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GQ was as strungout and confused as he was at the funeral. Sleep eluded him on the plane. Between his mother’s deathbed confession and the mess with Striker, his mind was spinning. He let out a heavy sigh, onlyhismom would dump a shit basket at his feet and then leave him.
He was sharing a room with Preacher, but after that charged look at the elevator, it was clear Preacher had the lovely but scary Karasu in his sights. Who was a brother to stand in the way of that kind of situation?
Getting laid helped with a lot of issues. But women weren’t exactly regulation, even in this somewhat civilian setting. Struggling with the hollow feeling of loneliness yawning inside him, he shifted restlessly.
He rose and grabbed a bottle of water from the small fridge. It was comfortable in the room with the air doing its job, but GQ felt caged.
He was often disappointed in his mom, but after her sudden death and the mind-bomb she’d dropped on him, he was still sorting it all out. He couldn’t help wondering what his dad was like, really like, not seen through the bitter lenses of his mother’s vision.
But did he really want to track him down if he could find some clue to who he was? He realized there was DNA tracking now that could pinpoint where his relatives were. It was a bit overwhelming to think he might have half-siblings or other relatives out there that his mom refused to talk about. Would they even care about him at all?
He would have to be smart if he was going to pursue this, but again, he wasn’t convinced it would be a smart move.
It was approaching midnight and the fast trip across the world was catching up to him. They would be hitting the ground running tomorrow morning. Yet when he rose from the comfortable sofa, he walked past the living room furniture positioned in front of a bank of tall windows, a pair of doors between. He threw them open and stepped out onto the balcony. Three floors above the street, he could see the lights of La Paz in the distance in a soft glow against the dark sky.
Behind the hotel was a large expanse of greenery, a ribbon of dark shadow. GQ couldn’t say he ever liked operating in the jungle. The SEAL part of him liked the cover, but it was a double-edged sword. What could be hidden, could also lie in wait.
He breathed in the heavy green odors, identifying the pretty floral scent of bougainvillea, a hardy flowering plant with different color leaves, often mistaken for flowers. He searched and found them growing along the white stucco fence that ran along the back of the hotel property, especially around a weathered, gray-blue wooden gate. He thought about how he would have liked to see that small house he had lived in with his mom be more cheerful. Maybe it would be a good idea to overhaul the whole place. Rose’s mom was fond of gardening. Maybe he could get some tips from her.
He respected the jungle, a world unto itself, ancient, mysterious, and primal. It was more of an entity rather than an ecosystem. Alive, breathing, watching with a dark shadowed soul.
The heat was thick, the sound of insects and creatures buzzing and clicking in the night, the trees moving and rustling in the upper branches and on the ground. Monkeys, most likely, nocturnal creatures foraging.
His head came up, his senses sharpening, the hair on the back of his neck bristled. Something was wrong…. Something moved through the brush, and he squinted into the dark. Was that— Could it be—
He ducked inside, adrenaline shooting into his system, and grabbed his combat helmet with the NVGs still attached. He set it on his head and rushed back outside. Setting the scopes over his eyes, he looked again.
Someone stumbled out of the trees, dressed in black, looking distinctly like covert special ops, and from what he could see weaponless, defenseless. Female. Clearly Injured with the way she moved. He rushed back inside, grabbed his tech vest and shrugged into it, snapping it snug. Buckling on his sidearm, he checked the chamber, racked the slide, and holstered the Glock. All that in mere seconds just like he was trained. Guys like him were always cocked, locked, and loaded. Snatching his phone off the coffee table, he tucked it into the back pocket of his jeans.
Not wanting to take the precious time to get through the long expanse of the hotel, he flipped over the balcony and shimmed down to the second-floor balcony, dropped without sound onto the bottom floor patio, then the ground. He crouched and grabbed his cell, called Iceman.
“This better be good, GQ.”
“Injured woman coming out of the jungle,” he said quickly. “Dressed in military clothing. Heading there now.”
“Where?” Ice’s voice was cool and crisp.
“Behind the hotel.”
“On our way.”
GQ pulled his Glock, thumbing off the safety, running for the gate. Unlatching it as he rushed through, he then sprinted across the open ground toward her and the edge of the underbrush. His senses heightened and every survival instinct switched on. He wrapped his right hand around his left on the gun’s grip, his gaze raking the area. The woman stumbled and went down to her knees, then she was back up again. She broke into a stumbling run, calling out weakly as sweat poured off her. “Help!”
He wanted to go to her, but he had to make sure she didn’t have anyone on her tail.
He listened, filtered out the animal sounds, and background noise, concentrating his hearing for a breath, for a step, for any little snick of sound that would tell him she had pursuers. GQ saw a man slide from tree to tree, and another tango flashed behind his NVGs. He moved to intercept, silently, quickly. He passed the woman, but she was down, and unmoving. He crouched and touched her neck, breathing easier at the strong but rapid beat of her pulse. He didn’t take his eyes off the underbrush.
Cracks of automatic gunfire, followed by an outburst of raw, primal screaming from the monkeys overhead, sent GQ hitting the dirt next to the woman, covering her. He aimed at the muzzle flashes and squeezed the trigger of his Glock 19 twice, rapid-fire. He heard a grunt and then the sounds of crashing through underbrush that slowly disappeared into the distance.
“Fucking cowards,” he growled. He holstered his weapon and turned fully to the woman, rolling her onto her back. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was shallow. He reached into his tact vest and pulled out his med kit. He used his knife to cut away the bloody sleeve. Pressing gauze to the wound, he lifted it and checked. Flesh wound. The head wound was bleeding profusely, as they usually did, but it also looked superficial. Her nose was probably broken.
She didn’t seem to be hit anywhere else.
He felt the air move behind him and pulled his weapon whirling. Iceman and the rest of the team raced toward him. “The underbrush. Two tangos,” he called out. “I winged one of them.”
His teammates and Karasu, dressed in some matte black catsuit that outlined every curve of her body, swept past him, all of them carrying their sidearms. Breakneck, Boomer, and Skull with Bones running beside him disappeared into the dense foliage.
Hazard, Preacher, and Ice took up a perimeter around them. He glanced at Preacher, who was busy watching their sixes. Lucky fucker.
