“In the inprocessing center at army basic, they asked me if I wanted to list a religion on my dog tags. I didn’t really have one, but I figured Catholic sounded good, and if there was a guy upstairs, it might put me in his favor. After the airstrike, they found four of us still alive. I was awake as they carried me into the field hospital from the chopper.” He looked up at the ceiling and took another deep breath.
“You’re doing great. What came next?”
“Someone lifted my tags off my chest and called for a chaplain. You know—last rites?” Justin reached up and rubbed the scruff on his chin. “I don’t know if it was the priest praying over me that saved me that day, or what. I’d lived when I shouldn’t have. When I didn’t want to.”
“So what happened that day, before you called for the strike?”
“There was this flash of clarity in the chaos, when I knew I had to make a decision, was running out of time.” Justin curled his shaking hands into fists in an attempt to steady them.
“Go on.”
“The exact moment plays through my head over and over, the same time I called for the airstrike. Oh-four-hundred-forty hours.”
“When you go out to ride every morning?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me about it.”
Justin nodded. “They came from everywhere, over the embankment, from our flanks and our six. Before I knew it, the enemy had surrounded us, closing my unit up in this horseshoe ambush.”
“So did you have reinforcements coming?”
“No one that could get to us before they got their hands on the convoy. I treated wounded, one after another. Some I couldn’t save. I came across the Ranger detachment’s commander, a captain. He’d been pinned under a truck by his leg. When I found him, he’d sawn through his shinbone with his Ka-Bar, completely amputating his leg. He’d used a belt, made a tourniquet, and just cut it off. He’d tried to crawl to the radio. As I began to treat him, I saw the desperation in his eyes and knew at that moment something bad was going to happen because of whatever was in the truck.”
“So he was mortally wounded?”
“No, he could have been saved if evac could get him out of the valley.” He tipped his head back and closed his eyes. “He ordered me to call for an airstrike. At first I thought he was delirious from the blood loss, but he wasn’t. He knew what he’d ordered. When I tried to talk reason into him, he pulled his weapon and pointed it at me. I didn’t make the choice because he had a forty-five in my face. I did it because of that look, and that he’d been desperate enough to cut his leg off and crawl twenty feet to try to reach the radio.
“I was terrified. I’ve never been so afraid. I knew when I picked up that radio and called, some—most likely all of us—were going to die, and it would be by my hand. It’s wrong to make that kind of decision, between life and death. It wasn’t my choice to make, it shouldn’t have been. I’m a coward, in that I chose to give into my fear. I didn’t have a fucking clue what was in that convoy, but I decided a lot of good men needed to die because of it.”
“Justin, you still don’t know what was in the convoy, do you?”
“I know. It’s not something you can avoid. Everyone had their shorts in a knot over it. I don’t watch the news or listen to the radio. I don’t have a computer because I can’t stand looking at what is going on over there. And they never bothered to tell me when they debriefed me. Said it was on a need-to-know basis, but you still hear about it. The waitress in a truck stop on my drive west, the nurses who treated me at Walter Reed, when they didn’t think I was awake and could hear them.”
“Then you know you really are a hero.”
He shook his head.
“No, hear me out. If you hadn’t called for that strike, your unit would have been overrun and the convoy seized. Inside that truck was an ancient plague that was found in a tomb uncovered in a bombing. The infection was headed for the CDC. They didn’t have a clue how to cure it or even treat it, but they intended to study it and try. It had gone airborne and could’ve been used as a weapon. Considering who was attacking, there was a good chance that’s what their intent was. That plague could have wiped mankind off this planet. The press has nicknamed it the Fourth Horseman.”
Justin frowned. “I knew it was bad, but not that bad.”
“If you hadn’t called for that strike, things would have been much worse. More than one person is under that impression. People all over the world have started prepping, anticipating something like this can come up again, and they want to be ready, in case there isn’t a hero there to stop it.”
All the oxygen in the room seemed to be sucked away. Justin reached up and pinched the bridge of his nose. “What kind of person transports something like that? Why didn’t they just destroy it in the first place?”
“Because some of the infected were still alive and American citizens. They didn’t know if anyone outside of the archeological team had contracted it, and they couldn’t take the chance they had, and not have a cure. Plus the Afghan government wanted those with the illness out of their country. Some countries were threatening war if we so much as moved in their direction. The government had to get to a helicopter to take them to a navy hospital ship with a special quarantine unit, but hostiles on the high ground made extraction by air from the valley impossible. What you did could have saved millions of lives.”
“It doesn’t change the fact I killed a lot of good men that day, or that I’m not proud of it. I want to make a request to those out there, wanting to get my story. Everyone knows the truth now. Please leave me in peace to live with what I’ve done.” Justin made a cutting motion across his throat.
The light on the recorder went off and Mercy lowered the camera.
“So….” He gave her a forced smile. What did she think of her hero now?
“So?”
“I’ll understand if you want nothing to do with me. I’m a coward, a killer—”
“A hero. My hero.” She set the camera on the floor. “Nobody can say what they would have done in your place, not until they stood in your boots and faced the same choice. I think you knew that convoy was bad news, and it would have been a big mistake to let it fall into enemy hands. I know you chose to sacrifice your life because you believed that was the right decision. I watched you on that ice when you rescued that pilot. You made a life and death choice there, too. Same thing that day in Afghanistan.”
He opened his mouth and Mercy raised her hand. “You can try to tell yourself you were a coward and that was why you made the call, but you and I both know that’s bullshit. You can’t sleep because you chose to end those lives—your own, and you lived when they didn’t. That’s called survivor’s guilt. You did what needed to be done, even if you don’t see it that way. Now I’m going to tell you why I came here, why I was after your story, and you’ll see, no matter how much you want to be perfect, you’re human. You’re not the only one who’s made mistakes and whose choice has cost someone their life.”
Epilogue
Six months later
The golf cart rolled up next to the shelter’s clinic. Justin glanced back to see Mercy climb out and grab a box from the back. She walked through the front door and over to where he worked. He wiped his sleeve across his forehead and rose from where he’d been kneeling and stocking the shelves. “Hello, beautiful. Are those the medical supplies we’ve been waiting for?”
“Maybe. What do I get in return if I give them to you?”
Justin laughed and shook his head. “Whatever you want.”
She handed him the box. “I’ll be collecting on that tonight.”
“Bonus.” He broke the seal and began to pull out antibiotics and medicines from a pet supply company. Same thing people used, but cheaper, and they could stock up in bulk. She grabbed a bottle and handed it to him. He glanced down at the ring on her finger and couldn’t help but smile. It looked good on her. They’d planned the wedding for next summer, and he was having a hard time waiting.
More than once he’d come close to suggesting they run off to Vegas and elope. But the old man wanted a wedding, with family and friends, so he gave in and went with it.
“What’s that shit-eating grin for?”
“I was just thinking how good you look with my ring on your finger.”
“You say the sweetest things.”
“I know.”
“And humble, too.”
“Don’t forget good-looking.”
She slapped a hand over her heart. “I could never forget that. Speaking of…I almost forgot.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a check. “The money for the story we sold for that miniseries. What do you want to do with it?”
Justin pulled it from her fingers and stared down at the seven-digit figure. Two million dollars. At first he hadn’t wanted to sell her interview and his to the highest bidder, but Mercy had convinced him he could use it to get a new start. Since he already had a new start, and as she’d promised, the media had left him alone once they had his story, he intended to use the funds in another way. He’d give it to the Cooperative to help expand their operation and shelter. The online businesses could benefit from the money. They could purchase more supplies—and he could use some of it to launch Mercy’s new book about a female train robber and her Texas Ranger. He didn’t need the money. Everything he’d ever wanted stood in the room with him.
Yeah, he’d found Mercy in the middle of nowhere, and now there was no place he’d rather be. Whatever the future held, he could face it—with her.
~ABOUT THE AUTHOR~
D. L. Jackson is a writer of urban fantasy, science fiction, military romance and erotic romance. She loves to incorporate crazy plot twists, comedy and the unexpected into her worlds. As a U.S. Army veteran, she naturally adores men in uniform and feels the world could always use more. She does her part by incorporating as many sexy soldiers in her novels as she can. When she isn't writing or running the roads, you can often find her online chatting with her peers and readers. Grab a cup of iced coffee, pull up your virtual chair and say hi. She loves emails and blog visits from her readers.
You can visit D.L. at:
http://authordljackson.com
Cinderella Wore Combat Boots
1Night Stand Series
Sometimes Fairytales come true.
First Sergeant Cori Valentine faces a bleak future. She’s turning forty in three weeks and life as she knows it is over. An injury received while on deployment has earned her an early retirement from the Marine Corps, something she’s not sure she’ll survive. Things get even better when interfering Marines set her up on a blind date for a party she doesn’t want. The guy has to be a total toad to want to go out with her. Right?
When Madame Eve informs Retired SEAL, Sol Keller she’s found his perfect match, he doesn’t believe it, but takes up the challenge. One look at the First Sergeant in a sexy dress and combat boots has him wondering if fairytales really can come true. Madame Eve might be the legendary Fairy Godmother, and Cori his Cinderella. Sol intends to show the Marine beauty a Prince Charming she’ll never forget, and that retirement isn’t the end of her story but merely the beginning.
This Endris Night
1Night Stand Series
One night. One party of a lifetime. One secret a century old which could end it all.
Shiya, a Yupik supermodel, travels to Alaska in pretense of attending a party where she’ll find the man of her dreams. But her real intent is to lure the man of her nightmares to where she can finally end a deadly game of cat and mouse.
Gunnar is on Earth for one reason—to recover the wreckage of a Doppelganger crash that is scattered for miles, throughout an Alaskan resort and human settlements. In order to get closer to the ship’s debris, he agrees to a date and finds himself face to face with a Terran woman who doesn’t know her genetics are from his world, or that she’s being tracked by someone whose duty is to eliminate all threats to their secret. Shiya’s heritage has placed her at the top of the killer’s list.
Now the only way to save her, is to claim her, and Shiya isn’t about to make it easy.
Table of Contents
Title page
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Epilogue
~ABOUT THE AUTHOR~
Finding Mercy Page 10