Chapter 3 #2
I shoved Caleb into the car, pushing him over the driver’s seat.
“Move, Caleb!” I ordered. He’d recovered enough from the flash grenade that he was able to follow my order.
“Get down!” I said, when he went to sit on the seat.
He squeezed himself onto the floor as best he could and covered his head.
Just as he did, the passenger side window blew out.
I winced as flying glass hit my face, but managed to fall into the driver’s seat.
I sent a silent thank-you heavenward that I’d left the car keys in my pocket, rather than inside the cabin.
I managed to get the car started and flew down the driveway toward the road.
“No, wait!” Caleb shouted. “We can’t leave Mav and Memphis!” he yelled as he tried to get into the passenger seat.
“We’re not! Stay down!” I ordered.
Thankfully, Caleb did as I said. I drove for almost half a mile before I found what I was looking for. I slammed on the brakes and said, “Stay here!”
I didn’t wait to see if Caleb followed my instructions.
I scanned my surroundings as I got out of the car.
My gut was telling me I’d gotten us far enough away from the assailants that Caleb would be safe in the car for the few minutes I needed.
I went to the trunk and practically ripped it and the long black case inside open.
My fingers flew as I quickly assembled my AS50 rifle.
I was running even as I attached the scope to the gun.
It took less than thirty seconds to get to the small rise overlooking the cabin.
It wasn’t as much height as I would have liked, but it was enough.
I fell to the ground and looked through the scope. Relief flooded my system as I spied Memphis and Mav still holding off the assailants. Memphis was holding his right shoulder, even as he continued to fire his gun. There was a bloom of blood beneath his hand.
I tore my gaze from my teammates and began searching out the area.
I already knew from the first guy I’d shot that the attackers were wearing army camouflage.
It took just seconds to find the first assailant and with one pull of my trigger, he went down.
Three more followed. I spotted another two bodies in my scope as I did a sweep of the area.
The last two men were on the move, trying to flee.
Presumably because they’d realized they’d come under sniper fire.
I easily took them out and then spent another minute searching for any stragglers.
When I swung my scope back to Memphis and Mav, I saw that Mav had his hand on Memphis’s gunshot wound.
I saw that Memphis was holding his hand in a thumbs-up position – it was a message to me that he was okay.
I climbed to my feet and ran down the rise. I didn’t bother dissembling the gun before tossing it in the trunk.
Caleb was still huddled in the same spot, and I could hear him crying softly. I reached down and grabbed his arm. “Hey,” I said. When he looked at me I said, “We’re safe. Mav and Memphis too.”
He let out a little sob and then nodded his head. He wiped at his tears and followed my urging to get into the seat after I swept as much of the broken glass off it as I could.
“You’re not hurt, right?” I asked.
“My ears hurt… my head too.”
“The ears are from the flash grenade,” I explained. “They’ll stop ringing soon.” I reached for his head and turned it so I could see the back. I could see a little bit of blood dampening his blond hair. “Looks like you hit your head when you fell.”
“I’m okay,” he said.
“I’ll take a look at it when we stop.”
“Stop?” Caleb asked as he looked over his shoulder. “Aren’t we going back to help Memphis and Mav?”
I shook my head but didn’t say anything.
I didn’t know how to explain to him that I wasn’t about to take him back into a situation that I couldn’t be sure was one hundred percent safe.
The attackers had been gunning for Caleb.
Of that, I had no doubt, considering the first bullet had been meant for him.
There was only one way those men had been able to find us, and despite Memphis and Mav being on my side, until I had some answers, we weren’t going anywhere but as far away from this place as we could get.
Alone.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone as I got the car moving. As soon as the phone got a signal, I located the number I wanted and hit dial.
“Jace, what’s going on?” Ronan asked the second he answered. It sounded like he was on the move and I instinctively knew he’d already talked to Memphis.
“How’d they find us?” I asked. I respected Ronan like nobody’s business, but I couldn’t keep the accusatory note from my voice.
“We don’t know,” Ronan said. “The jet is at the airstrip in Monroe County. Take Caleb there and Memphis and Mav will meet you—”
“No,” I cut in. “Those guys were professionals. If they’d been tracking me and Caleb, they would have hit us last night. There was only one way they found us.”
Ronan was quiet for a moment and I could practically see him frowning. “Mav and Memphis would never—”
“I know that,” I said. “Caleb was the target,” I confirmed.
“But they used Mav and Memphis to find him. I don’t know if they tagged their rental car or bugged their phones or what, but Caleb stays with me until we get some answers.
” I paused and added, “Just me,” to make sure Ronan understood I was in charge.
I was likely going to end up without a job after all this, not to mention that having Ronan Grisham as an enemy wasn’t going to be pretty, but Caleb’s life was on the line. I wasn’t messing around with protocol.
Ronan didn’t speak for the longest time and I was about to hang up when he said, “Caleb’s due to testify in a pre-trial hearing in three weeks. If he’s not back here by then, his father will walk.”
“Maybe that’s not a bad thing,” I said. My trigger finger practically itched at the prospect of getting Jack Cortano in the sights of my scope. Ironically, the man was safest in prison. It was one of the few places beyond Ronan’s reach.
“Look at the young man sitting next to you, Jace.”
I couldn’t help but do as Ronan said.
“Now tell me if you think he’s strong enough to carry the weight of his father’s death on his shoulders.”
I sighed because I didn’t need to look at Caleb to know that.
“If the jury in Caleb’s case pulls the same shit the one in Eli’s did, then you and Mav can battle it out for which one of you gets to take the fucker out. But until then, we need to play it by the book – for Caleb’s sake.”
I didn’t say anything because Ronan already knew I was in agreement.
“You have three weeks of radio silence,” Ronan murmured. “But just remember that you’re not the only one who’s worried about Caleb, okay?”
“Yeah,” I muttered.
“If you get anything out of him, fuck radio silence and reach out, do you hear me? I don’t care if you have to use goddamn carrier pigeons, you get word to me so we can figure out what the fuck is going on.”
I smiled at that. “I will.” Ronan and I were on the same page – the chances that Caleb knew something about who was after him was high. Even if he didn’t know exactly who it was, he’d clearly been hiding secrets. The encounter with Jennings had been proof of that.
“Mav and Memphis will clean the scene at the cabin,” Ronan said.
“Memphis was hurt,” I said.
“He says it’s a flesh wound. I’m already working to find someone to treat it before he and Mav fly home.”
Ronan’s words made sense. If Memphis went to a hospital, they’d have to report the gunshot wound to the authorities.
As for the cabin, it had seemed remote enough that the gunshots wouldn’t have alerted any neighbors, but there was always the possibility of a hunter or hiker having heard something.
Which meant Mav and Memphis would have to work fast to get rid of the evidence that Caleb and I had been there.
“Take care of yourself, Jace,” Ronan murmured, then he hung up. I didn’t waste any time in powering the phone off so it was no longer traceable.
“What was that back there?” Caleb asked. I turned to see that he was hunched over like he was in pain.
“A hit,” I said, not wanting to pull any punches with him. If I wanted his cooperation with what would happen next, I needed him to understand the full weight of the situation.
“A hit?” he said, shaking his head. “No, that’s not possible.”
“Those men were there to kill you, Caleb. The flash grenade, the suppressors—”
“The what?”
“Silencers,” I clarified.
I didn’t think it possible, but he paled even more. He was quiet for a moment before saying, “I thought he’d do it himself.”
“Who?” I asked as I tried to keep my focus on the winding road as we began heading down the mountain.
“My dad.”
“You think your dad put the hit out on you?”
“He hired those guys to hurt Eli,” he murmured.
I knew who he was talking about, of course.
I’d been with Caleb when we’d joined Mav and Eli on the journey to Seattle after I’d gotten Caleb out of the psychiatric hospital.
The plan had been to go to Eli’s apartment to get his dog, but the scene we’d walked in on had been pure chaos.
Two men had broken into the apartment to find the flash drive that’d had proof of Jack Cortano’s crimes against his sons and Eli on it.
Eli’s friend had been at the apartment instead and had ended up getting shot.
Fortunately, the young man had survived the incident.
The men Jack had hired had been ex-military…
mercenaries. They’d likely been contacts he’d made through his work in both the army and at the Department of Defense.
I knew Caleb’s theory had some merit to it.
While it seemed odd that Jack would wait two years to finally take out one of the witnesses to his crime, the fact that he’d been acquitted in Eli’s case could have been the catalyst. It would have been too risky to take out both Eli and Caleb before the trials, but with only Caleb left, maybe he’d gotten nervous.
Especially since he didn’t have anything from Caleb’s past to use against him, like he’d had with Eli.
Not to mention the added charge of murder that Jack was facing in Virginia for killing Nick.
The prosecutors were planning on going after him for first-degree murder there, a charge that could potentially carry the death penalty.
If Jack had had someone monitoring Caleb and had discovered his son had disappeared, it would have been the perfect time to eliminate him.
If those men had succeeded in taking us all out, they would have likely done what Memphis and Mav were going to do – burn the cabin and the bodies to get rid of as much evidence as possible and make it virtually impossible to identify the men.
If it’d been our bodies burned beyond recognition in that cabin, our identities likely never would have been discovered.
It would have just appeared that Caleb had up and vanished, and Jack would have walked away a free man.
“Have you been in contact with your father since he was arrested?” I asked.
When Caleb didn’t answer right away, it was answer enough.
“When?” I asked.
But Caleb just shook his head. As much as I wanted to press him, I knew I needed to stick to my plan and take care of step one.
Getting us good and lost.