Chapter 27

TWENTY-SEVEN

Cooper

“God dammit!” I watch in horror as the van Marcus is driving careens onto its side and slides into the woods, coming to a crashing stop against the trees.

I slam on the brakes and turn the wheel so my back end drifts out. My gun is already in my hand as we stop. There’s no way in hell I’ll leave Marcus here alone, potentially injured.

Fuck that noise.

Memories of Iraq come rushing back, but I push them away.

I can unpack that shit in therapy, but right now Marcus needs us.

Natalia’s already grabbed several magazines out of the glove box and shoved them in her pants.

“We don’t know how many are in the van,” I tell her.

“I’m watching.” She looks out the window. “I see three.”

“Another one coming out of the back.”

“If it’s four or five, we can take them,” she says firmly.

I want to laugh at her positivity, but it’s not funny.

Two masked men move toward the van and before I can react, Natalia takes one of them out.

Damn. I knew she was a hell of a shot, but I hadn’t realized just how good.

I fire at one of the others but miss since they’re moving faster now that they realize we’re not going down without a fight.

Someone yells something, and I realize it’s in Arabic.

So they’re after our prisoner.

We still don’t even know the guy’s name, which is unfortunate, but maybe we can change that if we can capture at least one of these assholes alive.

“We can’t kill them all,” I say to Natalia. “Keeping at least one alive helps us figure out what we’re dealing with.”

“I like taking out kneecaps,” she replies, and then does exactly that when a fifth guy climbs out of the van.

He collapses, howling in pain, and I shoot the driver.

We’re down to three now, but two of them have reached the van and there’s no sign that Marcus is able to protect himself.

“I’m going for Marcus!” I yell to her. “Cover me.”

Natalia starts firing like a maniac, and the three remaining assassins take cover, giving me time to get to the driver’s side of Marcus’s van, which also provides me with some protection.

“Marcus!”

“I’m here.” His voice is low. “I think my arm’s broken. I can’t get the damn seatbelt off.”

“I’ve got you, man.”

Natalia is still firing, so I slice through the seatbelt with my knife and hand Marcus his gun. He drops down beside me, his left arm hanging limply at his side.

“How many are there?” he asks.

“We think three. I saw five, Natalia already took out two.”

“How the hell did they know where we were?” he mutters, peeking through the windows.

“We’ll figure that out, but not now. I’ve got the right.” We hear the guys yelling Arabic and I swing my arm around to the right, gun pointed at whoever comes around the corner first. Marcus automatically points his gun to the left and we wait.

The prisoner is banging on the inside of the van, letting them know he’s there, and yelling in Arabic.

“Did he just say ‘shoot him’?” Marcus asks rhetorically.

“I don’t know. They’re talking too fast for me.”

Everything seems to happen in slow motion then.

Someone fires a gun, and a masked man fires as he comes around the front of the van, but I’m ready for him, taking my shot before he shoots so his goes wild, missing us by a mile. Someone else is coming around the rear bumper, but Marcus is ready and does the same thing.

I hear a yell and then Natalia’s voice.

“We’re clear!”

“Fuck.” I step over one guy’s body and hurry to the back.

Natalia is standing over the guy she shot in the knee, her booted foot on his stomach. “What’s your name?” she demands. She asks in English, then Limaji, then French. When she asks in French he looks up and scowls.

“Fuck off.”

Well, if nothing else, he can curse in English.

“Get him up,” Marcus says to me. “Gag him, put his hands in zip ties, and put him in your SUV. Natalia, you get the prisoner. I don’t think the van is going anywhere any time soon.”

Natalia moves toward our van, and I grab the guy who’s still holding his knee. We have a first aid kit in the back, and I use some bandages I found to create a tourniquet. He’s no good to us if he bleeds out—that’s the whole reason we kept him alive.

I hear Marcus on the phone to someone, probably Sandor, and Natalia has wrestled the prisoner out of the back. He’s not being cooperative, and my every instinct is to go help her, but I can’t. She’ll hate it and it would make her look bad, like she can’t handle herself.

This is a dynamic I’m going to have to think about when I have time.

The prisoner is leering at her now, but to her credit, Natalia is unfazed, merely yanking him forward. He’s trying to refuse to walk but when he falls to his knees, she pulls out her gun.

“Get up and walk or I’ll take out your knee next. Do not fucking test me.”

Oh, hell yeah.

There’s my badass girl.

I love when she talks kneecaps to bad guys.

The fact that he slowly gets to his feet is a testament to her power, and I get our wounded prisoner into the back of the SUV.

“Put them in the middle row,” Marcus says, “and I’ll sit in the far back.”

“I’ll get in the back,” Natalia offers. “You can’t climb well with your arm like that.”

“All right.” The fact that he agrees tells me how much pain he’s in.

“Sandor says to keep going to the prison,” Marcus tells us once the prisoners are secured, and we regroup outside the SUV. “We’ll drop off the first one, and if the second one dies while we’re doing it, it’ll hopefully send a message to whoever this is. But we’ve got some antibiotics to give him. Hopefully, that’ll stave off infection until we can get him medical attention. Sandor is meeting us in Vinake.”

I nod, and we get situated in the SUV. I’m driving, Marcus is in the passenger seat and Natalia is in the far back, at the ready in case there’s any more trouble.

* * *

We get to the prison a little later in the day than we anticipated, and it’s a whole ordeal getting rid of our original prisoner. The new prisoner is now moaning, pretending like he’s dying, but I checked the wound and it’s stopped bleeding. He’s going to need surgery to rebuild his knee, but that’s not our problem. And Sandor will be in Vinake by the time we get there to both interrogate him and decide whether or not he gets the surgery he needs.

Marcus is also in serious pain, but he refuses to take anything until we get to Vinake. There’s too much at stake for us to risk something else going wrong, and I force him to at least take a good dose of ibuprofen.

“Get some rest,” Natalia tells him once we’re back on the road. “We’ll wake you if anything happens.”

Marcus hesitates but then nods. A medic at the prison made a makeshift sling to hold his arm in place until he can get medical attention, but there’s no doubt he’s hurting.

“How long to Vinake?” I ask Natalia. She’s driving now since she knows the way and I want to keep an eye on both Dickhead #2 and Marcus.

“Less than three hours if the roads aren’t too bad. We don’t have highways up here so it’s all one- and two-lane roads most of the way.”

“All right.” I lean back in the seat and then glance at her. “You okay?”

“I’m fine. You?”

“Yeah.” She glances at me. “Welcome to the Royal Protectors.”

I grunt.

I’m not worried about the action we’re seeing—it’s the kind of thing I live for.

It’s just all the other things that are harder to wrap my head around.

I can’t fall down that kind of rabbit hole today, though.

We still have a long drive ahead of us and a prisoner to secure. Maybe even an interrogation later tonight.

The sun is getting lower in the sky, and I’m thankful it’s June so it doesn’t get dark too early. These back roads are narrow and winding, going through mountain passes with no rest areas, nowhere to pull off, nothing. It’s barren country up here, and I can see why it’s an ideal place for a prison. For the people who live here, though, it must be rough, especially in winter.

No wonder Natalia couldn’t wait to get the hell out.

By the time we get to Vinake, we’re tired and on edge, and our prisoner has passed out. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, but we’re following orders.

“This him?” Sandor meets us in front of the inn we’re staying at and peers into the car.

“Yeah. He lost a lot of blood but seems stable.”

“I’m going to take him out into a remote area to interrogate him. Natalia’s coming with me, you need to get Marcus to the hospital.”

It’s on the tip of my tongue to protest, but Sandor has already turned away. He’s not used to being questioned, and I shouldn’t anyway. There’s a chain of command, and though we’re encouraged to speak up during meetings, I know it’s not acceptable out in the field. So, I get back in the SUV and punch in the address for the hospital.

“Natalia’s going to be fine,” Marcus says in a hoarse voice.

I chuckle. “Am I that obvious?”

“Well, yeah. But she needs the experience. And you’re technically not a Royal Protector yet.”

“I know.”

“It’s going to be okay. Everything worked out.”

“But we still don’t know who’s after us or why our prisoner was important enough for them to find us again.”

“No, but we will. And there’s no better interrogator than Sandor. The first guy didn’t talk, but he will. This guy will too. It just may take time.”

“Yeah.” I stare straight ahead.

Something about this bugs me.

“What’s on your mind?” Marcus asks.

“They’re speaking Arabic, and that doesn’t track with most of the king’s enemies. I was just taken prisoner in Iraq. Could this have something to do with… me ?”

He seems thoughtful. “I guess it could, but why? I mean, weren’t there other guys with you when you were captured? Have they had any trouble?”

“I don’t know,” I admit. “But I’m going to reach out when we get back to Hiskale.”

“How would your captors even know where you are?” he asks.

“I don’t know that either.”

I’m probably imagining things.

It’s just this damn gut of mine.

The same one that never steers me wrong.

It might be time to mention my concerns to Joe.

That way, at the very least, they can look into other avenues.

I can’t imagine being right, but I also don’t want to risk it.

I’m starting to care for my new Protectors family, and I’m falling hard for Natalia.

Whether I stay or not, the last thing I ever want to do is put any of them in danger.