Chapter 19
MARCUS
Afew feet into the tree line, I find flattened undergrowth and a backpack. The perps squatted here waiting for us. They must have known we’d need to climb the rope, and they waited here in ambush.
My shoulder throbs, but it’s a manageable pain. I’ll get it seen to when we get back, but for now I compartmentalize it, pushing the ache down.
I track further into the forest, but there are no signs of anyone else. My shoulder throbs with a dull ache, but I push it aside and focus on the mission. I don’t like to leave Allegra alone for long, so I do a quick circuit and loop back to the rocks.
I find her clutching her backpack to her chest, watching the man who attacked us. He’s exactly where I left him, lying on his stomach, tied up, with a bullet in his ass.
I crouch before the perp, and he rolls his head to look at me. Blood trickles down his forehead, but it’s a small cut. He’s injured, but he won’t die out here.
“Who sent you?” I know the answer, but I want to hear it from his lips.
The man rolls his eyes to focus on me, and there’s a different kind of pain in his expression.
“My brother…” His voice is croaky, parched.
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“You shot my brother.”
His eyes dart toward the other side of the ravine, and realization hits. “That was your brother on the other side?”
He nods. That makes sense. He lunged at me to stop the shot. It wasn’t personal; it was family. If he’d waited, he might have gotten a better opportunity to take me down.
I peer over the edge of the cliff. On the rocks below is the mangled body of the man who went over. He won’t be moving again.
Across the ravine, a crimson trail of blood leads into the undergrowth. But there’s no body.
I go back to the perp and crouch next to him. “Tell me who sent you, and I’ll tell you about your brother.”
The man eyes me warily. “I don’t know who sent us. It was a contract. We took the contract. You don’t ask questions in my line of work.”
By his fighting skills, my guess is he was military once. Spat out by the military and into the life of a man paid to harm, threaten, and intimidate.
“A mercenary,” I spit out.
The man grins, showing bloody teeth. “Got to earn a living somehow. Isn’t that what you’re doing?”
My fingers curl over his collar. “I’m nothing like you.”
He chuckles. “Keep telling yourself that. We’re both hired muscle. Paid to kill.”
I let him go, and he slumps forward. “Your brother’s injured. The blood trail leads into the woods. Tomorrow we’ll send someone to find you and him.”
The man’s laughter dies on his lips. “You can’t leave me here.”
He looks panicked as I straighten up.
I reach for my pouch and pull out the medical kit. The man was lucky; the bullet went into the lower fleshy bit and exited through the thigh.
I patch him up as best I can without being too gentle. After he’s patched up, I haul him to a sitting position and loosen the ties so he can use his hands but not get out.
I pull out my rain jacket and cover him with it, then leave my last protein bar and my canteen within arm’s reach.
“You’re wrong. I’m not paid to kill; I’m paid to protect. And I always know who I work for.”
I turn my back on the man. He’s taken enough of my time and resources.
Allegra sits with her back against a boulder and her backpack clutched to her chest.
She’s pale, and she stares at a point in the distance.
The adrenaline has worn off. The confident woman who fired the shot and popped my shoulder back into place is gone, replaced by a vulnerability that makes my chest ache.
I’d rather have her stubborn confidence than this pale silence. This silence isn’t relief. It’s shock.
Something twists in my chest. I’ve seen soldiers cut down like this before after their first kill. Allegra didn’t kill the perp, but it’s not an easy thing to fire a weapon and harm someone. Not if you’re not trained for it.
I wish I could crack a joke, anything to ease the tension, but jokes won’t work now. What she needs is steady reassurance. I need to get her away from here and find a place to camp.
“Come on.” I put my arm around her shoulders and help her to her feet. Allegra leans on me as we stand up.
She looks up at me with wide eyes, and I see the little girl she once was, lost and vulnerable.
“Here, put this on.” I lift up her pack and hold the straps while she shrugs into it.
I shoulder my own pack, made lighter by leaving my warmest coat behind.
But as much as I was prepared to kill the mercenary when he attacked me, I won’t leave a man to die in the cold.
What his brother does is not my concern.
By the blood trail, my guess is we’ve eliminated the threat. He’s not going to get far.
I lead Allegra deep into the woods, cutting north, then east so we’re not treading a clear path.
I lock my hand with hers and we walk side by side, not speaking, but her fingers get warmer and her breathing steadies as we go. I push her onwards, wanting to put a good distance between us and the men we left behind.
I find a small clearing that will make a good camp, and we slide our packs off.
Allegra moves automatically to set up camp.
Our tasks have become routine. I secure the perimeter and set up the shelter while she gathers kindling and gets a fire going.
She drags a log over to make a seat, and she sits staring into the fire with a glassy look.
I wrap the sleeping bag around her shoulders and hand her my last food pack.
“You need to eat,” I say gently.
She takes it, and there’s gratitude in her eyes. After she’s eaten, I make her a coffee and dig out the last apple.
She takes both, and the color slowly returns to her cheeks as the light fades.
She’s carrying more than she’ll admit, but if she shares the burden, I’ll gladly shoulder it for her.
“Come on.”
I lace my fingers in hers and guide her to the shelter. Her body tucks into the sleeping bag next to mine, and I wrap my arms around her. A faint glow from the dying embers of the fire lights up her expression, and it’s raw, stripped of her usual defiance.
I brush her forehead with my lips, wanting to take the ache away. I want to return her to her passionate and hopeful and stubborn self, where she believed her experiments could change the world. They still can.
My shoulder aches as she leans on it, but I don’t care. Allegra needs me, and I’m here for her.