Just a few hundred meters more to go.
It was an agonizingly slow way to climb, but he didn’t have a choice. The face of the cliff was made mostly of sandstone. One wrong move and he was looking at one long drop to the base. While the fall probably wouldn’t kill him—unless he smashed in his head—it wasn’t something he wanted to experience.
Boots scraped against stone and he glanced to his right to see Jake a dozen meters away, climbing as carefully as he was. On Sawyer’s left, Caleb was at least a hundred meters ahead of them and moving absurdly fast. Sawyer had already come to the conclusion that reckless and out of control were defining characteristics of the omega werewolf.
“Hold your position.” Caleb’s voice was soft in his radio earpiece. “Patrol moving past up top.”
Shit.
Sawyer hugged the cliff face, holding his breath and trying to make himself disappear into a crack not nearly big enough to hide in. Somewhere above him, he heard the tread of heavy boots as guards walked along the perimeter of the monastery. The aforementioned guards were the reason Sawyer, Jake, and Caleb decided to climb the mountain free solo. Going without anchors, ropes, or gear of any kind increased the chances one of them would fall, but all it would take was one metal carabiner smacking against a rock when one of those guards was nearby and they’d have a dozen automatic weapons pointed in their direction. Exposed as they were on the side of the mountain, they’d be dead for sure.
Sawyer was still hugging the rocks when Harley whispered over the radio that she and Misty were in the line to board the aerial tram and about to get their invitations checked. While he was worried about Harley’s makeup and fake ID holding up, he was glad she wasn’t on the mountainside with him. The thought of her dangling by her fingers from a rock ledge the way he was at the moment made him want to throw up.
Thankfully, she’d been able to pass as one of the buyers attending the auction. Forrest, too. Jes had been able to use prosthetics, wigs, and makeup to make them look exactly like the real people they were pretending to be. Sawyer had watched the whole transformation and been seriously impressed with the STAT agent’s work. He hadn’t even recognized Harley afterward.
Misty and Erin were accompanying Harley and Forrest as their personal assistants. They didn’t look nearly as close in appearance to the real people even with Jes’s makeup magic, but hopefully whoever was checking the invitations wouldn’t pay much attention to them.
Since he, Jake, and Caleb were too big to consider getting into the auction as prospective buyers, they’d slip in with the security guards once they made it to the mountain top. With the makeup Jes had done to hide their features, hopefully none of the bad guys would recognize them from their previous encounters in Paris and Morocco. That said, Sawyer wasn’t thrilled with wearing the latex appliances on his face that changed the shape of his jaw and chin. They made his skin itch.
Unfortunately, Jes, Elliott, and Rory hadn’t been able to match the rest of the team up with any of the auction attendees, and because none of them was comfortable climbing the mountain, the plan had been for them to stay down at the base of the mountain and rescue each of the supernaturals purchased at the auction as they were brought down on the tram if things went sideways. Then, a few hours ago, they’d learned Boc was bringing in known criminals from the Athens area to do some work for the night. Sawyer had no idea what the work entailed, but it had been incredibly easy to slip Rory, Jes, Elliot, and Adriana, of all people, in that way. Thanks to a little makeup, no one would recognize them, either.
“The guard is gone,” Caleb said over the radio. “The coast is clear.”
Sawyer started climbing again, moving a little faster now. He didn’t want to get caught out here.
Makeup or no makeup, it was probably crazy to allow Adriana to come with them. But she’d insisted she could help them with the rescue by using her powers to take out the monastery’s power grid, shut down the tram, or even zap a few guards if that’s what they wanted her to do.
“I need to be there for Kristoff. If he dies up there and I did nothing to stop it, I’ll never be able to live with myself,” she said tearfully. “He saved my life. I have to help save his.”
It was that heartfelt plea that had finally made Sawyer and Jake agree to let her come with them. Who could say no to someone when all they wanted to do was save their boyfriend’s life? Besides, how could they go wrong having someone with them who could electrocute anyone who pissed her off?
Harley came on the radio again, letting them know she, Misty, Forrest, and Erin were boarding the tram and that there hadn’t been any problems with the invitations. Someone had simply checked names off a list.
Sawyer breathed a sigh of relief at that.
He grinned as he thought of the past two days he and Harley had spent together. After years of trying to make relationships work, he’d finally met a woman who completely got him. They clicked without any effort at all, even if all they’d had time to do was sit around in their hotel rooms or pull shifts at the surveillance villa and talk while eating souvlaki and gyros.
Sure, they’d kissed some more, and damn, it’d been amazing. He would have liked to do more than kiss, but they’d been too busy getting ready for the
