Kyle shook his head, surprised that through the turmoil, Bradley was still fretting over Abby, and he felt a rush of guilt. How could he distrust a guy genuinely concerned about his daughter’s well-being? Shoveling faster, he said, “She’s angry ... and sad ... and worried.”
Bradley stomped the shovel blade with his foot, driving it into the sand. “I get the anger and sadness, but what’s she worried about?”
“Some idiot that goes by the name Sexy.”
Bradley stiffened then met his gaze. “Abby explained about that, right? It’s just retaliation for calling her Squirt?”
Nodding, Kyle said, “My daughter always finds a way, to get her own way.”
After they’d finished digging, Bradley spread the Levins’ king-sized comforter over the grass and positioned Heather’s body in the center. Kyle placed Billy and the baby in their mother’s arms, the three of them locked in an eternal embrace.
Kyle’s legs jelled beneath him.
He sunk onto the ground. Horrifying realizations dredged up from deep within him, an immense crushing pressure that wrung the air from his lungs.
He would have trusted the air-dropped food—without question—and fed it to Abby. Looking at Heather, Billy, and Suzanne, a damning accusation screamed through his head: My ignorance could have killed my daughter.
87B
AFTER SEALING THE GRAVE, Bradley stopped by the Murphys’ lanai to check on Will. Last night, he had confiscated guns and knives, but how far was he supposed to go? Take Will’s belt? His shoelaces? Babysit him twenty-four-seven?
He gave a resigned sighed. If Will was suicidal, Bradley could hinder his effort, but couldn’t stop it. Not indefinitely.
Hopefully he’ll snap out of it, he thought. A voice within him asked: And if he doesn’t?
His best friend looked ghostly pale. Daylight illuminated sunken crevices below bloodshot eyes; and seeing the swollen, purple contusion staining the side of his face, Bradley winced. I guess that’s better than dead or missing.
“Hey, you feel like talking yet?”
Will looked up at him through hooded eyes, clouded with shame and regret. “Bradley, I’m so sorry ... I ... I ...”
Bradley flopped into a chair and said, “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not. I pulled a gun on my best friend. What the hell is wrong with me?”
“You’re lucky,” Bradley told him. “Not too many people pull a gun on a Marine and live to tell about it.”
A contrite tear spilled over his swollen cheek. “You must be pissed.”
“I’m not, Will ... I just don’t know how to help you.”
“You want to help me?”
“Of course. Just tell me what I can do.”
“I am so glad to hear that.” Will smeared his tears and flinched as his fingers grazed his bruise. “Can you take me to get my kids?”
Bradley fell backward against his chair, the words striking harder than any physical blow. Although Will was still breathing, the friend he had known and trusted was gone. The thought sent a shudder of emptiness through him.
“Listen, Will, I can’t take you today because I’ve got overwatch right now. How about tomorrow?”
Will’s forehead crinkled. “Do you think they’ll be safe until then?”
“Absolutely.” Bradley pushed himself from the chair. “The babysitter watching over your kids right now—He’s the best there is.”
“Okay, tomorrow then.”
What am I going to tell him tomorrow? Bradley thought.
As he trekked toward Sugar Lake Road, he spotted Abby beside the garage, rifle propped against her leg. At her feet on a bed of white sand, the scope manual and index card were held in place by Abby’s grenade paperweight.
“So how’s Will?” she asked.
“About the same. I’m glad to see you’re doing okay.”
“Yeah, well, tears won’t stop these bastards, but bullets will.”
Bradley managed an anemic smile. “So what’re you up to?”
“Working on my SWAGs.”
“Your Scientific-Wild-Ass-Guesses were pretty damned good yesterday.”
“Not good enough,” she told him. “Four misses, four chances for someone to shoot back.”
Bradley had expected the victory to make her cocky, but Abby appeared humbled by it.
She’s so damned unpredictable, he thought, bending down to retrieve the index card. Beneath it was a Mildot Master, an analog calculator designed like a slide rule for determining range, bullet drop, wind drift, and angle of fire. “Never used a scope before? You’re full of crap!”
“If you don’t believe me, ask Gramps—”
“I did.”
“And?”
“I think you’re both screwing with me.”
“I’m not ... But it’s a very tempting idea,” she said with a flirtatious sparkle in her eyes.
Bradley looked away. Heat stole into his cheeks, and he swore under his breath knowing his face was bright red. “Gee, look at the time. Got to get to overwatch.”
“Hey, wait. I need a favor.” Sensing his reluctance, she said, “Relax, it’s just a scope question. I’m having trouble with the crest of the hill. Which adjustments are closer? Original or new?”
Lips puckering, he reached for her rifle. After sighting both, he pointed to the pencil and snapped his fingers. Her new set was an improvement, but not where she needed to be.
After scribbling the corrections, he returned her rifle. “I’m glad you’re not letting that victory go to your head. You’ve still got a lot to learn.”
“I know. Can you teach me about leading the target?”
“Later. I’ve got to relieve Gramps at overwatch. He stayed an extra three hours so that I could ... You know.” Bradley held out the index card, then as Abby reached for it, he jerked it away. “You’ve really never used a scope before?”
“Only if you count video games,” she said with a guilty grin. “But I have read a bunch of books on mil-dot scopes and holdover. Unfortunately, book knowledge only gets you so far.”
Bradley walked away thinking it had gotten her further than most.
88B
AMED KHALID AL-DOSSARI had been transferred to Camp Sunshine in response to a rash of convoy attacks. Diesel, generators, weapons, and ammunition—supplies destined for the temporary Army base had been pilfered during the past week.
Amed’s job was to monitor, detect, and eliminate threats from miles away and miles above, using an unmanned aerial vehicle known as a Predator drone. It was a tedious job, staring incessantly at computer monitors, scanning the live video feed for ambush indicators; but that boredom was about to end.
Allah had reunited Amed with one of his cousins, effectively magnifying the damage the special forces of jihad could inflict upon the Great Satan.
He looked askance at Simon, the drone Pilot who shared his containerized office space. Then he rose to his feet, stepped behind his chair, and rotated his arms as if stretching. Simon’s eyes remained focused on his monitor.
Right hand slinking into his pocket, Amed extracted a coiled length of razor wire. His arms swung upward above his head. His thumbs slipped through the metal rings at either end, unraveling the wire.
A layer of righteous sweat filmed his face, his neck.
Wrists crossed, the razor wire formed a loop and plunged over Simon’s head before the unsuspecting Pilot could react.
Amed’s elbows sprung outward.
The wire sliced through muscles, arteries, and nerves, nearly decapitating him. Then Amed yanked the bloody corpse from the chair and seized control of the drone, which prowled thousands of feet above a six-vehicle convoy en route to Camp Sunshine.
He studied the live video feed; and once the lead vehicle arrived at the preordained location, he unleashed a Hellfire missile which reduced a transport truck to a ball of fire. Jihadists on the ground loosed an avalanche of bullets and rocket-propelled grenades. Americans exited their vehicles, using
them for cover—just as Amed anticipated. A second well-placed Hellfire missile butchered a dozen Soldiers.
The firefight raged. A handful of surviving Americans fought viciously, martyring more than half the jihadist fighters. And they might have prevailed, if not for an embedded sleeper, a fuel truck driver who drew his Army-issued sidearm and shot the Americans from behind while they contended with the ambush.
“Allahu Akbar!” Amed hissed, watching jihadists commandeer high-tech weapons of immense tactical value.
89B
ABBY WAS IN THE LANAI with Gramps, babysitting Will, when Bradley’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie. “There’s a preschool-aged kid walking up Sugar Lake Road; could be a trap.”
Gramps’ brow knitted. “Will, you stay right here,” he said, rapping his knuckles against the tabletop.
Abby grabbed her rifle and raced through the house, up the interior stairs, and out the front door, taking cover behind a square concrete portico column. Everyone had an assigned position. With Bradley at overwatch, Abby’s dad was stationed on Gramps’ front porch, while Gramps guarded the rear of both properties.
Torturous seconds of silence ticked by, the calm before the chaos. Why would a kid that age be wandering alone? Was it a trap? What kind of person would use their own child as human bait?
With quivering legs, Abby dropped to a knee and took a deliberate breath, trying to quell the gush of adrenaline.
The boy entered her field of view. Light-brown hair, pale complexion, hugging a furry blue monster—the kid looked scared witless. His gaze swept as though searching for someone. He sat down on the driveway apron and shouted, “Mommy? Daddy? Where are you?”
The fear and yearning in his little voice spurred sympathy and animosity.
Damn them for using a kid—
The sound of footsteps dissolved Abby’s thought.
How had someone snuck past Gramps?
Abby turned, rifle barrel pivoting like the needle on a compass.
It was Will.
“Billy, I’m here!” he shouted, running toward the child.
“Will, don’t! It’s a trap!”
He charged toward the street and gathered the boy in his arms. Abby’s eyes widened, watching the absurd scene. Will twirled the child in a jubilant dance, blissfully unaware of the boy’s terrified refrain, “You’re not my daddy. Let me go.”
Then in an instant, a flash.
A puff of bluish-black smoke.
A booming explosion.
Abby blinked and squinted, trying to focus her disbelieving eyes on the surreal scene. Will and the boy were crumpled heaps on the street, their bleeding bodies ravaged by a shower of metal pellets that mottled the roadway. A four-year-old suicide bomber? With a stuffed animal bomb?
Gunshots began resounding from the west. Bradley was engaging someone on Sugar Lake Road, hidden from view by the four-foot berm.
Drawing a slow breath, her eyes glided eastward. Three men in jeans and polo shirts were creeping down the hillside toward the Levins’ house, AK-47s at the ready. Abby watched their crouched advance, patiently waiting for them to reach the driveway—level ground.
Finger on the trigger, she hesitated; then a glance at Will and the boy hardened her resolve. Abby’s first round struck the lead man in the chest; her second, a perfect duplicate. Crosshairs on the third man, he dropped to the ground before she could fire.
Holy shit, she thought, my dad shot him!
A spate of bullets splattered above Abby’s head.
She flung herself behind the column. Her entire body felt like it was expanding and contracting with her rapid heartbeat. Where the hell did that barrage come from? Are they closing on my position?
Abby peeked around the column and detected movement higher on the hillside. Dressed in camouflage, two gunmen were backtracking toward the peak, a high probability location on Bradley’s index card. Although Abby had memorized the scope adjustments, this would be more complicated than ceramic plates. These targets were moving ... and shooting back.
She made an educated guess, leading to the right, gauging the elevation increase, and the bullet struck behind the man’s feet, succeeding only in making him move faster.
Damn it!
Abby adjusted the lead and holdover.
Fired again.
Another miss.
Damn it!
Her third shot nailed the back of his thigh, causing him to slip. Finally, he had stopped moving. The fourth round penetrated between his shoulder blades.
The other gunman ducked into the tree cover and crested the hill. Was he retreating? Trying to get a line of fire on her? Or worse, sneaking in behind Bradley?
A fierce sense of helplessness rushed through her. Gramps had the walkie-talkie. She had no way of warning Bradley.
Abby darted to the other column and scouted the ridgeline. Would the terrorist be moving when he popped up? What if she couldn’t hit him? What if he shoots Bradley?
Competition, she told herself, banishing the possibility of failure from her mind.
She adjusted her scope and surveilled the crest in a life-or-death game of peekaboo amongst the trees.
Bradley continued to exchange fire with attackers obscured by the contour of the land.
Peripherally, Abby could see bullet strikes shredding oak leaves thirty feet above him.
They can’t shoot uphill either.
She glimpsed motion. The top of the man’s head was protruding above the crest. He was a tiny lump between a window of tree trunks with a black headband encircling his forehead.
Abby waited, an inexplicable calm overtaking her.
The gunman crawled forward, attention divided between Abby’s former location and Bradley’s position.
His rifle inched upward, aligned toward overwatch.
Abby fired.
The round struck six inches in front of him, kicking up sand.
She nudged the barrel higher.
Squeezed.
Her second round burrowed through his black headband.
Relieved, she exhaled audibly, a cross between a sigh and a stifled laugh; then she turned toward Bradley. Fully automatic rounds had migrated down from the treetops, dousing the overwatch with a relentless spray of lead. Bradley was pinned down under suppressing fire, most likely for the benefit of the gunman she had just dispatched.
Abby sprinted across the driveway to the queen palm beside the garage; and although she couldn’t see the assaulting forces, she knew their location—just beyond the berm, behind the metal electrical box. Conflicting thoughts slammed headlong and spun like a vortex in her mind. If she breached the berm, she would become an easy target; and sneaking in behind them would put her in Bradley’s line of fire.
Damn it! Abby bowed her head, tapping it against the palm tree. How can I help Bradley?
90B
A COCKTAIL OF FRUSTRATION, disgust, and hatred was building inside Ryan.
Maddie’s teddy bear had been rigged with C-4 and ball bearings, a miniature claymore mine crammed into a stuffed animal. The explosives belonged to the U.S. Army, stolen by traitors within the ranks. A doctor, three nurses, and Maddie had been killed; six others had been mauled in the blast. Every time Ryan closed his eyes, he could see her scared little face.
How are we supposed to defeat people who are willing to weaponize American children?
This was a treacherous and heinous enemy. They were nameless, everywhere and nowhere; they could be anybody, a guy standing at attention beside you, or a civilian begging for help. Nothing could be trusted—no vehicles, no meals, no objects.
Feeling isolated and claustrophobic, Ryan left the containerized housing unit that served as troop barracks. Maybe a little of that overhyped Florida sunshine would help. It was a beautiful February day, seventy degrees with a gleaming, cloudless blue sky. Closing his eyes, Ryan turned toward the sun. Its rays heated his face, and he sucked in a deep breath as if nature’s light and warmth could fill the holes inside him
.
Then a raucous growl quaked the ground beneath his feet, the tremor rumbling upward through his legs.
Ryan’s eyelids flew open. He wheeled toward the sound.
A fire-lit cloud of smoke was rising over command quarters, the base’s center of operations.
Another suicide bomber? Ryan thought, senses jumping to DEFCON one, the most acute state of readiness.
Sirens wailed. First responders flooded the site—understaffed, overworked, and on edge since the teddy-bear bombing.
Another blast nearly knocked Ryan off his feet, this one followed by a large fireball.
The generators and diesel.
A funnel of dense black smoke confirmed his suspicion. How many more bombers are there?
Ryan was running toward command quarters to help evacuate wounded Soldiers when he saw it. A hundred feet above, descending in a near-vertical angle—there was a Predator drone in a full-on kamikaze dive.
Mouth agape, Ryan watched the aircraft impale itself on the flagpole at the center of Camp Sunshine. His body shook, seething with fury as the battered American flag landed irreverently in the dirt.
They hacked our fucking drones!
91B
BRADLEY WAS CROUCHED behind the sand-filled plastic bins, waiting for the gunman to switch magazines, a reprieve that never came. He concluded there had to be at least two gunmen and that they would not be wasting all that ammunition on suppressing fire without purpose. Someone had to be closing on his position.
Unlike the savages from Fern Ridge, who had shied away from a fight, these guys had some discipline.
Who are they?
Bradley peered around the plastic bins. A smattering of sand and pine needles danced a foot from his face—bullet strikes.
He sprung backward, heart jackhammering.
Somehow, he had to disrupt the steady downpour of bullets. He switched out his magazine, preparing to send an unaimed, twenty-round volley toward his attackers.
Then the automatic fire unexpectedly ceased.
Cautiously, Bradley peeked above the sand-filled bins. Two gunmen were running, abandoning the cover of the electrical box.
He pounced on the opportunity and shot one man in the chest.
Powerless- America Unplugged Page 43
