Prime (Chess Team Adventure, #0.5)

The arrival of a helicopter at Camp Blue Diamond—formerly the An-Ramadi Northern Palace, where Saddam Hussein’s half-brother had once lived, and presently headquarters of US Marine Corps 1st Division—was a common enough occurrence that Jack Sigler rarely took note. Something about this one was different, though. The deep bass thump of the rotors beating the air above the Euphrates River, as the bird made its final approach, resonated through his body like an alarm and fanned an ember of anxiety in the pit of his stomach. He poked at the food heaped on his tray—two hamburgers, a mini-pizza and an unopened bag of Cool Ranch Doritos—but his appetite had disappeared.

Daniel Parker, seated across the table from him, instantly picked up on Sigler’s discomfort. The team’s only African-American operator, Parker had a round, youthful face that was incapable of concealing his emotional state. “Someone just walk across your grave, Jack?”

“I just remembered something I need to take care of.” He stood, and in a single deft motion, scooped up the tray, dumped its contents into a nearby trash can and flung it like a Frisbee onto the tray rack. “I’ll catch up with you later.”

Parker stood as well. “Well that’s a coincidence. I just remembered that I need to take care of something, too.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“You tell me.”

Sigler regarded his teammate and friend with a wan smile, an expression that seemed completely alien on his rough, unshaven face. With his shaggy hair and hard expression, Sigler had been often told he resembled Hugh Jackman, or more precisely, that actor’s film portrayal of the comic book superhero Wolverine; Wolverine didn’t smile.

Before Sigler could answer, the Motorola Talkabout radio clipped to his belt crackled to life. “Jack, it’s Kevin. I need you at the TOC.”

Parker’s eyebrows went up. “Damn, Jack. Spidey-sense, much?”

“I’m wondering that myself,” Sigler muttered. The ominous feeling that had started with the approach of the helicopter was blossoming into something like paranoia. He keyed the transmit button on the radio. “Be there in five.”

It took him only three minutes to walk briskly from the dining facility in the main palace building, to FOB McCoy, the smaller, walled-off compound where Cipher element had set up shop. Above the always-locked metal door was a crudely painted sign that read ‘Animal House,’ presumably a reference to the college fraternity in the classic John Belushi movie of the same name: Delta Tau Chi—Delta House. The sign had appeared one night, a few weeks after they’d arrived in country—most likely some jarhead acting on a dare—but Kevin Rainer, Cipher element’s commander, had left it there. Although their unit designation was supposed to be classified, why bother denying what everyone at Camp Blue Diamond already knew; Cipher element was part of the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-D, the US Army’s elite counterterrorism interdiction unit, better known simply as Delta.

Sigler went directly to the tactical operations center (TOC)—known informally as The Lair—which served a dual purpose as both communications hub and conference room. Rainer was seated at the end of the long rectangular table, along with Doug Pettit and two other people—an athletically built, brown-haired man, and a woman—in civilian clothes. The man was Scott Klein, a CIA officer who had been working closely with Cipher element to disrupt communications between the different local insurgent groups, but it took Sigler a moment to recognize him; he was having trouble tearing his gaze away from the woman.

She was, in a word, stunning.

She was seated, but Sigler guessed that she was about the same height as Klein; the Company man was about 5’ 10”. Her blousy top mostly concealed her figure, but her arms, where they emerged from her rolled up sleeves, were slender and toned. It was her face however, framed in a cascade of long and straight black hair that arrested Sigler’s attention. Her almond-shaped eyes, the irises brown with flecks of gold, hinted at some recent Asian ancestry, as did her high cheekbones, but her face was longer, with a prominent forehead and a strong jaw.

“Hel-lo,” murmured Parker, slipping into the Lair behind Sigler.

Command Sergeant Major Pettit, Cipher element’s senior non-commissioned officer, directed a scathing look at the young operator, but no one else at the table seemed to notice, least of all the woman, whose attention was fixed on the screen of her laptop computer.

Klein rose and extended a hand to Sigler. “Jack, good to see you.”