CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Maria is going to have a cow,” Lennox murmured as he glanced at the clock on the dash before turning off the road and onto the driveway that led to the shack guarding the entrance to the Rybak property.
While he’d been hesitant about coming over tonight when he was sure Talia was going to be kicking his butt to the curb right after the movie, he hadn’t wanted to disappoint Maria. Not that it mattered. In a few hours, he doubted he’d ever see the little girl again.
Still, he’d tried hard to get here in time, for Maria’s benefit if nothing else. But work had been a nightmare today, with headquarters putting them through a seemingly endless series of training drills, then hours of equipment maintenance, followed by more hours of meaningless paperwork. He swore, it was almost as if the Navy knew about the crap he and his Teammates had gotten involved in last night and were punishing them for it. Or maybe it was just karma for keeping secrets?
Regardless, the day had been a nightmare, which was why he’d been a little terse with Talia when she’d texted to remind him about movie night with her and Maria. Okay, maybe it wasn’t only about the crap day at the office that had him so snappy. Knowing that the real reason Talia wanted to see him was so she could dump him was eating at him a little. More than a little.
Lennox slowed as he reached the guard shack, expecting the security guard to step out to clear him, like the guy had every other time he’d been here, but when he got to the gate, the man didn’t step out.
He stopped and lowered his window, leaning out a little to try and see in the window of the guard shack. But from this angle, it didn’t look like there was anyone in there at all. That couldn’t be right.
His phone dinged as he put the pickup in park and reached for the door handle. He paused to pull it out and saw that it was a text from Maria.
bad guys here
going to the house with Talia to hide in the safe room in the basement
His gut clenched.
Shit .
He was about to throw the truck into drive to take off for the main house when a horrible thought struck him. Jumping out of the truck, he ran into the guard shack only to stop when he saw booted feet sticking out from behind a desk. Blood seeped under the other side of the desk, streaks and splatters of the stuff covering the wall.
Racing around the desk, he knew the guard was dead before he even checked for a pulse. Two rounds in the chest, one in the head. Whoever these bad guys were, they weren’t randos, they were professional killers.
It had to be Keller.
Cursing, he grabbed the guard’s Glock off his equipment belt, along with the single extra magazine he could find. Then he was up and running for his truck again.
Driving one handed, Lennox pulled out his cell and dialed Colt. “Call the cops and get them out to the Rybak residence. I think Keller is here. The guard at the gate is dead, and Talia and Maria are hiding in the safe room. I’m going to get them. Get here as fast as you can.”
Colt said something about waiting for backup but that wasn’t going to happen, so Lennox hung up. A few seconds later, he slid to a stop in front of the big two-story house and the three suspicious SUVs parked there.
Crap .
He could be facing more than a dozen bad guys in there.
Lennox silently darted along the left side of the house. He glanced in several windows as he moved but he didn’t see movement inside. He didn’t know if that was good or bad. The ground began to slope downward a little around the back of the house and the entrance to the basement. Hopefully, Talia and Maria were already in the safe room and all he’d have to do was find a defensive position and take out anyone who came too close.
That plan went to crap when he rounded the corner of the house and practically ran into four men in black tactical gear. The way they all lifted their military grade assault weapons and started firing without even bothering to ID their target confirmed his initial assessment—they were cold-blooded killers.
Lennox ducked back around the corner, barely avoiding the hail of bullets that came his way. He hit the ground and rolled, coming up on his feet and immediately moving to the edge of the house again, kneeling down and hugging the wall.
The first of the attackers rounded the corner of the house at full speed, firing down the length of the wall as if he expected Lennox to be running in that direction but the bullets went right over his head. It was still disconcerting to have bullets zipping over that close to him—and hard as hell on the ears—but much better than the alternative.
Finally realizing where he was, the guy tried to adjust his aim but was unable to get a shot off before Lennox fired three 9mm rounds into the man’s lower torso, avoiding the thick tactical vest that covered the guy’s chest and upper stomach.
When the man started to collapse, Lennox dropped the handgun and snatched the short-barrel assault rifle from his hands. Using the guy’s body as a shield, he flipped the weapon around and opened full-automatic fire as his three buddies ran around the house.
Two of them went down immediately while the third retreated back around the corner, giving Lennox time to scramble out from under the body and dig for the extra rifle magazines in the guy’s vest. Picking up the Glock he’d dropped earlier, he shoved it in his back pocket and got ready to go after that last shooter.
Unfortunately, when he peeked around the corner to try and find his target, he realized it had taken him too long to get moving. The guy now had backup—too many for Lennox to stand there in the open and engage.
Praying Talia and Maria were already securely locked away in the safe room, Lennox turned and sprinted back the way he’d come, looking for the closest place he could reach that would get him out of sight before the men came around the house. If they caught him out in the open, it was all over.
When he heard the thud of boots behind him closing fast, he knew he was out of time. Cursing, Lennox launched himself toward the closest window, twisting at the last second so his shoulder was the first thing to impact the glass instead of his face.
He landed on the floor of a darkened guest bedroom hard enough to knock the air from his lungs but he forced himself upright all the same, knowing there’d be bullets coming through any minute. His concern proved correct as the walls of the room were ripped apart with automatic weapon fire as he lunged into the adjacent hallway and low-crawled away as fast as he could, chunks of drywall raining down on him.
Fifteen feet later, the darkened hallway split, with another corridor off to the right and a set of stairs leading up to the second floor on his left. He started to go right, hoping to find a way down to the basement, but paused as his cell buzzed.
Crappy time to stop and check his phone but he rolled over all the same so he could pull the thing from his back pocket. The text could be from Colt or even Maria. One look at the screen revealed that the message was from the latter.
couldn’t get to house
hiding in barn
bad guys are here
“You got to be kidding me,” Lennox groaned, shoving the cell back in his pocket. He’d spent all this time and effort trying to reach the basement, and they weren’t even there. But it hopefully meant they were safe, that was the important thing.
Pushing himself to his feet, Lennox turned toward the stairs on the left only to dive to the floor once again as bullets tore through the air over his head.
Twisting around, Lennox got his assault rifle up in time to send multiple three-round bursts back down the hallway toward the men who’d run out of the bedroom he left a few seconds earlier. One of them went down hard but the rest scrambled back into the bedroom, giving him enough time to get up and race for the stairs. He climbed fast, the thumping of multiple boots behind him in the hallway telling him that they were right on his heels.
When he reached the second floor and ran through the reading nook area, he tried to envision the layout of the house, and which direction would take him closer to the maintenance shed—or barn as Maria insisted on calling it.
Darting in what he hoped was the right direction, Lennox tore down a long hallway, pointing his assault rifle behind him in the general direction of the bad guys, and pulled the trigger until the magazine was empty. He heard a couple thuds but didn’t waste time looking back to see what he hit. Instead, he put his head down and charged through the master bedroom, not slowing as he dropped his shoulder and threw himself through the window on the far side of the room. Two windows in less than five minutes. That had to be a record.
The fall was about as thrilling as he’d imagined, though the impact that followed wasn’t fun at all. Crazy how he could parachute out of a plane at twenty thousand feet, and it was no big deal but jump out a second story window and it felt like he’d done a belly flop in a granite-filled swimming pool.
Pushing himself up with a groan, Lennox took off running toward the shed. He’d barely made it a dozen steps before the ground around him was ripped apart by automatic weapon fire. Since he hadn’t had a chance to reload his rifle, Lennox pulled the handgun from his back pocket, relieved it had stayed there throughout his trip through two different windows.
Spinning quickly, Lennox took careful shots at his two pursuers. Both of them stumbled, though he had no idea if they’d be staying down in any permanent way. But there was no one on his tail at the moment, so he’d take what he could get.
Lennox sprinted in the general direction of the shed, shoving the Glock in his back pocket again so he could reload the assault rifle with his last magazine as he ran. He should have searched that first guy for more ammo, he thought, kicking himself for the newbie mistake. This last magazine wouldn’t last long and then he’d be down to the pistol.
He sighed in relief when he finally saw the outline of the big maintenance shed off to the left, with bright lights shining through the windows. He turned that way, slowing as he heard voices vibrating through the metal walls. But he started moving faster a moment later when he realized that one of those voices was Talia, and she sounded like she was in trouble.
Moving fast, Lennox rounded the building and hurried to the front door, slowing only when he had a hand on the knob and was ready to go in. Then he took a second to ease open the door a crack, taking a quick peek. What he saw had his hand tightening on the doorknob and his rifle coming up as he readied himself to charge into the building.
Two men with assault rifles had pushed Talia and Katrina up against a big green tractor, weapons trained on them. They were seconds away from executing them.
Normally, the idea of throwing himself into the middle of a hostage situation wouldn’t even make Lennox bat an eye. But this was Talia they were talking about. The idea of getting this wrong—of her getting hurt—almost froze him solid. But he took a deep breath, shook himself to clear his head, then shoved open the door at a dead run.
The first man went down without ever knowing Lennox was there. The second reacted faster, lunging forward and getting an arm around Talia, pulling her in front of him as a human shield, awkwardly twisting his assault rifle around so he could shove the barrel against her head.
Lennox cursed silently but on the outside, he kept his face completely calm as he continued moving toward Talia and the man holding her. The guy twisted his body keeping Talia in front of him, preventing Lennox from getting a clear shot.
“Back off or I’ll shoot her!” the man warned.
Being at an impasse in the shed was the worst possible situation, especially since the guy’s backup was almost certainly getting closer by the second. He needed to end this before anyone else showed up. But he couldn’t take the shot, not without putting Talia at risk.
Talia caught his eye and he saw something there on her face that scared him. Whatever she was planning, he knew he was going to hate it.
Gaze still on Lennox, she jerked her elbow back, smashing her captor in the face. It wasn’t a stunning blow, but it was distracting, and she used the opportunity to throw herself to the side.
Lennox lifted his rifle a little tighter to his shoulder and took the shot.
Then he raced forward and slid to the floor beside Talia. His heart pounded even harder than it already had been when he saw how still she was.
“Talia, are you okay?” he asked urgently, sweeping her with his gaze for signs of injury as he rested a hand on her shoulder. “Please be okay.”
She rolled over, catching sight of the two dead bodies on the floor before swinging around to gaze up at him in surprise. “You came!” Her eyes filled with alarm. “He took Maria and Beverly! We need to go after them!”
Talia jumped up and ran for the door. Lennox was so startled that it took him a second to push himself to his feet and by then, she was already out of the building.
Cursing, Lennox chased after her, Katrina on his heels.
“Keller said something about taking them back to the vehicles to use Maria as leverage against her father,” Katrina told him.
“Shit.” Lennox picked up his pace the moment he was outside, but Talia was already out of sight. “Katrina, stay here where it’s safe.”
“No way!” she said from behind him. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw her running hard to keep up. “Beverly is my responsibility. I have to help get her back.”
Lennox would have stopped to argue, but he couldn’t waste the time. Talia had too much of a head start and there was no way he could let her confront Keller or any of his people by herself.
“Just stay behind me,” he said. “And don’t put yourself in a position where I have to stop what I’m doing to save you.”
Lennox expected to hear some grumbles at that, but Katrina never got a chance to voice them before a man leaped out of the shadows and started shooting at them.
Shoving Katrina out of the way, Lennox threw himself in the opposite direction, hoping to draw fire his way. It worked—probably better than he’d intended—as rounds tore up the ground around him.
He returned fire but the man was fast, even with the noticeable limp which meant he was probably one of the guys Lennox had injured earlier. Every time Lennox pulled the trigger on his assault rifle, sure he had the man in his sights, the idiot would dive, duck, or roll away. It was infuriating as hell. And Lennox had to blaze through his entire magazine and waste precious time before he finally got the agile POS.
“We have to move!” he shouted, dropping the assault rifle and turning to look for Katrina. “If we don’t hurry, we might be too late to save Talia and the kids.”
When silence met his words, Lennox realized with a sinking feeling that Katrina must have gone after Talia while he’d been distracted.
Cursing, he took off running at full speed toward the front of the house.
It couldn’t have taken him more than thirty seconds and he was still almost too late. Maria was already in the backseat of one of the SUVs, fighting with the driver in the front seat like a tiny wild cat as she attempted to get out of the vehicle.
Talia stood outside the SUV, one arm wrapped protectively around Beverly while she attempted to fight off Keller and get around him to help Maria at the same time. It wasn’t going well. And right into the middle of all the mayhem, Katrina went charging in to help .
Even as he continued forward, a hand reaching back to grab the handgun in his back pocket, Keller shoved Talia so hard she bounced off the side of the vehicle and tumbled to the ground. Another shove sent Katrina flying as well and she grunted as she hit the driveway.
Jaw tight, Lennox brought the Glock up and took aim at the center of Keller’s chest. As if sensing the gun trained on him, Keller lunged for Talia, grabbing her arm and yanking her to her feet, then did the same to Beverly. Using them as a shield, the man backed toward the SUV.
As much as Lennox wanted to take another shot, he couldn’t risk it.
So instead, Lennox stepped to his right, trying to get into a position that would give him a clear shot at Keller. Unfortunately, Keller moved too, keeping Talia and Beverly in front of him. Arm around Talia, he transferred Beverly to that hand as well so he could press his gun against Talia’s temple, the threat clear and obvious.
On the upside, Keller’s attention was so focused on Lennox that it gave Katrina the opening she’d been waiting for. Lunging forward, she wrapped her hands around Beverly, dragging her away from him and urging her to safety.
Keller’s mouth tightened but there was nothing he could do. Not when he had to keep his gun trained on Talia to hold off Lennox. Gaze locked on Lennox, he retreated into the backseat of the SUV, Talia still clutched in his arm.
Lennox cursed and sprinted toward them but it was too late. The SUV was already speeding away, Talia and Maria inside.
Turning, he ran for his truck, intending to go after them, but was forced to dive for the ground as Keller fired his weapon multiple times. He wasn’t shooting at Lennox though. Instead, the large caliber bullets riddled his pickup, taking out the tires on the driver’s side as well as the engine block.
His truck wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was he.
From where he still half lay on the ground, Lennox watched as the SUV drove away, the sound of Talia’s and Maria’s screams echoing in the night as it sped down the driveway and disappeared past the guard shack.
“What are we going to do?” Katrina said, her voice shaking as she held a crying Beverly close. “How are we going to get Talia and Maria back?”
“I don’t know yet,” Lennox said, jaw tight. “But we will.”
Because the alternative was unthinkable.