Chapter One
Five months earlier
Adam
“Merry effing Christmas,” I muttered as I took a bite of MRE turkey.
“It’s too hot to be Christmas,” my tent mate and Marine brother, Shawn O’Brien lamented from across the pop-up table as he wiped his brow with a towel he draped around his neck for specifically that purpose.
He took a bite of his own ready-to-eat meal of turkey and mashed potatoes, then lifted the container to look underneath it.
“What do you think the shelf life is on these things?”
“Probably like twenty years.”
“Yeah, well I think this one’s on year twenty-two.”
“It’s not my nana’s Christmas dinner, that’s for sure.”
As if trying to take our mind off the fact we were in the middle of nowhere in unfriendly territory, Shawn asked, “Where would you be at right now if you were home?”
“Lancastle, Massachusetts. My whole family’s there.” I paused to reflect they’d probably finished a big Christmas dinner and were playing board games in between watching football. “What about you?”
“Haven Springs, South Carolina, population nine hundred and ninety-five. We have one blinking light at the end of town.”
“I think Lancastle has you beat by a few thousand people. We even have stoplights. You get snow in South Carolina?”
“Very little.” He took another bite and grinned. “Just hurricanes.”
The air in our tent was sweltering, and I wiped my brow with my napkin. Big mistake. I could feel the paper pieces attached to my skin and used the hem of my shirt to clean them off before O’Brien could give me shit about it.
We were both in tan t-shirts and camo pants, but instead of our usual laced up tan leather boots, we both donned socks with our slides. Some people back home might consider it a fashion faux pas, but here in the desert, comfort trumped fashion.
It wasn’t like I cared about impressing any of these fuckers anyway.
Our small team had been pulled from the base camp just before Thanksgiving, effectively quashing our plans to go home for the holiday. Our company had been split: single guys with no kids would travel at Thanksgiving; the guys with wives and/or kids were supposed to go at Christmas.
None of the Marines at camp with me were in the second group, that’s how I knew we weren’t fucking around on this mission. They were obviously worried about orphaning dependents and widowing wives.
The team was made up of four elite squads, and we were tasked with finding and eliminating insurgents before they found us.
For the last month, things had been quiet, which made Captain Davidson nervous.
It’d been so quiet, in fact, that we’d planned on heading back to base camp and hopping a transport with the married guys to celebrate Christmas at home.
Then intelligence came in that there’d been movement in the area, and now I was eating my Christmas dinner out of a damn can while sweating my balls off.
“Can I ask you a favor?” O’Brien said as he took another bite of mashed potatoes.
“Yeah, man. Name it.”
He pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket and smoothed it out flat on the table. At the top, in his handwriting, were the words ‘Last Will and Testament’.
“What the fuck is this?”
“I want to make sure my girlfriend is taken care of in case something happens to me. Right now, my parents are the beneficiaries of my life insurance, bank accounts, and pension. I want it to go to her. I need you to sign as a witness.”
“I think you should have Captain Davidson do it. It would probably hold more weight having a superior officer be your witness.”
Besides, I didn’t love the idea of being the one to attest to Shawn’s will. Because if I ever had to testify, it would mean my brother in arms was dead. I didn’t like to think about that shit.
But in the desert halfway around the world, that was our reality. Something we were all too aware of, as evidenced by Shawn feeling the need to write a will.
He folded the paper in half and stuck it back in his pocket. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”
“I didn’t realize you were that serious about this girl.”
“I was going to ask her to marry me before we shipped out, but there was never a right time. I bought her a ring and everything.”
“Damn. I’m happy for you. You make sure you make it home to give it to her.”
“Since you won’t sign my will, I need you to promise me something.”
I nodded solemnly. “Okay.”
“If something happens to me, I want to make sure she gets the ring. It’s in my safe in the closet of my room at my parents’ house. The combination is—”
I cut him off. “You’re going to give it to her.”
He talked over me. “The combination is nine-eleven-one.”
I ran the numbers through my head.
“The date of the terrorist attacks?”
“And her birthday.”
“Aw, dude, she’s just a baby.”
“I don’t care. I fucking love her. And if something happens to me, I want her to know how much. How serious I was when I told her I was going to make her my wife.” His expression was urgent. “Tell me you’ll do that for me.”
I didn’t like it, but nodded solemnly.
“You have my word.”
I had no idea how soon I’d really have to make good on my promise.
~~
While on patrol later that day, my squad’s Joint Light Tactical Vehicle hit an IED on the side of the road. Fortunately, the engine block took the majority of the blast, and I was the only one seriously injured. But we were under heavy fire.
It was all hands-on-deck to come save our asses.
While on the way to help do that, the Humvee carrying Captain Davidson, O’Brien, and two other guys from our team, Roy Buckley, and Derek Rivers, was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.
We were in the firefight of our lives, but our casualties were minimized as my teammates rained hell down on the insurgents.
After the dust cleared Buckley and Rivers were injured, but not critically, same as me—although I’d lost a lot of blood, but Captain Davidson had been trapped in the wreckage and left with severe burns over half his body and fighting for his life.
He and I were airlifted to Germany immediately, while the two of them were triaged before being flown out.
Shawn had been killed instantly.
He was buried while I lay in a hospital bed in Germany. It’d killed me not to be at his funeral and pay my respects; he’d died coming to save me . I should have been paying better attention and seen that roadside bomb. There’d been a lot of guilt over that.
I hadn’t shied away from seeking help for my survivor’s guilt. In addition to intense physical therapy, a counselor had been part of my treatment plan.
And I knew a trip to South Carolina was in my future when I was finally discharged. I owed Shawn that.