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  “Shift the Reaper over and find me some fast movers,” he ordered.

  The jihadists had set up a wide perimeter to keep the strike team from spreading too far from the crash site, and he could already see some of the fighters picking over the first helo.

  They were dragging bodies out of the back of the bird, while two blocks to the east, their technicals were laying down a base of fire on Warchild’s team, allowing the dismounted soldiers to maneuver on the Americans.

  “Put it right in the middle of that formation,” Vann said, pointing at a mass of men flooding in from the north.

  “Yes sir, stand by for shot.”

  As he waited for the impact, he was left with the stark reality that he only had one missile left. It wasn’t going to be enough to get his men out.

  The screen blossomed as the missile slammed into the cab of one of the technicals, tossing what was left high in the air. The overpressure from the explosion ripped into the jihadists gathered around the vehicle, knocking them off their feet. Shards of metal began raining down on them from the sky.

  He took his encrypted cell phone from his pocket, knowing that sooner or later he was going to have to brief his boss. Pushing the redial button, he brought the phone to his ear, wondering if he should tell National Security Advisor Jacob Simmons that he was sending Brantley over to monitor the situation.

  The general was confident that the young captain would insure that any loose ends were tied up neatly, but that was small comfort. The plan had spun so far out of control already, what was there to salvage?

  He had advised against sending Boland back out after al Nusra had burned him, but the problem with working for Cage was the fact that the defense secretary always kept his cards tight to his chest. Vann knew something much bigger was in play than just trying to recover some stolen equipment, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what the bigger objective was.

  “It’s Vann,” he said as soon as Simmons answered the phone.

  “What’s the status?”

  “We hit the building, but we don’t have a body count.”

  “What about Ronin 6?”

  Vann could feel a wave of anger rising up inside him. He couldn’t care less about Mason Kane right now. He wanted to tell his boss that they had bigger fish to fry.

  “He was inside the building during the strike, but like I said, we have no idea of the effects.”

  “Patrick,” Simmons growled. “You’re doing a hell of a job, but I need to know if the targets are down.”

  “I’ll handle it, sir. One other thing, though: I’m going to need more assets to get the strike team out.”

  The phone fell silent, and Vann knew that Simmons was weighing his options. The wrong decision could pull the United States into another war. “Sir, what does it matter?” he asked. “As far as I can tell, whether we fight a war in Syria, or we fight in—”

  Simmons cut him off. “Be careful, Patrick,” he warned. “You do what you have to do to get them out, but nothing more. It’s not time yet.”

  “I’m going to need the F-18s.”

  “The president’s not going to like that, but I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Yes sir.”

  “And Patrick, I want Mason’s body,” he said before hanging up.

  Vann slipped the phone back into his pocket. He had no idea why Simmons was so obsessed with making sure that Mason was dead, but he took a deep breath, figuring it was well beyond his pay grade.

  “Get those F-18s on station and tell Savage 6 that help is on the way. Someone get Anderson on the phone. I need an extraction team in the air right now.”

  As his men jumped into action, General Vann felt his stomach churn. He was just as culpable as the man who’d put this fucked-up plan into action. He was too far invested to pull out now. That meant if things went sideways, he was going to burn.

  CHAPTER 14

  * * *

  The gunfire had decreased after the Hellfire eased the pressure they were getting from the north, but Renee was running low on ammo. Fifteen feet to her right, Parker kicked in the front door of a building. She could hear a woman scream as he made entry.

  They needed badly to get out of the open, and as soon as he yelled, “Clear,” the rest of the team began falling back.

  Renee was moving to cover when the firing kicked up again. A round ricocheted off the ground near her feet, and she turned to see a fighter spraying blindly down the street.

  She was exposed to so many angles that it was impossible to move without getting shot at. Only by sheer luck did she avoid being hit again. As the perimeter collapsed, more jihadists rushed closer to the beleaguered strike team, eager to press their advantage.

  Renee heard Warchild yelling from inside the building—he was directing men up onto the roof—leaving her to engage the latest threat. The sun that had been so pleasant earlier beat down on her exposed flesh, making her feel like an ant under a magnifying glass. She had been aware for some time that she was desperate for a sip of water and was beginning to feel the effects of dehydration.

  Renee fired from the hip and felt the bolt slam to the rear as the rounds chewed across the fighter’s chest.

  She scrambled for a fresh mag, tossing the empty in the dirt. The lack of water was taking its toll on her dexterity. Renee tried to seat the magazine, but it bounced off the mag well. She stopped in the middle of the street, forcing herself to focus, and she’d almost gotten the rifle back into action when a round pounded her in the chest, knocking her to the ground.

  It felt like she’d been hit with a sledgehammer. She tumbled backward, the magazine flying out of her hand. A wave of panic rushed up out of her subconscious, causing her to freeze up.

  “Not now,” she spat, fighting off the fear creeping up her spine as she scrambled to grab the magazine, which lay just out of reach.

  She hadn’t told anyone about the panic attacks she had been suffering for the past five months, but they were obviously getting worse, and now was definitely not the time to have one.

  Warchild appeared at the door of the building. A frown filled his face as he saw her sprawled on her back. Instantly he dove out into the street, oblivious to the rounds zipping over his head and shielded her with his body.

  He snapped the rifle from left to right, his finger dancing on the trigger like he was shooting a drill on the range. One of the first two rounds mushroomed inside the forehead of a fighter and the man’s legs buckled beneath him. Warchild’s muzzle snapped to the next target and he stacked two more rounds dead center of the jihadist’s chest. Then he flipped the selector to full auto and hammered a long burst toward the men gathering at the end of the block.

  “Come on,” he yelled at the fighters before lowering the rifle and yanking Renee off the ground just as her hand was closing around the magazine. She had just landed on her feet when an RPG screamed from up the street. With a violent lunge, she pushed Warchild out of the way.

  The warhead slammed into the side of the building, and the explosion knocked her over again. Debris slapped her across the face, acrid smoke burned her lungs, and dust stung her eyes. Yet she couldn’t be a victim, she told herself. She slammed the mag into the rifle and hit the bolt release. She was looking for Warchild when a jihadist came running out of the smoke.

  Renee watched in slow detachment as the fighter settled his muzzle on her and prepared to fire.

  Every detail was clearly defined: from the man’s dark-brown eyes to the stubble on his chin. The world had slowed, and she just stood there as his finger closed around the trigger.

  She could feel the blood dripping from her face, and the chill that came from mild dehydration. Renee was vaguely aware of the goose bumps on her arms as she stood staring at the man about to kill her.

  A shadow streaked from her right, and as she waited for the rifle to go off, she heard Sergeant Major Mitchell bellowing a war cry. The fighter hesitated, a look of fear crossing his face before he turned to engage
the man charging him.

  Mitchell launched himself into the air at the same moment the man fired, but his aim was high and Renee heard his bones crack when Mitchell’s shoulder slammed into his side. Despite the fact that one of his arms hung uselessly at his side, Mitchell speared the man into the ground and drove his helmet into the fighter’s face.

  He wrapped his massive hand around the fighter’s neck, squeezing while the man’s legs kicked helplessly beneath him. A moment later the jihadist was still, and Mitchell staggered to his feet, smiling through the mask of blood that covered his face.

  “Looks like we’re even,” he said before helping her to cover.

  CHAPTER 15

  * * *

  Mason Kane lay on his stomach, unable to see because of the thick brown haze enveloping him. He heard a muffled yell behind him, but the total darkness shrouded where it was coming from.

  “Zeus,” he croaked, forcing himself out of the dirt and rising to his knees.

  He remembered coming to the end of the tunnel at the same moment the grenade went off, and the overpressure slapped him in the face, knocking him back. Mason had felt the ground rumble beneath him and thought he’d heard a second explosion before being knocked unconscious.

  Dirt clogged his airways, and he gagged before vomiting a mass of mud and dirt onto the ground. The explosion had bent the barrel of his AK-47, and he used the butt stock to dig into the dirt around him.

  He had to find Zeus.

  “Fuck, where are you, buddy?” he yelled, flinging dirt behind him.

  A faint yell came from his left, and he coughed, spitting a mixture of mud and bile before tossing the rifle to the side. Mason clawed at the dirt with his bare hands, scrabbling like a dog in search of a bone. Finally, his fingers brushed against something hard.

  Scooping the dirt away in huge handfuls, he found the toe of Zeus’s boot. Spurred on by the fear that his friend was dying beneath him, he tried to yank him out. Zeus was buried too deep to muscle out, so Mason went back to digging. As the pit grew wider, the earth began relinquishing its hold on the Libyan.

  Sweat was pouring down Mason’s face, and his bandage was filthy by the time he pulled his unconscious friend out of the makeshift grave. Mason checked his pulse, and he was leaning forward to begin CPR when the Libyan’s filthy hand reached up and pushed his face away.

  “Get off me,” Zeus commanded weakly.

  “Holy shit,” Mason panted, falling back onto his ass to watch his partner sit up. As he did, an avalanche of black earth fell away from his body.

  “What were you trying to do, kiss me?” Zeus asked, spitting out a clod of dirt.

  “I was trying to save you,” Mason said.

  “It was your fault this shit happened,” Zeus replied, tossing a handful of dirt at his best friend.

  “Yeah, that was a terrible idea.”

  Overwhelmed by how close they had come to death, Mason lay flat on his back, allowing his eyes to adjust to his surroundings. Zeus got to his feet and shook himself like an animal coming out of water. Dirt flew in every direction, pelting the American, who was still trying to catch his breath.

  As he lay on the ground, his hand reached down to insure that the Glock was still secure in its holster. He heard Zeus say, “Looks like we got one.”

  Mason stood, feeling dirt slide down his pants, and moved out of the tunnel. He inspected the man lying on the ground. “Hey, are you okay?” he asked sarcastically in Arabic, kicking the man in the side.

  “Ahhhhh, damn you,” the jihadist screamed.

  The man’s shirt was covered in blood from the shrapnel that had pelted his body, and his pants leg was burned and tattered from the blast. A jagged wound had been opened in his abdomen, and Mason could see that he was losing a lot of blood. He tried to roll onto his stomach, but the American grabbed him by the shoulders, forcing him to lie flat.

  Mason knew the man was his only link to Boland and without a moment’s hesitation he brought his knee down on the jihadist’s wound.

  As expected, the man shrieked in pain. “What, does that hurt?” Mason asked, slapping the man’s hands away as he reached up. “Who are you?”

  “Fuck you,” his attacker gurgled in Arabic.

  “Hey, buddy,” Mason said, smacking him across the face, “you don’t have much time left, so let’s cut the shit. Tell me who you are, or I’m going to cut your eyelids off.”

  Mason slipped his knife from its sheath attached to his chest rig and held it up so the man could see it. The blade had been handmade in Illinois by master bladesmith John Kiedaisch—and Mason liked to joke that it never failed to leave an impression.

  “You are too late.” The man smiled, dazed in his agony.

  “Really? Well, guess what, I’m not going anywhere,” he said, driving his knee deeper into the man’s wound. “What’s your name?”

  The Arab twisted in pain, trying to alleviate the pressure being forced on his wound. Mason brought the knife closer to the man’s face, hovering the razor-sharp point over one eyeball.

  “If you keep squirming, you’re going to bleed faster, so sit still,” he commanded, backhanding him across the mouth.

  “Listen to me,” Zeus said, settling onto his haunches next to the Arab. “I know you are from Iran. Please tell my friend what he wants to know. I promise you that he will cut your face to ribbons if you don’t talk. And then he will leave your body to be eaten by the dogs. Just tell him your name,” he begged.

  “My name is Esmail.”

  That was progress, Mason thought. “Where did they take the American?”

  Esmail smiled sardonically, and Mason grabbed the man’s face with one hand. With the other, he pushed the tip of the blade down into his eyeball.

  “I told you,” Zeus said, looking away in disgust as their prisoner screamed in agony.

  “I asked you, where did they take the American?” Mason demanded again.

  “They are taking him to the border,” he cried, blood pouring from his eye.

  “Who took him?”

  “I do not know.”

  Mason stuck the blade deep into the man’s nose before pulling up on the handle. The honed edge cut through his nostril, and he screamed, “Al Qatar took him. It was al Qatar.”

  Mason’s face was set in a savage mask of fury, and Zeus could tell the jihadist would get no mercy. The Libyan shook his head while Mason continued his impromptu interrogation. “If you tell me where to find him, I will kill you quickly, but otherwise I must make you suffer.”

  “A village—there is a place the American used near al Hasakah, but I promise you, it is too late. Your friend is already dead.”

  Mason had a suspicion he was right about that. “Why did they take him?”

  “You will find out soon enough,” the Iranian whispered before finally succumbing to his wounds.

  “Esmail, hey, are you with me?” Mason yelled, slapping him across the face.

  Zeus grabbed his hand. “He is dead, my friend. Maybe next time don’t stab him in the eye.”

  Mason looked over at Zeus, taking in the disgust written across his friend’s face, before looking down at the dead Iranian. “What was I supposed to do?” Mason asked, struggling to his feet.

  Zeus’s eyes narrowed and anger washed over his face. “The longer you stay here, the more savage you become,” he accused.

  Mason slipped his knife back into its scabbard and got to his feet. He felt the dead man’s blood warm on his pants leg. He knew that Zeus was right. The worst part was that he had seen with his own eyes what happened to men who ventured too far from their humanity.

  He didn’t get off on inflicting pain, and he knew that sometimes the difference between good and evil was a very thin line. The problem was, once you crossed over, it was so very easy to stay on the other side.

  Mason had no idea how far the tunnel had taken them from the bank, but as he scanned the interior of the new building, he saw a door on the far wall. Sunlight trickled in throu
gh a hole where the knob should have been. It reminded him that they were far from finished.

  Distant gunfire told him that Renee was still under fire and he needed to find his team before they could go after al Qatar.

  “What do you want to do?” Zeus asked as they cautiously approached the door.

  “We have to get to the helos.”

  Mason drew his pistol, opened the door, and scanned the street before stepping outside. He had no idea who al Qatar was or why he had gone to such great lengths to snatch Mick Boland, but he owed it to his friend to find out.

  The sun blinded him as he cleared the next corner, moving south toward the sound of the gunfire. Behind him Zeus muttered curses to himself while shaking a layer of fresh earth from his AK-47.

  “Why am I up here with a pistol when you have a rifle?” Mason demanded, motioning for the Libyan to take point.

  Zeus flipped him the finger before stepping past him. Mason tried to keep from laughing at the man’s filthy face and grime-encrusted clothing.

  “You owe me a new pair of clothes,” Zeus snapped, as if he knew what Mason was thinking.

  The Libyan set near side security, allowing Mason to hobble across the street, where he posted up next to a bombed-out shop. Once he was set, Zeus jogged across and kept moving south.

  A man dressed in filthy gray pants and a brown T-shirt came running around the corner, surprising Zeus—who fired when he saw the rifle cradled in the man’s arms. The round blew through the man’s throat, ripping a gouging hole below his chin. He dropped the rifle and tried desperately to plug the wound with his shaking hands. Mason could see him choking on his own blood as Zeus pushed past him, advancing to the corner.

  Mason scooped the fighter’s rifle off the ground, ignoring the jihadist, who slumped against the wall and slid slowly to the ground. He was about to check the magazine when Zeus yanked a grenade off his filthy kit and bounced it around the corner.

  “Can’t go that way,” he said, sprinting past Mason.