Page 34 of Savage Escape

“I don’t know. I’m fucking making this up as I go along. I’ll happily take any suggestions.” He shook his head and motioned for her to continue. “We can make a new door in the walls. Hopefully, it’s not reinforced steel. Or run them over and hope those SUVs are bulletproof.”

“Suddenly,” he went back to the three downed bodies and went through pockets and wallets, “I’m not feeling so confident.”

A slightly muffled voice came out of a radio on one of the bodies.

Caden’s blood started to race. They were so fucking dead. She reached over, ripped a radio from the pile of bodies and dragged Savage, as much as she could drag the two-hundred-some odd pounds of man flesh, towards the door.

“Yeah, join the fucking club.” She checked her handgun and made sure the AK-47 was loaded and strapped to her back. “They just found us out. We’ve gotta do this now.”

The radio blared again.

“Okay, this might be your last chance to get another smooch.” His eyes were concentrated on their surroundings and he was checking his weapons at the same time. “Thought I should make ya aware of that.”

“How ‘bout we make it past that gate—not sporting body bags or toe tags and I’ll kiss ya ‘til you’re blue in the face.” She would do a whole helluva lot more than just kiss him if they survived, but he didn’t need to know that.

“Promise?” He checked his clip, glanced up, and touched her shoulder. Like he was trying to convey something. Like he was saying goodbye. Like he was saying good luck. Like he was trying to put a lifetime’s worth of words into one touch.

Which was so much more intimate than a kiss. And had the effect of pissing her off, scaring the shit out of her, and confusing her all at once. So she did the only thing she could do in defense: turned away and pushed through the double doors.

The sunlight was almost overwhelming. Grass was crunching under her stolen boots. The fresh air was in her lungs. For a moment, she felt... alive. She felt a surge of sun-fueled adrenaline and had to repress the sudden urge to giggle and go off skipping through the green green grass.

But then all hell broke loose and the giddy feeling building in her gut was effectively snuffed.

12

NATHAN

As soon as they’d pushed open the double doors and stepped into the sunlit courtyard, gunfire had rained down.

Reflexes, as tortured and malnourished as they and his whole body were, forced him to react almost instantaneously to the gunfire by diving for cover. And shit, there was no cover. The wooden bench that was so weather-beaten it shouldn’t still be standing would have to work.

They’d opened fire.

Someone had found them out. Nathan had trouble wrapping his head around it. It had been radioed in not even sixty whole seconds ago.

Sixty seconds,ifthat, was all it took for the entire compound to get the message, pinpoint their location, organize a plan of attack, and then execute said plan?

Guns were discharging left and right.

Nathan glanced to his left to check that Caden wasn’t shot full of holes. She wasn’t right beside him. She was glowering at him, no doubt cursing him in all the languages she knew, fouryards away. Apparently, they had dived for cover in different directions.

While Nathan had gone for the first barrier he’d seen, she’d used those thinking skills Nathan had yet to fully develop and dived in the direction of the SUVs. She was using one of those outside cement ashtrays that doubled as a trash can for cover. It was too skinny for any kind of proper cover, but she was angling all the important bits of her anatomy out of range as much as she could.

All Nathan could think for a terrifying moment was that Caden was gonna get dead, and he was going to get goddamn shot again.

Something was weird, though. It took the trained SEAL a whole thirteen seconds to realize what was happening. Or what wasnothappening.

It took him another seven moments for that tidbit to sink in. They’d opened fire but were not, in fact, aiming their weapons at the escaped prisoners. They were aiming for the helicopter hovering overhead and the giant holes in the gate encircling the perimeter that was now smoking and aflame. They’d inadvertently timed their escape perfectly with invaders. Maybe it was a rival gang or the authorities. Who the hell cared?

All Nathan could do was grin. Either he was the luckiest bastard in the world or... or nothing hewasthe luckiest man in the world.

Caden was moving, obviously already having caught on. She was fast and single-mindedly focused on the SUVs. Nathan moved to follow, keeping his automatic up and ready. He didn’t want to get shot by either party. The invaders would mistake him for his captors because he was dressed like them, and the ass-clowns guarding the compound would shoot him if he took off the clothes. Neither option was preferable.

A word of what the guard was saying caught Nathan’s attention. He searched out the shouter in the chaos and was surprised to find the guy was looking straight at him. Something about the way the man was yelling and pointing and looking directly at him was ringing alarm bells with Nathan.

He could only barely speak the language, and even that was to ask where the bathrooms were. Other uniformed guards were diverting their attention from the firefight to him. It didn’t take a native speaker to understand that they’d spotted him.

It took him only a moment to weigh his options and another to utilize the AK-47 and spray a few bullets their way. Mostly just to let them know that he was armed, and that he wasn’t their biggest concern at the moment. They mostly hit the ground or scattered, but the message was sent.

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