by Zoe Chant
Ethan! Go help Ethan!
Destiny once again clutched at the sink, and once again looked up into her teammates’ concerned faces. If she didn’t let them do something, they’d never let her alone. “Could you drive me home?”
“Of course,” Fiona said. “Justin, can you tell everyone Destiny and I had to go? Just say she wasn’t feeling well.”
“Got it,” Justin replied.
Fiona escorted Destiny to her own car and got behind the wheel. Destiny was relieved to find that the sense of urgency faded once she got in the car. She could tell that it was still there, but it seemed to be abiding its time so long as she was taking some kind of action. She closed her eyes, hoping to discourage questions. But when the car stopped and she opened them, she found that she was at Fiona and Justin’s house, not hers.
“I know it’s nothing serious, but you don’t look good,” Fiona said. “I thought you’d better stay where someone can keep an eye on you. The dogs aren’t allowed in the guest bedroom.”
Destiny couldn’t think of any reasonable objection to that, especially since the entire problem was unreasonable. She followed Fiona into the yard, where they were greeted by an overjoyed pack of dogs.
“Sit!” Fiona commanded. “No jumping!”
All six dogs obediently sat as Fiona took Destiny to the no-dogs-allowed part of the house, which consisted of a guest bedroom, Fiona’s art room filled with paintings and strange glass sculptures, and Fiona’s tech room filled with computers and electronics. Sit Fiona in front of a computer, and she could find out anything.
She could find anyone.
Ethan, Ethan, find Ethan!
Without intending to say anything at all, Destiny caught herself blurting out, “Could you find a Special Forces soldier on a classified mission? I mean, if you wanted to.”
Fiona studied her like Destiny was a computer she’d just started hacking. “If I wanted to. Sure. Like a Recon Marine, maybe?”
“Yeah,” Destiny admitted.
“Why? Ethan’s been on classified missions before. What’s special about this one?”
For the first time in her life, Destiny lied to a teammate. “Before he left last time, Ethan told me something that makes me think he might be in trouble. Because… because he should be back by now, and he isn’t.”
Fiona’s leaf-eyes seemed to see right through her. “This sounds like something you should take to Hal.”
“No!” Floundering, Destiny went on, “Uh, Ethan said it was classified, and not to tell the rest of the team, because he might get in trouble, and—
Fiona held up a slim hand. “Destiny. Stop. Don’t lie, you’re not good at it. What in the world is going on?”
Destiny bit her lip. Fiona was a close friend, but that only made it worse. A teammate whose opinion you respected was the last person you wanted to have find out that you weren’t the steady, dependable woman she thought you were. She couldn’t bear the idea of Fiona, of all her teammates, thinking Destiny was a freak and a lunatic.
The silence stretched out between them. Then Fiona said quietly, “I am the last person who should object to you keeping secrets. Pull up a chair.”
Fiona sat in front of a computer and got to work hacking into military databases. Destiny, very conscious of her lack of a classified clearance, did not pull up a chair. Instead, she fell back on her training as a soldier and averted her eyes.
“Found him!” Fiona exclaimed. “He’s in Pakistan, near the border of India. I’ve got the exact area here… Hmm.”
“What’s the ‘hmm?’” Destiny inquired.
“That’s all I can get,” Fiona replied. “His team must be involved in something top secret. It looks like a lot of stuff about them was never even entered into a database.”
“To protect it from people like you,” Destiny said drily.
Fiona gave her a catlike smile. “Guess we’ll have to investigate in person. Do you want the whole team—” Destiny frantically shook her head, sending her box braids flying. “How about just me, you, and Justin? Or just me and you?”
“Just me,” said Destiny. Most likely she’d lost her mind out of sheer broken-heartedness, and she didn’t want to drag Fiona into that. Not to mention that she didn’t want witnesses to her embarrassment when Ethan turned out to be absolutely fine. “It’s probably nothing. I’d feel weird dragging anyone else into it. I’ll fly into India, and then see if I want to try crossing the border. If it nothing, I’ll stay in India for a while. Sightsee, clear my head. You know.”
“I do know. Justin and I cleared our heads sightseeing in Venice once. I’ll tell the team you were stressed out and went on a trip to India. It won’t be a lie. On one condition.”
“What?” Destiny asked warily.
Fiona crossed the room, took a tiny piece of electronic equipment from a shelf, and handed it to Destiny. “Keep this on you at all times. It’s a GPS transmitter.” As Destiny opened her mouth to object, Fiona said, “I won’t use it to follow your movements. I know this is private business, and I respect that. But if you’re not back in a week and you haven’t called in to confirm that you’re all right, I’m coming to get you.”
“Got it.” Destiny clipped the transmitter into her bra, beside her emergency pills.
She borrowed Fiona’s computer, found the airport closest to Ethan’s coordinates, and booked a flight. Fiona dropped her at the airport. Destiny didn’t even have time to go home and pack. But her purse had a month’s supply of pills and everything else a girl might need if she had to go somewhere suddenly, and she could buy whatever else she needed at the airport.
All the way to the airport, her mind kept fluttering around like a bird that had accidentally flown into someone’s house, jittering from the conviction that she’d arrive and find that he was fine and she was insane and then she’d get arrested for trespassing in a war zone, the terror that he wasn’t fine at all and she’d arrive too late to save him, and memories of kissing Ethan, eating barbecue with Ethan, standing back to back with Ethan with their guns drawn.
The hurt in Ethan’s sea-colored eyes when she’d told him to stop asking.
Destiny knew she should stop asking. If she kept picking at the scab, the wound would never heal. But she couldn’t help herself.
Is Ethan my mate? Destiny asked her tiger.
Stop asking me that, hissed her tiger. If I ever spot your mate, believe me, you’ll be the first to know.
Destiny had heard so many variations on that reply over the last two years that it should have stopped making her feel like her heart had been ripped in two. But the pain was as sharp and fresh as it had ever been.
She boarded the plane bound for India. Maybe after this little vacation of insanity proved exactly how crazy her obsession with Ethan had driven her, she could finally let him go.
Chapter 6
Ethan
Ethan lay curled up in a wooden crate beneath a whole lot of MREs (country captain chicken flavor, his least favorite) and tried to strike a balance between staying absolutely still, so he wouldn’t knock them all over and alert the enemy that he’d smuggled himself into their plane, and moving just enough so he wouldn’t get cramps, which would definitely alert the enemy that he’d smuggled himself into their plane when he tried to get out of the crate and promptly fell on his face. The hardest part was not coughing. Probably he wouldn’t be heard over the noise of the engine, but he couldn’t risk it.
Rather than risk being spotted trying to follow a minimum of four enemy agents, he’d tried to circle around in the opposite direction and get back to his men before they did. He’d succeeded in not being spotted, but failed to beat them there. Ethan had watched from a distance while the four enemies who’d gone searching for him had met up with the four who’d stayed to guard Merlin, Pete, and Ransom.
Any hope he’d had of ambushing them and rescuing his teammates died then and there: eight against one was bad odds to begin with, and hopeless when the eight were armed and he was
n’t. Especially since his teammates were still unconscious and could easily be used as hostages to force his cooperation.
On the other hand, only two enemies were with the small, unmarked plane that waited nearby, and they were both hanging out in the cockpit. Ethan considered his options, then decided that his best chance at rescuing his men—and his only chance at getting to the bottom of it all—was to find their base. He’d ducked inside the cargo bay, made a quick weapons check and found none, and buried himself in the only real hiding space, which was a half-full crate of MREs. He hoped no one would get hungry enough to come grab one.
He’d also hoped that his teammates would be stashed in the cargo bay, but no such luck. Ethan hadn’t dared to peek out, but while he’d felt the thump of feet and heard muffled voices, no one seemed to have entered the cargo bay at all.
It felt like they’d been flying forever before his ears popped, signaling the descent. He waited, barely breathing, as he heard the enemies disembark. Once again, to his frustration, he could hear voices but couldn’t make out the words. And then both voices and footsteps faded, and silence fell.
Ethan forced himself to count to a thousand before he so much as moved. Then he extricated himself from the crate, taking care not to send MREs cascading to the floor. The cargo bay was dark and still. He tiptoed to the door and listened with his ear to it. Nothing. He opened it.
Darkness met his eyes, and he drew in a breath of warm, humid air. He blinked, trying to see by the light of the moon. He was on a small airfield outside a base designed to blend in with the surrounding jungle. The plane he was in had been painted dark green, with no identification markings. Ethan bet the entire place would be perfectly camouflaged from above, invisible unless you knew what to look for.
He dropped down and pushed the door closed behind him. Urgency warred with caution in his mind as he approached the hidden base, keeping to the shadows. As he grew closer, he saw that it was patrolled by guards. If he walked up, he’d be captured immediately. He needed to come up with a plan.
A wave of dizziness swept over him, making him stagger. He’d hoped that “resting” in the MRE crate would help him recover, but he felt worse instead of better. His lungs felt heavy and sodden, his hands were shaking, his head and side throbbed, and his legs threatened to give out from under him. He was in no condition to launch a one-man raid on this place.
Ethan returned to the plane, grabbed a few MREs, and headed out into the jungle. The moss-covered earth was springy, and his feet left no tracks. He wasn’t sure what country he was in, but he was familiar with this sort of terrain. A brief search uncovered a reasonable hiding place, a shallow cave in a hillside with its entrance hidden behind a curtain of vines.
He crawled in, cooked the MRE with its heating element, and ate it, trying not to think about joking with Destiny about the Five Fingers of Death. That thought led to him having to try not to think about their visit to Aunt Lizzie’s Back Porch, and then to trying not to think about their one-and-only, peach cobbler-flavored, across-the-table kiss.
No matter what happens to me, at least Destiny’s safe at home.
Comforted by that thought, he fell asleep.
Ethan woke to a shaft of dappled, greenish sunlight. He lay still, listening, but heard nothing but the chattering of monkeys and screeches of tropical birds. He stretched out, wincing, and again evaluated his condition. He felt less on the verge of collapse than he had the day before, and he was certainly capable of operating with a headache and broken ribs. But he could feel a slight rasp in his breathing, and though he couldn’t be entirely sure, he thought he felt warmer than could be accounted for by the tropical heat.
If I’m coming down with something, I have to move fast before it gets worse, he told himself.
He might not be a one-man strike-force just yet, but he felt up to doing some reconnaissance. Depending on what he discovered, he’d either sneak in and break out his team, or sneak in, find a radio, and call for help.
He peered out of the cave, taking care to keep unseen within the vine curtain. To his dismay, the area around the base was bustling with enemies. A second unmarked plane was coming in for a landing, and a medical team and a security team were waiting for it. When it landed, a man was removed on a stretcher. Ethan was too far away to see anything but that he was lying still and there was a whole lot of blood on his clothes. The medical team jumped on him, there was a brief flurry of action, and then the stretcher-bearers literally ran him inside.
Ethan had no idea who the man was, but a whole lot of unpleasant possibilities came into his head about why he was there and how he’d been wounded. Apex had screwed up the ambush, and he’d had a chance to fight back? He’d been wounded in combat, and Apex had taken advantage of the commotion to snatch him when he was helpless?
Apex had captured Shane by ambushing his team when they’d been in the middle of a firefight and he’d been distracted by trying to save the life of his buddy Justin, who’d been hit and was bleeding out. Destiny had told Ethan about it; Shane still didn’t like to talk about it. Justin wasn’t the only one who’d been left with scars.
I hope you make it, Ethan thought to the man he’d seen so briefly. If you do, I’ll get you out of there. I swear it.
Then, to his surprise, more people got off the plane. They were a pair of big men holding a struggling woman. She was yelling so loudly that Ethan could hear the sound, though he couldn’t understand the words. One of the men put his hand over her mouth.
Ethan tensed to run out, then forced himself to stay still. He’d be taken prisoner immediately, and then how could he help her? As he watched, she apparently bit the hand (Ethan heard an anguished yell, and the hand yanked itself away), stomped on a foot, and made a break for it—toward the base, not away.
That’s weird, Ethan thought.
Her attempt was brave but hopeless. She was instantly jumped by the security team and dragged inside.
I’ll get you out too, Ethan silently vowed to her.
Which meant that he now had five people to rescue, not three. Much as he longed to break in and free everyone instantly, that wasn’t realistic. In fact, getting in the base at all didn’t seem very realistic. Still, he had to try.
Ethan settled back down. He hated to keep the prisoners waiting for an entire day, but he had to make his attempt at night or he’d have no chance at all. With a badly wounded man to deal with, hopefully Apex would be too distracted to do anything irrevocable to anyone any time soon.
He ate another country captain chicken MRE, plowing through it with the reminder that he needed all the strength he could get. Then, exhausted, he dozed off.
He awoke with a start and a jolt of adrenaline, hearing the soft footfalls of someone making a stealthy approach. They were coming closer. He snatched up a rock and crouched, ready to brain the first person to try to crawl into his hideaway.
The footsteps stopped.
“Come out with your hands over your head!” yelled a gruff male voice. Ethan recognized it as that of one of the Apex agents who had searched for him.
He kept silent, rock at the ready. Let them come to him.
“This is your last chance!” shouted the agent.
Ethan didn’t move or speak. Inwardly, he cursed himself for not having gone farther away, or found a better hiding place, or one with a second exit, or—
A familiar metal object was tossed into the cave: a flashbang grenade. Ethan dropped the rock and dove for it, intending to throw it back at them.
It went off in his hand.
The brilliant flash of light blinded him, and the bang left him deaf. He fell to his knees, dizzy and reeling. He’d seen the effect of stun grenades before, and knew that the shock wave disturbed the fluid in the inner ears, giving people vertigo. But he’d never had one go off that close to him before. Though he knew why everything seemed to be whirling and pitching around him, he couldn’t do anything about it but grit his teeth and wait for it to wear off. He couldn
’t fight; he couldn’t even stand up.
Ethan was only vaguely aware of being pulled out of the cave, then dragged through the jungle. His ears were ringing like a fire alarm was going off in his head, and bright afterimages flashed every time he blinked.
By the time the dizziness wore off enough for him to become aware of his surroundings, he was halfway across the airfield. He stayed limp, hoping they’d think he was still incapacitated, while he took in the situation.
It was still day; he must have been found soon after he’d hidden. Or maybe he’d been so exhausted that he’d slept through the night and into the day. Not knowing which it was made him feel even more disoriented.
He was held by two big guards, who were accompanied by four more. More guards had gathered by the entrance to the base, which he was being dragged to. Once he was inside, he’d undoubtedly be locked up.
Right now, he was being hauled past the plane he’d smuggled himself into. He wished like hell he knew how to fly. He’d been offered flying lessons once, but—
He broke off that painful line of thought. No point dwelling on what was past and gone. He had to take the one chance he had, which was to try to escape on foot, now.
Ethan kicked out, slamming his foot into the side of the kneecap of one of the men holding him. The guard went down with a yell of pain. The grip of the other guard loosened as he reacted in surprise. Ethan punched him in the solar plexus, dropping him to the ground, then bolted for the jungle.
He made it halfway across the airfield before the guards caught up with him. Ethan went down under the weight of them, his face slamming into the concrete. The guards dragged him upright, then slammed him against the nearest plane. This time a guard held his feet. He struggled, but in vain. He was far outnumbered and still feeling the effects of the flashbang, in addition to his other injuries. Pain stabbed through his head, and he subsided, feeling dizzy and sick.
A tall man stepped in front of him, rubbing his chin. Glancing at the name on his uniform, he said, “Ethan McNeil.”