Authors: Paige Tyler
Hell, I wanted to put a bullet in him. Not that it would have mattered. The Taliban decided he didn’t do a
good enough job of luring us in and killed his wife and daughter anyway. He blew out his brains before we
ever got around to taking him in.”
She shook her head. So much heartache and death. “Well, at least Jayson made it.”
Landon snorted.
“Hey, he’s alive. That has to mean something.”
“I’m not so sure Jayson would agree with you.” The muscle in his jaw flexed. “It should be me in
Walter Reed. It would be if I’d just listened to my gut and gone to confiscate those damn weapons instead
of sending him.”
So that’s what this was. Survivor guilt. “And if you had, the insurgents might have ambushed him and
the other guys back in town, and Jayson would have been injured anyway.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No, I don’t. And neither do you.” She climbed over a downed tree that blocked their path. “I
understand where you’re coming from, I really do. But what happened to Jayson wasn’t your fault, Landon.
He was an unfortunate casualty of war.”
Just like Dave’s death. She wasn’t sure if telling Landon the story now would make him feel better or
worse. She’d tell Landon about Dave another time.
They arrived at Calballero’s compound a little after midnight. The place looked exactly like the
surveillance photos—a huge hacienda-style home surrounded by outbuildings and a high stone wall. Ivy
scanned the windows for light as she crouched down in the bushes beside Landon, but the place was dark
inside.
“Doesn’t look like Calballero’s home,” she whispered.
“Or he’s asleep.” Landon adjusted his NVGs as he surveyed the compound. “Main guard house, one
tower in front, and one in back. Two guards in each tower.”
She gazed over the bottom floor. “All the lower windows have bars on them. We can’t get in that way
unless we use the main entrance, which is right beside the guard house.”
“That’s not going to work.” Landon’s NVGs went from one tower to the other. “It looks like the guards
in the two towers can’t see each other. The back one is closest to the office. We scale it and get in that way.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
He pulled out one of the blocks of explosives they’d kept. “I’m going to set this up by the main gate in
case we need a distraction. I’ll be back.”
Ivy kept an eye on the guards while he was gone, listening for anything that might mean they’d spotted
Landon.
Turned out, Landon was as good with a sniper rifle as he was at being stealthy. He loaded the rifle with
those fancy DCO tranquilizer bullets and took out all four tower guards before they even knew what
happened.
Ivy was impressed. Nice shooting.
He slung the rifle over his shoulder. “Ready to do your thing?”
Ivy didn’t have to ask what he meant. She backed up to get a running start, then raced toward the wall
and leaped into the air. Grasping the edge, she pulled herself up onto the top, then turned to give Landon a
hand. As soon as he was beside her, she led the way to the guard tower and climbed inside, careful not to
step on the unconscious men on the floor.
Landon didn’t waste any time pulling out his M4 and shooting the foam-covered grappling hook over to
the roof of the hacienda. Because the tower was higher than the house, the trajectory was trickier, but he
nailed it in one shot. She had to admit they worked well together, and it made her forget she normally
wasn’t thrilled working with military types. Landon was turning out to be a lot different than she had
expected.
He glanced at her as he tied the thin aircraft cable to one of the tower’s support columns. “Can you
really get across this?”
She flashed him a smile as she turned on her communications headset. “Do cats like milk?”
He chuckled. “I know one who doesn’t.”
Laughing, she climbed onto the cable and ran down it. When she reached the hacienda, she dropped
onto a balcony off a third-floor room.
“So far, so good,” she whispered to Landon.
She tiptoed to the French doors and cautiously peeked inside. The bedroom was empty. “I’m going in.”
She probably didn’t need to tell Landon that since he was already covering her with his night vision
scope, but she liked keeping him in the loop.
“Be careful.”
“Always,” she told him.
She stopped to sniff the air when she got inside. No indication of anyone on this floor. While she
trusted her nose, she still moved carefully. She didn’t know exactly where the office was, so she had to
check each room. Luckily, it was the fourth one on the right, which meant Landon had a clear view of her
through a window.
“There’s a computer on the desk,” she told him. “I’m going to check it now.”
She took out the gadget Oliver from the tech division had given her to decode passwords and break
through firewalls, and plugged it into the USB port. She browsed through the files, but there was nothing
even remotely incriminating.
“Anything?” Landon asked.
“No. I’m going to look through his desk, see if there’s something in there.”
That turned out to be a waste of time. Lots of junk, but nothing tying him or anyone else to drug
smuggling.
Ivy looked around the room, searching for someplace Calballero might hide something he didn’t want
found. Her gaze locked on a painting. It couldn’t be that simple, could it?
She got to her feet and walked over to it. Sure enough, there was a wall safe behind the painting.
“I’ll be…”
“What is it?” Landon asked.
She quickly told him what she’d found. “The problem is, we don’t have anything to open it. Except
explosives.”
“Which we can’t use without risking destroying what’s inside. Not to mention bringing the rest of the
guards running.”
Ivy chewed on her lip. “There’s something else I can try, but it might take a little time.”
“As long as you can do it before Calballero gets back, go for it. What are you thinking about doing?”
“I might be able to smell which buttons on the keypad Calballero uses most.”
“No way. You can do that?”
She smiled at his words. There was no animosity there, just amazement. “Yeah. But it’s going to be hard.
My sense of smell isn’t my strongest skill.”
“Take all the time you need. I’ve got your back.”
Ivy’s lips curved. That was the first time anyone had ever said that. She leaned close to the keypad. She
sniffed each key, trying to pick out which ones had Calballero’s scent. This kind of wall safe used either a
four- or six-digit combination. Hopefully, Calballero used a four-digit number. If not, she could be screwed.
The number four key was definitely one. And the eight. After that, it got tough. It was almost as if
Calballero slid his fingers across some of the other keys as he moved around the pad.
To do this right, she needed to shift completely. She’d never done that on a mission because it was hard
to notice what was going on around her when she did. Which meant she was completely vulnerable. And
dependent on her partner. She’d never trusted anyone she worked with enough. But Landon said he had her
back.
Confident he’d alert her if trouble closed in, Ivy closed her eyes, sinking deeper into her animal self.
***
the gate. Calballero was back.
“We’ve got company,” he said into the headset. “Time to go.”
Ivy didn’t answer. Instead, she leaned closer to the safe.
“Ivy, let’s go.”
No answer. What the hell? Frowning, he grabbed his flashlight and pointed it at her, giving it a quick
flick on, then off. No response. Like she hadn’t even seen it. Was there some special code word he was
supposed to say, like
here, kitty, kitty
?
Down on the ground, Calballero entered the house, along with several men.
“Ivy, come on.”
She ignored him.
Landon slewed his scope away from her to scan the rest of the house. Calballero and the men looked
like they were heading for the stairs.
“Get the hell out of there. Now!”
Still no answer. What the hell was wrong with her? Couldn’t she hear the men coming? Another few
minutes and they’d be in the room with her.
Swearing under his breath, Landon slung the barrel of his sniper rifle over the cable. Holding on to both
ends of the weapon, he slid down to the balcony directly across from the tower. The friction of the wire
against the barrel completely screwed up the rifle, but he didn’t give a damn. Dropping it to the floor, he
whipped the M4 off his back and raced into the house.
He charged into the hallway just as Calballero and the two men with him topped the stairs. They had a
clear view of the office—and Ivy—from the landing, and didn’t even see him. They immediately pulled
their guns and aimed at her.
Landon squeezed the trigger, taking all three of them out just as one of them shot at Ivy. As the bullet hit
the wall beside her head, Ivy spun around, a laptop in her hands. Wide-eyed, she gaped at the dead men on
the floor, then at him.
“Dammit, let’s go!” he shouted.
She obeyed, running past him into the bedroom. He followed, pulling the remote from his pocket and
setting off the explosive charges near the main gate as he went. Hopefully, that’d distract the rest of
Calballero’s guards long enough for him and Ivy to get away.
Outside, Ivy jumped up and grabbed the wire, then pulled herself onto it and gracefully raced back to
the guard tower. Landon scooped up the sniper rifle he’d discarded earlier. It might be ruined beyond
repair, but he wasn’t about to leave it. Praying someone wasn’t below waiting to pick him off, he grabbed
the cable and climbed hand over hand up to the tower. The thin cable was rough on his hands, and it took
him a while to get across.
By the time he got there, Ivy had already leaped from the wall. He vaulted down after her, following as
she sped toward the tree line. If he wasn’t so damn pissed at her right now, he’d have seen the two guards
come around the corner of the wall ready to shoot him. Luckily, Ivy put a bullet through each of them
before Landon could even lift his carbine.
Swearing under his breath, he tossed one of the concussion grenades over the wall into the compound.
With any luck, the other guards would get confused and think whoever had killed Calballero was still
inside.
The blast rocked the ground as he and Ivy disappeared into the trees. She made a beeline for their
packs. While she recovered them from the bushes where they’d hidden them, he shoved the ruined sniper
rifle in the bushes. Trucks roared in the distance, echoing in the jungle.
He took his pack from Ivy, slipping his arms through the straps as he ran after her. Somewhere behind
them, Calballero’s guards randomly shot at them. They didn’t sound like they were getting closer, but he
and Ivy ran for a solid thirty minutes before stopping to rest.
Their headlong flight through the jungle hadn’t done a thing to cool Landon’s temper, and he
immediately rounded on her. “What the hell happened back there? Why didn’t you respond when I told you
Calballero was back?”
Ivy flinched as if he’d hit her. “I-I couldn’t hear you.”
“What the hell do you mean, you couldn’t hear me? I was practically shouting in your ear.”
“I…”
She looked away. But not before he saw the tears shimmering in her green eyes. Another reason he was
glad they didn’t allow women on the A-teams. They were too freaking sensitive.
“I…” She swallowed hard. “I messed up. I’m sorry, okay?”
Landon frowned. He got the apology. What he didn’t get was the way she’d said it. Like she was some
timid mouse instead of the bold, confident woman he’d spent the past two days with. That Ivy would have
glared and told him she’d been trying to get the information they’d come there for and wasn’t leaving until
she got it.
There was more going on here than just a screw-up on her part; he’d bet his next paycheck on it. And
whatever it was, it had something to do with her being a shifter. Their ability to work as a team depended
on each of them knowing the other’s weaknesses. If she went deaf sometimes, he needed to know about it.
But the middle of the jungle wasn’t the place to have that conversation.
Landon jerked his chin at the laptop she still clutched in her hands. “You think that’s what we’re looking
for?”
Ivy lifted her head to look at him. “Probably. People don’t lock up a laptop unless there’s something
important on it.”
She had a point. “It’ll be easier to carry if we rip out the hard drive.”
“Yeah.” She dropped to her knees, flipped the computer over and used the tip of her nail to unscrew the
compartment holding the hard drive. She took it out and put it into a plastic bag, then sealed it and stowed it
in her pack.
He hadn’t really been concerned whether the laptop was what they’d been after. It either was or it