Page 61 of How Much For a Life of Lies?

“Kai?”

“Hostiles. Ten.”

“And Kai?”

“I can’t see his tracker.”

Dread threatened to consume me, and no matter how hard I tried to suppress it, I couldn’t face the thought of Kai dead. But the fear gnawed at the edges of me as Luca tried over and over to connect.

“Keep trying,” I urged Luca, my voice strained. I needed to know, to hear Kai’s voice crackle through the static, to confirm that he was still out there. “I’m heading for the crash site.”

Luca stood. “Not on your own. Shadow Team has notified Canadian special forces, and CSOC is now holding twenty miles away.”

“Get them to the crash site.” If there was a chance of finding Kai alive, then I was taking it.

“Zach!” Luca tried to stop me.

I sidestepped him and sprinted down the front steps and into the trees beyond, starting the ATV and plugging in the last coordinates we had. Luca’s voice came through the comm in my ear telling me to keep my head on a swivel and that he was calling backup in.

As the ATV roared to life beneath me, a surge of adrenalin coursed through my veins, making me dizzy until I calmed my breathing.

With a sharp turn of the handlebars, I tore through the dense underbrush, my heart pounding as I raced the clock to get to where we’d lost contact with the helo. The forest blurred past me in a confusing mess of dark shapes, branches whipping at my face as I pushed the ATV to its limits, and the ground I covered seemed to take forever. What if I was too late? What if Kai was already gone? The thought sent a chill down my spine, but I refused to let it deter me.

Focusing all my energy on the task at hand, I pushed the ATV harder, determined to reach Kai before it was too late. With each passing moment, my imagination filled in the gaps, telling me he was already dead. I imagined a life without him, and it terrified me.

“Hostiles have left,” Luca advised. With Kai? Without him?

I didn’t see the smoke, but I smelled it as I barreled on, and finally, I burst through the trees into the wreckage of the helicopter lying twisted and broken before me, scorch marks and bent trees evidence of how hard it had hit the ground. My heart sank at the sight, but I pushed aside my fear and leaped from the ATV, sprinting towards the wreckage with reckless abandon.

No one would be alive if they’d been trapped inside, but when I drew closer, half terrified of what I’d see, it was obvious the cockpit was empty. Maybe he’d been thrown clear? Maybe he was trapped under the wreckage?

“Sierra Six, Luca?”

“Sierra Six, copy.”

“Tell me you’ve located Kai’s tracker?” The only thing left to track was his HK because the shoe tracker wasn’t active yet. A tracker didn’t mean he was alive, but if I found his HK, then I might find him. Or at least… No, I can’t think about finding him dead.

“Nothing.”

Hope disintegrated, as I had to abandon the ATV because the tangled undergrowth was too dense to navigate with the vehicle. I took the flashlight, had my gun out, and moved forward on foot, my senses on high alert for danger or any sign of Kai as I circled the burning wreckage.

With each step, the hope of finding my partner was slipping away.

“Sierra Three! Call out!” I shouted. Nothing. “Sierra Three!” Still nothing. “Kai!” I called out desperately, my voice echoing into the night.

But there was no answer, just the eerie silence of the forest closing in around me. As I trudged onward, my mind raced with possibilities, each more terrifying than the last.

Then, a glimmer of hope. A faint voice crackled through my radio.

“Sierra Two? CSOC is heading for the compound. Sending coordinates.”

I had no sense of where I was, but the nav said I was three miles away from the mines, and I trusted Luca to tell me if I couldn’t push, that he’d warn me if I was about to stumble on the hostiles that had been at the crash site and left. As I approached the rendezvous point, my heart raced with a mix of anticipation and dread. The CSOC team was waiting for outside the target area, and I quickly reported to Captain Halliday, who had been briefed and was assessing the situation with a cool, calculating stare.

“Captain, I need to go in,” I said, my voice tense with urgency. “I have to find my partner.”

Captain Halliday regarded me with a steely gaze, her expression unreadable. “Is there any sign of the friendly being alive and in there for a rescue?”

I hesitated, the weight of uncertainty pressing down on me. “No, but…”

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