Cowboy, Undercover

by Vicki Tharp

  “I’ve got two—no, make that three enclosed trucks. White. No identifying marks. We’re attempting to place trackers now. I thought this was supposed to be—”

  At the same time Lang cut out, bursts of light flashed far ahead between the trees.

  “Fuck. They’ve gone hot,” Gil said, indicating shots being fired.

  From the overwhelming spray of light coming from one direction and the intermittent, controlled fire coming from the other, Lang and his men were outnumbered and outgunned.

  “Get me down there.” Gil had slipped into a harness and tethered himself inside the helo. He slid open both rear doors, armed with an AR-15 he’d retrieved from a rack in the back.

  “Command, this is Big Bird, request permission to assist.”

  “Negative. You’re on overwatch—”

  Quinn switched the comms and Gil’s mic went hot. “Forget overwatch. Our men are going to get slaughtered if we don’t get down there.”

  “Who the hell let you on that bird, Brant?” Spinks hollered.

  Tessa was going to pay for allowing Gil on the mission. Probably with her job. But there wasn’t anything she could do about that now.

  “Man down,” Lang reported. “They’ve got cop killers. I’m going in.”

  Cop killers. Armor piercing rounds. Those bastards didn’t fool around.

  “Put me down. Now.” Gil didn’t leave any room for argument. One more guy might not make any difference, but then again, one more might. Tessa glanced at Quinn. Quinn nodded his agreement. After all, if they were going to disobey direct orders, both of their asses could be canned. She set the helo down in a clearing about one kilometer, one klick, away from the shooting.

  “Coming your way,” Gil told Lang. He ditched the harness, tossed on a bulletproof vest and clipped on a mobile radio. The armor wouldn’t help him if he got hit with an APR, but it was better than nothing.

  As soon as Gil was clear of the rotors, Tessa lifted off again. She switched to the internal comms, so only Quinn could hear her. “I hope he knows what the hell he’s doing.”

  Running a klick in the dark and over rough terrain got Gil’s blood pumping and his heart thumping, as the steady drip of adrenaline seared his veins. Up ahead, more shots were fired, but the tempo had slowed. Headlights from one of the trucks came on. Gil ducked, and a bullet thumped into the tree right where his head had been.

  Two trucks roared by, and Gil let them go. He didn’t want to give up his position. From his location behind the tree, he could make out Lang holed up behind the rear axle of the remaining truck. One of the task force guys had taken cover to Gil’s right behind another tree, and two others had found cover in a ditch.

  On the ground, out in the open, was the agent who’d been shot. The man slipped his hand up under his vest, and said, “He shot me. The fucker shot me.” The man groaned, pulled out his hand and stared at the blood. He chuckled. More pain, less humor. “Motherfucker. My wife is going to be pissed if I die.”

  “We’re not going to let you die,” one of Lang’s men said, Joel Cook, Gil thought. “We’re going to get you out of there.”

  Gil spoke into his radio, “Lang, coming up on your six. Don’t shoot.”

  Over the radio, Lang told his men to hold their fire.

  “Coming to you, buddy,” Gil said. “Cover me.”

  Lang peeked around the bumper of the of the truck and laid down suppressive fire. Gil ran over to Lang and pressed his back against the rear wheel. “What’s the plan.”

  “I gotta get Rivera before he bleeds out. They’ve got two guys behind that shack, one in the trees at about ten o’clock, and one I haven’t seen for a while. I think he took off, but I can’t be sure.”

  Rivera tried scooting backward, shoving at the ground with the heels of his boots. A shot rang out, the bullet hitting inches from Rivera’s right boot. Rivera stilled.

  “I can’t wait any longer. You guys cover me,” Lang said. “I’ll pull him behind that rocky outcrop.” Into his radio, Lang gave the orders. His men were to concentrate their fire on the shack, and Gil was to make sure the guy in the trees kept his head down. Lang counted down, and when he hit zero, Gil and the rest of the men started firing.

  Lang sprinted in a half crouch over to Rivera and hooked his hands under Rivera’s arms. Lang struggled as he dragged the dead weight toward the rocks. Gil cursed under his breath. Rivera was a big man, Gil should have been the one pulling him to safety.

  Gil’s AR-15 hit empty as Lang got Rivera behind cover. Gil dumped the empty mag and slapped a new one home. Lang shrugged off his backpack and pulled out a blowout kit, a first-aid kit designed to treat bullet wounds. A bullet rent the air, and Lang fell. Gil yelled into his radio, “Did any of you see where that came from?”

  From beneath the back end of the truck, Gil watched as Lang writhed on the ground. “My legs. I can’t feel my fucking legs.”

  Over the comms, someone said, “The shot came from that rise at Lang’s nine o’clock.” Meaning a position to Lang’s left. From Gil’s vantage point, the truck blocked his view. It was probably the guy Lang thought had run off. But instead of running off, the asshole had circled around and flanked them. Gil clicked the talk button on his radio, “Hang on, buddy. I’m coming for you.”

  “Stand down,” Lang said, “No one is going anywhere until someone gets that motherfucker.”

  Lang and Rivera were screwed, and Gil wasn’t sure why the shooter hadn’t wasted his teammates already. What was he waiting for?

  Lang and Rivera were pinned down. If they moved around to the other side of the rocks, they would be in the direct line of fire from the guys behind the shack, yet staying where they were would likely get them killed. Lang’s best hope for survival was for Gil to get the guy who’d ambushed Lang to surrender or end him.

  At that point, Gil didn’t care which.

  Gil slid under the truck. With his rifle cradled in his arms, he crawled to the truck’s right front wheel, the healing muscles from his old bullet wound bitched and complained and generally gave him hell like a bitter ex-wife on a rampage. The smell of gunpowder filled his nostrils and his ears rung from all the shooting.

  From his new position, Lang and Rivera were directly in his line of sight. Lang had rolled to his side and applied pressure to Rivera’s wound while trying to hold pressure on his own. Rivera was no longer talking, but the man’s moans of pain set Gil’s teeth on edge. If they waited too much longer, they’d be taking both guys out in body bags.

  Into his radio, Gil hissed, “One of you guys try to talk to this guy. I’ll see if I can locate his position.”

  “This is the Bison County Task Force. Drop your weapon, and come out with your hands up,” Cook said.

  Cook was one of the newer guys that had joined the task force shortly before Gil had been shot. From the direction of Cook’s voice, he’d moved to a better vantage point as well.

  A shot rang out and the tire Gil had been hiding behind hissed and went flat. The bullet pinged off the steel wheel and zinged past his head with inches to spare.

  He returned fire. A double tap. A body hit the ground with a soft thud. Over his radio, he heard, “Target in the tree has been neutralized.”

  “Someone needs to secure those guys at the back of the shack,” Gil ordered back.

  “We’re on it,” that from Hugh Fisher, one of the guys who’d taken cover in the ditch.

  Two shadows rose from the ditch and ran from cover to cover, making their way toward the shooters who had taken up positions behind the shack. No shots had come from that direction for a few minutes. Had those men taken off for the hills while they’d had the chance? A distinct possibility.

  On the way to the shack, one of Lang’s men knelt next to the guy Gil had shot, then kept moving. Dead, Gil figured. That left one more.

  “Come out now,” Cook ordered. “Unless you want to be dead like your buddy over there.”

  “You’ve got ten seconds. Come out, or we’re ta
king you out. Your choice.”

  Not standard negotiating protocol, but Rivera and Lang were bleeding out, they didn’t have the time to mess around.

  “Nine, eight, seven—”

  “I want—”

  “You shot a cop. You don’t get to negotiate,” Gil hollered. “You come out, or you get dead. Don’t matter much to me. Tick-tock, asshole.”

  “Five, four, three.”

  One of the agents slapped a new magazine into their duty weapon.

  “Two, one—”

  “Okay, okay.” There was a clatter as what looked like an AK-47 hit the ground.

  Gil rolled out from beneath the truck and got to his feet, the end of his barrel aimed at the guy’s head as Gil stood.

  “The back of the shack is clear,” Fisher said over the radio. “They must have taken off. Want us to pursue?”

  “Negative,” Gil said. “It’s clear out here, come on back.”

  The shooter stepped out, his hands on his head. “On your knees.” Gil’s aim didn’t falter. When the shooter complied, Gil said, “Cuff him.”

  “Motherfucker,” the guy screeched out when Cook yanked they guy’s arms behind him and cuffed him.

  “What’s his problem?” Gil asked.

  “Looks like he sprung a leak,” Cook said. “A shame it doesn’t look fatal.”

  Cook patted down the shooter and hauled him to his feet. Gil shouldered his weapon and hurried over to Rivera and Lang. Rivera had lost consciousness. Gil felt for a pulse, it was light, thready.

  “Someone give me a hand over here,” Gil called out.

  Lang’s blood-covered hand gripped Gil’s arm. “I can’t feel my legs, man. Holy fuck, I’m never going to have sex again.”

  “That’s bullshit, and you know it.” Gil couldn’t say what he really thought. He couldn’t say that Lang was probably right. He pulled off his outer shirt and held it against Lang’s lower abdomen. “It’s just a flesh wound.”

  Lang’s chuckle came out strangled, and his lips pulled back in a grimace. “Flesh wound. You’re such a prick.”

  “Don’t you forget it.” Even in the dark, Gil couldn’t miss the pool of blood dripping down Lang’s side. He loaded Lang’s wound with Quick Clot from the kit he found in one of the pockets of Lang’s tactical pants hoping to buy his friend some time.

  Fisher dropped to his knees beside Gil and held pressure on Rivera’s wound while Gil did the same for Lang. The bullet had struck low, beneath the bottom edge of Lang’s ballistic vest, and buried itself deep into Lang’s belly. With no exit wound, and Lang’s inability to move his legs, Gil was concerned that the bullet had lodged itself against Lang’s spine.

  “Medevac is on its way,” Fisher said, “but only one chopper was available.”

  As Fisher relayed the news, Gil heard the whompa-whompa-whompa of the medevac’s rotor as the chopper flew in. Rivera was worse off, but Lang wasn’t fairing much better. He’d started losing consciousness and he no longer grimaced as Gil held pressure on his wound. They didn’t have time to wait for the medevac to come back.

  “Cook,” Gil hollered. “Have Sterling on standby, we’ll evac Lang to the trauma center ourselves.”

  Tessa flopped down in the chair beside Gil in the waiting room at the trauma hospital in Idaho Falls. “How are you doing?”

  Not worth a damn sprang to mind, along with a few other honest words that might make Tessa, and especially Spinks, question his ability to do his job. “Fine.”

  She gave his hand a squeeze but didn’t hang on. Not with the rest of the guys waiting around. She wouldn’t want anyone to know that something was brewing between them, and Gil couldn’t blame her.

  In his mind, there was no work conflict with him leaving the task force, but she didn’t know his plans. Besides, he knew how much harder the women had to work to prove themselves to their teammates. He wouldn’t want to make her professional life any more challenging for her than it already was. But to say he didn’t want to wrap her in his arms and lose himself in her would be a damned lie.

  And that wasn’t the remnants of an adrenaline stiffy talking either.

  “That must be hard.” Tessa leaned in, her voice soft to keep it from carrying.

  “What?” He glanced at her, but she wasn’t looking at his crotch like he’d suspected. Jesus Christ. He needed to get his mind out of the gutter and off all of the delicious, delectable, devilish things he wanted to do with Tessa if he ever got her naked.

  Now wasn’t the time.

  Anytime you cheat death is a good time, his body was quick to remind him.

  Maybe, but he hadn’t been the one shot this time. He hadn’t been the one clinging to life as the helos motored to the trauma center at max rated speed. Rivera and Lang had.

  “Saving your friend’s life.”

  “That was the training.” Uncle Sam had made sure he knew more than basic first aid. He could start an IV, administer plasma expanders, and manage sucking chest wounds at least until someone more qualified came along. Luckily, the task force helo was sometimes used for rescue work and was well equipped for medical emergencies. “The harder part would have been watching him die.”

  Tessa stood and held out her hand. He took it and allowed her to pull him to his feet. After coming off the adrenaline dump, his legs hung from his body thick and heavy as tree stumps. It was all he could do to put one foot in front of the other.

  He didn’t ask her where they were going. It didn’t matter. He’d probably follow her through the gates of hell if she’d let him. None of the other agents in the room seemed to notice them leaving or that his hand engulfed hers. Or if they did, they were too caught up in their own heads to say anything.

  She led him into one of those single, unisex wheelchair accessible bathrooms and closed and locked the door behind her. “Strip.”

  He arched a brow at her. “Excuse me?”

  “You’re covered in blood. Take your clothes off. We need to get you cleaned up.”

  He didn’t really need help, but if a beautiful woman wanted him to undress, who was he to argue? Still, he hesitated.

  She didn’t.

  She tugged his bloodstained undershirt shirt from the waistband of his jeans and pulled it over his head. The bathroom had a plastic chair in the corner. She pushed him down onto it and yanked off his boots. Then she made quick work of his jeans, taking out his wallet and keys and handing them to him.

  “You want to keep these?” She held up his clothes.

  Even if he could get all the blood out, they’d never get clean enough. Not in his mind at least. “Toss them.”

  There was nothing sexual about what she was doing but tell that to his super-charged body. He’d just thought the adrenaline had thoroughly wrung him out. He’d been wrong. The hairs stood up on his arms as if she’d run her tongue down his torso and his dick struggled against the virtual straitjacket that was his underwear.

  She bobbed her chin toward his boxer briefs. “Those too.”

  He glanced down at his gray briefs that had become soaked with blood when he’d helped carry Lang to Tessa’s helo. Even after several hours, they were still damp. He hitched his thumbs in his waistband, then stopped.

  “What?” Tessa said. “Don’t tell me you’re shy.”

  “Hardly.”

  “Then off with them. Come on. Chop-chop.”

  Even though what was now happening beneath a thin cover of cotton had absolutely nothing to do with adrenaline and everything to do with Tessa, he said, “I should warn you. Adrenaline sometimes has this… uh… effect on guys—”

  “Yeah, yeah, Brant, I deployed with a bunch of men. Trust me, I know more about adrenaline boners than any woman should. I know how it works, you don’t have to worry about me thinking you’re attracted and want to jump my bones.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  Her dark brown eyes caught his, her pupils expanding. She swallowed hard, then made a rolling motion with her hand, telling him to hurry
up.

  “Fine,” he said. “It’s not like I didn’t warn you.”

  He lifted and shucked his underwear in one quick motion, balling them up and shooting them into the trash can for two points. It wasn’t like he’d ever wear them again.

  Her eyes went to his crotch, then darted away. “Yeah, well, you’ve seen one penis, you’ve seen them all.” The words came out right, but her bravado and bluster were gone. A blush rose to her cheeks.

  “Did you have a plan beyond getting me naked?”

  Her eyes traveled up from his junk, up, up, up his long torso and finally met his eyes again. “What?”

  “A plan. Do you have one? Or am I supposed to streak through the halls of the hospital?”

  “I—” her voice squeaked, and Gil had to hold back the grin. He was a big man. He was a big man everywhere. She may have seen penises before, which for some stupid reason made him oddly jealous, but she hadn’t seen his.

  “I have a plan,” she said. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.”

  She left, then popped her head back in. “Maybe you should lock the door. You don’t want to give some little old lady a heart attack if she stumbles in here.”

  “I’ve got it,” he said. “Little old ladies aren’t my thing anyway. I prefer a woman who can control a stick.” Did he just say that? Her face turned red again, so he must have.

  He locked the door behind her, needing to get his head on straight. He was an adult, not some horned-up hound that had slipped its leash and was out on the prowl.

  4

  You’ve seen one penis, you’ve seen them all.

  Gil had been quick to prove Tessa wrong.

  As Tessa raided one of the hospital’s supply closets, she tried not to think about how wrong she’d been. Tried not to imagine what he’d feel like in her hands, her mouth, and other places.

  Tessa hurried back to the bathroom, fanning herself with a blue surgical towel about the size of a hand towel. She rapped on the door with her knuckles. “It’s me, open up.”

  After a couple seconds, the lock clicked, and the door swung open. Gil stood behind the door to keep from being seen, though this late at night, the foot traffic was sparse.