“Be careful, please,” I choke out as red stains my cheeks. “And save them.”
Dom’s golden gaze rakes over my face, and he gives me one slow nod. Then he turns, jogging through the shadows like he was born to them, slipping into the house.
Sick, terrified, I turn toward the cave, knowing there’s nothing more I can do here. I can’t do anything for any of them. I don’t have training or even a weapon. I’m not like Lucky, keeping a convenient stash of— My breath rushes out of me.
Lucky’s hidey hole.
I stop, flooded with a focused sense of calm. No, I can’t go back to the farm and the safety of that hidden cave. Maybe I can help.
I’m truly shaking now, but I push off in the other direction, not looking at the carnage behind me, and run.
Chapter 34
Jaykob
SURVIVAL TIP #151
Don’t be a hero.
G od damn it, no!
My chest seizes as Lucky hits the ground, already limp. Idiot. Brave, stupid idiot.
Pressing around the corner of the shed, I wring out a few rounds toward the tree line where some fuckers have started getting bold. It won’t take long for them to work out that if we had more frags, we’d be using them. Lucky is sprawled a few feet from the truck where he and Jasper had been trapped, the burning barn illuminating his figure in shadows.
Not moving.
Fuck.
I grit down against the rush of sick, icy horror. Memories of Ryan, of getting the news, threaten to rise up, but there’s no way I have time for this shit. Pulling on the tricks the head-doctor taught me—because no way will I admit it, but they do work —I force myself to take in my surroundings, to catalog the shitty visuals of my present. At the same time, I press against the peeling, slick flesh of the burn wound running up my side, letting the pain anchor me. Okay, not exactly what the posh prince recommended, but it works.
This is bad. I just made it out of the barn before the exits became unusable, only to get trapped behind the drying shed.
Thanks to Lucky, we’re now free of the cluster over the far side that was closing in, but there are still too many in the trees trapping me here, and I’m running out of rounds.
If I could just get into the shed, I’d have a lot more fire power to work with, but trying now would only buy myself a quick plot in an early grave.
Jasper might be able to get out from behind that truck now, but the way he’s edging around it makes me think he’s gunning for Lucky over safety.
What’s left of him, anyway.
I grit my teeth, and peer round the corner of the shed toward the trees, wondering if I can make a run toward Bristlebrook.
A bullet whistles beside my head, and I jerk back.
Yeah, that’s a no.
Heat from the barn sends sweat trickling down my spine. I weigh up whether to go to Jasper, but he’s even more exposed than I am. Not to mention that running through the clearing without cover, even ten yards, would probably be enough for them to put my lights out.
I check my magazine, grunting when my exposed burn tugs as I move. Less than a dozen rounds. When I look up, Jasper crouches and creeps out into the clearing toward Lucky’s body. Two bullets fly from the trees—one goes wide but the other slashes the air right beside his neck. Jasper doesn’t flinch, doesn’t make any move to get out of the way, just keeps moving toward Lucky. Firelight flickers over the determined set of his jaw.
“Hey, asshole!” I shout at him. “Get back behind the truck.”
There’s no point. The kid’s probably gone anyway. You don’t take two bullets to the chest and make it without heavy-duty and quick medical intervention. Jasper’s just going to get himself killed as well, and I . . . don’t want that.
Jasper ignores me as neatly as he did the bullet. Damn it. This is not protocol. Panic fires through me. I lean out and fire toward the trees where the shots came from, shouting wildly at the stupid, untrained shrink.
“ This is goddamned. ”
Faces pull back and weapons gleam from the shadows.
“Stupid. ”
The shots shift away from firing on Jasper and start piercing the flimsy shed around me. I grunt and duck lower. This is a bad angle for me, but if I move around the shed, I won’t be able to cover Jasper for shit.
“Hero.”
I fire back twice and look back at Jasper, who’s pulling Lucky behind the truck.
“Bullshit.”
Hollering in wild relief, I lean out to fire again and I ring on empty. “Fuck.”
I toss down my now useless MK 16 and tug my Beretta out of my belt. It maybe has the range to reach the far tree line.
Maybe.
Unless something changes fast, we’re toast.
Chapter 35
Beau
SURVIVAL TIP #224
If you can protect your family,
you’ve done the best anyone could hope for in this life.
A hunter leans out from behind his tree and pops off two more shots at Jasper, and I’m grateful. It makes it easy for that silent, deadly calm to take over, letting me shed the healer and become the killer I need to be right now.
Wrapping my hand over his mouth, I punch my knife between his ribs, angling precisely so I puncture his heart. He’s the third in the last fifteen minutes.
I felt for Eden, when she took that life—I understand her pain better than most. I’m not like Dom, who can focus on a job and not flinch at the fallout. I’ve had a lot of different blood stain my hands, but the blood from delivering death never washes out the same way as blood from surgery.
I was born to save lives, though—and while sometimes that means picking up a scalpel, other times it means the knife.
I lower the man to the ground, dismantle his gun and toss his ammo. It’s no use to me, not half so good as my own weapon and not easy to carry with the rest of my gear, but I’m not about to let some other opportunist pick it up either.
Hearing movement close by, I grimace and move quickly behind a large boulder, watching as three men jog through the trees. Trying to get a better angle, I’m guessing. I hesitate for a moment, then let them pass. Three in close quarters is too risky; they’d have too much chance to alert others. I need to pick them off—it’s the only plan we have right now—and if I’m caught . . .
Well, if I’m caught, I’m not going to have much to worry about anymore, I suppose.
I heard Jasper call out for Lucien earlier, and the blast that followed, but I haven’t had a chance to get a visual. I can only hope it was our damage.
Allowing myself a moment, I edge forward and look out at the massacre. From this angle, I see Lucky lying between the truck and the burning barn. Burning embers rain down on the ground around him, and the fire lights him up well enough that I can see the dark stain flooding his chest. My breath stalls.
He needs medical attention.
Now.
But, almost as bad, Jasper seems to have abandoned the truck—and his God-given common sense—and is out in the open, moving toward him. If I hadn’t just killed the hunter standing here, he would have had a short, clear shot to Jasper’s skull.
With sharp relief, I see Jayk’s head as he peeks around the shed. He shouts at Jasper, but I can’t make out the words.
Bullets fly toward him.
Shit. This is bad. Some mighty kind of bad.
The shots are coming from these trees though, if I can just take the hunters out maybe they’ll have a chance to make it back to Bristlebrook and Dom.