by Zoe Dawson
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Kalawana, Sri Lanka Kukule Ganga Hydroelectric Dam A week later
Scarecrow sat at the edge of the Sinharaja rain forest, the air so heavy, he was drenched in sweat as it ran like rain from his pores and down his spine. They were tracking a lead on one of the warheads, and the redheaded spook Kat Harrington was taking point. She was dealing orders to Alpha Team, including Ruckus. It was good to have Blue back with them. Good that he and Charlie had found each other. Scarecrow could tell that girl was good for his brother in arms.
Scarecrow batted away another buzzing mosquito. His boots sunk into the rotting underbrush, the decaying odor rose up like gas. It was an island, for crissake. Where was the breeze?
They were getting ready to assault the dam where some remnant of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam had taken the Kukule Ganga Hydroelectric Dam. Scarecrow felt itchy. The Tigers were considered terrorists, and they were gathering weapons to start a new chapter in their bid for control. They had one of the US warheads, sold for a cache of diamonds they had killed for in the Congo.
Alpha Team was here to make sure they didn’t use it against the Sri Lankan people. Wicked was across the makeshift compound they had thrown together, and it wasn’t lost on him that Wicked had some history with Harrington. She stood out amongst the sweaty, dirty, hairy lot of them like a shining ruby, her green eyes always calculating, her obvious skill as a CIA operative on her like a second skin.
Ruckus called out, “Bring it in, guys.”
Finally, something to do instead of standing here, working the perimeter to make sure no one got the drop on them. Scarecrow flung his weapon over his shoulder, batting away the underbrush as he headed toward the tent. They’d been training for three straight days. Anticipation ran along his nerve endings.
Suddenly, he thought about his parents. He often did that before he went into battle. They were fragile, his dad struggling with age and memory loss, dementia that was only getting worse, and his mom struggling with providing care for him. She’d called him three days before, but he hadn’t answered, feeling the need to keep his mind on this mission and the success of retrieving this warhead. It would be a victory for them. As was required, he’d turned his phone off on this mission like he did on all his other missions. His parents were used to him being gone and uncommunicative through his deployments. But still, he thought about them and wondered why she’d called.
“We’ve discovered that the Tigers are indeed holed up in the underground power station.” Harrington unfolded a map and marked the location.
“How are we doing this?” Ruckus asked, clear that he considered Harrington the boss. It was to his credit that he could take orders and seem like he was the one giving them.
“We feel that going at them from the front would be fruitless and could spook them into detonating the warhead and damaging the dam, causing catastrophic flooding.” Scarecrow was getting a bad feeling about this. “We’re going through the tunnel.”
There was complete silence. Scarecrow and his teammates were aware that the water from the Kukule reservoir was fed into a three-and-a-half-mile long tunnel, which led directly to the underground power station. There was a maintenance entrance they could use to get inside the power station that would allow them to get the drop on the Tigers.
The sound of a chopper in the distance made Scarecrow look up. “Who’s that?” he asked.
Harrington pinned him with those no-nonsense eyes and said, “Your ride.”
Fifteen minutes later, they inserted just a half a mile away from the station. Cutting into the tunnel was the easy part. Inside the tunnel was dark, and Scarecrow had to take a fortifying breath. He hated tight, enclosed spaces. He dealt with it because he was a SEAL, but he couldn’t totally shake the discomfort. The SEALs moved with flashlights until they reached the outer wall.
Wicked got them ingress into the station through the maintenance door, and they filed inside. Anyone who’d kill innocent people deserved what they were about to get. He had a full clip. Hot and ready.
The enemy was nothing but a target to take out. Retrieving the warhead was the mission goal. As they moved through the station, Scarecrow shoved his weapon onto his back and pulled out his knife. His teammates were shadows moving with him. He kept track of them as a matter of routine. He’d worked with them so long, he could figure out who was who by their silhouettes. All of them were armed with steel.
Like a ghost, Scarecrow did the grim work of making sure that any man he came across died before any sound could leave his mouth. Once they reached the seat of the power plant, they surrounded the area. There were only four men left standing. Scarecrow could see the warhead.
He moved into position as did his buddies. With one word into the comm, Scarecrow rose up from his crouch and took out his man. Three of them went down.
The Genghis Khan lookalike, the one with the dark hair tied back and a stringy gray Manchu beard, was spared. He was going to tell them what had happened to the other three warheads.
It wasn’t until he was back stateside, shaved, showered, and feeling the cool breeze of the valley wind from his porch that he checked his phone. He was shocked. There had been so many calls from his mom. He immediately pressed her number.
“Arlo, my boy,” she answered. Her voice was full of pain and watery as if she’d been crying.”
“Mom, are you all right?”
“No, son. I tried to call you. I tried so hard to get in touch with you, but they kept telling me you weren’t available.”
“What is it, Mom?”
“Your dad was hospitalized three days ago. Right after he talked to that blonde woman. His heart…he wanted desperately to talk to you. That’s why I called Coronado and tried to get you on the phone.”
“I’m home now. I can talk to him.”
Her voice caught on a sob, and for several seconds, she wept, the sound of her grief shredding him. His throat got tight, and dread dropped into the pit of his stomach.
Her voice ragged with her attempt to stop her crying, she whispered, “I’m sorry, Arlo. He died two hours ago.”
For a full minute he couldn’t speak, so many emotions running through him, groping for a response, looking for a way to understand what the words his mom had uttered meant. His dad had died? Without talking to him? Without hearing his son’s voice for the last time?
His gut churned with a mix of guilt, helplessness, and a growing ball of grief that swamped him. “Oh, God, Mom.” His voice broke, but he kept his composure, barely. “I’ll be home as soon as I can.”
“Yes, please, Arlo. I need you.”
He promised her he would be there soon, gave her as much comfort as he could, but all through making the arrangements, he couldn’t shake the sense that whatever his dad had wanted to say to him was something he’d really needed to hear.
Now it was too late. His eyes filled, but he refused to break down now. He had to be strong for his mom.
He was heading home to Red River Parish and Bellise. Going home to lay his dad to rest sort out his mom’s future and find out who the hell this blonde woman was and why his dad had gotten so agitated with her.
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Look for Scarecrow, the next book in the SEAL Team Alpha series. Scarecrow has lost his dad, and his guilt is eating at him for not being there for him when he needed to talk. But what secret was his dad harboring that Scarecrow needed to hear? And who was this blonde woman shaking up his family? He has every intention of getting to the bottom of the mystery. Little does he know how devastating secrets can be or how this woman will impact his life with mind-blowing changes.
Glossary
BUD/S - Basic Underwater Demolitions/SEAL training
Comm - The equipment that SEALs use to communicate with each other in the field.
CO - Commanding Officer
DoD - Department of Defense
DZ - Drop zone, the targeted area for parachutists.
HALO - High altitude, low openi
ng jump from an aircraft.
HVT - High value target
IED - Improvised Incendiary Device
Klicks - Shortened word for kilometers.
LRRP - Long-range reconnaissance patrol.
LT - Nickname for lieutenant.
LZ - Landing Zone where aircraft can land.
Merc - Mercenary - guns for hire.
MWD - Military Working Dog
MRE - Meals, Ready-to-Eat, portable in pouches and packed with calories, these packaged meals are used in the field.
NATO - North Atlantic Treaty Organization
NCIS - Naval Criminal Investigative Service
NWU - Navy Working Uniform
RIB - Rigid Inflatable Boat
RPG - Rocket Propelled Grenade
R&R - Rest and Relaxation
Tango -Hostile combatants.
SERE -Stands for survival, evasion, resistance, escape. The principles of avoiding the enemy in the field.
Six - Military speak for watching a man’s back.
About the Author
Zoe Dawson lives in North Carolina, one of the friendliest states in the US. She discovered romance in her teens and has been spinning stories in her head ever since. Her heroes are sexy males with a disregard for danger and whether reluctant, gung-ho, or caught up in the action, show their hearts of gold.
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Her imagination runs wild with romances from sensual to scorching including romantic comedy, new adult, romantic suspense, small town, and urban fantasy. Look below to explore the many avenues to her writing. She believes it’s all about the happily ever afters and always will.
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You can find out more about Zoe here:
www.zoedawson.com
[email protected]
OTHER TITLES BY ZOE DAWSON
Romantic Comedy
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Going to the Dogs series
Leashed #1, Groomed #2
Hounded #3, Collared #4
Piggy Bank Blues #5, Holding Still #6
Louder Than Words #7 What Matters Most #8
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Going to the Dogs Wedding Novellas
Fetched #1, Tangled #2
Handled #3, Captured #4
Novellas (the complete series)
Romantic Suspense
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SEAL Team Alpha
Ruckus #1, Kid Chaos #2
Cowboy #3, Tank #4
New Adult
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Hope Parish Novels
A Perfect Mess #1, A Perfect Mistake #2
A Perfect Dilemma #3, Resisting Samantha #4
Handling Skylar #5, Sheltering Lawson #6
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Hope Parish Novellas
Finally Again #1, Beauty Shot #2
Mark Me #3, Novellas 1-3 (the complete series)
A Perfect Wedding #4, A Perfect Holiday #5
A Perfect Question #6, Novellas 4-6 (the complete series)
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Maverick Allstars series
Ramping Up #1
Small Town Romance
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Laurel Falls series
Leaving Yesterday #1
Urban Fantasy
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The Starbuck Chronicles
AfterLife #1
Erotica
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Forbidden Plays series
Playing Rough #1, Hard Pass #2, Illegal Motions #3