“We got a medical kit anywhere?” Yellowtail asked.
“I’m fine,” Antonio snapped.
“Me too,” Lino said.
Antonio reached for the bottle of wine, then shook his head and motioned to Yellowtail for the vodka.
Another blast rattled the room as Antonio took a swig from the bottle.
“Easy there,” Christopher said. “It’s not the end of the world yet.”
“No, but maybe not so far off,” Antonio said, taking another pull. “AMP is in control of the skies, and those pilots are raining hell down on the city.”
“We heard they’re hitting civilian targets,” Frankie said.
“No fucking shit,” Antonio said, glaring.
The men avoided their leader’s gaze, including Vinny, who looked down at his bloodstained sneakers.
“I’m not sure whether to root for AMP or the rebels at this point,” Antonio said. “AMP could very well end up killing us while winning the fight for Los Angeles. But if they lose, we lose our biggest business partner.”
Vinny didn’t know which sounded better: being blown to dust by a bomb, or starving with the rest of the city after the attack was over. Either way, the future of the Moretti family was in grave doubt, and he wasn’t sure Don Antonio could protect them this time.
* * *
Ronaldo slept a few hours, until a nightmare jerked him awake. Elena, sitting in a chair by his bed, reached over and gently touched his arm.
“It’s okay, you’re with your family,” she said.
My family …
For a while, Ronaldo had thought he might not see them again. After the ambush that nearly killed Lieutenant Castle, the Desert Snakes had no choice but to flee the refugee camp. Now, with AMP in control, they were outlaws.
He sat up in bed and nearly broke down at his wife’s gentle touch. A glance over at Monica brought a smile. She slept peacefully on a cot, holding her stuffed elephant, oblivious to the fighting aboveground.
Los Angeles was a war zone, and a quick scan of the grubby basement reminded Ronaldo just how far they were from safety.
Trapped inside the city, they had decided to flee to an office building owned by Zed Marks’s family. East of Los Angeles in City of Industry, it was away from most of the fighting, and the building seemed secure enough. But as soon as they had a window to escape, Ronaldo was getting his family out of the city.
“What time is it?” he asked.
Elena brought up her watch and looked at the pale-green radium dial. “Just after 4:00 a.m.”
“How come you’re not sleeping?” he asked.
“I just can’t.”
Marks stepped into the basement doorway wearing civilian clothes, holding his M4.
“Everything okay?” Ronaldo asked.
“Better get dressed,” Marks said. “I think you should see what’s happening.”
“Stay with Monica,” Ronaldo said to his wife as he threw on his shirt and tied his boots. He grabbed his rifle, then checked that Elena had her pistol.
“I’ll be right back,” he said.
Ronaldo followed Marks up the stairs to an open atrium of the five-story building. Then he crossed over to another door, which led to a stairwell. With Marks in the lead, they climbed to the roof, where his son waited just inside the low parapet.
In the distance, green tracer rounds lit up the night like a flurry of shooting stars. Flames flickered on the upper floors of several high-rises.
The jets were gone, but the fighting on the ground had only just begun. Distant explosions and the chatter of automatic weapons echoed through the night. Months of starvation and desperation had turned ordinary civilians into combatants, adding fuel to an already raging fire.
It was like Baghdad all over again. And not just here. Scenes like this played out in every major city and many smaller ones as well. On top of that, the city’s hundred thousand gang members were out in force, terrorizing, looting, murdering.
“We should be out there, fighting with our brothers,” Marks said.
He looked over, but Ronaldo didn’t respond. They both hated leaving after the ambush, but they had been vastly outnumbered.
Now Ronaldo had his family to think about, and until he got them somewhere safe, his duty was to them. Only then would he get back in this fight.
“Dad, I don’t understand how this happened,” Dom said.
“We were betrayed,” Ronaldo replied solemnly. “By a man who’s gone crazy as a meth head.”
“Elliot’s insane, all right,” said Marks. “But not in that way. He’s the dangerous kind of crazy—the kind that’s also a genius. Unfortunately for our country, he’s one of the best military tacticians anywhere.”
“Maybe so,” Ronaldo said, “but if the truth gets out, AMP will fall apart. If people knew they were responsible for Palo Verde and San Fran …” The smoky air made him want to spit. “Right now Elliot has made the Corps look like an enemy of the state. He’s probably going to say we were responsible for those attacks too.”
Marks spat on the tarred roof. “Our only chance is if the navy joins the fight. If they do, we might be able to take out that traitorous pile of shit Elliot.”
“You good for a bit?” Marks asked. “I could really use a few hours’ shut-eye.”
“Yeah, I’ll take watch.” Ronaldo looked at his son. “You go down with your mom and get some rest.”
Marks left, but Dom hesitated. He was not one to disobey orders, but Ronaldo could see he didn’t want to go.
“Okay, stay a little while,” Ronaldo said.
Dom smiled.
They sat down in office chairs nearby. Odd as it felt to be watching a battle in Los Angeles, Ronaldo was just glad to be sitting here with his boy.
“I missed you, buddy,” he said.
Dom looked over. “I missed you too.”
Ronaldo still didn’t know quite what had happened while he was gone, but Elena had said something about a robbery across the street. He decided to wait for Dom to bring it up, rather than put him on the spot. Positive reinforcement was key, especially now, with the world melting down around them.
“You did a good job protecting your mom and sister while I was gone. I’m proud of you.”
Dom shook his head. “I should have gotten them out of the city when I could.”
“No, I should have.”
A fireball mushroomed in the distance. Two seconds later came the boom. It was the third gas station they had seen go up tonight.
Ronaldo lowered his hand as the plume shrank into a raging fire.
“What do we do?” Dom asked.
Ronaldo wasn’t sure. He wanted to get his family out of here, but he was a wanted man, and AMP soldiers were everywhere.
“Dad?”
“Thinking,” Ronaldo snapped. Dom eased back, and Ronaldo gave his son a rueful nod. “I’m sorry, I just don’t know yet.”
They sat watching for several minutes before Dom spoke. “You still haven’t told me what happened at that refugee camp.”
Ronaldo gave a resigned sigh. “AMP ambushed us after President Coleman was killed. Marks and I and a few other marines won the fight, but we lost some good men. We decided to head back to LA—most of us, anyway.”
He paused, remembering what Castle had told him after they got him stabilized in one of the medical tents. He repeated the words to Dom.
“LT told me to come back here and take care of you guys.”
He left out the second part. Do it before AMP finds you and kills you.
Ronaldo sighed. “I booked it out of there with Marks, Tooth, and Bettis in a stolen AMP truck.”
“Where are Tooth and Bettis now?”
“They went to join another unit here, to fight AMP, but they all understood my decision to come get you guys out.
”
“Did the marines really kill President Coleman?”
“Hell no,” Ronaldo said. “Elliot planned this all along. When states started rebelling, he must have ordered the dirty-bomb attack in San Fran, and the hit on the Palo Verde nuclear plant.”
“But why the fuck would he do that, Dad? And who would carry out those orders?”
“History is full of evil men following evil orders, son.” He looked at Dom, not sure how else to explain it. “A reset,” he added, recalling Marks’s words. “Elliot wants a new America, I guess—one working for him.”
Dom nodded as if he understood, but Ronaldo wasn’t sure he did. Hell, he himself had only the barest sense of what was happening.
“The thing about war is it sometimes doesn’t make sense,” Ronaldo added. “If you look at past wars, they started over a series of things that each made sense in the moment but escalated out of control. Eventually, it’s just what happens.”
They looked out over the chaos. Smoke from hundreds of fires across the city choked the skyline, blocking out all the stars.
“Not quite the camping trip I was hoping for,” Ronaldo said, recalling his promise to his boy.
Dom chuckled nervously. “If we leave the city, we might be camping for a while.”
“True enough.”
A shout came from the open service door on the roof, cutting Ronaldo off. He got up from his chair and hurried over to find Elena standing in the doorway with Monica. Marks was in the stairwell behind them.
“What’s wrong?” Ronaldo asked.
“There are men outside,” she said.
“Where?”
She pointed to the edge of the building, and Ronaldo hurried over to have a look. An AMP Humvee had parked on the abandoned street below.
Marks joined him, crouching behind the low wall at the roof’s edge.
A man in a hoodie pointed up at the building, and four AMP soldiers wearing face masks and cradling rifles were looking up at the windows.
Ronaldo stepped back. “I count four plus a driver.”
Marks cursed. “Plus the asshole who just sold us out.”
“Who knows we’re here?”
“I don’t know, man,” Marks said, “but it’s not a coincidence.”
“There’s only five of them,” Dom said, “and you guys are marines.”
Ronaldo and Marks looked back at him. He stood by the doorway, holding the shotgun Ronaldo had given him before leaving for Atlanta.
For the first time, Ronaldo saw his son as a man.
Banging sounded below, followed by a crash that echoed through the open atrium.
“They’re in,” Ronaldo said.
“Sergeant Marks and Sergeant Salvatore,” a deep voice shouted, “we know you’re in here! Put down your weapons and come out with your hands up! You’re wanted for treason.”
“How do they know my name?” Ronaldo whispered. He looked to Marks. “What do you want to do?”
Marks didn’t reply right away, and Dom chimed in. “We can take ’em. We have to. If we don’t, they’ll kill you, like you said.”
“Kid’s right,” Marks said. “We’re considered traitors now, and we both know the punishment.”
Ronaldo nodded. “Dominic, watch your sister and mom.”
“Wait,” Elena said.
He expected her to tell him not to go, but she held out her hand and said, “You have my gun.”
“Everything’s going to be okay,” he said, handing her the pistol.
He looked at his family for a second. This time, he was up against other American soldiers acting under orders. But the world had suffered too long at the hands of men who didn’t stand up to unlawful orders, and Ronaldo was done with it. He turned and left with Marks, into the stairwell.
Halfway down, a loud click sounded, and the few lights they had on in the building blinked off.
“Shit, there goes the generator,” Marks whispered.
The stairwell was almost pitch black, and if the AMP soldiers had night-vision goggles …
Letting his eyes adjust, Ronaldo listened for footfalls. Then he cautiously made his way down to the landing.
They exited on the third floor and moved through an open area of desks and cubicles, guided by the dim light from the windows.
Marks flashed a hand signal, and they parted, moving to different sections in the maze of cubicles.
By the time Ronaldo got into position, the AMP soldiers were heading upstairs. He could hear multiple footfalls in the hallway.
Wedged behind a cubicle, he had a clear view of the entire office, and the glow of distant fires provided enough light for a clear field of fire. He brought up his rifle and aimed it at the entrance to the room, where a single AMP soldier entered.
As he suspected, the man had on “four eyes”—night-vision goggles. Keeping low, the soldier panned across the room and moved down an aisle before the second man entered. But where were the other two?
Ronaldo waited, heart thumping.
Footfalls echoed in the stairwell. They had split up. Shit.
He took the shot without waiting for Marks’s signal from across the room. A three-round burst caught the lead AMP soldier in the helmet and neck, dropping him.
Marks took down the second guy with a burst from the side, and Ronaldo hurried over to make sure the downed soldiers were dead.
One was still moving, and Marks double-tapped him, the muzzle flash lighting up the staff sergeant’s weathered features.
There was regret in his eyes. Ronaldo felt it too.
Regardless of the circumstances, killing another American—and a soldier, to boot—was not easy, especially knowing that these men were not much older than Dom.
The two marines didn’t linger but took off up the stairwell to intercept the other two AMP soldiers.
When they got to the stairwell, a gunshot rang out, followed by shouting and then two booms from a shotgun. But it wasn’t coming from the third floor.
Ronaldo felt his heart lodge in his throat. He pounded up the stairs and through the open service door to find the other two AMP soldiers lying on the rooftop. Standing by a rusted mechanical unit was Dom, his shotgun still trained on the downed men.
Elena and Monica hunkered down behind the air handler, safe and sound.
“Help me,” one of the AMP soldiers moaned. He squirmed, gripping his leg, blood gushing between his fingers and pooling around his thighs.
Ronaldo kicked his rifle away and bent down beside him. Pushing up the night-vision optics, he yanked off the face mask, revealing yet another youthful face. The young man coughed, flecking Ronaldo’s shirt with blood.
“How did you know where we are?” Ronaldo asked.
The soldier choked again and looked Ronaldo in the eyes before the light left his gaze.
Dom walked over, lowering his shotgun. Then he darted over to another air unit and vomited.
Ronaldo walked over to Elena and Monica, giving his son a moment to compose himself. He had also thrown up after killing his first enemy soldier.
“You okay?” Ronaldo asked.
Dom wiped his mouth off and managed a nod.
“It’ll pass,” he told him. “Until it does, you’re going to second-guess yourself. Don’t. You did the right thing.”
“You did what you had to do,” Marks said. “You protected your family.”
“How many did you guys get?” Dom asked.
“We had two downstairs. These two make … Shit, that civilian who told them we were up here could be on the horn selling us out again. AMP could have another team here in minutes. We need to clear out. Fast.”
For a tense moment, they all stood in silence. Ronaldo saw their progress in his mind, rushing downstairs, getting to their stolen AMP truck, and pulling away just as more AMP tr
oops surrounded them. He and his family would die, killed by men he once would have called brothers.
He shook off the negative thoughts, listening to the distant chatter of gunfire, the wail of sirens, and sporadic explosions. It sounded like the end of the world.
Over the apocalyptic noises came the rumble of something that made Ronaldo stiffen. He looked toward the sky, holding his breath.
“Get inside!” he yelled.
He got everyone through the door, then looked over his shoulder as several cruise missiles arced across the horizon, moving south, where they detonated in a brilliant fireball.
Ronaldo knew at once what they had hit. The Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base, AMP headquarters in southern California, was now a smoking crater. Even if the civilian rat had called in more AMP reinforcements, it wouldn’t matter now. He almost shouted in exultation as he clapped Marks on his bloodstained shoulder.
“The navy picked a side, brother! They’re with the Devil Dogs!”
-10-
At seven in the morning, Antonio stumbled out of the warehouse, his stomach in knots and his head pounding from the gash he received in the car accident.
Raising a hand to his eyes, he looked at the brilliant sunrise, feeling lucky to be alive. The past ten hours were some of the worst in his life, rivaling nights in Afghanistan, when he wasn’t sure he would see the dawn.
But Don Antonio Moretti had survived the night just as he had then, and so had his men.
Their new business, however, was shattered.
He took in a breath that reeked of burning rubber.
According to the radio reports, while AMP had won the battle for the skies, they were losing on the ground, which meant that his entire deal with Lieutenant Marten was in jeopardy.
He took another step outside, thinking of his family. They were okay two hours ago, when he last got a text from Lucia, right before the service went dead. Raff and several of his other trusted men were there, but that didn’t help Antonio feel much better.
Now that the bombardment appeared to be over, he needed to get back to them.
He scanned the skyline for fighter jets.
Smoke columns tilted away from the downtown skyline, where AMP missiles and bombs had wreaked havoc. A cloud of black drifted away from AMP targets the navy had pounded.
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