by Brian Drake
Buckley and Higgins broke off for a hallway. Raven and Osborne moved through a doorway into the kitchen.
Raven went left, Osborne right, both scanning for targets. “Clear,” Raven said.
“Clear,” Osborne echoed.
They left the kitchen for the hallway where the other two were about to check a room. Higgins tested the doorknob.
Automatic fire roared on the other side of the door. The shots punched through the sheetrock and splintered the door and cut down Higgins and Buckley. Both men screamed as the fire continued, then stopped. Raven ran forward with Osborne keeping pace. Raven chucked a grenade through a gap blown in the door. The blast shook the house. Raven pushed open the door.
Bingo. Bomb factory. Tables loaded with half-completed explosive devices. Two had cracked in half from the grenade blast and lay askew, the contents of the tabletops spilled on the floor. Two other tables remained. One body on the floor. The man clutched his now-empty Kalashnikov. Raven headed for one of the split tables. He thought he spotted a leg sticking out from one side. He shoved the broken half out of the way. The man on the ground was already dead.
Neither man was Ameer al-Ghazi.
“Where the hell is our target?” Raven snapped.
“Must have made a beer run,” Osborne said.
Raven didn’t laugh. He told Osborne to help with Higgins and Buckley. Higgins was silent; eyes closed. Buckley was awake, hands pressed to his body to stop the bleeding. Raven tossed a grenade down the hall to deter anybody hiding. The explosion rocked the walls and pushed a cloud of smoke through the hallway. He grabbed Higgins while Osborne carried Buckley. Raven called team two for help. The four shooters were outside when Raven and Osborne emerged. He ordered them to get Higgins and Buckley to the other L-ATV while they searched the rest of the house for al-Ghazi.
Raven and Osborne reentered with caution. With no second floor, at least they didn’t have to worry about somebody coming from upstairs. The narrow hallway presented problems of its own. Raven took one side, Osborne the other. Their muzzles probed the darkness and the lingering smoke.
Raven opened a door on his side and slipped inside. Small bedroom. An empty cot and closet. He rejoined Osborne in the hallway. They checked the next room. No sign of al-Ghazi or any other insurgent. Raven turned his attention to the last room at the end of the hall.
“Get down!”
The muzzle flash from Osborne’s weapon filled the dark space as Raven hit the floor. He turned back to look. From the first room he checked a man stumbled out, letting go of a pistol as he hit the floor.
Raven jumped up and ran to the fallen man. Osborne’s salvo had opened his chest; there would be no saving this one. He shined a light in the dead man’s face. “Jackpot,” he said. “There’s our target.”
“But how? You checked the room!”
“Cover me,” Raven said. He entered the room again and found the answer. A trap door in the floor of the closet. He shined the light into the gap but saw no other threats. Dropping a grenade down the hole, he stepped back as the blast sent chunks of debris and more smoke into the room. Waving a hand in front of his face, he turned to Osborne.
“I owe you one,” he said.
“I turned to look just in time,” the former Marine said. “He was going to shoot you in the back.”
“Let’s go, Osborne. You’ll be one of us yet.”
Buckley survived his wounds; Higgins did not. But Raven was happy with Osborne as a replacement. He immediately considered him a permanent member of the team.
Their bond forged over the next three months and many similar missions. Osborne ended up being more than another shooter. His father owned Osborne Defense, and manufactured many of the explosive devices the team used to carry out their missions. They were able to experiment with new gear as a result and report back to HQ what worked and what didn’t. When Raven rotated home, they remained in touch. As each traveled their own path in the shadow world, their reunions were few and far between, but they always made the best of it when they did see each other.
Now they were together again. Osborne needed help, and Raven owed him a favor.
5
Osborne didn't split any lips or faces on their continued sojourn through Paris nightlife. Osborne laughed it off. Maybe next time.
They’d split a taxi to Raven’s hotel. Osborne promised to meet Raven in the hotel restaurant at ten a.m. Raven ventured downstairs after a night of restlessness. He couldn’t stay out late like he used to. Another sign of getting older. He hated it. His watch showed 9:45 and his goal was to secure a table. He stopped in surprise when he found Osborne already seated in a back corner.
“Hard night, old man?” Osborne laughed.
Osborne sat with his back to the wall. He had a big grin on his face as Raven joined him. Raven’s back faced the open restaurant. It made him a little nervous but he had Aaron to warn of incoming threats. Then he chided himself for being paranoid. Nobody was going to shoot up the restaurant.
“You out-drank me last night,” Raven said. His head hurt. He grabbed a glass of ice water already on the table and took a long drink.
“And I still beat you here.” Osborne held a mug of coffee in both hands with his elbows on the table.
Raven laughed instead of trying to argue. “I’m still worn out from the Crazy Ivan I told you about.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for her.”
The air-conditioned restaurant cooled Osborne considerably, but he still wore light clothes, jeans and a black Tee-shirt. Raven noticed the Rolex Sea Dweller on Osborne’s wrist and held out his arm to show his own. “Didn’t notice last night.”
“Yeah. I bought it when I was doing better than I am now.”
A waitress with short dark hair asked for their orders. She wore thick makeup with a silver nose ring in her left nostril. The tips of her dark hair were pink. Raven needed time to review the menu and asked for tea. She departed.
“All right, you promised me a story or something.” Raven scanned the list of omelets. “Let’s hear it.”
“I need your help.”
“I’m listening.”
The waitress returned with Raven’s tea and they ordered. The restaurant wasn’t full but they were far enough away from other patrons to not have to speak low. Osborne set his coffee down and leaned forward.
“I need to get back to basics.”
“What do you mean?”
“The fighting has to stop sometime, right? And I don’t mean war fighting. I need to make peace with my father. He and I have been fighting long enough.”
“I don’t think you ever told me,” Raven said, “how the two of you stopped getting along.”
Osborne sat back and shrugged. “It was mostly my fault. He tried to help me after the war. I tried working for the company. I really did. But I couldn’t settle down. The war might have been over for me, but I still needed the action. So I quit. I asked my father for some money, a good deal of money, which he agreed to give me, and took off. We haven’t spoken since. Both of us said some things I don’t think we meant. You know.”
Raven nodded.
“And now? The younger guys are working for less. There are more lines on my face every day, and I can’t keep this up forever. It’s time for a change. Open a bait shop or something.” He laughed nervously.
“Think you can settle down this time?”
“It’s odd,” Osborne said, “what we’re opposed to when we’re young seems mighty tempting once the joints start to ache a little.”
“Sure.”
“Anyway, I don’t want to go back to Dad empty-handed. I figure I owe him the money he gave me.”
“Can we cut to the chase, Aaron?”
Osborne laughed again. “You never were a patient man, were you?”
The waitress returned with breakfast and the two began eating. As Osborne buttered a croissant, he said, “France has a huge drug problem, right?”
“Name a country not sufferin
g from a drug problem.” Raven swallowed a forkful of scrambled eggs. He’d decided against the omelet. The chef had made the eggs with butter and the taste was amazing. Scrambled eggs never let you down.
“I’ve picked out a target, a cocaine dealer in Marseille. A guy and his girlfriend. They’re sloppy. They think because they have connections they can deal in the open.”
“A target?” Raven said. “You want to rip them off?”
“It’s all planned out,” Osborne said. “All we have to do is take them out, and leave with their money.”
“How many guys you got?”
“Just me and my girlfriend and I hope, now, you.”
Raven raised an eyebrow. “This sounds crazy, Aaron.”
“We don’t need a lot of shooters. One night’s work. Split the take. I’m not asking you to work for free.”
“How nice of you.”
“What do you say?”
“Who’s your girlfriend?”
“Oh, you’ll like her. Her name is Tracy. She’s one of us. Military intelligence, various covert jobs, the whole bit.”
“Uh-huh.”
“She can handle a weapon and knows the drill.”
Raven concentrated on breakfast, mixing his eggs and hash browns. “I don’t know, bud.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Are you kidding? The last thing you want are French drug dealers coming after you. Your target is going to have friends and they will want to know who ripped them off.”
“You can’t live in fear, Sam.”
“I don’t want to take a bullet in the back, either.”
“But I don’t—”
“How about this,” Raven said. “I’ll give you the money. How much do you owe your father?”
“And be in debt to you now?”
“Pay me back with fishing gear when you open your bait shop.”
“No, Sam, the whole point is to get the money myself. Show my old man I’ve learned my lesson.”
“Like how to rip off drug dealers? You’ll put a target on your old man’s back, too. The Pentagon won’t like a major defense contractor having a fight with drug dealers.”
Osborne pressed his lips together in a frown. He hadn’t taken more than a few bites of his meal and it cooled on the plate. “You in or out?”
Raven started to get a bad feeling, and mixed emotions for saying no. All plans had risks. They could lessen the risks by anticipating problems. What sounded like a hair-brained scheme might work if they sorted the issues. And Raven had a hard time saying no to a friend, especially one who saved his life. He said, “I need to know more about your plan.”
“Let’s finish breakfast and take a walk. I’ll tell you everything. Come on, finish your breakfast. It’s on me.”
Osborne picked up his fork and returned to his food.
6
They walked along a busy sidewalk. Heavy traffic filled the street. Parisians moved at a brisk pace. Obvious tourists blocked the way as they checked maps and phones.
Raven’s bad feeling didn’t leave him. Osborne wasn’t telling him the truth, and his idea of paying back his father had severe flaws. Money was money. Who cared where it came from?
“You expect your father to make a fuss about you coming back?”
“I sure don’t expect a banquet in my honor. Like I told you, we didn’t part on good terms. It will help if I return the money.”
Raven didn’t reply. Why was he so focused on the money?
Sidewalk vendors tried to hock their tourist trinkets. They gave up when Raven and Osborne ignored them despite not being natives. The vendors found plenty of other out-of-towners to hustle.
“Your old man would welcome you home without the money, Aaron. You don’t need to risk your life.”
“You don’t know him.”
“But I know how fathers feel about their children.”
“I suppose you would, huh?”
“Why don’t you call him first?” Raven said. “He’s worried about you.”
Osborne shook his head. “No, I can’t. I gotta have the money when I do it.”
“Did you leave your father because of something he did?”
“No, nothing of the sort. I left because I needed to.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Still think I’m crazy?”
The Place de la Bastille loomed ahead, the tall tower in the center of the street stretching to the sky. Vehicle traffic clogged the roundabout encircling the tower. Diners at sidewalk cafes stuffed the sidewalks.
Raven took it all in as more thoughts raced through his mind. Aaron’s story carried genuine emotional weight; the type of detail needed to manipulate another party into accepting the premise. Raven didn’t want to think his pal was conning him, but had little doubt he was doing so. His refusal of Raven’s offer to clear the debt tripped alarm bells. He couldn’t chalk it up to simple pride. Aaron could guard oil rigs in the Med for as long as it took to save the money if he wanted. He had a quick fix in mind instead.
What was his true agenda? Osborne’s father ran a defense contracting firm. He manufactured ordnance. Explosives, missiles, high tech equipment. If Aaron screwed up and brought heat onto his family, a threat to national security loomed. The French drug cartel could trade getting even for blackmail. And collect US weaponry from a primary source.
Never mind the embarrassment his father’s company might face if the police captured Osborne in the middle of his scheme.
Raven needed to know the truth. And it meant helping Aaron get away clean. He owed Aaron for Iraq anyway; this gave him the opportunity to return the favor. Save Aaron’s life the way he’d saved his.
Raven’s ghosts had called to him; this was what he’d been waiting for. And he finally answered Aaron’s question. “Yes, you’re crazy. But I’m not going to abandon a pal. Count me in.”
Osborne smiled. It was a bright smile and lit up his eyes. It seemed as if a weight had lifted from his shoulders.
Then an explosion rocked the street and flung the two men across the sidewalk.
Raven crashed into a wheeled cart of tourist trinkets. The cart fell over, landing on top of its owner on the other side. Aaron Osborne hit the wall of a restaurant.
Raven rolled onto his left side, then flat on his stomach, covering the back of his neck with both hands. The shock wave hit hard, pinning him to the ground, nearby glass shattering, debris flying. He couldn’t breathe or hear.
The cart owner’s cries for help, lost in a fog of post-blast distortion, broke through Raven's daze. He forced together coherent thoughts and started breathing again. A bomb had gone off in the street near the tower marking the location of the Bastille. Raven waited a moment, and then rolled onto his back and sat up. Thick and heavy smoke billowed around them, hanging like white fog. The smoke stung Raven’s eyes. He wiped his eyes and looked around. People were running, screaming. Bodies on the sidewalk.
And gunfire. The rapid blasts of automatic weapons. Not close, but not far. From the center of the roundabout at the tower came more screaming.
“Sam!”
“I’m alive, Aaron!”
Osborne crawled beside Raven and helped him to his feet. There were three cuts, from glass, on Aaron’s face. “You armed?”
Raven pulled his .45 autoloader from the shoulder harness under his jacket. “Always.”
Two stray rounds smacked the restaurant wall behind them. Osborne drew a SIG Sauer P220 and snapped back the slide. “Let’s go hunting.”
They ran into the street toward the gunfire.
The car bomb detonated around 10:30 a.m.
In the moments prior, heavy traffic clogged the roundabout at the Place de la Bastille. Patrons filled available seats at the sidewalk cafes.
Nobody paid attention to the white panel van as it entered the roundabout. Everybody noticed when it exploded.
The bright orange flash, followed by the boom of the blast, broke the vehicle into pieces. Deadly shrapnel flew in all direc
tions. Heavy smoke filled the street.
The shockwave lifted the nearest cars off the ground and slammed them into cars behind and beside them. Secondary explosions from those vehicles rocked the street. A mass of twisted steel, broken glass and shattered bodies replaced the dull street routine.
The intersection echoed with panic and loud screams. Survivors began rising from the devastated café fronts.
From another vehicle further back in the congestion, four armed men emerged. Each toted a Kalashnikov automatic rifle. Tactical vests with spare ammunition magazines covered their chests. They shouted “Allah Akbar!” as they advanced, the AKMs spitting flame. The four gunmen walked along the stopped cars without opposition. They fired at will, fueled by the screams of the wounded and those trying to run away.
The jihadists had full control of the killing ground.
And then two Americans began shooting back.
7
Raven and Osborne weaved through the stopped traffic. They fixed their eyes on the four gunmen heading for the roundabout.
There was nothing Raven could do for the dead, but he could stop more from dying.
As he and Osborne hit the street, they pivoted left. The four gunmen didn’t spot the Americans right away. Using cars for cover, shouting at survivors trapped within to stay down, Raven and Osborne engaged the shooters.
One of the gunmen spotted Raven, stopped shouting mid-cry, and shouldered his AK to take aim. Raven fired first. The .45 slug punched through the gunner’s left eye, crashing through the back of his skull with a spurt of red. The man dropped. One of the other gunners saw him fall, and Osborne took the second man down with a double-tap through the head.
The remaining two stopped shooting and took cover. The screams and cries of victims all around drowned out the echoes of gunfire.
Raven stayed low, advancing a few feet every couple of seconds, looking over and around cars, his head like a bouncing ball. There was a risk in doing that, but there was no other way to spot the killers. He only had to drop and move before they saw him.
