Page 7 of Fast Kill

“Face down and don’t move,” Logan snapped at the first man he reached, who was bleeding from a gunshot to the lower leg. The man glared up at him for a long moment and Logan lost his patience, the pain he was in giving his voice an added bite. “Now.”

The guy rolled over with a grimace and laid his cheek against the wooden surface of the dock, hands laced behind his head and blood pooling out around his lower leg. Logan and Zaid stood watch while the Bahamians moved in to arrest the survivors.

Once everyone still breathing was either in cuffs or being looked at by medics, Logan limped for the sub berthed at the end of the dock. Kai was already there with some of the locals, carefully checking the hatch with the help of a tactical flashlight.

“What’ve we got?” Hamilton asked, stopping beside Logan with the head of the Bahamian special police.

“Don’t think they had time to rig it,” Kai said, shifting his knees and pushing his upper body back to give their team leader a better look. “But it never hurts to be cautious.”

“True enough.” Hamilton gave him a firm nod. “Do it.”

Logan was closest to Kai so he edged up to the hatch, the muzzle of his weapon aimed at it just in case they encountered any surprises once Kai twisted the sucker open. The team’s big man cracked it and yanked it open with one hand, a Glock in his other. Thankfully nothing exploded, and no one shot at them from inside.

Logan leaned forward with his weight on his good leg and aimed the tac light on his rifle into the vessel, favoring his left knee. It was already throbbing like a bad tooth. Something was definitely wrong with it; he just hoped it wasn’t serious.

The intense beam of light sliced through the blackness of the sub’s interior like a laser, revealing a hold stuffed full of plastic-wrapped bricks. Cocaine. There was no room for anyone to be in there with all that cargo, so one thorough sweep with the tac light proved more than enough to make the call.

“It’s clear,” Logan said, and straightened with his weight on his right leg, biting down on his back molars as his left knee protested the slight movement. The good news was, all the narcos at the dock were either dead or captured, and the amount of drugs seized was way above the arrest threshold needed.

He looked up to find Hamilton watching him closely, with narrowed eyes. “What did you do?”

“Nothing.” He stepped out of the way, making sure not to limp no matter how much it hurt.

His other teammates moved back out of the way and the Bahamians swarmed in, documenting the seizure with photos and then beginning the process of unloading the drugs.

Logan mentally cursed with each step on his way down the dock, refusing to let anyone know he was in pain. The last thing he wanted was to be pulled off duty because of a stupid injury.

Zaid was waiting for him when he reached the end and stepped onto the sand. In the glare of all the floodlights mounted on the Bahamian vehicles now ringing the scene, his teammate’s hazel eyes glinted with a touch of humor. He strode up and clasped Logan’s left shoulder, looking him dead in the eye. “Thanks, brother.”

A little uncomfortable with the recognition, Logan shrugged and looked down the beach where more emergency vehicles were arriving. Was his left pant leg tighter, or was it just his imagination? “Hey, no worries.”

“No.” Zaid squeezed again, waited until Logan met his eyes before continuing. “You saved my ass back there. I owe you.”

“Forget it, man. You’d have done the same for any of us.”

“Damn right, I would have.” One side of his mouth quirked upward. “Now tell me what you did to your left leg.”

Despite the pain he was in, Logan couldn’t help the wry twist of his lips. The team medic was one of the most observant people Logan had ever met, so it shouldn’t have surprised him that Zaid had already noticed. “You’re damn spooky sometimes with that shit, you know that, right?”

“I try. Now what are we dealing with?”

“It’s fine,” Logan said with a shrug. “No big deal.”

“We’ll see about that.” Zaid squatted down and immediately began rolling up Logan’s left pant leg. Logan bit back a protest, knowing it would do him no good, but wished they had more privacy. The other guys were all gathering around now, watching. “When did it happen?”

“When you fell on me.”

Zaid looked up at him and winced. “Sorry, man.”

“No worries.” But hewasstarting to worry, because it hurt like a bitch. What if it wasn’t something minor that he could muscle through? What if it put him out of action for a while?

“What’s this? Granger got fucked up on his first mission?” Kai said as he walked up, watching with interest as Zaid began his exam.

“Yeah, what’s with that, man?” Easton asked Logan, coming up to stand beside Kai. “You take a bullet?”

“Nah, it’s nothing. You can all go on about your business,” Logan told them. He didn’t want an audience for this sissy shit.

“Guess I smashed his knee in while he was saving my ass,” Zaid said.

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