Page 76 of Fighting for Lucy

Zander wished he’d told her he was falling in love with her when he had the chance. But he’d been a coward, felt like telling her he loved her was somehow going to jinx things, and was tantamount to admitting they weren't going to make it out alive.

Suddenly Rocco’s eyes snapped to his as he listened to whatever was being said into his comms.

“What?” Zander demanded.

“That was the pilot, he says someone’s approaching the helo,” Rocco told him. “A man and a woman. Looks like it could be Zimraan Mostafa, and he’s using Lucy as a human shield.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

January 28th

9:19 A.M.

Every time a shiverrocketed through her body, Lucy could feel the blade of the knife pressed against her throat nick her skin.

Zimraan’s arm was locked tightly around her chest, pressing painfully against the wounds he’d made.

Almost worse than the pain was the unrelenting cold. Hours of being out in it, the constant shivering, her muscles were aching, and honestly, without Zimraan holding her up and dragging her along with him, she was pretty sure she would have collapsed against the knife already and inadvertently slit her own throat.

“I will not be stopped,” Zimraan roared in her ear, making her flinch.

They were walking—well, Zimraan was trying to run, but she was too weak, too cold, and too clumsy to keep up—across the wide, open valley. They were practically sitting ducks out there, but Lucy was reassuring herself with the fact that the young terrorist’s men weren't going to open fire on them, and if it hadbeen Prey who had come to rescue them, they were too skilled to shoot randomly at them and risk hitting her.

Right now, it was Zander that she was most worried about. He’d been there in the courtyard when bullets started flying in every direction, and she was terrified that he’d been hit by one.

What if he was bleeding out right at this very second, all alone when she’d promised she would always be there for him?

Or, worse, what if he was already dead?

The very idea of him dying alone sent another shiver through her that, this time, had nothing to do with the cold.

“They will not kill me as long as I have you,” Zimraan said, but she got the feeling the words were more for his benefit than as a threat to her. It was obvious he was afraid, he was young, inexperienced, had no idea what he was doing, and he needed to reassure himself that he was making it out of this alive.

Only she had no intention of letting that happen.

Ahead of them, she saw a helicopter sitting on the ground. It had to be the one that had brought in Prey and was waiting to take them all to safety.

As soon as he saw it, Zimraan picked up the pace, forcing her to find strength she didn't really have to keep up with him or risk having her neck split open and dying right there in a dusty valley in Syria.

When they reached it, he shoved her on board. “Take us out of here or I kill her,” he warned the pilot.

The man looked at her, and she could see him debating his options. He was wearing a headset, and she hoped he communicated with the men who had stormed Zimraan’s compound. If he’d already alerted them, help was only minutes away. All she had to do was stay alive a tiny bit longer and she could go home.

Finally, the pilot nodded, and he started the rotors.

The roar hurt her ears, but held as she was there was no way for her to move her hands to cover them. The bite of the blade against her neck was a constant reminder of how precarious her situation was. One wrong move and her carotid artery could be sliced right open, and she’d be dead before anyone could do anything about it.

Just as they began to lift off the ground, she heard Zander scream her name.

Well, in reality she knew there was no way she could hear anything over the roar of the helicopter, but she felt him, and when she turned, she saw a dozen men running toward them. The man at the front of the pack was Zander.

Lucy knew it, felt it, even as her vision wavered and she couldn’t see clearly.

Alive.

Zander was alive.

Rejuvenated by the knowledge, Lucy quickly ran through scenarios.

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