Page 80 of Peace Under Fire

Squish glanced at the phone but didn’t reach for it. Instead, he stopped the SUV and glanced over his shoulder. Fabio had stopped rambling, but he still looked too shellshocked to be of much aid. Ajax looked steadier. At least, steady enough to not get himself killed.

“Ajax, head back to support team two.” He hit the button to lift the upper tailgate and watched Ajax vault out the opening like the end of the world was on his ass.

Once the top tailgate was down again, he eased the Rover forward. Still no lights ahead or behind them. If Crusher and crew had survived the attack, they hadn’t come this way for a rendezvous.

He hated leaving his team behind like this, but Crusher was right. He carried the motherlode in his rig. It was his responsibility to get them to safety.

“We need to get out of here,” Mandy said, her voice strained. “This is wearing on Jo.”

Squish pressed down harder on the accelerator. They’d barely covered twenty feet before the shrill scream of snowmobiles sounded ahead. Apparently, the ambush team had abandoned their waiting game.

Doubt surged within him and tried to yank his boot from the accelerator. They were headed directly at those screaming machines, which seemed counterintuitive. What if the bastards ahead could see the Rover? What if he’d imagined that moment in the woods when he’d been stumbling around looking for the SUV? What if he’d imagined Ajax saying he’d walked right through them?

Knowing they had no place else to go, he kept his boot on the pedal.

The snowmobiles came at them like shiny gray insects—noisy and fast. There were three of them, headlights on, two men aboard each vehicle. All of them carried rifles.

They raced forward in an arrow formation, the lead vehicle in the center, the second and third machine slightly behind, to the right and left. They weren’t using spotlights to search the edge of the forest, but then they didn’t need to. There was no way to hide when the tracks in the snow gave your movements away. A tight smirk crept across his face as he imagined their reaction when the Rover’s tracks just stopped after entering the forest.

Would they fan out and search the woods? Christ, he hoped so.

He tensed as the snowmobiles zoomed closer. They were headed directly at them, and there was no way to get out of their path. A sharp, tree-studded bank rose to their left and right.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

He hated, absolutely hated, relying on supernatural bullshit for their safety.

What if JoAnn was wrong? What if those bastards could see them? Or even if they couldn’t see them—because they sure as hell weren’t slowing down to avoid a head on collision—what if the Rover wasn’t exactly gone, either? What if the SUV was invisible but solid, and those bastard’s collided with them at full force? Or what if JoAnn’s energy lapsed as the snowmobiles reached them?

So many what ifs.

The snowmobiles were close enough now that he could see that the men riding them were scanning the sides of the driveway. What they weren’t doing was looking at the Land Rover.

And then he could see the whites of the lead driver’s eyes through the holes in his ski mask.

You walked through the car—twice—like a ghost.

He repeated Ajax’s comment over and over in his head, like a litany, like a prayer, and braced for impact.

The first machine screamed right through the middle of them, its engine so loud and shrill it almost drowned out the foggy hum in his brain. He twitched, expecting to feel something as the machine drove through him.

But there was nothing. Just the rapid thump of his heart and the hard press of the steering wheel against his rigid, white fingers.

The second and third machines passed through the outer edges of the SUV. Half outside, half inside, just as loud and freaky as the first snowmobile had been. And then they were behind them, the shrill scream of hard-working engines fading by the second.

The relief had barely registered when JoAnn groaned and Mandy broke the tense silence.

“Jacob. She can’t hold this much longer.”

“Try to hold it as long as you can. There may be more of your cockroaches ahead of us,” Squish said, increasing the pressure on the accelerator. “But let me know when you lose control and drop the shield.” At least being forewarned would give him time to adjust and prepare.

JoAnn didn’t have a sarcastic comeback, a sure sign she was close to spent. Squish increased his pressure on the accelerator, trying to find that fine line between speed and control. They reached the end of the driveway without encountering another snowmobile or JoAnn admitting defeat.

He barely paused to check for traffic before turning right and increasing his speed. The SUV surged forward, racing down the dark road. Clouds of white flakes flew at them. No sign of headlights in front or back.

“Give me the phone.” Squish reached toward Mandy without taking his eyes from the road.

Before Mandy had a chance to hand the cell over, a gruff, sleepy voice broke the silence.

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