Warrior (Heroes of Renegade #2)

Chapter 1

One

Northern Syria

Luca Saxon had been born in this dirt. It stood to reason he was going to die here as well.

His back hit the ground, and he rolled. Sand and dust coated everything. He coughed against the wave of grit but was unable to hear it over the sound of his ears ringing. Someone pulled him up roughly, lifting him by his vest to his feet.

The bearded face of his sergeant swam in front of him. Luca watched Hammer’s lips form the words not today.

Luca could barely breathe, but he coughed out the words, repeating them back to his team leader. “Not today.”

Hammer slapped the back of his shoulder, and they were on the move, weaving through rows of white tents while the oppressive July sun beat down on them.

Away from the tent that was in flames and what remained of the camp stove, nothing but charred debris now.

All thanks to a member of an ISIS sleeper cell working in this forsaken part of the world.

A woman hurried past them in a black niqab, completely covered except for the slit of her eyes.

Clinging to her hand was a little boy who couldn’t be more than six years old.

Both of them needed a full meal and a peaceful night of sleep—neither of which were commodities that could be easily obtained in the back alleys of this refugee camp.

The comms earbud in one ear hummed to life. “Trigger One, this is Trigger Three. I have visual.”

Sweet. Kane, a member of their team and one of Saxon’s best friends, had the suspect in sight.

But this was far from over. They needed to get their hands on Namir Hassan Al-Hijazi, fleeing through the camp up ahead, before the ISIS terror cell members that remained after last night’s raid caught him first. Namir needed to be in prison for what he’d done, betraying those Marines for such a deadly cause.

And while he was at least partially responsible for the death of six US soldiers, he had also stolen sensitive information that was now on a flash drive in his pocket.

Not only could they not lose Namir, but they also couldn’t afford to lose the information he carried.

Running full speed ahead of Saxon, Hammer called on the radio. “Trigger Three, give me his twenty. Over.”

Kane responded, “Three rows west of the medical tent.”

Saxon could see the Red Cross flag flying high in the center of the refugee camp and made a beeline toward it, catching up to Hammer so they were almost side by side. His buddy glanced over and grinned, as if this was just your average footrace through a war-torn country.

Up ahead, in the direction they were going, gunshots rang out. Someone screamed. Answering gunfire sounded across the open air.

“We’ve got company,” Elias said over the radio.

The fourth man of their team, Redding, wasn’t someone Saxon would have called a friend.

The guy was too edgy for his taste. But the US Army had seen fit to put them together on a team.

Considering how well he liked Hammer and Kane, Saxon wasn’t going to complain about one team member.

Hammer raced around the corner of the next tent, almost colliding with an armed insurgent. The two faced off against each other for a second before the other man slammed into the Delta Force team leader. They hit the ground in a cloud of dust.

Another man stepped between two tents about twenty feet up the row.

Saxon lifted his rifle and squeezed the trigger for a split second. But it was too late. The man’s gun fired, and the bullet slammed into the left side of Saxon’s arm. Tearing through flesh with heat and pain.

He cried out, almost going down, but managed to keep his wits about him. He aimed again with the rifle and squeezed off another grouping of shots. His left arm hung loose by his side, trickling blood down to his elbow.

The man collapsed to the ground in a pool of regret and bad choices.

Saxon turned to Hammer. The sergeant was on his feet now, blood running from a cut on his temple, his gun aimed at the man on the ground. The insurgent looked at Saxon, fully aware of what was about to happen.

He said the word brother in Arabic. More of a question than anything else.

“I’m not your brother,” Saxon replied in the same language, turning away so he could go and help Kane and Elias.

The shot exploded behind him, and a second later, Hammer caught up. “You need to get that arm looked at.”

Saxon wouldn’t have said he did, except that now Hammer pointed it out, the whole thing started to throb. “Let’s secure Namir and I’ll put some cream on it or something.”

Hammer snorted. “I will make it an order.”

“Did you get a picture of that guy?” They were supposed to photograph everyone they killed. With most of them being high-value targets, the higher-ups always wanted proof when a target was taken out.

“I recognized him from the briefing. Last year the guy blew up a home for orphans about a hundred miles east of here.”

Up ahead, the gunfire had eased off. Which could mean good or bad things for Kane.

“This is a lot of fuss just for a flash drive.” Saxon checked around the next corner. The opening of the tent flapped in the nonexistent breeze. The scent of curry spices hung in the air with a current of charred wood and the smell of too many bodies packed together with poor hygiene conditions.

His head swam, the heat beading drops of sweat across his forehead. He lifted a hand and swiped at his skin.

The world seemed to shift around him. Blood coated his fingers where it had dripped all the way down from the outside of his arm. He moved his fingers on that hand against one another, rubbing his thumb across his fingertips. Smearing the blood.

Hammer grabbed his elbow. “Easy.”

Kane’s voice came over the radio. “Package secure.”

“Meet us at the medical tent. Saxon needs a bandage.” Hammer’s arm snaked around his waist, and his buddy walked him under the flap of the tent. A long room flanked with medical beds on either side. Equipment seemed too sparse in here, except where crates had been stacked in one corner.

He didn’t need a hospital.

“Just put…” The name of the bandage eluded him. Saxon couldn’t string two thoughts together. “The thing on it. Let’s go.”

They had something with them that would go over his wound and stop the bleeding. At least long enough so they could get back to the rendezvous point and get picked up. There was a packet of it in the right thigh pocket of his cargoes. He reached down and patted it.

Hammer grunted. “And I went to the trouble of bringing you all the way to the finest hospital in Syria.”

A woman in a white lab coat over blue scrubs came over, her hair covered with a blue scarf.

She had dark eyes that were like huge midnight pools trying to suck him under the surface.

He tried to blink or look away, but she drew him.

She said something, but he couldn’t make out the words that seemed to swim around him.

Hammer walked to the bed she indicated and dumped Saxon down on his back.

He hissed out a breath between clenched teeth and tried to focus on the woman, because she was the best-looking thing in this place. Like a single flower in a garden that was nothing but neglected shrubs and trampled bushes. One of those plants that only bloomed at night.

Hammer leaned over him. “You’re going to wanna stop talking, buddy.”

Great. Whatever he’d been thinking just now, he’d apparently been saying it out loud as well. The doctor lady tapped a syringe, then stuck the needle into the outside of his arm.

Saxon hissed out another breath.

She patted his chest. “Just a few minutes and you’ll be good to go.”

He couldn’t look away. “Does it cost extra for the express service?”

She smiled at him, and so many things in his life seemed to fall into place.

“Only because you showed up in the middle of a malaria outbreak and I need to get back to treating patients. Not because you’re the only Americans in the place.

” She spoke with a crisp British accent that made him want to ask her what her favorite kind of tea was.

A commotion over by the entrance to the tent drew his attention.

He could feel her begin to irrigate the wound on the outside of his arm. Ouch.

He attempted to pay more attention to Kane and Elias striding down the center aisle of the hospital tent with dark looks on their faces, coming over to where Hammer stood at the end of the bed.

Elias had dirt smeared across his forehead and the side of his head, and Kane had grazes on the knuckles of his left hand.

“Tell me, Doc…” Kane clasped Saxon’s hand and pushed something small and made of hard plastic between their palms. When Kane pulled his hand away, Saxon closed his fingers around the flash drive. “Are you going to be able to reattach his brain?”

Saxon snorted. “Even if she doesn’t, I’ll still be smarter than you.”

Behind Kane, Elias and Hammer spoke in low tones too quiet for him to hear. Saxon slipped the flash drive into his pants pocket.

The doctor said, “If you’re going to demand the express service, it requires minimal questions.”

Kane stared at the woman like he’d fallen in love. Saxon cleared his throat, and Kane looked down at him.

“Understood.” Kane replied to the woman’s comment, but Saxon knew it was meant for him. As usual, they were on the same page.

Saxon wasn’t here to find the love of his life. But if she was going to show up suddenly, he wouldn’t argue.

Saxon said, “Get lost.”

Kane grinned. “Don’t worry, you’ll live. After all, only the good die young.” He turned and wandered back to the huddle of Hammer and Elias. Whatever had happened with Namir, it seemed they had the flash drive but not the man himself. Had he escaped?

Saxon didn’t like the sound of that, with members of the terror cells still scouring the refugee camp, looking for all of them. The bad guys were trying to take out Namir before the Delta Force team could grab the guy and drag both him and his information out of here.