Page 54

THERON

TWENTY MONTHS CAPTIVE

We’d been put on a cargo plane and flown—somewhere—to get to this map. I could hear the ocean on the other side of the doors. When we stepped out into the sunlight, the smell of brine and seaweed hit me in the face as the clammy sea breeze tore through us. But I wasn’t looking inland—my gaze was out to sea, where a massive carrier was anchored a few hundred yards out. Vetticus had added shipping containers to the deck to break up the vast area where planes would usually sit.

“Well, shit,”

Nyx muttered.

I jammed my comms unit into my ear and scanned the shoreline. There was a motorized inflatable boat beached just above the tide. The buzzer went off, and I knew we needed to get on that ship. We all took off and worked quickly to push the boat into the water. Nyx took the tiller and we jetted off through the breakers.

As soon as our feet hit the deck, Nyx turned to me. “Welcome home I guess?”

It had been years since I’d been on a ship. My work as a SEAL had taken me inland, but this was still familiar. We saw another team climb over the other railing and one of the men stopped and watched us. His eyes landed on me and he pointed his fingers like he was firing a gun.

“If I had to guess, that must be Kai,”

Nyx said dryly.

None of us had weapons yet, so with a last smirk from Kai, we took off our separate ways. Nyx led us into the bowels of the ship where we found weapons and ammo fairly quickly. Then we had to decide where to look for Red first.

“Let’s split up,” I said.

With such close quarters it made little sense to run seven deep. I sent the two new kids plus Kane to search the engine room. Nyx and Atlas would search the crew quarters and cargo hold and Preacher and I headed towards the pilothouse.

Preacher and I worked our way up top again and slowly swept the boat. I hated clearing ships because of the tight corners and narrow hallways. It was the perfect place for ambushes and I made sure the knife I found was easily accessible.

I signaled for Preacher to hold as we came up on a few shipping containers. I heard footsteps around the corner, then they paused. I looked at Preacher, giving him another hand signal and then we attacked. There were three of them. I quickly took out the one closest to me, knocking away the other one’s AR while Preacher took out the third. They didn’t get off a single round.

We weren’t the only team headed to the pilothouse and as we made our way down the hallway leading in; we hit a team of four already inside. I quickly motioned for Preacher to go one way and I took the other, dodging as bullets bit into the metal next to me. I returned fire, but they ducked out of sight.

Suddenly, a knife came low around a corner and bit into my thigh. I went down with a curse, only to stumble to my feet as he pulled my handgun from my belt and aimed it at me. I yanked the man’s arm forward, ejecting the clip and removing the slide, effectively disabling the firearm. I brought my elbow up and slammed it down on his arm, sending the man to his knees as he tried to avoid a broken arm.

The second man fired, but I pulled the other one in front of me so he killed his teammate. I shoved the body at the gunman. When he went down, I tackled him and repeatedly rammed his head into a metal pipe.

Over and over and over again—I lost myself in the blood lust as his head fell apart in my hands. Blood coated my vision, turning the world red. A hand on my shoulder had me whirling around with the man’s sidearm.

“Fuck,”

I gasped a curse as Preacher batted the gun away and I sagged against the wall, still half straddling the destroyed body beneath me. Preacher glanced at the body quickly then looked at something across the room and stepped over me.

My chest was heaving as I inhaled breath after breath that smelled of blood and gore. I tried to grab onto some semblance of my humanity but the blood lust was screaming through me, setting every atom in my being alight. Preacher picked up the radio and tried it, only to throw it viciously against the dash in frustration.

“It’s never that easy,”

I panted, climbing to my feet.

I grimaced and grabbed onto the center console with a hand slippery with blood up to my elbows. I was covered in it.

“Worth a try,”

he shrugged.

Preacher looked at the knife still in my leg, sucking on his teeth. He nodded towards it.

“Usually I’d say to leave it in but—”

“Yeah, I know—”

I tore a strip off my t-shirt, seeing a towel nearby I grabbed that too. I put the fabric in my mouth so I had it ready and wrapped my hand around the hilt. Preacher watched the door while I took a few quick breaths and counted to myself before yanking the knife straight up. I growled in pain, my hands shaking slightly as I wadded the towel up against the wound and used the strip of t-shirt to tie it in place. I picked up my AR and lashed out with a vicious kick to the body next to me with a growl of frustration. Asshole.

I nodded to Preacher. “Let’s move out.”

I limped my way after him as he led the way out of the pilothouse.