Hard Target: A Cobra Elite Novel

by Clare, Pamela

  “You’re not sorry?”

  “I should be, but I’m not. We need to be careful, Jenna. This isn’t a game.”

  No, it wasn’t. If they’d been caught…

  Jenna wished she didn’t have to say goodnight. But he couldn’t come inside, and she needed to get back to work.

  “Goodnight.” She rose onto her toes and kissed his cheek as a sister should. “Thank you for the surprise. It means a lot to me to have something that belonged to James. And thanks for the… uh… family time, too, Mr. Magic Fingers.”

  With that, she turned and keyed herself inside, her heart singing.

  9

  Derek sat in the Land Cruiser, his body aching with sexual frustration while he tried to write the daily report for Cobra HQ. What the hell was he supposed to say?

  Brought subject into generator shed, gave away my greatest tactical advantage without seeking gain, then kissed her, got her off, and left the shed with a hard-on.

  Yeah, no.

  If Derek had wanted a plan to ensure that he fucked up this job completely, that plan would look something like this past week. He hadn’t managed to persuade Jenna into coming back to the U.S., but he had made out with her and given away his strongest leverage without using it to his advantage.

  Jimmy’s dog tags and the photo were supposed to be the breaking point, the moment when this softer approach turned into hardball, pushing Jenna’s emotions to the edge. But Derek had handed her the dog tags and the photo without saying the things he’d planned to say.

  Your brother wouldn’t want you to die here, too. He would want to know that his Punk was far away from danger. Please come back with me, Jenna—for Jimmy’s sake.

  No, he hadn’t said it.

  Instead, he’d told her things he’d never told anyone, whining about his childhood, explaining to her how Jimmy had died. Then he’d tried to comfort her, kissed her mouth and her breasts, and given her a hand job. Would it make any difference if he explained in his report that her breasts were amazing?

  He didn’t think so.

  Operatives did not get sexually involved with people under their protection. Derek had helped write the damned rule book. If any other Cobra operative had done this sort of shit, Derek would fire him—or her—on the spot.

  The really fucked-up part of this was that Derek knew he wasn’t finished.

  He wanted her. He wanted Jenna.

  The need for her burned through him, leaving him horny and grouchy and strangely off-balance. He could still taste her, smell her, feel the satin of those lush breasts in his hands, see the expression of bliss on her face when she’d come.

  What the hell was wrong with him?

  He’d never been the kind of man who got turned inside out by women. He’d always been able to control his emotions and to separate his mind from his body when his body became a liability from physical pain, hunger, thirst, exhaustion, or sheer horniness. He’d taken pride in his ability to get people to do what he needed them to do through whatever means necessary—charm, fear, threats, violence. Hell, during his military years, he’d talked young Afghan men into betraying their AQ and Taliban relatives. What was so difficult about this job?

  Jenna.

  Somehow, she’d gotten under his skin. Maybe it was just the fact that she was Jimmy’s little sister, or maybe—

  The crunch of boots on snow brought his head around.

  Farzad walked up to the window, his expression troubled.

  Derek powered down the satellite connection on his iPad, slid the device into its locked drawer, and climbed out to see what Farzad needed.

  “Two boys arrived at the gate. They say Daesh fighters attacked a village about twenty kilometers east of here, killing the men and raping the women and girls. Some of the women are pregnant and need help.”

  Daesh—the Arabic name for Islamic State and the name IS fighters hated most—were known to be in Afghanistan. That’s where they’d gotten their start. Now that their so-called caliphate had fallen, fighters were fleeing wherever they could, stealing food and money, killing and raping fellow Muslims and non-Muslims alike. For all of their talk of Islam, IS was nothing more than a band of murdering thugs.

  “How did the boys get away?”

  “They said their mothers hid them. They walked all this way. We are feeding them now.”

  “Did they bring the injured women here?”

  “They say the women are too afraid to come because they feel shame. They want us to send midwives to the village.”

  Derek’s first impulse was to tell Farzad that hell would freeze over before he would allow Jenna to leave this compound, but he bit his tongue. He wasn’t in charge here. “What do you think?”

  “It would be dangerous to go to the village. Daesh might return, or we might be ambushed on the road. We would have to send some men to protect the women. But we can’t send many, or we’ll leave the hospital vulnerable. For all we know, those sons of pigs could be headed our way next.”

  “I agree.” Derek was glad Farzad saw it his way. “It would be far too dangerous to send the midwives to the village, and it would be foolish to divide our numbers and leave the hospital more open to attack.”

  “Can you speak to your sister, ask her what she and the others wish to do?”

  Wait. What?

  A part of Derek wanted to tell Farzad that he wouldn’t let Jenna go no matter what she wanted to do. But then he’d be just like her father, denying her the freedom to make her own choices. And yet if she went, she’d be putting herself and whoever went with her in grave danger.

  Hamzad strode up, spoke to Farzad. “It is the right thing to do. These are our people, our women, Afghan women. I volunteer to go. I am not afraid of Daesh.”

  Farzad turned back to Derek. “Please tell your sister.”

  “I’ll ask her.”

  He knew what she would say.

  * * *

  “I’ll go.” Jenna had experience in treating sexual assault victims. “Marie, you should stay. Delara, you, too, in case Marie needs you in the OR.”

  Delara looked both relieved and guilty. “You shouldn’t deal with all of it alone. You don’t know how many victims there are or how serious their injuries are.”

  “I’ll be fine.” Jenna sent Derek a text message to meet her by the back door in ten minutes and started filling a mobile medical kit with supplies. “I’ll need a vial of ceftriaxone and syringes.”

  Ceftriaxone could prevent a rape victim from contracting gonorrhea and other bacterial STIs. But if they were going to give these women the same quality of care they’d get in the U.S., they would also need to bring HepB vaccines, a week’s supply of prophylactic medication for HIV, as well as vaginal suture kits, pain medication, sedatives, and Ovral to prevent pregnancy. She ought to take a Doppler, too, as well as other OB supplies just in case one of the pregnant women in the village delivered while Jenna was there.

  She put the medical supplies near the back door then made a quick dash to her room to gather a bag of essential supplies for herself—soap, her hairbrush, toothbrush and toothpaste, a change of clothes. She grabbed her parka, her gaze landing on the box with James’ dog tags and the photo inside.

  She lifted the dog tags out of the box and slipped the ball chain over her head, tucking it inside her T-shirt. “You’re coming with me, big brother.”

  Outside, Derek was waiting for her, his lips a grim line. He spoke in English. “This is dangerous, Jenna.”

  She’d known he wouldn’t want her to go. “I’m just doing my job.”

  “If we run into anything that hints at trouble, I turn this vehicle around. Got it?”

  “Got it.”

  He picked up her duffel and loaded it with the boxes of supplies in the back of his Land Cruiser, switching to Dari. “You will ride with me. Hamzad and a few of the men will be just ahead of us, making sure the way is safe.”

  She climbed into the back seat, and buckled in, while Derek made a call on
his satellite phone. Then he held out a dark, heavy bundle of … something.

  “Put this on over your T-shirt.”

  A Kevlar vest.

  Good God.

  She peeled off her clothes down to her T-shirt, strapped into the body armor, and put on her tunic and parka again.

  Derek got into the driver’s seat and started the engine. The dashboard lit up with a display screen. “Cobra, this is Tower. The drone is five mikes out. Roger. Out.”

  Who was he talking to? “What drone?”

  Derek pushed a button, and an eerie green image filled the screen. He glanced over his shoulder and found her staring. “We launched a drone from Mazar-e-Sharif when I learned where we’d be going. I want to make sure those IS assholes aren’t lying in wait along the way.”

  “Wow.” Rather than comforting her, this news drove home the danger they faced, making her pulse quicken. They were heading into an area where IS fighters were hiding with only an armored Land Cruiser, the hospital’s old Humvee, and a handful of men to protect them.

  If they were ambushed…

  Had she made the right decision? Was she doing the right thing by putting all of them in danger? If she’d refused to come, they would all stay safe—or relatively safe—right here, rather than heading off into the unknown.

  And what about the girls and women who were hurt?

  Jenna couldn’t turn her back on them.

  They left the hospital, the Land Cruiser grinding its way over rutted dirt roads, headlights illuminating a rugged, snowy landscape, the tail lights of Hamzad’s vehicle red in the distance. Derek communicated with someone via the mic in his helmet. It was all military-speak, none of it making a bit of sense to her.

  It will be okay. Everything will be okay.

  * * *

  Derek found himself in a scene that was all too familiar. All of the adult males and older boys of the village lay dead in the snow, the eerie silence interrupted by the occasional wail of grief or child’s crying.

  If there was a hell, this was it.

  Hamzad looked around, fury naked on his face. “When The Lion hears of this…”

  Derek knew that Kazi would scour the countryside looking for the Daesh fighters who’d done this. He might be a petty tyrant with delusions of grandeur, but he was also a useful ally against terrorists. If he found these fighters, he would see them hanged.

  “Let’s move the bodies so their loved ones can wash them,” Hamzad called to the other men. “We can prepare graves in the morning.”

  While Hamzad and the others moved the bodies of the dead, Derek followed Jenna to the homes of the women who needed help. He stayed outside, on watch, still in touch with the team in Mazar-e-Sharif. They monitored the visual feed from the drone, ready to give Derek advanced warning should anything move their way.

  After close to forty minutes, Jenna stepped outside, clearly upset.

  “A pregnant mother and her two daughters,” she said. “The younger is only ten. They’re in shock. I examined them, did what I could for them medically, and made them tea. I thought it might soothe them.”

  “It might.”

  “What are these women going to do?” Jenna looked up at him, distress in her eyes. “The men are all gone. How will they live in this world?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Life for widows, especially those who had no grown sons, was rough.

  “I need to get to the others.”

  Derek moved with Jenna back and forth from house to house, remaining outside each door. His breath formed crystals in the air as the night grew colder, clouds hiding a waning moon.

  It was almost midnight when Jenna finished.

  “I don’t know what else we can do for them.” Jenna looked exhausted. “They need trauma counseling, but there’s no one to provide that for them. One woman is due to deliver in a month. I tried to persuade her to bring her children and come back with us, but she can’t handle that now.”

  “You can’t fix everything, Jenna.”

  “Why would anyone do this? These are simple people, farmers and shepherds. They have no money, nothing to steal. They don’t want to be a part of any war. How can anyone just kill them? How can anyone rape pregnant women and little girls? These are their fellow Muslims.”

  “I don’t know.” Derek found himself wanting to hold her. “Some people have nothing inside them but hate. You need sleep.”

  While Hamzad and his men stayed in an abandoned home on the other end of the village, Derek stayed near Jenna as she settled in for the night with one of the pregnant victims and her children.

  “I’ll be out here.”

  “In the cold?”

  “In the Land Cruiser. Do you have your phone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good.” He took her hand, gave it a squeeze, aware that others might be watching. “You’ve done all you can. Try to rest.”

  She shook her head, looking defeated. “I’ve done nothing.”

  He wasn’t going to argue with her. “Get inside where it’s warmer.”

  Derek parked the Land Cruiser so that it blocked the gate to the home. If those Daesh fuckers wanted to get inside again, they’d have to go through him.

  He checked in with the team in Mazar-e-Sharif. “Cobra, this is Tower. I’m going to get some shut-eye. Over.”

  “Tower, this is Cobra. Sweet dreams. Out.”

  Then Derek checked his weapons, unzipped a sub-zero sleeping bag, and tilted the seat back, using the open sleeping bag like a blanket. But sleep was slow in coming.

  * * *

  Jenna lay awake in the darkness, the day’s horrors stuck in her mind. Bruised and swollen vulva. Teeth marks on budding breasts. Vaginal lacerations.

  The youngest victim had been only seven.

  From the other side of the room came the sound of quiet weeping.

  Jenna’s heart broke.

  * * *

  Jenna stood in the back of the cemetery with Derek, tears in her eyes, the cold pinching her cheeks and biting through the soles of her shoes. Hamzad and his men joined with men from neighboring villages to say the funeral prayers for those who’d been murdered, the victims’ grandmothers, mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters standing in the back in burqas and sobbing in their grief.

  Life in this tiny village would never be the same.

  The women of the village had woken early this morning, made breakfast for themselves, their guests, and their children, looking dazed by terror and grief. Then, while Hamzad and his men had dug thirty-six shallow graves through the snow, the women had washed the bodies of their loved ones, weeping over them and wrapping them in whatever cloth they had on hand that could act as a shroud.

  By late afternoon, relatives from neighboring villages had begun to arrive, and Jenna had been relieved to see the survivors embraced by loved ones, who’d made food and cared for them. They’d spoken of the slaughter, but no one had said a word about the violence the women had suffered. Rape was a taboo subject here.

  Hamzad had insisted they stay for the funerals out of respect.

  Derek hadn’t been happy. “The longer we stay out here, the more dangerous it is.”

  He stood beside her now, his gaze never resting, tension rolling off him, earpiece still in his ear.

  In the cemetery, the bodies were lifted and placed by male relatives on their right sides in the graves so that their faces were turned toward Mecca. Then dirt was thrown in to cover them, first in ceremonial handfuls and then by the shovelful.

  When at last the burials had ended, Derek started back toward the Land Cruiser. “Let’s go.”

  As before, Hamzad and his men led the way, Derek following at a distance.

  Exhausted, Jenna fought to stay awake, the motion of the Land Cruiser lulling her to sleep. She jerked awake when the vehicle came to a sudden stop.

  “Hang on!” Derek shouted.

  He threw the Land Cruiser into reverse, slammed on the gas, and drove backward—fast.

/>   “What’s happening?”

  “The drone spotted a reception committee waiting for us up ahead—several large vehicles blocking the road.”

  A reception committee?

  Her heart gave a hard knock. “Is it Daesh?”

  “Let’s not find out.”

  “What about Hamzad and the men?”

  “I’m not here to protect Hamzad.”

  “Are we going back to the village?” Jenna wanted to know his plan.

  “No—and no more questions.”

  Jenna looked back over her shoulder, searching for someplace Derek might be able to hide the vehicle. If they kept going backward, they would end up in the village. What was to stop whoever was blocking the road from finding them there?

  Then she saw it—tire tracks through the snow.

  There was a road there, heading off to the east.

  “Cobra, this is Tower. Good copy, out.” Derek shot past the junction, slammed on the brakes, then threw the Land Cruiser into gear again. He turned left, leading them off to the east.

  “What if they follow us?” The words were out before she remembered that he didn’t want her asking questions.

  He met her gaze in the rearview mirror. “They already are.”

  10

  Derek should never have agreed to bring Jenna out here. He’d known it was too damned dangerous. IS and Taliban fighters were roaming the area. Militias, too. It had gone against every instinct he had, and he’d accepted her decision anyway.

  You’ve gone soft.

  He drove as safely and as quickly as he could, guided by the operatives watching the drone feed. If he slid off the road into a ditch, they would be fucked and beyond help. It would take a helicopter an hour to get airborne and most of an hour to reach them.

  “Jenna, you’ve got your sat phone, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Keep that on your body somewhere—inside your bra or something.”

  “I-I’m not wearing a bra.”

  Right. He knew that.