Luke ducked in first. Derek covered him. The room was dark and cold and reeked of urine. In the corner was a shadowy lump with a mop of blond hair. She wasn’t moving—not good news, considering all the noise.
“NVGs,” Derek said, shoving his night-vision goggles up. Their goggles and greasepaint made them look like alien robots, and they didn’t want to scare the hell out of her. Derek switched on the flashlight attached to his helmet as Luke reached to check her pulse. She flinched, then rolled over and suddenly started kicking and screaming like a banshee.
“It’s okay, ma’am,” Luke said. “Don’t be afraid.”
More shrieks and kicks.
“Hailey, it’s okay.”
She went still. Derek aimed the light at her as she cowered back. Dirt smudged her face, and the collar of her shirt was dark with blood. The nasty gash above her eye made Derek’s stomach turn.
“I’m Petty Officer Luke Jones, U.S. Navy.” He was already digging through his medical kit. “We’re here to take you home.”
Derek knelt down and looked the woman over. She held her wrist protectively against her body, and it was wrapped with a dirty scrap of cloth. Luke tore open a syringe as Derek peeled away the bandage to reveal an oozing green wound with bone jutting through the skin.
Derek glanced up at her. “We’ve got a helo coming to give you a ride.”
“You’re . . . American,” she rasped.
“Yep.” Derek got rid of the filthy-ass bandage as Luke prepped the shot. “Hey, your Bruins are doing pretty good. We plan to get you home in time for the Cup.”
She made a wet, choking sound, and Luke darted him a look. He’d meant to distract her, not make her cry.
“Five minutes!” someone yelled from upstairs.
Derek’s radio crackled, and he got to his feet. “Alpha, this is Delta. We need Vaughn or Jones over here.”
Derek rushed back upstairs, checking his watch as he went. He’d known Sean since BUD/S training, and he could tell by the tone of his voice that something was very wrong. Probably the hostage. A cold feeling of dread gripped him at the thought of losing another one.
In the courtyard, one of his teammates was building a pile of guns and ammo. The heap of AKs, chest racks, and RPGs took up most of the space. Another pair of guys had already started SSE—sensitive site exploitation—which meant confiscating any potential intelligence, along with fingerprinting and photographing casualties and their weapons, not only for ID purposes but also so that if the mission came to light, the enemy couldn’t claim they’d killed a bunch of innocent civilians.
Inside the second building, the SEAL pulling security directed Derek toward a stairwell leading to the basement. Someone had slapped a chem light on the wall with duct tape.
The cavern smelled as rank as the other one. Remnants of a wooden door lay on the floor. Mike emerged from a chamber with the doctor slung over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.
“He’s alive,” Mike said, answering the unspoken question.
Derek stepped out of his way. “We been on target too long, bro. Need to speed it up.”
“Vaughn, get over here.”
He followed a narrow corridor and almost stepped on a pair of legs jutting out from the wall. A young man was seated on the floor with his hands zip-cuffed behind him. He wore loose-fitting pants and high-top sneakers and was fifteen, max, but his eyes already had the flat, battle-hardened look of a warrior.
“Found him in the tunnel.” Sean nodded toward a passage that connected the house to who the hell knew what. The tunnel system here was like a rabbit warren.
Derek spotted a workbench littered with electrical wires, nails, several jars of black powder—all bomb components. He scanned the rest of the room, and his gaze came to rest on a large safe in the corner. It was a serious box, definitely imported, and would have been a major pain in the ass to get here.
Now Derek understood why he’d been called over. He glanced at the kid and tried to remember his rudimentary Pashto.
“What’s the number?” Derek asked in Pashto, because he didn’t know the word for “combination.”
The kid didn’t answer.
Derek pointed the stock of his gun at the safe. “Open it.”
The kid looked away, sullen.
“Fuck this.” Sean reached for his kit and got out some C-4.
Derek stepped over to check for booby traps. He didn’t see any, but there was only one way to know for sure. Sean set a small charge, and they crossed to the other side of the room. The burst reverberated through the cavern, and they rushed back over.
“Shit, look at all this.” Sean pulled out a stack of papers, singed around the edges and still smoking. He flung it to the ground and stomped the fire out as Derek reached in and pulled out a notebook computer.
“Two minutes,” the CO said over the radio.
Derek cursed. Even with the extra minutes they’d built into the plan, they were running behind.
Sean was already pulling out his mesh bag, which they carried for this purpose. Some of the papers were in English, but Derek didn’t take the time to read them as he jammed everything into the bag. He reached in and snatched a thumb drive as Sean grabbed another batch of papers. Loose pages fluttered to the ground.
His teammate held up a sheet. “Hey, look at this.”
“No time to read. We need to move.”
“It’s a map.”
Derek glanced at it. It was in English, with notes scrawled around the edges. Derek scanned the street names. His blood ran cold. He looked at Sean.
“Guys, move it!” someone yelled down the stairs.
Derek glanced at his watch. They’d been on target way too long. He glanced at the kid. In a matter of hours, this house would be looted and abandoned. In a matter of minutes, this guy would be in the wind.
“On your feet,” Derek ordered.
Sean shouldered his pack. “They said no prisoners.”
“On your feet!”
The kid stood grudgingly, proving he knew at least some English. Sean shot Derek a look before taking the prisoner by the arm and propelling him toward the stairs.
Derek’s mind reeled as he looked at the papers strewn on the floor. He scooped up every scrap and checked the safe again to make sure he hadn’t missed anything, then threw his bag over his shoulder and raced upstairs. All the windows rattled as a Black Hawk swooped overhead en route to the landing zone. He glanced into the courtyard just as their EOD guy ducked out. He’d been setting the charge on the ordnance, and the look on his face told Derek it was about to blow.
“Hey, what are you doing here? Haul ass!”
Boom!
Derek dropped to his knees as the house shook. Chunks of debris rained down from the ceiling.
“Come on!” Derek yelled.
They sprinted outside, where the last member of their team was holding security by the door. A few neighbors’ lights had come on. People peered through windows and leaned out from doorways.
“Vaughn, where the hell are you?”
It was Luke’s voice over the radio, probably already at the LZ, which was a vacant lot at the end of the street.
“We’re half a click away.”
They double-timed it toward the landing zone, pushing the prisoner ahead of them.
“We got company,” Cole said over the radio as a truck screeched around the corner. It was a shit vehicle, but it was packed with armed men and had a .50-cal machine gun mounted to the roof.
Derek grabbed Sean’s vest and yanked him out of the road. He pushed him down the alley leading to their alternate exfil route.
“Vaughn, report! Where are you?”
“Almost there.”
The street smelled like sewer water. Trash swirled in the rotor wash as they neared the waiting helo.
Rat-tat-tat.
The gunner on the truck let loose with the .50-cal. His buddies with AKs were well out of range, but that didn’t stop them from spraying bullets.
Derek rounded the building just in time to get a mouth full of dust. Mike was lifting the doctor into the chopper. Hailey had a SEAL on each arm, and they were practically carrying her, but she tore away from them and made a sprint for it. She flung herself onto the helo, and about a dozen hands reached out to pull her inside. Luke and Mike jumped in behind her.