Total pages in book: 69
Estimated words: 66205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 331(@200wpm)___ 265(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 66205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 331(@200wpm)___ 265(@250wpm)___ 221(@300wpm)
“Anything?” Gray heard Shay ask.
“Guard change in fifteen,” River responded.
Fifteen minutes. Good to know.
“Where’s the team holed up while they’re waiting?” Shay wondered.
“Somewhere in the building,” River answered. “Ryan said it’s just a bunch of cells and sorting rooms. Theory is, the drugs go through there. They identified equipment for cutting coke and turning it into bricks.”
The security had to be tight, in other words.
Gray had seen the map they’d drawn up of the compound, which consisted of four buildings. A main residence, designed like a luxurious hacienda, and a similar but more modest structure on the eastern side of the property, where they speculated workers stayed.
The last two buildings were simpler and therefore more interesting to the rescue team. Nobody put thought into how warehouses looked. The clay exterior wrapped up the structures into plain boxes with small windows, all of which had bars on them. And in the end, they’d opted for the building where they had observed food being delivered to.
The cartel’s operation took place behind high fences that the team had scaled and climbed over when the guards patrolling were out of sight.
“Do they have an estimated head count on hostiles?” It was Darius who asked.
“Twelve immediate threats,” River said. “They’re the heavy security. The rest are a nonissue, Ryan said. I’m assuming local foot soldiers hoping for scraps.”
Darius nodded to himself.
Gray didn’t know enough about how these things were run, but he did know that the cartels were excellent at delegating the criminal offenses to impoverished civilians, for lack of a better word, to basically do the dirty work. It was why they hadn’t killed the two men they’d restrained. Cartels wouldn’t waste anyone irreplaceable to keep an eye on the jungle. That was a job for some poor idiot just trying to put food on the table for his family.
Still, the soldiers were poor idiots hoping to climb the ranks, so it wasn’t like they had a whole lot of sympathy for the men. They just didn’t want to end their lives.
The drug trade had victims on both sides of the law.
“Any update from the helicopters?” Darius asked next, checking for heat signatures again. “If the kids are injured—or any of our crew, for that matter—there’s only so much Gray can do before he needs assistance.”
Gray longed for a day when Darius didn’t refer to people older than Gray as kids. Nobody here was a fucking kid. Crew Finlay and his partner were both a few years older than Gray, and the guy they’d been contracted to bring home was nineteen.
“We’re getting an update,” Shay said quietly. “Hold, please.”
Gray rose from the ground again and absently cracked his knuckles.
It had to be mind-numbing for River to receive information from two lines at the same time. Willow was behind the software, and she was trying to develop something new using AI, but she was secretive about that.
Darius suspected someone in DC had headhunted her.
Gray grinned to himself. Darius’s youngest sister, Elise, had been easy to fall for. A born mother, that one. And she had three little girls with Avery, one of Darius’s best friends. She was one of the most caring people ever, and she had a very typical little-sister/big-brother relationship with Darius that was always fun to behold. Willow was different. Gray had shared a journey with her very few people knew about, and he’d come to adore her step-by-step. And up until this past winter, he hadn’t believed he could love her any more.
Then Willow fuckin’ Quinn, gray hat extraordinaire, got pregnant.
Gray had never seen the Quinn family stunned before that day. All brothers, completely fucking speechless. Because while both Elise and Willow were autistic, it was Willow whose struggles shone through the most in her everyday life. Elise was a chameleon who could fake it till she made it. Willow could not, and according to her brothers, she’d spent her life giving off a vibe that just screamed she would never have kids of her own.
Sure, Gray had been surprised too, but not to the same extent. After all, she was an amazing auntie. She shared a special bond with Justin, and even more so with Elise and Avery’s daughters. Willow also had an honorary niece in a girl she used to babysit.
Now she’d make an amazing mother too. She’d started showing as well, and she was so fucking funny. Because she’d always be uniquely her, and if the baby kicked, she looked down at her belly and tried to talk sense into the little one.
Gray was excited to become an uncle again.
Fuck, now he missed the kids.
He couldn’t wait to—
“Okay, we have movement,” River informed them. Gray shook his head and refocused. “Rescue’s underway—it’s gonna be fast. Shay and I are gonna head down to the beach and reposition the Jet Skis for a quicker getaway. You two stay back. I’ll give you a heads-up if there’s movement on our end near your position. I’mma touch base with the pilots too.”