Chapter 36
If you’d asked him two weeks ago if a dog could be taught to understand the concept of undercover, Blaine would have laughed.
But when Rafe bent down and whispered something that sounded like “casual” to the dog, and the hyperalert stance vanished and he seemed to shift into an ordinary creature that could be any family pet, he wasn’t laughing.
“He’ll be the biggest doofus around if necessary. But he’ll never lose focus. He knows Ethan’s the goal.”
To keep any attention away from the rise where Rafe would be waiting, he headed back down and to the faint trail where they’d been before. And then he put on the most casual, out-for-a-day’s-hike-with-the-dog demeanor he could manage, although he doubted it was nearly as good as the dog’s.
It took several minutes to work their way down to the cluster of oak trees.
Ethan was still inside the tent—he knew Rafe would have updated him if not—while the other two were fussing with something near the tent flap, the older kid with the gun yelling something at the youngest one, “stupid” being the only word Blaine could make out.
He worked his way through the brush to where, when he emerged, he would be as close as possible to the tent, and also for the startle factor. Cutter, as usual, seemed to understand and pretty much ignored the branches that caught at his fur and neatly dodged another small group of prickly pears.
He let Cutter lead, keeping his gaze fastened on the leader, who was standing in front of the tent almost protectively now. All while trying to present as just a guy out walking his dog.
“Hey,” he called out with all the fake friendliness he could muster. “Nice day.”
The leader spun around, clearly jolted.
Hurt my boy and you’ll feel a real jolt.
Then the guy’s gaze fastened on Cutter, and Blaine could see the wariness come into his eyes. Cutter hid the more aggressive looks of his kin beneath a fluffier coat, but the intensity was still there to those who looked.
And maybe those who knew they should be looking.
“What are you doing here?” the leader asked, in a tough-guy tone Blaine thought—and hoped he was right—was a little put on. As if he were speaking as the guy he wanted to be, but wasn’t necessarily there yet.
Blaine gave him a rather wide-eyed look. “Walking my dog in a public park,” he said, trying his best to sound puzzled by the question.
“This is pretty far out.”
“Off the beaten path, yes,” he answered, still doing his best to sound like an innocent bystander. At the same time he was watching as one of the younger kids opened the tent flap behind the leader. “But that’s what the dog likes.”
The guy asked, both looking and sounding suspicious, “How’d you get here?”
“Flew, actually. Maybe you heard us, a few minutes ago? Or maybe you didn’t, that helicopter’s pretty quiet.”
Rafe’s voice snapped in his ear. “Ethan heard you. He’s headed out.”
Even as Rafe finished the warning, Ethan appeared in the tent’s opening.
Blaine had, when he’d been the most down about it all, wondered if his own son would even recognize him when he saw him.
Three months—three and a half now—wasn’t long in his life, but it was a lot longer in a fourteen-year-old’s.
That doubt was vanquished the instant their gazes locked. Ethan’s eyes widened.
Three things happened simultaneously. Cutter yipped. Ethan yelped, “Dad!”
And the leader pulled that pistol from his belt.
“Dad? This guy’s your father?” he snapped.
He aimed the pistol at Blaine. Cutter let out a low sound, not quite a growl but menacing nonetheless.
The leader shifted the weapon to the dog, but he was still looking at Blaine.
He obviously didn’t know where to focus, so Blaine decided to further distract him.
Anything to keep that weapon pointed anywhere but at Ethan.
Even if it was at him. He could see now it was a 9mm, matching the ammo box they’d found.
So unless the kid hit him smack in the head or heart, he could take one and keep moving.
Long enough for Rafe to take his shot, anyway.
“Now that you know who I am,” he said, “who are you?”
“None of your business.” He turned the weapon on Ethan, who looked terrified now. And that look steeled Blaine in a way nothing, not even combat, ever had.
“What should I call you, then? Boss, maybe?”
He didn’t think he was wrong about the slight shift in the kid’s expression. He’d liked that.
“Yeah,” the leader drawled, “you can call me that.”
“Okay, Boss. Enjoy the title while you have it.”
The rather shaggy brows lowered. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“They won’t let you in, you know,” he said, his tone conversational now. “Not after you couldn’t even get that cash register open.”
Shock flashed across the guy’s face, wiping out any trace of satisfaction. “How the hell do you know—” He cut himself off and shifted the weapon to Ethan again. “You’ve been talking to him?”
Whoa. He hadn’t expected that mind leap.
“Careful, he’s panicking,” Rafe’s voice said in his ear.
Just as the assessment came Blaine saw, as if he’d read it in the kid’s face, that he was indeed panicking. And he was going to bolt. In the same moment, the kid in the baseball cap grabbed Ethan’s arm and ran, half dragging him along with him farther into the brush beyond the tent.
Cutter let out a snarl and a sharp bark. Blaine moved after them instantly, although the brush slowed him down because of the simple difference in his size and the kids’.
“I’ll be right behind you, with him in the scope,” Rafe assured him in his ear.
“Good,” Blaine muttered, the first thing he’d said directly to the man backing him up.
“Say ‘follow’ and cut him loose.” Blaine knew Rafe meant Cutter. But he hesitated. The dog had never met Ethan, could he really—
As if he’d read his doubts Rafe said, “He’ll know. Trust him.” Blaine bent down and unclipped the leash. Cutter darted ahead. “He won’t attack unless you say so.”
I’ll try not to get him shot.
Blaine smothered the qualms as he’d so often had to before lifting off on a mission.
He forged forward in the dog’s wake, although making a lot more noise because he didn’t care anymore—stealth had left the equation.
Still Cutter got ahead of him, and he had to hustle to keep the dog in sight.
He heard Rafe some distance behind him but closer than he’d expected.
He’d obviously come over the rise and down, with the reason for concealment blown now.
He just had to hope Erin was safely out of range.
When Blaine reached the edge of the thicket of tall brush and was able to see out to a bare spot, it was like a scenario from a film.
Cutter had them cornered. Ethan was huddled on his knees, staring at the dog.
The armed target—he had no problem thinking of the guy that way, even if he was a teenager, not since he’d turned that weapon on Ethan—was jammed up against a V-shaped tumble of large rocks, boulders that were taller than he was.
It looked like the result of a long-ago landslide.
The wannabe boss’s gaze was fastened on Cutter, who looked beyond threatening as he snarled at him.
The kid was trying to get a bead on the dog with the pistol, but apparently Cutter was smart enough—or wolf enough—to keep moving side to side, so the kid couldn’t really do it.
He obviously was a few steps below amateur with the weapon.
Which of course made him even more dangerous.
Blaine stepped quickly out of the underbrush.
“I wouldn’t try that, if I were you. He’d take offense at you shooting at him, and that is not a dog you want coming at you.”
“Go to hell,” the kid spat out uselessly.
“Don’t think so,” he said. “Here are your options, Isaac.” He saw the boy react in shock to the name, but kept going. “You take the dog down, I take you down. You take me down, the dog takes you down. Either way, you lose.”
The wannabe gangster’s lip curled. Blaine hoped it was just false bravado. He gestured at Ethan with the pistol. The winter sun glinted off the chrome. “And what if I just shoot him?”
“Then I kill you where you stand.”
Blaine’s tone was deadly serious and icy cold. And it registered with the kid, who tried to back up a step but came up against the towering boulder.
“And,” he added in the same implacable voice, “way out here it would take a long time before anybody found your body.”
“That’s big talk for a guy who’s not even armed,” the kid blustered, shifting his focus—and the gun—away from Ethan.
In that instant Blaine lifted his right hand and snapped his index finger forward. A crack rang out from the trees in the same instant the kid’s backwards baseball cap flew off his head.
Isaac shrieked. He fell back against the boulder.
Blaine dived forward, grabbing Ethan. Using the same momentum he kicked out with his right leg, striking the kid’s gun hand hard.
The weapon went flying, landing near the baseball cap that now lay a few feet away, a bullet hole obvious in the brim. Isaac stared in shock at them both.
“Fair warning, he didn’t miss your head because he couldn’t hit it,” Blaine said, his own voice almost shaky from the wave of relief at having Ethan in his arms, alive and safe.
The former boss sagged against the boulder at his back, and slid down to the ground.
“Cutter, guard!”
The call came from behind him as Rafe cleared the brush, the rifle he’d fired that exquisitely aimed shot from now slung over his shoulder.
The dog leaped over to within a foot of the leader who was now just a terrified kid, gave a warning growl for good measure, and stood over him as if he were just hoping he’d try something so he could rip his throat out.
“I’d be scared of him,” Blaine said to Rafe when he reached them.
The sniper grinned. “Smart man.”
Blaine felt Ethan move, looked down to see him shifting his gaze from his broken captor to Cutter, to Rafe. And then, finally, he looked up at him.
“You came for me,” his son whispered.
“Of course I did.” He saw the moisture pooling in the boy’s eyes, and added with a smile, “And I brought the cavalry.”
Ethan threw his arms around Blaine’s waist. Blaine heard a sound, realized the boy was crying. He hugged him back, fiercely, breathing easily for the first time since he’d gotten that phone call.
His son was safe.
“Was that really you flying that helicopter?” The question was a bit muffled, since apparently Ethan didn’t want to let go. Which was fine with Blaine, because he didn’t, either.
“Yeah,” he answered. “And now I have to take it back. Want to go for a ride?”
Ethan tilted his head back then, the fear fading, and excitement growing. “Seriously?”
“Seriously,” Blaine said, looking down at the head that now nearly came up to his chin. How had he grown so much so fast? How much else, what other kinds of growth, had he missed out on?
That had to stop. And it would. Somehow.
Even if last night hadn’t meant what he hoped it had.