Chapter 7 #2
I was really hungry.
Hunger-induced nausea combined with bumpy roads made me cranky.
“How long have we been on the road?” I muttered.
Coach checked his watch. “Forty-eight minutes.”
And the last fifteen had been like this. Dirt roads and sharp turns.
Coach took another call. “Yeah?” He was checking the gun I’d handed over earlier. It was an old scraped-up Beretta 9000, and he seemed to know his way around it. “Are you fucking kidding me? They ask way too many questions.”
Who did?
“No, that’s for you to negotiate with them,” he said to whoever. “In the meantime, I want a massage chair in the rec room for my suffering, and I don’t wanna see any fucking paperwork.”
A massage chair would be awesome.
“Get two,” I whispered.
“Make that two chairs,” Coach added.
Suh-weet.
“Get out of here with that shit,” he chuckled darkly. “They don’t want the case—they just know it looks bad when we have one explosion, one casualty, and two injured that close to the Pentagon in the same day. Mark my words, they’re gonna let us do all the work, and they get the credit as usual.”
Uh-oh. Sounded to me like another government agency was getting involved. The FBI? The CIA? I bet it was the Feds.
“Who said that? Is that River? Put him on,” Coach demanded. “What’ve you got?”
His body language and the look in his eyes changed to something much more serious within seconds. Based on how his gaze flickered, his mind was racing and processing whatever River was saying, and it felt like we were quickly approaching go-time.
“Well, thanks for finally filling me in,” he stated quietly. “And he thinks Beckett is threatenin’ his operations.”
I sat straighter.
“Well, we’re sure as shit comin’ for them now ,” he said. “How far out are the others?”
It frustrated me when he only hummed or said “received” and “copy that” to whatever River said, because I wanted to be in the loop. Since we were traveling on a dirt road, we had to be getting fairly close to our destination, right? So I wanted to be clued in and given orders.
“No, it’ll be better since I have a recruit with me,” he answered. “I’d rather not risk his life unnecessarily.”
How nice of him.
“Copy. I’ll call you in one minute.” Coach pressed the button in his earbud again, and he locked eyes with me. “Change of plans. When I get the green light from River and Shira, we will shoot the tires to slow down the van.” He pointed at the back tires under the bench, and I lifted my eyebrows. Was he serious? “They’re heading for a bunker, and we can’t let them drive down there,” he said. “It’ll give them the advantage back.”
Yeah, no, fuck that. I wasn’t disappearing underground!
“Okay, so we blow out the tires, and then what? Drop and roll?” I peered under the bench and aimed the flashlight to see where I could fire for direct impact. It was impossible for me to know exactly where the tire sat in the wheelhouse, how thick and reinforced the material was in that area of the vehicle, and how many rounds we’d waste on getting through. “Are we sure it’s not better to shoot through the shell into the cab? We could get the driver.”
“They already did the math on that,” Coach replied. “If they’ve reinforced that wall in any way, we’re down five or six rounds, the driver’s been alerted to what we’re doing, and he’ll accelerate to get below faster.”
Fair enough.
“I’m glad you mentioned drop and roll,” he continued. “That’s exactly what we’ll do. When the van loses speed, we’ll jump out at my signal—I’ll be right behind you. And you don’t fucking break your legs. Keep the knees bent, let your side take the fall, protect your head. You can run with a broken elbow or fractured wrist. You can’t do that if you break your foot—fuck. Hold on.” He clenched his jaw and pressed the button again to take a call. “It hasn’t been a minute—what? He’s in position now?” He blew out a long breath and nodded to himself. “Roger. Okay, yeah. I’ll fill him in. Thirty seconds.” He made eye contact with me once more. “Forget what I said. We have our sniper in position. He’ll take out the tires. Once the vehicle slows down, we jump out. Moment you hit the ground, you fucking run, Watts. Are we clear? You head for the closest tree line, and you take cover in the forest.”
“Yes, sir. What’re the surroundings gonna look like?” Remembering I had earplugs in my pockets from target practice, I dug them out and inserted one of them.
“Their bunker sits in the center of a clearing that’s roughly ten acres,” he replied. I hated acres. Acres were useless to me. I needed the equivalent in football fields so I could visualize it. “Forest all around—and we have our backup waiting out there.”
“And the workers?” I asked without gesturing their way.
“We get to safety first.” He pressed the button yet again. “Coach and Watts, good to go.” He motioned for me to get on my feet, then abruptly pointed at my holster. At the same time, he instructed the workers to get down and huddle together.
Oh shit. Yeah. I secured the strap. I did not wanna lose the gun when I hit the ground.
“Confirmed.” Coach got up in front of me, blocking the doors, and gripped the handles. I inserted the other earplug. “In five, four, three, two…”
I pocketed my flashlight and braced myself.
The van jerked violently, and a loud blast cracked through the air like thunder. Adrenaline shot through me as it happened again and again. Four shots altogether, but the vehicle wouldn’t fucking slow down.
“They’re not slowing down,” Coach growled.
Holy shit. The tires were fucking out; whoever the sniper was had delivered perfect hits, but the driver kept pushing forward. In fact, he was accelerating, and the bumpy ride became a goddamn roller coaster.
They couldn’t do this for long, but maybe long enough to get us underground.
In a split-second decision, I drew my gun and aimed at the wall to the cab, and I fired one round, two, three, four, the sound almost obliterating my hearing, despite the earplugs. We skidded and jerked to a stop, and I fell against one of the workers. They were yelling and crying out, but I barely heard them. My heart pounded, my skin prickled, my breaths turned rapid, and yet my brain stayed sharp and calm.
Coach pointed forward. “We’re too far away from the tree line—we gotta take care of the two in the front!”
“Understood, sir!” I sucked in a breath, and when he opened the doors, I stumbled after. He went for the driver’s seat, and I went for the passenger—oh fuck.
A guy came out with a gun, and he looked equal parts furious and startled. Operator Tenley’s face flitted by in my brain, and I heard his instructions on repeat. Over and over, the same words. This is a sprint. End it quick. You put everything behind the very first blow. I rammed my elbow up his face, hammer-fisted him in the temple, and managed to grab his gun. Then I pushed him back against the door and shot him in the forehead.
Mom, I killed a man.
I drew a deep breath and looked into the cab, where Coach finished off the driver.
My shots had gone through. Maybe they hadn’t killed the driver, but when he was slouched forward like that, I saw two wounds in his shoulder.
Movement caught my eye, and I peered over the passenger’s side door to see a group of men running out from a down-sloped driveway. They were armed to the teeth, so I alerted Coach and instantly noticed my voice was too loud. Hell, I hadn’t even realized the ringing was going down.
Just like Coach had said, we were in the middle of a large clearing with low grass, and we were surrounded by forest. We had the sun on our side; it was blinding the newcomers more than us.
“One by one,” Coach commanded.
I nodded and rested my arm over the door. They were still outside the firing zone for a 9mm, and it might worry me in a moment, because they had rifles. Precision rifles, if my eyes weren’t betraying me. So why weren’t they using them?
“We have a friendly coming in from behind,” Coach warned. “Who is it?” Was that meant for me— “Okay. Welcome to the show, Crew. Been a while. You still owe me a countertop.”
“I had a feeling you missed me. And can we discuss interior design later?” The answer came from behind me, and I didn’t have time to look. Not that I needed to. He joined my side and nodded with a dip of his chin. “Mind if I start?”
Okay, I looked. He was older than me but not by much. Hot as hell too. He was also in combat gear, and the lucky fucker had an M4. He took aim and went to town, and they dropped like flies?—
“Cease fire!” Coach yelled. “We gotta run. Drones’re picking up movement. Vehicles coming up. Go!”
I cursed and turned around, and I took off in a sprint, aiming for the tree line some hundred yards away.
Coach smacked his hand against the van and spat out something in Spanish, presumably to the workers, before he positioned himself behind me.
“You could also pick up the pace!” I hollered.
“Shut up, recruit,” was his response.
We kicked up dust along the dirt road, especially the guy who’d joined us in boots made for rougher terrain. He was fast. Crew was his name? I was fairly sure I’d heard his name mentioned when Beckett was seeing off his mom and Alex.
A second or two before we reached the tree line, shots cracked through the air, and it was impossible to tell from which direction. They echoed all around us.
“That’s why he’s behind you,” Crew said, out of breath.
What? Oh. To have my back?
“Take us to the rendezvous, Finlay,” Coach ordered. “Or whatever the fuck your name is these days.”
“Aye, sir.” Crew went faster and veered off the road, straight into the forest. “For the record, I did the same thing Danny did. Husband’s name in private, same old for work—to prevent confusion. Yet, you’re more confused than ever, sir. Do you wanna talk about that?”
Hot damn. He did not take the slightest shit from Coach. Not even a breathless, backhanded comment.
I couldn’t help but grin.
It looked like I didn’t have to worry about safety as much here. The forest was incredibly dense, and at this time of year, the colors were the same both up above and down across the forest floor, yellowing green and burning orange.
We ran over to an area with more shrubs and shorter trees as well, and that was where I spotted two other men. A handful of backpacks and weapons cases on the ground, a camo blind cover set up between two trees, and a map trapped under four rocks.
I removed my earplugs and slowed down to catch my breath, and Coach strode right over to the two men and took out his AirPod.
“I need proper comms,” he said, heaving a breath.
“Yessir.” One of the others dug out something—oh, an earpiece. “The vehicles turned back.”
Coach inserted it and turned it on. “Coach here. What’s the status?”
Meanwhile, Crew extended a hand. “Agent Crew Finlay with JATE.”
I swallowed dryly and shook it. “Leighton Watts, lowly Hillcroft recruit. You escorted Operator Beckett’s family to San Diego the other day, right?”
He nodded once. “Yup. Do you know the others?” He gestured to the two men dressed similarly to himself, and I shook my head. I’d never seen them before. But before Crew could answer, we heard a shot blasting in the distance, and it made me flinch and turn to where we’d come from. “Don’t worry about it,” Crew said. “We have people and drones holding the line.”
Oh. Okay. To be honest, the whole thing was a little bizarre. I’d never experienced anything like this before, so I didn’t know what was going on. But frankly, I was along for the ride. I’d call this a good day so far. I was having fun.
Crew introduced me to the other two, who were Hillcroft operators. Max Morgan and JJ Williams, nicknamed “The Juniors” because they had fathers working at Hillcroft too. And Williams… Did that mean his dad was Legacy? Our Cold War professor? The one and only actual professor, to boot.
The Hillcroft operators’ combat outfits consisted of utility pants with multiple pockets, same kind I wore, long-sleeved tees, helmets, and Kevlar vests—all stripped-down versions of what service members wore in combat. Crew’s clothes were similar, except I could see he was from another agency. His helmet and vest had a lighter camo pattern. I’d heard of JATE Shield before. It was based in LA, if I wasn’t mistaken. They handled primarily domestic cases, while Hillcroft worked mostly internationally.
Not counting today. The past few weeks had been full of exceptions, I was learning. Hillcroft was almost never attacked, they said. Well, now we’d faced two of them in a short period of time.
I did my best to pay attention. I wanted to learn everything.
The Juniors were busy collecting information from whoever was communicating in their ears, and they moved red pins on the map. Coach was in a pissy mood and talking to someone about moving farther into the forest, because apparently it was going to be a waiting game now. We couldn’t make another move until it was dark.
That was going to be a problem for me.
I went over to Crew. “Excuse me. Is there any way to get my hands on an energy bar or something? Or should I be prepared for a suck-it-and-deal combo with extra French cries?”
“Ha!” He found that funny. “Extra French cries—I’m using that. There will be chow later, but in the meantime…” Then he retrieved something from a pocket, a protein bar, and handed it to me. “I gotchu covered.”
“Thanks.” I was so relieved. I let out a breath and tore it open. “I don’t function well without food. That’s when I mix up yards, feet, and meters until I walk myself right into enemy camp.”
I’d had a Drill in OSUT who yelled in my face that I had to learn them all, and then he got them mixed up himself.
“Dude, same.” Crew scratched his nose. “Which is why you should always carry a bar or two in your pockets. I carry four.”
I nodded and bit into the chocolaty bar. Good point. I was gonna do that. “I’ll turn one of my pockets into a DFAC.” Only, with edible food.
Crew snorted. “Army?”
I nodded and chewed.
“Zero movement from outside the bunker,” Operator Williams reported. “Hyatt’s calling in reinforcements to give us eyes in the sky along the outer rim too, and Squeezy’s joined the Intel unit with River remotely. Remember, she’ll only be verbal with Ryan and River.”
I took another bite of the protein bar and turned to Crew. “Do you know who’s in charge of this whole thing? Is it Operator Beckett?”
“He’s in charge on the ground,” he replied. “But they have Operator Adler running the show from the Operations Central. She’s the one who called me in yesterday morning when they learned about the second Hahn crew on US soil. Then, you know, with the operation growing, she brings in more consultants. I heard Operator Payne and the other Tenley twin on the line earlier. Operator Hyatt, in turn, is in charge of the drones, so he’s in the mix too.”
Jesus H. Christmas. “That’s too many cooks in the kitchen for me. I’d be dizzy hearing all the noise.”
I guessed it meant Hyatt was no longer filling in for Beckett in the schoolhouse.
“Yeah, it’s difficult to masturbate to.”
I smirked and tilted my head. “Marines?”
He grinned lazily, and we bumped fists.
“Pardon my boot question. What was your MOS?” I asked.
“Started out as a 0311 like most, and then I reclassed when I made Recon,” he said. “Got my jump wings and spent way too much time at Army installations since I just had to pick the smallest fuckin’ branch in the country, and then I found my specialty in logistics and pathfinding.”
Oh damn. That was impressive. Even more so because of the branch. The Marines, as far as I knew, didn’t have units on that level with just one specialty. You couldn’t be just a parachutist or a pathfinder.
I’d worked with more Marines than any other branch. They were our brothers.
“What about you?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Lowly infantry. Never advanced. Never saw combat.”
“You say lowly a lot,” he noted. “My kid brother’s part of the peacetime generation too. It ain’t nothin’, you know. Someone’s gotta hold the fort until the next war. Besides, when shit hits the fan—and it will—you’ll quit bitching about custom insoles and grooming regs real quick.”
I laughed, because that hit home in a tragic way. I’d overheard so many complaints about bullshit issues like that.
“Well, not me, personally,” I said. “Now I’m chasing Germans in the woods of Virginia. And here I was, thinking Germans weren’t our enemies anymore.”
He laughed. “Did you ever do a rotation over there?”
“Yeah. Best nine months of my life.”
Or maybe I couldn’t say that any longer. I hadn’t felt dead in a few days now. I was laughing more. Feeling more. I’d finally cried again. During sex, sure, fantastic sex, the best sex…
“Finlay!” Coach called. “Turn on your comms for a perimeter update.”
“Aw, man.” Crew inserted his earpiece. “Finlay online. Talk dirty to me, Gramps. Where you at?”
I grinned and finished the last of my protein bar, then stashed the wrapper in my pocket. While Crew wandered off, I trailed over to Coach, ’cause he seemed less agitated now, and he wasn’t talking to anyone. He was just digging through a backpack.
“Sir, is there anything I can do to help?” I asked.
He didn’t look up from the bag. “You can brace yourself for an inbound Beckett, who’s furious.”
Oh crap.
“What did I do?”
He shook his head and pulled out a Kevlar vest. “It’s me he’s mad at—for bringing a recruit along.”
I chewed on the corner of my lip and wondered if it was just about any recruit, or if it was me. I knew he didn’t want me here. He’d laughed when I’d offered to help, and then he’d given me the speech about me being too gung ho.
“Put this on.” He smacked the vest to my chest and leveled me with a serious look. “You were an asset today. Am I happy to have a recruit with us? Absolutely not, but we did what we could in a shitty situation, and you handled yourself well. Fucking your superior, notwithstanding.”
My eyes widened. First, with the incredible compliment that I was gonna cherish for a long time, and then a bitch-slap about a private matter? Jesus, man. And for the record, Beckett was the one fucking me!
“Um, thank you and hot damn, sir,” I muttered, putting on the vest. “By the way, don’t be mad at him about, uh, that. I came on to him.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “Did you tie him down and force him into anythin’?”
Well…no.
I squinted.
“I didn’t think so,” he said. “Look, part of our philosophy is to keep the leash on the looser side. We’re recruiting service members, with the majority having issues with authority. That doesn’t mean we wouldn’t like to enforce a stricter fraternization policy—we just know it wouldn’t be followed. But a senior operator gettin’ involved with his own recruit? Ain’t gonna fuckin’ happen.”
I lowered my gaze to the ground and felt a knot of unease form in my stomach.
“If this is serious, we’ll figure shit out,” he added. “Beckett can be removed from training you , specifically. You can become my responsibility. No sweat. But if you’re just screwin’ around…”
So…I got two days of happiness. All right. I nodded once. “I understand.”
Beckett and I weren’t serious. He’d been very fucking clear on his stance where relationships were concerned.
“We’ll call it off,” I forced myself to say. And just like that, I kind of wanted to cry. I walked away and fastened the straps on my vest.
“Can I sleep in your bed? Just for tonight.”
“After what we just did, I wouldn’t let you sleep anywhere else.”
Ow. This was gonna hurt.
I could already feel myself slipping into a familiar pool of numbness, except this one was laced with loss and anxiousness. Beckett would be here any moment, and I wasn’t sure how I’d handle the look of disappointment on his face. As far as he knew, we were a secret. One he’d intended to keep until he’d gotten his fill. Or whatever. But now, Coach, of all people, knew, and it was my fault.
Beckett was going to wash his hands of me in the swiftest way possible.
Breathe through the stabs.
I needed a distraction.
Seeing that the Juniors didn’t look too busy at the moment, I walked over to them so I could ask?—
“Marksmen inbound for a break,” Max declared. “That’s our cue.” He nudged his friend. “Two hours on the clock starting now.”
Oh. Okay, so they’d be busy now. They were leaving.
Some twenty feet behind me, Crew laughed at something.
“Look who’s ready for the Banana Wars! Nice jungle setup, Gramps. Chesty would be proud.”
I turned around and spotted two men walking toward us, decked out in ghillie suits—or nets—to blend in entirely with the background, including helmets and face coverings. Safe to say, their hiding spots had not only been on the ground but very close to the tree line where someone would be easily spotted by our targets.
Were they the ones who’d blown out the tires of the van? Because they were clearly snipers. Their rifles hung across their chests.
One of the men walked past Crew and smacked him upside the head. “Quit talkin’ like a boot, son.”
“Hey, fuck you. Not even a devil your advanced age can disrespect Chesty.” Crew scowled and followed while the snipers started shedding the protective gear. Helmets off, netting off.
In the meantime, the Juniors got ready to take over. They had their own helmets, but it was their turn with the ghillie suits, and they didn’t seem very happy about it.
Understandable. I’d gotten stuck in one of those nets more than once.
Crew handed out water bottles and rags to the men, who made quick work of removing the worst of the green and brown camo paint from their faces. Another thing I’d hated during field exercises, painting my face. Because everything got stuck to it, dirt and dust and sand and tiny twigs. Then you got sweaty, and…fuck those memories.
“Hudson!” Coach strode over to them, so I went another way.
I was starting to feel awkward and very out of place. I didn’t belong here. I had no orders to follow, and when I asked what I could do, all I got was shit answers. How did I “brace myself” for a furious Beckett? There was little to no room for creativity either. Like, how could I show initiative when there was nothing to do? I didn’t have any communication device, the Juniors had been monopolizing the map, Coach was all over the place, and I didn’t wanna be in the way.
But since there was no one by the map anymore, I trailed over there and eyed the area illustrated in faint black lines and tiny Xs. The lines showed what kind of terrain it was, right? Or were the lines hills and valleys? I couldn’t fucking remember, and we hadn’t started studying this yet.
They required us to have military experience here, and then they went and changed things up enough so we had to start over in so many ways. What was the point? I’d aced land nav, and here I couldn’t tell what were trees and what was terrain.
Either way, more operators had been called in since Beckett had left, that was for sure. Our location was marked with a blue pin, and I counted twelve, thirteen…fourteen red pins.
“That’s Coach’s recruit?”
I snapped up my gaze and instinctively backed off. Crew nodded. They were headed this way. The sniper ran the rag over his face some more, and I could tell he was much older. Late forties or so.
Had I met him before? He looked familiar.
“Yeah, meet Leighton Watts.”
The man smirked and extended a hand to me. “I saw what you did to the guy in the passenger’s seat. He went out like a light with one elbow.”
Oh. Heh. I shook his hand firmly. “Coach did tell me to eliminate the threat.”
He chuckled. “Good to meet you, kid. I’m Ryan.”
…Ryan? Ryan. Ryan, who looked familiar.
“…one hell of a jarhead and sniper.”
The memory of seeing a particular photo online flashed by in my mind. A younger Ryan Quinn and his dad standing side by side, wearing matching grins, one with a USMC tee and the other holding up a Go Army tee.
“Nice to meet you too,” I managed to get out. Nausea crawled up my throat, and my mouth watered because of it.
This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t him. He just looked like him a little. Or a lot.
“It’s not unheard of that he takes on assignments either.”
“Have we met before?” I heard Ryan ask. He cocked his head, and he was observing me in a way that made me wanna run away.
“Um, no, I…I don’t think so…” I scratched my forehead and eyed my options. Walk straight into the woods and disappear forever? Or go ask Coach something. Look busy. I had to look busy. I had to fucking vomit. “E-excuse me, I’m gonna go talk to my superior.” I looked down and walked away.
Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, that was my dad’s brother.
It was him. Not even I could deny it.
My eyes welled up, and emotions I had no time to deal with bubbled up faster than I could process them.
It’s Dad’s brother. He knew my dad. He grew up with him. They went to school together, shared a home, and probably raised hell together. It’s Dad’s brother.
Over by the backpacks on the ground, I snagged a bottle of water just to keep my hands occupied. I was thirsty, but I wasn’t sure I could swallow anything unless I wanted it to come right back up.
“Hey, kid,” Coach said. “Beckett will be here in sixty seconds.”
“Okay.” I cleared my throat and didn’t fucking know what to do.
What did I do? Where could I go?
My heart was drumming faster and faster, and my hands felt clammy.
Breathe.
“Leighton, are you okay?” Coach asked.
I nodded without glancing his way. I kept my blurry stare fixed on the ground that was covered in leaves.
Dad’s brother. His younger brother.
It was so weird too, because the image of my dad didn’t put him in his fifties, but of course, at this stage… He’d be right there. Fifty. And Ryan was like…forty-seven? Thereabouts.
“Good to meet you, kid. I’m Ryan.”
Good to meet you, kid.
He had a nice voice. Warm, rich, and perfect for someone who called a grown man kid .
I didn’t mind that he called me that. It was much worse when Beckett did it.
That’d become rare, though. And I’d admittedly grown fond of him calling me pup. It was sweet.
“Good to meet you, kid. I’m Ryan.”
Ryan Quinn.
Good to meet you, kid. You’re my nephew. We’re family.
Good to meet you, kid. So you say you’re my nephew…? I don’t fucking think so. Get outta my face.
A whimper threatened to escape, so I scrubbed a hand over my mouth and forced myself to swallow. Oh fuck, I was gonna break. I couldn’t do this now. I needed to get out of here. Now wasn’t the time. It wasn’t about me being a fucking coward like always—it was…it was today! We had a job to do. Enemies to take down. A case to solve. This was Beckett’s big operation. He wanted to kill the guy who was responsible for Vince’s death.
“Have we met before?”
I felt my chin wrinkle and my lips tremble, and all I could do was keep my hand there. Pretending something itched or whatever. I scrubbed at my mouth and blinked hard, then hurriedly wiped away a traitorous tear as it rolled down.
Get your shit together!
Goddammit, Mom. Why didn’t you tell me when you were alive? I can’t do this. I can’t fucking do it. You had enough information to go on at least four or five years before you died.
Had sixty seconds passed yet?
* * *
Bo and Leighton will return in Remade
Teaser on the next page