Chapter 5
Sarah laid out the items from her go bag on the long table in the big room at SEAL HQ. Off in one corner, five SEALs were playing poker, emitting loud growls and curses and, from the losers, grumpy muttering. A go bag was something all pilots kept nearby in case they crashed and had to switch to escape-and-evasion tactics in order to avoid being captured by the enemy.
Ethan folded his poker hand when he saw Sarah arrive. “I’m out, guys.”
“Good thing,” Ox grumbled, “you were cleaning us out.” The rest of the SEALs snickered. It was true.
Ethan grinned. “What a bunch of wimps.”
Sarah heard them ribbing one another as she sat down at the table with the bag’s contents strewn in front of her. She smiled when Ethan wandered over. It was 2100 and they had eaten at the chow hall earlier.
“What are you doing?” Ethan asked.
“Every three months I’ve got to go through my go bag and replace some of the items in it. Tonight is that night.”
Ethan looked up to see Trace, one of their combat medics, amble over to study the contents.
“Hey, Sarah,” he greeted.
“Hi, Trace.” She had a list of items, looking at each one for the expiration date on it. And then writing it down on a list, to get a new one from supply tomorrow.
“This looks pitiful,” Trace murmured. “Is this the Army’s brilliance in action when it comes to an escape-and-evasion kit?” He picked up the thin first-aid kit and wrinkled his nose in disapproval.
Sarah chuckled. “Well, I wear a survival vest when I fly. It’s got certain things in it, but not my go bag. What do I know?”
Ox, who had a very short neck, thick, meaty shoulders, another combat medic, got curious and joined Trace. “What the hell is that?”
Trace explained, holding up the thin kit as if it was a dead rat.
Ox snorted. “If I had to jump out of a burning helo with that puny piece of junk, I’d die that day. This is sinful. Army at its best.” He rummaged around through the other items from her go bag. “Sarah, little sister,” he muttered, scowling, “where’s your water?”
“Oh, here.” She held up a one-pint plastic bottle.
Ethan could see what was coming and put a hand over his mouth to hide his smile. His SEAL brothers had adopted Sarah and always called her little sister. She had become a welcome and established part of their small society.
“Damn,” Ox growled. “A pint of water? Do you know how long that will last you if you’re out running for your life from the Taliban?”
Sarah grinned. “Don’t hold back, Ox. Tell me.”
“Seriously?” Ox growled. “You know our guys go out on an eight-hour patrol and they consume between one to two gallons of water? Maybe put in fifteen miles?”
Trace rubbed his bearded jaw. “Yeah, Sarah, that’s not near enough water to take with you.”
Ethan saw Sarah scowl. More SEALs wandered over, hearing the spirited conversation. Pretty soon, ten of them were surrounding the long table. Sarah drew the men and, he knew secretly, they liked having her around. To some, she reminded them of a loved one, others, friends and for others, just having a woman around made them less animal-like. Since she’d been sleeping at the HQ, the men were tamer. Quieter.
“I don’t know what I need, guys,” she admitted in frustration.
Trace nodded. “Tell you what, Sarah. Let us put a ruck together that will keep you alive and ahead of the bad guys?”
Ox snapped his fingers. “Good idea! Trace you get your medical ruck and I’ll get mine. We’ll give her some good stuff out of ours to carry, just in case.”
About that time, Master Chief Gil Hunter came out of his office. Everyone turned and then stepped aside. He’d overheard the conversation and looked over her gear on the table.
Sarah scrunched her brow. Hunter gave her a slight smile.
“Ox is right, Sarah. This is a pitiful kit.” He lifted his head and called to Dagger, who was quitting the poker game to come over to see what was so interesting to everyone else.
“Dagger, get me a ruck out of supply. Bring it back and give it to Sarah.”
Confused, Sarah glanced at the master chief.
“These animals will show you how to put a proper E-and-E ruck together. Let them help you,” he clarified.
“Okay…” she murmured. “Thanks…”
Within two minutes, Dagger was back with a large desert camouflage ruck. Sarah realized it was the same ruck the SEALs carried out on patrol. He set it down, opened it up and stepped aside. The master chief went back to his office down the hall.
Trace and Ox arrived, opening up their massive eighty-pound rucks with nothing but medical supplies in them.
“Really,” Ox muttered, shaking his head, “get rid of this nonsense.” He used his thick, meaty arm and shoved all her go-bag supplies off the table and onto the deck.
Gasping, Sarah almost stood up, shocked.
“Let us take care of you,” Trace urged, waving his hand for her to sit back down. He opened up the new ruck. “Now, how much can you carry on your back, Sarah, weight-wise?”
“Fifty pounds?”
“Well,” Trace said, “pretend you’ve crashed and you’ve got to escape the Taliban. You know they’re coming for you. So based upon that and considering you’re adrenaline is supercharging you, could you do more than fifty?”
Sarah looked across the table at Ethan. He grinned and shrugged his shoulders. Sarah rolled her eyes. “Sixty? I mean, come on, guys, I’m not a damn mule carrying a load. Okay?”
They all grinned at one another. Sarah basked in their sincerity and care. Indeed, they did treat her like a brainless little sister.
Trace looked at Ox. “You think sixty?”
“Naw, gotta be sixty-five. You have to put two gallons of water in there. A gallon weighs over eight pounds. And you know how much the rest of our stuff weighs.”
“Hey, I’m not a combat corpsman, either, guys.”
“No,” Trace murmured, “but if you take a gunshot wound, you want the right equipment in your pack. If you’re on the run for days, infection sets in, high fever, and then your mind goes and the Taliban will capture you.”
Sarah could see she was not going to have a say in this new go bag and what it was going to contain. Ethan was hiding his smile, enjoying the hell out of himself at her expense.
She looked around the guys at the table. “What do you think I need instead?”
Well! About ten SEALs started telling her all at once what she’d need. It was well-intentioned cacophony until, finally, Trace held up his hands.
“Hey, animals! Quiet down, dudes. We can discuss it, get the stuff out here on the table, put it together and then see how much it weighs.”
For the next hour, the SEALs were bringing all kinds of supplies in for her new go bag. Ox, in his mid-thirties, was the rudder on this ship. Every time an item was brought out, it was decided by the team if it was worthy of going into her ruck or not. When Dagger tried to put ten purification tablets in her ruck, Ox knocked him upside the head.
“She needs a bottle of purification tablets!”
Every one snickered and laughed. Dagger turned a dull red.
“If she’s on the run,” Trace told him, “water’s going to be scarce. And when you find some, you fill up these two gallon jugs and drop purification tablets in each one, each time. You figure consuming two gallons a day, Dagger. She needs a bottle. Overkill is better in this situation.” He pulled a bottle from his medical ruck and placed it in hers. He’d get a refill later.
Sarah ended up learning a lot. Ox insisted on a bottle of sterilized water in case she received a gunshot wound. And if it went straight through the meat of her arm or leg, then she could use the turkey baster, which he also supplied, to suck up the sterilized water and shoot it through the wound to try to clean out the debris. Less chance of infection that way, he told her. Sarah just nodded, getting a heap of medical lessons as the evening
progressed.
Someone brought them cups of espresso. The rest of the SEALs grabbed chairs and sat around the table, kibitzing and giving suggestions or telling her their stories. When the ruck was finally filled and everyone was pleased with the result, Trace closed it up.
“Stand up, Sarah. You gotta get the shoulder straps right.”
Sarah came over and while Trace held the ruck, she slid her arms through the straps. He was careful to let the weight come down slowly on her shoulders so she’d adjust to it.
“God,” Sarah protested, “that’s heavy!”
The SEALs grinned. They knew too well. They carried rucks of the same weight on some types of patrols lasting days at a time. All that on top of a seventeen-to forty-pound Kevlar vest. Often, they were trekking with a hundred pounds on their back.
Ethan got up and turned around. “You need those straps set properly for you, Sarah.”
“Yeah,” Trace said, grinning. “I don’t want to get knocked on my ass for touching your lady in the wrong places. You show her.”
The SEALs howled good-naturedly.
Sarah felt heat sweep up her face. “You guys are animals.”
They gave her wolfish grins, not an apology among them. In fact, they wore her compliment with pride.
Ethan carefully adjusted the shoulder straps and then measured the strap around Sarah’s waist. He tightened everything up so it was snug. “Walk around. See what you think?”
“I feel like a prize pig being paraded around at a state fair, Quinn,” she griped.
The SEALs chuckled and laughed.
She walked around the perimeter of the big room. Moving her shoulders, Sarah said, “It feels okay, Ethan.”
“Now listen,” Ox said, wagging his finger in her face. “You stow that ruck right behind your seat. Hear me? There’s a good strap on top of that ruck. All you do is reach around with your left hand, grab it and go.”
“I will,” Sarah promised him.
Ethan helped her out of the ruck. It probably weighed around sixty-five pounds. He saw the warmth in Sarah’s eyes, her cheeks flushed. The team usually watched their language around her and toned down their primal behavior. Ox, however, was salty as hell and never minced words. He’d saved many lives—no one cared if he cursed or not.
“Thanks, guys,” Sarah said, meaning it.
“Don’t let any of those Army jerks tell you that you can’t have that ruck as a go bag,” Ox growled. He stabbed a finger at the ruck on the table. “That mother will save your life.”
*
The stars looked so close as Sarah walked with Ethan. At 2300, no one was around or awake in the camp, only the poor bastards who had duty at Bravo. Ethan kept her close, his arm around her shoulders as they walked slowly, not really going anywhere, just being together before they went to sleep.
“What’s up for you tomorrow?” he asked, leaning down and kissing her hair. He felt Sarah’s arm tighten a bit around his waist as they walked around the area near SEAL HQ.
“Standby duty. Me and Tait. Hope it’s a quiet day. You?”
“We’re out on a patrol in a valley.” He couldn’t say more. It was the same valley where FOB Thunder was located. The Army FOB was taking a weekly pounding from Khogani’s Hill tribe, who were interested in annihilating it. The SEALs were to be sent out on a four-man sniper team, including two snipers, Trace as their medic and himself as the comms man. They were going to be airlifted out at dawn, fast rope down on a ridge and go hunting for the Taliban.
“Just a day patrol?”
“Yeah,” he assured her, hearing the worry in her tone. “Easy stuff.”
Sarah snorted, turned around and halted. “Uh-uh, I don’t buy that, frogman.” She smiled up into his deeply shadowed face. Ethan’s hand settled around her waist and she laid her hands on his chest. “Remember the SEAL maxim? The only easy day was yesterday?”
Grimacing, Ethan said, “Yes, but I can always hope, can’t I?” He looked around where they stood. They were on the south side of the HQ, near the wall and deep in the shadows. No one was around and he leaned down and caught her smiling mouth, moving his lips across hers, feeling her softness, her pliancy. Sarah moaned and leaned fully against him, her fingers sliding around his neck, trying to draw him even nearer to herself. Her mouth opened and he tasted her heat and sweetness; his nostrils flared, inhaling her scent. Her hair swirled as he cradled her head, angling her, taking her deep, his tongue moving against hers. For a moment, they had one another. In that moment, they could forge an even stronger love between them.
Sarah reluctantly broke the kiss, knowing if they continued, Ethan would be bent over in pain and she wasn’t going to be in much better shape. Easing from his strong, cherishing mouth, she whispered, “I love you, Ethan.” And she smiled up into his hooded eyes seeing burning desire in them, but also the tenderness he always held for her.
Ethan moved his fingers through her loose hair and coaxed the strands away from her cheek. “You are my life, my breath,” he whispered against her mouth, absorbing her woman’s strength and her delicacy.
“Listen,” Sarah said, her voice husky, “I wanted to talk to you about something, Ethan.”
Seeing the seriousness in her eyes, her brow slightly scrunched, he leaned against the building, bringing her against him, their hips meeting and melding. He slid his hands from her shoulders to her waist. “Okay. What is it?” It was something important because he saw the struggle in her shadowed eyes as she held his gaze.
“Two weeks ago, at the villa, we talked about our dreams for after we get out of the military.”
He nodded, moving his hands in a soothing motion from her waist to her hips and back. “Yes.” Where was this going? Ethan went on guard.
She frowned. “Remember how I came apart when we discussed family? Having children?”
Groaning, Ethan rested his brow against hers. “Sarah, it’s okay. I don’t want to bring this up with you on standby tomorrow. I want you focused, not distracted.”
“I’m okay, Ethan.” Sarah closed her eyes, loving when he touched his brow to hers. Kind of a Vulcan mind meld of sorts. His long fingers tightened a little against her waist, as if trying to shield her. But she didn’t need his protection on this topic anymore. “Listen to me, will you?” She gave him a small shake, her hands on his shoulders.
“I would never not listen to you, Sarah.” Ethan straightened, holding her warm gaze. “I just don’t want you feeling emotionally torn up when you might have to fly tomorrow. That’s not a good combination and you know it.”
“I love you for being the big, bad guard dog, Ethan, but I’ve been chewing on this conversation for two weeks now and my flights haven’t suffered. I’m made out of stronger stuff than that. I can separate my personal life from my professional life. When I’m in that right-hand seat, I’m a hundred percent focused on my mission, my crew. Okay?”
He dragged in a deep breath, remembering how unstrung Sarah had become that night in the villa. “I hear you.”
“I’m not always a cry baby, Ethan. There was a lot going on in those two days.”
Nodding, he admitted, “It was kind of stressful in some ways. But in other ways—” he smiled a little, removing those scrunch lines across her brow with his thumb “—they were the best, too. For both of us.”
“Mmm,” she said, smiling. “I won’t ever forget them. Anyway,” she went on, “I’ve mulled over a lot of things. Why wouldn’t I think I’d be an okay mother? I’m remembering more and more about living in Bill and Marg Caldwell’s home as I get older.” Sarah shrugged and added, “Maybe as an adult, my brain is giving me back memories of those times, knowing I can handle it now when I couldn’t then.”
Ethan girded himself emotionally. He was scrambling inwardly because there was no safe place to take Sarah if she broke down as she had in the villa. At the same time, she seemed stable and he didn’t see angst in her blue eyes. Just a sense of truth, perhaps. “What did you remember?”
“Christ,” Ethan muttered, sliding his hand through her hair, his fingers moving to her slender neck.
It was as if Sarah felt his anguish, saw the rage and suffering in his eyes. “I needed to share this with you, Ethan,” she went on in a quiet tone, “because I got to thinking about Marg not being maternal. I didn’t have a role model, at least a positive one, to show me the way. I love kids, Ethan. I always have. I guess I always see myself in them when I was that age. I see how much better off they are than I was.
“They have a mother who fusses over them, kisses them when they fall down, and a father who loves them and is there for them. I knew even at a young age that something was very wrong where I lived with my foster parents.” Sarah held his worried gaze. “I remember one time finding an old rag doll in the closet where I was hiding from Bill. I remember that I loved that little doll. I used to stay in our bedroom and I would talk to her, cuddle her, pretend she was my baby and that I was going to show her love, not slaps, not raging anger. I had that doll for those six years I was there, Ethan.”
Sarah’s voice softened and she gave him a sad smile. “I gave her a name. I called her Annie. I looked so forward to pretending she was my baby. It was something positive in my life, Ethan. I don’t know if I’m making any sense to you, but that doll was a lifeline to me. Annie was something positive, pure and loving in my life. I could give her my love, my maternal and nurturing care.”
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