Lethal Pursuit (15 page)

She kicked and swore as he turned her away and began to propel her toward the rug-draped opening. Out of the corner of her eye she barely caught the look on Jackson’s face. Seeing the exhaustion and relief that she was safe set off a wave of determination inside her.

“Since the lieutenant is going back to her cage to serve an additional punishment and the Defense Secretary is unable to take his turn at the moment,
you’ll
go next.”

Maya’s blood ran cold as Khalid spoke the words to Jackson. The odds were down to one in five now. A twenty percent chance that the chamber he fired would be loaded.

She would not let it happen. Would
not
.

“Fucking cowardly
hijos de puta!
” She screamed it at the top of her lungs, thrashing in the big man’s powerful hold. It was no use. He was too strong, and she was too sapped of strength to do any real harm.

He propelled her forward through the opening to the corridor, but she didn’t make it easy for him. She rammed her head back, catching him in the chest with a hard thud that rattled her brain. When that didn’t work, she wrenched her head to the side and lunged at his wrist with an open mouth. He snatched his arm away just in time. Her teeth closed on the sleeve of his jacket, snapping hard together when he yanked it out of her mouth.

Fatigue began to creep in. A slow, insidious weakness stole through her muscles. She was out of breath, panting and sweating by the time they reached her cage. Maya dug her feet in, the heels of her boots scraping through the earthen floor. Mohammed was there behind them, hanging back as though he wasn’t sure what he was supposed to do.

She kept resisting. If she disabled the man holding her, she could easily take out Mohammed and find the exit to this place before anyone raised the alarm. With her feet unbound, she might be able to make it out of here. She’d run, find someone to help her. She’d get backup, rescue the others. It was the only option for escape they had. Once they locked her in that cage again, she’d never get out. Now was her only chance, before Jackson pulled that trigger. Maybe the diversion her escape caused would buy him and Haversham more time.

With a final burst of strength, she reared up and attacked. She called upon every training maneuver she’d been taught, and some she’d learned on the streets. The soles of her feet slammed into the man’s knees with a satisfying thud that made him stumble and growl in pain. Seizing upon that, she rammed her head back at the same time she drove her elbow up and at his throat. He barely managed to block it, and then he used his momentum to tip them forward. Maya lost her balance and fell, bracing for impact with the floor.

He caught her before she hit, suddenly clamped one arm around the front of her rib cage and covered her mouth with a merciless palm, cutting off her air. She screamed in rage and twisted, uncaring of the fiery shards of pain in her ribs and left cheek, through her mangled wrist. He squeezed her again once, hard, forcing the breath from her. With spots dancing in front of her eyes, she blinked to clear her vision and sucked in a breath to yell some more when he suddenly spoke.

His mouth was right next to her ear, so close she could feel the warmth of his breath on her skin, the heat of his large body around her. He spoke in a whisper, and the perfect English he used made the scream die in her throat.

“If you want to live, shut the fuck up and listen real carefully to what I say.”

Chapter Fifteen

Jackson was sick and fucking tired of this bullshit.

He could hear Maya yelling and cursing on her way back to her cage. The Sec Def wasn’t going to crack, no way, and that meant Jackson was probably going to die in the next few minutes. They wouldn’t make Haversham take a turn with the roulette. The guy was too far gone to even hold a gun, let alone hold it to his head or pull the trigger. And it didn’t make any sense for them to watch him blow his brains out when what they wanted was some fabricated political statement they thought would somehow further their twisted cause.

Khalid turned his eyes on him, his mouth still pinched with anger from his tangle with Maya. Jackson fully understood her reaction. When she’d pulled that trigger, he’d been out of his mind with fear, knowing there was fuck all he could do to stop her. And when that chamber had been empty, he’d never known relief so pure. He swore his heart had stopped beating.

Now the rage was back and he was ready to let loose. Because he wasn’t playing this game, no matter how many holes they put in him or the Sec Def. That was something Haversham would understand, because it was the POW code to never give in. Maya had done it to save him and Haversham, and Jackson would never forget it.

One of the three remaining masked men stepped forward to crouch next to Jackson with a knife. Jackson wanted to grab the blade slicing the zip tie at his wrists so badly his fingers twitched, but he managed to refrain, instead bringing his freed hands in front of him to rub at the raw skin and restore the circulation. “I want to bind up his leg,” he said of Haversham, who was still bleeding all over the place. “He’s losing a lot of blood and if he goes into shock and dies, you’ll never get that statement.”

Khalid jerked the bottom of his long black tunic down in an irritated motion. “Hurry up. Tie it off and nothing more.”

Asshole.

Khalid glanced around the room and scowled, muttered something to one of the others, who shrugged. Khalid growled in frustration and gestured to the man, who took off the scarf wrapped around his neck and offered it to Jackson, his other hand brandishing a pistol in case he made a wrong move. Taking the filthy bandage that would likely create the mother of all infections in Haversham’s flesh, Jackson shuffled on his knees to the Secretary. The guy was sucking in shallow breaths, his mouth a thin line, his nostrils pinched, skin beaded with sweat. In his weakened state, there was a chance he might not survive the shock and blood loss.

Kneeling at his side, Jackson carefully rolled up Haversham’s pant leg, exposing the wound. The tibia and fibula were both shattered. He could see the edges of the fibula just below the torn skin and muscle. The bullet had passed right through the lower leg, so that saved Haversham the pain of having a bullet dug out of him—if Khalid would have let Jackson do it. “I’m gonna wrap this as tight as I can. Hopefully it’ll slow the bleeding.” It was better than nothing.

Haversham nodded, the movement tight with pain.

“Hold on.” Jackson wrapped the sweat-stained scarf around Haversham’s shin and tied it, twisting the knot tight over the wound. Haversham blanched and let out a strangled growl, eyes squeezed shut and beads of sweat trickling down his face. Poor bastard. He’d suffer worse than that before the day was out. Broken bones hurt like a bitch. With nothing else to be done, Jackson sat back on his heels and rolled his shoulders to ease the tension there. Not that it helped.

“Your turn.”

Jackson looked over his shoulder at Khalid and stared back defiantly. The guy seemed edgy as hell, his eyes shifting here and there, his body posture agitated. He was watching Jackson’s hands, as if he expected him to pull a weapon out of nowhere and come at him. The way he was feeling, Jackson would give goddamn anything for the chance to go after him one-on-one with his bare hands.

“Sit back down and take the revolver.” Khalid gestured to where it lay on the dirt floor between him and Jackson.

Like hell. “Release the female first.”

Khalid’s lips curled in a sneer of contempt. “It is a fatal weakness you Americans have, wanting always to protect the women.”

Because where I come from
,
that’s what real men do.
“The strong have a duty to protect those weaker than them.” Maya would want to kick his ass for intimating that she was weak.

Those yellow eyes frosted. “You lie to yourself. Your government seems to think your duty is to subject the rest of the world to its beliefs. By your own definition, that should make
you
the terrorists.” He motioned with an impatient hand at the discarded weapon. “Take the revolver.” He cocked his pistol and aimed it at Haversham for good measure.

Jackson’s eyes slid over to the Sec Def and he got a minute shake of the head in answer. The guy didn’t want him to do it, even though he fully expected to be shot again. Dude had balls. Jackson respected that.

“I will not tell you again!” Khalid snapped.

Jackson opened his mouth to tell him to go fuck himself when a sudden explosion rocked the ground, making the floor undulate beneath him. They all stilled. Khalid froze in place, barking frantic Pashto at the others, who all glanced at each other with wide eyes. The flashlight rattled on the small metal table at the rear of the room, rolling to point a spotlight on the wall behind it.

A flare of hope swelled Jackson’s heart, filling it to bursting against his ribs. Had they been found?

Khalid was shouting something at the three other startled men when another blast shook the room. This one was closer, strong enough to rattle the walls and send earth cascading down on them. Jackson wobbled on his knees. The candle in the lantern flickered, its light almost extinguished before it flared to life again. The flashlight fell to the floor and rolled against the wall, blotting out most of its beam. With the room in mostly shadow, Jackson coiled in position, waiting for the right moment to spring. All he had to do was catch Khalid and one of the others off guard for a few seconds. He could snap an arm, take a pistol and even the odds within seconds.

Once he freed his feet, he could haul Haversham out over his shoulder and spring Maya so they could all get the hell out of here.

Casting frantic looks about him, Khalid continued yelling orders at his men. The dimmed light from the lantern and the flashlight cast his face in eerie shadows. With one final order, he turned his head to aim a single searing glance at Jackson before snatching up the revolver and storming out of the room. There wasn’t enough time for Jackson to attack any of the others.

All three remaining men stood back near the far wall, aiming their weapons at him. If he lunged now, he’d be dead before he got to his feet.

Tamping down the frustration eating at him, he strained to hear what was going on outside. Those explosions were no accident. He could hear men shouting, but no gunfire. Had a drone fired a missile at their location to draw the militants out? It was the only thing he could think of.

A minute later, yet another explosion ripped the quiet apart. Jackson stayed on his knees, ready to shove to his feet when the ground settled. One of the three guards said something to the others, who nodded. The guy lowered his weapon and headed toward the rug-covered opening, presumably to see what the hell was going on.

He reached out to grab the flap of the rug hanging there when someone ripped it away from the other side. A shot rang out, the bullet hitting him straight between the eyes. He dropped. Before he’d even hit the ground, Maya burst in with a pistol in her uninjured hand. Jackson didn’t even have time to move.

One of the others got out a sound of alarm as he and his comrade started to turn their weapons on her. Without pause, she fired twice more in rapid succession, hitting the remaining two men center mass and dropping them where they stood before they could get a single shot off.

In the flickering lantern light, she looked like an avenging angel standing there. Her hair was a tangled mess and her face was swollen to hell, but her hand was rock steady on that weapon, even with the pain she had to be in. The deadly intent was clear on her face.

Fuck, he loved her. He shot to his feet as she approached, trying to figure out how she’d gotten loose and found a weapon. “How—”

“Shh.” Shoving the pistol in her waistband for a moment, she pulled out a knife and handed it to Jackson then took the pistol again, never taking her eyes off the doorway. Jackson immediately sliced the zip tie at his ankles and jumped up to cut the Sec Def’s bonds.

“We’ve only got a few minutes,” Maya said from the doorway, peeking over her shoulder to make sure they were alone. “Can you carry him?”

“Yep.” He grabbed two pistols from the fallen men closest to him then bent and hauled Haversham over his shoulder, ignoring the man’s howl of agony and the pain ripping through his own body injuries.

Maya pushed aside the rug and took point, instantly assuming the leadership role that came with her rank. “Follow me.”

Yes
,
ma’am.
She took charge and kicked ass. Not only had she’d somehow gotten free of her jailors, she’d taken out three armed men to give them this chance for escape. He’d follow her fucking anywhere.

She paused only long enough to bend and grab something from the floor and hoist it over her shoulders, wincing when she stuck her broken wrist through the strap to haul it up her arm. In the dimness, Jackson barely made out the shape of the missing medical bag.

Since it was obvious she had a plan, he went with it. She turned left and took them down a narrower corridor, then right toward a light source that told him they were almost outside. Maya crouched down by the hand-dug opening, checking for threats. “Two tangos to our seven o’clock, but they’re distracted. I don’t see anyone else. We have to make a run for it, get to the trail he said is behind this compound to the right.”

Wait, they had inside help? “Who’s
he
?” he whispered, changing his grip on the back of Haversham’s thigh to steady him. He’d shoved one pistol into his waistband and had the other in his right hand, leaving his left free to anchor his patient.

“The guy who knocked out the kid and told me how to escape.” Her eyes stayed locked on whatever was going on outside. “We can’t talk from here out, so you have to trust me. You ready?”

He trusted her with his life and was about to prove it. “Ready.”

With that, she took off at a stumbling run, though it had to hurt like hell on her swollen feet. Jackson followed, expecting to hear either shouts or gunshots when someone saw them. For the moment, their luck held. No alarm sounded.

Haversham was draped lengthwise across his shoulders, gripping Jackson’s shirt in his fists, trying to hold back his grunts of pain. The added weight taxed the cramped muscles in Jackson’s legs and back, but the burst of adrenaline counteracted everything but the focus on getting as far away from here as possible.

He kept pace with Maya as she flat-out ran past the crumbling remains of houses and across the rock-strewn terrain. It looked like the captors had been hiding in some sort of a ramshackle village in the foothills that had been abandoned long ago. From the position of the sun low on the horizon and the red tint it threw on the landscape, he knew it was close to sundown. But the sun wasn’t setting in the position he’d gotten so used to during his deployment. Rather, it was setting
behind
the mountains looming above the foothills. Since they were obviously traveling west, that could only mean one thing.

They were in Pakistan. Or fucking close to it.

He’d barely thought it when those dreaded shouts finally rose up behind them. Shots cracked through the air, some close enough to ping off the ruins and rocks around them.

“This way,” Maya yelled back to him, her long, dark hair trailing behind her as she ran, taking a sharp right at the last building.

Up ahead in the wash of blood-red light, Jackson saw it. A thin trail that looked like it might once have been used by the goatherds who’d lived in the village long ago. From the wear patterns in the dry soil, it had been traveled recently but not often. The trail led straight up the hillside, disappearing from view at the crest. Was there an ambush waiting on the other side?

The shouts were closer now. More shots whizzed past, some close enough they sprayed him with dust when they impacted around his feet. The fine hairs on his nape rose in subconscious warning. A moment later, he heard the thud of running footsteps. Men giving chase. And from the sounds of it, they were gaining on them.

Maya heard it too. She risked a glance over her shoulder and must have decided whoever was back there was too close for comfort, because she ducked out of the way and went to one knee with her pistol ready in her one good hand. “Go, I’ll catch up,” she yelled at him without taking her eyes off her targets, face pale and drawn in lines of pain.

What? Like hell he was leaving her.

Jackson skidded to a stop just behind her, looking back in time to see Khalid and three other men armed with pistols bearing down on them. Whirling around, Jackson aimed his own, keeping his free hand on Haversham’s shoulder as he writhed in place.

Khalid held that stupid fucking Russian revolver in his hand. He squeezed the trigger, even though he was too far away to possibly hit any of them, and Jackson heard the dull click that signaled he’d fired on another empty chamber. If he hadn’t loaded or fired it since leaving the interrogation room, that left four chambers remaining, three of them empty.

Hesitating, Jackson started to slide Haversham off his shoulders. “Maya, get back.”

Her gaze stayed locked on her quarry. “No. He’s mine.”

Khalid fired on another empty chamber. Then again. Only two left now, and one was loaded. Taking aim, Jackson pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. Cursing, he pulled back the slide and tried again. Nothing.

Useless piece of shit.
Tossing it on the ground, Jackson reached for the weapon in his waistband and raised it. He fired, tagging one of Khalid’s men in the thigh. The guy grabbed his leg and fell in a heap, screaming. Another man ran into range, and Jackson winged him in the upper arm. Next to him, Maya fired. He didn’t watch to see if she’d hit one of the attackers. He fired again, but the chamber clicked empty. Fuck, he was out of ammo, and Khalid and another man were still closing in on them. Haversham muttered something in a pained wheeze.