CHAPTER EIGHT
“Brave. That’s why they’re your friends.”
Her whirling mind came to a halt at his comment.
“What?”
“You are incredibly brave, sir. Most people would hide in a hole after what you’ve been through. It’s an honor to know you.”
“Thanks, I think. Fifteen minutes.”
“Yes, sir.”
Alex jogged up the stairs to find Ben and Raz working on laptop computers at the dining-room table. Her family had already left for work. Pouring herself a cup of coffee, she took a seat. The men listened to the entire situation, from the Russian compound to Eleazar’s threats, without interruption. When she was done, Ben spoke. Raz followed with his thoughts, and she listened. Raz and Ben agreed to work their contacts to find answers to her questions. Alex jogged down the stairs with a better, broader perspective.
Still, Alex felt as though she was missing something. Something big.
The conversation with the Commanding Officer went as expected. The soldiers dropped off the map after following what they thought was a high-level Al Qaeda target. The CO was in contact with the soldiers until 1230 hours, and then communication ended. He didn’t report the outage right away because he was sure they would turn up. After an hour, his intelligence officer insisted on calling Military Intelligence.
Of course, he was delighted to get a chance to work with the infamous Fey. If he had known he would get to work with the Fey, he would have called immediately. Alex tried for professional, but she laughed when she clicked off the connection.
Looking at her watch, her heart clenched with anxiety.
Two hours to go. Christ.
She had no idea what to do next. She had no idea where to start. Without direction, she could not even start creating a strategy. Maybe if she let her mind wander, some brilliance might rise to the surface.
Closing her office door, she sat down in the overstuffed green chair. Her finger caressed the green fabric of the chair. John had bought this green chair for their bedroom in their apartment in Santa Monica. Alex smiled at the happy memories.
It was a two-bedroom apartment with a small yard and gleaming hardwood floors. Max, John, and Alex moved in at Thanksgiving, the weekend Matthew and Erin met.
God, her mother had been angry that she was moving in with her twin. “You’ll never find a husband now,” she insisted. Alex sighed. She could have told her mother that she and John were married six weeks earlier. Even all these years later, Alex shuddered to think of her mother’s hysterical, “It doesn’t look right.”
The apartment was perfect. So was John.
She smiled remembering John. He’d sit in this chair, surrounded by books, his blue eyes vague while his mind worked to memorize another scientific fact, and his hair askew. He usually had a pencil stuck behind his ear or in his mouth. He would look up just before she landed in his arms.
From the moment she had lain eyes on that man, his gravitational pull was more than she could withstand. She had to be near him, in his arms, and touching his skin. She would throw money at the cab driver, then fly past the bubbling fountain and blooming roses through the apartment, to his arms. Every single time.
Except the time she broke her thumb.
Holy crap.
Alex sat up in the chair. She had forgotten about breaking her thumb.
She never thought to tell John that her thumb was broken or the subsequent surgery to fix the break. Standing at the apartment door, she realized he would be furious. Her ears resonated with his imagined: “And you never thought to tell me?!” She dropped her duffle at the door and ran away. John found her sitting on the swings of a nearby playground. Their first Christmas together . . .
She had broken her thumb when they were dropping Matthew off in Afghanistan. They found the Russian compound during that trip.
She lay between Jesse and Matthew, focused on the world of stars and the calculations in her head. They were lost, and she had to find their location. Still the new “girl,” she had to get this right. Her stomach rumbled with nausea. Letting out a breath, she turned on her headlamp to check the map one more time.
Four Afghan men attacked them. Throwing a man over her head, she caught her thumb on the strap of his AK-47. She broke her thumb and a bone in her hand. She worked that entire trip with a broken left thumb. Jax, their medic, wrapped her hand every morning.
Just before they were attacked, Jesse said something.
What did he say?
She had no idea; she only knew it was important. Alex’s core burned hot.
If only Jesse was here. Fuck.
“I said that we don’t know how big this blackout area is.”
Alex’s mouth fell open. The full apparition of Jesse Abreu appeared in her office. He was wearing digital fatigues pushed up over his forearms, with his dog tags hanging outside his T-shirt. His pocket read “ABREU” in block letters. As she watched, the apparition began to fill in. The tattoo of an angel, Jesse’s essential nature as defined by the Cairo tattoo artist, flashed on his forearm.
“Who did you think you were talking to?” Jesse continued, speaking in Spanish. They spoke to each other in Spanish. “I’ve been trying to do this for a long time. You know, being a ghost doesn’t come with a manual.”
“Jesse,” she said in an exhale of breath.
“Hiya, Alexandra. I hate that blonde hair.”
“Jesse, you’re dead,” she said, continuing in Spanish.
Jesse laughed. “I’ve heard at least four people tell you that.”
“You were there . . . at Piñon Canyon. I saw you there.”
“It was my first time like this,” Jesse faded for a second. “I just freaked, and it happened.”
“The guy who killed everybody? Eleazar? He’s got some soldiers in Afghanistan.”
“He didn’t kill me.”
“What?”
“You heard me. He wants to get to you. He’s going to kill Mattie and the boys today. Did you ever forgive Zack?”
“No,” Alex said.
“It’s good that some things don’t change.” He faded out.
“Jesse,” Alex said. “Please don’t go, Jesse.”
“Jeez, I’m not any good at this ghost crap,” Jesse said. The outline of his form appeared, and then, in a flash, his body appeared. “Listen, we never mapped the edges of that GPS zone.”
“Right. Matthew’s going to the compound.”
“The soldiers are twenty miles south of the compound. The dead zone is huge, Alexandra. They’re about four miles into the area.”
“Thank God we have some time.”
“Why would you think that he would keep to a timetable?” Jesse disappeared.
Stunned, Alex fell back into the chair.
“Get to work, lazy butt,” Jesse’s voice said.
Alex jumped to her desk just as the video link clicked, showing Matthew’s face.
“Hey, Alex,” Matthew said. “We’re about five miles out from the compound. Zack says that the instruments are going crazy. I wanted to check in before we got cut off.”
There was a knock at her door. Without looking, she reached behind her to open the door to Ben and Raz.
“Mattie, you have to turn back. Jesse said . . .”
“Honey, Jesse’s dead.”
“Do you think I’m fucking stupid? I know that Jesse’s dead. The soldiers aren’t at the compound. They’re planning . . .”
“Hey, Zack. can you hold?” Matthew called through the intercom to Zack. Alex heard Zack laughing. “Let us check it out. We’ll be careful. We’re all wearing . . .”
“They don’t have any intention of letting you land.”
Alex clicked her computer to connect with Zack’s radio feed.
“Zack?”
“Hey, Alex, we’re way ahead of schedule. We’ve got at least an hour before . . .”
“Listen, you’ve got to head back. Eleazar doesn’t intend for you to land.”
/> “Have a feeling?”
“Something like that,” Alex said.
“That’s enough for me. One-eighty time.”
Alex closed her eyes for a moment. Zack was the only one who had experience working with her. The familiar longing for “normal” rose inside her. She ached for her Fey Special Forces Team, the team that trusted what she said, regardless of how she came by it. She let out a breath and said a silent prayer for patience. Opening her eyes, she saw Matthew discussing the change with the men.
“Ah, crap,” Zack said.
“What happened?”
“We picked up a couple of Grails. Missiles,” Zack said. “Four.”
“Have they locked?”
“Not yet,” Zack replied.
“Can you evade?” Matthew asked.
“Does shit stink? You’d better hang on,” Zack said. “Release the chaff. Hey, Matthew, can you get your guys . . .”
“We’re on it,” Matthew said.
Glued to the screen, Alex watched as Matthew and Troy threw open the helicopter doors and began shooting at the missiles with machine guns. Trece and the White Boy used their bulk to hold the men in the weaving helicopter.
“Troy?” Trece gave Troy a Barrett .416 long-range rifle. Throwing his machine gun to the side, Troy fired in quick succession.
“Hey! That boy can shoot.” Zack’s echoing voice through the radio feed created commentary for the riveting scene in front of her. “Troy’s hit two of them with that .416. My gunner’s hit another. One more to go. Now this shit is just pissing me off. Hang on.”
“We picked up two more,” Matthew yelled.
Troy threw the empty rifle at Trece and picked up the machine gun. Trece worked to load the weapon. The screen jerked as the helicopter evaded the missiles. Flares, designed to draw the Grail heat-seeking missiles away from the helicopter, sparkled outside the helicopter doors. Trece gave the loaded Barrett back to Troy. Troy picked up the rifle and fired in quick succession.
“He hit another. Where’d you pick up this guy, Alex?” Zack asked.
“Basic.”
There were voices in the background. “The gunner hit another missile. FUCK! We picked up another one. They must have watched us go over. Alex, you know this area. Where can we go to get away from these missiles?”
“What’s your exact location?” Alex asked.
“Command just linked to your Sergeant. You should have it on your screen.”
Alex tabbed her second computer screen as her Sergeant flicked onto the video link.
“Fey?”
“Sergeant? Can you contact the CO and tell him that he needs to get moving? Tell him it’s orders.”
“You have the . . .”
“I’m looking at the coordinates right now.”
Alex walked to her table to review her maps of Afghanistan. Nodding her head, she returned to the armoire.
“Zack.”
“Alex, you should leave the Englishman and marry me.”
“You’re very funny. Make a quick right turn.” The men clung to the helicopter as it swung around. “Ten kilometers, that’s all, then left. Good job, Zack. Now head south. Right. Your engineer is good. But don’t stay there too long. You’ll pick up another tribe in fifty kilometers. I don’t think they’re hostile, but I wouldn’t risk it.”
“Got it,” Zack said.
“Grails?” Alex asked. The video feed continued to jump and dodge as Zack maneuvered the helicopter to evade.
”Still have two on us.”
“Locked?”
“One,” Zack said. “Ah, fuck. Hold on.”
“Got it,” Troy screamed.
Trece and the White Boy pushed the doors closed as a missile exploded within feet of the helicopter. Through the small window, they watched the fireball of light and shrapnel explode once before erupting into flame again. Zack maneuvered the helicopter away from the worst of the fire.
“Hey,” Zack said. “We’re clear. My gunner got the last one.”
Alex watched the men cheer and laugh.
“I’m sending your engineer the coordinates to get you back to Kabul,” Alex said.
“What about the soldiers?” Matthew asked. “We’re here to get the soldiers.”
“It’s too dangerous.”
“Alex, where are the soldiers?” Zack asked.
“We came to do a job,” Matthew said. “God damn it, Alex. Those men are out there. Alone.”
Alex closed her eyes for a moment. Two years ago, she would have laughed, celebrated, and sent them on to do their job. But today? When she closed her eyes, she saw their death in bright blood red Technicolor.
“A terrorist succeeds when you are afraid,” Ben said.
Alex was startled when he spoke. She had forgotten he and Raz were there.
“Where are the soldiers?” Raz asked. He was standing next to her map table, looking that at the maps.
“Hang on, Matthew,” Alex said.
She pointed to an area of the map.
“They started here.” She pointed to a spot near the left edge of the area. “Assuming they walked three or maybe five miles an hour at the maximum, they should have made it here.” She pointed to a ridgeline. “According to their CO, they said they were in a flat, dry spot, which is not this location. The U-2 data shows a series of caves under here.”
Alex pointed to an area that looked like a flat, open valley between the squiggly lines of the topological map.
“I thought you knew that tribe,” Ben said. “Isn’t the guy who controls that whole area a friend of the Fey’s?”
“I’m not there,” Alex said.
“Where’s the rest of the team?” Ben asked.
“Here,” Alex pointed to a spot near the edge of the map. “I ordered them to get moving.”
“Eleazar’s going to roll on them,” Raz said.
Ben pointed to the map.
“You’re thinking they have Grails in the caves or that the helicopter won’t be able to land.”
Alex nodded.
“You have no contact with the three soldiers.”
“According to the CO,” Alex said.
Ben raised just a small corner of his mouth.
“What?” Alex asked.
“Would you mind if I used your computer?” Raz asked, plopping down in her chair.
Standing behind him, she watched him log through the Homeland Security server and then through to a world network. He clicked in a series of codes, and they were looking at satellite feed.
“Is that them? The missing soldiers?”
“Let’s see.”
Alex peered at the computer. Three soldiers lay in individual sleeping trenches. They had covered their faces in digital camouflage. They seemed to be asleep.
“I think so.”
He clicked a series of buttons, and they were looking at heat-seeking imaging.
“You’re right,” Raz said. “There are at least three guys, maybe more, on the ground here. I would say tunnels, not caves. There’s also a grouping of people just over this ridge.”
He clicked the buttons again to look at a picture of twelve armed men—Eleazar’s men.
“Can you see into the compound?”
“No, the mountains get in the way.” Raz reoriented the satellite to the area of the compound with little success.
“Hey, Alex,” Zack said. “We need a decision.”
Alex raised her eyebrows to Ben and Raz. “What does he not expect us to do?”
“Reinforcements?”
“He’ll have planned for that,” Ben said.
“Leave them there?”
“Expected.”
“Alex,” Zack’s voice sang over the radio feed.
“Hang on, Zack,” Alex said.
“Drones?”
“They crash at the site. These guys,” she pointed to the sleeping lost soldiers, “are dead either way. Those guys,” Alex pointed to Eleazar’s twelve armed men, “will kill our lost soldier
s if the guys in the tunnel don’t.”
“So we give up on the strangers?” Ben asked.
Alex laughed.
“That’s my girl,” Ben said. “I’m going to smoke.”
“What was that?” Raz asked.
“There’s no record of the Fey ever being in this region of Afghanistan.”
The Fey Page 9