Page 84 of Lethal Weakness

“Shit.”

We both hear the engines revving as reinforcements head our way, and neither of us says a word. I’m not even sure who I’m speaking to because he looks like my Jack, but he moves like…

“Stay still,” he warns me right before he shoots the chain connecting the bear trap to the closest tree.

It breaks the chain, but I’m still trapped in the metal clamps.

“Come on, we need better cover.” His arm goes around my back, anchoring me by my armpits as he keeps his rifle high and drags me behind the closest tree.

I groan in agony the whole way, and his sorrow-filled eyes meet me as soon as he rests my back against the trunk.

“You’re here,” I murmur in exhaustion.

“Of course, I am,” he says so assuredly. As if there is nowhere else he would possibly be than right here… Saving me.

He brushes his thumbs over my face, clearing the hair and muck from my skin. “I’m taking you home.”

A sad sob escapes me because home seems too far away to be possible.

He leans wide all of a sudden, popping off two more shots into the trees where two men emerge. They drop instantly, and I’m left staring at the man who is still a stranger to me.

“What are you?”

“I was a SEAL.” That’s all I get before three more men come running into the clearing and he puts them down. “Let’s get this off.”

He lowers his rifle from his shoulder and grips both sides of the trap in his hands.

“What are you doing?”

“This might hurt, and your foot might feel like it’s going to fall off, but it won’t. I promise.”

“Jack,” I whimper right before he pries the metal clamp apart with brute force, grunting as air escapes his lungs.

He white-knuckles it until it’s wide enough that my ankle is released from its teeth, making me cry out in agony. The exertion it takes to hold it open long enough for my foot to slip through makes his veins pop, but he doesn’t relent until I’m free.

Gasping in pain but free.

He finally releases the trap, letting the spring slam shut again, and it nearly catches his fingers before he chucks it into the trees.

“Ow, ow, ow,” I cry, hugging my knee to my chest because it hurts so bad.

He looks as closely as he can at my bloodied leg, but it’s dark, and I can tell he doesn’t want to touch it. It’s either that bad, or he doesn’t want to risk hurting me further.

“Can you move it?”

“No,” I answer immediately.

I can see his wheels turning as he checks the rounds left in his rifle and readies it back across his chest.

“Have you ever shot a gun?”

“No.”

He hands me the smallest one he’s probably carrying, but it’s like a boulder in my hand. “Point and shoot.”

“Jack, I don’t know how…”

“Linden, they want to keep you from getting to Avery. Shoot any mother fucker who wants to stop you.”