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Vaguely, she noticed the first man was standing up next to her. “I’m going to set the charges. Start heading to the side of the camp with the vehicles. As soon as I’m done, I’m going for a vehicle. Hopefully, you’ll be there by the time I’ve procured one.”

“Got it,” the man holding her said.

The first man left like he had never been there. The man carrying her looked down into her face. “Ms. Rivers, I’m going to have to set a fast pace to get us out of the line of fire and into a good position to take off in one of the vehicles. It’s going to be a rough ride, can you handle it?”

“Yes.” Her voice was so hoarse, she wondered if he could hear her.

“Is there any way you could ride piggyback along my front? We could make better time.”

Jenny felt the tears coming as she shook her head. She was useless.

“It’s not a problem. We can get this done. You know the SEAL motto. The only easy day was yesterday. We’ve got this.”

Well, that answered that question. They were SEALs. Maybe there was hope, after all.

7

The plan had been that when the mercenary camp was taken care of, Allen could land the helicopter and extract them. But in this sideways torrential downpour? Kostya wouldn’t risk it when there were other means to get them out of there, like the vehicles.

When Braxton got the third charge set, he drifted back into the forest, careful that nobody saw him. As soon as he lost sight of the clearing, he ran around to the west side so that he could commandeer a ride. Out of everybody, he was the fastest at hot-wiring a car. He’d even beat out the geek, Gideon.

It had to do with how good he was with munitions. Brax could hot-wire anything with wheels. But maybe he wouldn’t have to if this crew left the keys in one of the normal spots. On top of the wheels, under the sun visor and, of course, the glove box. He got to the vehicles and headed to the first one, a Toyota Land Cruiser. That would work best, and he’d leave the van for the rest of the men. Since they drove on the left side of the road, the cars had the steering wheels on the wrong side as far as Brax was concerned, but it worked to his advantage this time. The passenger’s side was parallel to the clearing, so he looked on top of the passenger side tires. No keys. He tried the driver’s door, and it was open. As soon as he did, he softly laughed.

There was always option four, leave the keys in the ignition.

“Nolan,” he said into his mic. “I’ve got our vehicle. It’s a Land Cruiser. We can push down the two back seats and you’ll have enough room to maneuver with her. Give me your position and I’ll come help carry her.”

“I’m almost to your position. Wait there,” Nolan responded.

“Is everybody in place?” Kostya asked. Everyone muttered yes. “Brax, how much longer before the charges go?”

Brax looked down at his watch and waited ten seconds to answer. “Four minutes exactly.”

“I’m here,” Nolan said through the driver’s side window. “I’ll go through the back.”

“Hold on, I’ll push back the rear seats so you can work on her when she’s flat.”

Nolan nodded.

Brax maneuvered to the back and pushed the seats down. The entire vehicle was filthy, but it was a hell of a lot better than the slurry of mud that was in the shack she’d been kept in. When he spied a tarp he grinned. Even better. He pushed the debris to the end of the Land Cruiser and placed the tarp out so Nolan could work on Jenny.

“Speed it up.” Nolan slammed his fist against the tailgate. Brax opened it and carefully took Jenny from Nolan’s arms and placed her down on the tarp. He yanked off his backpack and fished out his change of shirt, skivvies, and socks. He wrapped the underwear and socks into his shirt, and created a semblance of a pillow for her. Nolan gave him the side-eye as he pushed him out of the way.

She started to cough. Deep bronchial coughs that had her moaning in pain as she clutched her right side. Where her ribs were.

“Punctured lung?” Brax asked Nolan.

“No, she wouldn’t be able to cough like she is. Right now⁠—”

Explosions rocked the land cruiser, and Jenny groaned in pain again. It was heart-wrenching.

“Drive!” Kostya yelled through the comm.

The sound of rapid assault rifles going off was deafening. Brax scrambled between the passenger and driver’s seat, got situated, then started the engine.

He’d already scoped out where the road was, and of course the truck was pointing away from it. There was no way he was going to circle around or even do a three-point turn; he didn’t want to do anything that might put them in the line of fire. Fuck, he was going to have to get the hell out of here driving in reverse. He wouldn’t have done this; except he’d seen he had a rear windshield wiper.

As soon as he slammed the SUV into reverse, the rearview camera went into action and it displayed everything behind him. That’s not how he drove. He threw his left hand over the seat, and looked backward, and hit the accelerator. It didn’t move.