Core of Steel

by J. B. Havens

  Chapter 17

  We limped, hobbled, and dragged ourselves deeper and deeper into the jungle. Jordon stopped at one point and got his map and compass from his pack. I saw enough of it to notice that he had marked both pick up points; he altered our direction slightly and we continued on our corrected course. I was losing more blood by the minute and couldn’t walk at all anymore. I needed to stop soon. All the moving was keeping my wound from closing or clotting at all. Jordon was pushing us on past the point of muscle fatigue, past the limit of my endurance.

  “Jordon….Chris…I have to stop. I need your help with my leg.” I gripped his forearm as tightly as I could which wasn’t very tight at all. We were both getting covered in bug bites. What parts of my body didn’t ache itched to the level of insanity.

  He looked down at me as if he was really seeing me for the first time since we left the mansion’s estate. My hair stuck to my face with dried blood and sweat. I had cuts and scrapes all over my arms; I’m sure I looked as bad as I felt, which was half dead.

  “Okay, Mic. I’ll find us some sort of shelter and take care of that leg. We rest for no more than an hour. We can’t stop for long or we will never make it to the LZ in time. I think you forgot that this LZ is three times the distance away.”

  “Just get us somewhere. If we don’t address my leg soon, I’m going to lose it. The leg I mean, not my mind. Though that is up for debate right now.” Indulging in a moment of weakness and self-pity, I laid my head on Jordon’s shoulder. I fell back to my old standard deep breathing. I would need every ounce of resolve and determination left in me to make it through this.

  “I’ve got you, Bea. Don’t worry. You’re too much of a bitch to let this beat you.” I laughed a little and sucked it up. No time for a pity party. Instead, I promised myself a pint of Ben & Jerry’s, a long soak in the tub, and a trashy romance. Rarely done girly bliss for me.

  Jordon continued to hold me up and let me think that I was walking, and I kept on pretending I was walking. It wasn’t long before I gave that up completely and Jordon swung me up into his arms like a hero taking his heroine to bed. He had his pack and gear. Mine had been left behind at some point, plus my weight. The man was a superhero. He was getting a gold star and a week off when we got back.

  Jordon found us a tree that was bent over nearly to the ground, its branches creating a safe enough hole to hide us in. We still hadn’t seen any signs that we were being followed, but we weren’t taking any chances. I propped my back against the trunk and stretched my wounded leg out in front of me. A deep groan escaped before I could stop it. My pants had dried in the blood and stuck to the wound. Taking out my knife, I leaned forward and cut my pant leg off below the knee. I unwrapped the bandage cautiously; there was no exit wound, but I didn’t think the bone was broken. It was swollen, but not overly so, very red and still seeping blood. I needed to get the bullet out.

  ****

  Phillips sat in the helicopter, one leg hanging out into empty air. He was too tired and drained to bother pulling it back in. He rested his aching head against the cabin wall, eyes squeezed shut tight against the sights before him. He didn’t have to open his eyes to see what was there. Riley was tense and pale with shaking hands and blood on his face. Jones was picking dirt out from under his nails with a wicked looking knife. Pierce was going through his pack, checking charges and wires, throwing tiny bits and pieces out the cabin door.

  Linc was a mystery; he was sitting directly across from him with his arms wrapped around his drawn-up knees. He wasn’t talking or looking at anyone. He appeared to be lost in thought, buried somewhere inside himself.

  None of the others seemed too worried that Jordon and Mic were still out there. Why would they be? This had happened before and would surely happen again. If not to Mic, then to one of them. Their last mission was a good example. It had been an unusual mission even for them; one that required Mic to go undercover, posing as a madam looking to buy girls for her bordello from a notorious South African sex trafficker. Instead of going by the book, it blew up in their faces. Mic was held hostage, and it took every trick they had to get her out in one piece.

  Phillips banged his head against the cabin wall, trying to shake the memories loose. The naked and starving girls locked in cages by the dozens. The girls that weren’t on the brink of death from dehydration and starvation had wished they were. A lot of good came from that mission; the asshole running the operation was sleeping with the fishes, the girls were alive, and were back with their families. The image of Mic tied hand and foot to a wooden chair, and beaten bloody appeared in front of him like he was back in that stinking warehouse. He didn’t know if he could do this anymore; all the faces of his victims and the innocents they hadn’t been able to save were flashing in front of his mind like his own personal, twisted version of reality TV. Phillips was questioning everything about himself and his life. Was what they did worth the price he was paying?

  Flynn banked the Black Hawk and prepared to land. Phillips was expected to step up into a leadership role and lead these men on a rescue party back to Mic. He hoped and prayed with what he had left of a soul that Mic and Jordon would be patiently waiting at rally point B in the morning. He dreaded the thought of going back into that estate and pulling them out. He decided then and there, when they got home, that he was done. He wanted his walking papers and the new identity that they had all been promised.

  ****

  Mic looked down at her leg. Jordon had one big hand just above her knee and the other half way down her shin, holding her still while he examined her more closely. No exit wound for the bullet was a huge problem; he would have to dig it out. The bullet had entered through the back of her calf at an upward angle, most likely a ricochet. Being a ricochet, the bullet had already lost most of its velocity before hitting her, so it didn’t have the force or speed to exit her leg. Instead, the bullet was lodged just under the skin on the side of her calf, so close to the surface that he could see the outline of its shape.

  He looked up at Mic and caught her eye. He had to get it out as soon as possible; if not, all the moving around they had to do could dislodge it and make the wound that much worse. Better to cut it out and risk the infection.

  “Bea…..it’s right here.” He pointed to the bump on her calf. “I have to cut it out.” He pulled his own KA-BAR out and opened his IFAK. He had Quik Clot combat dressing, but not much else in the kit that was of use to them. He’d cut the bullet out, slap the Quik Clot on it, and get them moving. It was their only chance. He had some alcohol wipes, which would have to be sufficient. After putting on the only pair of gloves from the IFAK, he wiped the blade of the knife down first, and cleaned the skin where he would cut as gently as he could. She jerked back, trying to scoot away from him. He couldn’t blame her, this was going to hurt like hell.

  Jordon handed Mic a stick to bite down on. If they were being followed, they didn’t need the attention her screams would bring. “Take a deep breath, Bea, we have to do this quick.” With one last look into her pain filled eyes, he bent to his task and began to cut.

  ****

  I bit into that filthy stick and screamed in my head. The sharp knife cut easily into my skin, warm blood trickling down my leg. Sweat broke out all over my body and I started to shake. I fucking hated this. I wasn’t weak; I could take pain with a smile. But the already inflamed and sore flesh wasn’t helping to lessen the pain of Jordon’s gloved fingers in my calf muscle. I watched as he dug around, his thick fingers disappearing in my leg past the second knuckle.

  “Thought… you said… it was right… there…,” I choked out between each pain-filled gasp of air that I managed to drag into my lungs.

  “It was, but there must have been a pocket or something; as soon as I cut, it slipped deeper.” He grunted and closed his eyes. The concentration was carved into his face; he was biting his lip hard enough that he would draw blood soon. I found myself staring at him, trying to drag my mind anywhere beyond the feel
of his fingers. On another day, in a different time and place, maybe I would instead have been intent on where his fingers were, instead of trying to imagine that they were not inside of me. This is not the typical way that a man learned what the inside of a woman’s body felt like.

  The last thought almost drew a chuckle from me. I had a man digging a bullet out of me and I was thinking about sex. I swallowed my scream as Jordon grinned and jerked the bullet out. He dropped it into my hand before slapping a bandage on my leg and pressing hard. His two hands on my leg nearly covered my entire calf from knee to ankle. I don’t remember ever feeling so small before. I looked up and met Jordon’s eyes. They were soft and assessing, most likely looking for signs of shock. Other than the burning and throbbing in my leg, I was doing okay, considering we were stuck in the Colombian jungle with minimal supplies and I was injured. It could have been worse; we could have been in the desert of Afghanistan.

  Jordon pulled the bandages back slightly and checked the bleeding. From what I could see in the dim light it had more or less stopped. He used a strip of fabric he quickly tore from his shirt to tie the bandages in place; tight enough to keep them there, but not so tight it hindered my movements too much.

  Jordon sat back on his heels and stripped his gloves off. “Let’s rest here for a little bit, get something to drink. We can’t stay long, though.” He unclipped his canteen from his belt and handed it to me.

  I drank, but the piss-warm water did nothing to quench my thirst. I handed it back to him and rested my head against the tree, closing my eyes and trying to relax my shaking muscles by degrees before we started moving again. It was something I had learned long before leaving the Army to join Steel. In battle there were few moments to rest or regroup, and when they were afforded, you had to take them. You never knew when you would get another chance to just close your eyes and breathe.

  I opened my eyes and had trouble focusing. Chris’s eyes were so close to mine that I had to pull back so I could actually see him.

  “What?” I asked, just above a whisper.

  “Your eyes are beautiful. Has anyone ever told you that? The prefect mix of grey and blue. I can’t decide what color they are.” I didn’t know what to say. The truth was, yes, I had heard it before. I didn’t know why he was bringing up the color of my eyes right now. Maybe for the same reasons I had been thinking about his fingers, and how they would feel somewhere other than digging around inside my leg.

  “Chris…” I didn’t get a chance to say anything else before his lips were on mine. His kiss was soft and warm, polite really, if a kiss could be such a thing. He didn’t try to stick his tongue down my throat or get grabby. Just the barest of touches. I let myself enjoy it for just a second, surely after the morning we had we both deserved a little tenderness? It felt good, too good in fact, as warmth spread outward from my lips.

  He pulled his face back to a more viewable distance and didn’t say a word. Just took a drink from his canteen like nothing had happened. If that was the way he wanted to play it, I could go with it. If I was completely honest with myself, which I endeavor always to be, this had been coming for a while. I licked my lips, tasting him there, and took another drink when he passed me the canteen. It was almost empty, but there was water everywhere in the jungle. It wasn’t safe to drink usually, but we had a serum we could drop in it that would neutralize most bacteria and parasites. It made the water taste like metal, but it was better than no water at all.

  “Let’s get moving, Jordon. I want to get as far as we can before dark sets in.” He stood, and I raised my hand to him, letting him pull me to my feet. I stood on one foot, not wanting to put weight on my injured leg until I had to. Chris slung his arm back around me, helping me hobble along. He checked our position with his compass and we set off like Dorothy and the Scarecrow. Or would that be the Tin Man? Either way, we weren’t in Kanas anymore, and Oz was a shit hole.

  Chapter 18

  “Fuck… fuckity… fuck.” I swore over and over with each painful step. I could feel the wound seeping blood again, and I was soaked in sweat, from more than just the oppressive heat. I had lost a lot of blood; I was dehydrated and getting worse by the minute. I needed to rest again, but we couldn’t afford to stop. I was slowing us down more and more with each dragging step. If we stopped now we would never make the LZ in time.

  “You’re gonna make it, Mic. If I have to carry you, we’re going to fucking make it.” Jordon was just as tired as me, if not more so; he’d been more or less carrying me for the last two miles. My whole leg was a mass of agony. The way the pain was spreading, I could tell I was overtaxing it and more than likely working on a nasty infection. That didn’t matter right now. Getting to the rally point did. Our only saving grace was that for whatever reason Mateo’s men didn’t pursue us. I couldn’t think why not; we were easy pickings right now.

  “We have to get there on time; I have to tell them about Mateo’s son. He has a legacy… this isn’t over, Chris,” I said, between teeth gritted against the pain. At this rate my teeth would be ground down to nothing.

  “How much farther?” I panted and leaned my back against the rough bark of a tree as we stopped. He once again consulted his compass and map. I ignored him while he did it, instead listening to the fascinating sounds of the monkeys in the canopy above us. It would be interesting to get up in one of those giant trees and be able to see the animals making all this noise.

  “Not far. We’re almost there. With time to spare, even. I don’t know how we managed that,” Chris’s voice snapped me out of my day-dream. Night dream? Whatever.

  “Are you reading the map right?” It had gotten dark long ago; every time we stopped to check our position he had to turn on his flashlight. It was a risk, but a necessary one. I took the map and light from him, which earned me a heavy sigh of exasperation.

  “I know how to read a fucking map, Mic,” he snapped, jerking the map and light back from me before I had the chance to even look at it.

  “Don’t be an asshole, Christopher! We’ve been moving so slow I didn’t think there was a hope in hell of us being close already.” I pointed my finger at him as I whisper-yelled.

  “Mic, don’t you fucking call me Christopher! You’re not my mother,” he snapped back.

  “Obviously. I doubt you’d kiss your mother the way you just kissed me.” There it was. I was going to be the one to bring it up.

  “I don’t know why I did that.” He slipped his big arm back around me and got us moving again.

  “Neither do I.” I couldn’t think of what else to say, now that I had brought it up.

  “Well?” He asked, lifting an eyebrow at me before looking back to where we were going.

  “Well what?” I knew perfectly well what he was asking me. I was going to make him work for it.

  “Did you like it?” He blushed and ducked his head. It was really comical so see him all flustered over a kiss, when before he was stoic as he cut my leg open and dug a bullet out with his fingers. I couldn’t help but laugh.

  “Does it matter? It can’t happen again.” It was harsh, but true.

  “Yes, it does matter. It matters to me as a man. I know it can’t happen again, but I want to remember our one kiss. I will enjoy the memory more if I know that you enjoyed it as much as I did.” We had stopped walking at some point and I hadn’t even noticed. His arm was still around me, helping me to stand without putting too much weight on my injured leg. He moved until his hands grasped my arms just above my elbows, his thumbs brushing back and forth across my tattoos. His eyes were following the movement of his hands, like he was trying to memorize the way it looked to have his hands on my body, even on such an innocent place as my arms.

  “Yes.” His eyes snapped back to mine. “Yes, Chris. I enjoyed it and I wish to God I hadn’t, because now when I look at you, I will know what your lips feel like…what they taste like… how soft they are.” I shook my head back and forth, my sweaty hair sticking to my face. “This can’t be!
I won’t do it. Forget the kiss; wipe it from you memory. It’s the only way.” I jerked my arms from his hands and hobbled on. I had seen the hurt in his eyes, but it was necessary and he knew it.

  I didn’t get very far before he was back at my side, supporting me as we made a trail through the dense underbrush. Ironically, a machete would be pretty useful right about now.

  “Consider it forgotten, Mic,” he said softly.

  We didn’t talk after that, just put one foot in front of the other. It wasn’t a tense or uncomfortable silence. There was no weight to it. We were both lost in our own thoughts.

  ****

  Jordon kept his arm tight around Mic, knowing that he was holding her up at this point; and by now the only thing that was keeping her going was sheer stubbornness. She was doing her best not to slow them down, but it couldn’t be helped. She was stronger and more resolute than he had given her credit for. He had flinched and almost puked his guts out when she put a couple of stiches in his eyebrow; and here she was, soldiering on after he dug a fucking bullet out of her leg. Her body was every man’s wet dream, compact and strong, but it was her inner strength and razor-sharp wit that he found sexiest.

  Mic’s kiss was melted into Jordon’s brain. The feel of her lips beneath his was unlike anything he had ever felt before. He didn’t know what had come over him or why he had picked that moment to cross that invisible yet tangible line. Maybe it was the stress, or the heat, or a combination thereof. Whatever it was, he was glad he had done it. Now he knew it was everything and more, than he had ever imagined. No matter what she said, it wasn’t something he was going to be able to forget easily. There was no brushing this under the carpet for him, no moving on, or erasing it from his mind. He could still feel her lips against his, the press of them, sweet and fitting against his like they belonged there. He had to stop thinking about it or he was going to embarrass himself; with tight tactical pants there was no hiding it. Thankfully, it was plenty dark enough and she was so incredibly focused on not falling, that he could probably get away with it.