Chapter Fourteen
The blast hit like a hammer. The van jolted hard, throwing Avery forward. Isla slammed on the brakes, tires screaming against the pavement.
Dirt and debris pelted the windshield, clouding everything in a thick haze. The smell of smoke and burned asphalt filled the air. Avery’s ears rang so loud it drowned out her own breathing.
She blinked through the dust, trying to see. What she saw froze her.
The road ahead was gone. A gaping hole tore straight across the asphalt, wide enough to swallow the van whole. Chunks of pavement still crumbled at the edges, sliding into the pit below.
“Jesus,” Cal muttered, pushing himself up from the floor.
Avery’s heart slammed against her ribs. “Mick was right there,” she said, straining to see through the swirling smoke.
Jackson grabbed her arm before she could move. “Stay down.” His voice was steady, but she heard the tension under it.
The van screeched to a stop just short of the crater, the tires spitting gravel into the void. Isla slammed it into reverse, backing them up fast.
“Hold on,” she barked. The van jolted over the uneven road, the engine whining as she fought to keep control.
Then a shout cut through the smoke. “Stop!”
Avery’s head snapped toward the sound. Through the haze, she saw Mick shouting at them. He was stumbling toward them, blood running down his face, his hands tied in front of him. Each step looked painful, awkward.
Her instincts screamed not to trust him. But if he was the kidnapper, he’d just come within feet of a grenade blast. No one fakes that kind of chaos. Well, maybe no one. It was possible that Mick trusted the Brotherhood to keep him alive.
Jackson was already watching, gun up, eyes locked on the figure struggling toward them. “Keep your eyes open,” he warned. “Could be bait.”
Avery kept watching, her heart pounding. Mick’s face was a bloody mess, swollen and raw. His mouth moved like he was trying to speak, but his voice was lost in the wind and ringing aftermath of the blast.
He looked half-dead, but he still kept coming.
“Control, this is Prescott,” Isla said into her earpiece, her voice sharp but steady. “We’re backing out. Need to put distance between us and whoever’s got that launcher.”
Noah’s voice crackled back through the comm. “Do you have eyes on the shooter?”
“Negative,” Isla said, glancing through the mirrors. “No visual.”
Avery twisted around in her seat, trying to see through the shattered haze of dirt and dust. “I still see Mick,” she said. “He’s moving.”
He was off the road now, stumbling through the ditch, hands still tied, mud streaked across his face and chest. He looked desperate, like sheer willpower was the only thing keeping him upright.
“Keep going,” Jackson ordered. “If that launcher fires again, we’re done.”
The van bounced hard over a rut. Avery grabbed for balance, eyes locked on Mick. He didn’t stop, didn’t even slow down, just kept pushing toward them through the mud.
Avery’s gut twisted. “He’s following us,” she said quietly. “Still trying to get to us.”
“Could be leading whoever fired the grenade straight to us,” Cal muttered.
The idea hit like a punch. Avery’s stomach dropped. She couldn’t tell if Mick was running for help. Or running them straight into another ambush.
Gunfire cracked through the air, sharp and fast. Avery flinched as the sound echoed off the trees. Mick hit the ground, shouting something she could barely make out through the noise.
“Stop! Don’t shoot!” he yelled, voice hoarse and raw.
Isla cursed under her breath, gripping the wheel tighter. “Orders, Control?”
Noah’s voice came through, calm but clipped. “Stop the van. Pick him up. Check him for weapons first. We might be able to use him.”
Jackson’s reaction was immediate. “We don’t know if he’s leading us into a trap.”
“I know,” Noah said, “but he could have intel. If he really escaped, he might know where the other hostages are.”
Isla slowed the van, the tires crunching over gravel as she drove closer to Mick’s position. Avery’s stomach twisted with unease. She didn’t like this any more than Jackson did, but she understood Noah’s logic.
Mick pushed himself to his knees, hands still bound, blood dripping from a cut above his eye. He looked like hell.
If this was an act, he was committed to it.
But if it wasn’t, then he was their only lead.
“All right,” Jackson said tightly. “We take him. But the second he tries anything, he’s done.”
Avery nodded, her pulse hammering. The van rolled to a stop, and every instinct in her body screamed that something was about to go very, very wrong.
Gunfire erupted again. Bullets pinged off the side of the van, sparks flashing against the metal. Avery ducked instinctively, heart hammering.
Outside, Mick was still yelling, his voice breaking. Some of the shots tore into the dirt around him, kicking up dust and gravel. Whoever was shooting wasn’t aiming to kill him. They were trying to keep him pinned.
A new sound cut through the chaos. The roar of a truck coming fast from behind them. Tires screeched, and the van shuddered as Isla threw it into neutral, ready for anything.
“Brace,” Cal said sharply. He grabbed the onboard scanner, typing fast. “Running the plates.”
A beat later, he frowned. “It’s registered to a local farmer, lives about three miles out. Not Brotherhood.”
The truck skidded to a halt on the shoulder, the driver half out of the cab, eyes wide and terrified.
“Oh, God,” Avery whispered. The man was shaking, hands raised, shouting something about hearing explosions.
“He’s just a civilian,” Jackson said.
Isla lowered her window a crack, keeping one hand on her weapon. She motioned sharply for the man to turn around and go. “Get out of here!” she shouted. “Now!”
The farmer didn’t need to be told twice. He jumped back in the truck, tires spinning as he tore off down the road.
The gunfire stopped as suddenly as it had started, leaving only the fading echo of the engine and Avery’s racing heartbeat.
Something about the silence felt worse than the bullets.
Mick finally stumbled up to the van, half-crawling, half-dragging himself through the dirt. His clothes were torn and soaked with blood, his face caked in mud. He looked one step away from collapsing.
Jackson reached over and yanked the side door open. “Move,” he barked, grabbing Mick by the arm and hauling him inside. The van rocked with the sudden weight.
Mick gasped, his voice hoarse. “Get out of here. They’ll kill us all.”
Jackson shoved him down against the floor and ran his hands over him fast, checking for weapons. “Cal, cover him.”
“I’ve got him,” Cal said, weapon trained on Mick.
“He’s clean,” Jackson muttered, pulling back. “No gun, no blade. Doesn’t mean he’s not wearing comms.”
Mick shook his head hard. “I’m not. I swear.”
Cal grabbed the detector from his kit and knelt beside him. “We’ll see about that.” He ran the scanner over Mick’s chest, arms, and legs, the small device emitting a faint hum.
Avery held her breath. The van smelled of sweat and fear. Outside, the wind carried the faint echo of something moving in the distance.
Cal looked up, frowning. “Nothing. He’s clear. No transmitters, no trackers.”
Mick’s shouting filled the van, his voice raw and frantic. “Go. You have to leave now. They’ll kill you if you stay here.”
Isla glanced at Jackson in the rearview mirror. “We can’t just—”
Before she could finish, Noah’s voice crackled in their earpieces. “Listen up. The hostages aren’t in the barn. I repeat, they’re not there. No heat sources at the rest stop either.”
For a second, Avery couldn’t breathe. “What?” she snapped. “Then, who’s shooting at us? Who fired that grenade?”
Noah’s tone stayed level, but she heard the frustration beneath it. “My guess is it’s on some kind of timer.”
That didn’t mean it couldn’t be just as deadly. But where the heck were the kidnappers and hostages?
“We’ve swept everything within a half-mile radius,” Noah went on. “Nothing. Either the Brotherhood moved them or this was never about the hostages at all.”
Avery’s chest tightened with fury. Her fists curled against her thighs. “They played us,” she said, her voice shaking. She snapped toward Mick. “Where are they, Mick? Where are the hostages?”
He looked terrified, his gaze darting to the window. “I don’t know,” he said. “But you need to run.”
Jackson moved fast, closing the distance between them in a heartbeat. He grabbed Mick by the front of his shirt.
“Where are the hostages?” Jackson shouted.
Mick shook his head, eyes wide and frantic. “I don’t know. I told you, I don’t know.”
Jackson leaned closer, his face inches away. “You were there. You had to have seen something.”
Mick’s breath came hard and shallow. “They separated us about a half hour ago,” he said. “I heard shouting, engines. Then they were gone. I managed to cut myself loose and ran.”
“Who took them?” Jackson demanded.
Mick hesitated, and that hesitation made Avery’s skin crawl.
“Who?” Jackson snapped again.
Mick swallowed, voice breaking. “It was your boss,” he said, glancing at Avery. “Warren. Warren Sinclair.”