♣Height: 6’3”
♣Weight: 230lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Crescent Wind, Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Mountain Viper
RANGER JAMES: Team Daddy/Team Sergeant, Master Sgt.
♣Recruited from the 75th Ranger Regiment, Ft. Benning, GA
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon
♣Plans, coordinates & directs Team intelligence, analysis and dissemination.
♣Height: 6’4”
♣Weight: 225lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Crescent Wind, Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Mountain Viper, Operation Eagle Fury
JARED CROWE: Weapons Sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class
♣Recruited from Delta Force, Ft. Bragg, NC
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon, Sniper
♣Weapons expert. Capable of firing and employing all small arm and crew served weapons
♣Height: 6’0”
♣Weight: 220lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Crescent Wind, Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles
HOYT CROWE: Asst. Weapons Sergeant, Staff Sgt.
♣Recruited from Delta Force, Ft. Bragg, NC
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon, Sniper
♣Weapons expert. Capable of firing and employing all small arm and crew served weapons
♣Height: 6’0”
♣Weight: 210lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Crescent Wind, Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles
AARON SPEIRS: Medical Sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class
♣Recruited from Delta Force, Ft. Bragg, NC
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special reconnaissance, medic
♣The life-saver. Employs the latest field medical technology and limited surgical procedures
♣Height: 6’1”
♣Weight: 195lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles
RISER MALLON: Asst. Medical Sergeant, Staff Sgt.
♣Recruited from Delta Force, Ft. Bragg, NC
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon, medic
♣The life-saver. Employs the latest field medical technology and limited surgical procedures
♣Height: 6’2”
♣Weight: 215lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Anaconda, Operation Jacana, Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles,Operation Mountain Viper, Operation Eagle Fury
MERC: Engineer Sergeant, Sgt. 1st Class
♣Recruited from Special Operations Group (SOG) of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon, Demolitions, psychological operations
♣Demolition expert. Trained in psychological warfare, conducts field interrogations.
♣Height: 6’5”
♣Weight: 250lbs
♣Combat Experience: Classified
ETHAN SLADE: Communications
Sergeant/Commo Guy, Sgt. 1st Class
♣Recruited from the 75th Ranger Regiment, Ft. Benning, GA
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special recon, communications
♣Communications expert. Employ latest FM, multi-channel, and satellite communication devices.
♣Height: 6’0”
♣Weight: 200lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles
CORD CARTER: Weapons Sergeant, Staff Sgt.
♣Recruited from the Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command (MARSOC), Camp Lejeune, NC
♣Specialized Skills: direct action, unconventional warfare, special reconnoissance, weapons expert/sniper
♣Weapons expert. Capable of firing and employing all small arm and crew served weapons
♣Height: 6’1”
♣Weight: 210lbs
♣Combat Experience: Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Condor, Operation Summit, Operation Volcano, Operation Achilles
Prologue
“Remind me why we're here again.” Hoyt tossed the fresh-caught fish from the river down on the log at their campsite and pulled his fillet knife from his belt.
“You know why we’re here.” Jared's curt reply left much to be desired by way of explanation.
“I know why, but what I don't know is why.” Hoyt grabbed the first fish off the stringer and cleaned it, using the overturned log as a makeshift table.
Jared continued to stoke the campfire, the river rushing by twenty feet away. The sun dropped low on the horizon, hiding behind the tall Tennessee Mountains. Tennessee...God, how he hated this place.
“I heard there’s movement at Crowe Camp, you know this may be our chance for long overdue revenge.” Jared threw the last log on the fire, the loud crash sending sparks flying into the air.
Katlyn Crowe, a.k.a. Miss Kay, was Hoyt and Jared’s aunt. She was also the woman who had single handedly tried to kill them when they were children, and would have succeeded if it not for a scared little girl with the biggest golden eyes. She’d helped the brothers escape from Kay and Crowe Mountain.
“You really think Kay doesn’t know someone is trying to overthrow her? She owns that mountain and all the people on it. One whiff of treason and she’d have the whole county reporting,” Hoyt said.
Just thinking about Kay had Jared clenching his hands into fists. She was the reason for his nightmares. The reason he had to flee his home. “I think any chance to get our revenge is worth a shot.”
“And what if it’s a trap?” Hoyt brought the fish filets over, laid them in a cast-iron skillet and placed it on the grate over the fire.
“Either we take the chance at getting even or we puss out. I think we made the right decision.” The smell of cooking fish filled the air, but Jared doubted he could eat with his stomach crammed this full of revulsion.
Hoyt shook his head, the tired lines around his eyes deepening. The glow from the fire branding his skin a golden tan and his curly blond hair almost honey. Hoyt didn’t possess the deep-seated hatred for the Crowes that Jared did. But Hoyt was younger than him, enough so that he didn’t remember the pain, the starvation, the beatings Jared had taken to protect him.
Jared did though. He remembered every single one.
“I love you, brother. And you know I’ll follow you anywhere,” Hoyt hedged.
“But what? Finish what you wanted to say.”
“But I think you’ve let this hatred eat at you for too long. I thought you were moving past it. But now I find out you’ve been keeping tabs on that place, after all these years. You’re obsessed. If you’re not careful, you’ll spend your whole life hating and miss out on all the good.” Hoyt’s voice was quiet but dead on. His brother had always been the kind one, the happy-go-lucky ladies’ man, but he didn’t shirk from the shit either.
“How can you be so damn optimistic? You’ve seen the same crap I have on missions. You’ve seen the genocide, the rape, the murder. Hell, worse even than that. Not sure where you’ve been, but all I’ve seen is plenty of evidence that the human race is fucking evil.” The last mission the brothers’ Special Forces team had been on was a case in point. They’d tracked the terrorist, Al Seriq, to his compound in Pakistan to find hundreds of dead bodies, and to boot, they’d lost their teammate. There’d been nothing but death. And their team, Task Force Scorpion, had lost track of the terrorist. Fuck.
“What about back home? There’s a lo
t of good there.” Hoyt flipped the fish over and uncapped a bottle of water.
“Home? We don’t have a home. If you’re talking about Mercy, Mississippi, that’s where Hunter and Ranger are from. Not us. You think they want us staying around there?” After escaping Crowe Mountain, the brothers had quickly learned how hard it was to survive on their own. They’d seen the military as a light at the end of the tunnel. It provided three meals a day, a place to live, and a way to earn a living. Something the brothers had never had. Jared had joined up the day of his eighteenth birthday and Hoyt followed suit. “You think they want a couple of white trash orphans hanging around their family?”
Hoyt removed the fish from the heat and split it between two paper plates. He remained silent as he handed one to Jared and then took his spot on the ground, sitting cross-legged near the fire. The chilly fall air had a stiff bite tonight and Jared found himself hugging the fire, too.
They ate in silence. Had he been too harsh? Was Jared slowly murdering his brother’s hope for no reason?
Or was he protecting him from heartbreak?
“I really like it there.”
Jared was jerked from his thoughts by Hoyt’s soft response. “I know you like it in Mercy, but you know better. You never get attached. Attachments are weaknesses. Next thing you know you’ll be trying to get married and settle down. But you and I both know that’s not in either of our cards.” What did they have to offer? Nothing but white trash DNA and a past so screwed up even the SF psychologist steered clear.
Hoyt jumped to his feet and clenched his hands at his sides, his blue eyes burning as bright as the campfire. “Dammit, I’m sick of never being good enough. When will it end? When do we get to settle down and live out our lives without our past hanging over our every move?”
Jared stayed down, knowing Hoyt needed to get this out and come to terms. “When have I ever steered you wrong, little brother?”
Jared had devoted his life to raising Hoyt and protecting him. When the military tried to separate them into two different SF Teams, Jared had simply refused. After multiple fights and demerits, he’d succeeded. And now the Crowe brothers were the most decorated snipers in the whole Special Forces.
“You’ve never steered me wrong, but you’ve never let me live either. And now look where we are. We’re back on this fucking Godforsaken mountain, probably walking straight into a trap, and for what? All because you need revenge for something someone did to us when we were little kids!”
Anger coursed through Jared’s veins and he surged to his feet. “You might not remember what she did to us, but I do! I have to live with it every time I close my goddamn eyes. Of course I want revenge! I have to put these demons to bed.” Before I lose my mind.
“I hope you’re right this time, brother. I really do, because this is the last time I’ll come back here. I intend to move on from this. I will make Mercy my home and I will find someone to have a real relationship with. I’m sick of being homeless and I’m sick of being married to the military. I want more!” Hoyt threw his plate into the fire and stomped off into the woods. He stopped at the tree line and turned around. “Don’t follow me. I’ll be back for second watch.”
Jared collapsed back onto the ground, the fight draining from him. Had he been so wrapped up in his demons that he’d tried to drag Hoyt down with him?
Chapter 1
Jared Crowe had felt the press of cold steel against his skin before, but he had never expected to feel it here, at his home. A place he hated.
“Lookee here, I done caught me a rat.” Her voice had that hill folk lilt to it. An accent he normally found revolting, but for some reason he couldn't define, hers sounded nice.
Familiar.
Jared lowered his binoculars and placed them on the ground. The cold mountain air swirled through the mist that had not yet been dispelled by the early morning sun. Dry autumn leaves crackled, stirred up every now and then by a chilled breeze. A mockingbird let out a harsh caw down in the valley below, signaling a threat to his nest.
“Now, you keep them hands above your head and get up real nice and slow like. Don’t make me blow a hole in your head.” Okay, even if her voice was sexy, she was starting to piss him off.
Homegrown or terrorist he didn't care—Jared didn’t like it when gun barrels were pressed to his head.
She stepped back and Jared pushed off the hard rocky dirt, careful to keep his arms away from his body. No need to alert her. He had time. She would look away. Blink. And then it would be over.
“All right, you're doing good. Now turn around.”
Jared turned, just as slow and methodical as he had risen. Steam from his breath puffed in front of his face, but he didn’t feel the cold. And even if he had felt it, he wouldn’t have allowed it to affect him. His family had beaten any softness out of him long ago.
They’d beaten everything out of him.
He didn't experience normal emotions. He knew he was broken, but he didn't care enough to try and fix himself. It wasn't like he had a family or wife in need of his emotional support. The only people who needed him were his brother and his unit, and a sensitive weakling would be of no use to any of them.
Maybe that's why he found it so easy to smile at the woman in front of him, who was holding a shotgun as long as she was tall. “You fire that gun and it'll knock you on your ass, girl.”
A wide-brimmed floppy leather hat obscured half her features, and damned if her clothes gave away any indication of her actual age. She looked like a little girl playing dress-up in her daddy's clothes. Loose baggy jeans, baggy shirt, and a worn-out leather vest. He'd died and gone to hillbilly hell.
But her lush, tempting lips were all woman. Then she lifted her chin and he saw her eyes. Awareness sucker punched him and he drew in a small breath. Her eyes, the amber color of pure mountain whiskey. He'd known one girl—one person in his entire life—with those exotic gold eyes. “Sparrow.”
She blinked and steadied the butt of her shotgun against her shoulder, keeping a safe distance from him. “How do you know my name? What are you? You ain't no cop and you ain't no DEA. Them boys don't wear the camo like you got on.”
Camouflage paint completely covered his face, and a black do rag was tied tight and flat against his head. She wouldn't be able to recognize him in his war paint, not after all these years, and maybe that was for the best. He could reveal his identity later, take her by surprise and rip that gun out of her hands before she shot herself with it.
“You're right, I'm not any type of law enforcement. If I were, you'd be a lot safer than you are right now.” Jared made his voice menacing. Even allowed a little bit of his old accent to slip in. Let her know she wasn't dealing with some yuppie from the city who didn't know his way around the back woods.
“Who are you?”
“I'll keep that information to myself for now.” While he figured out the best course of action. He had no intention of harming this girl. She'd been the only one to show him kindness after his parents’ death all those years ago. But that didn't mean he couldn't use her to get into his aunt and uncle’s compound.
“If you won't tell me, you'll have to tell them.” She gestured past his shoulder. Jared glanced in that direction and spied two very large armed men.
A normal man would probably be scared.
But Jared hadn’t felt fear in over a decade. He turned back to face Sparrow and gave her a wink. “Too bad, I was looking forward to getting to know you better.”
Her eyes widened, her lips parted. She ducked her head, quickly obscuring her features with that monstrosity of a hat. But not before he'd seen the surprise. The fear.
Jared waited, calm and patient. He knew what it was to be feared. He waited for her hands to shake and tremble. Waited for her to back up a step and realize how close to danger she really was. But she didn't. She lifted her chin once more and those warm amber eyes flashed cold. “Jimbo, Bob, I caught me a spy.”
As if to dare him, she stepped
forward and placed her gun within his reach. If they’d been alone, he would have yanked it away from her. But not with two more guns pointed at his back
“You’re going to get to know me. Real, real good.”
* * *
Sparrow’s heart raced faster than a damn jackrabbit running from a fox. So much so that all she could hear was a buzz in her ears instead of individual heartbeats. Something about this man tugged at her memory.
How did he know her name? Sparrow gave a quick glance back at her adopted brothers, but their expressions gave away nothing. Not that they’d tell her anyway. Something was brewing between those two, something that boded ill for the mountain, and Sparrow couldn’t figure out what. She’d been spying and quietly questioning everyone she could trust, but had failed to turn up anything other than a bad feeling.
Maybe now she’d gotten the break she’d been waiting on.
Then he smiled, and her heart had stopped its furious pace altogether. That wasn't a smile of warmth. It wasn't even a smile of acknowledgment. No, that was a precursor of death. Hard flat black eyes did nothing but reflect her own image back at her.
Her survival instinct kicked into overdrive, but she smashed it down. She couldn't afford to give herself over to fear. Not here. Not ever.
When Sparrow was eight years old, her mama, Tootsie, had finally overdosed on painkillers. Sparrow was the one who’d found her, naked and cold in their trailer. Tootsie’s day trade had been her body. Her night trade had been the pills. Always the pills. From a young age, Sparrow had learned that in order to survive she needed to take care of herself.
Then Miss Kay Crowe had taken her in, and Sparrow found herself a turn-key family. One ready for her to move in with for good. One with a mother who wasn't a whore and a druggie. And even two real live older brothers. Even then Sparrow knew Kay wasn’t a good woman, but she had to be better than Tootsie. And if she was willing to take in a whore’s daughter, she had to be good deep down.
Men of Mercy: The Complete Story Page 52