Diego knew immediately that Luther was going to try to make it to one of the entrances to the caves. By abandoning the young woman, he gave them both a chance to live. Luther had to believe the soldiers wouldn’t kill the girl, who had once again curled up in a ball. She waved him away, and Luther was up and running. Diego rapidly shot as many of the soldiers gunning for him as possible, but there were so many. Inevitably Luther went down, rolling and tumbling, leaving a trail of blood splotches until he disappeared in the higher grass surrounding a pile of boulders.
Diego shot one of the soldiers who shot Luther, but even as the bullet plowed through the man’s chest, a secondary spray of blood spewed close to the first. Warrior Woman had turned back and was firing as well. She seemed to be an excellent shot. When she tried to get to the other two, she was instantly cut off.
From his vantage point above them, he could see the soldiers swooping in on the young woman on the ground. They surrounded her, guns out, but she didn’t put up any resistance as they approached her. It didn’t appear she had any weapons on her, and it was apparent to anyone looking at her that she was violently ill.
They secured her and turned away from the firefight still waging between Warrior Woman and other soldiers. They began to run back toward the meadow. Diego had to let them go and turn his attention to aiding Warrior Woman. She was game, that was certain. She didn’t flinch from a fight, even though the odds were overwhelming.
Diego didn’t miss, and he was dropping the soldiers closest toher as quickly as possible. She had no choice but to move from the depression she was in and head up the mountain to evade the wave of soldiers. She couldn’t get to the other woman, and she probably had no idea where Luther had gone. He’d vanished, as was his way. There were times when Diego wondered if he could teleport. He knew a couple of men who could do so, but they’d been enhanced in ways he hadn’t thought Luther had been.
Warrior Woman refused to give up or go down. She sighted target after target as her guns spat thunder. He tried to help her, picking off every enemy combatant he could. But no matter how many soldiers they took out, more took their place.
He swore as a bullet smashed into her, driving her backward and down. It appeared as if she might have been hit with a second bullet while she was going down. Diego retaliated, killing the two shooters, but soldiers swarmed around her, kicking her weapon from her hand and hastily dragging her into a more sheltered position, where a man, presumably a medic, crouched over her.
Diego didn’t like the way his heart accelerated or the way a terrible cold fury burned through him. He’d felt that same kind of icy rage when his sister had been murdered. He’d been just a boy at the time, but he’d gone hunting nevertheless, and he hadn’t stopped until all four offenders were food for scavengers.
He knew just how unrelenting and merciless he could be when the cold fury took him. It was not a sensation he enjoyed. He didn’t want to be a man who gloried in revenge. Or one who would kill out of anger, no matter how righteous that anger might be.
No, he preferred to be detached and coolheaded. To know that every bullet he fired, every life he took, was a necessity, a task he performed solely to defend others, protect his own life or serve his country.
After a few minutes, the men hoisted the limp, unconscious body of Warrior Woman and started hiking up the mountain withher. Clearly, they were making their way up the mountain, through the forest, to a clearing where they could rendezvous with a helicopter. Reluctantly he let them go.
He studied the soldiers. There was now a division of thirds. One-third had taken the girl with the darker hair toward the road where their vehicles had been left. They were going to find that Luther had rendered them useless. It would slow them down but not stop them. The second faction, the soldiers who had parachuted in, were taking Warrior Woman into the forest and up the mountain. The last third were scouring Luther’s homestead, looking for him.
Diego made his way down the mountain in a careful retreat. He had trackers in both women. Admittedly, he was concerned about Warrior Woman. She’d taken some nasty hits. His instinct was to go after her, but with the transmitters he could follow her easily enough. It was the only logical decision. He had to find out what he was dealing with before he made his plans.
Finding Luther was the most important first step. If Luther was in good enough shape, he’d be able to go after the other woman.
Luther would be able to tell Diego what was going on. Why so many soldiers were determined to take the women and why those soldiers were still hunting Luther. Once he secured Luther, he would then follow the soldiers who’d taken Warrior Woman. He hoped Luther was in good enough shape to go after the other woman. That was his best course of action, but he couldn’t do anything for either woman until he ensured that Luther was alive and would stay that way.
Diego scanned his surroundings. He knew there was an extensive cave system running below the property. He knew several ways into the cave system, though the caves weren’t on any map. Luther had discovered them accidentally and established severalhidden entrances to them, including one from inside his cabin. The cabin entrance was closest. To reach it, Diego just had to get through the line of soldiers and sneak into the cabin without being seen. The soldiers had already searched it looking for Luther. He had a big property, and the chances of them returning to search it again were low. They might guard it, and he particularly needed to rid them of their commander. He would have to do that before he got to the cabin.
Diego called on the red-tailed hawk he’d sent out to find the commander in charge. He would have to be secreted somewhere up high, where he could oversee Luther’s property. He was directing the remaining soldiers in a grid pattern. The hawk reacted with a dizzying vision of a man perched on the branch of a tree. Diego would need a clear line of sight to take him down.
The cabin wasn’t exactly in the open; there were too many flowering bushes growing tall and wide around it. That provided him with cover as he made his way through enemy lines to a large bush growing near the cabin’s front door. He used his ability to feel the ground and felt the crush of heavy boots coming down on tall grasses and brush.
The flame azalea standing sentry beside the cabin’s door was in full bloom, the showy double blossoms bright and gorgeous and plentiful, the low-hanging branches providing a curtain for him to slide behind. The last time he’d hidden in this bush, he’d had to wait for enemies close to the cabin to move past, and it was no different this time.
The flowers were gorgeous. The bush had been Lotty’s favorite, and Luther babied it until it thrived, the abundance of fiery red-orange flowers a testament to the great love he’d borne for his wife.
Rubin loved Jonquille the way Luther had loved Lotty.
The deep connection between them left Diego feeling isolatedand alone. Rubin and Jonquille didn’t mean for him to feel that way. His brother and sister-in-law included Diego in their lives, but just seeing them, he felt apart. Just as when he’d observed Lotty and Luther when he’d been a child. Outside their circle of love. Unworthy of being included in it.
He knew he hadn’t been loved as a child by his mother. She’d withdrawn from her children but still tried to take care of them—with the exception of Diego. Diego had never been able to do anything right. He’d learned fast that he was going to get into trouble no matter what he did. Somehow, it didn’t matter to him. He’d adopted Rubin’s code and stayed with it. Loyalty. Family. Community. Survival. Rubin had been the leader in all things moral, and Diego followed him.
He could honestly say he knew how to love. He loved his brother and Jonquille. He loved Ezekiel, Mordichai and Malichai Fortunes. When teenage Rubin and Diego hopped a train and headed for anywhere but here, they landed in Detroit, where Ezekiel eventually found them on the street trying to survive. They had no problem in the woods, but learning the ways of city streets was much more difficult, and they had a tendency to defend themselves to the death. Ezekiel took them under his protective wing and guided them through those perils. And there were many perils. Just as many as living off the land in these mountains provided, only in the city, the dangers were different.
The faint vibration in the ground ceased, confirming the soldiers had moved away from Luther’s cabin.
Once the soldiers were completely away from the cabin, Diego made it onto the roof. Thanks to the red-tailed hawk, he knew where the commanding officer was secreted while directing the search for Luther. It took only seconds to set up and begin his sweep of the trees.
The terrain rose into a good-sized hill with a large grove of treescovering it. Using his enhanced vision, he saw the commander’s face come into sharp focus.
Diego took a breath, let it out and squeezed the trigger. The moment he did, he rolled from his vantage point, taking his gun with him. He hit the ground, caught up his pack and entered the cabin.
2
Entering the caves tracking a wounded Luther was a bit like hunting a wounded cougar or leopard. Diego knew the way through the cabin into the narrow, low man-made tunnel Luther had dug to connect to the cave system. The dark, twisting uphill tunnel was reinforced with metal, rebar and cement. Diego followed along, bending nearly double in places as he made his way uphill and then down toward the woods.
