Текст книги "Collateral Damage"

Автор книги: Kaylea Cross

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Текущая страница: 14 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

“Oh God, please let this training exercise be over with fast,” he muttered to himself as he started the engine. He’d gone too long without her already. He wasn’t sure he could handle even one more day apart.

This time he wanted it all, including his ring back on her finger and for Honor to take his name. They belonged together. He wanted the whole world to know she was his.

Chapter Eighteen

In a dim, underground room beneath a professional building in Peshawar, Safir pushed aside the plate containing his half-eaten dinner. He was too amped up to eat or sleep.

Footsteps on the concrete stairs had him tensing. He drew his pistol and aimed it toward the bottom of the staircase, heart thudding.

“It’s just me,” Qasim called out.

Safir kept his gun where it was, waiting until he could verify that his friend was alone and not under duress of any sort. Sliding the pistol back into its holster, he scanned Qasim, seeing a radio in his hand. Alarm punched through him. “Did you turn it off before coming into the building? Did you take the battery out of your cell phone?” He couldn’t help the urgency in his voice.

“Yes and yes,” Qasim answered calmly as he stopped at the bottom of the stairs. He took in the dim, dingy space before settling his gaze on Safir. He frowned when he saw the half-full plate next to him. “You’ve barely eaten or slept for the past three days.”

Safir waved his concern away. “Don’t lecture me.”

“Are you worried someone will try to poison you?” Qasim asked, a hint of sarcasm in his tone.

The thought had crossed his mind but he wasn’t about to admit it because he knew Qasim and all the others thought he was slowly losing it. Since the drone strikes he’d become increasingly mistrustful and he’d heard that the men whispered he was becoming paranoid like Rahim had been. He felt it happening too and didn’t know how to stop it. Whenever he tried to sleep he always jerked awake at the sound of a deafening explosion and the smell of burning flesh in his nostrils. Whatever it took to remain safe and undetected, he’d do it. At this point he was more concerned with his own safety than anything else.

“I’m not worried about anything except ensuring no one locates me until I can make sure this attack happens.” Just sixteen hours more and then all his work and sacrifice will finally have been worth something. Of course he’d have to be far away from here by then.

A loud banging on the steel door at the top of the stairs made him leap to his feet. Qasim urged him away with a hand signal, pistol in his grip as he edged toward the bottom of the staircase. “Who is it?”

“Anwar,” he called back, muffled by the door. “Satellite call for Safir.”

Qasim darted a look at Safir. “It’s Omar.”

The twenty-year-old hacker who worked at Boeing they’d hired some months back. He’d been working on finalizing the last details necessary for tomorrow’s operation. Things Safir had been unable to ascertain himself. Safir nodded his consent to Qasim.

“Are you alone?” Qasim called up to Anwar.

“Yes, it’s just me.”

Safir stayed where he was, cloaked in shadow while Qasim went up the steps. His friend would take a bullet to protect him, but Safir never wanted it to come to that.

The door opened and shut. He relaxed when there were no shots fired and then a set of footsteps descended. Qasim appeared at the top of the stairs, holstering his pistol at his hip. He nodded at Safir. “It’s safe.”

“Did you search him?” Safir asked.

Qasim nodded. “No electronics except for the phone. We’re good.”

Safir hurried up the stairs and took the phone from Anwar. His bodyguard and Qasim stood watch while he spoke. “Omar. Is everything ready?” He didn’t mention the drones aloud. The timing was too critical now to risk anyone who might be listening in figuring out what their plan was.

“Everything’s ready to go. And I found out something else I thought you should know.” The hacker’s voice was filled with pride. Safir’s own heart rate picked up in response.

“What is it?” he demanded, impatient to get off the phone. They could track him this way. The fewer people who knew he was here, the better. And he had to move locations again within the next few hours. Not something he relished doing in broad daylight but he didn’t have much choice if he wanted to avoid foreign surveillance and detection.

He could hear the smile in the younger man’s voice. “The VIP in town is going to make an appearance on the base tomorrow.”

Safir couldn’t believe his luck. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. But this changes the timing of the operation slightly, to a few hours earlier.”

Triumph exploded inside him. This was the opportunity he’d been praying for. It seemed Allah was finally listening. “It doesn’t matter. We’ll have to move it up. Is everything else in place?” Omar’s part of the operation was the most important, especially now that the VIP would be on base. The money Safir had spent securing Omar and the American insider would easily have fed have a dozen villages here for the next year. If the two men didn’t deliver on their promises, Safir would make sure they suffered horrific deaths.

Omar chuckled. “I’m ready.”

****

The first thing Honor noticed when she got into work the next morning was the heightened security. At the gates, at the PX, and the entrance to the hangars. And those were just the ones she could see, not including the snipers and whatever personal security detail the incoming VIP—she was guessing some big government bigwig—had sent ahead of his or her arrival.

She ran into Smithers on the way to her office. “Hey, everybody up to speed on what’s going on today?” she asked him.

In addition to being alerted by her superiors, Liam had called to update her last night after his briefing. He couldn’t go into specific detail but he’d said they’d received credible threats about an attack on the base, likely to do with the incoming VIP today, and the Fourth of July made for a very symbolic date. Intelligence pointed to the threat being linked to someone named Safir, who’d been part of Rahim’s network and now ran the propaganda machine from overseas.

Liam had also said there was a rumor going around that there might be an insider helping them with the plot. That was more disturbing to her than the rest of it.

“Yep, everybody knows the score.”

Guards at the gates were being extra careful in checking IDs and everyone on base had been told to stay vigilant. Increased security happened from time to time, but it made sense with whoever this VIP was coming to visit.

Everyone except gate guards, MPs and the VIP’s security detail remained unarmed, as usual all weapons locked away in each unit’s arms room. Honor wasn’t worried though. An attacker wouldn’t live longer than two minutes here if they tried anything, not with all the added security.

“Ipman’s here, too,” Smithers added.

She stopped and looked up at him in surprise. “Ipman’s back? I thought he was taking the rest of the week off?”

“Can’t do much with his cast on, but he said he wanted to come in anyhow. I think it’s hard on him, being alone at home on the Fourth.”

“Yeah, no doubt. How’s he seem?” She hadn’t seen or talked to him since they’d taken him to the hospital.

“Way better. He’s been to talk to someone off base a couple times and dried up for a few days now.”

Since he hadn’t assaulted his wife and she’d since dropped the charges, command had decided to let him return to work. Honor just hadn’t expected him to return this early. If he was willing to work hard and follow direction, she was fine with it though. “Okay, great. Have you got stuff to keep him busy with you? If not, I’ve got a whole ton of paperwork and filing he can help me with.”

“I’ll send him over when he’s finished with me in the hangar.”

“Thanks, Smithy.”

In her office she returned some phone calls, then had a quick meeting with her direct superior before sitting down to tackle her paperwork. She took care of the most important things first, saving the more mundane things for later. As she worked her mind kept skipping back to yesterday and she found herself smiling.

She had a good feeling about the way things were going with her and Liam. He was gone for the next few days on a training mission someplace, but he’d promised to call her as soon as he got back and she knew he would. Last night after he’d told her about the increased threat level he’d ended the call with a “sleep well, sweet pea”. That endearment, spoken just the way he used to in that deeply intimate tone he reserved only for her, had suffused her entire body with warmth.

At a knock on her door, she turned in her chair to see Ipman standing there. She waved him in and he shut the door behind him. His stance was stiff and he met her gaze only fleetingly as he stood there. “How’s the hand?” she asked to break the ice.

It seemed to unfreeze him. “I don’t need surgery.”

“That’s good news.”

“Yeah.” He rubbed his free hand over the back of his neck. “Listen, ma’am, I wanted to apologize for the other day.”

She sat back in her chair and folded her hands across her abdomen. “Sure. Go ahead.”

Her blunt answer seemed to throw him for a second. “Uh, yeah, I was in a really bad place mentally and… I’m sorry I acted like an asshole. I appreciate what you and Sarn’t Smithers did for me.”

Honor wasn’t about to make the guy grovel. “You’re welcome, and apology accepted. So, did Smithy send you over to help me out?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

And there was the Ipman she remembered. “Great.” She handed him a stack of files. “Filing cabinet’s over there on the far wall,” she said with a teasing smile.

They worked together for an hour and a half until Smithers came into her office, breathing hard as though he’d run over from the hangar. “Hey, you guys hear who the VIP is?”

“No, who?” Honor asked, giving him half her attention as she typed out an e-mail.

“The President and First lady.”

At that she stopped typing and turned her head to stare at him. “No way.” She knew he’d been in Seattle for some high-profile meetings with some other leaders in an environmental summit, but she hadn’t expected him to visit the base today. Jeez, no wonder the security was insane.

Ipman turned away from the filing cabinet, where he’d figured out a one-handed system of filing. “You serious?”

“Yeah, just found out. Was a last minute decision, apparently. Morale booster for the troops, maybe his party thinks it’s a good way to boost votes, who knows, but for sure he’s making an appearance. You two coming to the concert?” He checked his watch. “Starts in twenty minutes. If you want a seat, you’d better get there quick.”

“Wait, who’s performing again?” Ipman asked, stacking the last of the files atop the cabinet. Smithers named two big country stars and Ipman’s face lit up. “I’m so there.” He glanced at Honor. “You coming, ma’am?”

All her important work was caught up and an outdoor concert sounded perfect. “Sure, why not.” She shut off her computer, turned off the lights and locked up, sliding her cell phone into her front pants pocket. “What about the others?” she asked as they left the building and headed to the outdoor concert site that had been set up by the USO. The sun had just sunk out of sight and it was a beautiful, calm night. Perfect for a concert and fireworks. “Isn’t Andrews coming?”

“Nah, he and some of the other guys might come later,” Smithers answered. “Man, I wonder how many Secret Service agents are here?” he mused, looking around as they neared the venue.

A large stage had been set up at the far end of one of the PT fields, festooned with red, blue and white bunting and a huge banner that read Thank You Troops. A security checkpoint had been set up at all the entrances to the field. Honor and the others stopped and let the guards she suspected were undercover Secret Service agents search them. Beyond the temporary gates, young families were already set up on the field with blankets spread on the grass and picnic-style dinners laid out to enjoy.

Once they were through security Honor had a better view of the venue. There were a few rows of chairs set up near the front of the stage where she guessed the President would be sitting, then some low security gates. High-ranking officers and other officials were in the seats already, a dozen big men dressed in suits standing with their backs to the metal gates as they scanned the crowd.

“There’s some of your Secret Service guys,” Honor said to Smithers, raising her voice to be heard over the noise of the assembled crowd. It was no secret that Smithy had always dreamed of joining the Secret Service after he left the Army.

“That’s gonna be me someday,” he said to her and Ipman.

“I bet you will,” Honor answered. There’d be way more undercover guys dressed in uniform scattered throughout the crowd and elsewhere on base, and then there’d be the sniper teams and bomb-sniffing dog teams and the rest of the entourage that came with a presidential appearance. The air space around the base would be guarded as well.

Honor surveyed the growing crowd around her, a mix of mostly soldiers and their families. She remembered Liam’s warning about a possible insider attack, and now that she knew the President was coming—the perfect target for a terrorist—a shiver of foreboding ripped through her. But then she chided herself.

If the soldiers on base hadn’t known about him visiting the base tonight, then a terrorist couldn’t have known either. Besides, with all this additional security she was safer here than she’d ever been back at Bagram. That made her feel better.

Hundreds of people were already gathered in the large grass field, right up to the secured area, most talking in groups and some craning their necks with their cell phones raised toward the stage, taking pictures and no doubt hoping to get a shot of the President whenever he arrived. Zooming in with their cameras from this distance was the closest they’d get to him.

An official from the USO came on stage to get things rolling and soon the opening act got underway. With Ipman on one side of her and Smithers on the other she let herself relax as the chords from the two acoustic guitars blended with the singers’ voices.

The crowd joined in, singing along, whistling and clapping in approval at the end of each song. At the end of the opening act, just as dusk began to fall, the President arrived and the crowd went nuts, hollering and whistling like crazy. He smiled at the greeting and waved to the crowd before taking his seat, then the main act came out.

Ipman was obviously far more excited to see the headlining country artist because he whistled and yelled and sang along in a slightly off-key voice to the opening number. By the time it was over Honor was relaxed and enjoying herself. Didn’t matter that she only knew a few of the songs, the venue was awesome and the exuberant energy from the crowd was contagious.

The singer ended one song, said a little speech thanking the soldiers for their service, which was met with more raucous applause, then pointed to his drummer and the air filled with a complex rhythm a second before the electric guitar started up.

A sudden commotion broke out in the VIP area.

Honor’s gaze jerked to the President as a few of the Secret Service guys jumped the metal barrier and surrounded him and the First lady. The singer faltered and the rest of the band lost their rhythm. Honor stared in alarm, her heart seizing as the security team grabbed the POTUS and bodily rushed him out of the field.

“What the hell?” Smithers muttered, looking around in suspicion. The energy in the crowd had already shifted, everyone glancing around them, a chorus of concerned murmurs rising into the evening air.

“We should go,” Honor said, reaching for Smithers’ arm.

She’d just closed her fingers around his wrist when a shout sounded behind them. Whipping around, she caught the look of alarm on one soldier’s face as something streaked by overhead. Less than a heartbeat later, the world came apart in a blast of heat and noise that threw her off her feet.

Chapter Nineteen

Honor hit the ground face down, the impact punching the air from her lungs. A tremendous roar erupted, drowning out everything else. She struggled to her side as it faded, gasping for air.

What the hell?

Screams and shouting came from the area where the stage had been only moments before. Now it and the entire area surrounding it was a smoldering crater.

Heart pounding, she pushed to her knees and cast a frantic glance around. Smithers and Ipman were also climbing to their feet, looking slightly dazed. Whipping her head around, she checked in the direction where security had dragged the President. Was he still alive? She got her breath back, found her voice. “Did you guys see—”

More screams from behind her, another streak and a second explosion detonated in another wave of sound and heat. This time it was close enough that the ground rolled beneath her. She gasped and instinctively crouched as the shockwave blasted outward, beating at her body like a hurricane-force wind. Debris began raining down, pelting her head and back with bits of dirt and slivers of wood.

Honor covered her head to shield her face until the worst of it had passed. A strong hand wrapped around her upper arm. Pulled upward. She squinted up into Smithers’ grim face. “RPGs?” she shouted over the noise, climbing to her feet. Ipman was looking around frantically.

“Dunno,” he answered, hauling her upright. “From the size of those blasts though, I think it’s worse than that.”

Near the second impact site she saw bodies. Some moving, others not. A few of them naked, their clothes either burned or blown off in the explosion. She lurched toward them, stomach twisting when she saw some of the wounds. Other soldiers were already converging on them as she reached the scene. People were on cell phones and shouting for water, bandages, medical kits. A terrible helplessness washed over her, along with the fear that the attack wasn’t over yet.

“We can’t do any more for them. We gotta go,” Smithers urged, grasping her upper arm again.

Knowing he was right, Honor nodded. On unsteady legs she turned and ran with them away from the field. At the edge of it they got caught up in the surging mass of soldiers and family members scrambling for cover. Mothers, fathers, kids all caught up in the confusion. The level of chaos was unlike anything Honor had ever seen, even during the most recent attack on Bagram. Nobody knew what the hell was going on. That strike had clearly been targeting the President, but was there more coming?

She wove her way through the crowd and headed south as fast as possible, away from the field. They needed weapons to defend themselves if this wasn’t over. “Our arms room,” she yelled to Smithers and Ipman, running toward their company building. She pulled out her phone to call the armorer as she pushed her way through a knot of walking wounded, their faces and arms cut and bleeding.

Honor couldn’t afford to stop and help them. POTUS visit or not, the base was under attack and the nearest armed security personnel had just been obliterated in those explosions. Guards and MPs would be fanning out in an effort to stop further attacks but per regulations the majority of soldiers on base weren’t armed. The chatter Liam had told her about was right, and the security precautions taken had done dick-all to safeguard the facility, its soldiers and their families.

She and her fellow soldiers were the first line of defense now.

All around her people were racing in different directions. Some wounded, some carrying injured soldiers, others trying to rush their terrified family members and children to safety. Honor wheeled right around the corner of the next building, dodging a line of Humvees and emergency vehicles as they headed toward the PT field. She ran past without stopping.

Two hundred yards to the company building. Ipman and Smithers were right with her.

Then the unmistakable staccato shots of an automatic rifle shattered the air.

Honor faltered, automatically searching for this new threat. Enemy shooters? Or security agents firing on tangos?

The thought had barely formed when screams of agony came from her left, raising the hair on the back of her neck as she understood what was happening.

Active shooters were on base. Targeting unarmed soldiers and their families. They’d either forced their way through the security gates, or…

They were dressed in uniform to blend in. Maybe they were even currently serving. Liam had mentioned rumors of an insider. The thought enraged Honor.

Before she could move, another burst of fire opened up, closer this time.

Shit! Honor grabbed the soldier closest to her and tackled him to the ground. Ipman. Smithers hit the deck beside them just as bullets slammed into the asphalt to their left, kicking up a spray of needle-like shards. Honor gritted her teeth as they pelted her left side like little beestings, her mind screaming at her to get the hell out of range.

Move, move! She got to her elbows and began belly crawling toward cover, barely feeling the tears in her skin as she made for the shelter of the closest building. Her breath was sawing in and out of her lungs, her heart pounding her ribcage so hard it felt bruised.

“What the fuck is happening?” Ipman snapped, right behind her.

“Just move, go, go,” Smithers barked, crawling as fast as his large frame would allow.

Honor scrambled around the corner of the building and pressed her spine up against the far side, panting for breath. Her knees and elbows were raw and bleeding but she was barely aware of the sting.

She was shaking all over, fighting to wrestle back control of her body as she scanned the area in front of her, then risked a glance back the way they’d come. No sign of the shooters but she could still hear automatic fire in the distance, moving away from them. Soldiers and civilians were running in every direction to escape the deadly hail of bullets.

It was utter fucking chaos out there.

As the crowd cleared she could see bodies lying on the ground, people fallen where they’d been hit, some writhing in pools of their own blood. Others were limping away or being dragged to shelter by bystanders. Some were racing toward the barracks or the gun range, she hoped to get weapons.

Checking in the other direction, she gazed toward their target destination. Like-minded soldiers had reached their arms room and were rushing around with rifles, only adding to the confusion. Due to the nature of the attack there was no way to tell who was friend and who was foe until the shooting started. The timing didn’t help—all the shadows formed as dusk fell making it hard to see far away clearly even with the lights posted on the buildings.

“We gotta get weapons,” she told the others, mentally mapping out various routes to the company building. She settled on what was likely the safest route, given the direction of the shooting. Arming themselves was the only way to defend themselves and others against active shooters.

“Come on.” Her legs wobbled a second as she got to her feet but she turned and ran along the wall of the building to the end and shoved the door open. She raced down the darkened hallway then skidded to a stop and pressed against the wall when she saw other soldiers already hunkered down near the opposite doorway.

One of them looked over his shoulder at her. “Can’t see the shooters,” he said in a quiet voice. Satisfied he wasn’t part of the attack, Honor moved closer. She and Smithers approached the soldiers at the door and snuck a peek outside, Ipman trailing behind. Through the window in the door she could see groups of soldiers were running around but she didn’t hear any more shots. Was the threat neutralized?

She wasn’t going to risk it. “Have to get weapons,” she said to the others. “Let’s go.” With that she shoved the release bar and the door swung open. Immediately the volume of screams and yells increased.

Ignoring everything but getting to the arms room, Honor sprinted to the next building, pausing only to ensure there was no gunfire before hurrying to the next. The others followed. She leapfrogged her way across the base, pushing back the numbness that wanted to overtake her. Her soldiers needed her. They—

She gasped and stumbled, staring in horror as something hit the ammunition holding area. The building erupted into a towering column of fire and smoke, shaking the ground with the force of the explosion. The blast wave knocked her down and she barely had time to throw out an elbow to save her head from slamming into the ground.

“Jesus, they blew up the AHA,” Smithers muttered in disbelief. He was scraped all over his hands, arms and face, bleeding from at least a dozen cuts, his eyes wide.

Shaking, Honor pushed up onto her right hip and opened her mouth to reply just as smaller, secondary explosions started to go off.

Boom. Boom. Boom-boom-boom as the ammunition and weapons detonated from the heat of the fire.

Their firepower had just gone up in smoke. “Shit,” she breathed and twisted her head to check behind her. Where the hell were the freaking missiles coming from?

Confusion had reigned before but now the energy shifted toward panic. Rather than hunker down behind cover, people were running for their lives now, fleeing the burning armory and scattering in every direction.

The vehicles trying to reach the PT field ground to a halt as a wave of people clogged the roads. Honor saw men and women carrying babies, frightened children crying as they clung to their parents.

She climbed to her feet and saw the retreating wave of humanity draw up short and stumble back in their direction. It took a moment for her to realize they were being shot at. She couldn’t hear the gunshots over the exploding munitions, only realized what was going on when she saw people start to fall.

Oh my God, how many more? “Go,” she yelled, and once again pushed to her feet. Shit, where did they go now? They needed cover. Somewhere far away from the shooting so they could regroup and come up with another plan.

“Right behind you, ma’am,” Ipman shouted. He, Smithers and a group of three civilians—two women and a middle-aged man—ran with her back to the previous building and skirted along its back side.

The young woman holding a little boy no older than four stared at her with stricken eyes. “What do we do now? Where do we go?” Her voice broke and she buried her face in her son’s neck, clutching him to her.

“The hangars,” Honor decided. They could get to the hangars and access the weapons locked up there. Only a couple of pistols and maybe one rifle that she knew of, not enough for everyone following her, but it was better than nothing. She was the ranking officer of the group; these people were her responsibility. She needed to get the civilians safely behind cover before she and her soldiers could go after the weapons.

Pausing behind a storage building, Honor darted a glance around the edge of it. Through the fleeing crowd she checked the route she’d decided on, didn’t see any shooters. “This way. Don’t stop running, no matter what. If the shooting starts again, just find cover and stay low.”

With that she tore across the open space, her pulse racing, thighs burning as she ran full tilt to the access road that would take them to the hangars. She dodged people and vehicles, the cries and screams of the wounded fading in the background, overtaken by the wail of approaching sirens.

Overhead the distinctive scream of a fighter jet split the air. Glancing up, she caught the flares of its engines as it did a steep climb then banked eastward. Go get them, she urged its pilot. The crowd thinned for a moment then thickened. She bounced off a male soldier’s shoulder, righted herself then swerved left.

The others were still with her. She veered around a fire truck heading toward the burning AHA, and finally the hangar came in sight. A distant beat of rotors told her air support was finally arriving. She risked a glance into the twilit sky, searching for the aircraft, but couldn’t see anything.

Keeping alert for any more threats she locked her gaze on the back entrance to the hangar. Once she reached it she punched the access code into the keypad. The door unlocked and she shoved it open, holding it for the others as they all rushed past into the darkness beyond. As soon as the last person was inside she jerked it shut with a metallic clang that echoed through the air.

Ragged breathing filled the dim, cavernous space. Everyone crouched down and hugged the walls, staying away from the windows.

“What the fuck, what the fuck?” the middle-aged man muttered in a rough voice, running his hands over his head.

“I know. Everyone just sit tight until we can get a reliable SITREP,” she told them. Then she sent him, Smithers and Ipman to each corner of the hangar with instructions to alert her if they heard more shooting.

Leaving the two women to comfort the little boy, Honor took position at the east door, her back to the wall beside it, being careful to stay below window level. Next she yanked her cell phone from her pocket and checked for messages.

Nothing.

She dialed her superior, got his voicemail and left a message alerting him to what had happened and where she currently was. Then she texted Liam. She knew he was out on exercise but he’d know soon enough what had happened, if he didn’t already, and she wanted to reassure him that she was okay.

For now, at least, she thought grimly.

She’d just slipped the phone back into her pocket when Ipman called out in a loud whisper from the southeast corner. “I hear more shooting to my eleven o’clock.”

Everyone tensed and the hangar became eerily silent. Sure enough, the distinct sound of more automatic fire came from the direction noted, seeming to grow louder every second. So did the sound of the inbound helos. She prayed they were gunships.

Honor pressed her lips together. If the shooter or shooters were coming their way, they were sitting ducks.

She whipped her head around, looking for possible weapons to use. They could bar the doors shut and prevent someone from entering, but they couldn’t render the place bulletproof. “You guys brace the doors. Ladies, help me start building a barricade around that Huey.” She indicated the old chopper in the center of the hangar.