by Dale Mayer
She shook her head. “Right? But for me,” she said, pulling back her blankets and curling up under them. Reaching up she rubbed the towel around her hair in an attempt dry it faster. “it’s more a case of taking a moment of freedom while I’m allowed it. I don’t know what tomorrow will bring. And I can’t say this is what I thought I signed up for.”
“Agreed,” Parker said, standing up with his own bag. “Let’s hope tomorrow is better. I’ll go for a shower myself. Are you okay here with Samson?”
She glanced over to see Samson sleeping in his crate, out for the night. “We’ll do just fine,” she said. “Don’t wake me when you come back.”
“I won’t,” he said. He left quietly. In spite of herself and in spite of all that had happened, she closed her eyes and fell asleep.
When Parker returned to his barracks, he wasn’t surprised to find her sleeping. Too many emotional situations for both of them had happened today, and tomorrow would likely be much worse. Samson appeared to be out for the count too. Even in his crate, he’d stretched out on his side, his legs straight out in front, with light snores accompanying the rise and fall of his chest. Now if only Parker could do the same. But his mind spun endlessly on what had happened. And why …
Something else seemed to be going on here, and he knew that, but, being on the way out and not belonging to the base anymore, he really had no options to get more information.
It kind of sucked. He didn’t know how big the theft-of-government-property issue was, since the colonel already seemed aware of it, even working on it. Right? Were he and Sandy in any kind of danger? That was the last thing he wanted. Because of him, she had gone on that ride in the first place. Of course Badger and Commander Cross were likely to feel fairly guilty over all this as well. Or would if things went south. Right now they were all watching the proceedings with a wary eye.
He looked down at Samson, who lifted his head and looked back at him. “It’s okay, boy.”
Samson’s ears twitched, but he never made a sound as he lay back down.
Parker pulled the covers up over his shoulders. Everything was so out of sync. This was already an emotional trip with his brother lying cold in the navy morgue. To think that, when Parker got home, he had to go through the whole funeral process and deal with his father was just another massive emotional roller coaster ride coming. But to have this added altercation happen while he was here paying his respects on the base where his brother had died? … Well, that was even more upsetting.
He lay quietly, zoning in and out of sleep, knowing he needed to sleep but unable to. It seemed like he should have found something important amid all this, and yet he couldn’t grasp what it might have been. As he lay here deep in thought, Samson raised the alarm.
He started with a growl, low, deep and barely discernible. But Parker heard it. He reached out a hand and touched Samson’s paw against the cage. With Parker’s eyes open, he adjusted to the darkness. He checked his watch; it was just after midnight.
He lay still as he searched for whatever was bothering Samson. The dog shifted in his crate, rolling onto his side and then up. He stood tall and turned to face the other side, where Sandy was. Parker bolted up and saw her form curled under the blanket still. He sighed with relief. “She’s still there, buddy. It’s okay.”
But his whisper was so soft. And that’s when he realized the movement on the other side of her bed, on the other side of the wall. This was one of the temporary barracks, not something they kept here for months on end. These structures came and went, depending on the numbers and the space required and didn’t offer much beside protection from the elements.
He wouldn’t have been at all surprised that they had thrown it up just for him and Sandy. There were windows, but they had plastic over the edges. He saw a figure outside who dropped down below the window and then straightened again, the shadow blending in with the moonlight. He watched it cross to the next window, drop under again and then come up around the back. It kept moving around their barracks and then sliding up on his side.
Not the actions of an appointed sentry on guard.
Samson once again growled, his gaze tracking the shadow as it went. “Right. Good call. Not sure who that is,” Parker whispered. He straightened up, walked to the next window and watched the shadow approach. Parker peered outside.
Again not the appointed sentry doing a walk around the perimeter on a regular time schedule since the figure never went past this particular corner of the barracks. He watched and waited, but the guy stayed behind that corner. Close to Samson and close to Parker’s bed. And that made Parker angry.
He opened the door just enough of a crack to see the moonlight, with enough light that he could see any shadows shifting. All clear. Parker let the door drift open enough to step out. Still moving silently, barefoot, he crept closer to the corner where the intruder should have been. And then he heard the breathing. Whoever it was still stood on the other side, just out of sight. Parker waited. He should have brought Samson with him, except the dog probably would have growled and given away their position.
Whoever was standing there hopefully didn’t know Parker was here. Then he heard a voice around the corner.
“They’re sleeping,” said the terse male voice.
Parker couldn’t hear the response when it came back, but the watcher answered, “The dog’s there too.”
A moment of silence ensued.
“I can do that.”
More silence.
“I said, I can do it.” The phone call ended with a growl.
Parker watched the shadows as the intruder pulled out a handgun and put a silencer on the end. Parker stepped quickly back toward the open door. Inside the entrance of the doorway just a few steps away from the gunman, he watched as a man in a military police uniform crept toward the open door. As soon as the handgun swept up and pointed at Sandy, Parker grabbed it and drop-kicked the MP to the ground. He twisted his arm back and around and held him down, hitting a pressure point to knock him out.
Moving as quietly as he could, he dragged the man back inside.
“What did you do?” Sandy asked from behind him.
“Stopped him from shooting you,” he said.
“I saw him,” she said. “I heard a noise and bolted up, and that’s when I saw the damn gun.”
“Yeah,” Parker said, his voice harsh but very low. “We’ve been targeted.”
With the man on the ground in front of Parker, his knee pressed in the MP’s back, he quickly sent Badger a text message. It seemed stupid to be contacting Badger, but right now Parker didn’t know who else to trust. Badger’s response was On it.
He almost laughed. Sent him a reply. Faster than that please.
He didn’t get a response, and he didn’t expect one. Ten minutes later a march of boots came toward him. He held up his finger to Sandy.
She nodded.
Samson growled. Parker walked over and released the hatch on the cage and brought Samson to stand guard over the man down.
At the door, there was a knock.
“Who is it?” Parker asked, his voice hard.
“Colonel Barek,” he said. “I spoke to you earlier tonight.”
“You did,” Parker replied.
“I want to come in,” the colonel said.
“That’s nice. Are you coming in alone? With or without weapons?” Parker asked. He now held his would-be assailant’s gun in his hand.
“Young man, I think you’re in a bit over your head,” the colonel’s voice said calmly.
“And I think you’ve lost control of your base,” Parker said, his voice equally soft.
There was a sucked-in breath, and the door slammed open. The colonel stepped in and slammed the door behind him. He stared at Parker intently, every line of his body was taut.
Parker stood his ground. He motioned at the man on the ground. “He came in to shoot us, not fifteen minutes ago. This is his weapon, and it was pointed directly at Sandy. I hear
d him outside talking to somebody on his phone about taking care of it.”
The colonel looked down at the man, frowned, turned to Parker. “That explains why Commander Cross contacted me in the middle of the night.”
“Unless you wanted to discuss cake recipes, I would presume so,” Parker snapped.
He heard Sandy’s gasp. She walked over and faced the colonel. “The door opened, and I saw this man holding a gun in my direction. I didn’t have time to react, just rolled sideways, and Parker reached up and subdued him.”
The colonel’s shoulders sagged ever-so-slightly. “Damn it,” he said. “We thought we had this dealt with.”
“I presume you still have somebody double-crossing you within the base.”
The colonel looked at him and gave a brief smile. “Something like that. Nothing quite so Hollywoodish.”
“Betrayal comes in many forms,” Sandy said. “It doesn’t have to be Hollywood style at all. It just has to be somebody who’s looking to profit from their own actions instead of helping our country.”
“And again, something like that,” he said. “But you appear to have stirred up a hornet’s nest by finding Ronnie.”
“Ronnie or the dog?”
The colonel glanced at Samson, glanced at the cage and saw the open door.
“I let him out for our own defense,” Parker said coolly. “He’s the one that alerted me to our current mess.”
The colonel nodded. “These dogs have saved many lives,” he said. He lifted his hat from his head and ran his fingers through his hair. “So we have one MP who’s a bad egg,” he said. “Now the question is, how many others are there?”
“Do you recognize him, sir?” Sandy asked. “Or is there a chance the real MP is tied up or dead somewhere else and missing his uniform?”
The colonel’s gaze went from her to Parker and nodded slowly. “As much as I wish that were the case, I do recognize him. Now we have a bigger problem.” He opened the door and called for two men. Both of them, senior aides, came in and took one look. Their faces dropped. They reached down and grabbed the prisoner, had a quick discussion in low tones that neither Parker nor Sandy could hear. They escorted the man away. The colonel looked at the handgun in Parker’s hand and said, “Son, I need that.”
“I’m sure you do,” Parker said, staring down at it. “The problem is, we’re the ones now caught in the middle of something we had no involvement in. And we don’t have weapons.”
“You shouldn’t need them here.”
“But obviously we do,” Sandy said, her hand rubbing the top of Samson’s head and linking her arm through Parker’s. “Can’t say either of us feel very safe here now.”
Parker turned the handgun away from his body and held it out handle first to the colonel. “We are more than happy to leave this base,” he said.
The colonel nodded slowly. “I’ll change the sentries and put two men on guard,” he said. “They won’t be MPs. They’ll be my own men. Get some sleep. You’ll need it. Tomorrow is an emotional day for you both.” He turned, glanced back at Samson, and said, “And, if he’s not in that cage, he needs to be. Do you hear me?”
“I hear you,” Parker said. “But I also want to remind you that he’s the one that saved our lives.”
“Noted,” the colonel said. “You know how much paperwork this will entail now?” He turned and took his leave.
When the door clanged behind him, an almost palpable change came in the air.
Sandy glanced at Parker. “Okay, that was rough too.”
“Go ahead and sleep,” he said.
She snorted. “I don’t think I’ll be able to.”
“I know,” he said. “It’s almost one in the morning. Not even sure how that came to take so long. But we have to get up at six a.m., so we have five hours. Trying to stay awake is almost impossible too.”
She remained where she was and asked, “What do you think about all this?”
“I’m afraid we disturbed somebody when we spoke to Ronnie, and I think someone is afraid that we might have seen them or something.”
“Did you tell the colonel about those two men, Gorman and Tobey, present when Samson disappeared?”
Parker shook his head. “No, I don’t think I did.”
She nodded. “Maybe he needs to be updated.” Parker stared down at his phone, and she said, “Personally I’d probably text him the same way that you got him to come here. It’s got to be easier than facing the guards out there.”
He chuckled. “I’m sending the information to Badger, asking him to relay it to the colonel. But I also need to update Badger on this shooter now too.”
Sandy waved her hand at him. Then walked closer and gave him a quick hug. “You do that. I’m done. I’m going back to sleep.”
“I thought you couldn’t sleep,” he said teasingly, hating to see her step away from him. She’d felt so right in his arms, even if for only a moment.
“Sure, but the alternative sucks too. So I’ll try.”
He watched as she pulled out a set of headphones, popped them into her ears and pulled the blankets around her.
He smiled, settled back, and texted Badger. It would be a long night. The colonel might have put good people in charge out front of their barracks, but Parker wouldn’t take a chance. He had trusted somebody already tonight to look after them, and that obviously hadn’t gone well. He wouldn’t make that same mistake twice.
Chapter 6
In spite of herself, she slept. When she awoke again, she bolted upright, grabbing for the side of the bed.
“Take it easy,” Parker said. “It’s okay.”
She glanced at him, then sighed with relief as she remembered where she was. She sagged against the pillow as she rubbed her face. When she refocused, she saw Parker sitting up, leaning against the back of the bed, with Samson also stretched out on Parker’s bed, half on top of him.
“I see you and Samson are bonding,” she said in a light tone before a yawn overtook her.
Samson lifted his head and gave a bark. His tail wagged as he watched her.
“He’s a great dog,” Parker said. “A part of me says I should take him home myself and keep him.”
“If you want him, you know you could probably have him,” she said. “He needs a good home after what he’s been through. And you do have an in with the military. Not to mention, Samson trusts you.”
He stroked Samson gently. “I would like to keep him.”
“Either you or me. He’s the last link we have to our brothers,” she murmured, staring at Parker and Samson, loving the connection between man and dog. They had a bond already. She couldn’t imagine separating them and the further stress that would bring to Samson. For Parker it might not be as bad, but the longer the two were together, the harder it would be. Parker looked like an all-or-nothing type of guy. She’d listened to her brother talk about Jerry’s family, and Parker had been mentioned, always with respect and fondness.
She was grateful he was here with her. This was a crap trip in the first place. Adding that to everything that had happened since they’d first arrived, well, … it didn’t bear thinking about being alone right now. Plus she really liked Parker. Wanted to spend time with him. It would be lovely to stay in touch when back stateside. And not just for the connection with their brothers …
“But is that a good enough reason?” he asked. “Or should we be looking at what’s best for him?”
“Meaning, neither of us have a job in a couple weeks and have no clue where and how we’ll be, so do we have any business keeping a dog like that?”
He chuckled. “All of that and more, yes.”
“The thing is, if you make him a priority,” Sandy said, “other things will fall in line.”
“Right,” Parker said. “Something to think about. And, speaking of which, it’s almost six, and this guy needs to go outside.” He patted Samson on the back. “Do you want to go out, Samson?”
Samson barked and jumped off Park
er’s bed, gave an excited yelp and stretched out his front paws.
“I’m coming with you then,” Sandy said. “I don’t want to be left alone anymore.” She hesitated, looked at her bag, and asked, “Could you turn your back for a second?”
“Or do you want us to walk you to the bathroom?”
She nodded and smiled. “I have to go anyway, so, if we can do that, that would be great.”
Samson walked over to Sandy, his tail wagging ferociously. His body wiggled with joy, as if saying good morning.
She crouched in front of him and hugged him gently. “Thank you for saving my life, big guy.”
He nudged her for more attention, which she willingly gave him. When she could stand again, she slipped on her shoes and grabbed her bag, and the three of them went to the women’s bathroom. She changed, brushed her teeth, her hair and washed her face. Her eyes were still gritty from lack of sleep, but she felt much better and more prepared for the day. The only trick now was to get through today and to get home.
Maybe then some sense of normalcy would come again. Although not likely. Did one ever get over losing a sibling?
Nor could she get over the feeling of being disconnected from everything around her. She was still in the service, but it didn’t feel like it was her world anymore. She was in a transition from this to … what? When she stepped back out, Samson greeted her with a wagging tail, and Parker had a smile on his face. She grinned at the two of them, loving that they were waiting for her. She motioned to her bag.
He nodded. “Let’s go back and put it in with mine.”
She realized he was fully dressed. “Lucky you,” she said. “I gather you got dressed while I was sleeping.”
“Yep,” he said cheerfully. “I didn’t mind if you looked.”
That got a laugh out of her. “Now if I’d only realized that,” she said, “I would have had sweet dreams instead of holding nightmares at bay.”
He squeezed her hand gently. “It was a pretty tough night,” he said. “I’m glad you got some sleep.”
“I did,” she said. “But I’ll be feeling the shortness of it by the time we get on the plane today.”