by Ronie Kendig
The thought traced an icy finger down her spine. To make that shot, the attacker would’ve been … Right where I am.
If that was true, then the Afghans would’ve had sentries monitoring this spot.
Darci froze and listened. The roar of the wind and the defiant rustle of her coat made it impossible to hear anything. If someone wanted to sneak up on her, she’d be dead and never know. Then she’d never have to feel the guilt again of giving Heath the fake e-mail address.
Swallowing, she pushed her thoughts to the dilapidated “fortress.” No light twinkled through a curtain or blanketed opening.
Abandoned?
She flicked her gaze to the tents. When a glare of white burst through the lens, she resisted the urge to tense. More than a hundred yards from the camp, there was no way they would know she was here. But it still left her feeling naked, more so with the unusually cold night.
The men wore qmis, loose-fitting shirts that reached their knees, and shalwar, full trousers tied at the waist with a string. Heavy jackets concealed whether or not the men wore vests, but she was sure their chaplay, the thick leather shoes, provided little protection against the cold night. At least not the same protection her Columbias provided.
What made her hesitate was the pagray. The turbans were not worn high off the forehead as normal—necessitated for touching of the forehead during prayers—but instead they were low and pressed against their brows.
Odd.
Move on. It was cold, and she’d been gone too long already. Someone—Toque—was bound to notice.
She dragged the NVGs over the camp, counted heads and tents, memorized the layout. Another odd thing. It wasn’t set up like a village, with clusters of tents close together for families. They were all huddled together. Not family-like. More … like the military.
Well, they were Taliban. And she had their numbers and location. Which was what her CO wanted to know. But did a small cluster like this justify the great increase?
Tugging the jacket hood up over her head, she dug down into her coat and retrieved the phone. Capitalizing on the protection of cover from her hood to shield the blue glow from the night and sentries, she turned it on. Punched in her lat-long, her data, and the date and time. Sent it spiraling to the satellite somewhere overhead. Then powered it down, tucked it back in her pocket, and nudged the hood out of the way.
Once again, she used her NVGs to study the valley. The people. The layout. Learn everything she could. Trailing the neon-green along the upper portions of the valley, she traced the hills. The plateaus. Searching for caves and other possible groupings of fighters.
Small for a Taliban camp, this settlement broke too many molds and unsettled her. But analysis wasn’t her job. Recon and reporting were.
“Just tell me what you see.” Burnett had been adamant that she not put herself in danger. Darci cringed every time he warned her to be careful. She and danger had a love-hate relationship: She loved to avoid it. It hated to miss her. Invariably, it not only found her, but hunted her down. Sort of like Heath.
No, no. Can’t go there. Not now. Not ever.
“If you don’t go into the cave of the tiger, how are you going to get its cub?”
Darci ordered the voice to shut up, to leave her alone. Going into that camp—or going there with Heath—would not bring trouble to her doorstep. She’d walk into its den!
But if she didn’t, the little inconsistencies about what was happening out here wouldn’t be answered. What if something was going on down there? They were less than two hours from Bagram. From thousands of American troops and their allies.
Darci pushed onto her knees. “Don’t do this.” She tucked the NVGs into her coat and zipped it as she started down the side of the mountain. “This is really stupid,” she muttered.
True. But Burnett had kept her in this job because of the very instincts that had her hustling down into the veritable den of tigers. The night before she left the base, he’d all but vowed to send her packing if she didn’t find something.
Her boot slipped—rocks, pebbles, and dirt dribbled down. She froze, swallowing hard as she waited to see if the wind had carried the noise to the Taliban. Satisfied it hadn’t, she hurried along. Kept herself tucked into the shadow of a cleft that gave protection against the angry wind and the probing eyes of the men down in the settlement.
She scurried along the shelf to where the mountain tiered down to the valley floor with what looked like hand-carved terraces. Once used for farming, no doubt. For her, they served as stairs and a quick path—but also an exposed one.
Squatting at the base amid a tangle of brambles and boulders, she peered over a large boulder toward the far right where a fire roared. Men laughed and talked. If she was caught, they’d kill her. After a brutal gang rape, no doubt.
She squelched the thoughts. No use going there except to remind herself to be quick and careful. No mistakes. In and out. Back to the campsite—
Stupid, stupid, stupid. If someone figured out she was missing …
Half-bent, Darci sprinted the fifty feet across the open and scrambled up behind the building. Back pressed against the wall, she felt it shift.
Rocks and dirt rained down on her. Dust plumed around her face.
She blinked and choked back a cough. Cautious, she peered around the corner. Laughing continued. So did she. On her feet, she crouch-ran along the wall to the far side where she’d seen through to the other side. Enough would be missing to allow her to gain entry without being noticed. True to her expectations, she found the hole. Glanced over the twelve-inch ledge—and bingo! The debris spread over the ground. Inside.
So, what was going on? Why were the men outside when they could patch this place up and take shelter for the winter and from the coming blizzard?
Darci slunk through the darkness, blinking against a gust of wind that nearly knocked the breath from her chest. Inside the home, she confirmed her suspicions. Empty. Abandoned. She moved to the wall and peered around the cloth that still hung in the window.
A dozen men now gathered around the fire.
Where are the women?
The realization hit her in the gut. No women. This wasn’t a Taliban settlement. Her gaze pinged over the men. Laughter barreled up from one side. Two men roughed around, tangling with each other. A pagray tumbled free. The man who’d knocked it loose threw his head back and cackled, his laughter howling with the wind.
The man who’d lost his turban retrieved the length of material from the ground and straightened. Like a dance of demons, firelight flickered over his face, revealing his origins.
Darci sucked in a hard breath. Him!
Eleven
What were the Chinese doing hundreds of miles from their border and dressed like Taliban fighters? Darci jerked away from the window and pressed her spine against the cement-block wall. She slid down, her mind thundering with what she’d just seen. Panic swirled and whirled through her body, overloading it with adrenaline and heat. In particular, what was Tao doing here? And if he was here, then so was …
Oh man. Out now. “He nearly killed you.” Ba’s warning haunted her. She had to get out of here before they discovered her.
This was bad. No, no. This went beyond bad. This was Threat Level Red. DEFCON 1. Threat Level Critical. And any other “extreme” world system panic code.
Heart jammed into her throat, she pushed back against the cold cement and stared up through the hole-laden ceiling to the blanket of black. Don’t do anything stupid.
Steadying her pulse was the first objective. If she couldn’t get herself under control, she wouldn’t be able to think. To devise a strategy and get out of here alive.
If they found her—
No. She would get out of here. Get back up that mountain without being seen. Get the team back to Bagram where there were lots of guns and battalions of men trained to fight.
No go. Chopper wouldn’t extract till morning.
Yet … she felt her pulse slow
ing, calming. If she could sneak back into the rugged terrain without these men seeing her, then she could hoof it back to camp, night would pass, and the chopper would come. No one would be the wiser, but Burnett would have his information. The team would be safe. She would be safe.
The last time she believed that, she’d almost died.
So did he.
This can’t be happening!
Chinese in Afghanistan—hiding and far away from the mines they were authorized to work. It didn’t make sense. What were they doing here?
Darci slowly rose to her feet, lifted the NVGs to her face to construct more data, knowing full well she’d have to give a complete report. Were all the men Chinese? Or just some?
She slid aside the panic and adrenaline and replaced it with the uncanny ability that had gotten her recruited into military intelligence: her ability to divide her fear from her reason and carry out the mission all the same. Some might call her coldhearted, or a colorful metaphor. To her, it was just intuition. Instinct. A gift for survival.
Yes, Chinese. All fifteen. They had weapons. But they also had crates in their tents—nicely fitted tents with rugs and pallets, cooking stoves. But nothing else. Like vehicles. How had they gotten here? Which route delivered them to this Afghan province? How had they not been seen and reported?
The clothes. They dressed like Taliban.
Move it or lose it, Darci. Using every ounce of training, she shifted toward the hole she’d climbed through minutes ago. Sound took on a deafening level, as if each step shouted her presence. Halfway across, she lifted her booted foot over a crate and set it down. Then her other foot. Relaxed. Focused. Stealthy.
Rolled rugs cluttered the dirt floor. She used one to step around the others. A strange noise hissed from the carpet. She leapt aside, staring at the dark bundle. A sickening feeling tightened her stomach.
No, no time to sort it out. Just get back to the hills.
Toeing her way to the entrance, gaze locked on the sliver of space that afforded her a view of the Chinese encampment, she kept moving. Wind ripped the thin material covering the window and jerked it back.
Darci froze, afraid the men might see her dark form shift in the night.
But with the wind came a scurrying sound. She stilled and let her eyes rove the interior. Something … something wasn’t right.
The rug she’d just stepped on, the hissing one—okay, that made her sound like a loon—it had shifted. That’s not how it had been a second ago.
Another sound. This time it almost seemed like a whimper. An old stove huddled against the far wall. A shelf dangled on the wall, a pile of pottery shards on the floor. Rugs. A low-slung bed frame without a mattress. A blanket draped over it. Whites of eyes peeking back at her.
Darci shoved herself back. Gasped.
The whimper rose.
Her gaze shot to the window. The laughter and insanity continued—stupid men thought they were impervious and invincible—so no one was the wiser to her presence. It was just her and whoever lay beneath the bed, which … too small a space to conceal an adult. That pushed her toward the frame.
Slowly … she stalked closer, her hand going to the small of her back. Darci went to a knee. Craned her neck to the side and peered under.
Tears slid from wide dark eyes, dusted by bangs and jet black hair. A small child peered back. Hand in her mouth, the girl seemed to be stifling her cries. Face screwed tight, she drew back.
“Hello,” Darci whispered in perfect Pashto. “Where is your daddy?”
With slobber-coated fingers, the girl pointed to the middle of the dwelling. Darci didn’t have to look to know the girl was pointing to the pile of rolled-up carpets. The very ones Darci had stepped on.
“Your mother, is she … here?”
The girl shook her head, freeing more tears. Dead, too, it seemed. How on earth had this little girl managed to hide? And from the Chinese men who’d slaughtered her people, who just happened to be in the wrong place—their own home!
Double snap. This complicated things. She couldn’t leave the child. But taking her into the mountains could get them both killed. Something about this little girl reminded her of the mission Darci almost didn’t survive. She’d expected to be abandoned, she’d been so near death. But she fought to stay alive. Fought to find a way out. And she did.
Just like this little angel. She’d stayed alive against impossible odds. No way would Darci abandon her now. Time’s short. “We must leave. Before the men see us.”
Another frantic shake of her head.
“They are bad, yes?” she continued in the tongue of the little girl, who readily agreed. “I have friends in the mountains who can help us. We will go to the Americans.”
A sniffle.
Darci held out her hand. “Please? Before they see us.”
The little one reached up and pushed back the blanket. She stood. Even in the darkness, Darci could see the blood that coated the girl’s clothes, making her ache. Had she witnessed her parents’ murders, hidden here? The girl couldn’t be more than three or four. Darci lifted the girl, who kicked free of the blanket that tangled around her feet. Her foot hit the frame.
Thud!
“Augh!”
She clamped a hand over the girl’s mouth. “Shh.”
“Check it out,” came the terse command, followed by thumping of booted feet.
Darci pinched her lips and hurried to the opening she’d come through. Adrenaline jolted through her veins, heating her. The child was heavy, which made Darci’s steps louder. But if the girl walked on her own, she’d slow them down. Darci scrambled to the safety of the low-lying wall. They were doomed.
God …
Why she’d even gone there, she didn’t know. God hadn’t helped her mom. Why would He help her? She believed in Him. She did. She just wasn’t sure—
Just move!
Holding the girl tight against her chest, she peered over the wall to the men clambering into the building. Rowdy and sloppy, they pushed and taunted each other, clearly not taking the noise as a serious threat.
Good. Eyes on the mountain, Darci plotted her path. Once she got far enough away, she’d unzip her jacket and tuck the slight frame of the child into its warmth. Wind tugged at her as she darted to what looked like an abandoned well. Crouched, she checked the men.
Still oblivious.
“Just a little farther,” she said to the girl, then scurried out into the open, aiming for a cluster of shrubs and brambles that lined a dry creek bed. Halfway there and still safe. Her panic began to subside. At least, the edge of that panic. She knew better than to let her guard down until she was at base.
Squatting, she set down the child and unzipped her jacket. She motioned the girl back into her arms, then instructed her to wrap her legs around Darci’s waist. Once in position, she tugged the jacket, tugging hard to make it zip.
“Okay,” she whispered. “Hold very tight. Do not let go.”
The moon reflected off the obsidian orbs peeking from below dark bangs. The tiny arms tightened around her. “Tighter.” The girl complied, but it still wasn’t nearly as much as Darci preferred.
When an explosion of laughter ripped through the valley, Darci seized the chance. She shoved up and launched toward the mountain. She plunged onward, feeling as if she had a fifty-pound rucksack strapped to her front. The ground before her rose enough to make the run harder. Her breath came in snatches.
With one arm she braced the girl’s bottom and pumped for speed with the other arm.
A shout rang out.
Crack!
Dirt burst up at her, peppering her face. Rifle fire!
Twelve
Camp Eggers, Kabul, Afghanistan
Amazing. It hadn’t changed in the two years since he’d left. Barren, flat, tan—it’s the reason the country was named Afghanistan. But then again, when he glanced down the heavily fortified and fenced road to the gorgeous Hindu Kush—formidable, daunting, stunning—nothing was barr
en about this place.
A gust of wind stirred up a sand demon that prowled the monochromatic scene dotted with splotches of green from occasional shrubs. Small trees reached toward the heavens with bent, gnarly hands, as if begging for water. Fear and awe wove a wicked tapestry through him as the quiet terrain erupted with ghoulish memories. Bombs. IEDs. The tat-a-tat-tat of M4s.
Heath jogged down the steps to the temporary bunk, Trinity’s lead in one hand and his duffel in the other. His performance last night came in a distant second, considering the attack. Between the adrenaline, the performance, and predawn rise this morning, exhaustion weighted his limbs. He was out of shape. Plain and simple.
A furry head nudged beneath his hand. Without taking his eyes off the phantom plain beneath the sun’s unrelenting oppression, Heath rubbed Trinity’s ears. Could she sense it, too? The ominous feeling he’d felt thick and rancid after that attack? Was she remembering that horrific day that left her with a small scar and him with one bigger?
A Humvee squawked to a stop just feet in front of Heath, pulling Trinity into work mode. “Easy, girl.”
Two men piled out of the vehicle. One strode toward him.
Heath held up a hand. “Approach slowly. She might not be government issue now, but she’s still got razor-sharp instincts and teeth.”
The specialist smiled beneath his helmet and sweat, compliments of the mountain of clothing, vests, and gear. “Daniels?”
Sack slung over his shoulder, Heath extended his hand.
“Specialist Randy Farley. I’m your tour guide back to Bagram.”
Specialist. The specialist who’d driven the MRAP was dead. Would this one end up that way, too? What about Jia? Where was she? Was she safe, out of reach of the Taliban or other extremists? Man, that near-kiss … was something … like near-stupidity.
Shake it off.
“First stop—the training field.”
“No rest for the weary.” Heath glanced back at Hogan who trudged down the steps of the portable building they’d crashed in last night. She wore a frown the size of “who authorized you to disturb my beauty sleep?”
