Bone Deep(62)

He did as she demanded. “Now you,” she ordered.

Again, he did as she demanded. She met Bullet’s gaze and nodded. Her sister turned to leave, took two steps and turned back, firing a single shot and dropping one of the soldier to the ground, a smoking hole dead center of his forehead.

She pulled the leader’s hands up so far behind his back his shoulders popped. He screamed at the pressure she was putting on the joints, begging her to stop. “That’s what will happen every time you try something,” Bone called out. To the man at her feet she said softly, “So if you like your shoulders attached and your men’s brains inside their heads, don’t move.”

Bullet left then and it was just Bone. She had gone over every escape avenue available with her sisters the last two days. She’d known what Dmitry refused to acknowledge—Joseph was worried and worried men pulled out all the stops in times of need.

“I know who sent you,” she told the leader.

He didn’t say a word.

“I’m going to send you back to him with a message,” she said prolonging the conversation as long as she needed to allow the babies and her sisters to escape.

She stood behind the man and pulled out her knife again. The sound of the metal Blade had honed for her sliding over the leather of its scabbard was quite lovely against the backdrop of silence.

“I know this will piss you off, but I’ve held you here, at my mercy, with nothing more than my hands. It is ironic to me that your guns and knives could not do what my bare hands have managed to accomplish.”

He didn’t speak but anger and frustration rode the lines of his body. American men hated being at the mercy of women. Bone enjoyed exploiting it. The simple anger bleeding off the Spec Ops solider in her grasp was an end-run emotion. Rage though—rage could be channeled making everything sharper, more distinct, defining that line between life and death. This man had no idea how much of a tightrope she was walking at present.

“Face down boys, hands and legs spread wide,” she yelled at his men.

They did without hesitation.

She put her hands on the leader’s shoulders and said, “Your turn.”

He did and when he was face down she cut his flak jacket and then cut open his shirt. Bone was quick about her work but she wanted Joseph and the last remaining name on her list to know Blade was coming.

The man screamed and cried but he didn’t lift up. His fear smelled delightful. The stylized C crossed with an X she carved into his back really was lovely.

“Tell him we aren’t finished and that it will be painful,” Bone whispered.

Then she took off, running like the wind to the panic room where she punched the buttons and entered, closed the door back and locked it. She had a moment’s pause. Her bag was upstairs…she needed that bag. Yes, the things inside it were from her past but they were hers. She would grieve their loss but realized she could not go back for it.

So she set the trip switches on the system that would blow this entire house sky high and she unlocked the door before she took off down the tunnel that led to the beach.

It didn’t take them long to trip the switch and the concussion from the blast knocked her off her feet. Debris and dirt rained down on her but she picked herself up and ran. She ran until she came to the door that brought her to the sand and when she opened it, she saw the babies, her sisters, Juana, Carmelita, and Raines.

She fell to her knees, eyes dry but tears streaking down the windows of her soul. Blood leaked from her body, dotting the sand around her—reminding her of another time the sand had been thirsty.

The tears she refused to cry were not tears of pain. They were tears of acute joy and still she could not give them life.

Tears were for death. Her people were alive. And in the end that was all that mattered.





Chapter Twenty


Rand watched Gretchen sleep, but could not keep his hands off her. He stroked her skin, careful of her bandages and careful not to wake her. She had taken three bullets. Two in the back and one in the thigh.

He would never be able to thank Bone. There were no words for what she’d done for him earlier today. None.

“I’m alive,” his woman whispered from the small bed.

“And because you are, I am as well,” Rand murmured, kissing her lips and skimming down to her collarbone.

“Sleep, Mr. Beckett. I will heal and this will all be a dream,” she said softly, her tone faraway.

“I know, baby. I know you’ll heal,” he said, kissing the skin over her heart.

She was asleep moments later.

He had their names with a simple hack of the DOD’s database. He knew where they lived, what they’d eaten last week and where the ones who’d survived would be next. His hands clenched and so did the heart in his chest. His killer knew more pain.

“You will heal and I will kill them,” he promised. “I’ll kill them all.”





Chapter Twenty-One


Adam could not breathe. Saya still had not woken, had not even acknowledged he was there with her. She had a nasty bump on her head though Dmitry said her vitals were fine. She more-than-likely suffered a concussion. Her pupils were reacting fine and she responded to stimuli, but she would not wake.

He would never be able to thank Bone. Not for what she’d done for them all today. She’d gotten his woman out of harm’s way and for that he’d lay down his own life for her.