Taking Fire

by Cindy Gerard

  “Carlyle, kill those fucking lights,” Nate ordered. “We’ll lay down cover.” No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.

  The axiom rolled through Bobby’s mind. This was what happened in rushed operations thrown together in bad conditions and without proper recon and surveillance. So much for a sneak attack.

  Time for plan B, the oh, shit plan. All men on deck, a full-out assault on the Bunker as soon as Carlyle killed those lights and that damn alarm.

  Muzzle flashes erupted from the Bunker—the bad guys clearly knew they had company—and Black’s team lit up the warehouse with live rounds and tracer fire in response.

  Suddenly, the warehouse went dark. The alarms stopped screaming. Score one for the good guys.

  “Carlyle?” Nate barked over the radio.

  “I’m good,” Carlyle barked back, sounding out of breath.

  Without surprise on their side, things got much more dangerous. And they couldn’t use overwhelming firepower to shoot their way into the Bunker, or Meir could become a victim of friendly fire.

  Another problem: they hadn’t anticipated that the warehouse would be so full of crap. They had to maneuver around stacks of crates and machinery to get to the Bunker. While offering some protection, the obstacles cost them speed. And speed was their best weapon right now.

  As one, the team ran the maze toward the Bunker, bullets whizzing all around them. Bobby flipped down his night-vision goggles, firing as he ran. Running beside him, Talia did the same. He stopped and hunkered down behind a crate about fifteen yards from the Bunker’s front entrance, then looked around and counted. All six infrared lights that the team had secured to their helmets to identify one another in the dark were present and accounted for.

  He ducked for cover when another round of gunfire strafed the warehouse and the flash of tracers lit things up like the Vegas Strip.

  “Green’s down!”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Bobby saw Carlyle grab Green by the handle on the back of his body armor and drag him behind a stack of crates.

  “He’s just stunned, Steph,” Carlyle said after several long, tense seconds.

  “I’m fine,” Green grumbled.

  “You damn well better be.” Steph sounded worried but strong.

  “On one, two, three,” Black said, and everyone but Green stood and laid fire in the direction of the ground-floor guard who’d been giving them grief.

  “Tango down,” Jones said.

  “Ditto that,” said Santos.

  Two down, seven to go.

  Then a machine gun started firing from a first-floor window.

  Jesus. These guys were loaded for bear.

  Bobby dropped to one knee and shone the laser sight on his rifle about a foot over the muzzle flash from the big gun. He fired a three-round burst, and the machine gun went silent.

  “Tango down,” he said into his mike, then glanced at Talia. “You okay?”

  “No,” she said. “They must know we’re here after Meir. What if . . . what if they decide to ki—”

  “They’re not going to kill him,” he promised her, praying he wasn’t lying, then shut off his mike so the others couldn’t hear their conversation. “These bastards think they’re invincible. They plan to be the last men standing. And they’re going to keep Meir as their prize until the last shot is fired. They want you alive. They want you to see that they’re in control. And to do that, they’ll want you to see that they have your son. Our son,” he added firmly. “And I’m not going to let that happen.”

  Santos fired a 40mm flashbang grenade through the window the machine-gunner had been using, and Bobby clicked his mike back on, getting back into the game as a loud crack reverberated through his ­earpiece—more tango fire, distinguishable from the team’s fire because the tangos weren’t using sound suppressors. Then the muffled whosh, whosh, whosh of a sound-suppressed M4.

  “Tango down,” Jones said.

  “Hoo-ah!” Brown whooped. “Give ’em hell, boys!”

  The next several seconds were a clinic of a precision team working together as though their thoughts were connected. Cooper and Santos peeled off toward the back Bunker door, taking one of the breaching charges with them. Jones and Green, with the remaining breaching charge, belly-crawled to the front door while everyone else laid cover fire.

  “Breaching in three, two, one.” Santos’s voice came over the mike, followed by the huge roar of an explosion.

  “Ditto that,” Jones said, as he and Green scrambled out of harm’s way. Jones hit the firing clacker, and three seconds later, the Bunker’s front door blew down with a jaw-rattling boom and fell inward in a cloud of smoke.

  They were in!

  As Santos and Cooper started clearing the first floor from back to front, Jones and Green charged in and started clearing from front to back, meeting them in the middle.

  On Green’s heels, Black and Carlyle rushed in, discarding their original plan on the fly. “Heading to the second floor,” Black said, and got a “Roger that” from both Jones and Santos. Although this all happened in a matter of moments, Bobby felt as though time had stopped. Nothing moved fast enough to suit him.

  “I can’t sit here and do nothing,” he said over his mike. “I’m heading for the fourth floor.”

  Beside him, Talia rose.

  “No!” he said. “You stay put. We need someone to cover, in case anyone gets past us.”

  “I’m with Bobby.” Mike Brown appeared out of nowhere.

  Her face pale but calm, Talia nodded, then took a position behind a huge turbine. “Bring him to me.”

  Bobby gave her a clipped nod, and with Brown on his heels, he charged through the blown Bunker door.

  The room billowed with smoke and the smell of plastic explosives. The fire sprinklers had gone off, and cold water drizzled down his back.

  “We’re inside, heading up the stairwell for the top floor,” he reported.

  “Roger that,” from Black.

  Based on the blueprints, there were stairwells leading up both the front and the back of the building. In theory, they should have cleared one floor at a time. But the drone photos indicated that Meir was on the top floor, so that was where he headed.

  His earpiece echoed with the sound of more flashbangs, then a burst of M4 fire and a gargled scream that quickly went silent.

  “Tango down. Second floor clear,” Jones said.

  Brown followed as Bobby ran up the stairwell taking two steps at a time, his adrenaline hitting an all-time high. They had entered the textbook “fatal funnel.” No place to hide, and all a bad guy had to do was fire a burst into the well and be guaranteed to hit one of them.

  His breath rasped, and his heart pounded. More out of concern for what they would find than from exertion.

  A flash of light from muzzle fire had him dropping to his knees in defense. Behind him, Brown fired three distinct snicks.

  “Tango down.”

  The two of them jumped over the body and raced up the stairwell, past the third floor and onto the fourth landing without running into more resistance. Taggart stood next to Brown by the stair door, a flashbang in his hand.

  As soon as Mike opened the door, Bobby tossed it inside. The two of them charged into the hall when it went off. Bobby’s only thought was of getting to Meir before the bad guys had a chance to recover and decide to kill him.

  In the strobe of the flashbang, he saw a man raise an AK-47.

  He fired three rounds into the man’s chest and followed that with two in the head. “Tango down,” he reported grimly.

  If his tally was right, Hamas was down seven. That left two standing in the way of getting Meir.

  The odds were now better than good. But it only took one lunatic to fire a killing shot, so he kept moving. He and Brown quickly cleared the rest of the floor.
/>   And found nothing.

  No one.

  Where the hell was Meir?

  Bobby keyed in his mike. “Fourth floor clear. Anybody have eyes on the boy?”

  “Negative,” came a unison reply.

  What the hell?

  Nate jumped in. “Start a search in detail.”

  They’d have to look under every bed and table, in every closet and bathroom. Anyplace anyone could be hiding.

  Rhonda’s voice broke over the radio. “All teams, we’re going to have company soon. I’ve been monitoring radio chatter, and the Omani police received a report of shots fired in the warehouse district. That would be us.”

  Shit. The last thing they wanted was to have to explain an unsanctioned U.S.-backed op on Omani soil, especially when he, personally, had already sent four dead Hamas in a crushed rental Golf to their morgue.

  “I’ll try to divert them,” Rhonda added. “I’m thinking another bomb threat on the opposite side of the city will trump a suspected-shots-fired call.”

  Whatever it took. If Rhonda could buy them even five minutes, it could be the difference between pulling this off or not.

  35

  Rami didn’t know what to do. Amir had ordered him to hide in this closet and to kill anyone who came in. To kill Meir.

  All around him, he heard gunfire. Explosions. Meir had curled up in a corner, his eyes closed, his hands over his ears. He was so scared.

  So was Rami.

  The guns kept firing, and voices shouted in Arabic. “Kill them! Kill the infidels!” Amir shouted.

  But Rami knew this was not about Allah. This was about revenge and money.

  “What’s happening?” Meir asked him, his eyes wide and afraid.

  And again, Rami thought of his little brother back home. Of his mother. And he thought of how he hoped someone would protect them if anything bad happened.

  He drew a bracing breath, picked up the gun, and stared for a long time at Meir, thinking of the orders Amir had given him.

  “It’s going to be all right,” Rami said. “It’s going to be all right.”

  The door flew open and slammed against the wall.

  Amir. “Give him to me.”

  Rami faced Amir, standing between him and Meir, the rifle in his hands. “You will not hurt him,” Rami said, swallowing back a thick lump of fear.

  Amir’s eyes grew dark with rage. “You will give him to me. Now.”

  Rami backed a step toward Meir. “I will kill for Allah. But not for you.”

  Amir roared and leaped into the closet. He swung the butt end of his rifle at Rami’s head, hitting him in the jaw.

  Pain exploded through his face, and he tasted blood as he dropped the rifle, then fell to the floor.

  Amir kicked him hard in the stomach. He doubled over in pain, then felt the mean edge of Amir’s boot heel slam into the back of his head. Then he felt nothing at all.

  * * *

  Brown moved to the front of the building, and Bobby ran toward the back. The plan was to search every nook and cranny that they might have missed and meet in the middle.

  Bobby jerked open a door to what looked like a closet. A flash of light stunned him, and something slammed into his chest plate. A bullet. He staggered backward and brought his rifle up, and the instant the laser hit the bad guy’s face, he pulled the trigger.

  Nothing. His rifle was jammed.

  And then he saw Meir. Amir al-Attar had his hand clutched around his throat, holding the boy against him like a human shield.

  And Bobby knew he would die before he’d let anything hurt his son.

  He dropped the rifle and reached for his pistol. Another flash of light flared, and another bullet hit his body armor dead center in the sternum, knocking him over backward.

  Pain knifed through his chest as the wind was knocked out of him. He gasped for air, groping for something to break his fall, and hit the edge of a desk with his FAST helmet on the way down.

  The chin strap gave, the helmet flew off, and his head hit the floor with a crack.

  Stars swam in a suddenly endless sky of black. Then even the stars burned out.

  * * *

  Talia heard the sounds of the battle as she crouched behind a large turbine that provided cover while she watched the doorway. Every flashbang explosion, every round of rifle fire, tore at her resolve to stay put.

  Each somber report of a tango down gave her hope, and she itched to get into the Bunker to help them look for Meir.

  But she’d given her word. She’d do her job and count on Taggart and the team to save her son.

  “Taggart’s down.” Brown’s voice boomed over the mike. “Carlyle, get your ass up here.”

  Oh, God. “H-how bad?” she asked, her voice trembling.

  “Not sure.” Brown grunted as if he was moving something heavy. “He’s breathing. I don’t see any blood.”

  “What are you . . . what the hell?”

  That was Taggart’s voice! She expelled a huge breath of relief.

  Brown said, “I think he must have gotten his bell rung. Now, stay down. Damn it, Boom, just stay the hell down! Carlyle’s on the way. Let him check you out.”

  “No time. Have to . . . have to get to Meir. Amir . . . has him.”

  Meir was still in the hands of the terrorist! Her fingers tightened on her rifle. They should have found him by now. Each moment that passed drove her a little closer to panic. Where was he? Had they already killed him? The thought ripped at her heart.

  No longer willing to stay out of the fight, she stood—then quickly ducked back down.

  A shadowy figure appeared in the Bunker doorway, the smoke backlighting him in a ghostly haze.

  One of the team? One of the terrorists?

  She couldn’t see. Couldn’t tell.

  She quickly lowered her NVGs so she could see better in the dark, and she immediately knew.

  The man stepping out of the doorway wasn’t wearing team fatigues. He wore a dishdasha. He was one of the terrorists.

  Her breath caught when he turned his head directly her way.

  Amir al-Attar.

  In one hand, he gripped an AK-74U short-barreled rifle. In his other, he had a death grip around Meir’s neck and shoulder.

  He was alive!

  Heart slamming, she drew a steadying breath, and her years of training took over. Knowing she was more accurate with a handgun than with a rifle, she calmly wiped her sweating palm on her pants leg and reached for the pistol.

  With the precision and steadiness of an automaton, she cocked the hammer back.

  Amir whirled around at the sound, bringing his rifle to bear, pointing it straight at her head.

  She fired first.

  Hit him through his open mouth. And couldn’t stop firing—three more rounds into the center of his forehead.

  He dropped like a stone, taking Meir down with him.

  Then she sprinted across the floor and pried Meir out from under the body.

  “Momma!” His arms flew around her neck.

  She scooped him up and ran back behind the safety of the turbine. “Yes, it’s Momma!” she cried, hugging his warm, precious body which he’d wrapped around hers like a monkey around a tree trunk.

  “You came.”

  “I promised, didn’t I?” Crying tears of relief and joy, she hugged him harder. “I always k-keep my promise.” Although she didn’t want to let him go, she pried him away from her so she could check him over. Finding no blood, she patted him down for injuries and cried a few more tears once she was sure he was unharmed.

  “Rami kept me safe,” he said, and lunged back into her arms.

  She buried her face in his neck. She was never letting him go. Never.

  When she finally looked up, she saw Black and Jones flanking a trus
sed-up terrorist. Hakeem. They’d taken him alive. Then she saw Taggart standing right in front of her, his eyes full of joy, relief, and pain.

  “Say it,” he whispered—and only then did she realize the gunfire had stopped. “Say it,” he repeated. “You earned the right.”

  She smiled through her tears, then keyed her radio. “Tango down. Hostage secure.”

  PART III

  * * *

  Redemption

  “Love doesn’t hurt. Expectations do.”

  —Pushkaraj Shirke

  36

  One week later

  “Nate was in a good mood today.”

  Bobby, Coop, and Mike Brown were relaxing over beer and thick steaks sizzling on a grill in Coop and Rhonda’s backyard.

  “That’s because his DOD briefing on the Oman op even put a smile on the head of the joint chief of staff’s face,” Brown said.

  “Well, hell yeah.” Coop flipped all three steaks. “We took out the Hamas cell responsible for the embassy bombing, gathered enough evidence at Ultramar to prove it was them, and got our hostage out without a scratch. And we provided enough intel on a terrorist money launderer to nail the bastard, plus, we took Hakeem al-Attar alive and he’s talking his head off. We even brought the drone back. What’s not to smile about?”

  “And yet our friend here”—Brown looked pointedly at Bobby—“looks like he lost his dog. Did you lose your dog, Boom?”

  Bobby tipped back his beer. He hadn’t wanted to come tonight, but it was tradition. The three of them were the only living members of the One-Eyed Jacks team. Because they all knew how transient life could be, they’d long ago made a pact to gather after every op to celebrate the fact that they were still around.

  “Never had a dog,” he said, realizing the moment the words were out how dour and poor me he sounded.

  “Indigestion, then?” Coop glanced over his shoulder, a spatula in his hand.

  He knew they weren’t going to quit until they got what they wanted out of him. “Ask your damn questions, already.”

  Brown glanced at Coop and, at his nod, let ’er rip. “How are things going with the boy?”