Free Fall (Elite Force #4)(20)
Author: Catherine Mann

That didn’t scare him. But the fact that the person had used his real name? That scared the shit out of him. Only one person would use his name on this line while he was in the middle of a top secret op in Africa.

“How did you get this number?” Damn it, their business was concluded. He’d done what they asked. The debt had been settled.

“My people can always find your number.”

All those video screens and the hum of activity in the next cubicle over had his skin crawling. If a Predator unscrambled his encrypted signal… “I can’t talk now.”

“Then just listen,” the mechanical voice continued. “There’s a young man who will be on the flight with the rescued hostages.”

How the hell did they know that clear across the ocean? He looked around him at the computers with workers hunched over the screens, wearing headsets and monitoring data. Who? Who was trying to sabotage his life? Was someone here talking to him or feeding information?

Maybe if he kept the person talking, he could find the bastard who’d been making him dance like a puppet for the past year. He wasn’t some errand boy.

He’d paid off his debt. “What is it you want?”

“Very simple. We just want to know what he says, who he implicates.”

“Who is this person?”

“Check your messages when they land. We’ll send you the rest of your assignment then.”

That sounded easy enough, but he didn’t need their help anymore. He wasn’t going to risk his ass for nothing.

“No can do,” he lied. “I don’t have access to what you want. Sorry, but I’m out.”

“I’m disappointed to hear that. But not surprised.”

A crackle sound on the other end of the line and then…

“Henry?” The voice changer had been removed. His wife spoke now, familiar, dear—terrified.

Panic twisted his gut in half. “Charlotte? Are you okay?”

Please Lord, let her be all right. His mind was already racing to a horrific conclusion.

“They haven’t hurt me, but they have guns, Henry. They carjacked me.” Her voice cracked on a sob. “They have Ellie too. We were in the minivan together. I’d just picked her up from preschool.”

Whimpers carried over the line, his daughter in the background.

Nausea welled, and he tried like hell to swallow it back. He was going to be sick, right here in front of everyone in the hangar. His secret would be out and his family would suffer the consequences.

Sweat beaded on his brow. He had to keep his cool, for his family, for his career, for his life.

“Stay calm, Charlotte. I’ll take care of everything. I promise.”

“Henry, I love…”

The phone line went dead.

Chapter 5

His time with Stella was at an end.

Jose eyed the approaching aircraft with relief—and yeah, a little disappointment since he would have to say good-bye once and for all. This bizarre pocket of time together was over, reopening all the wounds that had only just started healing after Stella dumped him the first time.

There wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Their ride had arrived, descending about fifty yards away. Not a helicopter after all, but a CV-22, the Air Force’s newer tilt rotor aircraft. Engines on the wings moved, enabling it to do vertical takeoff and landings like a chopper, then point forward to fly like a regular plane. The CV-22 combined the maneuverability of a helicopter with the speed of an airplane.

The military wasn’t messing around here.

Jose stood along with Bubbles, both of them sliding in place along either side of Sutton Harper, propping him as he hopped on one leg.

Jose glanced left at Stella, knowing he had to help the lame student, knowing she could take care of herself. But aching with everything inside him to toss her over his shoulder and carry her straight to the aircraft himself. “Stella? Are you good?”

“I’m fine.” Her hand fell away from her ribs, the ribs he’d seen her cradling one too many times. “The sooner we get onboard, the sooner I can let you medics baby me to pieces.”

The CV-22 descended, blades whomp, whomp, whomping, pushing the air downward. Tall grass bowed in an outward circle.

“Go,” Bubbles shouted. “Go, go, go!”

Bubbles’s words popped like a starter pistol through Jose’s brain. He ran. His body worked on instinct from dozens of marathons, countless missions. His feet moved, legs pumping with everything inside him. Sprinting out from the cover of trees. Each step pushed the fresh scent of morning out of the ground.

As he raced closer to the helicopter, he could already almost smell the familiarity of it, a mustiness of past missions mingling with the scent of hydraulic fluid. This was his life, the military. Dreams of enlisting had been the only thing that kept him going as a teenager when his mother’s drinking got worse. When his sister started drinking too.

He’d been thirteen years old then, parked in front of the television for the summer because his sister drank away their zoo pass money. He’d seen a commercial about joining the Air Force, seeing the world.

For him, anywhere sounded better than where he’d been that day—

“Jose!” Stella’s scream just barely carried over the roar of the helicopter.

He jerked his head around fast and saw her. She’d stopped dead in her tracks, a gun in her hand and horror plastered across her face. His 9 mm that he’d given her, not really expecting that she would need to use it. He followed the line of her aimed weapon.

A teenage boy ran out of the tree line with a rifle slung over his shoulder. A couple of goats scattered as he plowed forward, his words carried away by the wind.

“Halt!” Stella shouted.

The boy froze, his eyes wide, but his hold on his rifle looked practiced, comfortable. Stella leveled the gun, pointing with the fluid ease of training. Jose’s stomach rose up to his throat. The thunder of the lowering CV-22 echoed the roar in his head. The boy didn’t seem much older than Jose had been when sitting in front of the television all those years ago, dreaming of joining the military but too young to make that dream come true yet.

Carefully, the boy tossed away the weapon and raised his arms in the air, the rising sun swelling behind him. Wind from the rotor blades whipped his too large khakis and T-shirt. His broad forehead was furrowed, his hair buzzed short. He was skinny, but it was tough to tell if that was from hunger or just teenage lankiness.

It all happened so fast, not more than five or six seconds, and in that time, any of them could have shot the boy. Or given the way the kid handled the rifle, he could have killed them in their hesitation. What the hell were they supposed to do with him now?