Disavowed(7)

Trapping her.

She blinked away the snowflakes tangling on her lashes, trying to see more of the man before her. The leader, she could tell by the way the others stayed back slightly. He was around six feet tall and wide through the shoulders. She didn’t think any of these guys had taken that shot at her, otherwise they’d have killed her already. They appeared to want to take her alive.

But if she was wrong and they’d come to finish the job, she wasn’t going down without a fight. Her index finger tightened around the trigger.

“Drop it,” the leader commanded, his voice low and menacing over the wind.

Nope. No way in hell. She maintained her aim, ready to fire if necessary. She vowed to kill at least two of them before they took her down.

The man didn’t move, the barrel of his pistol never wavering from her center mass. “Drop it, now.”

Her mind raced. She was trained for this. She’d made contingency plans long before coming here tonight. These guys might not be here to kill her, but they weren’t going to let her go, either. There was no way she could take the leader down and get past him before the others shot her. She kept her free hand pressed against her wound, aware of the warmth of her blood as it leaked down her right side and leg. There was only one choice.

Slowly, hating to do it even though it was her only viable option, Briar complied with his order, lowering her weapon.

The man took a gliding step forward, his aim steady, his movements precise, practiced. “Toss it aside and show me your hands.”

Pushing out a breath, ignoring the way her mind screamed in protest at being unarmed in this situation, she tossed the H&K aside in the snow and raised both gloved hands so he could see she wasn’t holding a weapon. She was shocked and disheartened at how weak her arms felt.

Immediately two men approached, one from either side. They grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and flipped her over onto her stomach. Briar bit back a growl as a hot flare of pain speared her side and more blood flowed over her skin.

One secured her hands behind her back with a zip tie while the other patted her down for more weapons. He removed her backup pistol strapped to her left ankle and the KA-BAR knife sheathed to her right calf. Her rifle was with her pack, ditched behind some rocks about ten yards back.

Briar maintained awareness of all of the men as the leader walked over and got down on one knee next to her. She tensed at his sharply indrawn breath.

“B?”

The startled recognition in his voice made Briar lift her head to peer up at him. He pushed back his goggles and put a hand on her shoulder. She stiffened and squinted up at him, then stared in shock. Supervisory Special Agent Matteo DeLuca, commander of the HRT.

Shit. Briar internally groaned as humiliation and anger churned in her gut, mixing with the pain, burning away the awful shakiness. She resisted the urge to look away.

He scowled down at her. “What the hell are you— You took out Ramadi?”

Clenching her jaw, Briar lowered her gaze and rested her cheek against the snow, uncaring of the freezing cold against her skin. If word of her capture got out, her career— hell, life as she knew it—would be over.

The hand on her shoulder tightened. “Who shot you?” he demanded, clearly out of patience with her silent routine.

She didn’t know, so she didn’t answer. She was acutely aware of the seven other men standing around watching and listening while she tried to come up with a way out of this mess. Being caught burned a hell of a lot worse than the bullet wound, and it hurt plenty.

DeLuca hunkered down more, shielding her from the worst of the wind with his body. “I don’t know who sent you but we’re on the same side and I want to help you. So talk to me.”

There was nothing to say. She didn’t answer to him or anyone else waiting down this mountain. Ramadi was dead, and that was all he needed to know until she cleared things with Janaia.

DeLuca pushed out a frustrated sigh and waved one of his men forward. “Schroder, come take a look at her. The rest of you maintain the perimeter. Other shooter’s likely still in the area.” He stood and pulled out what she assumed was a satellite phone. The screen gave off a faint illumination in the darkness.

Good luck getting a call out in these conditions, she thought with a mental snort.

Another man, she assumed Schroder, the team’s medic, came over and squatted beside her. “Your name’s B?”

She flashed him a cold look that only made him grin, his teeth a startling white against the camouflage paint on his skin.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” He started pulling things out of his ruck and she heard the snap of latex gloves going on.