Chapter 18
chapter
eighteen
Drake
Viktor and the Guardians tracked Izabel to Providence Forge. After receiving instructions from the AGS boss, I drove my Escalade, headlights off, onto an unpaved road and parked behind two black SUVs.
“Gear in the back,” I told Marcus. We met behind the vehicle’s tailgate. I opened a custom-built compartment and handed him a vest and put on my own.
Marcus gave a low whistle. “Whoa, this is pretty badass.” He picked up the special edition H&K submachine gun.
“Sorry, bro, that’s my baby,” I muttered. “Here…” I handed him two handguns and a rifle. If circumstances were different, I would have laughed at Harrelson’s disappointed expression, but levity was nowhere to be found in the situation.
After gearing up, we joined Viktor’s huddle with the team. They were looking at a diagram on his tablet, a layout of the property ahead.
“Tim got us the floor plan of the farmhouse,” Viktor informed us. “Brick and Edmunds are scoping INFIL points. Drone shows seven heat signatures. Two perimeter guards. Three inside.”
“You said seven,” Drake said. “Izabel and?—?”
“Suspect it’s Mitchell.”
“Doing his own dirty work?”
Viktor shrugged. “The clusterfuck he’s in? I’m not surprised. No self-respecting military contractor would harm the wife of a brother.” He pressed on his earpiece. He was receiving a transmission from either Brick or Edmunds.
I studied the farmhouse behind the cover of the tree line that served as our staging area. It was sitting on maybe twenty acres. My phone buzzed once in my pocket. I slipped it out.
It was a message from an unknown number. Attached to it was a video. Terror unlike I’d ever felt before seized my lungs in a vise as the contents of the recording unfolded.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I said hoarsely. “Jesus…Izabel…no…no…no…”
My wife was squirming helplessly away from a big guy holding a syringe. When the man stabbed her in the neck, I wanted to roar. Izabel’s scream was the final hammer that shattered my nerves. My vision misted red as I watched her convulse.
Another message followed. “Let’s talk.”
“Gonna kill those motherfuckers!” I charged forward, totally feral. Two bodies tackled me. I grappled against them, threw one off, and punched another. Someone grunted.
I found myself pinned. Choking.
The red haze cleared, and I saw Viktor’s face snarling down at me. His forearm put pressure on my windpipe. “Get a grip, Maddox!”
“They’re killing her!” I snarled back.
“Tyrosine Penthanol. Not. Gonna. Kill. Her.”
That didn’t sound any better in my crazed mind. It was a torture drug. It caused unbearable pain in the form of fire through the veins like flesh-eating acid.
I wanted to howl, to rage, to cry. I attempted to reel it in, to find that calming center, but I was lost in a storm of fury and despair. Mitchell had found the one thing that would break me and send me to my knees.
Boots scraped the gravel beside us.
“I’ve got this.” Marcus Harrelson appeared above us.
Viktor pushed up and away. I remained on the ground.
Breathing in.
Expelling out.
A hand appeared in front of me. I stared at it for one beat, two beats. I grabbed it, letting Marcus haul me up straight into a tight hug.
My former commander murmured in my ear, “Don’t let Mitchell win, Lieutenant.
This mission isn’t over until we get every single motherfucker who murdered our brothers.
” Marcus drew back, keeping a hand firmly clasped over my nape to give me a supportive once-over shake. “We’ll get Izabel back. Got it?”
I gave a tight nod.
“Hooyah, brother.”
“Hooyah…Commander.”
I was calm.
We took out the two perimeter guards with simultaneous suppressed sniper rounds.
Mitchell’s men never saw us coming.
The team converged through two INFIL points on the one-story farmhouse.
Brick and Edmunds busted through the front door and gunned down two of the mercenaries.
Marcus shot through the window and killed the merc who delivered Izabel’s pain shot.
I wanted that job, but I also wanted to be the first one to get to my wife.
I crashed through the second INFIL point—the window of the same room—just as Marcus took his shot.
I rolled, gun drawn and had it pointed at that motherfucker Mitchell, noting that Izabel was slouched on the chair… unmoving and soundless.
I coated my nerves in ice as the compulsion to shoot Mitchell on the spot screamed inside me. My finger feathered the trigger as the other man stared at me in stark fear.
“I should kill you…”
“She’s alive,” Mitchell said in a thin voice. “She just passed out?—”
“Shut up, you worthless piece of shit,” I snarled.
Viktor turned into the room, leading with the muzzle of an assault rifle. My gun shook as I grappled between bloodlust and the desire to see this fucker burn for his sins for years to come.
“Maddox,” Viktor’s voice reached me in the vacuum, and only then did I tear my eyes away from Mitchell as the task force chief tipped his chin. “Got this. Go to Izabel.”
Viktor barely finished his words when I snapped out of bloodlust and turned to Izabel. I sank to a crouch, slid the KA-BAR from my boot, and cut the flex ties. She fell limply into my arms and I scooped her up.
Without another word, I walked out of the room. Guardians filing in gave me a nod of sympathy.
“Is she all right?” Marcus asked, coming in through the front door and hurrying over to me.
I couldn’t speak through the lump in my throat. I didn’t know if it was from relief or fear.
All I could do was stare at my Izabel.
Inhale.
Exhale.
“She’s gonna be all right,” someone said beside me. “Medic!”
Wetness streamed down my cheeks and splashed on her face.
Izabel’s brows furrowed and her lids fluttered.
A pulse of hope pushed away the lingering anxiety. We could finally and truly start our life that was cruelly interrupted three years ago.
“Iza,” I whispered.