Chapter 12

Chapter

Twelve

April 18 th

1:23 P.M.

"Are you shot?" Axe asked Beth as he pressed her down into the ground, covering her entire body with his own.

Panic drummed a steady beat inside him.

The gunshots had come out of nowhere. He and his team were highly trained, and they hadn't detected any other presence in the woods.

Whoever these guys were, they were good.

Almost too good, considering he and Beth were sitting ducks out there.

While his team had all taken cover behind trees, Axe's only thought had been Beth and keeping her from getting hit. If she hadn't been already. Now with gunshots continuing to be fired at them, there was nowhere for him to go. For now, they were stuck where they were, and if Beth had been hit and was bleeding out, there would be nothing he could do for her.

He'd be forced to lie there and watch her bleed out beneath him .

"N-no," Beth stammered. "Are y-you?"

Honestly, with fear consuming every inch of him like the greedy monster it was, he couldn't tell. There was no searing pain coming from any part of his body, not even a sting, so he took that to mean he hadn't been shot, but with so much adrenalin flooding his body any pain could be quite easily masked.

"I'm not hit," he assured her.

Another shot hit close enough that he could feel the dirt fly up onto his face. From the way she flinched beneath him, he knew Beth had felt it, too.

They were too exposed out there, but the only way to get to cover was to move, and that meant exposing Beth to the flying bullets.

Which he was not prepared to do.

Cursing the fact that they weren't wearing comms because they hadn't thought it would be necessary, Axe wished he could communicate with his team without having to yell out and give the enemy more information about them, their exact positions, how many of them there were, and that they had an unarmed, untrained woman with them.

"Axel, I remember this place, we're close," Beth whispered.

It never even occurred to him to ask her if she was sure. Beth had been an absolute rockstar. Even though she had struggled, getting frustrated with herself when she couldn't just walk them in a straight line to the place she'd been held captive, she had fought through her annoyance, focused herself, and led them all the way to there.

Even if his faith in his wife wasn't as strong as it was, the fact that they were being shot at confirmed that wherever the facility was that Beth had been held at, it had to be nearby.

There was no other reason someone would be shooting at them.

Deciding to risk calling out to his team was better than grabbing Beth and running with her to hide behind the trees, Axe asked, "We got eyes on them?"

"Negative," Scorpion's voice called back.

"Has to be at least four of them from the direction of the shots," Trick added.

"Angle suggests they're above us," Panther said .

That made no sense. If the men were in the trees shooting at them, they should be able to pin down the location of the shots much easier.

But now that he was ruthlessly shoving back the terror at Beth being stuck in the center of a gunfight, he realized that the shots were somewhat chaotic. While several had come close to hitting him and Beth, others seemed to fly about randomly.

"Anyone hit?" he asked.

Five negatives somewhat soothed his frazzled nerves but didn't explain the haphazard shots. How could these men be good enough to remain undetected, but not good enough to pick them off one by one?

In reality, all seven of them should already be dead.

They should have been shot before they even realized they were being watched.

"Shots don't seem to be directed at any of us specifically," Tank said, echoing Axe's own concerns.

"And they're not coming closer and haven't responded to us talking," Rock added.

Something felt wrong, but he had no idea what it was. Were they hoping to confuse them, wait for one of them to make a move, and then take them out? Maybe they wanted to be able to say they had been shot at first so they didn't have to explain seven dead bodies? Or maybe they were trying to lure them into some sort of trap?

A cry fell from Beth's lips as another bullet hit the ground right where the one before had, a mere three inches from their heads.

What were the chances someone would hit that same exact spot?

"Axel, the guns, I remember, it's not people. They're programmed to shoot when something sets off the motion sensors. I remember almost getting hit when I ran," Beth said in a rush.

Again, he didn't doubt his wife for a second. She hadn't only been strong enough to survive what Baranov had done to her, but she'd been smart enough to escape as well.

"Guys, no one is shooting at us, it's a security system set up to shoot at movement," he called out.

"Genius," Panther muttered, and Axe rolled his eyes at the tech genius who could find something about this to be excited about.

"We need to get close to the system so we can shut it down. We can't stay here forever," Axe said. Because while there might not be an actual person shooting at them, the system would be set to alert whatever human guards were nearby, and soon they would all be converging on this area.

"If I can get close enough I can shut it down," Panther said confidently.

"Or we just shoot them down," Scorpion muttered.

"Panther's plan first, otherwise, have at it," Axe ordered.

The seconds felt interminably long as he lay there, forced to wait while his team took care of the threat. But nothing would make him move and put his wife at risk. If they stayed exactly where they were, they wouldn't be hit. The guns could fire only in the same directions time and time again, and they were in a safe spot so he didn't dare move and put Beth in danger.

Sooner or later, the weapons would run out of ammo, but he had no intention of hanging around until then. The need to get Beth out of there, somewhere safe, somewhere far away from the place that had tortured her so badly her mind had needed to shut down just to survive, was almost too strong to ignore.

Knowing how close this place was to the compound made him want to pack up Beth, and the others, and ship them off to hole up at Prey's main office building. The place was in the middle of Manhattan and had several secure apartments. Leonid Baranov managing to get to Beth there would be impossible.

Ever since Beth returned a year ago, they had known the place she'd been kept had to be close to the compound, but they had checked out the entire area and found nothing indicating a facility where she could have been held captive. Knowing it was close to the compound, and now knowing it were two different things, and the safe home they had built no longer felt all that safe.

Baranov could have come for them at any time.

Why hadn't he?

What had stopped him from annihilating Bravo Team when he had already put out hits on them six years ago?

None of it made sense.

The Russian oligarch had been there when Beth was held captive, she said she remembered him watching her as she fought for her life, but her only interactions appeared to have been with Tomas Butcher.

That had to mean something, but as another bullet slammed into the earth inches from his wife's head, it was hard to concentrate long enough to figure out what.

"Hold on, wisp, I got you," he murmured, hoping to soothe her a little. Just because she wasn't complaining, screaming, or crying didn't mean she wasn't terrified. He could feel how badly she was shaking.

"You always have me," she whispered back.

"Always," he agreed. There would never be a time when he wasn't prepared to put his body between her and a bullet.

As soon as this was over, he was tucking his wife safely away at Prey. Then he was going to do whatever it took to finally bring down Leonid Baranov once and for all.

If only they could hurry up and move from this spot.

Come on, Panther .

The number of bullets flying had decreased, implying that one of the guns shooting at them had been disabled. Still, the occasional bullet hit the ground or a tree nearby which meant there was at least one more in operation, probably more.

Seconds ticked by feeling more like hours.

Until finally, everything went quiet.

Deadly quiet.

The kind of quiet that was like being in the eye of a hurricane.

April 18 th

1:58 P.M.

"D-did Panther get the g-guns to turn o-off?" Beth asked. As much as she hated that her voice was shaking along with the rest of her, there was nothing she could do about it.

Knowing what she had survived, knowing she had killed to stay alive, none of it meant anything in this moment. Because deep down inside, she was no trained warrior, she was just a woman who had been forced to learn how to live through terror because it was either that or die.

Literally, those were her only two options.

The men there with her knew what they were doing, they were confident in their abilities, and while she had no doubt Axel was terrified for her safety, and all the other men on Bravo Team were afraid of not making it home to their loved ones, they weren't rocked by tremors like she was.

"I think he did, wisp," Axel replied. His voice was soft and soothing. If it wasn't for the way he pressed her down into the ground hard enough that it hurt and felt like she was being crushed, she would think he wasn't affected by the gunshots.

"Then why aren't we getting up?" she asked, pleased when she managed to keep the shakes out of her voice that time.

"Because we don't move until Panther himself tells us we're all clear," he replied evenly.

"But no more shots have come," she reminded him. She wanted to get up, find that place, and tear it to the ground so no one else could ever be hurt there again.

"I won't risk you," Axel said in a voice that very clearly communicated that arguing would be pointless.

Not that she wanted to argue anyway. Beth trusted her husband and these men who were the big brothers she'd dreamed of having as a child implicitly. But …

How could she ask them to keep risking their lives for her?

Just because she'd had amnesia and had been doing her best to keep her distance from all of Bravo Team not just her husband didn't mean she wasn't aware of how many times they'd gone out hunting down a lead. Of course, she knew that they weren't in danger just because of her and what had happened to her. This was the job they had picked, the life they had chosen, and if it wasn't she might never have survived Leonid Baranov's House of Horrors.

But knowing they put themselves in danger to make the world a safer place, to save people like her, to kill people like Leonid Baranov, and knowing they were putting themselves in danger specifically for her because they loved her was so very different.

"We've gotta get out of here," Panther called out, sounding breathless as footsteps suddenly pounded the ground around them.

In one smooth move, Axel hooked his arm around her waist and pulled her up with him. "What did you find?" he demanded.

"There were four stations with guns aimed in all directions. I disabled all four of them," Panther replied.

To Beth, that sounded great, but obviously there was more bad news coming.

Seemed there was always bad news coming.

Why for once in her twenty-four years couldn't something go right for her?

Seriously, did the universe hate her or something? It gave her a family right out of a nightmare, then threw her from the frying pan into the fire, then when it finally gave her a break and a wonderful man to love her, it then took it all away.

No more.

Please no more. I don't think I can take another bad thing .

Was that why she had really been so hesitant to let Axel get close when she had amnesia? Was it because, at the back of her mind, she feared that something else would happen and it would be the final straw that broke the camel's back and destroyed her?

As much as she wanted to pretend she was strong enough to survive anything, the truth was she wasn't. Nobody was. Sooner or later, she'd break under the pressure life kept piling on her shoulders.

"What are you doing?" she asked, startled when Axel suddenly picked her up and pushed her up toward the branches of a nearby tree.

"Weren't you listening?" he asked.

"Umm … I might have been distracted," she admitted.

"Whoever set those guns up was alerted as soon as they started firing. Panther, Rock, and Tank saw them when they went to disable the guns," Axel summarized for her. She didn't have to ask to know that Scorpion and Trick had stayed there watching over her and Axel while the others had gone to disable the weapons.

But she did have to ask why he was putting her in a tree instead of all of them running. "So, we have to get out of here then," she said, wriggling in her husband's hold.

"No time."

The grimness in Axel's tone made her blood turn to ice. It sounded so … final. "Maybe there is," she said desperately, fighting the fresh wave of terror mounting inside her.

"No, wisp, there isn't," Axel said with a calm she knew he didn't feel. "You're going to hide. Panther saw at least a dozen men, but there could be more. Depending on how well trained they are, we might stand a chance."

She could barely breathe let alone speak. "And if you don't?"

Although she asked the question, they all knew the answer.

If Bravo Team couldn't fight off the men, they would all die in these woods. Tillie would never get to marry the man she loved after putting off the wedding twice already. Likewise, Ariel would never get to marry her lifelong crush and soulmate. Jessica wouldn't marry Scorpion and would raise their daughter alone. Stephanie would never get to say yes when Trick asked her to marry him. And Elle would be left raising her daughter, Panther's son, and their unborn child alone.

All because of her.

"You can't die," she said, clawing at Axel, desperate to latch onto him so he couldn't leave her.

"Don't plan on dying, wisp, I can promise you that," Axel said, his voice soothing even as his eyes were tumultuous, filled with fear, regret, and pain. He might not be planning on dying, but it didn't mean it wouldn't happen.

"No one on our side is dying here today," Rock said confidently.

"Amen, brother," Trick added.

"You forgotten who you're talking to, Bethie?" Tank asked, determination in his dark eyes.

"We're taking them down," Scorpion said.

"Because no one is hurting the people we love ever again," Panther declared.

"We're going to do everything we can, wisp. None of us will go down without a fight. But we need to know you're safe and out of the way. You're going to stay there and not come down. Not for anything," Axel clarified.

Aware she was wasting time with her panicking, Beth gave a shaky nod. "Kiss me?" she asked, all too aware it might be the last time she ever got to kiss her husband.

Crushing his mouth to hers in a quick but heartfelt kiss, Axel then lifted her up into the tree.

Beth's hands were shaking badly as she grabbed a branch and began to pull herself higher. Axel and the guys had disappeared as if into thin air, although she felt them nearby when she chanced a quick glance down.

When she thought she had gone high enough that nobody would see her she stopped. Wrapping her legs around the branch she was sitting on, Beth leaned against the tree trunk and squeezed her eyes closed as though that could make everything go away.

No sooner had she caught her breath than gunfire erupted below her.

No stranger to fear, there was something different about knowing it wasn't you who was in immediate danger but the man you loved. The people you loved. People who hadn't hesitated to take her under their wing, shower her with love and care, and be there for her in all the ways she hadn't even known she needed.

Now they were down there putting their very lives on the line for her.

While Axel was her heart, her soul, her everything, she loved every single one of those men and would do anything for them.

Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she pressed her hands to her ears in a desperate but pointless attempt to block out the sound of firing guns. Had Axel been hit? One of the guys? Or were they slowly eliminating the enemy?

There was no way for her to know from up there.

"Beth," the sound of her name being called by a voice she recognized from her nightmares had her eyes popping open, her hands dropping from her ears.

She didn't hear Axel.

Didn't hear any of the others .

Did that mean they were all already dead?

Was it over?

Had they lost?

"I know you're close by, Beth," Tomas Butcher's voice continued. "And if you don't come out from wherever you're hiding in the next sixty seconds, I'm going to put a bullet in the brain of one of your friends here. Then, another sixty seconds after that I'll kill another, and another, until your husband is all that's left. Then I'll torture him and kill him slowly until the sounds of his screams pull you in."