Army of Two (22 page)

“I’m not asking for a commitment. I know we have obstacles between us. All I’m asking for is a chance to see where these feelings between us lead.”

Something stirred in a locked corner of her heart. It was quickly smothered by a reflexive wave of panic. “I’m sorry, Mitch. I can’t change who I am any more than you could change who you are. We’re just not compatible.”

His voice dropped. “It felt to me as if we were more than compatible, Chantal.”

“I won’t deny we have a physical attraction, and the circumstances we’ve been through led us to share more intimacy than we would have otherwise, but that’s over.”

“You know it was more than sex. We did make love. You can deny the word all you want, but it’s there.”

“On second thought, don’t visit here again. It would be best for both of us if we make a clean break.”

“A clean break. Like the last time.”

“Yes. Exactly. Like the last time.”

He raked his hands through his hair and turned to face her. “Well, I guess we’re even.”

The anger in his eyes made her take an involuntary step back. “What?”

“We’ve come full circle. We played out this scene before, only this time you’re the voice of reason and I’m the one trying to hang on to a fantasy.”

“Mitch—”

“How’s this for more irony? If I’d taken what you’d offered all those years ago, I might have found out how wrong I’d been about you. I would have learned what a strong, resourceful and loyal woman you were, in spite of your age. You might have learned that love is nothing to be afraid of. We could have undone the damage that twisted relationship with your mother did and your scars would have healed. Hell, we wouldn’t even be having this conversation because we could still be together.”

Her lips parted but there was nothing she could say. The child inside her was silent, too.

Mitch was right. They’d come full circle. She recognized the pain beneath his anger, because that was how she had felt when he had rejected her.

Yet he
had
made the logical choice, just as she was doing now. It would be the best for both of them.

Then why didn’t it feel right? Why did she want to walk back into his arms and stay, not for another minute or another day but forever? Why was the panic in her gut getting worse instead of better? “Major Redinger!”

She jerked at the interruption. Mitch swore under his breath and glanced over his shoulder. “Not now, Matheson.”

A blond man was running down the path beside the Aerie. He was larger than the soldiers she’d seen inside. He didn’t appear to be dissuaded by the ice in Mitch’s tone. He took the few steps to the deck in one bound. “Major, we need to evacuate.”

“What are you talking about, Sergeant?”

“Knox has the whole place wired. There are bricks of C4 under the main joists. The timers I saw are set to blow in two minutes.”

Chapter 14

C
hantal’s brain couldn’t process the warning immediately. The words were lost in the emotions already whirling through her mind. It was Mitch’s reaction that penetrated her daze. He anchored his fingers on her arm and dragged her off the deck. “Get everyone out!” he ordered the soldier. “Follow the path to the top of the hill. The trees and rock should shield us.”

“I’m on it, sir,” he said, racing into the lobby.

Through the side window, Chantal could see the word had already begun to spread. FBI agents cleared the room. People streamed to the exits. Many jumped from the back of the deck and ran past her and Mitch.

Chantal dug her heels into the gravel when they reached the path. “No! He’s wrong! This has to be a mistake.”

“Sergeant Matheson’s our ordnance man. He’s never wrong.”

She struggled against Mitch’s hold. “I have to see! Let me go!”

“Stop fighting, we have to get clear.”

“This doesn’t make sense. Why would Knox—”

“Plant bombs? To cover his retreat. He probably planned this from the start.”

No. Please, no. It was supposed to be over. “Two minutes,” she gasped. “Your man said there were two minutes.”

“More like half a minute now.”

“Then tell him to pull the plugs or cut the wires. Anything!”

He clamped his arm around her waist, lifted her from her feet and carried her against his hip. His limp became a lurch, but his progress up the hill didn’t slow. “I won’t order one of my men to throw away his life for a building.”

She felt something hard press into her ribs. It was the knife she’d picked up from Knox’s man. She’d put it in her jacket pocket. She wrapped her arms around the trunk of a pine tree that Mitch was passing and yanked herself out of his grip.

“Chantal!”

She ran down the path, fumbling in her pocket for the knife. If she’d been thinking straight, she would have realized she knew nothing about deactivating timers or defusing bombs, but she was operating on pure emotion. She’d just let Mitch go. She’d cut off any hope of a relationship between them. She couldn’t lose this place, too. Not without a fight.

There was no one else coming from the lodge now. The path was empty. The doors had been left open. Light spilled to the ground, warm and inviting. The windows glowed in welcome, as they had on countless nights before. From the distance, over the noise of the hovering helicopters and the confused shouts of the people who had reached the hilltop behind her, a loon cried into the darkness.

The familiar sound made her steps falter. It would be all right. Sergeant Matheson must have been wrong. Mitch was overreacting. How could anyone, even a monster like Knox, want to destroy something as special as this? The Aerie would endure. It had to. It was her sanctuary.

A solid weight hit the backs of her legs. The knife flew from her grasp. Gravel stung her knees and palms as she fell to the ground.

Mitch crawled up her body. “What the hell are you trying to do?”

She twisted beneath him and pushed at his chest. “I want to save it.”

“You can’t.” He caught her hands. “It’s not worth your life.”

“It
is
my life. It’s all I have left.”

“We’re out of time. Hang on!” He wrapped one arm behind her back, hooked a leg around both of hers and rolled them off the path and toward the trees. He brought them to a stop at the base of a big spruce, cupped the back of her head and pressed her face to his shoulder.

She couldn’t move. Mitch’s weight pinned her down. She couldn’t see. His shoulder blocked her vision. But nothing could shield her from the vibration that traveled through the ground. The blast that followed ripped the limbs from the trees around them. It sucked the air from her lungs. She had no breath left to scream.

One after another, the charges went off, turning logs into splinters and glass into a deadly rain of slivers. Mitch gathered her closer, coiling his arms around her head as debris struck the ground around them. The screech of tearing metal mixed with the roar of crumbling concrete. The noise built and deepened until it seemed as if the Aerie itself was crying.

The building was pulling away from its foundation. Timber cracked. Rock split. What remained rumbled down the hillside and crashed into the water below. Echoes bounced from the lake, replaying the destruction until they too were absorbed by the water and the night was still once again.

How many times had she thought things couldn’t get worse? The worst had just happened. Chantal sobbed. It turned into a cough as she choked on the dust that clouded the air. She wrenched her arms free to push against Mitch’s shoulders.

He didn’t budge. Warm liquid seeped over her left wrist. For the second time in what seemed like minutes, she was feeling someone else’s blood on her skin.

No.
No!

She turned her head. Her lips brushed the edge of his jaw. “Mitch?”

He didn’t respond. He still wasn’t moving.

“Mitch!”
she cried. She moved her hands to his back. Her right palm struck the edge of something hard. What felt like a piece of wood jutted from his back just below his shoulder. He wasn’t wearing his leather jacket. He’d left it inside. There had been nothing but the fleece of his sweatshirt to protect him from the debris.

She’d been wrong. Losing the Aerie wasn’t the worst thing that could happen.

Oh, God! Would this nightmare never end? She clawed at the ground behind her until she had dragged herself from beneath Mitch’s inert weight. She filled her lungs and began to scream for help. Between breaths, she pulled off her jacket and pressed the sleeves around his wound to stem the bleeding.

It seemed to take forever. Her throat became hoarse from shouting, but at last a flashlight beam stabbed through the dust cloud, wobbling down the path from the hilltop.

“Over here!” she yelled.

The large blond man, Sergeant Matheson, was the first to reach them. He took in the situation at once. “It’s the major,” he called. “Jack, bring your kit!”

Within seconds they were surrounded by the other four commandos. Sergeant Norton knelt beside Mitch while Matheson shone the flashlight on his back.

Chantal swayed when she got a good look at the ragged piece of wood that was imbedded below his shoulder. It must have come from one of the trees. Bark was still attached to one side.

“He’ll need a stretcher,” Norton said. “Dunk? Kurt?”

Before he’d finished speaking, two of the men had turned and were already sprinting through the debris on their way back up the hill.

“Miss Leduc, you have to let go,” Norton said. “I need to pack around that toothpick before we can move him.”

“Will he be all right?”

“Sure, ma’am. It’s only a flesh wound.”

“Don’t try that soldier-speak on me. I’m a general’s daughter. I want to know how he is.”

Norton motioned to her hands. She pulled them back. “It doesn’t appear as if the wood hit anything vital,” he said, working as he talked. “Doesn’t look as if he lost enough blood to knock him out, either. My guess is some other chunk of the tree hit his head on the way down.”

She skimmed her fingers over Mitch’s head. “There’s a lump here. Near the left side.”

“Okay, it’s a safe bet he’s got a concussion.”

“How serious do you think it is?”

“No way to tell for sure without tests, but my money’s on the major. He’s got a hell of a hard head.”

“That’s for sure,” Matheson said. He squatted on the other side of Mitch. “He’s one tough old man.”

Their voices held both tenderness and pride. Chantal stroked a lock of hair from Mitch’s forehead. “Then he should wake up soon.”

“Redinger wouldn’t let anything keep him down for long.” A dark-haired Hispanic man knelt at her side. “He’s probably thinking up a new training op while he’s taking this little nap.”

“Hell, yeah. He’ll be pissed I didn’t spot those charges sooner.”

“He’ll have you practicing demo with your toes next week, Junior.”

Matheson frowned. “I thought for sure he’d gotten clear of the blast. His ankle must have been worse than he let on.”

The man beside her grunted. “I would have carried him myself if I’d known.”

“Yeah right, Gonzo.” Norton took a compact, plastic pouch from his med kit and bared Mitch’s arm to start an IV drip. “Ten to one he wouldn’t have let you.”

Chantal trailed her fingertips over Mitch’s cheek. Her hand trembled. “He’s the strongest man I know,” she said. “He won’t give up.”

“He hasn’t given up on any of us,” Norton said. “And we’re the sorriest bunch you’re liable to see. The man’s a glutton for punishment.”

“It was my fault he got hurt. He was protecting me. He didn’t think about himself. He never does. He only wants to do what’s right—” Her voice broke.

The three men exchanged glances. She licked a tear from the corner of her mouth. No one spoke again until the other soldiers returned with a stretcher. “Gonzo, we could use more space.”

The dark-haired soldier gripped her beneath her arms and lifted her away from Mitch. “We’ll take it from here, ma’am.”

“Let me help. Please.”

“We’ve got it covered. Ready? On three.”

The members of Eagle Squadron moved as one, closing ranks around their commander as they carried him up the hill.

Chantal scrambled to follow. She had to wipe her eyes to see where she was going, and the scene she’d just witnessed hadn’t helped stem the tears. She’d been dead wrong to say that Mitch had chosen to live his life alone. His men were as loyal to him as he was to them. No amount of army protocol could squelch the genuine emotion they’d revealed.

Don’t mistake control for a lack of feeling.

That’s what Mitch had told her. And she wouldn’t. Not ever again.

A helicopter with FBI markings sat on the cleared hilltop beside the black Huey that had belonged to Knox. People had gathered in clumps on the rock. No one appeared to be injured. The debris hadn’t reached this far. Tyra ran toward her. “Oh, Chantal, I’m so sorry.”

She tried to keep walking. “I don’t think it’s as bad as it looks.”

“It’s okay. You don’t have to be brave with me.” Tyra stepped in front of her, forcing her to stop. She gave her a firm hug. “You must be devastated.”

“He’s strong. He’ll be all right.”

“It hasn’t sunk in yet, has it?” she asked softly, pulling back to take her by the arms. “I can understand that.”

The men were heading for the FBI helicopter. Chantal looked past Tyra to keep them in sight. “Please, I have to go.”

“Agent Templar says we can delay the questioning for a few days. We all need time to get back on our feet, and you need time to mourn.”

“Mourn?” she asked. “Mitch isn’t
dead.
He’s already getting help. He’ll recover. I know he will.”

“Mitch? Honey, I’m not talking about Major Redinger, I’m talking about the Aerie.”

The tears flowed faster. She wiped them impatiently and looked over her shoulder. The full scope of the destruction wasn’t visible from here. The darkness and what was left of the trees concealed it.

“I know how you loved the place.”

Yes, she had loved it. It had filled an emptiness inside her, a void that her fear had kept her from filling any other way. She had loved the walls with their smell of wood smoke and the soaring sky that had stretched beyond the windows. It had kept her safe while her heart had undertaken the long, slow process of growing up.