Fighting For Valor

by Patricia D. Eddy

  “Yep. Trevor said they got back a few hours ago.” After she enters another set of commands, she makes a low, frustrated sound I’ve never heard her make before. Was that a…growl? “Succotash.”

  “Succotash?” The laugh that rolls through me eases the last of the tension behind my eyes and reminds me just how fucking lucky I am. Even if I can’t keep up with all the odd words Wren uses in place of more conventional curses. “I love you, little bird.”

  Her fingers still on the keys, and she peers up at me, a soft smile tugging her lips and her jade green eyes dark. “I love you too. And I’m glad you’re home. How was training?”

  I ramble on as she works, and amazingly, she listens to every word and still manages to follow a set of financial transactions from one bank to another. “Everyone seemed glad to be back after West’s honeymoon.”

  “And you?” Searching my face, she huffs quietly. “Don’t answer now. But tonight…talk to me?”

  How does she know? That if I peel back the lid on the darkness, I won’t be able to put it away and let her finish her work?

  “I can read you, Ry. Someday, maybe it’ll stop surprising you.” With a quick squeeze to my thigh, she returns her focus to the laptop and shakes her head. “This is so weird,” she mutters. “Every single transaction has an extra piece of code that makes no sense. It doesn’t do anything. But it’s obviously important. This guy’s too good to put useless information in these wire transfers.”

  Glancing over at the screen, I choke on my sip of beer, take Wren’s laptop over her sputtered protest, and stare at the string of letters and numbers I know better than my own birthdate.

  94820RJT008000

  In a little window off to the side of the screen, the surveillance video plays, and I pause, rewind, and zoom in.

  “Holy fucking shit.”

  “Ry? What the heck is this?”

  I can’t force the word over the lump in my throat. Six years. Six years and eight months. Pulling out my phone, I send a text to my team.

  HVT located in Afghanistan. We leave in three hours. Plan on being gone five days.

  Within minutes, Inara, West, and Graham have all confirmed, and Wren’s staring at me like I’ve grown a second head.

  She arches her brow. “Ryker McCabe, what in the hockey pucks is going on here?”

  “Pack a bag, sweetheart. We’re going to Boston.”

  Boston

  Dax

  The sound of chimes wakes me from a deep sleep. Next to me, Evianna calls out on a yawn, “Alfie, show the front door.”

  Her home security system—the one she designed, built, and launched just a few days ago—lights up, but all I can see through my damaged eyes is a dull glow. A second later, she sits up, and her fingers curl around my arm. “Dax. It’s Ryker and Wren. They’re outside. Here.”

  For a moment, her words don’t register. And then, it’s like someone shot electricity through my entire body. I’m on my feet, fumbling around for my pajama pants, until I remember I’m not at my apartment. I’m at Evianna’s house—where we’ve been living for the past ten days—and I’m still a little iffy about where everything is.

  “Dax. Stop.” Her footsteps make the wood floors creak as she rounds the bed, and I still. “Pants,” she says softly as she drapes the material over my hands. “And a black t-shirt. I’ll let them in. Your cane’s downstairs, and I’ll bring it up—”

  “I can make it to the living room,” I grit out.

  With a little huff, she heads for the bedroom door. “If you fall down the stairs, I’m going to be really pissed off.”

  “Darlin’, wait.” Regret roughens my tone, and I pull on the pants and shirt, then hold out my hand. “You’re right. I need…help.” I’m not steady. Neither is she. With her holding my elbow, I can feel the slight tremble in her fingers. “What time is it?”

  “Six-thirty-three. It’s barely light out.” At the bottom of the stairs, she guides me to the right, enters a ten-digit code, then flips the locks.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask as soon as Ry and Wren’s diffuse, hazy forms are silhouetted in the pre-dawn glow from the street lights.

  “Snackcakes,” Wren mutters. “You didn’t call him, did you?” Ryker grunts what might be a no, and I think Wren elbows him as she huffs. “Dax, I’m sorry. I should have…I don’t know. Fudgesicles. Can we…uh…come in?”

  Manners, Holloway. Remember ‘em.

  “Yeah. It’s fine…I mean…don’t apologize.” Though I dislike being touched, I reach out, and she wraps her arms around me for a quick hug. Ry’s stiffer, sidling past me without so much as a ‘morning.

  The women embrace as I shut the door, exchanging apologies for the early hour and not being dressed flowing between the two as Evianna leads us all into the kitchen. “Just let me start the coffee, okay?” she asks with a squeeze to my fingers.

  Whatever Ry’s doing here, it’s bad. I just talked to the man a little over a day ago. Ford and Joey got back last night, so I know they’re safe. I need something to do, but it’s not that big of a kitchen. I can at least find the mugs, and I carry four to the table, setting them down with only a hint of a clatter.

  Pinching the bridge of my nose, I try to think. “We have…uh…”

  “Nothing,” Evianna answers. The coffee starts to percolate, and she slides into the chair next to me and links our fingers. “Unless you consider Honey Nut Cheerios suitable for guests?”

  “Coffee’s fine,” Ryker says.

  No one says a word for several minutes, but Wren pulls out her laptop, and I can hear her typing furiously. When the drip, drip, drip of the coffee slows, Evianna brings the pot to the table and fills the mugs.

  “Do you have any honey?” Wren asks.

  I can feel the tension rolling off Ryker, and after Evianna slides the bottle of honey in front or Wren, he rubs his hand over his bald head, then clears his throat. “We found something in Abdul Faruk’s finances.”

  “Something important enough to show up at Evi—our—house before sunrise?” I asked her to marry me a week ago, and though we haven’t talked about a wedding yet, if things work out, we’ll get married next to Ry and Wren at the end of the year. But it still feels odd to refer to this as our place.

  “Yeah. How much did Ford tell you?” Ry leans forward, his massive presence dominating the room. I’m tall, but he’s the biggest motherfucker I’ve ever seen…or had ever seen before I lost my sight.

  “I got a text message from him when he got in last night. He and Joey are at his place, safe. Trevor’s back too. Nomar, the spook he knows who worked the Uzbeck theater, is stuck in a hospital in Turkey for another couple of days.”

  Where’s this going?

  I find Evianna’s hand under the table and run my thumb over her engagement ring. She calms me. Centers me. Helps quiet my demons. And at the moment, those demons are trying to bring down the entire fucking house.

  “They had help escaping Faruk’s compound,” Wren says. “Trevor sent me all of the footage from his and Nomar’s bodycams, and I spent yesterday afternoon digging into Faruk’s finances. He has dozens of offshore accounts, and untangling all the transactions, sources and destinations…it was driving me bonkers.”

  “You?” Wren’s the best hacker I’ve ever met, and she routinely has to delve into complex financial data for our clients. Bonkers is extreme for her.

  “There was this code…”

  Ry finishes her sentence, “At the end of every transaction. A code that didn’t need to be there.”

  “Are you going to get to the fucking point?” My headache’s already started, and it’s not even 7:00 a.m. “Or is this just a really long-winded story so I won’t kick your ass for waking us up—”

  “Dax,” Evianna says in my ear. “This is…this is bad. Can’t you hear it in his voice?”

  Fuck. Of course I can. It’s been there since we opened the door. But I just got my best friend—my brother—back after six years. I’m not prepared to
lose him again, and I can’t think of any other reason he’d be this…off.

  “94820RJT008000.”

  “No.” I push back from the table, half knocking over the chair in my rush to stand, to pace, to get some fucking air. “Evianna…I need…” Not paying a damn bit of attention to where I am, I bang into the counter, lose my balance, and go down, hard.

  “Dax!” Evianna cries, but it’s Ryker who takes my arm and pulls me to my feet.

  “Give us a minute,” he grits out. The lock on the back door thunks, and the crisp morning air hits my cheeks. I’m free. In Boston. Not back in Hell. Not broken. Well, not completely broken. And my brother’s still at my side.

  “It’s just a code,” I say, my voice rough.

  “Yeah. It was. Until I saw the video from Trevor’s body cam. It’s him, Dax. Older. Beard, long hair, looked like shit. Like…the man we knew—the man we called our brother—died a long time ago. But his body… It’s him. My team’s on their way here. I don’t care what it takes. We’re bringing him home.”

  I can hear the emotion in Ry’s voice. The tears he’s fighting not to let spill.

  And then it hits me. Why he’s about to break.

  “We left him there. Fuck. We left a man behind.”

  Chapter Eight

  Dax

  It’s too early, and I should have called first, but Ry was right to just show up at my door this morning. Some things can’t be explained over the phone. He rings Ford’s doorbell, and I hear footsteps inside.

  As the door opens, a small hazy form darts behind Ford’s taller one. Shit. Ry probably scared the crap out of Joey.

  “Didn’t know we were hosting a party this morning,” Ford says. “You couldn’t have called first? Joey’s—”

  Wren edges around me. “Joey? I’m Wren. It’s really good to meet you.”

  Ford introduces us all, but we’re still standing just inside the door. “Ford, can we sit down? Wren and Ryker found something on the surveillance tapes from Faruk’s compound we need to talk about.”

  “Yeah, whatever. You want coffee?” he asks.

  I wave him off as I take one end of the couch, and Joey and Ford huddle together on the other end.

  “This is from Nomar’s bodycam,” Wren says. “Before the three of you went in to rescue Joey.”

  I can’t see the screen, but it sounds like Faruk is beating the crap out of Joey, and I’m about to say something when Ford pipes up. “Wren,” he warns, “what’s the point of this?”

  “Sorry.” Her voice drops to a whisper and she taps a few keys. “Joey, you’re off the video now. But you need to see this next part.”

  Ry explained what’s on the screen. Our friend, our teammate, walking across the yard, looking like a broken man with no hope. Behind Wren, Ry clears his throat. “Do you know who that man is?”

  “Isaad,” Joey says quietly. “He was…kind.”

  Ford recounts their escape and how this Isaad directed them to an underground tunnel. “He said Faruk took his name and his honor. Everything that made him who he was. His ledger was full of blood. And if he was lucky, he’d be able to kill Faruk before Faruk killed him. And then he said he was sorry.”

  Ryker stands a little taller. “That enough proof for you?”

  “Yeah.” I take off my glasses and pinch the bridge of my nose. “I’m going with you. At least to the safehouse in Kabul. If he’s alive, I need to be there.”

  “Who?” Ford asks. “Who the hell is this Isaad guy? He didn’t sound like a local.”

  Ryker’s voice is raspier and rougher than normal. “His name is Jackson Richards. But when we knew him, when he was the Communications Sergeant on our ODA team, we called him Ripper.”

  Ryker

  We leave Ford’s apartment and head directly to Second Sight. Dax hasn’t said a fucking word since we walked out the door, and I don’t know how to reach him. Or if I even can.

  He’s out of the car faster than I think should be possible for a blind man and headed for the elevator, his cane tapping lightly on the concrete. “Don’t,” Wren says when I take a deep breath, ready to stop him. “Let him have a few minutes.”

  Meeting her gaze, I can see my anguish reflected in her green eyes. “Sweetheart, I’m…” My knuckles crack as I ball my hands into fists, little lightning bolts of pain shooting through my fingers. But it’s only a fraction of what I deserve.

  “You didn’t leave him,” she whispers. Gently, she cups my cheek, leans in, and ghosts her lips over mine. “You thought he was dead. You had every reason to believe he’d died six months before you escaped. He wasn’t in Hell. You had no way of knowing where he was. I know you, Ryker McCabe. If you’d had a single shred of doubt, you’d have turned that whole country upside down to find him.”

  “I can’t get those words out of my head. ‘Faruk took his name and his honor. Everything that made him who he was.’” I need to hit something, but the steering wheel of the rental car wouldn’t be a good target, and I want the whole team on a transpo to Afghanistan as soon as West gives us the go ahead. But if there’s time, I’m finding Dax’s boxing gym and punching the shit out of a heavy bag. “I thought…I thought I got him killed, Wren. But this is worse. I…destroyed him.”

  “Stop that right now,” she says sharply. “That horsepucky isn’t going to do you—or Ripper—any good. You didn’t destroy him. Faruk did. You are going to get him back. Now, come on. We’ve given Dax enough time alone, and West, Inara, and Graham should be here soon.”

  As we reach the elevator, I wrap my arm around Wren’s shoulders, pull her close, and kiss the top of her head. “I couldn’t do this without you, little bird. I love you.”

  “You’d do it.” Her lips curve into a half-smile. “Because that’s who you are. But you don’t have to do it alone.”

  My team—Inara, West, and Graham—along with Dax, some guy named Clive, and Wren all sit around a conference table with a view of the Boston skyline. And I doubt any of them have even looked twice at it.

  “This is going to be tricky,” West says as Wren projects satellite images of the compound on the wall. “He’s got a shit ton of firepower, a position with three-sixty visibility, and we have no idea if the target’s going to welcome us with open arms or try to kill us.”

  I slam my fist down on the table, and Wren stifles a yelp. “This is Ripper we’re talking about. He’s Special Forces. There’s no way he’d turn on us,” I say, the words rough as they scrape over the back of my throat. I know the guy. Knew him, at least. “We all had two weeks of SERE training. And fuck…we survived Hell. Ripper didn’t disappear for six months. He was as messed up as Dax and I were, but the last time I heard his voice, he was singing Bohemian Rhapsody as he was trying to do…well…something. Never knew what, but that was our code for resistance.”

  A quiet, low voice from the door startles all of us. “SERE training helped you and Dax survive being prisoners of war. But that bastard who carved the two of you up wasn’t trained in enhanced interrogation and psychological torture.”

  “And you are?” I push to my feet, straightening my shoulders to show off all seven feet of my bulk. This guy’s small—compared to me—and I don’t want anyone else in this room. Hell, I didn’t want Clive here, but Dax insisted.

  “Trevor,” Dax says. “Sit down, Ry. He’s one of mine. Ex-CIA. You can trust him.”

  My gaze slides to Dax, and I nod. “Fine. But are we inviting anyone else to this circus?”

  “No.” Trevor shuts the conference room door, but doesn’t sit. Instead, he shoves his hands into his pockets and rests his back against the wall. “McCabe, I don’t know you. But between the little Dax has said about his time in Hell and your face, I’d bet your torture involved pain, movement restriction, isolation, and starvation. Along with your captor trying to convince you everything would be okay if you’d just tell him what he needed to know.”

  “Trevor—” Wren begins, but I squeeze her hand.

  “It’s all
right, sweetheart. I know what I look like.” Returning my gaze to Trevor, I growl, “Add in time in the hole and you’ve got it pretty well covered. So?”

  “That’s not how you break a man.” His voice quiets even more, and his eyes darken. “That’s how you torture a man. But if you want to break him, there’s more to it. And if you want to take away everything he is…that’s only the start.”

  West clears his throat—not that it does much good. “He’s right.” All heads turn in unison. “My team…we were trained in some of the techniques. I don’t…I need a minute.” He strides from the room, glaring at Trevor for a beat before slamming the door behind him.

  “Keep going,” I say.

  “Wren? Are you sure you want to hear this?” Trevor asks. “I can come get you when—”

  “Flippin’ Flapjacks,” my little bird says as she rolls her eyes. “I was kidnapped, drugged, and beaten by the head of a Russian bratva less than six weeks ago. No, I don’t want to hear this. Yes, I’m going to. Get on with it.” She links her fingers with mine, and I feel the tremble. Anger flares, hot and prickling along my skin, and I tighten my free hand around the arm of the chair until it creaks in my grip.

  With a sigh, Trevor runs a hand through his hair. “If you want to destroy a man’s psyche, you don’t just beat the shit out of him. Pain is only a small part of the process. First, you take him away from everything he’s ever known. That didn’t happen in Hell. It probably happened there,” he points at the map. “Faruk’s compound is a good four hours from the mountains by truck. Then, you switch things up. Hell was cold, yeah?”

  Dax and I both grunt our assent in unison. Deep under the mountain, the intense heat never penetrated.

  “That part of Afghanistan where Faruk is? It’s hotter than the surface of the sun in July. So hot, it’s hard to breathe. They might feed him. Might not. But they’d deprive him of water until he was almost dead. Then, they’d give him a sealed bottle. Tell him it was clean. But all you need is a hypodermic needle and a lighter and you can inject a bottle full of LSD or other psychotropic and no one’s the wiser.”