the right. This country has gone to shit. The politicians are making a shambles of our government and our standing among foreign nations. It’s time someone took control and stopped the absurdity.”
“Well, someone needs to stop you.” Lana ducked quickly, drove her elbow into Powell’s gut and dove behind him.
Powell swung his weapon toward Trevor and Swede.
Trevor took the only chance he had and fired on Powell before he could fire on them. He hit him with his first shot.
The man stood as if he hadn’t been hit full-on in the chest. He raised his weap
on and stared directly at Trevor.
Trevor and Swede dropped to the ground as a burst of bullets ripped through the air over their heads.
Then Powell crumpled to the ground like a rag doll, the machinegun slipping free of his grip.
Lana grabbed for the weapon and stood over the man, her eyes wide and angry. She pulled the trigger, but the weapon jammed. She pulled back the bolt and let it slam forward and tried to pull the trigger again, and it jammed again. “Dammit!”
Swede laughed. “Remind me not to piss off your girlfriend. I’m going to go see if I can help the others, now that you have this situation in hand.” Swede left Trevor and ran toward the trucks stalled at the exit at the compound.
Trevor crossed to Lana, removed the machinegun from her grip and threw it to the side. Then he pulled her into his arms and held her shaking body.
“These men should die,” Lana sobbed into his shirt. “They abuse women, frighten children and kill good people.” Her fingers curled into his shirt, and she looked up into his eyes, tears making dark streaks down her face. “You found me. How?”
He touched the necklace around her throat. “I didn’t want to lose you ever again. I put a tracking device on you.”
“But I put it in my jacket pocket. The jacket I left at the store back in Bozeman.”
He smiled and kissed the tip of her soot-smudged nose. “I gave you two. One of them is in the necklace you’re wearing.”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him tight. “I didn’t think you’d find me. I was going to get myself out of this situation if it was the last thing I did.”
And it had almost been the last thing she’d done. Trevor swallowed hard on the lump forming in his throat. “Lana, sweetheart, I need to tell you something before anything else happens to you.”
She looked up at him, a frown denting her brow. “What is it?” Her frown deepened as she looked into his face. “What’s wrong?” She leaned back and ran her gaze over his body. “Were you hurt?”
He chuckled. “I’m fine, but I don’t think my heart will ever be quite the same.”
She leaned her ear against his chest. “It sounds fine to me.”
He gripped her face and forced her to look him in the eyes. “Woman, will you just listen to what I have to say?”
She nodded. “Shoot.”
“I love you, Lana.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ve loved you for a very long time. Even before Mason beat me to popping the question, I’ve loved you.” He dug in his pocket and pulled out a small box, now covered in soot. “I bought this before he asked you to marry him. I was waiting for the perfect moment to ask you. But I waited too long. Mason got there first.” He dropped to one knee next to the dead director, a burning building puffing smoke into the air and did what he should have done two years ago.
“Lana, will you give me that second chance I don’t deserve, and do me the honor of being my wife? I promise to love, honor and cherish you for the rest of my life. And at this rate, that might not be too long. Please, say yes before anything else happens.”
The roof of the hut crashed to the ground behind them, sending out a shower of sparks.
Tears spilled from Lana’s eyes, and she dropped to her knees in front of him. “Are you sure? Do you really want to marry this mess of a woman? Knowing I was married to your best friend?”
“Mason would have wanted us to be together. I think he knew how much I loved you. But he loved you, too. I don’t blame him for holding onto you with both hands. He was faster and smarter than I was. But this old dog can learn from his mistakes.”
Lana pressed a finger to Trevor’s lips. “Yes.”
“I promise you I’ll take care of you. I’ll give you all the children you want and even change diapers.”
She shook her head, smiling, her teeth white in the darkness of her dirty face. “I said yes.”
Trevor shut up and let her words sink in. She’d said yes. His heart filled to overflowing, threatening to burst right out of his chest. He rose to his feet, bringing her with him. Then he took the ring he’d purchased two years ago out of the box and slipped it onto her finger where it had always belonged. “I love you, Lana. Always have. Always will.”
Epilogue
“Need another lemonade?”
Lana tipped back her head and smiled at Trevor. “Not yet. I haven’t finished the one I have. But thanks.” She sat back in the lounge chair on Hank and Sadie’s wide porch, happier than she’d been in a very long time.
“The bridesmaids dresses are supposed to come in this week,” Sadie said.
“The florist said she can get the white daisies you requested for your bouquet.” Boomer’s wife, Daphne, dropped down on the seat beside Lana. “All we need is a band, and we’ll be set for next month.”
Lana smiled. “Now that the ladies and the children from the Free America compound are settled in their temporary lodging at Mrs. Kinner’s B&B, I feel like I can think about the wedding.”
“I hope they keep their husbands in jail for a very long time,” Molly, Kujo’s girl, said. “I couldn’t get over the number of bruises those women had all over their bodies. Those men should never be free.”
“Agreed. Sadie and Hank were kind enough to rent out the B&B for a year, so they could get situated and have a place to stay until they get on their feet, find jobs and can support their children on their own.” Lana drew in a deep breath and let it out. “Which brings us back to the subject of the wedding. Do you think we can move up the date?”
“What?” Trevor straightened from his position leaning against the porch railing. “You want to get married sooner? I thought all brides needed time to plan everything.”
Lana frowned, though the corners of her lips twitched. “You’re not getting cold feet, are you?”
He reached for her hands and pulled her to her feet. “No way. I’d marry you tonight if we could nab a preacher.”
“Good,” Lana brushed a kiss across his lips. “But a week from now will be soon enough.”
“A week?” Sadie and Daphne squeaked at once. “We can’t possibly get everything ready in a week.”
“Then we won’t worry about the things that we can’t do,” Lana said. “I’d like to be married as soon as possible, so I can go on my honeymoon before I’m too big to enjoy it with my man.”
“What? You…too big?” Trevor shook his head. “You eat like a bird. That’ll never happen.”
“Sweetheart, it’s about to get real,” she said and shifted his hand from her arm to her belly. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a plastic wand. “The blue line means positive.”
Trevor shook his head again. “Positive for what?”
Sadie and Daphne both dissolved into laughter.
“What’s so funny?” Hank climbed the steps to the porch, smiling.
Swede, Boomer, Kujo and Chuck all gathered around.
“Yeah, let us in on the joke,” Chuck said, holding Daphne’s baby girl, Maya.
“Lana’s pregnant,” Sadie announced.
“And the wedding date just got moved up.” Daphne clapped her hands. “We’re having a wedding next week.”
Trevor’s eyes widened. “A baby? You’re pregnant with a baby?” He ran his hand over her flat belly. “Are you sure?”
She nodded. “It moves our plans forward a little, but the house should be finished before the baby arrives, and we’ll have time to get furniture for the nursery.” Lana stared up into Trevor’s eyes. “You are happy, aren’t you?”
He nodded. “I’ve never been happier in my life.” Then he grabbed her around the waist and swung her around. “I’m going to be a daddy!”
When he set her back on her feet, he kissed her soundly. “Let’s have a wedding.”
She laughed, her heart swelling in her chest. “Trevor?”
“Yes, darlin’,” he said.
“If this baby is a boy…could we call him Mason?”
Trevor swallowed hard, and his eyes gli
ttered with moisture. “I wouldn’t call him anything else. Mason was just as much a part of my life as you are.” He led Lana over to the porch swing and settled her in beside him. “If it’s a girl, we can call her Maisie. The main thing is that this child will know how much I love you and how much I love him.”
“Or her.” Lana leaned into Trevor, her love for the man filling her life so completely.
In her heart she knew Mason would have approved and would have been happy that she’d gotten on with her life and found someone who loved her as much as he had. “I love you, Trevor. Forever and always.”
Wyatt’s War
Hearts & Heroes Series Book #1
New York Times & USA Today
Bestselling Author
ELLE JAMES
Chapter 1
Sergeant Major Wyatt Magnus pushed past the pain in his knee, forcing himself to finish a three-mile run in the sticky heat of south Texas. Thankfully his ribs had healed and his broken fingers had mended enough he could pull the trigger again. He didn’t anticipate needing to use the nine-millimeter Beretta tucked beneath his fluorescent vest. San Antonio wasn’t what he’d call a hot zone. Not like Somalia, his last real assignment.
It wouldn’t be long before his commander saw he was fit for combat duty, not playing the role of a babysitter for fat tourists, politicians and businessmen visiting the Alamo and stuffing themselves on Tex-Mex food while pretending to attend an International Trade Convention.
The scents of fajitas and salsa filled the air, accompanied by the happy cadence of a mariachi band. Twinkle lights lit the trees along the downtown River Walk as he completed his run around the San Antonio Convention Center and started back to his hotel. Neither the food, nor the music lightened his spirits.