“And how do we know we can trust you?” I countered. “The government sent a small team for such a valuable man. It’s almost like your boss didn’t clear this mission.” I took a knee, keeping my arm extended, pistol on him.
“Everyone wants the cleaner, but he’s dead. If you get me out of here, I’ll give you the client list he gave us just before the attack,” the man said instead. “Do we have a deal?”
Fuck, that was good news. “Deal,” I said without hesitation, but then a prickling sense of awareness washed over me as a red dot appeared on the guy’s back.
“Move,” I yelled to him, but it was too late, and he collapsed as the round made contact.
Jesse and I searched for cover as an unrecognizable voice came over comms. “This is Echo One. Sniper down.”
Echo One? And was he British? “Tell me that’s our backup,” I mouthed to Jesse, and he nodded.
“Sorry we’re late to the party, boys,” the Brit went on, “but we’re here now. And it looks like we have company. Two vehicles are en route, and they’re armed to the teeth. I suggest you get cover now.”
“Roger that,” Jesse replied, then low-crawled to the downed officer, and he unfurled his palm. “We have jackpot,” Jesse announced, letting the team know we weren’t walking away empty-handed.
“Wait for my orders to leave the cabin,” Carter said. “We need to get you and that package out of there, and there are too many threats out here.”
A whooshing sound of static hit my ear from the comm, followed by rapid sounds of gunfire outside the cabin as we made our way back to the side door. I exchanged my pistol for my rifle while we waited for orders.
“This is Echo Two. You want any of these fuckers rolling up in armed vehicles alive, or do you prefer them extra crispy with a side of bacon?” A Southern accent rolled through the line, hard to miss even over comms.
Who the hell were these guys?
“This is Alpha One. Keep a few alive if you can.”
“Roger that,” the Southerner answered.
“Echo Two’s my wife’s brother,” Jesse shared with me in a low voice. “So don’t worry, he’s highly motivated to get us out of here.” He looked back at me, and a flash of his bright-white teeth from a smile was visible through the green hue of my night vision.
“So your wife will kill him if something happens to you?” I asked.
Another smirk from Jesse. “Let’s just say you don’t want to get on a Southern woman’s bad side.”
“That’s the truth.” Another unfamiliar voice, and I detected a Boston accent. I forgot the fancier-than-normal comms meant they could hear us whether we wanted them to or not.
“And that voice you just heard . . . my sister’s husband,” Jesse remarked.
“A family business, huh?” I was shocked we were smiling and joking in the middle of battle. But hell, it only brought me back to my days in the army. And it wasn’t any different back then, only my dark sense of humor in my early twenties was a lot worse than now.
“You don’t know the half of it,” the Southerner, Echo Two, said in response. “And we’re preparing to send a little gift basket in the form of a fuck-you-up-the-ass present to the men hot on your tail on the southside. Take cover,” he warned.
“Roger that,” Carter remarked, and then an explosion rattled the ground.
“I could use a gift like that,” Alessandro said. “I’ve got two fuckers who just won’t quit twenty meters from the east side of the cabin. Lassoing their location with the IR laser now.”
“This is Echo Two. Target location confirmed,” the Southerner said. “And you’re welcome,” he added before the ground rocked beneath our feet yet again.
“This is Echo One,” the Brit said in my ear a minute later. “I can confirm from my vantage point there’s no more movement. Targets all appear to be down. There’s a chance one or two are alive, but they’re for sure as hell not threats now.”
“Roger that,” Carter responded. “Alpha Two and Seven, you’re clear to move,” he told us, and we left the cabin.
I took a deep breath, trying my best to relax, but we weren’t out of the woods yet. Literally and figuratively.
“This really your life now?” I asked Jesse as we moved, meeting up with Hudson and Alessandro on our trek to exfil.
Jesse tapped his ear, muting his comm this time, so I copied his move. We could still hear the others, but our conversation was now private. “Well, we prefer not to call in SEALs for an assist, because they’ll give us army boys hell for it later, but we do what we have to do.”