Short Fuse: Elite Operators, Book 2

by Rebecca Crowley

  “What the hell?” she shrieked, ducking in her seat. “What’s going on?”

  The engine roared as he floored the accelerator. “They’re trying to hit the tires.”

  “But why?”

  “We’re clearly more use alive. Maybe they want information. Or hostages.”

  Another bullet glanced off the back of the truck with a metallic clink. Warren fought to keep the car steady, never losing speed as he swerved to compensate for the impact.

  “I saw the muzzle flash in the rearview,” he muttered, knuckles white on the steering wheel. “Only one weapon’s been fired. Shooter’s in the passenger seat.”

  A third shot thudded into the road beside them.

  “Okay, two weapons.”

  Nicola pressed her back against the seat. She squeezed her eyes shut, indulging in a single moment of unrestrained fear. Then she swallowed her swelling panic, took a deep breath and sat up.

  “What do we do?”

  He unbuckled his seatbelt. “Switch places.”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of phoning the security booth at Hambani.”

  “They’ll never reach us in time. Shift over here. If you climb into my lap, you can take over the pedals while I move out from under you.”

  “Only because you bought me dinner first.” She released the catch on her seatbelt and scooted across the gearbox. He tugged her into the space between his thighs and the bottom of the wheel. She took over steering just in time to avoid a deep pothole, jerking the truck to the left and then back to the center of the lane.

  “Forget the clutch, just keep the speed up and stay in gear. Are you ready?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Perfect.”

  Before she had a chance to panic he slipped out from under her, and she slammed her foot on the accelerator. The shafts of illumination from the headlights bounced and juddered along the uneven asphalt, and she had to squint through the windshield to see the road.

  Warren slid into the passenger side and she dropped into her seat, instantly realizing it was pushed so far back to accommodate his long legs that she could barely reach the pedals. She hunkered forward, perching on the very edge, her calf straining as she floored the accelerator.

  Another gunshot cracked through the night. She squeezed the wheel until it dug into her palms, weaving between two potholes, the muscles in her legs trembling from the mix of adrenaline and terror.

  He was kneeling on the passenger seat, facing backward, gun propped beside the headrest. She glanced at the rear of the car, then snapped her gaze back to the road.

  “What are you going to—”

  This time the shot was right next to her ear, and followed by the dull sound of coated glass slivers scattering onto the asphalt as the back window shattered. She jumped at the unexpected noise, nearly sending the car into the ditch beside the road.

  “Think you could warn me next time?” she snapped, raising her voice to be heard over the roaring engine.

  “Sorry,” he called. “I’m going to shoot out their front tires. Shout if there’s a big pothole. I don’t want to miss.”

  “Will do.”

  He hunched forward, peering down the barrel of the gun. She stole a look at the back window in the rearview mirror. Splintered glass hung around the edges, leaving a hole that couldn’t be more than nine or ten inches in diameter. The dual beams of the pursuing headlights seemed closer than ever, throwing the jagged shards still clinging to the frame into sharp relief.

  “Gotcha,” Warren murmured, and fired.

  This time she was ready for the shot, but not the hollow bang and metallic screech that followed. The interior of the car seemed like a nightclub with a short circuit as the headlights behind them jolted and swung, streaking across her mirrors in a bright flash before they disappeared altogether.

  She kept the pressure on the accelerator, not daring to hope they were in the clear. “What happened?”

  “I took out one tire and the driver lost control. Keep going, they may be able to change it and come after us.”

  Her leg was numb from stretching to reach the pedal but she held it to the floor, scooting forward to exert as much pressure as she could. A shallow pothole appeared on the right-hand side and she steered to avoid it.

  Suddenly the wheel was loose in her hands, the whole steering shaft vibrating as the back end fishtailed, sending them toward the ditch at the edge of the pavement. She fought to keep control and that’s when it all registered—the distant gunshot, the impact on the rear door, Warren’s hissed curse as he scrambled into the backseat and returned fire through the hole in the window.

  “Don’t stop,” he shouted, but she didn’t have much choice. As the car skidded she slipped off her precarious perch, her foot coming off the accelerator as she hurried to regain her seating. She slammed it back in place, praying the car hadn’t come out of gear, recovering her grip on the wheel just in time to yank it to miss a wide pothole.

  But not quickly enough to avoid the even bigger one beside it.

  The front left wheel dropped into the crater with a sickening crunch. The whole car tilted heavily, sending her sliding into the driver’s-side door as the engine stalled. In barely a second they went from hurtling down the road to completely stationary, stranded halfway out of a pothole. The night seemed eerily quiet, the silence punctuated by the low buzz of insects.

  She cast a terrified glance in Warren’s direction, scared less of his reproach than his disappointment.

  He didn’t even look at her, remaining focused on the darkness beyond the rear window.

  “Don’t panic. Put the car in gear and keep going.” His tone was calm and reassuring, without a hint of irritation.

  She righted herself and stole a second to drag the seat forward so she could finally reach the pedals. She propped her right foot above the accelerator, left above the clutch, and desperately tried to remember how she’d gotten the damn thing started at the airport.

  Nope, she had nothing.

  “Put it in neutral and hold down the clutch,” he instructed, as if he could sense her confusion. “Turn the key in the ignition.”

  “And then raise the clutch while pressing the accelerator,” she concluded, her ability to think sloshing back into her head like a bucket of soapy water.

  “It has a high biting point so let the clutch get halfway up.”

  She did, and in the next instant the engine was doing its rugged equivalent of purring. She eased the vehicle out of the pothole, then hastened up the gears until they were once again racing along the road toward the mine.

  “Any sign of them back there?”

  “Not yet.”

  She glanced over her shoulder. Warren was crouched on the backseat, gun aimed out the broken window.

  “You should put on your seatbelt. I don’t want to get a ticket.”

  “The way you drive, my seatbelt is the least of our concerns.”

  “Say something about women drivers and you’re walking the rest of the way.”

  “I would never.”

  He appeared at her elbow, hauled himself into the cab and dropped into the passenger seat. She eyed him cautiously, allowing a tiny ember of relief to flare in her chest.

  “Are they gone?”

  “For now. Even if they put on a spare, we’re nearly to Hambani. I don’t think they’ll chance getting any closer.”

  “What did they want?”

  “Not to kill us. Their aim wasn’t that accurate, but those were wounding shots. They definitely planned to take us alive.”

  “Take us?” she echoed hollowly.

  “I doubt anyone would instigate a high-speed chase on an empty road because they just wanted to talk.”

  For a minute she said nothing, digesting the escalation of a few minor criminal incidents to a
full-scale assault. The mine wasn’t the only target, now. They were, too.

  “So the goat head—”

  “Suggests we’re dealing with Matsulu rebels. Probably leftover guerrilla fighters who managed to evade capture at the end of the civil conflict.”

  “Is that better or worse than greedy thieves trying to steal guns and gold?”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe they have principles, an ideology—an agenda much bigger than us or Hambani. Or maybe they’re just hungry and angry and tired, and trying to hit out at the conquering powers wherever they can.”

  “From our perspective, which would we prefer? Which is easier to fight? Radical political motives or unhappiness and desperation?”

  “Desperation,” he replied immediately. “A starving man can be persuaded by three square meals in prison. But a believer? He’ll die for his cause. Every time.”

  She guided the car around a bend and there it was, the bold, bright lights of Hambani piercing the heavy darkness. It loomed large on the horizon, an industrial citadel with backlit barbed-wire shadows embroidering the ground and high walls forbidding entry to any without a job to do. The faint sound of clanking machinery promised that Hambani never slept, that it was stalwart, that the digging and drilling and blasting would continue unabated, immune to the whims of those who dared challenge its purpose.

  Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, ripping up the earth in pursuit of ancient metal. It was beautiful in its immutability, its unapologetic self-insistence. But as Nicola slowed the car in the approach to the gate, she asked herself a question for the first time in nearly a decade of working in mining.

  Was it worth it?

  Warren helped Nicola down from the cab with an unsteady hand. The high-adrenaline sense of invincibility that had powered him through the chase was gone, leaving him drained and exhausted.

  She seemed even worse, stumbling as she set foot on the ground, her knees buckling. He wrapped his arm around her waist and she grabbed fistfuls of his shirt, teetering but staying upright.

  “I’ve spent years visiting some of the most destitute places on earth, and now one little car ride has me practically fainting. Guess I’m not as hardcore as I thought,” she muttered ruefully.

  “Did any of those other visits involve getting shot at?”

  “I was in a taxi in Caracas when there was a drive-by on the other side of the street. Does that count?”

  “They were aiming at someone else. Not really the same.”

  He glanced over his shoulder at the headquarters building, which seemed as dark and uninhabited as the road they’d just sped down. “I guess everyone’s gone to bed. Maybe we should drive back to the cabins. I’m not sure either of us is up to the walk.”

  She didn’t reply, and when he looked down he found a battleground of warring emotions on her face.

  “Hey.” He curved his index finger under her chin, lifting her gaze to his. “What’s wrong?”

  She sighed. “What isn’t? We’ve got sheds blowing up, illegal weapons hidden around the property, safety standards that would give the risk department a heart attack, random animal parts turning up on my doorstep, and now we’ve barely escaped being kidnapped. I pride myself on my due diligence and flexibility, that I can turn up to any of Garraway’s mines anywhere in the world and jump straight in to help. But at Hambani? I don’t know if I’m coming or going. Or if I should be here at all.”

  He watched her for a few seconds, saw the self-doubt and helplessness and frustration fighting for dominance. He understood. Any one of those was preferable to fear.

  “Are you always this hard on yourself?”

  “Only when I fail this badly.”

  “You haven’t failed,” he told her with absolute conviction. He cupped her cheeks, which were as soft and smooth as the skin of a ripe plum. “You’re smart and resourceful, and you’ll find a way through this. I’ll be right behind you when you do.”

  She opened her mouth, ready to protest, so he silenced her with a kiss and smiled inwardly at her tiny squeak of surprise as their lips met.

  As her body melted against his and her arms slipped around his waist, he forced himself to keep the pace slow and even. When he’d kissed her in the kitchen last night, he’d been so pumped full of adrenaline and anger that he’d responded with an instant, barely contained hunger. So much had happened in the short time since then, from their night in her cabin to the moment he sent Roger to the floor. He wanted this to be different. He wanted her to know there was more to him than fistfights, gunshots and a bad temper.

  He poured his heart into the kiss, and he felt her respond in kind. The movement of their mouths together was alternately tender and fevered, bold and wary, playful and earnest, and every bit as complicated yet persistent as the burgeoning connection between them seemed to be.

  Soon he felt the hot delirium of arousal pulling at the edges of his awareness, accompanied by its throbbing physical manifestation. He fought to hold himself together, to contain the raw lust that tugged ever harder at his rational mind. He eased his hands beneath her jacket to encircle the narrow contours of her waist.

  As her teeth grazed the inside of his lower lip, he felt his control slipping. He spread his palms over the taut curves of her behind, his tongue relentlessly pursuing hers, and as the haze of desire clouded over the last clear part of his brain, he jerked her against his body. Any self-consciousness about the press of his erection was banished by the moan that escaped from her throat just seconds before she closed her mouth on his lower lip, sucking hard.

  He ground against her with an impatient growl, full of irrational annoyance at their location and its lack of feasible surfaces for lovemaking. She crossed her wrists behind his neck and pulled back in his embrace, peering up at him with an expression of playfulness that failed to fully conceal the disbelief in her eyes.

  “Do you really think I can still do some good here?”

  She deserved the truth, and he sorted through his thoughts before answering, alert for a hint of skepticism or resignation. The absence of either surprised him. Had he gone from being someone capable of finding the negative in anything, to actually believing in someone?

  “Yes. I do.”

  She dropped her hands to curl her fingers in the belt loops on his jeans. “Why do I get the sense that was hard for you to say?”

  “I’m not used to having faith in anyone but myself.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  Her smile more closely approached her usual confidence, but self-doubt lingered at the edges. His heart sank in empathy. It was clear she loved her job and excelled at it. He hoped Hambani hadn’t ruined everything.

  He was on the brink of saying something else, trying to find the right words of encouragement when the office door burst open. Instinctively he edged in front of Nicola and drew his weapon, then lowered it when Alex’s eyes widened in panic and he flung his palms into the air.

  “Sorry.” Warren shoved the Glock back in its holster.

  “You can apologize by buying me a new pair of boxers,” Alex muttered, then regarded them with fresh interest. “Everything okay in town? You both seem a little jumpy.”

  “No, not okay at all.” Nicola drew a deep breath. “A group of men in a pickup chased us back to the mine. Warren has seen one of them before, here onsite when the shed blew up, and in the settlement when we visited. They were trying to shoot out our tires, but Warren got them first.”

  Alex swallowed hard. “What did they look like?”

  “Latadians,” Warren supplied. “Matsulus, I think. Why?”

  “Roger drives a pickup. He and his truck have been missing since dinner.”

  “Missing?” she echoed hollowly, her posture sagging.

  Resisting the urge to slip a reassuring arm around her waist, he turned to Alex. “How do we know he’s not
drinking himself to sleep in one of the sheds?”

  “Maybe he drove into town for a few drinks,” Nicola suggested.

  Alex shook his head. “He was different at dinner. Quiet, and stone-cold sober. He said he was going to bed early, and he offered me a lift back to our cabins in the golf cart. I wanted to stay behind and get some work done. When I got to our cabins about an hour later, he wasn’t there.”

  “So he changed his mind.” Nicola shrugged. “There’s no need to get all—”

  “You don’t understand. It wasn’t like he’d left. It was like he’d been taken.”

  The air seemed to tense around them. Nicola shivered in a suddenly cool breeze, and for the first time Warren noted the change in temperature. He glanced at the sky, where clouds obscured the moon. It was going to rain.

  “One step at a time,” he instructed calmly, automatically switching into professional mode. “You said his car was gone. Doesn’t that imply he drove it out of here?”

  “Or he was forced to drive it at gunpoint.”

  “Did you check with gate security?”

  “Dan went down there about twenty minutes ago. He called me a few seconds before I came outside and found the two of you.” Alex’s expression turned rueful. “The guard was watching a little portable TV. He recognized Roger’s vehicle and waved it through without really looking at it.”

  “And the closed-circuit camera?”

  “Doesn’t show anything. Since the driver never had to roll down the window to flash his ID, all you can see is the reflection of the lights on the glass.”

  Nicola shifted her weight uneasily, wrapping her arms around herself. The night was getting chillier by the minute.

  “You said it looked like he’d been taken,” Warren reminded Alex, who nodded vigorously. “What gave you that impression?”

  “There was no broken glass or anything, and the door was shut, but he left three-quarters of a cup of tea that was still warm when I got there. And his laptop was open, and the lights were on. It just didn’t feel like Roger. He’s anal about conserving energy and not wasting anything. When I first arrived onsite he gave me a big lecture on fully shutting down my computer, not leaving it on standby, even if I’d only be gone an hour. It seemed like he’d been interrupted.” He frowned. “Do you think I’m reading too much into it? Like I said, there were no obvious signs of a struggle.”