Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
Josie felt sick. She was terrified. She’d dreamed about being out of that cell for weeks, but now that she was, she wanted to go back. Back to where she knew what to expect, where she didn’t have to worry about being shot or hunted like an animal.
But…she wasn’t alone anymore. And that was better than what she’d endured while in captivity. Nate was larger than life, both physically and metaphorically. He kept himself between her and danger. Had constantly checked on her, reassured her. He didn’t treat her as if she was a liability, which Josie knew she was.
She’d lost the sandals his friends had given her the minute they picked up their pace, and hurrying through the streets was extremely painful. It felt as if she’d found every pebble and sharp stone as they’d fled. But if Nate could endure without any sign of the pain he had to be in, so could she. There was no way she would slow him down .
But finding out they’d be escaping by boat? That nearly broke her. Memories assailed Josie…seeing Ayden shot, his body carelessly thrown overboard. The panic and terror when those men had grabbed her and dragged her onto their boat.
Out on the water, she, Nate, and Kevlar would be sitting ducks. She knew that better than anyone. There’d been nowhere to hide when the men had overtaken her and Ayden. No running away. She could swim, but in the middle of the gulf, where could she go?
And now she had to get back on another boat. A smaller one. And they’d surely be chased. It was her worst nightmare all over again.
But she had no choice. None. Nate was right; it wasn’t as if a helicopter could come in and get them on the docks.
Her breaths were coming too fast as terror swam in her veins. But when Nate took her hand, and he and his fellow Navy SEAL stepped away from the shelter of the buildings, she had no choice but to follow. Her ears were ringing, and it felt as if she was seeing the world through a long dark tunnel. It didn’t help that the mesh over her face blocked her peripheral vision. Someone could be sneaking up on them and they wouldn’t even know.
“One step at a time,” Nate said softly from beside her.
She squeezed his hand in acknowledgement, and feeling his fingers tighten around hers in return made her feel not quite so alone. Not quite so scared.
They stepped onto the dock leading to the boat—and that’s when the shit hit the fan.
Someone yelled something from behind them, and without Nate or Kevlar having to tell her, Josie ran. They bolted toward the brown boat, and the man sitting next to the engine stood and gestured wildly for them to hurry.
Thankful that it was the correct boat, and they weren’t about to jump into the vessel of some stranger who didn’t know what was happening, Josie felt almost numb with relief as she ran faster. Nate was practically dragging her, since his legs were longer than hers, but he never let go of her hand. Never told her she was being too slow.
When they got to the boat, the man had already started the engine. Josie didn’t hesitate. She lifted her leg to jump in, but promptly tripped over the vast material of the burka. Thankfully, she fell right where she wanted to go anyway—into the boat. She felt the craft lurch as Nate and Kevlar followed behind her.
Before she could sit up, she was pinned to the bottom of the boat as their driver gunned the engine.
“Hang on!” Nate yelled over the sound of the powerful motor.
Josie couldn’t see, she couldn’t breathe, all she could do was hold on, as Nate had instructed. She bounced slightly every time the boat went over a wave. She heard nothing but the piercing sound of the engine as she lay on her stomach and tried not to throw up.
After a few minutes, Nate lifted himself up and off her. Josie stayed where she was. Her heart was hammering and it felt as if she was having a heart attack. The boat didn’t slow. In fact, it felt as if it was speeding up.
To her surprise, Nate turned her and began trying to get the burka up and over her head. The second it was removed, even though they were in no way safe, Josie immediately felt as if she could breathe again.
“We’re doing it,” he said, his words almost whipped away by the wind. “We’re outrunning them!”
Looking behind them, Josie saw three boats in pursuit but, to her relief, it didn’t seem as if they were gaining.
“You did good, Spirit,” Nate told her.
Josie wasn’t sure at first that she’d liked the nickname Nate had given her, but it was growing on her. Of course, she wished she could tell him her real name, but since her voice still didn’t seem to work, it wasn’t exactly possible at the moment.
Kevlar reached up to his ear and seemed to fiddle with the receiver, then half-yelled to be heard over the rushing wind, “We’re on our way with tangos hot on our heels. Roger, we’ll be ready. It’ll be good to see you too. Out.” He looked at her, then Blink. “Hold on, you two, we’re almost there.”
Josie swallowed hard and glanced ahead of them. All she saw was open water, but she knew somewhere out there was the “safe” zone. They just had to get to it before the men giving chase caught up to them.
She saw it before she heard it. A helicopter. It seemed tiny in the distance, but as they got closer and closer, it grew in size.
“That’s it. Our way out of here!” Nate shouted.
Something occurred to Josie then. How the hell were they going to get into the helicopter? She wasn’t sure, with no one out here patrolling the waters, that the people chasing would care about a borderline. She watched with trepidation as they raced closer and closer to the chopper .
Soon it was above them. The huge machine banked to the right and circled around so it paced them, heading in the same direction as the boat they were in kept driving at the same breakneck speed it had been, never slowing.
A door opened on the side of the helicopter—and a rope dropped from the opening.
Oh hell no!
Josie was not climbing up a freaking rope while driving a million miles an hour! She wasn’t a circus performer. She couldn’t do it!
But she should’ve known Nate would never ask something like that of her.
“All we have to do is hold on,” he told her, his mouth close to her ear. “They’ll pull us up with a mechanical winch. Just hold onto me and I’ll keep you safe, Spirit. I give you my word.”
For some reason, she believed him. He hadn’t broken any of the promises he’d made to her so far. She was terrified, scared shitless, but then again, everything that had happened to her recently was scary and horrible. Why would this be any different?
And yet, it was. She wasn’t alone this time. Ayden hadn’t been able to protect her; honestly, he hadn’t even tried. He panicked when he realized what he’d done, that he’d accidentally taken them into Iranian waters. He even tried to blame Josie when the men had boarded. Of course, it hadn’t done any good. He’d been shot seconds after unsuccessfully trying to throw her under the bus.
But this man? He didn’t panic when things went wrong minutes after they’d been freed from their cells. He was calm, cool, and had done everything to protect her as they fled.
Nate stared down at her, as if waiting for her agreement on what was about to happen. That was another thing she respected about this man. He didn’t force anything on her. Made it seem as if she had a say in what was happening. She didn’t, but she appreciated the effort anyway.
She finally nodded.
“Good. Hamburger or salad. They’ll soon be ours,” he quipped, then looked up at the dangling rope. He stood, and Josie did her best to brace his legs. Which was ridiculous. It wasn’t as if she had the strength to keep him from falling due to the erratic motions of the boat. Still, it made her feel as if she wasn’t quite as helpless as she felt to be helping in some little way. Thankfully, Kevlar was on his other side, further stabilizing Nate as he reached for the rope.
To her amazement, Nate quickly manipulated a portion of the long rope into a loop and secured it around his hips. Then he motioned for her to stand. Apparently, they would be going up first. Joy.
Josie stood up—and immediately fell back on her ass as the boat went over a fairly large wave.
He frowned and held out his hand. Josie gripped it and, with his help, managed to get herself up against him. He and Kevlar looped the rope around her waist, and then under her butt. “Hop up!” he yelled against the wind.
Josie didn’t understand. She frowned at him.
He didn’t explain further. Instead, he simply put his hands on her butt and lifted. Automatically, Josie wrapped her legs around him, locking her ankles together at the small of his back.
“Hold on!” he yelled.
It was then that she realized all three of them would be going up at the same time. While Nate had been helping get her situated, Kevlar had quickly attached himself to the remaining length of rope that she’d thought was just “extra.” He’d be dangling under the two of them.
Josie had a moment to pray that the rope was strong enough to lift three bodies at once. That it wouldn’t break and send them all plunging into the water. That whatever mechanical contraption would be hauling them upward would be able to function with their combined weight.
Then her terror was suddenly focused elsewhere. Over Nate’s shoulder, Josie saw several men in the boats that were pursuing them, aiming what looked like rifles on steroids straight at their boat.
A squeak left her throat. She wanted to yell for Nate to watch out. To point out the fact that they were about to get shot, but her voice wasn’t cooperating.
She hissed as she felt pressure on her ass, and suddenly they began to ascend at a rapid rate. To her horror, they were about a dozen feet up when she saw the man who’d driven them to freedom fall over in the bottom of the boat.
He’d been shot!
Sorrow filled her. She hadn’t said a word to the man, and he hadn’t talked to any of them, but he’d risked his life to help them escape. Now he’d been shot because of them.
Closing her eyes, she buried her face in Nate’s neck. She tightened her legs and arms around him and prayed he wouldn’t drop her.
They spun in circles as the chopper lifted high into the sky and away from the boats, bullets flying around them. Josie felt dizzy, and she opened her eyes to try to get her equilibrium back. She instantly regretted it, as their position above the waves was way higher than she’d anticipated.
“Almost there!” Nate yelled.
Josie looked up and saw the skids of the helicopter getting closer and closer at an alarming rate. Once again, she closed her eyes, not wanting to see the collision that was about to happen. Except it didn’t.
She felt the rope swing outward, which made her open her eyes. A man inside the helicopter was manipulating the rope so they avoided smacking into the skids. He made it look so easy to maneuver them…but she supposed he probably had lots of practice helping people into a helicopter flying a million miles an hour over a churning ocean while being shot at.
The thought made her internally roll her eyes at herself. It was weird the things the brain came up with to cope with stressful situations.
Then hands were touching her, and she felt something hard at her back. They were yanked inside, and she watched as Kevlar hauled himself inside the chopper with little ceremony and an efficiency built by experience.
“Go, go, go!” someone yelled.
Before she had a chance to feel relieved that they were inside the helicopter, it banked left, hard. Sending her and Nate careening toward the other side. His back smacked against the metal wall of the chopper, and then they were sliding forward.
“Fuck!” Nate cursed, but his arms tightened around Josie, not letting go, not trying to remove the harness he’d wrapped around them both.
The noise inside the chopper was so loud, Josie couldn’t hear anything but Nate.
“Easy, bro!”
The cover-up Josie had worn for weeks slid up as, once again, the helicopter banked hard to one side. She felt burning on the back of her thigh, but before she could even register the pain, a loud boom echoed through the chopper, making it lurch, and for a second, Josie thought the engine had stopped.
“Fuck!” Nate yelled. Then he looked down at her. “We’re hit.”
The words didn’t register at first. And when they did finally sink in, the terror Josie felt earlier—all of it…running from their prison, seeing the boat they had to get in, being chased on the open seas, dangling by what seemed like a thread from a helicopter—increased tenfold.
“We’ve got one of the best pilots in the Army flying this thing. We’ll be fine.”
Josie had no idea how the hell they were going to be fine when they’d just been hit by some sort of missile. She could smell the smoke now, the caustic scent of gas.
Nate managed to sit upright. While keeping his arms around Josie, he scooted toward a lone seat right behind one of the pilots. Even with the chopper moving from side to side, obviously trying to evade more weapons fire from the men in boats, he pulled himself into the seat with Josie still clinging to him. Kevlar had strapped himself to the side of the chopper and he was on his knees, pointing his weapon out the still-open door of the chopper.
To her surprise, Nate pulled a harness, a seat belt of sorts, around the both of them, snapping it into place. He had his arms around her back, and her face was pressed against the side of his neck. She was straddling his lap, her crotch pressed tight against his, her cover-up and bikini no barrier whatsoever. The position should’ve been awkward, but all Josie could think of was sticking as close to Nate as possible.
She was about to die in a fiery helicopter crash. And if that didn’t kill her, water filling the interior as they sank to the bottom of the ocean certainly would.
She didn’t want to be alone when she died, and as long as she clung to Nate, at least they would die together.
The helicopter trip was the longest of Josie’s life. It could’ve been ten minutes or an hour. She had no clue. By some miracle, they didn’t crash. Not into the ocean, at least. She vaguely heard Nate speaking but due to her fear, his words made no sense.
Then his arms tightened around her so hard it was difficult to breathe. She figured out why when the sound of the engine suddenly disappeared.
“This is it. Hang on!” one of the pilots called out.
Squeezing her eyes shut, Josie did as ordered.
The last thing she heard was a popping sound, and Nate saying “ fuck! ” before the world turned upside down and something hit her head—hard.
Blink woke to the smell of something burning. Everything returned to him in a flash. The crazy boat ride, being hoisted to the chopper, seeing his brother, Tate, behind the controls, then the helicopter being hit with an RPG. Tate swearing as he and his copilot fought to stay in the air. He heard him say something about going down in Iraq before the engine died and they crashed.
Feeling pressure on his chest, Blink looked down and saw Spirit lying bonelessly against him. He’d managed to get them both into one of the seats and strapped in. Thank God. If he hadn’t, they’d probably both be dead right now. As it was, he saw blood dripping from the side of Spirit’s head.
“Tate? Kevlar?” he called out, worried about his brother and the other pilot and his team leader.
“I’m good!” Kevlar said.
“Alive!” Tate replied. “You and the girl?”
“Same,” Blink said. He felt little puffs of air on his neck, so he knew Spirit was breathing.
“Shit, man, that was intense,” the copilot said.
Blink focused and saw they were all still sitting in the cockpit of the MH-60 Black Hawk helicopter. Behind him was nothing but open air. To his right, the door of the chopper was completely missing and above him, he saw sky.
“Good to see you, bro,” Tate said, turning around with a small smirk. “But I mean, maybe we could’ve met over a beer at a bar or something instead?”
Blink couldn’t stop the smile that spread over his lips. “ Can’t help but be in the middle of a clusterfuck, can you?” he asked his twin.
“Heard you needed a ride, who was I to turn that down?” Tate said.
“If you’re done with your brotherly reunion, Casper, I’m thinking we need to get the hell out of here. We left a trail that tangos on both sides of the border will be able to follow,” the copilot said. “We need to be out of here when they arrive.”
“Bro, this is Pyro, my copilot,” Tate said.
Blink nodded at the other man. “This is Kevlar, my team leader,” he said, introducing Kevlar to the pilots. “Where are we?”
“Mountains between Iraq and Iran. I tried to get us to the desert, but steering was fucked by that RPG. This was as good as I could get,” his brother explained.
“Any landing you walk away from is a perfect landing,” Kevlar told him.
“Tell that to Laryn. She’s gonna be pissed I crashed her baby.”
Blink eyed him. “Laryn?”
“She’s a mechanic on the naval carrier working as a special contractor to the Army for the Night Stalkers who was in the area when we got word you needed a lift out of Iran,” Pyro answered. “You’re lucky we were around. The Navy asked for us to join them onboard…for a mission I can’t talk about, of course. Laryn always warns Casper that if he brings this beauty back with even a scratch, he’ll answer to her,” Pyro said.
Blink nodded, then returned his attention to Spirit with a frown. She hadn’t stirred against him. He unclipped the harness then quickly released the ropes he’d used to secure her to him for their ride into the chopper. He scooted forward in his seat. The cockpit was sitting at an angle, and he marveled anew at the fact that they were all still alive. He always knew his brother was a damn good pilot, had to be in order to be a Night Stalker, one of the best of the best as far as helicopter pilots went in the Army, but this certainly proved it.
Kevlar helped him move so he didn’t have to let go of Spirit, and every muscle in his body screamed as he scooted to the edge of the chopper and stepped outside with Spirit still limp in his arms. He walked a few steps away from the smoldering chopper and went to his knees.
“Spirit?” he asked, as he lay her down on her back on the rocky ground.
“Who is she?” Tate asked, crouching beside him.
“No clue,” Blink said. “She was in the cell next to mine.” He glanced briefly at his twin. “Look at her. She’s been starved. The only reason she was still alive was because there was a fucking leak in the corner of her cell, where she was able to collect water. And she gave it to me. She had this little tin cup, and it filled up every couple of days. And after a torture session, she gave that precious water to me . She hasn’t spoken a single word. I have no idea what her name is, where she’s from, or anything about her…but she’s mine .”
Blink’s words were fierce and guttural. What he was saying made no sense, but he didn’t care. He was in awe of this woman. She’d done everything he’d asked of her and more. She had no reason to trust him, and yet she had anyway. She’d been thrown away, forgotten, and somehow she’d survived. Her spirit still shone as bright as the fucking sun.
“Easy, Blink,” Kevlar said, putting a hand on his shoulder.
Blink took a deep breath. Getting emotional and worked up wouldn’t do Spirit any good. He needed to stay calm. Do what needed to be done.
Tate nodded. “Take your woman over there while Pyro and I do what we need to do. We’ll get the emergency packs and then we’ll be on our way.”
“I’ll help,” Kevlar said without hesitation.
Blink should’ve known his brother wouldn’t tell him he was being ridiculous. They were twins; Tate knew him better than anyone in the entire world.
“Tate,” he said when his brother started to walk away.
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.” Blink didn’t know what he was thanking his brother for. Coming to get him. Landing the disabled chopper. Not telling him that he was ridiculous for claiming a woman he didn’t even know by name.
His brother didn’t need clarification. He simply nodded, then turned back to the helicopter.
Blink stood and carefully picked up Spirit, carrying her about a hundred feet away from the downed chopper. His brother, Pyro, and Kevlar had jobs to do. They needed to make sure no one was able to get any government secrets by dismantling the helicopter. They’d destroy what they could, then torch the rest.
Right now, he was more concerned with the fact that Spirit was still unconscious. He put her back on the ground and inspected the wound on her head. It was bleeding sluggishly, but when he brushed her hair away from the wound, he was relieved to see it didn’t need stitches.
He was carefully inspecting her arms and legs when his skin prickled, and Blink looked at her face—startled to realize she was awake and looking right at him.
“Hey,” he said in a calm tone.
As expected, she didn’t respond, simply continued to stare.
“Can you sit up?” he asked.
He waited, but when she didn’t nod or shake her head, decided to encourage her to move anyway. He got her to a sitting position, and she finally took her gaze from him and looked around. Her eyes widened when she saw the helicopter.
“Yeah, it was a hard landing,” Blink said, with no intonation in his voice.
She made a strangled sound in her throat that he thought might be a chuckle, and he felt ten feet tall that he’d been able to do that. Make her laugh. “My brother is apparently a fucking wizard,” he told her. Then sighed. “Right, so…bad news is that we crashed. But the good news is that we’re not in the ocean, and we aren’t in Iran anymore.”
Her gaze swung back to him, and she lifted a brow. Now it was Blink’s turn to chuckle. “Right, so we’re in Iraq. But we aren’t actively at war with them anymore. So all we have to do is take a little walk through the mountains and I’m sure Tex will have us picked up in no time.”
Spirit tilted her head as if to ask who the hell he was talking about.
“Tex is a former Navy SEAL who has made it his mission in life to watch over those of us crazy enough to do this job. I’ve got a tracker. In my underwear. It’s how my team knew exactly where to find me, and how the chopper found us in the middle of the ocean. It might take a couple of days, but they will come and get us,” Blink told her.
“We’re almost ready to go,” Tate called out.
Blink looked at Spirit. “That’s my brother, the fancy-ass helicopter pilot. We’re twins.”
Spirit looked over at Tate, then back to him, then back at his twin. She wrinkled her nose, then shook her head at him.
“What? We are.”
She shook her head again.
Blink couldn’t help but grin. “You don’t think we look alike? Literally no one can tell us apart,” he informed her.
To his surprise, Spirit pointed at herself.
“You can?” Blink asked.
She nodded.
For some reason, he liked that. No, he freaking loved it. And as much as he wanted to sit here and chat with this woman in their entirely unique way, they needed to get moving.
“Right. Good. Well…that’s my brother. His name is Tate, but he goes by his call sign of Casper. That’s his copilot, Pyro. They have to destroy the chopper before we go, so there will be a loud boom, and we need to be moving when it happens so anyone who might come to investigate doesn’t find us here.”
He wasn’t surprised when Spirit merely nodded once more, then tried to stand.
“Easy!” Blink exclaimed when she swayed on her feet. He didn’t feel much more steady himself, but it wasn’t as if either of them had a choice to lay around and eat bonbons.
When she was standing firm, it hit Blink that she was practically naked. Yes, she still had on her bikini, but the cover-up was torn in several places. And when she turned away from him, he saw a nasty red mark on the back of her thigh.
She was hurt. And seeing that mark made him feel nauseous. It was a silly thing to worry about; they were all totally banged up from the crash. He should just be thankful they were alive. But still, seeing that mark on her leg made him realize how fragile she was, despite her iron will. She’d been tough as hell up until now, and would have to continue to be…and he hated it.
“Tate!” he called out.
His brother turned.
“Need some clothes here.”
Without a word, Tate jogged over to where they were standing and dropped a large pack at his feet. “Not sure what’s in there,” he told him.
“I’ll make it work. Thanks. How much time?”
“Five minutes.”
“Roger.”
Then his twin headed back to the helicopter to help Pyro and Kevlar pull out wires and set explosives.
Blink unzipped the pack and began to rifle through it. He pulled out a brown undershirt that the Army soldiers wore beneath their uniforms. It would be way too big on Spirit, but he didn’t think she’d care.
“We need to get you dressed in something more appropriate. Can you take off that cover-up?” It was a huge ask, and Blink knew it. He stood between her and the other men. They weren’t watching them, and it wasn’t as if they didn’t know exactly what she looked like. The cover-up was as good as useless, but he knew it was probably psychological protection at this point, more than anything else.
She met his gaze, then slowly peeled the torn, dirty piece of material over her shoulders and let it fall to the ground.
“Here, lean over,” he told her softly. “I’ll help you get the shirt on.”
She bent forward, and he eased the material over her head. It fell halfway down her thighs. Blink hadn’t missed the way her ribs stood out, how her belly was concave, how her hip bones protruded obscenely from her body. She looked like the pictures he’d seen of prisoners of war from Vietnam and World War II. It made him sick to think of what she’d suffered…and how many days she might’ve had left if they hadn’t escaped. But the fact that she was still upright, still pressing on, impressed the hell out of him.
He turned back to his brother’s pack before he did something stupid…like fall to his knees and vow to never let her go hungry again. The fact was, she wasn’t his. For all he knew, she had a family waiting for her back in the States. A husband. Maybe kids. He was helping her escape and that was it.
But it didn’t feel like that was all this was. He felt a connection with this woman that he’d never experienced before. They’d bonded back in those cells and when she’d given him her precious water, the only thing keeping her alive, it felt like she’d given a small part of herself to him.
Blink wasn’t the kind of man to force a woman to do anything , let alone stay with him. It was very likely she was grateful he’d helped her escape. Might even want to keep in touch because of the situation they’d been through together. But he wasn’t sure she’d like the man he was in the real world. A homebody. An introvert. More likely to stand back and watch life pass him by than take part.
He pulled a pair of camo pants from the duffle and frowned. They were going to be huge on Spirit. There was no way he’d be able to modify them enough for her to wear. Especially not before they had to get out of the area.
“Fuck,” he muttered, before stuffing them back into the pack and pulling out a pair of socks. Now these she could use. Blink turned back to Spirit.
She was staring down at him.
“These will be big too, but we don’t have shoes for you to wear. I think if we double them up, they should cushion your feet enough that you can walk. But if anything starts hurting, let me know and I’ll carry you.”
She frowned at that.
“I know, I know, you don’t want to be a burden. And you aren’t—hear me?” he said almost fiercely. “You’ve been anything but a burden. We’re partners. Teammates. And teammates help each other.”
He saw her swallow hard, then nod.
“Good. Oh, and while the last thing I want is to see you in my brother’s underwear, I’m thinking that’s preferable to going without anything. They’ll be like shorts,” Blink said, pulling out a pair of olive-green boxers.
Spirit’s eyes widened, and she eagerly reached for the underwear. Even those were too big for her, almost falling off her hips.
“Here, let me help,” Blink said, finding a piece of paracord in the pack and quickly tying it around her too-skinny waist as a belt. He folded the extra material from the boxers over the rope so it wouldn’t scratch her skin. “There. Does that work? Can you walk all right?”
Spirit took a few steps in a small circle, then nodded at him. She looked both pathetic and kind of adorable in her new outfit. The oversized shirt, the boxers peeking out from under the hem, the socks pulled over her calves. It wasn’t enough—not nearly enough—but the fact that he’d covered her a little made Blink feel better about their situation.
The boots in Tate’s pack felt like dead weight after he pulled them on. He felt guilty that he had sturdy footwear and Spirit was in fucking socks. But there was literally nothing he could do about that right now. He hoped like hell Tex had already done his thing, and help was coming to them sooner rather than later.
“Okay, we’re ready. Cover your ears,” Pyro called out.
Instead of covering his own, Blink stepped close to Spirit and put his hands over her ears.
Then she surprised the hell out of him…by reaching up and covering his own with her tiny hands.
The loud explosion from whatever the others had rigged up was much bigger and louder than Blink expected.
“Time to go!” Tate exclaimed, as he jogged toward them with Pyro and Kevlar at his heels. “That’s gonna be a bullseye for every member of the Taliban and other bad guys for miles. They’ll be pissing themselves to get here to see what they can find. She good?”
“She’s good,” Blink said. “And she can hear you just fine. Don’t talk about her as if she’s not standing in front of you.”
“Sorry,” Tate apologized immediately. “You got a name?” he asked Spirit.
She stared back at him without saying a word.
“She doesn’t talk,” Blink reminded his brother. “Not with words.”
To his credit, Tate merely nodded. “Got it. The way I figure it, we need to move southwest. Make sure we don’t accidentally cross into Iran. I’m guessing you’ve both had enough of their hospitality.”
Blink snorted in response.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. It won’t be easy, but there should be plenty of places to hole up if we need to. This part of Iraq is inhabited, but we can avoid any outposts. If you need a break,” Tate said, looking at Spirit, “let us know. This isn’t a matter of racing to any particular point. We just need to keep moving and watch our six for tangos. We’ll be picked up as fast as the hands of diplomacy can manage.”
Blink nodded. He understood what his brother was saying. No one would be happy with the events that had transpired. A US soldier being taken captive, then being shot down while not in Iranian airspace, then a Night Stalker helicopter crashing in Iraq. And now with both Army and Navy personnel in danger, all the stops would be pulled out to get them home safely. It was only a matter of time before someone came for them.
They just had to stay alive until then .
Pyro led them as they walked away from the crash. Looking back, Blink shook his head in amazement. If he was a cat, he’d definitely used up a few of his nine lives, but he felt as if he had the spirits of his former teammates looking after him. And he knew without a doubt that his current team was probably already seeking permission to come after him once more.
As long as they didn’t run into any pockets of Taliban fighters—who would gladly kill a few Americans dumb enough to encroach on their territory—they’d be fine.