by Susan Wiggs
“Then they won’t care what I’ve got on, right?”
“You need to look like you,” Sonnet said, trolling through the closet. “What’s with all the black and beige?”
“Work clothes,” said Daisy. “I have to wear stuff that helps me fade into the background when I’m photographing. And I always need lots of pockets.”
“Today is not a workday. You need something that looks like you. Not you trying to look like someone else.” She took out a dress with a ruffled neckline, then put it back. “Cute, but too fussy.” The next couple were “boring,” and others were “loud.” Daisy was starting to get a complex and was a little worried she would run out of clothing.
“Aha,” Sonnet said, snatching a dress and holding it under Daisy’s chin. “I think this is it, and in your signature color, too.”
“I have a signature color?”
“Yellow. It’s dynamite on you.”
“Aw. Sonnet, that’s so nice of you.”
“We don’t have time for nice. Put this on. I’ll find you shoes and a bag.”
Ten minutes later, Daisy felt a surge of confidence as she checked herself out in the mirror. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“You don’t have to do without me. That’s what sisters are for.”
Daisy grinned at their images in the mirror. “Do you think we look like sisters?”
Sonnet was Italian and African-American to Daisy’s blond hair and pale skin. “A matched set. Look at us. When we were back in high school, and our parents were just getting together, I never pictured our future. It seemed like bad luck to do that.”
In college, Sonnet had spent most of her time studying abroad. She’d done prestigious internships at NATO and SHAPE. Soon, she’d be working at the United Nations for UNESCO. She was the smartest, most ambitious person Daisy knew.
“I have something to ask you,” she said.
“You want to borrow my Kate Spade bag?” Sonnet asked. “It might look great with that outfit.”
“No, nothing like that. I wanted to know if you’d be my maid of honor. In the wedding.”
Sonnet took a step back. “Seriously?”
“Of course, seriously. Don’t act so surprised.”
“Okay, but you have like this whole flock of girl cousins, so I figured you’d pick one of them—”
“I want you. You’re the best friend I’ve ever had, and you’re Charlie’s aunt, and it would mean so much if you would do it.”
“Of course I’ll do it,” Sonnet said.
A thrill rippled through Daisy, the way it did every time she thought about Julian and the upcoming wedding. She couldn’t keep the grin from her face. It was almost embarrassing, how happy she was. She gave Sonnet a hug and said, “I’m so excited, it’s ridiculous.”
“That makes two of us. But right now, you have to get through this meeting. I can’t believe you’re going to be an air force wife.”
“I can’t believe I’m going to be any kind of wife at all,” Daisy said. “I miss him so much already, Sonnet. Maybe someone at this meeting will tell me how to deal with missing him.”
“How can you not miss the love of your life?”
“Julian and I have had a lot of practice being apart. I thought I was prepared for being separated from him now, but it’s different, somehow. Now that we’re engaged, everything just…I don’t know, matters so much.” She looked around the house she’d made into a home. One day soon, she would be making a home somewhere with Julian. She didn’t know where, didn’t know his likes and dislikes. There was so much to discover, but when would they ever have time?
“Sonnet, am I signing on to have an absentee husband?”
“It’s only temporary. His service commitment is four years, right? That’s how long it takes to become a doctor.”
“There’s a huge flaw in your logic, but I get what you’re saying.” She checked herself one more time in the hall mirror. “It’s the weirdest thing, almost magical. We’ve managed to fall in love and stay that way while never even living in the same town. He knows me in ways no one else does even though…some things are still…mysterious. In a good way,” she added quickly.
Sonnet shooed her out the door. “Charlie and I will be fine,” she said. “Don’t even think about coming home before dinner.”
The people at the meeting were mostly female, mostly young. All shapes and sizes, all races. The one thing they had in common was that everyone had recently married or was about to marry an officer. A good many of the attendees came from a military background, and they tended to speak in code, rattling off acronyms for every possible eventuality—would she be in the OWC or the EWC? When can you expect the CACO at your ADU?—until Daisy felt her eyes glaze over. She forced herself to listen attentively and make notes.
During the question-and-answer period, the questions ran the gamut, from how the on-base housing system worked to establishing a career of one’s own while following the spouse all over the globe.
Daisy felt lucky in this respect. Her camera made for a portable career. After she and Julian married, she would be a freelancer. The prospect was a bit daunting after the relative stability of Wendela’s Wedding Wonders. She thought about the empty in-box tray at home, sitting on her worktable in silent accusation. She really did need to get to work on her submission to the MoMA competition. Earning a spot in the exhibition was a long shot, a risky one, but everything worth having was risky.
She was drifting, her thoughts wandering to some idyllic place, when one of the spouses—a guy—raised his hand. “Rudy McBean,” he said. “My wife’s a second lieutenant in the army, and she was deployed last week to Afghanistan.” He looked around the now-silent room. “Sorry to bring this up,” he said. “I know it’s easier to talk about stuff like the difference between the base dispensary and the commissary, and who to call about banking and health care and so forth. Those are all important things, I’ll allow that.”
Murmurs of agreement drifted through the room.
He stared at the floor, steepled his fingers together. “What I need to know, what nobody’s explained to me yet, is what you do with the worry. Every time I turn on the TV or open an internet browser, I’m bombarded with bad news about the war. How do I get through the day, knowing my wife is in the thick of the danger?”
His anguished query threw a pall of silence over the room. Daisy’s lungs felt cold from holding her breath. Looking around at the others, she realized the guy had spoken for many of them, herself included. Julian was on a special mission he wasn’t allowed to talk about, but there was one thing he didn’t need to tell her—he was exposed to danger on a regular basis. She could not fool herself about that.
“That’s why groups like this exist, and we’re everywhere. You can always find someone to talk to. It helps to remind yourself that every single job in the world carries risks. Soldiers, sailors and airmen, sure. But also mailmen and bank clerks, and hell, runway models.”
Daisy studied the woman speaking. She was more like a girl, with a name tag that read “Blythe.” She looked even younger than Daisy.
The guy who had asked the question chuckled. “Somehow I think I’d worry less about the runway model getting maimed or killed.”
“Choose not to focus on your worry,” Blythe said. “Choose to focus on the joy.”
“Easy to say,” he pointed out. “But can anyone actually do that?”
She got quiet for a moment. Then she said, “I did.”
No one moved. Her use of the past tense was very pointed. She said, “I was eighteen when I got married. Nineteen when Manny was killed. And it was like…it was like going to hell. The only thing that saved me was focusing on the love and joy we had, however brief. Now I’m in love again.” Her face softened. “He’s a pilot. Probably more at risk than your average mailman. But I love him, and that’s what I’ll focus on. Every day.”
Daisy didn’t want to believe her ears. She wanted to run from the room, and
she suspected a lot of the others felt the same way. But this girl, younger than Daisy herself, was a cold blast of reality in all the idealistic talk.
“I wanted to bring your attention to these brochures here,” said the hostess in desperation. “If you’re interested in continuing your education, you have a lot of options…”
Somehow, equilibrium settled in again. Daisy helped herself to several pamphlets and brochures, and she sat listening politely to the conversation. Nearby, two women were trading comments. “She’s right about the risk,” one said. “The average person has a greater chance of being in a car accident than a combat soldier has of getting killed.”
In her head, Daisy was already composing her next email to Julian. Why didn’t you tell me about the risk, she would say in an ironic tone.
The fact that he had a risky job was completely consistent with the Julian she’d always known—the rock-climbing, bungee-jumping, adrenaline junkie determined to wring every drop of excitement out of every moment of life.
It was part of what made him Julian. It was part of what made her love him.
Nine
Near Puerto San Alberto, Colombia
Dangling from a rope several hundred feet above a river gorge, Julian spoke into his shoulder-mounted radio. “Just do it the way we did in training drills. Piece of cake.” He looked over at Francisco Ramos, his Colombian counterpart. Ramos was on a rope several feet away. His face, spackled with camo paint, flickered with uncertainty, and his widened eyes clearly begged to differ.
There were a few hundred treacherous feet between them and their destination, a hidden drug operation. Julian and Ramos were charged with installing surveillance gear to monitor the activity. The unit had run through drills until they’d seen every detail in their sleep. Julian had practiced every possible move, from rappelling out of trees to simulate a helicopter exit to employing a new computer program designed to jam or decode signals.
“I don’t like heights,” Ramos said.
“You couldn’t have said something before now?”
“It would not have mattered. I do as I’m told.”
“We all do,” Julian conceded. Ramos, who was in the Colombian Air Force, was as well-trained and dedicated as his U.S. counterparts. The success of the ops depended on it. “We’ll be done before you know it. Let me check in.”
“Talk to me, Angel,” he prodded the COM specialist at the base of operations. “We’re almost there.” Angel de Soto was the glue of the procedure, and he seemed to hold more details in his head than a computer’s hard drive. He was miles away at Palanquero Air Base, coordinating the efforts of the Americans and Colombians in the cooperative covert operation. The mission, planned for months, was about to be executed by a top-secret team.
“The chopper is waiting,” said Angel. “The other team finished. Install the gear and get your asses back to the chopper. Over.”
“Gastineaux, out.” Julian lowered himself with quick, assured movements. Through gaps in the trees, he could make out what amounted to an entire armed city surrounded by a towering forest of mahogany, cinchona and evergreens twined with exotic vines. He could only pray like hell the men on patrol wouldn’t see him and Ramos as they installed the high-powered, weatherproof surveillance system. Suspended like a couple of spiders against the sheer rock face, they were at huge risk for being spotted. And when the enemy was armed with full-auto AK-47s, former Soviet RPGs, hand grenades and even some American light antitank weapons—you definitely didn’t want to be spotted.
“Some view, eh?” he said to Ramos.
His partner flashed a nervous grin, revealing his signature gold front tooth. He’d once explained that his father insisted the dentist use gold rather than porcelain, to prove to the world he could afford dental work for his family.
Through his scope, Julian scanned the strategically located camp at the estuary of the river. With its busy docks and warehouses crammed with ordnance and bricks of cocaine, its airport and system of private roads, its private army and infrastructure, the drug lord’s compound seemed to run like a machine. It was better financed than any government entity, thanks to investments from overseas terror organizations.
The ultimate goal was to take out the operation and with it, Don Benito Gamboa, one of the richest and most dangerous men in Colombia, lord of an empire of soldiers and criminals. If successful, the strike would result in the biggest drug seizure in history.
The mission coordinator had often lectured them— “We don’t exist. We do our job and move on. You won’t get any awards or recognition for your work here, even if you disrupt a year supply of drugs.”
“Check it out,” Julian murmured, lifting his binoculars. A rain-scented wind blew through the gorge, ruffling the jungle canopy. The lower river was spanned by a table bridge, one that could be moved by means of a motor. Previous intel had not revealed that, and it meant the chopper was vulnerable on the beach a few miles to the north. They had set it down not knowing armed vehicles could reach it. Nor had the earlier reconnaissance detected the formidable array of antiaircraft weaponry. Through his scope, Julian saw guns and antiaircraft weaponry, including a rolling airframe missile, which he’d never even seen up close before. The thing was capable of tracking and correcting its own course, literally chasing an aircraft through the sky.
He reported the new intel to Angel.
“A bridge?” De Soto demanded. “A fucking bridge? How did we miss that? Hell, never mind, hurry your asses up.”
A whirring sound drew his attention to Ramos. Julian looked over to see his partner plummeting down the rock face. Something had unclipped and he was in free fall, his hands grappling with the rope.
No, thought Julian. Nonononononono… This couldn’t be happening.
Ramos had dropped into the thick foliage at the base of the rock. To his credit, he’d not made a sound. Only the ominous whir of the rope could be heard, inevitably followed by the crunch of impact. Both Julian and Ramos were packing forty pounds of gear.
Julian was already descending as he radioed to report the mishap. De Soto, always known for his sangfroid, was completely silent for several heartbeats. For Julian, that hesitation underscored what he knew—this was bad. Really bad.
“Get to him and get out,” de Soto ordered. “I’ll alert the chopper. Over.”
“I’m on it, over.” Julian pictured the chopper, which had previously been used for fire control, waiting outside the compound, far enough away to avoid detection.
“And don’t get killed.”
“Roger that.”
He silenced the radio and lowered himself to the jungle floor. Ramos lay bleeding on the brushy ground. A branch had ripped through his arm. The blood was bright red, spurting with every pulse of his heart—this meant it came from an artery.
Bleeding was always worse than it appeared, Julian knew that. However, one glance at Ramos’s ashen face, his glazed eyes struggling to stay open, told him the wound was bad.
“I got you, Francisco,” Julian said. “I’m here.”
“Tried to stop the bleeding,” Ramos said in a thin voice. “Hand’s too slippery…”
“Aguanta,” said Julian. “Hang in there.” He applied direct pressure to the wound, praying the blood loss was not as bad as it looked. The human body contained twelve pints of blood. A person could tolerate losing a pint. Two pints would send him into shock. Three… Julian pressed harder on the wound. With his other hand he pressed above the elbow, where he’d been taught the brachial artery was located. The bleeding slowed but didn’t stop.
He took a second to look around, reconnoiter. There was no way they could climb back up, not with Ramos bleeding like this.
“We’re inside the compound,” Julian muttered, spotting a towering chain-link fence topped with razor wire. “Nobody’s spotted us. Might as well wait here.”
“Just us and the jaguars,” Ramos said.
Julian managed a rough field dressing, securing it with his belt. He di
dn’t want to apply a tourniquet because that would probably cause his friend to lose the limb. He made Ramos drink as much water as he could stand. In the surrounding forest, Crayola-colored birds swooped and chittered. Julian used silent code to relay their situation to the base. A satellite GPS would guide them to the chopper. He only hoped the wire cutters were stout enough to take on the chain link.
“Tell me about your family,” he said, checking the supply of water in the canteen.
“You’re only asking me that to keep me conscious.”
“Just talk. Pretend we’re at that cantina in Calle Roja, drinking longneck bottles of Bahia beer pulled straight out of the bins of ice.”
“I’ve already told you everything.”
“Tell me again.”
Ramos sighed. “My parents wanted me to marry up, eh? Find some girl from a wealthy family, who would bring me up in the world. They never understood, the heart doesn’t work that way. You can’t go and find someone. Your heart takes you there, sí?”
“Yes,” said Julian, thinking of all the times through the years when he’d tried to talk himself out of loving Daisy. “You’re smarter than you look, amigo.”
“Rosalinda’s family wanted the same for her. A rich boy, someone with prospects.”
“You’ve got prospects,” Julian pointed out.
“I have a beautiful wife and a home in Puerto Salgar. All I ever wanted was to run a river-fishing operation, a fine occupation in the outdoors, no? Something that would allow me to come home to my family each night. I thought serving in the air force would accelerate my dreams, eh? But Rosalinda, she is running out of patience. She has no idea what I’m doing, but she knows it’s a risk.”
Julian swallowed past a knot of guilt in his throat. There was the cover…and then there was the truth. The truth was, the team was so deeply secret, he wasn’t even sure anyone but the top level Colombian hosts knew its true purpose. He wasn’t even sure he knew its purpose.