Page 35 of Her Honorable Hero

“But you will, won’t you?” She knew this man.

He nodded.

He turned from her. “Billy,” he bellowed. “Bring the leash! Bring it fast. Follow the light circling on the ceiling.” He flashed his light at the ceiling.

“Who’s Billy?”

“Never mind,” he said as he took a peek under the makeshift bandage on her upper arm. She knew that it was still seeping blood. “Dammit, woman, you sure did a number on yourself.”

She sucked in a deep breath as he gently touched her wound.

“Griff? Captain?” A young man’s voice sounded somewhere nearby. She saw a gangly blond teenager slowly come into view.

“We’re here, what’s the ETA on your brother?” Josiah asked.

“They see the train. He said to tell you both that they’re coordinating with someone named Dex from your team, Griff.”

Miranda watched as the young man in a wetsuit and tennis shoes climbed over two seats and thrust what looked like a rope at Griff.

“How’s Scarlett?” Miranda asked Josiah.

“She’s in and out of consciousness,” he said in a tight voice.

It had been a stupid question.

Josiah pulled out his phone and pressed a number. “McAllister? What the fuck is going on?”

Miranda watched as emotions played over the older man’s face. Finally, she saw a look of relief. “Yeah, requesting some of the equipment from Camp Pendleton is great. You go to the Admiral if you need to.”

Josiah actually grinned at something the man on the other end of the phone was saying. Miranda would bet her bottom dollar that the man said he had already gone to the admiral.

Okay, that was one aspect of the rescue handled, but what about the rest? “Griff, why aren’t we swarming with Emergency personnel?” Miranda asked.

“Honey, it might seem like hours, but it hasn’t even been a half-hour.”

That couldn’t be right.

“But, shouldn’t they be here by now, even if it has been just a half-hour?” she asked.

“We’re not near a road, it’s hard for them to make it. But they sent a helicopter, and we heard them pounding on the side of the train.”

“And—” Josiah started to say something.

“What?” she demanded. Both men stayed silent. “Tell me, I need to know.”

“There’s smoke coming from the rail car next to this one, and fire coming from the lead engine,” Billy blurted out. “That’s the one they’ll be working on first.”

“Thank you for telling me.” She gave the teen a tight smile. “Okay, then we’re on our own. Got it. I’m used to that. Now help me get to Hope,” she said, looking up at Griff.

This big man who had come to mean so much to her looked down at her, his eyes dark with resolve. “This is how it’s going to work. No deviating from the plan, got it, Slade?” When he didn’t continue, she reluctantly nodded. “I’m going to tie this leash to your uninjured foot. Then you’re going to crawl out there, keeping your body as low to the ground as possible. That will help keep the earth stable. You with me?”

She nodded again.

He turned so that his back was to Billy and Josiah. Then he bent down so that their eyes were just inches apart. “You are not going to let one bad thing happen to you. I want a whole hell of a lot more than just a date. I haven’t chased you for nine weeks to let you slip away this easily.”

Miranda barked out a laugh, then clapped her hand over her mouth. She felt like shit that she had actually laughed at a time like this.

“This? This is slipping away easy? You need your sense of reality checked, Mr. Porter.”