An intel specialist reported into Griffin’s earbud, “Box canyon. Steep but not sheer cliffs. One pickup truck. Two tangos in the back. Photo analyst thinks she sees weapons. One heat signature on the west rim of the valley.”

Griffin snorted. They’d kidnapped a SEAL trainee and demanded that a SEAL meet them out here. They’d better be armed to the teeth if they expected to walk away from this alive. Not to mention, nobody messed with Sherri without answering to him.

Cal said in his ear, “Okay, Grif. Contact’s made. Back off, and let the full SEAL team move in.”

“Is there any sign of Tate?” he asked on the open frequency that included the intel team.

“Negative.”

“If she’s not here, I’m going to have to go in there and play this out,” he responded.

“Negative, Grif,” Cal snapped. “Let us take these guys.”

“You know as well as I do they’ll never talk. If they don’t take me to her, she could be anywhere, dying.”

Cal started to argue, and Griffin pulled the earbud out of his ear, letting it hang on its cord down his chest. Nope. Not gonna squabble with the boss about this. If Sherri wasn’t in the truck, he was handing himself over to these bastards.

It was entirely possible they would shoot him as he approached. But in that case, Sherri was likely already dead, and he didn’t have any great desire to live in a world without her, anyway.

Arms held low and away from his sides, he walked forward toward his fate. If this was how he died, so be it.

* * *

Sherri froze in the act of standing up to stomp on a small boulder and send it down the slope as one of the Russians called out of the shadows, “Show your face, Caldwell!”

Her gut leaped at the confirmation that the special operator approaching was indeed Griffin.

Even better, now that the hostile had spoken, Griffin knew there were men hiding out here. In reality, he probably already knew exactly how many there were and where they were, given the technology SEALs could bring to bear on an encounter like this. She sank back down slowly to watch the scenario unfold, her protective instincts on hyperdrive.

Griffin lifted his NODs up on top of his helmet. Her heart jumped with joy at the sight of him, so close. Now the two of them just had to get out of this confrontation alive.

“Come toward the truck!” the accented voice called out of the darkness.

“Identify yourselves!” Griffin called back. “Show me Tate, or I don’t come any closer!”

“You’re in our gunsights, Caldwell!”

“Then shoot me now!”

Sherri winced. He was brave to call their bluff like that. She knew Haddad wanted him alive, but he didn’t know that.

Silence greeted his challenge.

“That’s what I thought,” Griffin called back. “Show me Tate!”