Page 74 of The Only Reason (The Trident Trilogy 2)

He gives me a hard right cross to the jaw. He’s at least a decade older than me, a few inches shorter, and twenty pounds lighter, but he still manages to spin my head around.

“What did you say to me?” He gets within an inch of my face. I’ve always heard he was tough, but his bravado is unreal. If I didn’t hate him so much right now, I’d be impressed.

Chase wedges himself between us. “For reasons I truly cannot understand right now, Millie loves both of you, so why don’t we make sure you both get home in one piece?”

Chase pushes me back. I’m in full body armor with multiple weapons and explosives hanging from me, and he still seems to think I’m the lesser threat. Honestly, I don’t think he’s wrong.

“Have you tracked her phone?” Chase asks me.

I pull it out of my vest and hold it up. “She left me a message that she was coming here—Azayiz’s family house in the Birir Valley. Is this it?”

We both look at Mack. His face changes from deadly to just really pissed off.

“Their family house is about a half mile southeast of here. No one lives there that I’m aware of,” Mack says, his eyes still firmly on me.

Just as I’m about to send a few guys down there to check it out, we hear an explosion of rifle fire in the distance.

“Hawk, where’s it coming from?” I look over to him standing on the porch.

He turns around and grimaces. “Best I can tell, that’s coming from about a half mile southeast of here.”

“Fuck.” I lower my microphone.

“We haven’t gotten any signal here,” Chase says quickly.

“I’m guessing I have stronger equipment than your cellphone,” I say, shaking my head. “Base, this is Echo One. We’re hearing gunfire about a half mile southeast of our position. What do you see?”

“Echo One. This is Base,” I hear in my earpiece. “The image isn’t crystal clear, but we’re seeing what looks like about a dozen fighting-age males. Looks like they’re armed primarily with rifles. They’re shooting in the direction of a car. Looks like one person down and two returning fire. One is small. Could be female.”

“Roger that. We think it could be our female target and MIA agent. Headed that way.”

Mack is shaking his head at me. His expression is back to deadly. “If she dies, I will fucking kill you.”

I decide to not tell him about the one body down already. “She’s here to find you, chief,” I say, pointing in the direction of the gunfire. “This is all on you.”

“How about both of you shut the fuck up and we go get her?” Chase says, moving to the door. I pull him back and shove him toward Mack.

I look at my team and point in the direction of the gunfire. As we head out the door, I turn around to look at Chase and Mack. “You’re not going anywhere. Stay here.” I look right at Mack. “If you die again, she’ll kill herself. I’m serious. She won’t be able to deal with it. Stay here and stay the fuck alive.”

We make it about a quarter mile when we see the car with a body—thankfully too large to be Millie’s—lying near the front. I finally see Millie—in the same clothes she was wearing when I last saw her—crouched behind the rear tire. She pops up and gets two rounds off toward the three guys closing in on her. One of the guys falls. There’s a man next to her, firing a pistol very poorly. He hasn’t hit anything. My team scatters out behind the houses and walls above their position. I can see about ten other fighters still alive and slowly closing in on them.

“Millie! Get down!” I shout. She lifts her head just enough to see our rifle barrels pointing over the wall. She curls her body up into a ball behind the tire as we start firing. Fortunately, the guys approaching her don’t see us quickly enough to take much cover. We have eight of them down within seconds. JJ fans out to the left as we provide cover fire. He has both of the others down within a minute. We stop firing and it gets quiet.

“Millie!” I yell. “Don’t move. Hold your position.”

I motion my guys out to the flanks. They slowly form a wide circle around her to make sure we’re clear. Bryce and I make a straight path to her—guns high and ready to return fire. We make it to her without receiving any more incoming fire.

“You okay?” I say, sliding down on my knees next to her. I examine her to make sure she’s not hurt. I can’t find any bullet holes.

“They shot my aunt,” she says, pointing toward the body on the ground. Her eyes start to water. “I think she’s dead.”

Bryce is already at the body. He checks for vitals and shakes his head at us. “She’s gone,” he says. Millie closes her eyes as a tear rolls down her cheek.

“Millie. We have to get you out of here. We have helos incoming in fifteen minutes. Let’s get you safe until they get here.”

She nods as she looks over to her aunt. She crawls over and touches Azayiz’s face lightly with her hand. The rest of my team is back from clearing the area. They’re all in a circle around Millie.

“Wait,” she says, looking around quickly. “Where’s Fareed?”

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