Rescued Heart (Titan World)

by Tarina Deaton

  “Do you know what the plan is?” He looked at Rocco.

  Rocco glanced over at him. “We’re waiting on some final intel. Once we get to DC, we’ll have about an hour on the ground before we take off. Jared’s holding off on the full brief until you’re on the ground.”

  “How long have you been with Titan?”

  “A few years. Jared recruited me out of Special Forces.”

  “You like it?”

  Rocco grinned. “Love it, man.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re a Ranger, right?” Rocco glanced at him and then watch his flight instruments.

  “Yeah.”

  “You ever go out on a mission and realize there was no point to it? Sure, you shwacked some bad guys, but it didn’t actually accomplish anything.”

  “Yeah, a few times.” Every fucking mission in Iraq and Afghanistan had left him more and more disillusioned. His soldiers were what was important. The guy or gal to his left and right. If not for them, he’d have been out of the Army a long time ago.

  “Never happens. Every mission we take has a clear objective. We don’t always solve the larger problem, but we sure as hell put a huge mother fucking dent in it.”

  Jordan looked out into the inky-black night. What would that be like?

  The skids touched down gently, with the slightest jar. He twisted the release on his harness and waited for Rocco to shut the engine down. Grabbing his gear from the back, he followed Rocco into the hangar. A gray C-130 aircraft filled the large space, the crew stairs down and waiting for passengers.

  Rocco led him to the second briefing room where Westin, two guys, and a leather clad, bombshell of a woman stood around a conference table. A bank of computer monitors hung on the wall at their backs, various maps with mission planning overlays displayed on two of them. He set he gear down as Westin caught his eye.

  “Jordan Grant, this is Colby Winters and Cash Garrison.” He exchanged head nods as Westin indicated each man. “They’ll be on the team with us. You met our pilot, Rocco. This is our weapons specialist, Sugar and Parker’s on VTC somewhere.”

  “I’m here.” A disembodied voice sounded from the computers. Seconds later a face appeared on the middle of the five screens. “We ready?”

  “Go,” Westin said.

  “Emmeline France. Goes by Em-ee. Thirty-one years old. Undergrad from UNC-Chapel Hill, M.S. as a family nurse practitioner. Briefly married at twenty-three but divorced two years later. She worked three years at various hospitals in the Carolinas and Virginia before she began working for the NGO Medical Relief United in 2014. Six months ago MRU was contracted by a larger, global NGO to run the women’s clinic in Gao, Mali.”

  Various pictures flashed on the far right screen during Parker’s narrative. Jeez, little Emme had grown up. She had the same eyes as her brother, but hers were more golden than brown and shone bright in her sweetheart face.

  Parker continued. “This was the proof of life al-Murabitun sent a few days after they raided the clinic.” The next picture showed a bruise high on her temple with blood matted in her hair. Dark circles hung heavy under her eyes and the twinkle, so evident in all her other pictures, was missing.

  His gut clenched. His breathing increased and he had the overwhelming urge to beat the ever-living crap out of something. Or someone.

  “Jesus,” Sugar said. “When was that picture taken?”

  “Two weeks ago,” Parker said.

  “Nothing since?”

  “No.”

  “Shit,” she whispered. “How do we know she’s still alive?”

  Westin slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close. “The group is still trying to negotiate as if she is. They’ve made threats of sending body parts, which is why the family contacted us.” He pressed his mouth against her temple.

  The moment was intimate and he felt intrusive and uncomfortable watching. No one else seemed to find it out of the norm, however.

  “One way or the other, Baby Cakes, she’s coming home.” Westin released her and said, “Parker, let us know if there’re any updates,” before turning back to the group. He looked at Jordan. “You good?”

  No. He was not good. All he could picture was the gangly little girl who used to tag along after him and Doug. Planting his feet, he crossed his arms. “What haven’t you told the Frances?” He glared at Westin.

  Westin matched his stance. Jordan refused to break first. He wasn’t going to kowtow to anyone. He didn’t give two shits what kind of reputation they had.

  Sugar decided the outcome when she smacked Westin on the chest with the back of her hand. “Quit it and tell the man what he needs to know.”

  Westin leveled a flat ‘we’ll talk about this later’ look at her. Sugar winked in response and Jordan looked at his boots to hide his smile.

  “Emme France may have been targeted.”

  His head snapped up. “What?”

  “She maintains a blog,” Westin said.

  “Okay.”

  “She’s passionate about women’s issues.”

  He raised his eyes to the high ceiling of the hangar. “For fuck’s sake, spit it out.”

  Someone started choking on a cough. “Sorry,” Winters wheezed. “Dot went down the wrong pipe.”

  “Look man, I get it. You’re top dog. When it comes time, I’ll take orders like a good soldier,” Jordan said. “But right now is not that time. Spell it out.”

  Westin dropped his arms and braced his hands on the table. “She may have caught the attention of this group because of the content of her blog and video blog.”

  “It’s called a vlog, boss,” Rocco said. Westin glared at him and Rocco threw his hands up. “Sorry.”

  “Why do you think that?” Jordan asked.

  “Parker dug into her blog. There were a lot of deleted comments — threats, warnings to stop, general ‘death to America’ comments — that sort of thing.”

  One of the computers chimed and Cash reached over and hit a key. Parker’s face appeared on the screen. “We got satellite and new proof of life. Which one you want first?”

  “Proof of life.” Sugar and Jordan spoke at the same time.

  “Coming up now.”

  The camera was shaky, obviously hand-held. A woman sat tied to a chair. Lank, dirty hair obscuring her face. Two guards, visible from the chest down, stood behind the chair, AK-47s gripped tight in their hands. A hand reached out and pushed the woman’s head back.

  The collective gasps could have sucked the air out of the hangar. One of her eyes was swollen shut. Livid bruising covered the left side of her face and blood caked around her nostrils.

  A heavily accented voice sounded from the video. “This is what happens when you don’t pay. No more talking. You have forty-eight hours to send the ransom or she dies.”

  The screen when black.

  “Fuck!” Rage boiled up through him. He had to move. Slamming out of the room, he stood on the landing of the stairs. He needed something to punch. Gripping the cold, metal railing he shook it. When they got there, he was going to rip every one of them apart with his bare hands. Reach into their chests and tear out their hearts. The image of her tied to that chair was seared onto the back of his retinas. God, when her mom and dad saw that video… Shit.

  He ripped the door open and stormed back into the office. “Please tell me her family hasn’t seen that.”

  “No,” Parker said. “It’s sitting in the inbox of the negotiator’s email.”

  “Kill it,” he demanded. “Her parents can’t see it. Ever.”

  “Make it look like it was delivered,” Westin said. “Then erase it.”

  “Copy. I’ll analyze it. See if I can pull anything useful,” Paker said.

  “What’s the intel?” Westin asked.

  Parker looked at the camera. “We have eyes on the compound.”

  “In the building?” Jordan asked.

  “Unfortunately, no.” Parker said. “But almost as good.”

&
nbsp; One of the screens switched to an overhead view of a walled compound. It reminded him of the old PAC-MAN game grid — straight lines indicating walls, openings that were likely doorways. Distinct red dots moved around the compound. Occasionally a line would appear from the dots. An arm?

  He’d never seen a sensor like this. He moved around the table, closer to the screen. “Is this satellite or UAV?”

  “UAV,” Westin said.

  “Where did you get this?”

  He looked at Jordan. “It’s R and D.”

  Research and development? What the hell? Why wasn’t this technology fielded to troops on the ground? He shook his head. Not an argument he had time for right now.

  He looked at the screen again. “What are we looking at?”

  Parker spoke from the screen. “The red forms are heat signatures. Looks like they’ve got some goats around the compound. There’s four guards inside the walls.” A yellow cursor appeared on the screen and hovered over the forms on the screen. “There’re three separate rooms — here, here, and here.” The cursor followed his words. “Two heat signatures in this room and this room, with one outside the door. Probably guards. Looks to be about a dozen in this room with another guard outside. There’s three signatures in this room. My guess is guards given there aren’t any outside the room.”

  “What’s with the group of signatures?” Cash asked.

  “Hang on.” Parker disappeared from the screen briefly. “I have a search running. You’ll have the video feed part of the time you’re in transit and again shortly after you land.” He looked over to the side. “Boss, you’re not going to like this.”

  “What?” Westin asked.

  “Reports are coming in that a group of girls was taken three days ago from a school close to the clinic Emme was grabbed from.”

  Sugar and Winters started talking at once, saying the same thing — they had to rescue the girls, they couldn’t leave them there.

  Panic built low in Jordan’s chest. No diversions. He understood their outrage, but Emme was the mission. The priority.

  “Stop,” Westin ordered. “Parker, who’s in the area?”

  “Hang on,” he slid off screen again.

  “What about Delta?” Rocco asked.

  “They’re not available.”

  Parker slid back into view. “Leonidas has a team in Niger.”

  “Contact them. See if they can support.”

  “On it.”

  “Make sure everything is available on the plane.” Westin looked at his watch. “Wheels up in thirty-minutes. We need to get Jordan kitted-out and load up. Make sure we have a schematic of the compound and overview of surround areas — electro-optical and infrared.”

  “Did you bring personal weapons?” Sugar asked Jordan.

  He looked down at her. “Yes.”

  “Let me see ‘em.”

  He cocked an eyebrow.

  “I wouldn’t argue if I were you,” Cash said. “You’ll lose.”

  He sighed, but picked up his weapons case off the floor, laid it on the table, and thumbed the combination. After snapping the lid open, he stepped to the side.

  Sugar pushed in the hinge pins of his M-4 and cracked the stock open. After a quick field check and functions check, she laid it back down and inspected his Glocks. Shaking his head, he watched her handle his weapons like a pro. He should know by now not to underestimate a woman. Bree and Denise had proved that.

  She stopped, gun gripped in one hand, slide held back with the other. “What?”

  He shook his head again. “Nothing. Just thinking I shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.”

  “How’s that?” She released the slide and set the gun down.

  “Well.” He crossed his arms and rocked back on his heels. “You look like you should be on the cover of a retro pinup girl calendar, not on the cover of Guns and Ammo.”

  “Who says I’m not on both?” She winked.

  “Quit flirting, Sugar,” Westin said, without looking away from the monitor he was working at.

  “Spoil sport,” she quipped. “Come on, hot stuff. Let’s get you some ammo and gear.” He followed her down the stairs, to a chain link gate that divided the far side of the hangar into a storage area. Metal lockers lined the wall and she opened several, revealing row upon row of guns and various other weapons. Pulling out several drawers of an industrial sized tool box, she pulled out ammo and magazines.

  “Take what you need. Minimum full combat load. The way these boys go in, I’d take more if I were you. What size vest do you wear?”

  “Huh?” He felt like Arnold Schwarzenegger in Commando when he broke into the gun store. All that was missing was the RPG launcher. Nope, there it was.

  Sugar chuckled and repeated her question.

  “Large.” In the end he walked out with body armor, helmet, tactical radio, NVGs, thigh and vest holder for his hand guns, two tactical knives, and a partridge in a pear tree. All new. All top of the line. He wasn’t an ammo sexual by any means, but even he had a semi.

  “Rocco’s done with pre-flight. Let’s load up.” Westin passed him and stopped at Sugar. Jordan kept walking, not wanting to intrude on their goodbye.

  He grabbed his gear and climbed the stairs of the aircraft. Jesus. This was not the standard jump seat set up. The front half of the plane was tricked out like the interior of private jets he’d only seen in the movies. Plush, dark brown leather captain’s chairs arranged around small tables. It looked like the back of the passenger area was set up for bunks.

  Cash approached from the back and reached for his weapons case. “We’ll put this in the cargo area. Take anything out of your ruck you want up here and I’ll take that as well.”

  Setting his ruck on one of the chairs, he pulled out his laptop and earphones before handing his bag off. Cash exited through a door at the back of the passenger area and Jordan caught a glimpse of the cargo compartment — and the AH-6 helicopter in the back. “Jesus. Is that a Little Bird?”

  Cash looked toward the back of the plane and grinned. “We aren’t walking from Timbuktu.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Jordan gave up on sleep. He was too keyed up, his mind going a mile a minute. It wasn’t unusual before a big op. The night before a normal mission, he slept like a baby, but anything major and he couldn’t shut off the part of his brain that thought of every possible scenario and anything that could go wrong.

  They’d spent the first two hours sand-tabling the mission, going over comms and signals. Westin had received word that Leonidas, another private security company, would be able to assist them with the take-down of the compound and retrieval of the school girls, allowing Titan to focus on recovering Emme.

  Opening his laptop, he connected to the plane’s wifi and searched for Emme’s blog. Her most recent post had been from three weeks ago, just before her kidnapping. She wrote about the importance of education for young girls in the country and how the terrorist groups were trying to close schools and intimidate villages. Browsing through older posts, he clicked on a link that took him to her YouTube page.

  “Hey, everyone. It was a tough day today and I don’t really have the energy to write about it, so I figured I’d share in person. Or as in person as a video can be.”

  Her smile was tight and her eyes were full of weariness.

  “A girl came in today. And I do mean girl. She was only fourteen or fifteen years old. She had a miscarriage at three months. She was worried her husband would beat her for losing the baby.” She rested her chin on her hand and looked off in the distance for several seconds. She sighed and looked back at the camera. “I’ve been here for four months and I still can’t fathom it. I think about girls her age back in the States and their biggest concern is how many Twitter followers they have. Hell, when I was fifteen my biggest concern was a boy calling me a stuck-up tease.” She looked down at the table and a wistful smile played at her mouth. “I had someone who made me realize my worth was my own. I controlled it, not s
omeone else and definitely not someone else’s opinion of me. These girls don’t have that. I want to give it to them, but I don’t know how.”

  He paused the video. She was talking about him. And their one and only kiss.

  Staring at the screen, he recognized the girl he’d kissed all those years ago. Even though she looked like she carried the weight of the world on her shoulders, Emme now was more beautiful. Her long lashes swept her cheeks and freckles dotted her nose. Her dark, curly hair was piled high on her head and he wondered if it still felt as soft as it had back then.

  He’d avoided her the rest of that summer and the next two summers after that. Their kiss had made him realized she’d grown up at some point. He couldn’t look at her and see the little girl who’d chased after him and Doug. The one he’d teased and whose braids he’d pulled. Out of respect for her father and brother, he’d stayed away. But he’d always wondered what would have happened if he’d been given the chance to kiss her again.

  Westin sat in the chair across from him. Jordan took off his earphones and closed his laptop.

  “You going to take it?”

  Jordan’s brow crinkled. “Take what?”

  “The promotion.”

  “What promotion?

  Westin started at him, not saying anything.

  He rolled his eyes. “Dude, seriously. You really need to be a little more forth coming with the words. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Your commander told you there were extra incentives for taking the job,” Westin said.

  “I didn’t ask what they were. I didn’t care.”

  Westin continued to stare at him as he ran his fingers over his lips and didn’t say anything for several seconds. “When we recover her, we’ll leave immediately for Abu Dhabi. We have a doctor on standby to take a look at her. General and Mrs. France have agreed to stay in the States and let the furor of her rescue die down before we transport her back. Two weeks minimum, but it could be longer.” He folded his hands across his stomach. “I told them I would ask you, but if you’d prefer to catch up with your unit, I can arrange for someone else—”