Chapter 7 Aftermath #2
Not because it was smart. Not because it was tactical. Not even because it was the right thing to do.
Because she couldn't stop seeing his eyes. Couldn't stop hearing his voice. Couldn't shake the feeling that something had started in that compound that wouldn't end until she saw him again.
She turned and headed back inside. There was work to do. Plans to make. Intelligence to gather. A rescue operation to coordinate that would either save a life or destroy everything Shadow Veil had built.
But first she needed to figure out why the thought of never seeing those eyes again felt like losing something she'd only just found.
Twelve Kilometers Outside Mosul
Steele woke up to pain and darkness.
His head pounded where they'd hit him. His leg was on fire. His hands were zip-tied behind his back and he was lying on concrete that smelled like oil and old blood.
He kept his breathing steady. Didn't open his eyes yet. Listened first. Footsteps. Two, maybe three men. Voices in Arabic. Agitated. Arguing about something.
He tested the zip ties. Tight. Professional. Not getting out of these without tools.
His tactical vest was gone. Weapons gone. Radio gone. Medical kit gone. They'd stripped him down to his base layer and cargo pants. Standard procedure for captured personnel. Remove anything useful. Leave them vulnerable.
His leg throbbed with each heartbeat. Arterial bleed. He'd lost a lot of blood. Was probably still losing it. Without medical attention, he had hours at best.
The footsteps approached. Someone kicked his boot. Hard.
"Wake up," a voice said in accented English.
Steele opened his eyes. The room resolved slowly. Basement. Concrete walls. Single bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. Three men standing over him. One held an AK-47. The other two had side arms.
"American soldier," the man said. It wasn't a question.
Steele didn't respond.
The man kicked him again. "Who are you? Why are you here?"
Name, rank, serial number. That's all they were getting. But even that was problematic because technically he wasn't supposed to be here. Delta Force didn't officially operate in Iraq without Iraqi government approval.
The man crouched down. Got close. "Rashid Nazari wants to know who sent you. Who gave you orders to breach his home. To terrorize his family."
Steele almost laughed. Terrorize his family. The same family Nazari was planning to sell piece by piece.
"You will tell us," the man continued. "Or you will die slowly."
Probably true. They'd torture him for information. When he didn't give them anything useful, they'd kill him and dump his body somewhere it wouldn't be found for weeks.
Unless his team came back.
Bulldog would be arguing for immediate recovery.
Hawk would be calculating odds and resources.
Ghost would be monitoring communications trying to locate him.
Risk would be prepping medical equipment because when they found him, he was going to need it.
Joker would be volunteering to drive straight back into Mosul if that's what it took.
But the mission had failed. Nazari was gone. The team had orders to exfil. Command would make the calculation: one operator versus strategic objectives. Intelligence value versus risk.
He might be on his own.
The man stood. Said something in Arabic to the others. They dragged Steele upright, zip ties cutting into his wrists. The movement sent fresh waves of pain through his arm and leg. He felt blood soaking through his pants. Still bleeding. Still dying by inches.
They shoved him into a chair. One of them hit him across the face. Testing. Seeing what he'd give them.
Steele tasted blood. Didn't make a sound.
This was going to be a long night.
The hits came fast. Professional. Designed to hurt without causing death. Steele absorbed them. Kept his breathing steady. Focused on staying present.
But his mind kept drifting. Back to the compound. To the chaos. To her.
Dark blue eyes above a tactical mask. Fierce and focused and alive in a way that had made him forget about the pain in his leg for half a second. The woman from the other team. The one who'd extracted the civilians. The one who'd looked at him like she was trying to decide if he was worth saving.
He wondered if she made it out. Wondered if the kid was safe. Wondered if she thought about him at all or if he was just another tactical problem she'd solved and moved on from.
Another hit. He focused on breathing. On her eyes. Strange anchor to hold onto. A woman whose name he didn't know. Whose face he'd barely seen. But those eyes. He remembered those eyes.
The interrogation continued. Questions in broken English. Silence from Steele. More pain. The cycle repeating like some kind of nightmare he couldn't wake from.
But every time his mind threatened to fracture, to give in to the pain and the fear and the knowledge that rescue might not come, he thought about her. About the way she'd moved through that compound. Competent. Lethal. The kind of operator who got the job done no matter what stood in her way.
She'd made it out. He was sure of that. She was too good not to. The kid was safe because of her. Because of the choice they'd both made in that chaos.
Worth it. Even if this was how it ended. Even if those dark eyes were the last thing he saw before Nazari's men killed him. Worth it.
Erbil Air Base Rally Point
Bulldog paced like a caged animal while Hawk stood perfectly still and Ghost monitored every frequency hoping for a signal that wasn't coming.
"We have to go back," Bulldog said for the third time.
"We don't know where he is," Hawk replied, voice calm but strained.
"Then we find him. We search every building in that compound until—"
"The compound's hot," Ghost interrupted. "Iraqi security forces are responding. Local militia's been alerted. If we go back now, we're walking into a hornet's nest."
"So we just leave him?"
"I didn't say that."
Risk sat on an equipment crate, medical pack at his feet, ready to move the second they had a target location. "He's injured. I saw blood. If he's not treated soon, he won't make it anyway."
"Then we move NOW," Bulldog insisted.
Hawk finally turned from his position watching the airfield. "We need Command approval. We need updated intel. We need a plan that doesn't get everyone killed."
"Since when do we wait for permission?"
"Since we're operating in a foreign country without official sanction and our original mission already went sideways." Hawk's voice stayed level but his eyes were hard. "I want him back as much as you do. But rushing in blind gets us all captured or killed. Then nobody comes home."
Joker spoke from where he sat checking equipment. "What if someone else gets to him first?"
They all looked at him.
"That team that breached the south wall," Joker continued. "They extracted the wife and kid. Professional operation. Well-equipped. They might have resources we don't."
"They also might be the reason Steele's captured in the first place," Bulldog growled.
"Or they might be the reason the kid's alive," Risk countered. "Steele made the call to help them extract. That was his choice."
Ghost's tablet chimed. He looked at the screen. Frowned. "I'm picking up communications. Someone's monitoring Iraqi security frequencies. Someone with serious signal intelligence capability. They're tracking the same compound we just hit."
"Who?" Hawk asked.
"Unknown. But they're good. Really good. Almost as good as me."
"Can you trace them?"
Ghost's fingers moved across the screen. "Maybe. Give me time."
"We don't have time," Bulldog said. "Every minute we wait is another minute Steele's—"
His radio crackled. Command frequency. They all went silent.
"Delta Six, this is Overwatch. Requesting immediate SITREP on mission status. Be advised, you are ordered to return to Erbil for debrief. Acknowledge."
Hawk picked up the radio. Looked at his team. Made the call.
"Overwatch, Delta Six. Mission compromised. Target escaped. One operator MIA. Requesting authorization for recovery operation."
A pause. Then: "Negative, Delta Six. Stand down. Return to base. Recovery protocols will be assessed at Command level."
Which meant abandon the operator. Let the bureaucrats decide if he was worth saving.
Bulldog's jaw clenched.
Hawk's eyes went cold.
Ghost kept working his tablet.
Risk stood, shouldering his medical pack.
Joker cracked his knuckles.
"Copy, Overwatch," Hawk said into the radio. Then he turned to his team. "Gear up. We're going to need a plan."
Because orders were orders.
But nobody left a man behind.
Not ever.
Safe House Four Hours Later
Mara's phone rang at 0600. She'd been lying on one of the cots in the small bedroom, staring at the ceiling and not sleeping. Quinn.
"He's alive," Quinn said without preamble. "The American. I've got confirmation."
Mara sat up, her heart kicking against her ribs. Relief crashed through her so hard it was almost painful. "How?"
"Iraqi security communications. They're reporting a captured American soldier at Nazari's compound. Wounded but conscious. Under guard."
Wounded but conscious. Still alive. Still breathing. Still waiting for someone to come.
"His team?"
"At Erbil Air Base. Command ordered them to stand down. But I'm monitoring their communications. They're not standing down. They're planning something."
Mara stood and walked to the window. Dawn had fully broken now, the Iraqi countryside bathed in early morning light that made everything look deceptively peaceful.
She pressed her hand against the glass and tried not to think about what "wounded" meant.
Tried not to imagine him in pain. Tried not to remember the blood she'd seen soaking through his pants.
"Can we beat them to it?" she asked.
"Beat them to what?"
"The rescue. Can we get to him before his team does?"
Silence on the line. Then: "Why would we do that?"
"Because we left him behind. Because it's the right thing to do.
Because I'm not okay with an American operator dying because we were there.
" Because I can't stop seeing his eyes. Because four hours of trying to sleep just meant four hours of hearing his voice.
Because something happened in that compound and I need to know if it was real.
She didn't say the last part.
"Mara, this is insane. We're four women in hostile territory with two civilians to protect. We don't have the resources for a combat rescue against a fortified position."
"Then we get creative."
"This isn't our mission."
"It is now."
Another pause. Then Quinn's voice, resigned: "What do you need?"
Mara smiled despite everything. Despite the risk.
Despite the impossibility. Despite the fact that she was about to commit Shadow Veil to a rescue operation for a man whose name she didn't even know.
A man whose face she couldn't stop seeing.
Whose voice she couldn't stop hearing. Who'd looked at her like he'd seen something in her worth dying for.
"Everything you've got."