Captured By The Mercenaries

There was no point in telling the men to run. They wouldn’t make it far enough away. Evacuation was just as useless with the timeframe we had. The only chance was that I could disarm it.

Setting my backpack down, I knelt down on one knee, studying the device, while I dug around for the tools I’d brought along.

At the front was an array of wires. Green, red, blue, and white. I studied the way they went from the trigger, to the explosives. Despite the duct tape and rat’s nest of wires, closer examination showed it was done right, if not clean. Whoever had made this knew what they were doing. That didn’t necessarily mean they followed the accepted way of making bombs. Considering the way they’d thrown it all together, I was banking on it not being to any kind of standard. “Do you know if Roj makes his own IEDs?” I asked.

“Colby,” Rafe gritted out between clenched teeth. “It’s not going to matter if you don’t do something.”

“I am,” I told him.

“Doesn’t look like it,” Arsen pointed out.

They were getting nervous because all I was doing was examining it. Little did they know if I cut the wrong damn wire we were all going to be scattered into chunks around this alleyway. Our blood would paint the walls. The visual made bile rise in my throat. “I need to know if this thing was put together by one person, or several. It matters,” was all I said to them.

“Roj builds everything himself. He doesn’t farm out anything,” Rafe confirmed. They’d been studying this man’s habits far longer than even the U.S. Army had. I trusted Rafe’s knowledge.

“Good, it means that, although unconventional, the bomb will at least be consistent.” Bombs were like art, in a way. You could see someone's technique on it and learn to read it. When multiple people got involved in one bomb, it made the whole design unpredictable.

Before anyone else could say anything, a man from the market rushed down the alleyway, speaking loudly. He was talking way too fast for me to catch anything, besides, I was a bit preoccupied.

Brandon and his team pulled the man away, speaking quietly with him. They must have explained the situation because when I tossed a look over my shoulder the guy’s eyes were wide and locked on me. Without another word, he spun and ran back the way he’d come.

Shouts and sounds of a large crowd running past floated toward us. It was like I was in a bubble, the sound hardly registering.

My eyes fixed back on the problem in front of me. The standard way of making a bomb meant I should cut the blue wire to disconnect the trigger from the explosives. But…who knew how these guys had rigged it up? For all I knew that would set the thing off immediately. There’s no reason for them to color code wires the same way as we did.

The timer flashed in my peripheral. One minute, thirty seconds. My chest was heaving thanks to my anxiety. If I cut the wrong wire so many people were going to die. They may be running from the market as I sat here and deliberated, but that didn’t mean they could outrun the toxic gas that would result from the explosion.

I picked up my wire strippers and cut away the blue wrapping around the wire. I studied it, then cut the casing away from the green. Gritting my teeth, I did the same with the white. Red was the only one I wasn’t going to touch. My gut was screaming at me that the red wire was dangerous and not just because of what the color often signaled.

My eyes flicked between the other wires, heart thrumming in my ears so hard I couldn’t tell if anyone spoke to me. Looking at the way the bomb was built, where the wires were leading, what I knew of bomb making, some inner instinct told me what to do. She’d never led me astray before, but then again this was the most dangerous IED I’d been near because it wasn’t mine, and it wasn’t in a test setting.

Sucking in a breath, I grabbed my wire cutters with one hand, firmly held the white wire in the other and snipped it before I could second guess myself. My heart froze in my chest and my lungs burned as I waited, my inhale trapped inside.

The clock stopped.

I sagged back against a hard body. One of the guys was standing directly behind where I was kneeling. My back was against his thighs and just the size of them let me know it was Arsen. His hands grasped my shoulders and he squeezed as a sign of congratulations.

Glancing over, I met Sig’s relieved face. I smiled at him. A quick scan revealed that Rafe was on my left. “I have to dismantle the rest of it, but most of the danger is past.”

“Most?” he asked.

“I’ll still be dealing with radioactive material, but as long as I don’t drop the container we’re fine,” I joked.

He didn’t look amused, but he nodded. “Brando, go let the city know it’s safe to come back, but suggest they stay in their homes while we clear this out.”

“Will do. So much for keeping a low profile here,” he said in amusement.

“Sorry for blowing your cover,” Arsen rumbled.

“Nah, no worries. We’re out of here tomorrow. It was worth it considering the alternative was getting blown up.” Brandon came over and crouched down near me. We stared at the IED together, then he put a large hand on my shoulder. “Thanks.”

I didn’t get a chance to respond before he was back on his feet and they were leaving.

“Give us a shout if you need anything else,” he said, clasping Rafe’s hand.

“Same, Brother,” Rafe told him.

Arsen and Sig said their goodbyes to the other team as well while I looked around for something I could transport this stuff in. There was the box I’d flipped. That would work for the timer and various wires.