Cora went back inside and ran upstairs to the roof access. She took the point at the front northwest corner, facing the grouping of trees and fence, and opened the boxes of ammo for easy access and watched the front of the property as she loaded the rifle. She was proud of herself when her hands didn’t shake. She shut her mind off, not allowing herself to think about what she was about to do. She was going to kill someone. There was no way around it. Alejandro and his men wouldn’t just walk away. She looked through the scope, just as men were approaching the front gate, trying to find the best way onto the property without notice. Too late for that. Cora counted at least forty men. She had no idea if more were coming in from the sides or back. They were so screwed. The trap door behind her opened, and Ortiz jumped up and took the point at the opposite corner of the house. They sat and waited for the enemy to approach. Cora tried to breathe evenly; she knew if her breaths were off it could mess up her shot. Exhale and shoot. Cora looked over at Ortiz and almost did a double take when he reached into his side pocket for a cookie and was munching away as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Seriously? They were outnumbered, and he was snacking on a… was that an Oreo? Only she would have this kind of luck.
“Relax, Chica.” He told her in between bites but still looking through his scope. “Today, only enemies die.”
That was reassuring. Not.
As one Alejandro’s men started scaling the walls. As they reached the top, and started climbing over the wall, their bodies jolted and fell back.
“What the hell was that?” Cora whispered in horror watching men being electrocuted and dropping like flies.
“Hound put a wire on the top of the fence that if someone attempts to scale the fence gets a couple thousand volts of electricity jolted through their body,” Ortiz chuckled.
That sounded horrible.
The men backed away from the fence, and several jumped into their vehicles and rammed the gate, forgetting about being stealthy. They had to run into it several times before it broke open. Cora aimed at the vehicle, wondering how many bullets it would take to take down the vehicle, when she saw Ortiz was reaching for something in his pocket. Really? Another Oreo now? He pulled out what looked like a remote and held it up with his thumb over it but not pressing down.
“You may want to cover your ears, Chica.” He said right before he hit the button and an explosion erupted and the vehicle’s front end exploded sending its front end in the air. Several more explosions erupted, and she saw bodies scurrying out of the way. Cora stared in opened mouthed shock. Aaron had land mines? She and Hannah had been walking the property for the past four days, and she could have stepped on one of these? Ortiz hit another button, and another explosion went off, sending men flying in the air. Ortiz laughed as he did it repeatedly. Cora kept her ears covered and watched in horror as Ortiz blew people up so casually. Did her parents do things like this? It was horrible. Why did she think she could do this? She was about to say forget this and crawl off the roof and hide with Hannah when Ortiz waved at her. “Time to go to war, Chica.”
Could she do this? Did she really have a choice at this point? No. These men needed her. Hannah needed her. She could do this. She had shown promise when she was younger at shooting. Her parents had entered her in several competitions that she had won. But those were targets, not real people. Liam was counting on her. Hannah was counting on her. Charlie and his team were counting on her.
Cora pulled her rifle back up and took aim. She shut the world out and focused on a target as they ran towards the house. Cora adjusted her sight and took a deep breath. She exhaled and squeezed the trigger. One target down. She took aim at another then another. She could hear Ortiz firing, but she blocked him out until he grabbed her and pulled her down. She was about to question him, but a piercing screech rang out and hit the house. Gunfire erupted and pelted the house. She could hear Charlie yelling from the porch below her and returning fire.
“Come on, Chica.” Ortiz pulled her up. “We must fight.”
Cora retook her position and started firing. This time she didn’t tune everything out. Ortiz continued to fire next to her and hit the button on the remote. Cora had to squint as explosions erupted and tampered her vision, but she kept firing. Charlie and Daniel “Bear” moved off the porch and were sneaking around the grounds trying to take out the enemy from behind. Cora became nervous she couldn’t tell who she was shooting at. She feared she would hit Charlie or Daniel by mistake. Cora turned to her right and fired at a new group of men trying to sneak up on them from the side of the barn next to the trees. She fired her last shot and was grabbing more ammo, and watching a new group of men come in through the trees, when she heard it before she saw it. A loud whistle growing louder by the second, a small object became larger as it flew towards her and Ortiz on the roof. It was a missile.
“RPG!” Ortiz yelled before he grabbed Cora and pulled her to the trap door just as it hit the roof. The house shook, and debris rained down around them Ortiz the brunt of the impact then turned to lay on top of her, shielding her from the debris raining down on them.
When it was over Cora
