Chapter 70
SOMEWHERE IN IRAQ
MITCH Rapp had a problem.
Maybe more than one.
For starters, he was once again in the truck’s driver’s seat with Azad beside him.
Though their last talk had seemed to do the trick in that the Kurd no longer regaled Rapp with a litany of America’s slights, now Azad didn’t want to talk at all.
Ordinarily, this development would be fine with Rapp, but the long hours and tedium that accompanied long-distance driving were getting to him.
He’d caught himself drifting off to sleep twice and would have welcomed a little chitchat with the Kurd, especially since their relationship’s boundaries had now been firmly established.
But Azad was not in a talking mood.
At first, Rapp had chalked up his companion’s sudden antisocial swing to a by-product of their rather direct conversation.
Rapp had gotten in the man’s face and he was sulking.
But the more he observed the Kurd, the less inclined Rapp was to believe this theory.
Azad wasn’t so much pouting as distracted.
Twice he’d spread a map across his lap to verify their position before folding it back up again.
Now he was obsessively checking his watch and drumming his fingers against his knee.
Rapp couldn’t figure out what had the man so animated.
It had taken the larger convoy a bit longer than he would have anticipated to work their way west through Ramadi’s traffic, but they were currently making good time along Highway 1.
Regardless of the source of the Kurd’s anxiety, he was amped up and uncommunicative, which in turn had Rapp’s hackles raised.
When he wasn’t drifting off to sleep.
But the issues inside the truck’s cabin were only one of Rapp’s problems. His larger, and more urgent, concern lay outside the tanker.
Or to be more specific, his position outside the tanker.
In a move that Rapp should have seen coming, Ibrahim had changed the convoy’s makeup when he’d integrated the DGS’s trucks.
To maintain continuity and prevent the newcomers from getting lost, he’d adjusted the order of march.
The convoy’s new makeup alternated every other vehicle between DGS and Ibrahim trucks.
This meant that Rapp’s order of march had changed from the third vehicle to the second.
Which was not good.
Rapp was by no means an expert on convoy takedowns, but he understood the obvious—the lead and trail vehicles did not fare well.
If the assaulters were particularly thorough, the second vehicle also was included in the kill zone, and American special operators were nothing if not thorough.
He didn’t know when the raid would occur, but since they were currently west of Ramadi, the hit could come at any time.
Which meant he needed to change his convoy order.
Rapp glanced at Azad. The Kurd was fidgeting in his seat, still seemingly caught up in his own world. Rapp pushed the clutch and revved the gas. The engine roared as the RPMs skyrocketed. Azad looked over.
“What are you doing?”
Rapp shook his head. “Something’s wrong with the transmission.”
Rapp activated the right turn signal and steered the tanker into the burn lane.
“No,” Azad said. “NO!”
The Kurd reached for the steering wheel and Rapp knocked his hand away. “What are you doing?”
“Get back in line!”
Azad grabbed the wheel with both hands and tried to wrench it left even as Rapp turned right. Rapp was balling up his fist when something distracted him.
A flash of light.