Danger Mine: A Base Branch Novel

by Megan Mitcham

  The outline of his forehead, nose, and strong jaw were darker than the grey night beyond. A peace eased the beat of her heart. Whether it was him or the moonlight filtering in, this perspective seemed so much brighter than the solitary back of the cave.

  She pillowed her head on her left arm and reached her right outside the envelope of heat the nylon, cotton, and her body created. The icy air prickled the gap that formed between her glove and sleeve. Carefully she lowered her arm around Street’s billowy sleeping bag and held him close.

  His chest rose and then settled in a contented breath. She got lost in the rhythm of his breathing and slipped into the sweet oblivion of sleep.

  13

  Street hadn’t slept that well ever. That said something. He slept like a brick anywhere. Did it make him a total fanny that the tiny arm of a sexy woman he’d grown to adore worked as the best tonic in the land? Probably—and he didn’t give a shit. He didn’t even care that when he’d yawned like a bear she’d snatched it away as though he might’ve bitten it off.

  He stepped back into the cave after relieving himself. Both their bags sat propped against the rock wall, sleeping bags, protein bar packages, and water nowhere in sight. “You’ve been busy.”

  Khani leaned again the cave next to her pack, her knees tucked under her chin, arms around her legs in a self-comforting position. She seemed so vulnerable. Closed off, and yet, open at the same time. He’d never seen her anything but on point, which meant on guard. Slowly, a millimeter at a time, she revealed her secrets.

  “I want to make it to the beacon in time to plan our next move and execute before nightfall.” She tugged the cap lower on her ears and stood as much as the shelter allowed.

  There it was again, a tiny acknowledgement that she’d actually listened to what he’d said. He lifted her pack and she slipped into it without a fuss. His gaze snagged on the silky hair that slid across his bare fingers. He clamped his eyes shut against the hunger that threatened to buckle his knees.

  Street cleared his throat. “That shouldn’t be hard. It’s barely light outside, but enough we won’t break our necks.” He stepped back, hefted his pack, and then stepped into the serenity of dawn on a glacier.

  They settled into a fast pace with Khani in the lead. Every few hundred yards or so she checked the map and tracker strength, making certain they stayed on course. Street watched the tree line growing to their right and the ridge on their left. If anyone wanted to pick them off, this was the place. They were balls-out exposed. It rankled the hairs on his nape, but there was nothing to be done about it except keep moving.

  She did. One foot in front of the other, Khani pushed the tempo. The closer they drew to the pulse of Zeke’s tracker the faster her heels shoved off the crisp ice. Street sensed her reserves slipping.

  Four hours after they started hiking, the grade finally flattened and packed snow added a layer of irritation to the hike.

  “I can’t believe you two were going to do this for fun.”

  “Me either.” She stopped abruptly and stabbed the air. “Look.” The sun crowned the first of four knobby mountains in the distance. Hints of blue sky peeked through puffy white clouds while spindly rays of light glistened off every surface. Were they not standing in the middle of it, the picture would’ve been idyllic. Her aim centered the nearest ridge. “The beacon is coming from the base of that first formation.”

  Her face angled in his direction. Sweat shined on her upper lip. Street caught her arm. “Wait.” He clamped the end of his glove between his teeth and yanked it off. As though taming a wild animal he moved his hand steadily toward her face while maintaining eye contact.

  The zipper-pull of her jacket flapped with her rapid breaths. Cold skin greeted his warm. He swiped the moisture off her mouth with his thumb, and then licked it off the pad of his finger. “You need to slow down. I know it’s hard, but if you sweat through your clothes, I’ll be forced to strip you, and warm you with my body.” He released her. “We can’t have you succumbing to hypothermia.”

  “No,” she breathed, “we can’t. You lead for a while. I won’t be able to pace myself.” Her petite red nose shined against her pale face.

  Street’s gaze sharpened on the spot where he’d rubbed away sweat, and apparently, make-up. Tiny scars, almost translucent in the daylight, criss-crossed her skin in a random pattern. Her hand flew to her mouth. His gaze leapt to her wide one.

  She dropped her hand, and the action looked like it cost her. “Later, okay?”

  “Later.” He nodded, stepped around her, and pushed forward, knowing those scars had something to do with the reason she walled the world off and wondering why. Surely it wasn’t their appearance. They were barely noticeable in the best light and not at all with her cosmetics obsession. Which meant it had to do with receiving the scars and the ones the experience left on her insides.

  Oh Khani, how fucked up we are.

  The powder thickened the farther they climbed, bogging his big boots. He glanced over his shoulder and found Khani walking literally in his footsteps.

  “Quit smiling at me,” she commanded. “It’s easier. This way.”

  “Sure, make me do all the work.”

  “If you were pounding one out, you wouldn’t be complaining, would you?”

  “Nope. But that’s not work, now is it?”

  “No.” She shooed him on with her hands. “Now move it.”

  Street did his best to keep a pace steady enough to hedge their heart rates, but also fast enough to keep her from stomping him into the snow. As soon as they reached the narrow shadow of the mountain Khani passed him.

  Desperation propelled her into a sprint. It was all he could do to keep his arse upright and her from leaving him in the flurries of her pursuit.

  She bailed from her pack ten yards from the outcropping. “Zeke,” she bellowed. Black hair whipped left and right in her desperate attempt to locate her brother, despite her earlier words. Her shoulders lowered and she cleared the distance in seconds. “Zeke!”

  Khani dove into the snow knees first. Her arms wind-milled. White sailed behind her. All around her. The tip of a large black boot shown horizontal to her frantic form.

  Street’s heart crawled up his chest cavity.

  Please God, don’t let her have come all this way to find him buried in the snow.

  He ditched his pack and raced to her side. Street plowed so much snow with his abrupt stop his knees hit the ice underneath. His hands poised to free Zeke’s body from the frozen earth. He stilled beside Khani and stared down.

  A large man in black cargo pants and hiking boots lay face-down in the snow. Frozen blood clotted brown hair. A tattoo on his partially obscured forearm read, ‘Sinner’ in Russian Cyrillic script. SOS stained the man’s wrist. It didn’t add up.

  Zeke Slaghter’s military profile only referenced one tattoo. A dagger, the logo for the Royal Marine Commandos, ran up his abdomen, over his left pectoral, and stopped at his heart. Unless he’d gotten the Russian ink long ago and showered in the barracks fully clothed, there was no way he could have hidden them in Her Majesty’s Royal Marines.

  Khani roared and gnashed at the snow, her face a mask of rage and disbelief. Her arms gouged at the powder with frantic pulls.

  “Stop. Khani.” Street reached out to still her. Her elbow shot out and found the center of his solar plexus. His thumb rubbed at the sting. He choked out, “It’s not him.”

  She continued to dig like a woman possessed.

  He used his shoulder and drove it into her, bowling her over. Her head sank into the snow inches from the dead man’s shoulder. Street’s legs pinned hers to the ground. His arms knotted hers between their chests.

  The heat of her screams blasted his cheek. She thrashed beneath him, her entire body rigid.

  “Spasite Ot Syda,” he yelled.

  She stilled. Her eyes finally focused on him. “What?”

  “Save me from judgment. It’s the tattoo on the bloke’s wrist.�
�

  “What?” she sobbed the word. Her bottom lip quivered.

  “That body has at least two Russian mob tats. That isn’t your brother, not unless he affiliated ten or more years ago without you knowing. The ink is old.”

  Her gaze cut to the body. No longer fearing her flying fists, he sat back and pulled her up to her knees again. She braced her hands in the snow and panted. The heat of her breaths curled into the day.

  He leaned around her and moved the snow off the man’s arm. A cry seeped from her lips. She hung her head between her shoulder blades and yelled, covering her sorrow and relief in rage. The piercing sound faded into the wind.

  Street grabbed the man’s belt and flipped him onto his back. A scar ran the length of his face, pulling down the edge of his right eye. He reached into the dead man’s pockets. A set of keys filled the right front and a wallet barely fit inside the front left.

  The American license of Zeke Slaughter occupied the first flap of the black leather trifold. No surprise there. They’d probably hoped the body would remain forever hidden in the ice field, but should it surface due to scavenging they’d covered their bases. Amateurs. They hadn’t even fastened the belt around his waist or put the jacket tucked beneath the body on him.

  Trenched and mussed snow surrounded the body aside from the mess Khani had created. Beyond the line they’d travelled to get here the snow turned to hard packed ice. No discernible path led to or away from the scene, besides theirs.

  “I don’t think Zeke killed him.” She settled onto her heels, and then stood. Her head turned this way and that, taking in the scene.

  “Me neither. There are at least six different prints around the body. They probably ambushed him at night and left this lucky bachelor in his place.”

  “Damnit.” Khani yanked the crooked beanie from her head and tugged at her hair.

  “This is a good thing. They want information from Zeke otherwise he’d be the one laying in the snow with a hole in the back of his head.”

  She pulled back on the cap, and then shook her hands out like a fighter getting loose before a match. “Okay. You’re right. They want information. He won’t give it. They’ll torture him.” She said it with trained distance. “They’ll need a place to do it. Some place quiet and out of the way.” Khani spun on her heels with her arms wide. “So where the fuck would they take him from here? They didn’t leave tracks.”

  Street walked downhill to his pack, and then carried it to the rock ledge. He hauled the laptop from the recesses. “I’ll redirect an infrared satellite to scan the surrounding area. Your brother is a big chap and this is the middle of freaking nowhere. They couldn’t have gone far. You get ahold of Tucker and give him a heads-up. You’ll want extraction, if not help on the ground.” He set the satellite to work with a few clicks.

  “Oh, I don’t want help on the ground. I want every last one of them for myself.”

  “Well, tough shit, troop. I’m taking my fair share.”

  “He’s my brother.”

  “And you’re…” He bit his tongue. If he finished that sentence with you’re-my-anything, he’d obliterate all the headway he’d made. Though hadn’t he already? Yes, if she ever found out he looked into her brother’s affairs. “…wasting time. Go make the call.”

  The heat signature came back with three possible structures. One sat directly north of them, another to the east, and the last to the west. The northern one was closest, and therefore the most logical, but he eased back literally and figuratively. He thought about what he’d learned about the Russian mob and Zeke in the fifteen minutes Khani had given him alone at the hotel.

  Top was the head, the leader. Right was the heir to the throne. Left was the enforcer. They divided territories in this convoluted method. A low ranking member of the organization lived south of the heir and the killer, who lived equidistant west and east of their leader, whose home was always north.

  Isay and his uncle were south. Stas was north. Which meant in this complicated mess, Grisha would set-up in the west—available or not—he’d make it so.

  Street plotted the coordinates on his map, and then stashed the computer in his pack. Khani stood near her bag, hip cocked, one hand on the sway of her waist, and the other on the phone.

  He plotted their course and then studied the landforms around their target. A swath of deep crevices yawned between them and the cabin. That, and a shit ton of miles. The structure sat high on the incline of the glacier-fed river with a steep drop down the back to the water below. A small shed stood to the south of the main building. One winding road led in and out of the place. They couldn't make it easy, could they?

  With the advance plotted, Street folded the map, and then stuffed it into the pocket on his thigh. He used his boots and shoved loose snow over the body. When it looked like no more than a heap he walked a little way from the scene toward the west, hoping to find some reassurance he wasn’t leading them down the wrong path.

  Twice his feet slipped on the incline and slick surface. The third time did him in. Hard and fast the ice met his keister with a smack. He laid on his pack and glared at the sleek shell of frozen water. From the intimate slant, Street noticed more than thirty distinct boot prints. They gouged the roughened ice, leaving behind glossy patches that made walking difficult at best.

  “Laying down on the job, King?” Khani extended her hand.

  Maybe he’d hit his head on the fall. She’d called him by his given name. His gaze jumped to her face. All the misery that had carved her features with sharp lines had softened into…hope, and something else. He’d seen Khani wide-eyed twice: once in shock at seeing him in DC and once in excitement at his willingness to submit. He’d never seen her smokey gaze wide with what he could only call wonderment. He looked behind him, expecting to see Zeke strolling from the tree line. But only they were crazy enough to be this far up the Alaskan glacier during the melting season.

  “I found tracks,” he said dumbly.

  “Then let’s follow them.” She wiggled her protracted hand.

  It would be safer for him to peel himself off the ice than it would be to accept her hand. But Khani hadn’t made the offer casually. She made it with intent and a meaning that maxed-out every blood vessel in his body.

  Street pulled off his right glove. He wrapped his naked palm around Khani’s. “Yes, ma’am.”

  She tugged him up without incident, unless he counted the toe-to-toe stare-off in which they tangled. Lust and her delicious mouth charmed his gaze south. He strained every fibrous grain of his self-control and poured himself into her weighted admiration.

  “Thank you,” she breathed.

  He wouldn’t ask for what. It didn’t matter. She’d dropped another notch of her steel wall, allowed him to peek over the top. “Always.” He nodded and granted her the lead with a tilt of his head.

  “Your find, your lead.”

  “You just want to stare at my bum, huh?” Street held both arms out like an airplane and negotiated the slick path toward the brush.

  “That’s just a bonus. I want you to clear the path through that mess.”

  He didn’t have to see her to know she likely stabbed a finger and rolled her eyes at the waist high, tightly-woven bushes fringing the forest head. “If five guys—one of them not going willingly—dozed through there even a week and a half ago, they did the worst part for us. And if there’s not a path, we know they didn’t go that way.”

  “True.”

  “What did Vail say?” Street maintained an easy pace on the hazardous path and Khani stayed on his six.

  “He has a friend at Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage who owes him a favor.”

  “What are they going to do? Write our last will and testament?”

  “It’s a joint military base, not a law office. They’ll send a bird to get us whenever, wherever.”

  “We’ll find him, Khani. I can’t guarantee what shape he’ll be in after a week, but we’ll find him.”

  St
reet stepped over a narrow gap in the ice and came face to face with infinity. “Blow me.” White ice swirled with blue, turning brighter and brighter in color the deeper it went. The skinny chasm went deep enough that his balls tucked close to his body for fear of dropping in and never being recovered.

  “Is that an invitation?” Khani laughed. The jolly noise died abruptly. She stepped across the cleft, cleared a safe distance, and then leaned over the edge and peered down. “Give me a jungle, desert, or city any day of the week. This shit creeps me out.”

  He crossed and yanked a rope from his pack. After a few twists and a tug he created a slipknot, and then held the loop low for Khani to step into. “If that creeps you out, the ones you can’t see are sure to make you piss your pants.”

  14

  Khani wrestled with the last strap on her shoe-claw things. “Why do we need these things? We didn’t need them for the last three.”

  “They’re called crampons.”

  “I don’t give a shit. If I could use them to stomp someone to death, they’d be cool and maybe I’d care, but now.” She shook her head. “Nope.”

  “This soldier is a little bit wider than the rest, wouldn’t you say?”

  Street stood at the edge of a precipice too wide to cross with an adrenaline-fueled leap as they’d done before. It was also so long they couldn't see either end of it, if it ever ended. He held an ice pick over his head and sucked in a deep breath.

  She scrambled to her feet. “Wait a minute,” she shrieked. “Aren’t there ropes—as in plural—and carabiners and ladders and helmets and harnesses involved in this too?”

  “Yep, supposed to be. But we’re not Sherpas or professional climbers.”

  “What the hell is a Sherpa?”

  Before she completed her sentence Street threw himself toward death. His arms arched. His torso stretched. The metal points of his crampons nearly pierced his wide, firm butt. Then he crunched, turning all those nylon-covered muscles onto the sheet of ice. The gleaming point of the axe pierced the ice. It hacked shards of crystalline water into the air. The spiny tips of his crampons serrated the wall. Then gravity took hold.