Page 98 of Over the Top

Charles Favian was fucking brilliant. He was going to call in retired SEALs and appeal to them to help two brothers in trouble. Now, if only some of those SEALs lived damned close by.

Charles had kept him on the line, and Gunner heard him talking urgently on another phone. “Yes. Call everyone. These are the coordinates. There’s a baby out there in the middle of it. Yes. And two SEALs. Spencer Newman and Gunner Vance. Team Ten.”

He glanced over at Chas, who stared back fearfully.

“Are we going to die?” Chas asked grimly.

He smiled bravely and lied, “Nah. SEALs always find a way.”

Spencer radioed urgently, “Fall back. I’ll cover your retreat and trap the trail.”

Gunner hung up on Charles, for they’d just run out of time. They were on their own now.

He set up his rig between two of the boulders to cover where the trail emerged and waited grimly for the final retreat. Drago came bursting out of the jungle first. He leaped behind the rocks and landed with the kind of grunt that gave away that he’d been hit.

“Chas, check him for wounds and do what you can,” Gunner bit out, never taking his eyes off the trail.

In under a minute, Spencer also burst out of the jungle, but he was ducking as someone shot at him. Aiming over his head, Gunner sent a round down the mountain to give Spencer the cover he needed to make it behind the boulders.

That was it. They were done retreating. Now they would shoot it out until they ran out of ammo or died, whichever came first.

Spencer set up shop at the left end of the outcropping. Drago waited impatiently while Chas insisted on tying a bandage around his left thigh, and then he rolled to the right side of the wall of rock.

“Ammo check?” Spencer murmured.

“I’ve got a couple hundred rounds,” Gunner reported.

“Same,” Drago replied.

“I’m at about one-twenty,” Spencer supplied.

Spencer didn’t have to tell them to conserve rounds. They all knew they were massively outgunned.

Over the next few minutes, the bad guys figured out where they were and fanned out across the slope below. The good news was the thick undergrowth was giving them hell and slowing them down a lot. Which, at the end of the day, only prolonged the inevitable.

Grim determination to go down fighting settled in Gunner’s gut. He’d been in some bad situations before, but none as hopeless as this one. If he had to die, this wasn’t a bad way to go. He was with friends and the only two people in world he loved. It sucked that Poppy wasn’t going to get to grow up and have a full life. She should’ve gotten a chance to be a kid, fall in love, have kids of her own—

He broke off the train of thought. He had no time for despair. Not yet.

But as the next hour passed and the bad guys methodically forced them to use their precious ammo fighting off wave after wave of attacks, the despair set in, whether he wanted it to or not.

Chas rendered basic first aid, tying strips of cloth over their various minor wounds as they got nicked by flying shards of stone. He also passed them water bottles and the precious clips of spare ammo. For her part, Poppy cowered in the lee of the rocks with her thumb or her pacifier jammed in her mouth. She whimpered from time to time, but silence didn’t matter anymore. The bad guys knew exactly where they were and were patiently wearing them down.

“Ammo check?” Spencer asked a shade wearily.

“Thirty-two,” Gunner reported.

“Sixteen,” Drago reported.

“I’m at twelve. Time to let them draw in close. Let’s make the shots count.”

Gunner knew what Spencer was saying without stating it aloud. They were going to die soon. It was a last-ditch SEAL maneuver to let their position get overrun and burn the last few rounds of ammo on point-blank shots that would take out as many of the enemy as possible before they were gunned down themselves. As a SEAL, if you had to die, you took as many of the bastards with you as you could.

“It’s been an honor, sir,” Gunner said formally to Spencer.

“Likewise,” Spencer replied.

Drago just swore under his breath, off radio but loud enough for Gunner to hear. Then Drago transmitted. “I love you, Spencer Newman.”

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