His burly pal Bubbles filled the doorway. He pivoted hard and took the lead. Jose looped an arm around her waist and hauled her with him.
So much for a heartfelt reunion. But then she had often accused Jose of being illogical. Now she couldn’t complain when he did everything right to save her life. They didn’t have time for a huggy, feel-good moment. She needed to think, to be sure everyone had been accounted for.
“Did you get everybody?” Stella pressed for details. “Even the two that are dead?”
The failure of their lost lives threatened to send her to her knees again.
“Two dead. Four injured,” Bubbles clipped out. “The SEALs got ’em all.”
“No, five injured. Thirteen hostages total. It was twelve plus me.” She forced her mind to cycle through the events of the past three days, praying she wasn’t confusing things in her exhaustion. “Did you clear the room where I was held? It’s…”
“We know where it is. We saw your message.”
She’d guessed right about the robotic fly. She hadn’t been hallucinating. “Then let’s go. Maybe the room beside it? But there were definitely at least five injured.”
Bubbles raced from room to room, cell to cell, and appeared again so fast and silent they could have renamed him Ghost. Just when she’d given up hope, Bubbles came out with his arm hitched around the injured fella—Sutton Harper—steadying him. The tortured student dragged his leg behind, clutching his arm to his stomach. His blond curly hair was plastered to his head with grime, his hiking clothes damp with perspiration. But he was alive.
Jose pressed his finger to his headset, listening, then nodded. “All accounted for. No more waiting. We’ve got to roll if we’re going to make the chopper pickup.”
Sutton limped slower, groaning. “Go without me. Seriously, dude. I’m holding you back and that’s a risk to Stella. You can send someone for me later.”
“No can do.” Bubbles powered on, hauling his patient.
Sutton nodded to Jose and Stella. “Then you two go. Take her and leave.”
Stella shook her head. “We stay together.”
Of course Sutton, an honest to God twenty-two-year-old student, an innocent in all of this, didn’t know her role here and she sure as hell didn’t intend to tell him. Knowing would only put him further at risk if they were unable to escape now. She was able to protect herself. In fact, her job included protecting him.
She turned to Jose. “Help him so we can move faster. I’ll keep up.” She willed herself to stand steely strong in spite of her aching ribs and throbbing shoulder. Exhaustion and hunger gnawed at her. “We don’t have time to argue.”
Hesitating for only a second, a second where his eyes flashed with frustration and urgency, Jose moved forward and hitched his shoulder under Sutton’s other arm. “Let’s roll out.”
Stella ignored her own aches and focused on one foot in front of the other as Jose and his PJ teammate hauled Sutton through the narrow cinder block corridors, stepping over dead guards, ducking out into the courtyard.
Even the weak, last rays of the sun stung her eyes after three days inside in captivity. She blinked away spots. Her foot caught on a root protruding from the cracked earth. She flung out her arms to brace her fall. Her palms slapped the rough bark of a gnarled galool tree.
“Stella?” Jose called back over his shoulder, shooting an arm out.
“I’m good. The light blinded me for a second. Keep going.”
Steady on her feet again, she dashed forward, catching up and keeping pace, running toward the oh-so-distant sound of helicopter blades slicing the air. How far to the helicopter pickup? Asking would only waste precious breath, and even if the chopper was miles away, she wouldn’t slow down. This was an all-out race for their lives. Sure, the guards had been taken down, but reinforcements would be on their way soon. This particular separatist group was large, organized with the support of a powerful warlord.
And damn it, Jose was in the line of fire because of her. Fighting for professionalism was tougher than ever for her now, leaving her edgy, angry.
Scared.
The most dangerous emotion of all as it made them all vulnerable.
She’d selfishly begun this journey seeking information about her mother. Now she knew it was about lots of mothers and children, just as the VP’s wife hoped to highlight in her visit. And while Stella wouldn’t look away from facts about her mother if they came her way, she had a mission to complete.
Was the frenzy and the separatists’ big “plan” all tied into the upcoming visit of the VP’s wife? Her visit here, the causes she stood for, didn’t sit well with many in the region.
And Jose had been drawn into the middle of this hell.
He stopped shy of the gate, adjusting his hold on Sutton. “Bubbles, you crawl over and I’ll hoist him up to you.”
The land mines. Of course. God, how horrifically ironic if she’d lost focus now when she was so close to escape.