34. Bradyn
CHAPTER 34
brADYN
I t only took us fifteen minutes to get through the grate leading into the compound, but it felt like lifetimes. Especially once we’d gotten confirmation that the senator’s plane landed at a private airstrip and Kennedy was among the passengers.
Something we only know because Tucker hacked into the hangar’s security cameras and pulled the footage for us. She’s close. I can feel her.
God, please let me get to her in time. I need You to guide my steps. Guide us.
Still dressed in the black wet suit I wore through the water, I keep my assault rifle at the ready as I creep forward through the grounds. I’m moving soundlessly and sticking to cover as I can, all of my brothers moving in formation behind me. Bravo walks at my side, silent but at the ready.
Echo with Elliot.
Romeo with Riley.
Tango with Tucker.
And Delta with Dylan.
We’re a team—the ten of us. And with God on our side, we’ll finish this mission and free Kennedy. “Two up ahead on the right,” Tucker whispers into the earpiece.
I see the guards up ahead, their backs toward us. Elliot takes the one on the right, and I go left. We move as one, both of us snaking our arms around the necks of the guards and squeezing, holding until their bodies go limp.
Quickly, we zip-tie their hands together, remove their weapons, and tuck them out of sight. They’ll be out for a while, hopefully waking just in time to have those zip ties swapped for cuffs. That is as long as the voicemail I left for Frank Loyotta earlier gets heard in time. Otherwise, we’re truly on our own.
Lifting my weapon again, I fall back into formation, and we sneak around the side of the building. We’re so close. Right near an entrance.
“Incoming!” I hear someone yell and plaster myself against the wall. Bravo moves with me, my entire team pressing our bodies against the wall, just out of view as the large iron gate opens and a black SUV speeds in.
The car slams to a stop, and two men get out, one of them looking absolutely furious.
“No one can do anything right, George. You know that. No one. You want a job done, you have to do it yourself.”
“Yes, boss,” he replies.
He says something else, but it’s muffled as they slip inside the house. Yet he didn’t need to say anything more for me to understand just why he’s here. Kennedy. My heart begins to pound.
“We have to move,” I whisper into the earpiece.
It’s a delicate balance, moving fast enough to get there in time but not so fast we risk bringing attention to ourselves. A full-on midday assault is enough of a risk.
We creep toward a side door, and I step back as Tucker moves to the front, placing a lock break onto the keypad. Within seconds, the light turns green, and he removes it then falls back into place behind us.
I glance back, gesturing toward the door to let them know I’m going in. Weapon at the ready, I shove against the door.
The hall is empty, so we flood it in formation, clearing every room we pass. So far, we see no guards patrolling the interior, nor house staff. Not unusual for places like this—most of the security is outside.
We’ve only made it through part of the downstairs, and there are two other floors to get through. She could be anywhere, and I get the feeling we’re running out of time.
Come on, Kennedy, where are you?
A scream tears through the house, and my heart slams against my ribs. Kennedy ! I pick up speed, no longer caring if we get spotted. All that matters is getting to her.
I have to get to her.
We reach a door right before a set of stairs, and I press my ear against it.
“Please, I’m telling you that I don’t know anything!” Kennedy screams again.
“I will not be lied to! Come on, sweetheart, we’re just getting started. Be honest with Ralphie, and I promise to make this quick.”
She screams again, a heart-stopping cry of pain.
I slam my boot into the door, and it flies open. The man reaches for a gun holstered beneath his arm, but I’m faster. “Fass, Bravo!” I order. Bravo lunges forward, his jaws clenching around the man’s forearm. The man screams in pain, and I disarm him, ripping the firearm from his grasp while Bravo takes him to the ground.
The other dogs all stand at the ready, growling low and deep as the man stares at them in fear, his eyes wide. “Get this mutt off of me!” he yells.
“Keep squirming; it only makes him bite harder,” Elliot replies as he withdraws zip ties from a pocket on his vest.
“Aus , Bravo,” I order. Let go. Bravo releases him, and Elliot’s quick with the zip ties, securing his hands behind his back.
With him no longer a threat, I turn toward Kennedy. Her face is bruised, her lip split open, eyes bloodshot. Blood slicks against the skin of her arms where her sleeves were cut off—long cuts from the blade discarded at her side.
There’s a bit of blood matted to her hair and dripping down her forehead.
Fury ignites in my veins. A thirst for vengeance that will not be quenched until this man is dead. I start to turn toward him.
“You came for me.” Kennedy’s soft voice grounds me, and I remain where I am. She’s top priority, and vengeance is not mine to have. Not when God can deliver far worse than I can if He so chooses.
I rip the knife from my boot and cut the ropes binding her. “Of course I came for you.”
She tries to smile, but she winces and reaches up to touch the cut on her lip. “I told you not to.” Her wrists are covered in bruises from the ropes as well as burn marks where she tried to get free.
I swallow down my anger and do my best to only focus on her. “I’ve always struggled with following directions.”
“We need to get out, brother,” Tucker says. “Otherwise, we’re about to be sitting ducks.”
“You’re already sitting ducks, you fools. You won’t make it out of this alive, and now I’ll really make her suffer.”
A heavy thud masked with a soft grunt has me turning my head. Dylan slowly lowers his boot back to the ground, and the man lies unconscious on the floor. “Don’t act like none of you wanted to do that and so much worse.”
No one says a word, and I know that, in this moment, we all appreciate Dylan’s temper. Honestly, he probably saved the man’s life by knocking him out.
Kennedy rests her head against my chest. “Alexander has the key in his pocket. We find him, we have the proof.”
“That’s good,” I tell her. “Because I’ve already made a call.”
“This is good, Hunt,” Frank Loyotta says appreciatively as the senator is loaded into the back of a police cruiser. While it’s not necessarily his wheelhouse, Frank has connections that I don’t. Connections that led to the Department of Homeland Security showing up on Senator Brown’s door, along with multiple media outlets and a slew of local police.
I smile. “Thanks for showing up.”
“Anytime. Turns out the guy you found in there with your girl is Rice Berns. He’s wanted in four Countries and has been on the FBI’s most-wanted list for a decade. The good senator there tried to save his own hide by telling us Rice was behind everything and he was only being blackmailed. We got both him and his son, Klive, trying to escape out the back. And wouldn’t you know, the senator had a thumb drive in his pocket. Think we’ll find anything on that?”
“I would think so. It’s likely the key. Tucker has the main one. He can get it to you before you head out. You’ll need one to read the other.”
He nods. “Seriously, you did great work. Again.”
“It’s a team effort,” I reply.
“You and your brothers ever want to come work for me, all you have to do is say the word. I’ll make it happen.”
I shake his offered hand. “Appreciate that, Frank, but I’m really looking forward to some quiet time after this.” My gaze lands on Kennedy. She’s sitting in the back of an ambulance, a blanket over her shoulders.
She turns toward me, and our gazes hold. For a moment, everyone else just fades away, and it’s just her and me.
Thank You, Lord.
“Ahh, I get it now.” Frank clasps me on the shoulder. “You know where to find me if you change your mind.”
“That I do.”
“You should know, though, after we got off the phone, I did some digging. I have a friend in the marshals, and he looked into what happened that night.”
“The night Oliva Brown and Kennedy’s parents were killed?”
He nods. “It was all buried pretty good, and Olivia’s identity was hidden, but he pressed in the right places and got his hands on the real file.”
“They’ll get justice then; that’s good.”
“That’s the thing, though. Aside from the three marshals, only one other body was recovered that night.”
“What do you mean?” I turn away from Kennedy and focus fully on him.
“The murders were called in by a man who was also living at the residence.”
“What are you telling me?” I don’t dare read into what he’s saying because, if I read between the lines and I’m wrong—well—I don’t want to be wrong.
“I’m telling you that not everyone died that night,” he says. “There were two other survivors.”