“Time to die, motherfucker.” I snap his hand behind his back until I hear it crack, allowing the gun to fall to the floor.
“Ask him where he is, Harris.” I spin the fucker around, and Harris mumbles some bullshit jargon. The soldier dressed all in black spits in his direction. I shove him forward and put a bullet straight through the back of his head.
“Roberts. Where the fuck—” I turn around to face our enemy, my words cut off mid-sentence. The one whose life I’m about to take is standing before me. Roberts has the fucker’s hands behind his back, his once white cloak now stained and dirty just like his heart.
“You Americans cannot come in here and do this. This is wrong.” He speaks in English. Of course he knows English. To hear my native tongue flowing out of his mouth has my hands itching to cut his tongue out.
“Wrong?” I question, my brows lifting. “This is right, bitch. Back away from him, Roberts.” The instant Roberts moves out of the way, I send the last four rounds from my mag straight the fuck into his black soul.
“Snake down.” Our code that he’s dead echoes through our ears. This means the chopper is on its way back. It’ll be here in three minutes tops. The women are folding their hands together, rocking back and forth in the corner, screaming. They're obviously praying for the death of this so-called leader. I release the clip on my camera and shove my evidence deep inside my pocket.
We leave the exact same way we came in, but now the silence greets us in the half-lit street. We run along the sides of the buildings, never cowering, yet always keeping cover.
I list off every member of my team into my headpiece. They all answer back with their chosen code word assigned to them during training. When I hear her sweet voice answer with the word ‘hunger’, my lips tilt upwards. Our mission is over, and she has no idea just how hungry I am for her.
CHAPTER SIX
JADE
It’s a difficult task to try to get into the mind of a sniper, and it’s by far more strenuous to live as one. I’ve trained for this, studied usage in weapons, how to handle stressful situations and the ability to accept any challenge set in front of me, and I'm proud to say I've always succeeded in my missions.
Your mind has to be in the right place. Our emotions are demanding. Summing it up, you have to literally require your mind to not only do the work it needs to do on the inside to keep you alive, you also have to let it take over every aspect and every grueling detail on the outside.
It’s JJ and I up here. Each of us trained to do this with the privilege to see through our night vision gear as if it’s daylight. Our eyes have to be everywhere. My sights are zeroed in, and I’m ready to pull the trigger at any moment.
That’s why I stayed as far away from Kaleb as I could today. He’s a distraction out here I can’t afford. Not only for myself, but for every single one of my teammates, including him. One slipup, one miss, and we could jeopardize this entire mission. Or worse yet, lose a member of the team. As hard as it is to snub out another life and watch them die unexpectedly from your hand, there is no way in hell I will lose my focus and take a chance on losing one of the guys. To have to live the rest of my life knowing it was my fault would be worse than death to me.
I felt Kaleb’s eyes on me all day. The urge to run to him ran through my veins as fast as the blood coursing through them. I may be an American soldier, but I’m a woman. I have a need to be held every once in a while, and I'd love to have someone tell me they care.
I know he’s not that man. God, how I wish he were. He’s crawled under my skin during the past few days. Every waking moment, all I can think about is him. I’m a fool for believing him when he told me we would continue this once we arrive back home. I'm sure he’s a liar, a manipulator, and I let him take me without knowing a damn thing about him. It's easy to say one thing in the sweltering heat of the desert, then change it completely once you hit safe land. The desert makes you fucking crazy.