Down Range (Shadow Warriors - Book 2)
Page 22
“How is Jake?” he asked quietly.
Morgan sat back, carefully stretching her right leg. She could see the worry in her father’s expression. He’d been the Rock of Gibraltar in their family. Morgan felt his strong, calm presence and she was able to pull herself together. That same energy was around Jake. They were the only two men in her life who could settle her down, help her gather her strewn, wild emotions and focus. She found her voice. “I haven’t heard from him in two weeks.”
Jim nodded. “He’s out on the op, then. That’s a special kind of hell.” He knew about the hell of waiting. Many years earlier he’d been kept in Hawaii after coming out of a coma from his head wound. Days later, he’d accidentally found out Cathy was being used as a scapegoat in front of Congress for everything that had gone wrong with the WLF. It had been torture to discover the woman he loved so fiercely was being systematically slaughtered by the politicians, placing the blame at her feet, when nothing could have been further from the truth.
He knew his daughter was battling valiantly to appear unworried. Jim Boland understood, as few would, how being wounded and nearly dying made a person feel horribly vulnerable for months afterward. And just when his daughter needed Jake the most, he’d had to leave her side. That placed Morgan under special pressure, the kind no person should ever have to endure alone.
“It’s hard, but he’s going to come home to you, Kitten. I know that. Just hold on to that even if you don’t believe it yourself. Just believe me?”
Her father’s encouragement did more to support her than he could ever imagine. Morgan clung to his hand. “Oh, Dad, he doesn’t know Emma’s his daughter….” A sob of remorse rose in her throat. “I couldn’t tell him before he left. It would have devastated him. He wouldn’t be able to focus on his mission.”
Boland released her hand and moved carefully next to his daughter. She was strong, like her mother. Resilient. A fighter to the end. He placed his arm around her shoulders and allowed her to lean against him, her face buried against his shoulder. “It’s all right to cry, Kitten. We’re here…. We’ll help you…. And when Jake gets home, you can tell him then. You were right not to tell him before he left. You made the right decision….”
Morgan finally released the pent-up tears she’d held in ever since being wounded. She couldn’t cry in front of Jake. She knew how worried he was for her. Sobbing against her father’s broad shoulder, his arms holding her gently, she released a backlog of hurt, anxiety, fear of almost dying.
Emma was in bed for the night in the hotel suite. Cathy stepped out of the room and quietly shut the door. They’d had room service earlier, their dinner spent around a table as a family together for the first time in a long while. She worriedly assessed her daughter. Morgan was exhausted. She knew Jim and Morgan had had a long talk earlier when she’d taken Emma to the pool. Cathy was grateful Morgan had a special relationship with her father, glad to act as a diversion for Emma so they could talk privately.
Morgan sat in a leather chair opposite the coffee table and the couch.
Cathy went to sit down next to her husband. It was the first time she’d been able to talk with Morgan. With Emma around, they kept the conversation light and happy. Her husband slid his arm around Cathy’s shoulders. Holding Morgan’s dark eyes, seeing how pale she’d become, she said, “Do you want to go to bed? You look so tired.”
Morgan roused herself. “No. I’m just let down, Mom. It’s been rough…but you know that.” Her mother’s incredible blind courage to gut through the Thailand conflict as a combat soldier, and then to go stateside after nearly dying from her leg wound to take on Congress, was nothing short of heroic in Morgan’s eyes. She met her mother’s warm, understanding look.
“What can we do for you, Morgan?”
She grimaced. “I want Jake home, Mom. Safe. I want him to meet Emma.” Opening her hands, Morgan added wearily, “Life is so damned complicated sometimes….”
Jim gazed at his wife and then over at his daughter. “You’re going through a real test, Kitten. But you have our genes and your mother’s strength to get through this. Jake will come home alive.”
“I wish,” Morgan whispered, giving her father a glance, “you could promise me that, but I know you can’t.” She pressed her hand to her heart. “I feel like a lost, scared little child inside, Dad. I feel so inept. I don’t know what I’ll do if Jake doesn’t make it home.”
Jake had to meet his daughter, if nothing else. Morgan loved him, but she had no illusions that Jake would want a permanent relationship. He’d told her more than once he didn’t want her to be a widow again. That in his line of business it was easy to get killed, leaving a family behind without support.
“Don’t go there,” Cathy urged strongly. She sat up. “Morgan, look at me?”
Her mother was like steel when she needed to be, and Morgan could hear it in her husky voice. Opening her eyes, she held her mother’s sharpened green gaze.
“Don’t ever give up. I never thought I’d ever see your father again. I know what it’s like to be alone and the world is caving in around you. I didn’t have Jim to talk to, to listen to his counsel, to cry on his shoulder. I wanted to do all of that. But I was alone in a way that I never would wish on anyone. But you’re there now, just like I was….” Her voice lowered with feeling. “Morgan, you just have to have faith. You have to believe that Jake will be okay, that he’ll return to you. And to Emma.”
Morgan nodded. “There are minutes and hours when I know that, Mom. And there are days that are so black that I feel like I’ve fallen into a hole I’ll never dig myself out of. I worry so much for Jake….”
“I know. I’ve been there, honey. It’s all right to feel what you feel, but you can’t let it stop you. You have to keep fighting. You have to hold the faith for Emma, yourself and Jake. You have the heart to do that. I know. You’re my daughter.”
Morgan stood looking out of her hospital room window while leaning on her crutches. It was midday. Her heart felt bruised and beat-up. Her parents and Emma had just left after their healing four-day visit. With them, Morgan had felt strong, capable and positive. Now…
Feeling depressed, she ached for Jake’s arms around her. He had always fed her strength, fed her his love, whether he knew it or not. Turning, Morgan moved slowly on her crutches to a chair near her bed. She hated the bed, having been trapped in it for so long.
There had been no word from Jake. She wished with all her soul Vero could contact her, let her know what was going on. But she knew he couldn’t. It was a top secret op, and no one outside of the SEAL world would know anything about it. Not even her.
Wearily, Morgan sat down, feeling lost, feeling torn apart on so many levels. With her parents nearby, they’d helped her make some life-changing decisions. Would Jake ever stop bolting from her life? Would he care what her plans were? What she wanted for them more than anything? Would he walk through those glass doors of Operations at Andrews into her arms? Or would Jake come home in a coffin?
Not knowing was the worst stress Morgan had ever tangled with. Being out on the op, she knew the focus was on killing the enemy. There was little room for thoughts about loved ones. A child. A parent. Every cell in her body was oriented toward that op and surviving it to return home. Now, Morgan decided, looking out at the blue sky dotted with white clouds, she understood how the wife of any black-ops soldier felt. The wife and family were left completely out of the loop. Alone with wild, crazy, insane thoughts of the man or woman dying in battle. No one to tell her whether her loved one was alive or not. It was a special hell, and she hated it.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Everest Main, this is Everest Actual. Over.” Jake spoke quietly into his mouth mic, getting ready to set up for the sniper shot. He waited to hear Vero’s Puerto Rican accent over the radio from J-bad. To his right was his sniper partner, Petty Officer Lance Bigelow. Everyone called him “Big” because he was barely five foot six inches tall and weighed one hundred an
d forty pounds. Big was the smallest SEAL to make it through BUD/S. But he was one hell of a sniper and the only man he’d want as a partner on this op. Big lay prone beside him, a spotter scope in hand, watching and assessing conditions in the early afternoon. The sunlight was bright at eleven thousand feet. It was below freezing.
“Everest Actual, this is Everest Main. Over.”
It felt good to hear Vero’s voice. Jake lay prone, the AW Mag on a bipod, pointed at his target. “We’ve got Red Mountain spotted. An eleven-hundred-yard shot. We need approval.”
No sniper op went down without authorization from higher SEAL command. The man who’d taken over as warlord when Sangar Khogani had been killed was his brother, two years younger, Anosh Khogani. He was riding below them on a goat path. They were on a scree slope just below the ridgeline. It was a simple shot compared to the one Jake had tried and failed with Sangar Khogani.
The summer sunlight was bright overhead. They wore their ghillie suits, having built a hide, and remained in position, waiting. Just waiting. Reza had ridden up into the mountains, found Anosh and his twenty soldiers on horseback. He’d been able to find out from a villager, who’d overheard the group talking one night, that they were coming this way. Ground assets like Reza were invaluable.
Jake never left his gaze off the target through his Night Force scope. Anosh was tall, bearded, wearing a dark brown turban and clothing. He was just as murderous as his older brother, having already killed a number of Shinwari villagers on their way down to the cave region south of where they were hidden. Jake was dying for some water but didn’t dare take a drink right now.
“What’s the holdup from SOCOM?” Big muttered into his mic, focused below.
“I screwed up another shot a couple of months ago,” Jake said in a low voice. “They’re probably wondering if I can hit our HVT this time around.”
Chuckling softly, Big grinned. His close-cropped blond hair was covered with a gray, cream and black headdress. “Well, if that’s the truth, Ram, you wouldn’t be here on this op. Would you?”
Grinning a little, feeling exhaustion because they’d only gotten two hours’ sleep before being awakened to stand watch, Jake said, “No, I s’pose not.”
“Everest Actual, do you have a clear shot? Over.”
“Everest Main, roger. No deflections or impediments. Wind is gusting to thirty miles per hour. Over.”
“Everest Actual, you said an eleven-hundred-yard shot? Confirm? Over.”
SEAL headquarters in J-bad was probably going nuts with that info. AW Mag accurate shots were good up to one thousand yards. Beyond that, it became the skill of the sniper, luck and a crapshoot of sorts. It really rested on the sniper to make up the difference. Jake knew he could take the shot and make it good. The only obstacle was always the wind. Mountain shots were notoriously difficult.
“Think they’re peeing their pants about now?” Big asked, unable to keep the laughter out of his low voice.
A tired smile stretched Jake’s mouth. He wanted to rub his scratchy beard with his dirty fingers. No bath for nearly three weeks, and he reeked. His skin continually itched. He would remain focused on his target instead. “More than likely.”
“Everest Actual, you’re cleared to take the shot. Exfil has been alerted.”
“Roger that, Everest Main. Out.” Jake glanced over at his partner. “Let’s mount up.”
Big gave a feral smile and went back to his spotting duties. He assessed the wind, the temperature, the altitude and so many other variables that all played into a successful shot.
Jake settled down on the rocks, the points biting into his Kevlar and his lower body. His head was below the ridge, the scope on Anosh Khogani, who rode at the head of the column. This time, it was a clear shot. Jake breathed out. His finger was on the trigger. All sounds, all sensations dissolved as Jake focused, Anosh’s head in the crosshairs of his scope. The fiberglass stock was pressed tight against his cheek, his right hand extended, finger on the two-pound trigger. His left hand was tucked across his chest. Calm settled over Jake as he hit his still point. Squeezing the trigger, he heard the snap of the bullet leaving the barrel, the stock jamming into his shoulder as it recoiled. He knew Big would follow the vapor trail of the bullet through his spotter scope.
“Bull’s-eye!” Big crowed triumphantly.
Instantly, Jake shimmied up over the ridge, taking the sniper rifle with him. Big quickly followed. Now time was of the essence. The shot had killed Anosh Khogani. One more bad guy was down.
Jake slid down the slope on his ass feeling the pounding and bruising to his flesh. Below them, Reza waited tensely, holding the reins on three nervous horses. Big played rearguard action. Halfway down the slope, Jake called into J-bad and gave the report they wanted to hear. Four weeks and they’d finally nailed the murdering bastard.
Jake threw Reza a thumbs-up as he landed on his feet. He quickly took off his ghillie suit, jamming it into his pack. Big tumbled ass end over teakettle, falling in front of the horses, who jerked around, frightened.
Big leaped up, jerked off his suit, jammed it into the ruck near the bushes.
There were three goat paths leading up to where they had taken the shot. The Taliban was not stupid; they’d figure out the direction of the shot and know it was courtesy of a SEAL sniper team. And then they’d come after them.
Glancing back at the ridge, Jake leaped into the saddle, his ruck across his shoulders, the AW Mag, barrel down, strapped to the outside of it. Reza handed Big the reins to his horse.
“They’re here!” Reza cried, pointing up at the ridgeline two thousand feet above them.
Jake snarled a curse, jerked his thumb over his shoulder, a sign for Reza to take the lead.
“Here!” Big yelled, throwing him the M-4 rifle with the grenade launcher on a rail attached beneath it.
Jake caught the weapon and whirled his horse around as the other two took off at a gallop down the path. He was the officer; it was his duty to take care of his men. There were Apaches on the way from Camp Bravo. And a medevac.
As Jake yanked his horse to stand still, he jammed the M-4 to his shoulder and fired a high shot with a grenade. The Taliban riders were sliding and slipping down the rocky slope. He watched the grenade arc below where the leader was. The blast blew up tons of material, soil, rock and gravel flying in all directions.
Jake didn’t wait to see the devastating results. He whipped his horse around, digging his heels into the flanks and yelling at the animal. Instantly, the horse bolted, crazed by the noise and rocks, galloping in panic down the goat path. Wind whistled past Jake. His eyes watered as his gallant little horse sped nimbly downward. Ahead, he saw Reza and Big. All they had to do was make it down a five-thousand-foot slope to the valley below. There, a Night Stalker MH-47 would pick them up, and then they could get them the hell out of Dodge.
The snaps and pops of bullets passed close to Jake’s head. He rode low, urging the horse on, praying it wouldn’t stumble. If it did, he’d be thrown over the horse’s head. They rounded another curve on the mountain. The goat path became a very steep descent after that, a good two-thousand-foot drop to the valley below. Jake could see the Chinook helicopter landing. He changed channels on his radio and called to the pilot.
“Everest Actual to Fox One. We’re two thousand feet away. We’re coming in hot!”
“Roger, Everest Actual. We’re touching down now and will wait.”
The horse was laboring, stumbling as Jake sent it flying full speed down the steep path. He leaned back. Way back, as the horse suddenly skidded on its rump, front legs thrown outward as it tried to negotiate the gravel path. Damn! Jake felt the horse slipping.
He threw his weight the other way, helping the horse to right itself. Instantly, it slid sideways and then made crowhopping movements to regain its balance on the path. On either side of them were nothing but huge boulders and smaller boulders. If they hit them at this speed, Jake knew they’d both break their necks.
And then his horse grunted.
Jake realized in a split second a bullet had found the animal. His eyes narrowed, and he gripped the M-4 as he went sailing over the animal’s head. Just as he hit the path and rolled off of it, banging over boulders the size of bowling balls, Jake had the air knocked out of him.
He landed with a thud against a huge boulder ten feet high, momentarily gasping and dazed. More shots sang around him, striking the nearby rocks, sparks igniting as the bullets ricocheted off them. Jake scrambled for safety behind the boulder. He swung the short barrel of the M-4 around the gray granite and fired a second grenade toward the Taliban wildly galloping down upon him. The grenade landed near the end of the group. Horses and riders went flying into the air as it exploded.
Cursing, Jake made a call directly to the Apaches, asking for help. Where the hell were they? He gave his GPS location, methodically firing the M-4 at the approaching tribesmen. The hatred on their faces was evident. He could die if he didn’t kill all of them. It was one against twenty. Good odds for a SEAL, he thought, squeezing off shot after shot. The Taliban soldiers were flying out of the saddles as he hit the mark every time.
Ten men were left. Jake heard another sound over the roar of gunfire. The Apaches! Relief avalanched through him as two of the ugly-looking predators flew over the ridge, their rockets aimed at the Taliban. Dammit! He was danger close!
Jake dived for the ground, lying prone, opening his mouth, closing his eyes and holding his hands over his ears. When explosions went off this close, if a person didn’t open their mouth, the air in the lungs had no escape and massive injury could result. By opening his mouth, he equalized the air between his lungs and the outside air around him, dodging severe, even lethal, injury.