The Guardian (A Wounded Warrior Novel)

by Anna del Mar

  But hours of kicking the door didn’t work. The air in the cell grew hot and heavy with my own carbon dioxide. The hours stretched into centuries. I tried digging myself out of the hole, sinking my fingers into the moist, thick loam only to scrape my knuckles on the wall of cement blocks that encased my cell. I was buried alive, worse than I’d been as a child.

  I had no idea how long I’d been in that hole when I first heard the screams. They were my own, piercing my nightmares. Long periods of darkness obscured my being. I couldn’t breathe. At some point, I somehow managed to turn around in my grave. I banged my hands against the metal door until I lost consciousness.

  When I came to again, I thought of Matthias. My heart ached against my bruised ribs. I had just found him, accepted him, given myself permission to love him, and yet now that I had a chance at happiness, I was going to die from slow asphyxiation or insanity, whichever came first.

  Matthias

  I laid on my belly, working my binoculars at the highest point of a small kopje, a rocky outcrop that towered over the plains. With my elbows braced on granite, I hid between the rocks and the vegetation that would usually conceal beasts not of the human kind. Over the last twenty-four hours, I’d tracked Kumbuyo and his men for nearly forty clicks into uncharted terrain. The tracking had been difficult, the journey grueling. But now that I had Kumbuyo’s camp within my sights, none of that mattered.

  The kopje where I’d set up my advance scouting position had gotten my attention as I scouted the area. I noticed that wildlife—herds and predators alike—stayed away from what should’ve been prime real estate. Then I’d spotted the guards, a sorry bunch of emaciated child soldiers led by a couple of older, heavily armed tangos.

  No doubt, Kumbuyo had setup this outpost to protect and defend access to his main camp from the south. It would’ve been a good thought if he’d staffed it with properly trained men. As it was, the leaders of this group were so slack and smug that they sat under the shade, drinking cheap rum and smoking pot.

  Good break. I chambered my Sig Sauer. Piece of cake.

  I stole up to the guard post undetected. Without firing a single bullet, I neutralized six men in seven minutes. The two assholes tried to fight me, so they had to go. As to the child soldiers, the little shitheads were feisty as hell—a couple of them actually tried to shoot me—but I wasn’t in the habit of killing children. I confiscated their weapons and ordered them due south to Pacha Ziwa with a promise of food and shelter. I felt reasonably certain they’d follow my commands, since they’d be killed on sight if they showed up without their weapons at Kumbuyo’s main camp. The kopje was now officially mine.

  A quick inspection revealed that Kumbuyo kept a large cache of arms and ammunitions hidden in the shallow caves in and around the outcrop. The cache included diesel fuel, heavy armory, weapons, and rocket launchers. Fucking hell. Kumbuyo was armed for World War III. As a fuel and weapons depot, this was a vital outpost to him.

  I adjusted my binoculars, scanning the main camp, taking in even the smallest details. The compound was cunningly disguised as a sprawling Maasai boma, except that there were no cattle around, no women or children either. The Massai would be furious if they knew these criminals shielded their presence by imitating their ways. A massive nine-foot palisade surrounded a group of mud huts built concentrically around a center clearing, where armed thugs loitered around a number of small fires.

  I scanned the compound, looking for headquarters. Bingo. A larger building stood at twelve o’clock. It looked like the others, but when I focused in, I spotted a block construction foundation disguised under mud walls. The armed tangos patrolling around the structure confirmed its importance. If all of that wasn’t enough, a couple of luxury Suburbans parked in front of it. Got you.

  I directed my binoculars to the compound’s gates, which faced east at the three o’clock position. Sentinels guarded the gates and walked the palisade’s inner perimeter. I focused on the spot north of the gates, where several improvised fighting vehicles were parked, concealed beneath cammo nets. Working the binoculars’ range, I spotted an impressive number of civilian pickups or four-by-fours, mounted with machine guns, recoilless guns, and even some anti-aircraft guns. Son of a bitch. Kumbuyo was quickly building up his inventory.

  I pulled out the tracking device I’d had on me at all times since Jade and I had returned to the station from Zanzibar. I set it on the rock face and had to endure the agonizing wait for it to get a satellite lock. It was my ace in the hole, the fallback plan I’d put in place in case everything went to hell, as it had. The device took its sweet time triangulating my position. I hadn’t had a chance to test it. I crossed my fingers and hoped the goddamn thing worked.

  A map of the area came on the small screen, a satellite shot taken from above. A red blimp appeared next, marking the exact location where I laid surveying the compound. Given its short three-mile range, I was already pushing its capabilities. But I’d tracked Kumbuyo and his poachers to the complex. Now I had to figure out if Jade was in there.

  A small bleep announced that the satellite had hooked up to a new signal. It was strange, the signal was very weak, but another bubble appeared on the radar, pulsing slowly like a dying heart. Jesus Christ. Jade was in there. Or at least her body was somewhere in the south quadrant of that compound. My guts clenched. She couldn’t be dead. I would’ve felt the cataclysmic shift in a world without Jade.

  Head in the mission, soldier. I gave myself a mental kick in the ass. Kumbuyo needed Jade. She was alive. I had to believe that. Better yet, I had coordinates. Now I had to figure out a creative way to get in and out of the heavily fortified camp.

  I tore my eyes from the tracking device and worked my binoculars over the landscape in a last scouting sweep. The success of my mission depended on my ability to suppress my emotions, stick to my core training, and perform at the top of my range. A wake of dust rising to the northeast caught my attention. I focused my binoculars and discovered a caravan of fully loaded trucks. They had to be heading for Kumbuyo’s camp.

  Aiming my lenses for maximum magnification, I got a better look. Beneath the tarps fluttering in the wind, towers of elephant tusks piled on the truck beds. Rem’s ivory had arrived. Hidden in some of those tusks, the trackers should also be activated. The ivory’s arrival added urgency to my mission. As soon as Rem locked on those coordinates, the camp would become a hot target. If Jade was in there, I needed to get her out. Hang on, babe. I’m coming.

  I calculated that the ivory caravan was about thirty minutes out. I cased the access to Kumbuyo’s camp, making mental notes: One windy dirt road, three tattered bridges over seasonal streams flanked by bursts of vegetation, and several enormous baobabs strategically located along the way. The beginnings of a search and rescue plan began to form in my mind: distraction, infiltration, and extraction.

  Distraction first. I hustled to wire the kopje as fast as I could, using Kumbuyo’s own supplies of fuel and dynamite. I was gonna need a distance detonator to pull this off, so I added one of Kumbuyo’s Russian made RPGs to my gear. For good measure, I picked out three hand grenades from Kumbuyo’s stash and stuffed them in my leg pockets. I nixed the impulse to load myself up with all kinds of goodies. I couldn’t afford to weight myself down. I had to be smart and precise, light and nimble, in and out. I set the mission timetable on my watch and hightailed out of the outcrop.

  On my way back to the truck, I made a quick stop under the solitary sausage tree that stood along the tenuous track connecting the outpost with the main compound. I pulled out Kumbuyo’s wanted flyer from my pocket, held the piece of paper to the trunk, and stabbed one of my spare knives through the forehead of Kumbuyo’s picture. It felt goddamn good.

  “I’m coming after you, you son of a bitch,” I muttered before I hoofed it back to the spot where I’d hidden my truck.

  I drove the Land Rover down the ravine. I made my way along the shallow brook that cut the plain from north to south, concealed by
the high banks at either side. My tires ground over stones. The truck sank, slid, skidded and bounced over the mud and the shallow current. It was a good thing it’d rained some. Due to the water, there would be no dust plume to betray my approach. Once I got near the road, I concealed the Land Rover under the old, rickety bridge. Using my knives, I made the arduous climb up the baobab that towered over the bridge junction.

  I was still trying to catch my breath when the first of the ivory loaded trucks roared below me. Damn, they were moving fast. I waited until the armed pickups escorting the larger trucks sped by and the last truck slowed down to cross the bridge. Then I jumped, falling some six or seven feet onto the tarp that covered the tusks.

  Holy hell. The impact rattled my teeth, reverberated through my bones, and left my thigh smarting with a nasty bruise. But at least I’d made it onto the damn truck. Christ. I was getting too old for this shit. Grinding my teeth, I sneaked under the tarp and positioned myself to fire the RPG between the slats of the cargo bed. It was only after the compound’s gates opened and most of the trucks ahead of mine had pulled in that I took a deep breath, narrowed my eye on the viewfinder, and acquired my target. With the target on my crosshairs, I said a little prayer and fired.

  Four, three, two…The RPG hit its mark just as the truck I was riding in cleared the gates. The blast of the first explosion was followed by a sequence of larger detonations as the weapons’ cache caught fire and blew up. A quick peek revealed a column of smoke obscuring the sky. The fireworks were quite impressive. Target destroyed. Distraction enacted.

  I wiggled off that truck faster than a mamba on the hunt. I found safe cover behind a massive stack of supply crates and watched the compound come alive. To my advantage, the attention of every tango in the complex was on the burning kopje. Infiltration complete.

  A group of men burst out of the command and control structure, led by none other than Kumbuyo. I squinted in shock when I spotted Lamba himself, striding out, wearing the ridiculous uniform he liked to wear for foreign journalists and the likes, surrounded by his bodyguards. Jesus fucking Christ. Lamba was here.

  My pulse was already hammering my ears, but it revved up with the visual confirmation. If Lamba and Kumbuyo were here, so was Jade. Kumbuyo barked his orders and mounted one of the trucks, guiding his men to the outpost. My tactics had worked. Kumbuyo was out of the compound.

  It took all I had to keep to the plan and not go off half-cocked to scour the compound’s southern quadrant. Darting at a crouch, dodging the distracted sentinels, I sneaked into the compound’s parking area. Moving stealthily, I stole a five-gallon gas can from the back of one the trucks, unscrewed the cap and spilled a trail of gasoline that linked the improvised fighting vehicles parked together. With the can empty and my hail Mary ready to go, I had my exit strategy in place. Now I just had to find Jade.

  Jade

  A voice recalled me from the darkness.

  “Jade?” Matthias’s voice interrupted my nightmares. “Jade!”

  I came to with a startled gasp. The air was hot, poisoned with my own exhalations. My mouth tasted like dirt. The underground cell seemed smaller, as if it was collapsing around me. Kumbuyo had abandoned me here to die. Or maybe I was already dead?

  Death. It seemed very tempting to me. Freedom. One way or another, I needed my freedom. Defiance. The wildness in me refused to cower. Kumbuyo couldn’t kill me if I was already dead when he came back. The idea that had been obsessively churning in the back of my mind for many hours finally won out. Do it, a seductive voice whispered in my ears. Get it over with.

  I groped for the razor blade in my pocket and felt along the underside of my wrist. I tried to locate a vein large enough to matter. The hell with Kumbuyo. I refused to be his victim.

  “Jade?” Matthias voice came again, along with pounding on the door. “Are you in there?”

  Holy crap. Was I dreaming? No it couldn’t be. I had to be hallucinating. Matthias was a thousand miles away, safe, at the embassy.

  “Jade!” his voice came again, pebbly, impatient, pissed. “If you’re there, I need to know.”

  “Matthias?” His name came out in a hoarse squeak. My throat was dry and raw from my earlier screams. Logically speaking, it couldn’t be Matthias out there and yet my heart pounded and my body’s radar pinged as if the contact was real. How could it be?

  Hell, this was Matthias Hawking we were talking about. If anyone could be here, it’d be him.

  “Matthias!” I turned on my belly and rapped my sore knuckles against the harsh metal. “Matthias, I’m here!”

  “Hang on.” His voice came again, slightly muted by the steel door, but clear. Bang. The door rattled, shook, maybe even dented, but didn’t budge. After several failed kicking attempts. I heard him cursing on the other side.

  “Where’s the key?” he asked.

  “Kumbuyo has it.”

  He mumbled another string of obscenities.

  I was going to die in here. And Matthias was going to die too, as soon as Kumbuyo caught up with him. “Matthias?”

  “I’m here,” he said, his voice crisp now, and very near, just on the other side.

  I leaned my forehead against the metal, imagining his hand spread against the opposite flank of the door and his fingers stroking my cheek.

  “I’m trying very hard.” I forced myself not to cry. “But…you can’t be here and I can’t take this anymore. Not this. I just…can’t.”

  “Give me a second here, babe.”

  Babe. The sobs broke out of my throat. I could hear thumps and clunks outside, the rustle of Matthias at work. The door strained on its hinges. More clicking. He tried to pick the lock. But I’d been working on that door for a long time and I knew better.

  “The door won’t budge,” I said. “Without the key, there isn’t a way out.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “The thing is…” I sobbed. “I can’t do this anymore.”

  “Yes, you can, you will,” he said. “Tell me, how deep is it in there?”

  I wiped my tears with the back of my hand. My hands were shivering. My whole body was shivering. My voice came out in a quiver. “Maybe five feet deep and four feet tall?”

  “Okay,” he said. “I can work with that. But it’s gonna take me a sec. I need to do some magic here.”

  “I…I can’t take this.”

  “Won’t be long.” I could hear him working on something outside. “I need to make some adjustments. Just a few minutes. Ten, maybe twenty minutes.”

  My heart slammed against my ribs. My breath came in desperate gasps. I didn’t think I could handle the next ten seconds, let alone twenty minutes. Every moment that passed, I wanted to die.

  “You can’t get me out,” I croaked. “I know. I tried.”

  “Have some faith in me,” he said. “I’m getting you out of there, come hell or high water.”

  “You don’t have time to get me out.” It was too dangerous for Matthias to be here. There would be no mercy for him if Kumbuyo found him. Trapped in the poachers’ camp, Matthias’s death would be long and painful, a gruesome spectacle. “You need to leave. Kumbuyo will come. He’ll kill you.”

  “Kumbuyo is out of the compound, hunting me,” Matthias said. “I created a distraction that will have him gone for a while. I also neutralized his guards outside. We’ve got a little time.”

  Time? No. I was out of time. I’d already lost it in here, several times over the long hours. I couldn’t handle the confinement anymore. The gloom had seeped into my mind and all the way to my soul. My oxygen-starved mind fixated on one thought: If I were dead, Matthias would leave and find safety, far away from this horrible place.

  “I want you to go,” I said. “Do you hear me?”

  “I hear you,” he said. “But I’m not leaving.”

  “There’s no point in getting both of us caught,” I said. “I’ll take care of myself. I’ve got a razor blade.”

  A bang hit the door, rattling my bra
in and startling me out of my sorry state.

  “Listen to me,” Matthias barked. “You are not thinking rationally. You will not use that blade. Do you hear me?”

  I swallowed the sob choking my throat. “It’s the best solution.”

  “The hell it is. You will not give up on me. Ever. Put that thing away. Now. Those are your orders, marine, and you will comply. Do you understand?”

  I squeezed the thin sheet of metal between my index and my thumb. The little rectangle radiated with my body’s heat. Tempting. So tempting. To protect Matthias. To end the misery. Like that day, long ago, when my mother locked me in the closet and called the cops after I’d put her pimp in his place. I’d never told anybody about that. I’d tried and failed back then. But I was so much more competent now. This time around, I could finish the job.

  “I know you don’t trust anybody,” Matthias said. “But I’ve got the skills. I can do this. Give me a chance. I came all the way out here to find you. You owe me a chance.”

  The anger in his voice. The desperation. The pleading that seeped into his tone.

  “Are you listening?” He banged on the door again. “I need you to put away the razor. Do it for yourself. Do it for me. Do it for us, for our future.”

  I shut my eyes and willed myself to take another hot, foul, toxic breath, for myself. I inhaled again, this time for Matthias. I took another breath, for us. And then the next breath and the one after that one, for our future.

  “You are fierce,” he said. “You can do this.”

  I sobbed. “I’m not so fierce.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I hesitated.

  “Come on, babe, talk to me. I need to hear your voice.”

  “Once before.” I forced myself to say it aloud, to push it out of me, to expel the clog from my pipelines. “I tried to end it. When I was younger. After I hit that creep with the shovel. I wanted to end it. Now I want to end it again. This time for good.”