by Harley Tate
Dani was enough of an attachment. He didn’t need a woman like Melody complicating his life. But seeing her about to rush the front door and put herself in harm’s way for a pair of neighbors did something to him.
The urge to protect her, not just to keep her alive, but safe and content and away from the horrors of this new existence, overwhelmed him. This was the reason he left the University. Fear of connecting with another person and putting her needs above his own.
Colt cursed at himself.
Emotions made wrecks of men. Tore them up and spit them out worse than they were before. Time and again he’d seen it, not just on the front lines or in a covert op, but at home in the everyday existence of before.
Feelings killed.
He scrubbed a hand down his face and tested the use of his leg. It hurt, but he could climb a ladder if he had to. The lack of sleep the night before wasn’t new, but his years as an air marshal softened his skills. Colt wasn’t the SEAL he used to be.
If Melody couldn’t accept the hard choices, if she couldn’t rationally assess when to fight and when to hide, then what future did she have? He hadn’t shared with her the worst of his fears.
The soldiers across the street didn’t know they were connected. Not yet. But if Jarvis learned Melody, her brother, and the Wilkinses were helping Colt and Dani, then everything changed. All of them were at risk, not just of death, but of much, much worse.
Jarvis would use any one of them to get to Colt. One look at Melody and she would go to the top of the list. He couldn’t let that happen. If Melody couldn’t see reason, Colt didn’t have a choice. He would have to leave whether Dani wanted to go with him or not.
Chapter Fourteen
DANI
Wilkins Residence
Eugene, Oregon
8:00 a.m.
“We have to do something. They’re good people. John and Angela have lived here for years. They’ve never been anything but nice. They even watched Lottie when Doug and I went to visit family last year.” Melody hugged a cup of coffee as if it were the only comfort on earth.
“It doesn't matter how nice they are, Melody.” Colt crossed his arms. “We can’t go in there blind.”
“So don’t!”
Dani chewed on the inside of her lip. She didn’t understand how grown adults couldn’t see the reality of the situation. Only Colt and Doug understood. The pair of them sat on the couch, for once not arguing with each other.
The minute the three of them showed up, Dani knew something bad must have happened. She never expected a hostage situation.
Doug brought her focus back to the conversation. “It’s too dangerous. Right now we’re not on the army’s radar. If we go over there, then we’re putting everyone here at risk. Not just us, Melody, but Harvey and Gloria. Will, too. I know you want to help, but we would only be hurting ourselves.”
Colt rubbed his forehead as he focused on the coffee table in front of him. “Doug is right. I’ve been on plenty of recovery missions. This isn’t one I would ever sign off on. Not as a SEAL, not now.”
Gloria spoke up. “What if one of us just walked across the street and knocked on the door? I could bring some water over and pretend I’m just there to visit.”
“The second the soldiers inside see you, you’ll become another hostage.”
“Or worse.” Doug shook his head. “I can’t believe we’re still having this conversation. The only option is to lie low and keep an eye out. That’s all.”
Melody thunked her mug down on the table. “We can’t ignore it! We have to help them!”
Dani stuck out her chin. “Easy for you to say.”
Melody’s eyes snapped up and she pinned Dani with a stare. “Excuse me?”
She pushed off the wall and walked up to the couch to stand behind Colt and Doug. “It’s easy to vote to fight when you won’t be the one risking your life.”
Melody’s brows dipped. “I never said I wouldn’t fight.”
“But you never said you would, either. Do you even know how to fire a gun? Hold a rifle? Can you defend yourself when a soldier catches you and tries to rip your clothes off?”
The other woman’s eyes went wide, but Dani didn’t stop. These people needed to understand what they were up against. They needed to know the hell she had already suffered. How it was just the tip of the freakin’ iceberg.
Dani gripped the edge of the couch for support. “These soldiers? The army that came here to save you? They won’t hesitate to take advantage. The second they catch you, you’re nothing more than a body. An object they can use. If they know you’ve got a brother over here who cares about you, they’ll use you as bait.”
Mrs. Wilkins spoke up from her spot across the room. “Danielle, that’s enough.”
“No, let her finish.” Colt turned around and gave her a nod. “Tell them, Dani.”
She swallowed, memories of the night trapped with Colonel Jarvis and his men fresh in her mind. “If they don’t care about your welfare, if it doesn’t matter to them whether you live or die, then you’re just fun. If Colt hadn’t rescued me…”
Dani pressed her lips together, drawing up the power to keep her voice even. “If he hadn’t risked everything to get me out of that apartment, I would be dead. But before that, I’d have been used in every way imaginable.”
Melody paled, but Dani plowed on. “I was trapped in the bathroom with one, a real winner who smoked like a chimney and never quit leering. He pinned me to the shower wall, thrust his hand between my legs. He didn’t plan on stopping.”
Movement caught her eye and Dani noticed Will hovering in the hallway, listening. Fine. Let him hear it. Maybe it would wake him up. Maybe her story would wake all of them the hell up.
“I was trapped, wearing nothing but my underwear, and his hands were all over me. Groping, touching, tugging at my panties. I had a choice in that bathroom. I could let him rape me, or I could fight back.”
Dani straightened up to her full height, letting go of the couch to stand on her own. “I chose to fight back. Do you know what it feels like to pop a man’s eyeballs? To jab your fingers so hard into another human’s eyes that they explode like cherry tomatoes under pressure?” She focused on Melody. “I do.”
Colt reached out and grabbed her hand. He squeezed and Dani sucked in a breath.
Melody exhaled. “I’m sorry, Dani. I didn’t know.”
Colt turned back around. “That’s not the end of it. She might have blinded that soldier, but the others tried to kill us. I was shot, Dani ran through a fire, and we both jumped out of a third-story window.”
He paused as he chose his next words. “Those men are still out there. Jarvis was in the apartment. He knows who we are and he wants us dead. We can’t risk a mission across the street. If you all want to stop the army, if you want to kick Jarvis out of this town, we need to be smart, not heroic.”
Melody slid back on the couch in silence, her gaze bopping between Dani and Colt.
Mrs. Wilkins eased down onto the couch beside her and smiled one of those placating, pity smiles Dani’s way.
Dani fought the urge to throw something. Pity never sat well with her. It was one of the main reasons social workers never picked up on her mother’s drug addiction and Dani’s perilous home life. She didn’t need pity. She needed a break.
That’s what she thought she’d found here with these people. Mr. and Mrs. Wilkins, Melody and Doug. They were supposed to understand and give her a chance to hope for the future.
Instead, it was more of the same. She stared at the back of Colt’s head. He got it. More than even Dani herself. It had been Dani’s own failings that hastened Gran’s death and led to her mother’s betrayal. If she’d been harder from the start, more callous, more calculating, maybe then she would have escaped the army’s wrath entirely.
She wouldn’t be beat up and scarred and Colt wouldn’t be sitting there with a bullet hole in his arm. Because of her inability to give up on the past, she almost kil
led them both. It wouldn’t happen again.
Dani moved just enough to catch sight of Will still hiding behind the hallway wall. He heard the entire thing. She hoped it kicked some sense into him.
“It seems we’ve all been living in a bit of denial around here.” Mrs. Wilkins voiced the very thoughts echoing around inside Dani’s head. “We can’t help but come at this from another perspective. Although the army has been harsh regarding pets and dissidents, they haven’t hurt any of us. Not physically.”
Doug slid forward on the couch. “You know they could at any time.”
“I understand that. Which is why I’m proposing a scouting mission.”
“No way.” Doug shook his head. “Not until they clear out.”
She held up her wrinkled hand. “What if we only watch the house?”
Colt spoke up. “Surveillance only?”
“No!” Dani surged forward, but Colt held up a hand.
“For what purpose?”
“To keep tabs on them, for one, and to monitor for signs of Angela and John. There might come a time when the army lets down its guard. We might be able to rescue them without much risk.”
Harvey chimed in to support his wife. “Gloria has a point. Now that we know they are camped out across from Melody and Doug, we need to be extra vigilant. A constant watch is a prudent move.”
“I agree.” Colt glanced back at Dani. “We need to be prepared in case they come here next. We don’t know what they’re after.”
“I might.” Melody spoke up for the first time since Dani shut her up. “John worked for the University as an engineer. He helped run the central power station.”
“The grid’s fried. Why would they need his help now?”
“I don’t know. But based on all the gas they’ve siphoned and the generators you said were running on campus, maybe they’re getting worried about their fuel supply.”
Harvey nodded. “The central power station is a natural gas facility. It burns natural gas and harnesses the steam for electricity. One of the students who worked in my bookshop told me about it. She said they were trying to convert more and more of the University’s systems to run off the steam power.”
“And John knows something about this?”
Melody nodded. “Angela said he’s always over there troubleshooting the system.”
Colt leaned back on the couch. “If John can get the power station running, there will be no stopping Jarvis. He’ll have all the power he needs. People will flock to the University. They won’t hesitate to trade their freedom for a hot shower and a cup of coffee.”
“Do you think that’s what he’s after? A modern-day feudal system with a bunch of serfs and him the lord?”
“Overlord is more like it.” Dani shuddered. The thought of Jarvis turning the entire town into his empire sent a chill down her spine. If he succeeded, there would be no stopping him. He could expand beyond Eugene into the neighboring rural areas, eventually take over the bigger cities.
Become the de-facto ruler of the Pacific Northwest.
She exhaled. “We can’t let that happen. If the neighbors are the key to Jarvis’s power, we have to stop them.”
Mrs. Wilkins focused on Dani, her eyebrow raised in doubt. “What happened to not taking a chance?”
“That was before. I know what that man is like. He’ll stop at nothing to stay in power. If Jarvis gets his hands on a working power station, we’ll never make it out of Eugene alive.”
“Then you do want to save the Cliftons?”
Dani snorted. “No. I want to ensure that power station never goes online.”
Colt nodded in agreement. “Dani’s right. This isn’t about saving your neighbors. It’s about stopping a madman.” He stood up in a rush. “We can try to save the Cliftons, but you all have to understand something. The easiest way to eliminate the threat is to kill anyone with knowledge.”
Melody’s eyes went wide. “You mean kill John and Angela?”
“If it comes down to it, yes. And you need to be prepared for just that possibility.”
Chapter Fifteen
COLT
Bellemeade Way
Eugene, Oregon
12:00 p.m.
The sun cast no shadow while Colt and Doug crouched behind a house two away from the Cliftons’ place. With low clouds and thick, humid air, the neighborhood hung like Colt’s breath, waiting for a rainstorm or a volley of bullets.
He focused his binoculars on the Cliftons’ front porch and scanned for some sign of life. Nothing. “Tell me more about John and Angela. He works for the university, but what else do you know about them?”
Doug rubbed a hand over his black hair. “Not much to tell, really. They seemed like every other neighbor on this street.”
“Any kids?”
“No. Angela worked part-time as an interior designer, I think. She was always fussing with the house.”
Harvey chimed in. “The place was a real fixer-upper when they bought it. Old Mrs. Oster lived there fifty years, the last twenty as a widow. She didn’t keep up with the times.”
Colt nodded. “So Angela spent most of her time at home. Is the house as clean on the inside as it is on the outside?”
“She’s a neat freak, that’s for sure. The one time John invited a bunch of guys from the neighborhood over, he made a point of using coasters. Said Angela would lose it if we damaged her antique coffee table.”
A clean, organized house meant fewer items to hide behind or use as makeshift weapons. Colt frowned. There weren’t even any gangly bushes around the house for cover. “What about the layout of the house? Tell me what you remember.”
“If it’s still the same as Mrs. Oster’s place, then you walk into a living room with an archway to a formal dining room.” Harvey squinted as he tried to remember. “The kitchen is in the back.”
Doug agreed. “John’s home office is the other window on the front porch. Full of engineering books and a desk. I never went upstairs.”
“What about a basement or entry from the backyard?”
“No idea.”
It wasn’t much to go on. An orderly house with a living room and office up front and a kitchen in the back. If there wasn’t a way in through either a basement or the yard, they would have to storm the front door. The absolute worst possible option.
He longed for some of his gear as a SEAL. Even a handful of items from the sporting goods store he loaded up on before Jarvis tried to riddle him with bullets would be better than nothing. Too bad he’d been too weak to carry most of it.
The rifles each man carried and Colt’s handgun were the only weapons left. Colt thought about Dani and how she’d stormed up to those soldiers at the model home and pulled the trigger like it had been no more than a video game. She’d been prepared to kill that man over a cat she didn’t even know.
He frowned. Was that the life she could look forward to? Were they all destined to become mercenaries out for vengeance or control? Colt brought the binoculars back up to his eyes. If they shot first, how different were they from Jarvis and his men?
Still no movement.
He turned to Harvey. “We can’t see anything from here. If the army is still inside, they’ve retreated to an interior room. We’ll need to get closer. Maybe even break in.” He paused to glance at Doug. “Are you both prepared to engage?”
Doug and Harvey made eye contact across Colt. After a moment, Harvey nodded. “I am. If what you’ve said about Jarvis is true, he can’t bring the grid online. If he controls the power, he’ll control the entire town. He’ll turn us all into his slaves.”
“Do you really think he’s capable?” Doug voiced his doubts. “Won’t some of the guardsmen rebel? Once the power’s on, what can Jarvis really do?”
Trying to convince a civilian about the sway a senior officer held over enlisted men wasn’t easy, but Colt tried his best. “The men serving under Jarvis don’t question orders. They follow orders.”
“Even if those o
rders are wrong?”
“Wrong is subjective. They teach you in boot camp to not even think about it that way. They teach you to do the job no matter what.”
From the way his nose wrinkled as he thought, Doug still wasn’t buying it. “How about we get closer? See if we can get a clearer view of the inside and then decide what to do?”
“All right.”
Harvey spoke up. “What if they spot us?”
“If they fire first, I sure as hell hope you both engage. I’ll be fighting alongside you, but I can’t take on eight soldiers alone.”
Doug checked the safety on his rifle. “If they shoot first, I’ll back you up. But I’m not going in guns blazing.”
“Neither am I.” Harvey pulled his own rifle off his shoulder and held it in both hands. “But I won’t leave you hanging.”
It was the best Colt could expect in the circumstances. He didn’t want to shoot first, either. With any luck, they wouldn’t need to fire a single round.
The fewer firefights, the better. Colt and Dani couldn’t hide under Jarvis’s nose if they shot up every group of guardsmen they came across, especially not some right down the street. With a deep breath, Colt stood up. “Let’s do this.”
He sketched out a rough plan to Harvey and Doug and the three set off, one taking the front, one the rear, and one the side. Colt crept up to the picket fence of the neighbor’s yard and climbed over. Ducking behind a bush covered in bristled, purple flowers, he checked again for movement inside.
Nothing.
The longer they watched the house, the more his unease grew. Something wasn’t right. Either the army was long gone with John and all the information they needed to reboot the University’s grid, or something bad happened inside that house.
Maybe both.
He motioned to Harvey, who waited at the side yard to keep going before creeping around the front steps and up to the front corner of the Cliftons’ house. From his view, it appeared Harvey would have no luck in the side yard. All he could see were two windows above eye-level and no door.