CHAPTER 20
LARA
“It’s okay to be nervous. When they come, just shoot straight. Don’t be afraid of friendly fire. No one we know will be coming up this path. It’ll just be the bad guys. Okay?”
Stan nodded and tried to smile back at her. She could just barely make him out on the other side, with just the moonlight to keep the both of them from standing completely in darkness. He was much older than her and could have been her father, and she wondered if he found the idea of her attempting to comfort him just as absurd as she did.
She was crouched next to some trees and listening to the sound of boat motors getting closer. It seemed as if they had been coming for hours now. What was taking them so long?
Be careful what you wish for.
It wouldn’t be long now before heavily armed men began rushing up the beach in an attempt to kill her and everyone on the island. It was going to be bloody. Even more so than the last time. And back then she had Will, and there weren’t nearly as many men coming.
Ten boats. At least four men to a boat. At least.
How were they going to kill so many? And could they really go through with this? Could she? The idea of spilling so much blood just to keep the island should have horrified her, but it didn’t. That, more than anything, made her hands tremble so much she had to rub them against her pants just to give them something to do.
This wasn’t what she had envisioned doing with the rest of her life. Not that she had any choice in the matter. The decisions had been made for her. Out there. By Kate.
Where did you get so many men willing to die for you, Kate? Was this the plan all along? Make us kill each other?
She pushed those useless thoughts away and focused on the here and now. It didn’t matter where these men came from or who they were. They were coming fast and armed and they had only one goal, and she couldn’t allow that. Not with everyone’s lives at stake. Carly, Vera, Elise, and all the poor souls who had come here hoping for a new start.
As afraid as she was about what was about to happen, Lara was also angry. More than that, she was pissed off. She wondered if this was how Will felt whenever he went into battle. No, probably not. Will was always pragmatic. He wouldn’t really look at the men coming on boats now as anything but obstacles to overcome.
You should be here with me right now, Will. Where the hell are you?
You promised you’d come home…
She remained crouched behind the wall of trees, next to the ten-yard-wide pathway that connected the beach and stretched about half a football field until it reached the wide open grounds behind them. Without the lamps that serpentined across the island, everything was blackened, including the hotel and the unfinished swimming pools. The only structure on the entire island that still had lights was the Tower, glowing brightly behind her, and that was only because of the LED lamps on the third floor.
Even the birds that usually chirped away, oblivious to human presence on the island, had gone uncharacteristically quiet tonight.
Did they know? Of course not. How could they?
Behind her, Sarah shifted back and forth on the balls of her feet, apparently unable to decide whether she wanted to sit down or remain standing.
“You okay?” Lara whispered over her shoulder.
Like Stan a few seconds ago, Sarah tried to smile, and just like Stan, it came out poorly. “I’ve never shot anyone before.”
“You’ll do fine. Just follow my lead.”
“What’s it like?”
“What?”
“Killing someone. What’s it like?”
“Don’t think about it. Shoot, reload, and keep shooting until there’s nothing to shoot at anymore. They’re coming here to kill us. Just keep reminding yourself of that. Do it for Jenny. For Mae. For everyone who is counting on us right now.”
Sarah nodded mutely, then went back to trying to decide whether to sit or stand, and constantly changing up her grip on the M4.
“You’ll do fine,” Lara said again, and hoped it was at least convincing. Judging by Sarah’s face, she guessed she was only halfway successful.
There was a time when Lara had been just like Sarah — scared and uncomfortable with a gun in her hands. Those days were long gone, and even as she turned back to the darkness, she wished Will’s face was looking back at her.
You promised me, Will. Where are you?
But he wasn’t there. Instead, she saw Roy, his blond hair easy to spot in the semidarkness. He had moved away from the trees and was standing next to Stan in a spot that allowed him to remain behind cover while still able to peer down the pathway and at the moonlit beach on the other side. Compared to Stan, Roy looked strangely serene, the M4 hanging almost naturally from a sling in front of him. She knew better, of course. Roy was a former IT man, and the closest he’d ever come to holding a gun in his life before The Purge was playing Call of Duty on the PlayStation.
Roy glanced over and grinned at her. “Remember that time in the woods? When we were chasing West?”
She smiled back. “Yes.”
“Man, I was so unprepared back then.”
“Not anymore.”
“Not anymore. What’s that motto of yours again?”
“Which one?”
“‘Adapt or perish’?”
“Ah.”
“I guess you can say I’ve successfully adapted.”
And not a moment too soon.
“They’re taking their sweet time,” Roy said. “I wish they’d get here already. My legs are cramping up from the waiting.”
Be careful what you wish for, Lara thought for the second time as the sound of motors seemed to increase in decibel on cue.
It wouldn’t be long now…
There was a click in her right ear, and she heard Blaine’s voice through the earbud connected to her radio. “Lara.”
Lara pressed the PTT dangling from her vest. “Yeah, Blaine.”
“They’re getting closer, right? We can hear them all the way on the other side of the island.”
“Yeah, they’re getting closer.”
“Keo said ten boats?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t understand why they’re just attacking the beach with ten boats. Is that all they have?”
“I don’t know,” Lara said. Then, “Keo.”
“Yeah,” Keo said through the radio.
“How many boats did you see when you were at their staging area?”
“I didn’t exactly do an official count. Most of them were already in the water.” He paused, seemed to think about it some more, before adding, “Remember what we talked about? How they’ve been going around sinking boats for a while now, trying to keep everyone on land? Maybe these ten are all they have left in the area.”
“What a bunch of asshats,” Danny said. “I bet a lot of people paid good money for those boats.”
“What are you thinking, Blaine?” Lara asked.
“I don’t know what I’m thinking,” Blaine said.
“Spit it out,” Danny said.
“It’s just that…this is pretty bold of them, to just think they can invade Song Island by hitting the beach,” Blaine said. “Especially knowing how it all turned out last time.”
She didn’t blame Blaine for being suspicious. That was all she had been doing since they spotted the ten boats. But there was no way to alter the plan now, not with the attackers bearing down on them.
“Blaine has a point,” she said into the radio. “This could all be one big diversion. There could be more approaching from the other sides. Report in as soon as you see or hear anything out of the ordinary. Anything at all. Understand?”