Chapter 12
CHAPTER TWELVE
Chase coughed and tried his best not to pass out.
He’d been talking to Ghost and Fletch in the living room about the plan for the morning once Sadie’s uncle arrived, when the world around them had exploded.
One minute they’d been standing there, and the next he was lying on the ground trying to catch his breath.
He sat up, momentarily confused, but quickly figured out they were under attack when he saw the hole in the side of the house and Ghost and Fletch lying motionless across from him.
His first thought was for Sadie, but from what he could tell, the missile, or whatever it was that had come through the house, had hit the side opposite the upstairs bedrooms. He turned his head to look toward the stairs and gasped in horror when he saw they were cut off by a pile of debris.
Fletch moaned then, and Chase turned his attention from the blocked stairs to his friends. He crawled over to Fletch, wincing with every movement. His side hurt, bad, but he ignored it for the moment.
“Fletch, wake up, man.”
Fletch’s eyes opened then closed again. Chase saw a large piece of wood sticking out of his side. He was bleeding profusely. Swearing, he looked over to Ghost. The other man was sitting up now and shaking his head as if trying to get his bearings.
“Ghost, Fletch is hurt,” Chase told him. “I need your help.”
As if his words were a switch, Ghost turned his head and immediately crawled over to where Chase was kneeling over Fletch. “Shit. That doesn’t look good.”
“I know, but we’ve got to get that out.”
“Fuck.” Ghost looked around as if searching for something. “We’d be better off leaving it in place, but I don’t think we’ve got a choice. We need to stop that bleeding.”
“Right, that’s what I was thinking,” Chase agreed. “If he wasn’t bleeding so heavily, we could leave it in, but if we don’t stop the blood, he’ll bleed out before help can get here.”
Ghost nodded grimly and quickly took off his T-shirt.
Chase reached for the wood. “I’ll pull, you get ready to apply pressure. Ready? One, two, three!” On the last count, Chase pulled and the wood easily slid out of Fletch’s side. He moaned but didn’t open his eyes.
Ghost was there to immediately apply pressure to the hole in his teammate’s side. Using his T-shirt to help staunch the blood flow, he leaned on the wound and turned to Chase. “The women?”
“Not sure. The stairway is blocked, but it looks like this room took the brunt of the damage.”
Ghost turned to look at the stairs. “Fuck. Jonathan?”
“That’s my assumption,” Chase agreed.
“Fuck,” Ghost repeated.
“My guess is that he’s trying to force us out of the house. Cutting us off from the women was just a bonus. He’s not going to try to face us one-on-one. He’s perfectly happy working from a distance and doing a snatch-and-grab.”
“Ghost?” Rayne’s muffled voice came from above the blocked stairway.
“Yeah, baby, I’m here,” Ghost replied in a loud voice.
“Are you okay?”
“How are you? And the others?”
Chase noted that he didn’t tell Rayne about Fletch.
“We’re good. We can’t get in Annie’s room, but Sadie somehow wiggled in there through a hole the size of a dime. I smell smoke… Is there a fire in there?”
Chase turned to look and saw that indeed there was a fire. He’d been so intent on Fletch that he hadn’t even noticed. He coughed.
“Yeah, but we’re good. We’re gettin’ out now.”
“Ghost?” Rayne asked. “Where’s Fletch?”
“He’s here,” Ghost told her. Then added, “He’s hurt, Rayne, but he’s gonna be fine. Me and Chase have him. Hear me? He’s good. You guys just need to get outside. But stay together. Under no circumstances should you split up.”
“We can’t get to Annie! Sadie said she’s going to take her out the window in her room.”
Chase swore under his breath. He and Ghost looked down at Fletch. They were both needed to get him out of the house. Ghost couldn’t take his hands off the wound, and he couldn’t carry him and keep pressure on his side at the same time.
Ghost obviously came to the same conclusion because he told Rayne, “Get out of the house. Find Sadie and stick with her. This wasn’t an accident. You hear me?”
“Oh God. Yeah, Ghost, I hear you.”
Both he and Ghost heard Rayne calling out to Emily as she backed away from the blocked entryway.
“Come on, Em. We need to get out of here. Sadie’s waiting for us.
I’m sure Annie’s fine. She’s probably excited about all this, not scared.
Come on.” Her voice shook, but she was doing what Ghost had asked.
Chase met Ghost’s eyes. They both coughed as the room continued to fill with smoke.
The flames were higher now. They didn’t have a choice; they couldn’t stay here, no matter how dangerous it could be to move Fletch.
They were damned if they did and damned if they didn’t.
But the fire would kill them all if they didn’t get out of the house.
“I’ll go recon a way out,” Chase told Ghost.
He nodded.
Chase rose on wobbly legs and put a hand on his side as he stood up. It hurt like a motherfucker. He looked down at his hand and saw it was smeared with blood. It wasn’t as bad as Fletch’s wound, but he’d obviously been hit by flying debris.
The easiest way out would be through the hole in the wall that had been created when the rocket entered the house, but the fire was blocking that exit.
He didn’t want to use the front door, as they would be sitting ducks by walking into the yard from such an exposed exit.
That left the back door that led to the backyard and porch area.
Chase peered through the curtain and tried to assess the danger.
He couldn’t see much, as it was still dark, but there didn’t seem to be anything blocking the door and preventing their exit.
They could get Fletch out and into the tall grass surrounding the backyard.
Then he could go and find Sadie and the others.
He made his way back to Fletch and Ghost, coughing the whole time.
The smoke was getting thick, and soon Chase knew they wouldn’t be able to see anything.
He gestured toward the back door and Ghost nodded.
Chase grabbed hold of Fletch’s arm on the side that wasn’t injured and raised his eyebrows at Ghost, asking if he was ready.
When Ghost nodded, Chase used all his strength to pull Fletch across the floor by his arm. Ghost stayed right by their side, on his knees, keeping pressure on Fletch’s wound as they made their way toward the exit.
The amount of effort it took to drag the unconscious man was enormous, and Chase felt blood dripping from his side. But he wasn’t going to give up. Fletch had allowed him to stay at his house, and now it had been destroyed by the very person they’d been trying to stay hidden from.
He vowed right then and there to make sure the man was compensated every penny it would take to rebuild his house.
The FBI would most certainly pitch in, if not outright pay for everything.
They were desperately trying to find Jonathan, almost as desperate as Chase had been.
The stashed weapons in the secret tunnel at the school had made finding Jonathan a priority…
and it looked like they’d had a reason to be worried.
He obviously hadn’t left all of the weapons behind when he’d disappeared.
Chase would pull whatever strings it took to get compensation for Fletch.
They reached the back door and Chase checked it one more time.
He didn’t see anything. He pulled open the door and listened.
All he could hear was the crackling of the flames.
He nodded at Ghost once more and they worked together to get Fletch outside and across the yard.
Pulling the man through the grass was a lot tougher than across the wood floors in his home, but Chase dug deep and managed.
He pulled his friend into the tall grass and panted when they finally stopped. “Someone had to have heard the explosion and called the cops by now. I’ll go and get the women and bring them back here,” Chase told Ghost.
Just then, a huge explosion sounded from the front of the house.
Both men’s heads swung around, even though they couldn’t see anything from behind the house.
Ghost’s gaze went to something beyond Chase, and he exclaimed, “What the fuck?”
Chase turned in time to see a small shape running away from the house and into the woods as if the hounds of hell were at her heels. She was limping as she ran, but Annie definitely had a destination in mind.
“Dammit,” Chase said, wanting to yell out to the little girl, but not willing to risk giving away their position.
Fletch was still vulnerable, and Ghost couldn’t exactly fight someone off…
not with him literally holding Fletch’s life in the palms of his hands.
Their hands were tied, and Chase was the only one who could freely move at the moment.
“Go,” Ghost ordered. “Fuck, go!”
Chase didn’t stick around to debate the issue. Bent over in a crouch to stay low, he took off for the side of the house. He almost ran right into Rayne and Emily. He grabbed Rayne by the shoulders to keep himself from falling over. “Ghost and Fletch are out back in the tall grass. Go.”
“But you’re bleeding!” Rayne said with wide eyes. “Bro, you need to come with us.” She tugged at his sleeve, not letting go, and looking up at him with such concern and fright, he wanted to scoop her up and tell her that everything was fine. But he didn’t have time.
“Annie? Is she with them?” Emily asked urgently.
“No, but she’s fine. I saw her myself. She’s headed for the neighbor’s house. Go. Please.”
Without a word, Emily took off running across the yard in the direction Chase said he’d seen her go.
Chase stared at his sister. Her eyes were wide and she had dirt smeared across her forehead. “Go, sis. I got this.”