Mountain Refuge (Mountain Mutineers #1)

Epilogue

Corbin

W e had various graveyards spread throughout the mountain known only to those of us who lived upon it. These were not gravesites that were visited or well maintained. They were nothing more than locations to dump bodies of those who tried to harm those who we protected.

The fourteen mercenaries and Sebastian Gunther claimed such graves.

By the time the others had arrived, the battle had been over. Beyond scrapes and bruises, I had a knife wound in my back. In fact, I literally had a knife in my back until Brooke had removed it for me. Her face was cut up pretty good from her glass window exploding too close to her. Thankfully none of the glass got in her eyes, though she did have a good piece embedded in her cheek. I got it out for her using a pair of tweezers.

Elijah was… Well, it was difficult to determine his injuries at first. Then again, not all wounds were physical.

Dalton and Tommy arrived long before Walter and Josie did. Despite still healing from her injuries, Josie insisted on coming down with Walter. We were all shocked at Tommy’s appearance, but the man just stood there with a scowl and his shotgun muttering about Brooke’s SOS saying the kids were in danger. I always knew the old coot had a soft heart. Not that he would ever admit it.

Other than some bruising to her neck, Belle was fine. None of the blood splatter on her had been hers. Brooke tried to shield Belle’s eyes as much as possible through the living room to get her out of the cabin.

I had to physically drag Elijah off of Gunther’s mangled corpse. In fact, none of us even knew it was Gunther until Belle had said something. Elijah had been so enraged that he’d kicked and hit at me to continue getting at the body on the bedroom floor. I passed Elijah off to Brooke to help calm him down.

Then I had to check the bodies of Trenton and little Lucas.

There wasn’t much in this world that made me cry. My father had beaten that ability out of me a long time ago—or so I thought. As I knelt down by those two unmoving forms, tears had flowed freely down into my unkempt beard.

I didn’t know Trenton well, but he’d seemed like a good kid. But Lucas? My little buddy and nephew? I couldn’t imagine a world without him in it. What was I going to tell my mother, who loved him like a grandson?

Slowly, I reached for Trenton. He had such a tight hold on Lucas’s little form that they both rolled together as I placed Trenton onto his back. I saw then the blood that coated the side of Trenton’s face that had been pressed into the floor. So much blood…

And Lucas. He could have been sleeping, he looked so peaceful.

Tears fogged my vision so much that it took me far too long to realize that Trenton’s chest was moving up and down. It wasn’t much, but it was there! I quickly moved into action.

Careful of his cast and splint, I pried Trenton’ s hands off of Lucas. Praying more than I ever had in my life, I checked my nephew over. He was so still, I still feared the worst, but then I felt his pulse and was able to catch his shallow breath. He was alive! I didn’t know why he wasn’t waking but he was fucking alive!

I shouted out for Elijah and Brooke to come back. They came running in. It looked like Brooke had been trying to wash the blood off of Elijah’s face and hands. The crimson splatters now looked like warrior paint smeared across his face.

“He’s alive!”

For a moment, I thought Elijah was going to faint.

Brooke rushed forward before Elijah could, which was probably a good idea given the amount of blood still on my best friend. “What’s wrong with him?”

“I don’t know, but we need to get them to a doctor!” As soon as Brooke had Lucas, I turned my attention to Trenton. “It looks like he was shot in the temple. I don’t think the bullet went in though. I don’t see an entry wound.”

“He must have taken a bullet to the head and went down on top of Lucas,” Brooke supplied. “Lucas might have hit his head from the fall.”

Even after taking a bullet to the temple, Trenton had somehow kept his grip on Lucas. I couldn’t imagine how.

Knowing we needed a doctor but also knowing we couldn’t get down the mountain fast enough, our options looked limited. Until Dalton fired up the helicopter now abandoned on the front of Brooke’s lawn. It seemed our only option to get down as fast as we needed.

Walter offered to take Belle up to my cabin and my mom, but Belle threw a fit and demanded to come with us. It was a good thing the helicopter was so massive. I didn’t know a lot about helicopters or their capacities, but this one had carried the fourteen men plus Gunther up into the mountains .

Which was how we ended up leaving Brooke’s broken cabin and the massacred mercenaries for Tommy, Josie, and Walter to deal with as we flew down into town. I knew Dalton didn’t come down off of the mountain often, so this was a huge sacrifice on his part.

Brooke and Elijah kept hold of Lucas, continuing to try and wake him, while I was applying pressure to Trenton’s head wound. I knew head wounds tended to bleed a lot but damn the kid had lost a lot of blood.

Arriving at the hospital and dealing with all of the people there was nearly too much for me, but I gritted it out to stay with Trenton so Elijah and Brooke could remain with Lucas. Dalton had dropped us off and then immediately flew away. I had no idea what he was planning on doing with the helicopter. Though there was a good chance Dalton was claiming it as the spoils of war.

Even with how often I went to town to drop off my furniture to Jack to sell, I still wasn’t used to people . I was a big guy with unkempt hair and a perpetual scowl when not around my family. People didn’t approach me or talk to me unless they had to. I was fine with that. But now I had to talk to people, the nurses and doctors, and I was not okay with it.

Trenton had been taken back for tests. I had no idea what to say if or when the police showed up. I didn’t have a good history with police. Not a single one of them that had handled my arrest stopped to ask if my father deserved his death. No one had looked at my malnourished body and had asked if I’d even eaten that day. None had looked at my bruised and battered mother and wondered if she had older injuries hidden beneath the new ones.

I wanted to leave before the cops came to investigate, but Dalton had already left and I didn’t know where Elijah or Brooke were .

Thank God Jack showed up. He looked awful, but I was glad to see him.

“How did they find us?” I asked him.

“Dr. Souleiman was attacked in her home two nights ago. I can only assume she overheard something of use from when Owen brought Trenton and Josie there for treatment. I’m not sure how they located Dr. Souleiman.” He coughed, working to catch his breath. Walking pneumonia was no joke. “We might never know now that Gunther is dead.”

“Good riddance,” I muttered.

“You’ll find no argument with me. Any news on Lucas?”

I shook my head. “They’re in with the doctor now.” I wiped a blood crusted hand down my face. “Christ, Jack, we were supposed to protect them. What if Lucas doesn’t make it? What if Trenton has brain damage?”

“Speculating does no one any good.” Jack indicated towards the men’s room across the way. “Go get cleaned up. I’ll wait for the doctors.”