Cruz: Scifi Alien Invasion Romance (Hell Squad Book 2) (3 page)

A knock at the door made him scowl.

He opened it to see Marcus standing in his doorway.

Cruz raised a brow. “You managed to drag yourself away from Elle?”

Marcus grunted and came inside. “Got a summons from Holmes.”

A smile broke on Cruz’s lips. General Holmes—in his early forties, highly educated with a distinguished air and a love of following the rules—clashed badly with Marcus’s rough, tough way of doing things.

Cruz held up his bottle. “Beer?”

Marcus grunted his agreement and Cruz popped the top off another homebrew and handed it over.

Marcus sank into an armchair and took a sip. “Holmes got some intel that a group of human survivors are being kept prisoner by the raptors.”

Cruz leaned against the small bench that made up his tiny kitchenette. “Prisoners? We’ve seen raptors take prisoners, but they’re usually dead within a few hours.”

“These ones have been there for months.”

Cruz straightened. “Why? What are they doing with them?”

“Don’t know. Learning our language, our way of life? Who knows with these alien bastards? A survivor made it here to base and said he saw these prisoners before he managed to escape. Said a Dr. Randall Lonsdale and a Dr. Natalya Vasin are among the prisoners. Two
genius
energy scientists.”

Shit. “Who the raptors could learn a lot from.”

“Yeah. And whose expertise could be used around here.”

“When do we go in?”

Marcus took another long drag of his beer. “That’s the problem. We don’t know
where
they’re being held.”

“Shit.”

“I suggested to Holmes that Santha could help.”

Cruz straightened. “What?”

“She’s been doing recon in the city since the raptors arrived. I’m guessing she knows their movements and where they’re holed up better than anybody.”

“Our drone footage—”

“Isn’t enough. The raptors are good at jamming signals and are learning to dodge them. We don’t have nearly enough info to find these prisoners. Santha might have seen something or knows something that could help us locate them.”

Yeah, Cruz knew she’d be a big asset. That’s why he tried so hard to convince to come with them. He gave a mental snort. Okay, that wasn’t the real reason. She’d be a hell of a lot safer here at the base and she’d be here, near him. Just the thought of her was like a shot of adrenaline to the veins. “So we head in and find her.”

Except they didn’t know where she holed up. She always found them.

“Elle’s started working on that. She’s been marking the times we’ve run into Santha and locations where we know she’s attacked the raptors. We should be able to narrow down a location and find her.”

Cruz nodded. “Let’s get to work.”

***

The sun was setting, spreading shadows through the ruins of Sydney. Santha moved quickly and quietly. She only had twenty minutes to set the explosives before the raptors arrived.

She moved through the old gas station. The windows of the store were shattered, the shelves empty and a drinks fridge knocked on its side. Outside, the sign indicating the prices for gas, hydrogen and battery recharge had toppled, and leaves were piled up against the front door, rotting.

She’d seen the raptors using this place for storage. Putting something liquid in the underground storage tanks. She guessed it was some sort of fuel. She’d stolen a raptor ground transport once—an ugly, brute-looking vehicle that reminded her of a triceratops. It had run on some black, sludge-like substance.

Moving fast, she swung her backpack off and plucked out the small circular Nova charges, each about the size of her palm. They were small, compact and powerful. She pressed one to the side of the pump. A light blinked on—activated—then blinked off.

After the first wave of the invasion, Santha hadn’t hysterically run through the streets, or headed west looking for the military to protect her. She’d broken into abandoned stores, and military and police installations, and stockpiled weapons, armor and explosives.

She glanced toward the west and wondered, just for a second, what it would be like to be safe and warm in Blue Mountain Base. And at the same time, she wondered what Cruz’s warm naked body would feel like pressed against hers.

Sighing, she leaned her forehead against the cool metal of the pump beside her. He was destroying her concentration. She’d prided herself on her laser-sharp focus when she’d been on the SWAT team. The guys had joked that nothing could distract Santha from her work.

Now her work was destroying the raptors. It had been the reason she’d kept living, kept breathing, for the year since the invasion. It had kept her warm at night, kept her company when the shadows of loneliness dogged her. She needed her focus now, more than ever.

With a shake of her head, she stuck another charge on the next pump and waited for the light. Revenge was all she needed. Warm bases and warm bodies were a luxury she couldn’t afford.

She eyed the charges. One more should be enough. She didn’t want to overdo it when she had no idea if what they were storing was explosive or flammable. She didn’t want to leave a crater or set what was left of the city up in flames.

A growling sound echoed down the empty street.

The hairs on the back of her neck rose. With hurried movements, she stuck the last charge on the lid covering the underground tank. Then she shoved the rest of her stuff in the backpack and swung it onto her back.
Time to go.

The snarls and growls got louder, followed by an almost wolf-like howl.

Except she knew these were no wolves.

They came into view, racing along the street in a vicious pack. Canids.

The canine-like aliens had thick, tough skin, spikes along their backs, and jaws filled with wicked teeth. They’d also developed a taste for human flesh.

Dammit.
Santha sprinted back around the gas station building, squeezed through a hole in the fence and ran in the opposite direction. She lifted her gaze to the rooftops. Up was best. Canids could jump but they weren’t the best climbers.

She spied an apartment building ahead. She’d scale the wall, wait the canids out, and then as a bonus, she might get to watch the raptors blow themselves to tiny alien pieces while she was at it.

But she was halfway to the building when raptor fire hit the ground around her. The green poison sizzled and hissed. She dived over it, rolled and got straight back to her feet.

Santha cursed under her breath. A raptor patrol was coming from the opposite direction, leaving her trapped in between. Eight of them, all armed.

She pulled her two Shockwave laser pistols from their holsters on her hips and fired. She didn’t bother aiming. She just wanted enough distraction to get to cover.

Some of the raptors scattered, others kept firing.

Santha walked backwards, her green lasers lighting up the street. As she neared a shop front, she turned and ran.

The door to the grocery store stood open like a gaping mouth. She’d just reached it when raptor fire tore across her left thigh.

“Ahh.” She almost went down but grabbed the door frame. The burning pain was indescribable. Panting, she pulled herself inside.

Fuck
. The acidic poison was chewing through her trousers and eating through her skin. Now she was bleeding profusely, too, her trousers wet with her blood.
Not good.

Gritting her teeth and fighting to stay conscious, she grabbed a grenade from her belt, ripped out the pin and tossed it outside.

She didn’t wait to see what happened. She heard the bang, and the yells of the raptors, but she also heard the growls of the canids getting closer. She quickly grabbed a tube of med-gel off her belt, ripped the lid off with her teeth and squeezed the entire tube onto her wound.

Instantly, the pain eased a little. It was all she could do for the moment. She needed to get out of there…because the raptor poison also paralyzed.

Santha hobbled to the back of the store and out into a narrow alley. She hadn’t gone far when she realized she was leaving a hell of a blood trail.

Shit
. She squeezed her eyes shut. The pain might have lessened but it was still bad enough to have bile rising in her throat. She swallowed repeatedly and kept moving, but it wasn’t long before she was dragging her leg and sobbing from the pain. The paralyzing effect of the raptor toxin was shutting down the muscles in her leg.

The canid yips and howls were getting louder.

She wouldn’t make it. Not like this.

Santha slumped against the side of a building. After fumbling in the pouch attached to her belt, she yanked out a pressure injector filled with a blue liquid. She dragged in a breath, jabbed it into her good thigh and depressed it.

Wincing, she waited until the bracer shot hit her. It was a cocktail of stimulants and painkillers designed for use by Special Forces troops on the front line. The advantage was it would hold off the paralysis and she could get away. The downside was that when it wore off, she’d collapse, out cold.

The bracer hit in a few seconds and Santha tilted her head back, savoring the sensation as the pain faded away and adrenaline surged through her. Her senses sharpened, and energy flashed through her in a seductive rush.

She grabbed a tourniquet from her pouch and yanked it tight around the top of her thigh. She ignored the ugly wound.

Then she ran.

She knew the stims wouldn’t last long. She moved through buildings, ran along streets, leaped over abandoned cars. She needed as much distance between her and the aliens as she could get.

But the excited yips and snarls of canids were still following her.

They were tracking her.

She ran faster. Her lungs burned.

As she sprinted through what had once been a park, she rounded the now-overgrown playground where kids had once played and laughed. When had she last laughed? She knew. That last night with Kareena, before the fiery lights in the sky had turned night into day.

Santha burst out of the park and raced along the sidewalk. She rounded a corner and a huge wave of dizziness hit her.

No. No
. The bracer was wearing off.

She staggered and hit a fence. Winded, she found her balance and kept moving. But her pace was slower now, her injured leg dragging behind her.

A huge explosion tore through the growing darkness.

The gas station.

Santha managed a small, satisfied smile.
Take that, you bastards.

Pain filtered in. She gritted her teeth.
Have…to keep moving
. She looked down and saw her trouser leg was completely soaked in blood.

Santha forced herself to keep moving. One foot in front of the other. She was panting and sweat poured into her eyes. Sobbing, she pulled herself into an alley.

She couldn’t go any farther.

Fumbling, she pulled a canister off her belt. It was a repellent she’d made that the canids hated. She opened it and dumped the contents on the ground. It wouldn’t deter them for long, but it was better than nothing.

She moved farther into the alley, then dropped down behind a dumpster and dragged herself so her back was against the wall. She wasn’t sure where she was exactly. How far to the top floor apartment with a view of the harbor that had become her home since the attack?

Her vision wavered and she closed her eyes.

Then she heard them.

The canids were coming.

She dropped her head back against the wall and released a shuddering breath. “I’m so sorry, Kareena.” Santha fumbled in her pocket and pulled out a photo. It was a shot of her and her sister, their arms around each other, laughing for the camera. Kareena was shorter and curvier than Santha—she took after their mother—and had a sunnier personality. She’d been the best of them, a nurse who’d loved caring for others. “Not going…to be able to take them all down for you, sis.”

The canid snarls were much louder now.

Santha grabbed the last object on her belt. Another grenade.

Fighting off dizziness, she pulled the grenade close to her chest, her finger on the pin. She’d have to wait until the canids got really close. That way, she could take out as many as possible.

As she waited in the dark to die, her fuzzy thoughts turned to a handsome face and deep-brown eyes, and the regrets of what would never be.

Chapter Three

Cruz crept through the night, his night-vision lens showing everything around him in varying shades of green.

The team was moving behind him, everyone on alert for signs of the raptors.

Suddenly, an explosion ripped through the night. A ball of flames rose above the rooftops, flaring through his night vision. Behind him, he heard the others mutter curses.

Santha
. Cruz waited for his eyes to adjust. It had to be.

He’d studied her movements on their drones over the last few weeks. She was a master at sneaking in, setting charges, and blowing raptors to hell.

Marcus moved up beside him. “Think it’s her?”

“Yep.”

“Let’s check it out.” Marcus waved the team on.

They moved fast now, sticking to the shadows. As they reached the explosion site, they crouched behind some abandoned cars and watched the chaos as raptors milled around a burning gas station. Two raptor armored personnel carriers were parked nearby—damned ugly, squat-looking things. There were plenty of raptor bodies lying on the ground as well, some burned beyond recognition.

Cruz smiled to himself.
Muy bien
. She was the queen of destruction.

Then he spied a few raptors through the flames who looked like they were arguing. Some were gesturing. Cruz grabbed his binocs. He waited for the view to zoom in and saw what they were pointing at. A small pack of canids were loping away.

Shit
. “Canids are on the trail of something.”

“Okay, Hell Squad,” Marcus murmured. “Let’s circle around these guys and see what’s got the canids so excited.”

They gave the raptors a wide berth, even though Cruz’s fingers itched to take a few out. But first, he needed to find Santha.