Chapter 21
THE CALL
Fort Liberty, North Carolina
Logan checked his phone for the third time in an hour. Still nothing from Mara. Not unusual exactly. She'd warned him she'd be busy with work this week. But usually she'd send at least a quick text. A good morning message or a random photo or something to let him know she was thinking about him.
Three days of radio silence was starting to feel wrong.
He tried calling again. Straight to voicemail. He hung up without leaving a message. There were already four from him sitting in her inbox. No point adding another one.
"You good?" Bulldog asked from across the team room. They were supposed to be reviewing training scenarios for the new guys but Logan's attention kept drifting to his phone.
"Yeah. Fine." Logan set the phone down and tried to focus on the tactical map in front of him. "Just haven't heard from Mara in a few days. Probably just buried in whatever project she's working on."
"She does the same kind of work we do, right? Rescue operations?" Bulldog pulled up a chair. "Maybe she's deployed somewhere. Out of communication range."
"Maybe." But Mara usually gave him a heads up when she was going dark. A text that said "working" so he'd know not to worry when she didn't respond. The fact that she hadn't sent that message was what was eating at him.
"You want to take a break? Go call her again?" Bulldog's tone was understanding. He knew what it was like to be dating someone whose work made regular communication impossible sometimes.
"No. She'll call when she can." Logan forced himself to focus. "Let's get through these scenarios. New guys need to be ready for next week's training op."
They worked for another two hours. Logan kept his phone on the table in front of him, screen up, volume on high. Just in case. When it finally buzzed, he grabbed it so fast he almost knocked over his coffee.
Not Mara. Just a notification from his bank about his credit card balance.
He set the phone back down with more force than necessary.
"Logan." Bulldog's voice was quiet. "Maybe you should try her team. Quinn, right? The one Beth knows? See if she's heard anything."
"I don't want to be that guy. The worried boyfriend calling her work because she hasn't texted in three days.
That's clingy. That's not giving her space to do her job.
" Logan ran a hand through his hair. "Besides, what am I going to say?
Hey, is Mara okay? She hasn't called me and I'm freaking out? That makes me sound pathetic."
"It makes you sound like someone who cares." Bulldog stood up. "Look, I'll reach out to Beth. See if she can check with Quinn. Casual. Just asking if everything's good. That way it doesn't come from you directly."
Logan wanted to say no. Wanted to be cool about this. But the knot in his stomach that had been building for three days said otherwise. "Yeah. Okay. Thanks."
Bulldog left the room to make the call. Logan stared at his phone like he could will it to ring.
Like if he wanted it badly enough, Mara would call and everything would be fine.
She'd laugh and apologize for going dark and explain that she'd been in the middle of something intense and couldn't get to her phone.
That's how it would go. That's how it had to go.
Bulldog came back fifteen minutes later. His expression was neutral but his eyes told a different story. "Beth's trying to reach Quinn. She'll let me know when she hears something."
"Okay." Logan went back to the tactical maps but the symbols might as well have been hieroglyphics for all the sense they made.
His mind was elsewhere. On a woman in Louisiana who did dangerous work and who hadn't called in three days.
On all the things that could go wrong in the kind of operations Mara ran.
On the possibility that something had happened and he was sitting here in North Carolina completely useless.
The afternoon dragged. Logan went through the motions.
Briefed the new guys. Ran through training scenarios.
Hit the gym with Risk who didn't ask why Logan was pushing harder than usual.
Everyone on the team knew he'd been different since meeting Mara.
Lighter. Happier. The fact that he was now tense and distracted told them all they needed to know.
Evening came and still no word. Logan was in his quarters trying to decide if he should try calling again when there was a knock on his door.
He opened it to find Ghost standing there with an expression Logan had seen before.
The one Ghost got when he had bad news to deliver and didn't know how to say it.
Logan's stomach dropped. "What happened?"
"Can I come in?"
"Just tell me."
Ghost stepped into the room anyway and closed the door behind him. "I heard from Beth. She got in contact with Quinn."
"And?" Logan's voice came out harder than he intended. "Is Mara okay?"
Ghost was quiet for a moment too long. That silence told Logan everything he needed to know before Ghost even opened his mouth. "There's been a situation."
"What kind of situation?" The words felt like they were coming from someone else. Like Logan was watching this conversation happen to a different person in a different room.
"Mara's team was running an operation. Rescue op in Iraq. Things went sideways." Ghost met Logan's eyes. "She's missing, Logan. Her team lost contact with her during extraction. They found evidence she was taken."
The world stopped.
Logan heard the words. Understood them individually. Missing. Iraq. Taken. But strung together they didn't make sense. Couldn't make sense. Mara was in Louisiana. Safe. Just busy with work. Not in Iraq. Not missing. Not taken.
"When?" The word came out rough. Barely recognizable as his own voice.
"Approximately thirty-six hours ago. Her team has been trying to locate her. They reached out to me because they need help. They need people who know the region and who have resources they don't have access to."
Thirty-six hours. Mara had been missing for thirty-six hours and he'd been sitting here in North Carolina thinking she was just busy. Leaving voicemails. Getting annoyed that she wasn't texting him back. While she was God knows where in the hands of God knows who.
"Iraq," Logan said. The word tasted like metal. "She was in Iraq and didn't tell me."
"She was running an operation. Rescue of fifteen trafficked women near Erbil.
It went well. They got all the women out.
But during extraction, Mara was providing overwatch and got separated from her team.
Someone ambushed her. Took her." Ghost's voice was clinical.
Factual. The way he delivered information when emotion would get in the way.
"Her team found her gear. No blood. Vehicle tracks heading toward Mosul. "
Mosul. The city where they'd pulled Steele. Where Nazari had held him. Where everything had gone to hell months ago.
"Nazari." Logan's hands clenched into fists. "You think Nazari took her?"
"I don't know. Her team lead, Sloane, she sent me everything they have.
It's not much. Professional ambush. Someone who knew her route.
Vehicle tracks heading northeast. That's all we've got.
" Ghost pulled out his phone and showed Logan a map.
"This is where they lost her. This is the direction the tracks headed.
That puts them somewhere in this region if they continued on the same bearing. "
Logan stared at the map. At the red circle marking where Mara had disappeared.
At the arrow showing the probable direction.
His mind was already working tactically.
Distance to target. Insertion options. Resources needed.
But underneath the tactical thinking was a cold rage building.
Someone had taken Mara. Someone had hurt her, because you didn't take a trained operator without hurting them.
Someone was holding her right now and she was alone and scared and he was here instead of there.
"I need to talk to Hawk." Logan headed for the door.
"Logan, wait." Ghost caught his arm. "We don't have authorization for this. Iraq is complicated right now. We can't just roll in there without clearance from command."
"I don't care about clearance." Logan's voice was flat. Cold. "Mara is in Iraq. Someone took her. I'm going to get her back. With or without authorization."
"That's not how this works and you know it. We're military. We have rules. Chain of command. Operational parameters." Ghost didn't let go. "You go off half-cocked and you'll get yourself killed. Worse, you'll get Mara killed."
Logan knew Ghost was right. Knew that rushing into Iraq without intelligence or support or authorization was suicide. But the alternative was sitting here doing nothing while Mara was in enemy hands. While whoever had taken her did things he didn't want to imagine.
"Then what do you suggest? We file a report? Wait for command to decide if they want to authorize a rescue? How long does that take, Ghost? Days? Weeks? How long do you think Mara has?"
"I suggest we do this smart. We coordinate with her team.
We build an intelligence picture. We figure out where she is and who has her.
Then we put together a plan that has a chance of actually working.
" Ghost finally released Logan's arm. "Hawk's already working on it.
He got the message from Sloane twenty minutes before I came here.
He's in the SCIF right now pulling everything we have on the region. "
"Why didn't you tell me that first?" Logan was already moving toward the door again.
"Because I needed to see what you'd do. Needed to know if you could think tactically or if you were going to let emotion drive you into making stupid decisions.
" Ghost followed him into the hallway. "You're no good to Mara if you're dead, Logan.
So we do this the smart way. The way that actually gets her back alive. "