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Sean brought the thick mouth protector up over his lips. “We jump.”

And with that, he threw himself out into the bitter cold, tumbling down until he hit the ground.

AIDAN

God, he hated the cold.

Growing up in what amounted to little more than a slum at the edge of Detroit, Michigan, Aidan had grown up loathing the cold. More often than not, his mother had been too drunk to bother to turn on the heat. When there had been money to keep the heat on anyway. Aidan had spent so many years of his childhood hiding in his room or choosing to wander the streets, even in the heart of winter, enduring the cold instead of his mother’s company.

And now he was all but tossed into it.

Aidan peered up, watching the now black dot that was the helicopter flying into the distance. It disappeared behind the mountains, leaving the five of them standing in a clearing surrounded by snow-covered fir trees. Everything around them, from the ground to the mountains, was covered in a heavy blanket of snow, and the wind bit deep as it howled through the treeless clearing where they stood.

Aidan hated it.

Matt huffed. “Where the fuck are we?”

“Canada,” Aidan said.

Matt jerked his head toward him. “Seriously?”

Aidan thought about it, letting his mind drift to their flight. They’d slapped the blinders on them pretty quickly, but he’d been paying attention to their direction. There had been a few changes in their cardinal direction, both in the plane and the helicopter. At first, he’d thought they were dropping them in the northern United States, but the trip was a little too long for that, even if he accounted for them purposefully trying to throw him off.

Aidan nodded. “Almost completely sure.”

“How do you know?”

“I paid attention.”

“That’s about as clear as mud,” Matt snapped.

“Enough. Knowing where we are is a good start, but arguing over it isn’t going to solve anything. Get your heads in the game,” Sean barked.

Aidan turned to him. “What’s our objective?”

Only the team leader had been given their objective, while the rest had been left in the dark. Why that was the case was anyone’s guess, though Aidan suspected, just like blindfolding them had been an attempt to keep them confused, the secrecy was another means of keeping them guessing.

Sean cleared his throat. “There’s a camp, about twenty miles out from here, to the north-northeast. We’re to find it and report in within five days.”

“We have five days to get through this shit?” Matt asked in horror.

Ricardo snorted, kicking at the snow around his shins. “Reminds me of home.”

Aidan snapped his head toward him. “You’re used to this?”

Ricardo shrugged. “Grew up in northern Minnesota. This was the sort of shit you saw during winter.”

Sean glanced at Aidan. “Why?”

“If you’re taking point, then Ricardo should be at the back. If he’s used to this, then he’s our best bet for watching our asses,” Aidan said.

Sean watched him for a moment, his bright jade eyes fixed on Aidan’s face for what felt like an eternity. They were finally being thrown to the wolves, made to test themselves and one another. Each of them was used to the desert and its harsh demands. This frozen wasteland was something else altogether, and Aidan prayed Sean wouldn’t continue the same trend as before.

Please, let the man Aidan thought he’d glimpsed in his room back at the barracks be the one that was truly Sean.

Sean turned to Ricardo. “Advice?”

Ricardo pointed at Aidan. “That one’s got a compass in his head. If we follow his directions, your lead, and stick to the trees away from the wind, then we should manage to reach the target in a few days instead of five.”