by Ronie Kendig
Sajjan came out of his chair and eased around his desk to her side. “I am grateful for your respect and admiration, and I would ask that you let that guide you.”
“I am. That’s why I’m here.” Undaunted. So like Nina.
“Daughter,” he said softly, noting how the edges of her hard shell seemed to wilt beneath that word. “My allegiance is to my family first and my country second.”
“And God?”
He lifted his chin, smiling down at her. “Above all others.”
“So. Afghanistan before America.” Defiance glinted in her expression. “You realize Tony is American. I am American. So—”
He touched a finger to her lips.
She slapped it away, scowling.
“Trust me, Timbrel. But do not demand of me what you know I will not give, and at the same time, believe me when I say I would never intentionally put those in my family in harm’s way.”
She gave a curt nod. “Fine.” Backed up a step. “I’ll sic Beo on you if Tony gets hurt.”
As if responding, the retired working dog growled from the shadows of a corner, and then the bullmastiff’s nails clicked on the highly polished floor as he trotted out ahead of the firebrand. The door closed.
A low rumble of laughter came from the side office.
Sajjan turned toward the door. “You heard that?”
Tony VanAllen walked in, his chest out a little more than normal. His chin a measure higher. “I’d say I have nothing to fear with her watching my back.”
“And you were worried about your back?”
“Not in the least,” Tony said, his expression sparked with conviction.
He had chosen the former Special Forces soldier for good reason and after much deliberation. With all the years Sajjan spent working the tricky waters of politics in this volatile area, he could not be too careful. “What have you said to her of what we’re doing?”
“Nothing. Timbrel just knows I’m working. And after what happened”—he patted his leg, indicating the prosthesis—“she’s a little protective.”
“A little?” Smiling, Sajjan returned to his desk. Scanned the recent encrypted reports. Heaviness weighted his optimism about turning this region around financially and politically. “I think we should plan for you to return to Raptor team as a contractor.”
“Contractor—might as well send me in as the enemy.” Tony rubbed the scruffiness around his jaw. “You think it’s necessary, I’ll go. But—can you get it set up?”
Sajjan gave him a look.
“Forget I asked—but seriously? Are you asking me to spy on my own brothers?”
CHAPTER 6
Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan
26 March—1545 Hours
A storm blew into the Command building, a cluster of soldiers stalking past her cubicle. General Ramsey, Captain Watters, Titanis, and yes—Sal, trouped toward the rear of the building.
Cassie came to her feet.
Foreboding draped their countenances like a thick, heavy blanket. They were ticked. Determined. So much that they didn’t even notice or acknowledge her. She moved to the edge of the cubicles, watching. Something was wrong. Very wrong.
Her phone buzzed. Not her work phone. But the other phone. Cassie scurried back to her desk, tugged open the drawer, drew out the black nondescript phone, and glanced at the ID. Gearney—her handler.
She coded in. Pressed the phone to her ear. “This is Lieutenant Walker with DIA.” The words had to be spoken exactly in that order. She glanced around the room, verifying there wasn’t anyone in proximity, which would determine what she said next. “How can I help you?”
“You’re alone?”
“Yes.” Cassie’s gaze locked onto the crowd gathering around Ramsey’s office door and the hum of conversation.
“We need you in Kabul. An asset will give you the packet.”
Kabul? Cassie frowned and turned away from Ramsey’s office. “Sir, something is happening here. I think—”
“Tomorrow, Walker. No questions. Just do it.”
The phone went dead. Frustration coiled in Cassie’s stomach and tightened. Tomorrow? With what was happening here? Were they insane? But she was a low-level analyst. A lackey. Barely had clearance for what they’d tasked her with.
She rolled her shoulders and stretched her jaw. Fine. She wouldn’t be at the bottom of the stack forever. She’d prove herself. She’d gotten this far. Faster than most operatives.
But leaving the base when things were heating up so much, when she felt she could be of help, didn’t make sense. She could guide the soldiers toward answers that would stop this insanity. She reached for the thin tendril of hope that she could redeem herself. Maybe then Sal would forgive her.
The thought squeezed the air from her lungs. His hatred was so palpable. Had, for so long, mirrored her own hatred of herself. The hatred that pushed her to contemplate suicide.
But then God threw her a lifesaver.
Cassie’s landline rang. She lifted the handset. “Lieutenant Walker.”
“So, you are in Afghanistan.”
Heart thumping at the feminine Chinese voice filtering through her phone, Cassie leaned forward. “Kiew?” Disbelief colored her voice and her mind!
“So you remember.” Her words held a smile in them.
“Of course I do,” Cassie said through a laughing breath. “How could I forgot my China sister?”
“Or me my America sister.”
Her laugh mingled with her friend’s as the worries of the day seemed to flit away amid a rush of affection and endearment. “How…?”
“I am here, too.”
Cassie blinked again. “Here?” She looked around the somewhat-quiet area. Of course her friend didn’t mean the base—she couldn’t. “You mean Afghanistan?”
“Yes. On business.”
“How crazy—how on earth did you find me here?”
“Look, I’m in between meetings and time is short. I just wanted to connect. When I heard you were here, I couldn’t resist calling.”
“Where are you?”
“Kabul.”
“Kabul? But that’s only a few hours away!”
Kiew laughed. “Crazy, isn’t it? That we’re both here—in another country yet closer than we’ve been since the year you were an exchange student. It’s been too long since we got to see each other. E-mail and phone calls are nice but not the same.”
“No kidding.” Cassie gasped, remembering her earlier call. “Hey, I just remembered they’re sending me that way for a meeting with a contractor. Do you think you could get away for lunch or something?” She couldn’t shake the joy but something else was there. The wildness of it all.
“Oh, I’m not sure. My schedule is very tight.”
Disappointment tugged at Cassie. “I bet. You’ve always been hard to get ahold of.”
“Yes,” Kiew mumbled, her tone shifting dramatically.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t blaming you.”
“No, no, I understand.”
“I’m just glad you called. You made my day. It’s been pretty crazy and depressing here.”
“Same here. Look,” Kiew said firmly. “I will meet you for lunch.”
Cassie brightened. “Really? Are you sure?”
“I will make time. Two o’clock?”
“Oh, I’ll need to confirm the time—I’m not sure of my schedule yet.” Cassie reached for a pen and paper. “What number can I reach you at?”
“I’m at a pay phone. I’ll have to call you back.”
“Oh. Okay.” Strange, but that’s the way things had always been with Kiew. She shrugged aside the surprise and disappointment. “I can confirm by tomorrow morning. Call my cell.” After providing her number, Cassie hung up, smiling. Breathing a little deeper, a little more contentedly.
“… plan with Riordan for contingencies.”
Cassie looked up as Sal’s voice drew closer.
He stalked down the hall with Captain Watters, both of
their faces taut with tension.
“Captain?”
Watters stopped and turned as Lieutenant Hastings hurried toward him with a handful of papers.
Cassie seized the opportunity. She went to Sal and touched his arm.
He jerked, his handsome face contorted not in pain. But anger. “What?”
“What happened? Everyone’s—”
“Someone killed the prisoner.” His brown eyes sparked with disgust. “Camera feed wasn’t working while the man was in the facility murdering our only possibility of finding out who was behind the attack.”
“The feed didn’t work?”
“Coincidentally so.” Sal wouldn’t look at her.
She remembered the days when he couldn’t stop looking at her. When those brown eyes teemed with admiration and attraction. Not repulsion or disgust.
The phone in Cassie’s hand buzzed. She lifted her phone. “Excuse me.” She stepped away and coded in, receiving the text: OUTSIDE, TWO MINUTES.
Her pulse sped. Slipping out and not drawing attention while Sal was within sight… She lifted her purse from the drawer and started for the side entrance. With a quick glance to verify Sal and his captain were enthralled in conversation with Hastings, Cassie pushed into the night. Almost seven o’clock. The thin veil of night had just draped across the base, but the stalwart lights served as sentries to ward off the darkness, the terrorists.
Though he might resent her and hold Vida’s death against her, Sal knew Cassie Walker better than most people knew their best friends. And she had walked out of the Command building with concern and haste. What had that been about?
He collided with someone and turned. Froze. “Candyman?”
The man’s grin was buried beneath a burly sandy-blond beard. “Glad to see you haven’t forgotten me.”
“What are you doing here?” Dean asked.
“Hastings called me in. Contracting me to work with Raptor because they’re pulling Titanis for another gig.”
Dean scowled. “When were they going to tell me about this?”
“Probably about now,” Candyman said. “Sorry if I popped the lid early.”
With a slap on the man’s shoulder, Dean smiled. “No worries. Glad to have you onboard again. We’re about to head out. You ready?”
The question was probably more about the prosthesis than about the man’s preparedness. “Titanium-man reporting for duty, sir.” Unflappable as always.
“Sal, talk to Riordan and let me know what he says.” Dean broke away from Hastings. “I need to work with Ramsey and General Ames to get things sorted. We need some credible intel to work.” He nodded to Candyman. “I’ll find you after the meeting.”
“Agreed.” Sal jammed his hands in his pant pockets and headed out of the building with Candyman. “I knew that guy was bad meat. Never should’ve left that cell.”
“What happened?”
“Spook got in and killed a witness.” He left and the guy died. “We all knew something was wrong.” Their boots crushed pebbles as they trudged across the gravel path from the Command building.
Sal hunched his shoulders. They desperately needed the tide to swing in their favor. “Too much going wrong,” he mumbled, his periphery catching something.
To the left, two people stood between the USO building and a portable maintenance building. No. Sal slowed. Not just two people. A male and a female. About to divert his gaze, his mind registered the hair of the female. Her build and shape.
Cassie.
Something in his chest backfired like an RPG had hit center mass. The man touched the side of her face. Cassie ducked then glanced over her shoulder. Looked right at Sal.
Anger exploded through him.
She widened her eyes.
Whistling, Candyman nudged Sal. “D’you see that?”
“How could I not?” Sal churned the memory through his mind. So, Cassie hadn’t changed. Was this guy her next victim?
“Crazy. I heard she was into you. Thought she had more class than that.”
“Yeah, well, now you know.” But as Sal made his way across the base to the Boardwalk to meet up with Riordan and the rest of Raptor, something tugged at his mind. Nagged at him.
“Hey.” Eagle hustled up to him. “Something’s up—oh! Candyman.” The two shook hands and patted shoulders.
“Candyman’s contracting,” Sal said. “And we knew something was up.”
Eagle was soon joined by Harrier and Hawk. “No, I mean with the SEALs.” He bobbed his head toward the Boardwalk.
In the middle of an open area, Riordan stood alone beneath a lone lamp. Like a well-lit target. The gruesome reminder of Burnett’s death made Sal hesitate to join the party. In a wide perimeter, Riordan’s team stood around him.
“What’s that about?”
“Dunno,” Hawk said. “Knight’s patrolling with Ddrake but none of them are talking.”
Interesting. Obviously Riordan wanted to talk alone. “Okay, spread out.” Sal started toward the SEAL commander.
“A little late, Falcon?” Riordan smirked. “Heard there was some excitement over at detainment.”
“Someone killed the shooter we captured the other night.” Sal glanced around the area, feeling exposed. Vulnerable.
“We needed to talk.”
“Kinda figured that out,” Sal said, spotting Knight and MWD Ddrake near some of the portable buildings that once held restaurants.
“Any thoughts on who killed your prisoner?”
Sal sighed. “A spook. Came in with too much information and got the job done before we could figure it out.”
“Surveillance footage?”
“Down.”
“Convenient.”
“Agreed.” Sal let out another long sigh. Then met Riordan’s gaze. “So, we’re here. You’re here.” He eyeballed the teams standing around, unsettled. “This is a lot of cloak-and-dagger stuff. What’s going on?”
Head bowed, the late-twenties SEAL looked up through a terse brow as he nodded. His dark hair hung in straggly curls around a bearded face. Against his sun-darkened brow a white scar told of at least one battle the SEAL had seen. He looked like a homeless man, but those dark eyes betrayed him. Told Sal the man missed nothing. He took everything in like a supercomputer, processing and analyzing. Though he hated squids out of Green Beret duty, Sal had a keen respect for this one. Schmidt, with his white-blond hair and cocky attitude, was another fish altogether.
“I think you know things are a bit whacked.”
“That’s an understatement.”
“I’m not entirely sure which of our COs we can trust.”
Sal drew his gaze back to the commander, surprised at the comment. But it was one that had become painfully obvious in the last month as Osiris made impossible headway in his attack against the U.S. military.
“They’ve already attacked CECOM, and it’ll be days, if not weeks, before we figure out what damage was done.”
“I can just about guarantee the intel we gathered from that Tera Pass laptop is destroyed.”
“It was a strategic, well-planned hit.” Riordan scratched the side of his beard. “They got in when they shouldn’t have.”
“Then someone kills the only lead we have on the shooter and those responsible for the attack.”
Riordan nodded. “I think you’re starting to see where I’m coming from.”
“I think I’ve been there for a while, just unwilling to accept what it meant.” Accusing superiors of colluding with the enemy wasn’t a charge made lightly.
“It’s too well coordinated. Funny that your prisoner dies while the cameras are down.”
“Hysterical,” Sal said. “About as hysterical as watching my favorite general bleed out.”
Riordan’s expression hardened. “So, we know the same thing—this goes up the chain.”
Balling his fists was all Sal could do with what he felt, a tangle of emotions he couldn’t seem to sort through. “We need proof. Work it hard. Keep report
s to Command vague. Enough to keep them off our butts about reporting in, but not enough for whoever is behind this to head us off.”
“Or kill another friendly.” Riordan tossed his chin, indicating behind Sal. “What about your team?”
“What about them?”
“How far do you trust them?”
Sal didn’t like the question and threw it back at the SEAL. “More than I trust you.”
Riordan smirked. “Okay, let’s keep tabs. I’ll give you what I know and keep you informed. I’d like you to do the same.”
Sal nodded—and as he did, a glint somewhere caught his attention. He snapped his gaze to the right. To a shadowy spot beyond the USO building.
Riordan shifted. “What?”
He couldn’t say why or what propelled him, but Sal took off running. He wasn’t going to lose anyone to another sniper. Wasn’t going to let anyone take out another of his team because he wasn’t responsive enough.
Even as he bolted, he heard shouts and the teams rallying behind him—at the same time, he saw a shadow drop from the roof of the chow hall. A light beam struck the man.
Sal thanked God He’d made him fast. He sprinted. “It’s the spook!”
EAMON
Takkar Towers, Kabul, Afghanistan
I can’t believe you told him I’m your wife!”
Eamon locked the door, retrieved the weapon from his pack that he’d slung over his shoulder. He walked the condo, anticipating trouble, but not wanting to stress Brie any more than she already was. “It’s Afghanistan. A man and a woman staying in the same condo would not only draw attention, but ire and possible outrage. Being American and here is trouble enough.”
Fifteen hundred square feet with clean lines and Spartan furniture. No trouble crossing a room and avoiding obstacles. Easy to defend with only a short hall to negotiate. Bedrooms sat off the main living area and full-sized kitchen. A bathroom sat between the two smaller bedrooms and the master opposite. Yet it felt cramped. Maybe because every time he turned around, she was there. Right there.
He tossed his pack on the small bed of the first bedroom. “You can take the master.” She’d have her own bathroom and privacy that way.