Tactical Rescue

by Maggie K. Black

  Her heart stopped.

  “Where’s Zack?”

  Seth gasped for breath. She leaped down and readied the ax, ready to swing. Hot tears rushed to her eyes.

  “Where is Zack? If you’ve hurt him, I’ll—”

  Zack rose through the water behind him. Water streamed from his hair and down the lines of his face. His wet T-shirt was plastered down his muscular chest like something carved out of marble. A grim smile turned at the corners of his lips as his eyes met hers.

  Her heart lurched as the relief of seeing his face crashed hard against the knowledge of just how deep the pain had been at the thought of losing him.

  Zack’s not mine. He’ll never be mine. But if anything had happened to him, my heart would’ve shattered.

  Zack yanked Seth by the back of the neck and dragged him onto the shore.

  “Got the laptop and the bag?” Zack asked.

  “Yeah.” She stood there, the ax still clutched in her hands, feeling relieved and uncertain as to what to do next, and yet desperate to be in the arms of the man now yanking her stepbrother up toward the camper.

  “You sank the truck,” Zack said, with a tone she couldn’t quite read. He was knelt over Seth. His knee pressed into Seth’s back. Zack glanced toward the dark clouds now moving across purple sky. “I hope we got everything out of it that we need, because the oxygen tank’s ruined and I don’t know if we’ve got enough light for another dive.”

  “There was a dead body in the truck, Zack, that’s why the truck sank earlier.” She could feel her voice rising with the desire to defend herself from Zack’s unspoken accusation. “Ivan, the Black Talon thug who tried to kidnap me, was in the driver’s seat. That’s why I came back up for air. Then I had to cut the cable while you were underwater or we’d have totally lost the camper.”

  He just nodded like his brain was silently processing the information. Then he said, “My handcuffs are with my jacket, on the ground by the camper. Do you have anything I can tie his legs up with?

  “There’s packing tape in the camper,” she said. “But it’s not that great.”

  “Well, it’ll have to do,” Zack said. “Just let me get him tied up and then I’ll help you push the camper a little farther back onto the shore.”

  She turned back to the camper.

  “Don’t do it, Becs!” Seth’s voice made her stop. “Please. You can’t trust Zack.”

  “Zack? I can’t trust Zack?” she repeated, turning back. “You’re the one who bullied me through high school. You blew up the rocks I was standing on. You stole my truck and my camper. You practically threatened to drown me.”

  “Should’ve known you’d never understand.” Seth was looking up at her from the ground, still under Zack’s grasp. “I took what I did from that computer because I thought it would help save lives. I came to you for your help when everything suddenly went south. And stole your truck because you wouldn’t help me. I only blew up the road to keep Zack from getting to you, and if you’d let me we could’ve shared my oxygen long enough to get away from him together.” Disgust filled his voice. “But you’re siding with the enemy.”

  “The enemy? You think Zack is your enemy?” She crouched down until they were eye level. “Zack is the only person I’ve ever been able to count on to have my back. You’re a thief and a murderer.”

  “I never killed anyone!”

  “What about the dead body in my truck?”

  “I didn’t kill him!”

  “Then who did?” Rebecca asked.

  He didn’t answer. She stood up slowly.

  “You think Zack’s trustworthy?” Seth asked. “Zack didn’t tell you what was going on. He didn’t even tell you I was involved. I bet he didn’t even tell you there’s a warrant out for your arrest? That you’re wanted for conspiracy to commit treason and murder? It’s all over the news. I’m accused of killing a cop, which means you’re accused of helping me kill a cop. You get anywhere near a police station, they’ll toss you in jail and throw away the key. And Zack will stand by and let them do it!”

  “Don’t even try.” She almost snorted. “I’m not going to believe you now.”

  “I’m not lying!” Seth looked up at the man still holding him down in the dirt. “Am I, Zack? Tell her! Tell Rebecca the truth. I’m accused of killing a cop, aren’t I? She’s accused of being an accomplice. There’s a warrant out for her arrest, isn’t there? You know full well the moment police spot Rebecca, they’re going to draw their guns and handcuff her. If she sticks with you she’ll end up behind bars, and you didn’t even warn her.”

  “That’s not true, is it, Zack?” Her eyes searched Zack’s face.

  Zack gritted his teeth. He looked past Rebecca into the trees.

  “It appears the woman wasn’t a real cop,” he said, finally. “And yes, she did pass away from her injuries.”

  Seth tried to twist his head around to face him. “Who was she?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How long had she been in Canada?” Seth asked. “Please, just tell me that?”

  Zack shook his head as if there was water in his ears. “I don’t see why that matters. But my understanding is that she’d been with the police force for a couple of years, and she was not who she’d claimed to be.”

  The relief on Seth’s face was palpable.

  But Rebecca didn’t get what he had to be relieved about. “Is this your way of dancing around the fact that she might’ve been a Black Talon criminal hidden in the Ontario Provincial Police?”

  “I can’t discount the possibility,” Zack said.

  “You knew there was a warrant issued for my arrest?”

  “I did.”

  “And didn’t tell me?”

  Thunder rumbled in the distance.

  “I didn’t tell you.” Zack’s facial expression didn’t even flicker. “I did my job.”

  * * *

  Zack raised his knuckles toward the broken camper door, hesitated and then knocked.

  “Come in.”

  He opened the door. Rebecca was standing with her back to him in the shambles of her camper. She gripped the thin counter with both hands. She’d changed out of her wet suit into a pair of jeans and an oversize sweatshirt. But even through the thick folds of fabric he could see her arms were shaking. He could see the last red rays of the setting sun filtering through the trees in the window ahead of him, but faint rain now fell off the camper’s canopy behind him, as if they were caught in a tiny sliver of space in the unsettled weather patterns.

  Rebecca’s laptop lay open on the tiny table showing the same black screen with red Cyrillic letters that it had when he’d shut it down. The case was cracked but had managed to keep her laptop safe and dry. Not that they were any closer to finding out the password. Seth now sat on the ground in front of the camper, with his hands cuffed behind his back and his legs bound by packing tape at his ankles. He’d refused to speak to Zack ever since Rebecca had stormed into the camper. Not a word. Not even so much as a grunt. And as much as Seth was pulling Zack’s patience to the limits, Zack knew he wasn’t authorized to interrogate Seth. Nor was he about to lay a hand on him.

  But maybe Rebecca would have better results in getting answers from him. Certainly Seth had seemed eager to talk, to have Rebecca on his side. Only it seemed Rebecca didn’t feel much like talking to Zack right now, either. The thirty-eight year-old ran his hand through his prematurely graying hair. His phone was still missing and likely lost to the quarry. Rebecca’s phone had been broken in the rock slide. When he’d patted Seth down, he’d found nothing on him but his wallet. Looked like their only hope now was to walk Seth back to the road and flag a vehicle down for help. Either that or he could leave Seth here with Rebecca and head back by himself.

  Neither option appealed to him much.<
br />
  “How’s it going?” Zack’s hand hovered over her back, waiting for a signal it was okay to touch her. After she’d discovered he’d known about the warrant for her arrest, she’d barely spoken to him besides getting him the packing tape.

  “Hey, any chance of some dinner out here?” Seth called from outside the door. “Maybe some of that horrible bean soup you make? Some of us are hungry.”

  Rebecca turned around. She looked down at Zack’s hand still outstretched in front of her. He slid it into his pocket.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked. “I’m thinking you haven’t eaten in hours.”

  He shrugged. “I’m not particularly hungry. But I could eat.”

  She turned toward the cupboards, crouched down and pulled out a large silver tin.

  “You told me once that you were always hungry,” she said.

  “No, I was always sad,” he said. “I just hadn’t figured out how to tell the difference between hungry and sad back then.”

  She opened the lid and dumped a mixture of dried vegetables, beans, lentils and herbs into a pot. Then poured in some bottled water and stirred.

  “Eventually, I replaced food with exercise,” he added. “After you and I went our separate ways, I exercised way too much at first. Like five or six hours a day. Finally I got better at finding balance.”

  She pulled a tiny gas burner out from under the sink, set it on the counter and lit the flame. Then she set the pot on top.

  “You’d lost a good chunk of weight in the months before the sports banquet,” she said after a long moment. “Was that the reason why?”

  He paused, wondering how to answer the question.

  “No,” he said. “It was because hanging with you so much made me really happy.”

  She didn’t answer. The glimmer of sun disappeared outside. She switched on a battery lamp, then reached up and attached it to a hook above his head. The rain fell harder. The soup bubbled. The camper felt crowded. As though it was filled to the brim with questions neither of them knew how to ask and words neither of them were ready to say.

  “We should eat,” Zack said finally. “Then we should take turns napping, to keep our strength up. I’m only going to need about fifteen minutes, but you should have at least an hour. After that we’re going to have to find a way to signal for help. It might be best if we all head back to the main road, but to be honest I don’t want to take action until I’ve really thought it through.”

  “I’m going to be arrested by the first cop we see, aren’t I?” She leaned back against the counter. “I’m going to be handcuffed and carted away with Seth, and we’ll have no way of knowing if the person arresting me is a real cop or some Black Talon criminal.”

  “That’s not going to happen. I promise. I won’t let it.” In one step, Zack had crossed the camper. He pulled her into his arms and she let him. He felt her body shaking as he held her tightly to his chest. Then he brushed the fingers of one hand against her chin, and tilted her head until she looked up at him.

  “Listen to me,” he said. “I won’t let anybody I don’t trust take you anywhere. And I will never let anyone hurt you. Ever. I’ve always been there for you and I’m always going to be there for you. I promise.”

  “You can’t promise that, because that’s not true.” She looked up into his face, and he could see both strength and pain battling inside her eyes. “You’re not going to be there when I need you, Zack. Just like you disappeared from my life the last time, when you were the one person I was counting on to help hold me together. You weren’t there for me when my mother died, and I was left with nothing but this camper and this land, so I had to drop out of university and rebuild my life from the ground up. You’re not going to be there for me in two days when you need to report back to base for deployment. You’re not going to be there for me next week, next month, next year, when you’re off getting shot at and saving lives wherever in the world you are.”

  The pot bubbled over. He let go. She turned back to the counter, lowered the heat and stirred.

  “I’m sorry if that sounds harsh,” she added. “Because I know you’re a really good guy and I believe you mean what you’re saying. But I’m nothing but a short-term mission here, Zack, and I know it. At the end of the day, I have to save myself, and the more secrets you keep from me, the more you’re just putting my life in danger.”

  He stepped back and stared at her shoulders. He wanted to reach out and hug her again. To hold her. To promise that he’d always be there and that he’d never leave. But he couldn’t. So instead, he bent down and started picking up random things off the floor—clothes, books, dishes, equipment—and piling them on a shelf beside her narrow bunk.

  A glint of gold caught his eye. He reached for it.

  It was her martial arts trophy. His eyes ran over the inscription.

  “They had a medal for you that night, too, you know,” she said. She looked down at the trophy in his hands. “Which you would’ve known if you’d showed up to the banquet. I meant to tell you. But I was too hurt at first, and then when you told me you’d joined the military, I was so surprised I forgot.”

  “What did it say?”

  “Biggest Heart.” She turned back and unclipped the three plastic mugs that still hung attached to hooks over the tiny sink and poured soup into each of them in turn. “Fitting, right? You had the biggest heart of anyone I knew, back then.”

  There was this edge to her voice, as if she thought there was nothing left in his rib cage now but dust and ashes.

  “I still have a heart, Rebecca,” he said gruffly. “And it’s as big as it ever was. I just got a whole lot better at controlling it.”

  “Because you decided to turn it off.” She said it lightly, and somehow the fact that she could make it sound as though it was nothing irked him even more than if she’d sounded serious.

  “No, because somebody broke it.”

  Thunder crashed. The rain poured hard around them, beating down against the ground. Outside, he could hear Seth complaining he was getting wet. But inside, it was as if the walls had shrunk. The beat of his own heart filled his ears. The mugs shook in Rebecca’s hands.

  “Broke your heart?” She stepped closer. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Who broke your heart, Zack?”

  You did, Rebecca. You did on the night of the sports banquet. How can you not know that?

  “It doesn’t matter.” He looked up to the rain pounding on the skylight above their heads. “I probably needed to have my heart broken. It helped me get where I needed to be. Helped me focus. Helped me train. Helped me save countless lives. Helped me learn how to engage my brain, calm down and be rational. Instead of charging off after every surge of emotion I was feeling, like—”

  Like I did today. Like when I hopped on my motorcycle and flew up the highway to see you when I saw your brother’s face on the television screen.

  The air in the camper grew darker. Her breath brushed up against his neck.

  “Like I ran through the pouring rain in just my jeans and a T-shirt, without an umbrella or even a jacket, in a torrential downpour, the night you got this trophy.” He tossed it onto the bunk. “The storm was so bad that night I could see motorcycles and garbage cans getting washed down the streets of the base. But there I was, plowing on through the storm, like some foolish, unbridled, reckless kid, five seconds after hitting the send button on my online military application, just to tell you I had.”

  And the moment he’d gotten there, and seen the look of utter disgust on her face, he’d known there was no way she could ever love a man like him.

  “Hey!” Seth’s voice floated through the crack in the partially open door. “I’m drowning out here. Could someone bring me a bath towel? A paper towel? Anything?”

  Zack grabbed the largest of the three mugs from Rebecca’s hands an
d tossed it back, drinking it straight down without even pausing for breath. Hot soup stung his throat. He dropped the empty mug in the sink.

  “You should go talk to Seth.” Zack sat down on the bunk. “Maybe he’ll tell you something useful, like the password he’s locked your computer with or how a dead Black Talon ended up in your truck. You might be our best chance to get answers out of him. I’m going to take a quick nap. Then I’ll figure out our next move.”

  Zack set the alarm on his watch for fifteen minutes. Rebecca hesitated.

  “Look,” he added, “this might be the last chance you ever get to have a conversation with him that doesn’t involve talking through a sheet of Plexiglas. Besides, he really sounds like he wants soup. I could use some quiet, to think our way out of this.”

  Zack leaned back on the foam mattress and closed his eyes. He heard her feet creek on the camper floor. The door swung open then shut. He pressed his hands into his eyes.

  If he’d gotten so good at controlling his wayward heart, then what was this fierce and foolish beat he could feel thudding like a fist in his chest right now?

  Lord, why is my heart still so drawn to a woman who can never be mine? How do I get us all out of here alive?

  He lay down on her bunk and stared at the ceiling.

  Please Lord, help her get the truth out of Seth. It might not solve all our problems, but it’ll definitely make life easier if he stops fighting us.

  His head was spinning. His body felt weak. His stomach felt nauseous. He turned over and reached to grab a book out of the shelf to his right, feeling for a Bible.

  Instead, the mustached grin of General Arthur Miles stared back at him from the cover of his autobiography.

  His friends in the unit always liked to tease him that if only he’d been smart enough to marry the General’s stepdaughter, he’d be company quartermaster sergeant by now. Not that he’d ever wanted to do a job other than the one he was doing now. But now, something about the whole premise of the joke gave him pause. What if he’d stayed with Rebecca and had realized that admiring a man’s military record wasn’t the same as liking the person behind the hero’s mask? He’d never once stopped to consider what would’ve happened to his career if he hadn’t liked how the General treated Rebecca or her mother. Or worse yet, if the General had disliked him.