Chapter 19
The movement is human. Nothing moves the way a person does.
I lift my hand without looking back. Signaling, stop.
The hunter takes another step. Closer this time, not moving away.
Jade’s fear spikes. The shallow pull of her breath behind me is enough for me to know.
I press the shotgun into her hands, adjusting her grip. “Hold it tight,” I murmur, barely a breath against her ear. “They’re coming.”
I take her thumb, guide it to the safety. Press.
“Here. That’s off. You feel it?”
A tiny nod.
“Listen to me.” My mouth is right at her ear now. “If anyone comes through that dark that isn’t me, you shoot. Don’t wait. Don’t second guess it. You understand?”
Another nod.
I shift back just enough to look at her. I can barely see her face, just the outline, the shine of her eyes catching what little light there is.
She’s scared. I hate it, but can’t process now. I have to move.
“I’ll whistle once when it’s clear,” I tell her. “Until then, you don’t move. Anyone but me comes at you, your job is to pull the trigger.”
I leave her in the dark, one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. But I can’t hunt effectively with her. So I focus.
Listening.
It takes no time to find him. I circle around silently, watching his shadow through the trees.
This guy’s not only a piece of shit, he’s got terrible situational awareness.
He takes his pack off, lays down his gun, humming to himself as he unzips his pants.
“Pssst,” I hiss as he takes a leak.
The stream cuts off. His head pivots, but when I don’t move, he mutters something and goes back to pissing.
He’s still got his dick in his hands when I put him in a headlock.
For a satisfying moment he’s too shocked to even register what’s happened.
“Who you looking for?” I snarl, tightening my hold.
“No one,” he whines. “Let me go. I promise—”
His next sound is a gasp.
“You like playing in the dark, hunting innocent women?”
He’s pissing again. The splatter on his boots this time.
“No. I mean… yes. Is that what you want me to say? I’ll say anything.”
“Who organizes the hunt, the gambling?”
He gulps, the knob of his Adam’s apple bobbing against my arm. “Some guy in another country.”
I punch him in the kidney. “Be specific.”
“I… I don’t know.” He gasps, whining in pain. “It’s all handled in crypto. I’ll pay you. Just let me go and I’ll drop a million in Crypto right now. I’ve got my phone.”
When I lift him off his feet, I growl in his ear. “Give me a name.”
“No one knows his name. They call him Apocalypse. I paid some company.”
The intel adds up, worse by the minute.
“What is Vesuvius’s job?”
He claws at my arm. “Can’t breathe. Please…”
When I let up a fraction, he hisses in a breath. Taking several gulps before he can speak.
“Christ. You’re insane. Vesuvius is just one of the game show hosts.”
Game show.
“It’s just a fucking game to you?”
He hesitates, then nods against my arm. “They’re nobodies. Just lowlife scum. We’re just doing them a favor. Ending their misery.”
Blinding rage sweeps through me. The utility knife with the rusty blade is burning a hole in my palm.
He jolts when I stick it in his groin.
“Wh… what?” He gasps.
“That’s for Jade.” I jerk the blade sideways, slicing through his femoral artery.
“You. You cut me,” he whimpers. “I need a medic.”
I laugh crudely, dropping him onto the ground as the scent of blood fills the air. He scrambles to put pressure on his groin, but it won’t help.
“Scary shit, huh? Don’t you wish you would have heard me coming?” I wipe the blade on the ground and retract it back into the casing.
He’s crying, shuddering, reaching for me with a bloody hand with his pants still around his thighs, his artery pumping faster. “Help me!”
“Enjoy hell. I’ll send your buddies along real soon.”
“No. No! Don’t leave me.”
I pick up his rifle and inspect it. “Nice. I’ll put this to good use tonight—delivering justice. Oh, and thanks for the Glock too.”
I hold up the pistol he didn’t even know I swiped from the holster on his hip.
He’s lying flat now. Gasping like a fish out of water.
While he’s still holding onto the last ounces of his humanity, I step close and rip off his shirt—the one that matches all the other hunters.
In a backpack, he’s carrying a satellite phone, water, and extra ammo, first aid kit. Other things I don’t have time to inspect.
I toss the red kit to him. “You wanted a medic? Here’s some gauze and bandaids.”
The cell phone from his pack is unlocked. An app is open. On the screen are six blinking beacons. The hunters. They’re scattered over the mountain. Converging on the old marijuana grow. There’s a pin drop there too. The last place our collars transmitted.
I need to get to Jade. She’s not close to the grow, but anywhere in this forest it’s too fucking close.
Glazed eyes follow me, but the hunter’s body as limp as his dick. Too weak to move. Blood’s not spurting now, it’s oozing from his exposed groin.
In the dim light of the redwood forest it’s not even red. It’s just another shade of dark, soaking into a forest floor.
It gives me no pleasure watching him take his last breath. Nothing will give me relief until we’re off this mountain.
I don’t check his pulse. Don’t even look his way again as I pull on his shirt.
It’s still warm. That should bother a decent human. Too bad that person is long fucking gone.
I shoulder the strap on his rifle, shove the Glock in my waistband, and turn down the mountain with one purpose—get to Jade.
This time, I follow a direct route down. Moving through the undergrowth, cutting along the edge of a burn scar with ghostly tree skeletons.
The hair on my nape rises, causing me to stop.
I scan my surroundings. Search the opening between the trees, and finally look up.
Fuck. I know what that sound is now.
Over the ridge rises a black helicopter sporting only minimal lighting. One fast pass, it shudders the trees and drops low to sweep down the ridge.
Fucking hell!
If they’re using thermal imaging, we’re fucked. I need to get to Jade. I don’t bother with stealth, I run. I’m halfway down the slope when I hear her.
Not a scream. Crashing, branches snapping, feet pounding dirt, the unmistakable sound of someone running blind through dense woods.
The helicopter spooked her. She’s running.
I cut left, angling to intercept, reading the sound. Calculating her direction, distance, speed.
The surprising thing, she’s heading south, downhill, away from the position I left her in. Away from the direction I went.
Afraid.
I close the gap within two minutes. She bursts through a wall of ferns and I catch her around the waist before she gets past me.
Her breath squeaks out. The shotgun thumps to the ground.
“It’s me. It’s me.” I pin her arms and press my mouth against her ear. “Jade. Stop. It’s Ryker.”
Her body goes rigid with a startled cry before she collapses into me.
“The helicopter,” she pants. “There’s a helicopter.”
“I know, baby. I heard it.”
Her wide, scared gaze turns to me over her shoulder. “Are they bringing more hunters or helping them?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Tears slip over her lashes, streaking in the dirt on her face. “Oh god. Oh god, Ryker.”
The terror in her eyes eclipses what I saw in her before, as if she’s completely sedative-free now, running on another shot of adrenaline from an already drained body.
“Listen to me.” I turn her in my arms so I can capture her face in my hand. “Breathe. Slow, easy. You’re with me now.”
She nods, but her fingers twist into my shirt. The shirt I took off a dead man to serve as camouflage when I take out his fellow hunters.
“You did the right thing by moving. But you don’t run from me, okay? You run to me.”
The shine coating her eyes gets thicker. When she nods, it’s choppier.
“I won’t leave you alone again.”
She bites at her lip, blows out a shaky exhale and I tuck her under my arm. Close enough to feel the shudders running through her small body. “Come on. We need cover.”
We move deeper into the old growth trees, away from the open ground, until I find what I’m looking for.
It’s a cluster of downed trees stacked against a rock outcropping. This is a natural blind with sight-lines in three directions and solid cover at our backs.
“This looks good.”
I position her behind the thickest trunk with the shotgun across her lap. “Stay low. Same rules. But I’m not going anywhere.”
I unsling the scoped rifle and settle prone on the fallen tree trunk beside her. “I can do what I need to do right here, sweetheart.”