by Cat Johnson
When the room fell silent, he continued. “When we’re taking pictures or up on stage, you all can be in charge. But here and now, for this situation, if you people want to stay alive and get out of here in one piece, I’m in charge. That means you do what I say quickly, calmly and without question. Do you understand?”
He looked around the room and saw a collective nod from among the assembly. The combined adrenaline felt almost palpable to Hawk’s over-tuned senses.
“Now, here’s what we know. Someone, most likely a guerilla faction of the Taliban, blew the wall of the base prison. I assume they did that to break out someone important to them who’s being held there, and until they accomplish that goal they aren’t going to leave.”
“And for some even more good news,” Mel piped in, “that facility with the giant hole in the wall can hold up to five hundred prisoners. Most of them Taliban or al Qaeda suspects who are not bloody happy to be there.”
Great. Hawk sighed.
“But won’t they just want to get the hell out of prison and run for the hills?” Kerri asked.
Mel shook his head. “We have to remember, love. These people don’t care if they live or die, and they will gladly take us with them. In their opinion, the more evil occupiers—meaning us—they can kill the better."
Hawk took back control of the floor before this guy frightened them into further frenzy. “We have an undisclosed number of insurgents within the perimeter of the base who are obviously in possession of explosives and most likely weapons. We have the escaped prisoners, and I’m assuming snipers outside the fences. But we’re within the largest US base in Afghanistan. The troops here are well armed and trained. They can handle this.”
“So what does this all mean for us, Hawk? What do we do? Tell us what to do, sugar.” Kerri’s unquestioning faith in him put even more pressure on the already overwhelming situation.
Hawk had been prepared for almost every scenario in training and in battle, but he was experienced in leading a squad of skilled professional soldiers, not a laughably diverse group of untrained civilians.
“We stay here and sit tight for now.” He didn’t want to say it, but he didn’t know what else to do without putting them all in jeopardy. At least he had some semblance of control here. If the insurgents came through the door, he had his pistol. He knew Tony had some firepower hidden on his person too. That made two pistols to at least defend the women with.
If their attackers chose to blow the building instead... Hawk decided not to think about that right now. He could only hope the baddies were more occupied with freeing the prisoners—possibly five hundred of them if the facility was at full capacity. Shit. How the fuck did this happen?
Maybe he should risk a run for the bunker with them all.
Catching Emily’s gaze, he saw hate and anger in her eyes before she looked away again. One problem at a time. He couldn’t figure out what was wrong with her if he didn’t keep her alive first.
“If only we had some weapons.” Jai let out a breath.
Hawk shook his head to disagree. “No. Weapons in the hands of the untrained are worse than no weapons at all.”
“Four years ROTC in college. One tour in the sandbox courtesy of the Army and two more years embedded as an AP photographer in Kandahar. That enough training for you?” Jai cocked one brow in his direction.
Well, damn. That’s what he got for judging a book by its cover. Hawk nodded. “Yeah, it’s enough, but we still don’t have any weapons.”
“I have a weapon, and I know how to use it,” Tony said succinctly.
Just as Hawk had suspected. How Tony had smuggled that on base Hawk didn’t even want to imagine.
“I know, Tony, and I’m glad for that at least. But whatever you’re hiding not so effectively in that shoulder-holster under your jacket doesn’t have enough range or firepower to do us much good against what those guys have out there.”
“I have a phone.” Emily spoke for the first time since the explosion.
“You have signal? I haven’t been able to get shit out here.” Tony held up his own phone.
“Satellite phone,” Jai answered Tony’s question for Emily.
This whole thing was too surreal, discussing cell-phone signal in the middle of an attack on a supposedly secure base.
Hawk laughed. “Well, that’s great. Who are you gonna call, Emily?”
“My boss.” She answered him with unmistakable attitude.
She was being deliberately evasive because she was angry with him, for what he would love to know.
“Emily. Please. This is not the time—”
“My boss is engaged to BB Dalton. He’s part of a SpecOps team.” Emily interrupted his lecture.
Yeah, Hawk knew the team. “Emily, Dalton and his boys are too far away to do us any good. From the States or even Germany to here is—”
She shook her head violently. “No, they’re not home. Katie mentioned they’re at some training thing in Kabul this week. That’s not too far.”
Hawk could have hugged her for that piece of information, if he thought she wouldn’t slug him. He laughed. “No, that’s not too far.”
Hawk never thought he’d be happy to hear the name Dalton again, but in this situation he was.
Kabul to Bagram was probably about sixty kilometers. If Zeta could lay hands on a Black Hawk, which Hawk had no doubt they could, they could be there in under thirty minutes. But then what? Seven men against an insurgent uprising and prison break. Even Zeta might have trouble with those odds.
“Call her, Em. Call now,” Jai said.
Emily fumbled getting the phone out of her bag. She dialed with visibly shaking hands. After a few tense moments her expression became visibly relieved. “Katie. I need you to get a hold of BB right away...”
The entire process probably took less than five minutes but moved in slow motion the way things often did in times of crisis. It seemed like an eternity between the time Emily had told her boss about the situation and disconnected, and when her phone rang again.
The attention of every person in the room was on her as she fumbled to pick it up.
“Hello. BB, thank God.” Emily’s voice broke on a sob.
Hawk moved to stand closer to Emily. Tears glistening in her eyes, she spoke with Dalton through the satellite phone. She nodded a few times at whatever he’d said, then she held the phone up to Hawk. “He wants to talk to you.”
Taking a deep, steadying breath, Hawk pressed the phone to his ear. “Dalton, it’s Hawk.”
“Hawkins, am I glad you’re there with Emily for this.”
“Me too.” More than Dalton could ever know.
The connection was bad and Dalton sounded as if he was shouting over a hell of a lot of background noise, but Hawk was happy to hear the bastard’s voice.
“Listen up, Hawkins. The commander’s on the line with CentCom now. I didn’t tell Em this, but we’ve been briefed as to the conditions there. I have to be honest with you, it’s not good.”
No shit. “Yeah. I had kinda guessed that.”
“What’s your situation? Are you secure?”
“We’ve got nothing but two pistols among us as far as firepower. I’ve got five civilians holed up with me in a wood-constructed office building located in the center of the base.”
Jai cleared his throat pointedly.
“One of the civilians is former military.” With a glance at the photographer, Hawk amended his statement. “Another is hired muscle, so I’m pretty sure he knows his way around a gun. Two more are women and one’s an Australian reporter.”
“Cameraman, mate. Not a reporter, and I did some time in the Australian military myself,” the Aussie corrected him.
Suddenly, it seemed everybody thought they were warriors. Hawk rolled his eyes.
He heard Dalton speaking to someone on his end of the line, then he was back. “Matt says he traced the signal from your satellite phone. He’s pinpointed your precise location within the base o
n the GPS. Wait for us there. We’re already in the air on our way to you.”
So Zeta knew where they were. Great. But what the hell they thought they were going to do once they got here, Hawk couldn’t even begin to guess.
“Roger that, Dalton. You got any suggestions for the meantime?”
“Just don’t move from your present position until you hear from me,” Dalton instructed.
Don’t move? Hawk raised a brow. All of Task Force Zeta’s super-secret training, all of their science-fiction-worthy state-of-the-art implants and toys, and that was the best advice Dalton could give? The same plan Hawk had already settled on before the phone call.
“Great. Thanks.” Hawk shook his head and began to consider a contingency plan of his own, just in case Miller’s golden boys weren’t as superhuman as they thought.
“I’m sorry, Hawk. I’ll get back to you. We’ll have more specifics soon. Keep the phone nearby. I’ll call you back.”
“Copy that.”
Dalton disconnected the call, leaving Hawk staring down at the black object in his hand. His fingers itched for his rifle, but instead, he was forced to depend on a damn phone and Pretty Boy Dalton and the Zetas to save him.
He was not a happy man.
“What’d they say?” The Aussie had moved to stand closer.
“To sit tight.”
“I’m not too good at sitting around doing nothing, mate.” Mel’s proclamation sounded more like a threat.
Fists clenched, Hawk breathed in deeply through his nose, trying to control his anger. “You think I am?”
Kerri stepped between the two. She turned to Hawk and laid a hand on his forearm. “Listen, sugar. We know you’re doing the best you can. If whoever was on that phone told you to sit tight, then we sit tight.”
Hawk heard an irritated huff come from the corner of the office where Emily had sequestered herself since handing him the phone.
What the hell had he done to deserve this? Where the hell was his Alpha team leader? And for that matter, Wally too? Even hung over, Wally would still be a help. Instead, Hawk was alone to deal with one inexplicably angry and obviously jealous woman, a loose-cannon cameraman and, lest he forget, a terrorist bombing and breached prison facility.
So much for his simple modeling assignment.
A camera flash brought him out of his reverie. Turning toward Rasta-photographer, Hawk frowned. “What the hell do you think you are doing?”
Camera still in hand, the man flashed brilliant, white teeth. “Recording this moment for posterity, and possibly winning me some photo awards. People love pictures of this kind of shit.”
Hawk growled and was about to tell him what he thought about that when the phone rang again.
He punched the button to answer it. “Yeah.”
“Hawk, it’s Dalton. Listen close. We have an ETA for our arrival. This is what I need you to do. First, do not move from that building for any reason. No matter what. Do you hear me?”
“Yeah. I heard you the first time. What’s the plan?”
“Can’t tell you that. This isn’t a secure line. You’re gonna have to trust us, Hawkins.”
Trust Dalton? With Emily’s life and that of four other civilians currently in his care? Not a situation Hawk wanted to be in, but it looked as if he had no other choice.
“Dalton?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t screw up or I’ll have to kill you.”
Hawk heard his laughter through the static on the line. “Zeta doesn’t screw up, Hawk. You of all people should know that.”
And if Pretty Boy thought that Hawk had forgotten they were all here in Bagram and in this mess because of that stupid bet made in a moment of insanity in the Alps, he was dead wrong. Hawk only hoped they all lived to regret the decision he’d made in those mountains some more tomorrow.
“Okay, Hawk, I have to go. I need you to get the civilians under as much cover as possible immediately. Stay away from the windows and doors and do not exit that building.” Dalton shouted that warning again over the sound of the helo carrying Zeta to their rescue.
“Roger that.”
“Tell Em she’s gonna be fine. I’ll be there in a few.” A click and silence followed Dalton’s last statement.
Phone still in his hand, Hawk glanced around the room at all of the people depending on him.
Commanding a group of soldiers was one thing. Hawk could be certain his orders would be followed. Now, he could only hope. He really hated hoping.
Pushing doubts aside, Hawk sprang into action.
“I need the men to pair off and each grab a desk. Move them to the back of the room away from the window.” He grabbed the end of one desk himself as Tony quickly moved to take the other side. The two cameramen did the same with another piece of furniture.
“Everybody take cover under the desks and do not move, no matter what.” He looked specifically at Emily. “Do you hear me?”
Eyes wide, she nodded and started to move just as Hawk detected the sound of Army Black Hawks in the air.
“Move it! Now. Quick.”
Pinning Emily beneath the leg hole of one desk with his own body, Hawk heard the helicopters open fire as the good guys—at least he really hoped it was the good guys—blasted away, taking out the insurgents keeping them all pinned down within their own base.
No wonder Pretty Boy wanted them inside. Dalton must have located the building they were being held in and targeted any hostiles nearby. Hawk shook his head at the risky maneuver. Hitting friendlies was always a possibility in this kind of situation. Then again, Zeta had technology no normal soldier even dreamed of. Hawk and those with him were probably safer from Dalton and his guys laying down covering fire from the sky than they were from the rest of the armed personnel trying to defend the base from the bad guys already on the inside.
As Emily trembled beneath him, Hawk tucked her head beneath his chin. He mumbled against her hair, “Hell of a fucking plan, Dalton.”
He hoped to God it worked.
Chapter Seventeen
The dream always hit Emily the same, never less frightening. Surreal noises came from outside the building. Even huddled beneath both the desk and Hawk’s bulk, Emily was surrounded by horrible sounds the likes of which she’d only ever heard before in war movies.
Explosions, rapid gunfire, rockets whistling through the air followed by more explosions. All of that deafening, heart-stopping noise punctuated by the constant whir of helicopters above. Hawk held her tight, murmuring assurances she could barely hear over the firefight outside and her own pulse pounding.
In a cold sweat and with her heart racing, she awoke with a start. Even after all this time, months later, the recollection of those events affected her in the form of nightmares. Her memories wouldn’t let her rest, day or night.
Yes, the dream always started the same. She was making her way to the USO tent to check her email just after sunrise. She caught a glimpse of Hawk, buttoning his stupid camouflage jacket while sneaking out of Kerri’s tent. The realization of what must have happened between them. The feeling of nausea so strong it would have emptied her stomach if she’d taken the time to eat or drink anything that morning.
The scene usually fast-forwarded to her taking shelter beneath the desk during the melee, cradled in Hawk’s arms. She hated him for what he’d done and hated herself that she couldn’t bring herself to push him away. Then she’d wake up.
Maybe she needed therapy. There was no reason for her to have the nightmares. Against all odds, everyone had been rescued unharmed.
When Emily had finally heard BB’s voice outside the office door, she knew everything would be all right. Two black-clad figures had broken through the flimsy wood, yelling the entire time to Hawk and Tony not to shoot, that they were the good guys.
Emily had somehow fought her way from beneath Hawk and run at BB, crashing into him hard with a hug that would have toppled a smaller man.
In the blur of shouted instruct
ions and running that followed, before she could even begin to grasp what had happened, Emily found herself thrust into a helicopter and in the air, flying away from the battle. While the other Black Hawks above kept the men who’d attacked the base occupied, BB and his team had whisked Emily and the rest of their small group away, minus Hawk.
Hawk wasn’t with them on the helicopter, nor did he arrive later while they waited in the relative safety of the airport in Kabul for word of the situation at Bagram. Unfortunately, Kerri London was there, and that was enough to remind Emily exactly why she shouldn’t care if Hawk lived or died. Even more unfortunate was the fact that Emily did care what happened to Hawk. She hated that.
Glancing at her bedside clock now, she wasn’t at all surprised to see it read four thirty. Why did the stupid dream always seem to come at the same time each morning? For once, she’d like to sleep at least until five thirty. Six thirty would be even better.
With a sigh, she swung her pajama-clad legs from beneath the warmth of her sheets and stumbled blindly toward the kitchen and the coffee pot. She’d learned to set up the coffee maker the night before now that the predawn awakenings had become her norm.
Yawning, Emily flipped open her laptop on the kitchen table while the steaming brew dripped slowly into the waiting carafe.
This was another habit Emily had gotten into, checking her email immediately upon waking. She did it before work each morning during the week and obsessively all day on weekends.
Worse, she’d gotten used to receiving the usual email from Hawk. She’d come to expect to find it waiting there for her. He’d emailed her nearly every day during the past months since she’d gotten home from Afghanistan. An impressive run considering she had never responded. Not even once.
How could she respond? She didn’t know what to say. Her pride wouldn’t allow her to admit to him that he’d torn out her heart by spending the night with Kerri. She certainly couldn’t say she forgave him, because she didn’t. Yet she still anticipated the correspondence daily.
He’d long since stopped begging her to tell him what had upset her that day back in Bagram—as if he didn’t know. Now he simply told her about his day—the weather, funny things Wally or Pettit had said or done, apologizing profusely when a mission or an internet outage kept him from emailing her for any length of time. Each day she would read the email about twenty times and then save it in a special file to read again later.
