by C. G. Cooper
“Okay if I ask the obvious question?” Charles motioned to Lena.
“I'm an open book around this one,” Shamblin said
“Alrighty, and don’t take this the wrong way, Terry, but what the hell are you doing here?”
“Can’t an old pal come see his buddies?”
Charles glanced again at Lena.
“Speak your mind, Marine,” Shamblin said.
Charles pinched the bridge of his nose as if he was coming down with a headache. “I won’t sugarcoat it.”
“Wouldn't expect you to.”
“The command still has a few upper echelon types who remember the way you crowed your way out of this joint. The worst is the Major.”
“You’re kidding. Jansen? I thought they drummed that clown out of the Corps.”
“You know what they say about turds and the Corps.”
Shamblin winced. “Yeah, they stick better than mud on a pig.”
“You got it. Now, knowing that Major Jansen might just drop in at any minute, how can we of so humble an upbringing help the returning hero.”
“Cut the hero crap,” Shamblin said. It was the first rise of anger Lena had seen in the man.
“My bad,” said Charles. “Didn’t know you were so testy about it. The question remains. Why the hell are you here? We could’ve done this off base.”
Shamblin snatched a tin of chewing tobacco from a desk and wedged a fat lump behind his lower lip. “I need a favor.”
“You need us to babysit?” Charles asked.
“I don’t need a babysitter,” Lena said, heat rising to her cheeks.
“I didn’t mean for you, Lena. I meant it for this crusty bastard here stealing my last lipper.”
Shamblin readjusted himself in his seat. “I’ve taught her everything I know, at least as far as what I can do on the outside. I need your help to teach her in here.”
Both Marines looked at their friend with undisguised shock.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” said Gains.
“No way,” Charles added.
Shamblin took the comments in stride, just as he’d told Lena he would. “You’ll both teach her.”
Charles stood up from his chair and pointed at the older Marine. “Listen, Terry. I like you. Hell, I owe you my life. But I don’t know what I ever did to make you think that you could come in here and—”
“Sit down, Charles.”
Charles remained standing.
“Fine, I’ll join you on your level.” said Shamblin, rising from his chair. “Now, when I tell you who this young lady’s father is, I’ll bet you a million dollars you’ll jump through your ass to help us.”
Charles’ incredulous face twisted to outright rage. “Get out.”
“Don't you want to hear the name?” Shamblin asked as if offering ice cream to a child.
“I want to hear it,” said Gains. That drew a glare from Charles.
Shamblin’s smile went cheek to cheek. He told them her father’s name.
Two things happened.
First, Gains’s mouth dropped open.
Second, Charles went cloud white and dropped back into his chair.
“No fucking way,” Gains said in barely a whisper.
“Yes fucking way,” Shamblin said. “Now, are you two gonna help me, or do I need to fly all the way to Pendleton to ask for help?”
Charles slipped from the chair down onto his knee and looked up at Lena.
“Sweetheart, your father was the bravest sonofabitch I ever met. The three of us are alive because of him. I tell you here and now that I will do anything and everything to pay that debt back.”
And just like that, Lena was unofficially enrolled in Marine Sniper School.
Chapter Twenty
STOKES — ARRINGTON, TENNESSEE — PRESENT DAY
“You’re sure?” Cal asked.
Daniel only nodded.
“I can go with you.”
“We’ll be fine.”
As if to put an exclamation to that point, Liberty licked Cal’s arm.
“Okay, okay. You know I don’t like that.” He smiled as he stroked her dark coat. “You be good, okay?”
Liberty cocked her head and might’ve been looking into her master’s soul, gauging his true motives. Cal gave her one last pat on the butt and got out of the car. “Stay safe.”
“Always,” Daniel said from the driver’s seat. He gave Cal a final reaffirming wink and was off.
“I wish I had his trust in destiny,” Cal said to the world. He took his next step more confidently, still unsure of where this decision would lead.
A few minutes later he came upon a familiar sight, a place with one too many memories.
Chapter Twenty-One
ZIMMER — WASHINGTON, D.C. — PRESENT DAY
“Let’s go over it again,” the president said, rubbing a palm over his forehead. A move that elicited knowing glances from the men and women gathered around the table.
“How about we take a fifteen-minute break,” Marge Haines suggested. “A little early lunch?”
The cabinet attendees began ruffling their papers together.
“No,” Zimmer said, still staring at the report before him, which by now might as well have been in Latin. “We’re done for the day.”
Zimmer leaned back in his chair and waited until it was himself and Marge.
“Tell me that’s the last meeting of the day,” he said wearily.
Haines glanced at her phone. “You want me to tell you the truth or would it be better to run with your fantasy.”
“Run with the fantasy,” Zimmer said, knuckling his eyes for a blissful twenty seconds.
“Very well. Yes, Mr. President, we’re done for the day. As a matter of fact, we’re done for the week. Next comes a two-hour massage followed by hot cocoa and a nap in a bed covered in angel down.”
“That’s enough, Marge.”
“Once you’re properly rested, it’s off to a private island inaccessible by all but our most elite special operations soldiers.”
“Are you done?”
“Angelina Jolie and J.Lo will be waiting to play ping pong in case you’re in the mood.”
“Uh huh.”
“Oh, and I hear the Rolling Stones are giving a private concert.”
He waited for more, but she was done. He opened his eyes and there was Haines, where she always was. Different than his old friend and last chief of staff, Travis Haden. There was a solidity to both, but Haines brought a coaxing femininity that allowed for humor and a kind word where Haden might have offered a stern rebuke.
“Would be nice, wouldn’t it?” he said.
“Ping pong with J.Lo? Sorry, I’m more of a Ryan Reynolds gal.”
The president couldn’t help but laugh at her dry delivery. Her eyes were smiling though. Those eyes. He’d noticed them more each day.
No. Can’t go there, he thought.
And he couldn’t. Haden and Haines had been involved. To what level, he didn’t know. But weren’t there rules against dating your dead friend’s ex? Had to be.
“Penny for your thoughts?” she said, her gaze shifting from her phone and momentarily resting on him.
“Nothing important,” he said, shaking his last thoughts from the room. “Just feeling sorry for myself.”
“You’ve got exactly two minutes and thirteen seconds to feel sorry for yourself.”
“And then?”
“Then you have a meeting with the trade minister of Pakistan.”
Zimmer groaned. “Is this the one with the nose hair or the sweaty handshake?”
“Both, sir.”
But they laughed now. At least levity dropped in once in a while. Reality drove in a split second later, as it usually did in the White House.
“Marge, do you think I made the right call with Top and Gaucho?”
Haines slid her phone into her coat pocket. “I think you made the right call...”
“But…?”
“But I
think you should’ve taken certain, mmm, precautions.”
“Such as?”
“Maybe send someone to keep an eye on them.”
Zimmer’s frown deepened. “You think that’s necessary?”
“You asked me, Mr. President. I told you.”
Zimmer slammed a palm onto the desk. “Dammit, Marge, would you just talk to me like a human being?”
Haines sat there straight-faced, the poker queen. “Well I’m terribly sorry, Mr. President, sir, but you can’t have it both ways. I work for you; you work for the American people. Outside of the Oval, we can putz around as much as we want. But when we’re in the Oval, I’m just doing my job and I’d appreciate it if you would allow me to do it. Yes, you made the right call. Yes, you should have taken precautions. What more do you want from me?”
Zimmer rubbed his face in frustration. She was magnificent and aggravating at the same time.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Apology accepted, Mr. President.”
“When we’re out of the Oval, you’ll get an apology from your friend Brandon as well.”
“Works for me.”
Zimmer shook his head at his desk. Ever since Top and Gaucho had shown up he’d been even more out of sorts. The feeling of missing the camaraderie of his brothers had only succeeded in enticing him back to his friends, yet farther from his duty as president.
“Hey, Marge?”
“Yes, Brandon.” She sounded out every letter.
Zimmer chuckled. Impossible not to—also impossible not to note the flutter he felt in his stomach like a lovesick 15-year-old.
“Always be you, okay?”
“I have to… otherwise I’d have to buy a whole new wardrobe.”
And there it was. She was so sure of her path. Why couldn’t he feel the same way?
Chapter Twenty-Two
LENA — RICHWOOD, WEST VIRGINIA — AGE 16
The cinder block five feet from her head exploded into bits, some of which cut into her left hand. Dust clouded her vision. Sound of splitting rock cracked her eardrums.
Lena did her best to ignore it all, her eyes still resting quietly behind her rifle sights. No target yet. Still only empty air, blue sky, and clouds behind.
She’d been in the same spot for two days, her longest stretch yet. They’d told her about the resiliency of the human body, and she was starting to believe it. For eight hours each day the sun baked into her. She’d learned to watch the movement of shadows and the rising of bugs and animals as the sun dropped out of sight. She’d become one with this spot, what with its divots and muscle-stabbing rocks.
Lena did a scan of her body, tightening and loosing muscles from her head down to her toes. Methodical. Careful. Habit now.
The thwoomp of a mortar exiting a tube elicited a subconscious inhale. The round hit to the east. Two more followed.
How many days would it be? Three? Five? A week?
Too much time to think on time. Shouldn’t that be on a T-shirt or something?
Focus, she told herself. There were times when her 16-year-old mind told her she ought to be doing 16-year-old things. Boyfriends. BFFs. Hair-twirling calls long into the night. But that wasn’t her life. It wasn’t her.
Yes, she went to school. Yes, she interacted with kids her age. But it was little more than window dressing. Her real life was here, sweating under the sun, never moving a visible muscle, always focused on the target.
Well, not always. She learned that the hard way.
On her first foray into the field, while the sneaky Marines had her focused on the target, each crept in from opposite angles, unseen and unheard. It wasn’t until she felt a blade fall across her chigger-nipped neck that she discovered her mistake.
She would not make that mistake again. It was harder for her. She knew that, accepted it, and rolled on. There would be no spotter, no partner to watch her. She would be like the women snipers of World War II - lone wolves taking down Hitler’s officers one shot at a time.
So, she waited, then waited some more. And not once did her father leave her or did she consider abandoning the mission he’d imparted so many years ago.
Chapter Twenty-Three
DUNN — CAMP SPARTAN, ARRINGTON, TENNESSEE — PRESENT DAY
The knock at the door could not have come at a worse time.
“Come in,” Dunn said with a restrained bark.
“Sir, there’s someone at the main gate who’d like to speak with you.”
Dunn looked up from the mess that was the current state of affairs of his desk. “Is this a joke?”
The kid was new; made apparent by the way he squirmed to find an answer. “No, sir?”
Scratch that, Dunn thought. This isn’t a kid. He’s a veteran newly hired to the SSI team. There’d been a lot of them lately. He wouldn’t have remembered the guy’s name if it wasn’t pinned to his pocket.
“Sorry, I’ve got a lot on my plate.”
“Yes, sir.”
“The person at the gate. Does he have a name?”
“He wouldn’t give one, sir.”
Dunn shook his head impatiently. “I don’t understand. Tell him to go away.”
He didn’t have time for this crap. On top of the search for Cal, he had a company to run.
“Sir, he says he wants to see you personally.”
Dunn almost lost his famous cool again, thinking the pen in his left hand might go nicely lodged in the wall.
“Tell me, McPherson, why can’t the many qualified men up the chain of command take care of this mystery man?”
But Dunn was curious. Even more curious when McPherson struggled for words again. Dunn remembered this one now. Army Ranger. Good with an AK. Father was in the gun business. Had the hands of an armorer. A good find. A good soldier. Take a breath, Todd Dunn.
“Spit it out, son,” he said with a smirk. “Did they teach you to go mute at Ranger school?”
“No, sir. And I’m sorry to bother you, but the guy seems legit. Nice enough, but hard. You know the type.”
Of course he did. He was that type. “And he seemed legit because...?”
“Sir, he says he owns SSI.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
DUNN — CAMP SPARTAN, ARRINGTON, TENNESSEE — PRESENT DAY
By the time Dunn got to the main gate, a small group of SSI veterans had appeared. Word moved fast. It always did within the ranks.
Cal Stokes had risen to near demigod status in the eyes of the old timers. He’d swept in on a hurricane and left just as fast. Dunn often caught snippets of gossip surrounding Cal’s growing legend. “I heard Stokes is in North Korea,” or “I’ll bet Stokes is gonna take out the Russian president next.” Then there were times he heard SSI employees scheming to get a spot at The Jefferson Group. That grated Dunn personally, as it effectively stripped SSI of the coveted tip-of-the-spear position. That had changed with the entrance of Matthew Wilcox, but not as much as Dunn once believed as he looked down from the gate at his old friend.
Dunn didn't need to say a thing. The crowd hushed as soon as he appeared.
“You gonna invite me in or do I need a written invitation?” Cal asked.
Dunn toyed with the idea of putting the Marine in shackles. That would teach him a lesson. That’s what he deserved and was no less than what the president had asked for, but this was delicate. It had to be.
Dunn’s calculating mind snapped in fast. What would Cal in shackles do to his own image? He knew he wasn’t as charismatic as Cal or as resourceful as Haines, but he was a solid leader who’d righted the ship and kept pressing for improvement.
Dunn forced a smile that he hoped didn’t seemed forced.
“I thought you were coming later tonight.”
Cal shrugged. “Made good time. Hope that’s okay.”
“No problem. Come on in.”
There were handshakes and pats on the back, no doubt some of Dunn’s men wanting the glory that was Stokes to rub off on them.
Shit,
he thought. When had he gotten so crass? It had been Cal’s own cousin, Travis, who saved Dunn from a life in jail. He might’ve gotten off eventually, but his career in the Army was dead, and what would he do after that?
Remember the favor they did for you, Dunn told himself. After a breath, he added, but don’t forget who you’re dealing with here.
Chapter Twenty-Five
GAUCHO — COPENHAGEN — PRESENT DAY
“You sure we should be doing this?” Gaucho asked, hooking the wire running from the camera to the power source over a dented downspout.
“You got any better ideas?” Top said, his friend’s feet clamped in the larger man’s shoulders. “Now hurry up. You’ve put on weight.” He grunted for effect.
“Hey, watch it. I’m vulnerable lately.”
“We can watch rom-coms together under a blanket later if that’ll help.”
“No offense, amigo, but I’d rather fry up here.”
Gaucho secured the wire in place with a piece of black tape and admired the jury-rigged contraption. It was the best they could do. The neighborhood wasn’t exactly prime for surveillance. Too many eyes that would easily notice a huge black man and his Hispanic sidekick. That’s why the two men never got sent for public surveillance, something Gaucho once thought of smugly.
Top knelt to a squat and Gaucho hopped off the shoulder perch.
“You know, I could get used to this,” he said, brushing his hands together. “How about the two of us set up shop as a private investigative service. We could call it Under My Eye.”
“You been thinking about that for a while now, haven’t you?”
Gaucho shrugged. “Maybe.”
Top shook his head. “Man, you’ve been watching too much Handmaid’s Tale. And besides, this surveillance business would eat you from the guts in less than a week.”
Gaucho lifted the small backpack from the ground. “You think we’ll find Wilcox?”