“We’ll get to her. Everything else clear?”
“Crystal,” he replies.
“Great.” I turn to survey my team. Even dirtied and bloodied, there’s no other group of men I would count on to have my back. They’re the best of the best. And I’m lucky to serve beside them. “Let’s go find this girl and get her home.”
“On you, Cap,” Sawyer says as he raises his weapon at the ready.
With a final nod, I turn and raise my weapon then head for the stairs. Cowboy was right, and both men at the top of the stairs are down, their eyes frozen open, pulses nonexistent.
God, please let her be alive.
Please don’t let us be too late.
I pause by the door and hold up a fist for my team to pause, too. Pressing my ear to the door to listen for any sounds, I gently close one hand around the handle and try to turn it. The door’s locked, and I hear nothing on the other side.
If she were dead, they wouldn’t have kept the door locked.
Either she’s in there alone—or she’s not. But my hope that we’ll find her alive grows.
Adrenaline pumping through my veins, I shove the anger down to keep a clear head. Details matter in moments like this. Emotions will blur already distorted lines.
Glancing back at my team, I motion for Ryker to come around. He offers me a slight nod, and I raise my weapon all the way, training the barrel on the door. Ryker raises a heavy boot and slams it into the door.
It splinters, and we move in as one.
It takes less than a heartbeat to get inside, but that heartbeat feels like it takes hours when I see a silver blade pressed to the throat of a trembling teenage girl. Her blue eyes are wide and terrified, her cheeks dirty, trails of tears cutting through the grime.
The man behind her glares at me, dark eyes darting back and forth between me and the rest of my team. He’s sizing us up. Trying to decide if he has a chance. Given that he used to be one of us, he likely knows he doesn’t.
“Come on, Martin, you know the only way you’re walking out of this is if you let her go,” I warn, my weapon trained on him and the girl since I can’t get a clear shot through her, considering the coward is using her as a shield.
“You’re on the wrong side,” he snaps.
“You’ve got that backward, Bud,” Sawyer comments. “Good guys don’t kidnap terrified teenage girls. No matter the circumstances. I always knew you were a loose cannon.”
“Please,” she whimpers, the word barely audible with her thick accent and the terror in her tone. “Let me go.”
“Shut up!” Martin yells, pulling her tighter against him. She cries out, and a bead of crimson drips down the side of her throat where the bite of the blade got her.
I glance at Sawyer. Then Ryker. Then one final look in Garrison’s direction.
Their gazes say the same thing I’m thinking: Martin is going to kill her as soon as he comes to the understanding that he’s not leaving here a free man. He knows he’s going down, and he’ll take her with him just to cause as much damage as he can.
Something I can’t allow.
“It’s going to be okay,” I tell the girl. “Okay?”
Her eyes widen, but she takes a deep breath.
I squeeze the trigger.
The gunshot is deafening in this small room, and the girl screams in pain as the bullet rips through the meat of her shoulder and slams into her abductor. Martin releases her and stumbles backward. Both Ryker and Sawyer move in on him while I rush for the girl.
Garrison is already getting his med kit ready to go while I lay my weapon aside and apply pressure.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. “I had no choice.”
“I-I know,” she whimpers. Tears stream down her face. “My dad. I want my dad. Can I go home now?” she sobs.
