Clear by Fire (19 page)

Despite the air cover, the gunners and the pilot called out possible threats as they thundered toward the gravel-covered pad. The pilot brought the Black Hawk low over the stone-filled Hesco barriers before dropping the bird down for a soft landing.

Renee hung the headphones back on their hook and, keeping her head low, scooted out of the helo, her feet crunching into the gravel. The rotors kicked up a cloud of brown dust, obscuring the area as the engines went to full power. The nose of the Black Hawk dipped forward as the tail came up and the helicopter leapt into the sky.

Kevin yelled to catch her attention and pointed with an outstretched arm toward two bearded Americans standing at the edge of the landing zone. Renee walked over to them, cleaning the grit out of her mouth with a drink from her CamelBak.

“Ma’am, I’m Sergeant First Class Miles and this is Captain Westin with the Third Special Forces Group. We had no idea you were coming out until we got the call from your pilot.”

“Pleased to meet you, Sergeant Miles, and you too, Captain. How long have you been on site?”

“We received a call from the FOB late last night. It came over a satellite phone and said the base was under attack,” the captain began as they walked off the pad and into the perimeter of the small FOB. “Someone back at headquarters made contact with us over the radio and for some reason, our commo guy waited thirty or forty minutes before sending it up the chain.”

Renee counted ten men moving around the perimeter and an
additional seven-man gun team pulling security from the apex of the low mountain peak. The FOB was perched on the flat edge of the mountain face. It had an excellent field of view of the valley floor below, and she could barely make out the quarantined village off in the distance. Renee could see plumes of dust rising like clouds from the valley floor where the heavy Chinooks were landing.

Evidence of the attack was inescapable and the stench of death rose above the FOB like the aftertaste of violence. Blast marks from grenades scorched the gravel where they had exploded, and bullet holes stared like eyeless sockets from the exterior of many of the buildings. The sun glinted off the shiny spent brass and gave the momentary illusion of something valuable.

So this is what a crime scene feels like.

“How many casualties were there?” she asked as she surveyed the carnage. It felt wrong to be here.

“There was an eight-man element here, with one commo guy; all of them were KIA. We have no reports of enemy casualties and no blood trails, but we haven’t cleared anything besides the perimeter. It looks like they hit them while they were still in their racks. The last stand was around the commo shed. We found a lot of brass outside, but we haven’t located the phone anywhere.” Captain Westin spoke like he was ordering dinner. There was no emotion in his voice and absolutely zero empathy. It was obvious he didn’t care for the outsiders interfering in what he considered a Special Forces matter.

The commo looked lonely and abandoned at the top of the hill, and the door frame and walls were pockmarked with bullet holes and blast marks. Renee could tell that whoever held the building had not wanted to give it up.

“They must have brought in some outside talent for this one,” Captain Westin was saying as Renee walked into the shack. “I honestly didn’t think hajjis had it in them.”

Somewhere along the lines of communication, word of who perpetrated the atrocity was not being shared. Either the generals
hadn’t released the information, or someone was already trying to cover it up.

Renee shot a glance at Kevin, who shrugged and shook his head. She’d play along and let the facts speak for themselves.

Walking through the door of the commo shed, she stepped gingerly onto the cracked and splintered floor. Jagged black edges had been burned into the plywood planks that lined the bottom of the building, and splattered blood was still visible on the wall where one of the SF soldiers had been hit.

“Who is this guy?” she asked, pointing to one of the bodies.

“His name is Specialist Kent. He was a communications guy we borrowed from headquarters.”

The entry wounds to his chest and head were much smaller than they would have been if they had come from heavier-caliber rounds.

A layer of sand was spread over the pool of blood that marked the site of his death, but the blood had seeped through and stained the sand crimson.

The smell of cordite hung faintly in the air like incense from an ancient ritual, and as Renee moved closer to the desk, just a few lonely drops of blood marked Specialist Kent’s final resting place in Afghanistan. She turned slowly, searching outward from the desk, hoping to see anything that would tell her what she already knew.

“You still think that the Afghanis did this?” she asked, scanning the efficient kill zone.

“Maybe the Iranians or the Pakis sent a team over the border,” the captain said.

“Captain, how long have you been in country?”

“Uh, a little over two months.”

“Do you have any other combat experience?”

“Yes, ma’am, I was with the 508 Parachute Infantry Regiment in 2007.”

“Oh yeah, where were you?” Kevin asked, looking up from another body that lay off in the corner.

“I was at Kandahar. I was the supply executive officer.”

“So you never got into the shit? Is that what you’re saying?” Kevin stared at him, daring him to deny that he’d never actually been in combat.

“Well, uhh . . .”

“Listen,
sir
, were not talking about a bunch of National Guard guys guarding a checkpoint at Balad. These men were some badass motherfuckers, and there is no way they get hit in the middle of the night without taking somebody with them.”

“Well, I’ve heard of things like this happening in the Korangal.”

“What Kevin is trying to say is that somebody with a highly honed skill set did this.”

“Ma’am, what’s that over there?” Kevin was pointing to the corner just to the left of where Kent had been killed. It was a small white square of cloth covered in what looked like dirt. However, as she bent down closer she immediately knew what it was.

“I’m not sure that I’m following you,” the captain said.

“Renee, what kind of brass is that?” Kevin asked.

“I’ve got 5.56 NATO and two 7.62s. I guess the 5.56 is from him?” she said, bending down to scoop up some of the expended brass off the floor. “What about the brass outside, Captain?” Renee asked.

“It’s all 7.62s.”

“What are you thinking?” Bones asked.

“The entry wounds, they are too small for an AK. I bet this brass was planted.”

Renee walked over to where Kevin was squatting and looked down at the corpse. He was no Green Beret. The soldier’s hair was cut low, almost to the scalp, and his body was soft and flabby.

“You have a Gerber?” she asked Kevin, who slipped the multi tool off his belt and handed it to her. She opened up the pliers and said, “Sorry about this, kid,” and slipped the nose into the chest wound.

“What the hell do you think you are doing?” the captain said, exploding, as he stepped forward. Bones moved into his path and stuck out his hand.

“Chill out, sir.” He looked to SFC Miles to see if there was going to be a problem and the seasoned warrior simply shrugged.

Renee dug around for a second before the pliers hit something hard, and then very carefully she pulled out a mangled 5.56 round.

“The bullet never lies,” Kevin said softly.

She maternally patted Specialist Kent on the head and whispered another apology before standing up. Holding the bloodstained round up for the captain to see, she asked, “So who called Jalalabad and asked for the drone?”

“I can’t believe you did that.” The captain was pale as he looked at the bloody round.

“The drone, who called for it?” she asked again forcibly.

“The drone was vectored in after we couldn’t raise the FOB via radio or satellite phone. It was sometime this morning, but I was told that there was an equipment issue and it never made it to the objective.”

The lies had already begun in earnest.

Renee dropped the bullet and wiped the Gerber on her pants before handing it back to Kevin.

“Kevin, let the pilot know we’re ready for pickup. Captain, you might want to call your headquarters and find out what really happened here.”

“I’m not sure I’m following you.” They had only been here five minutes and had already found signs that pointed to a well-coordinated unit.

Renee wasn’t sure whether the man was playing dumb or didn’t see what was going on. The fact that someone had managed to take out an entire SF team without taking massive casualties was a feat in itself, but when you combined that with the fact that the site wasn’t even on the maps, it pointed to a leak somewhere at the top.

There was something bigger going on here, and she wasn’t about to get caught in the middle if she could help it.

“Birds are inbound,” Bones said as they walked out of the commo shed.

“We’re done here.”

They stopped short of the pad and turned to shield their faces from the sand the bird kicked up as it touched down. Sergeant Miles waited for the crew chief to motion the team forward, then grabbed Renee by the crook of her arm and helped guide her to the door.

The team loaded up, leaving Renee and Sergeant Miles hunched beneath the spinning rotors. He stuck out his hand and shouted, “I know someone who can find Barnes for you.”

Renee leaned forward, caught off guard by the sudden gesture. She stuck out her hand, and he jammed a folded scrap of green paper into her palm. He waited for her to gain control of it and then quickly pulled his hand away. Clutching the note tightly, she climbed into the Black Hawk and took a seat on the floor as the crew chief signaled the pilot that he was good to take off.

The helicopter squatted as the torque from the rotors compressed the hydraulic shocks of the landing gear before it shot skyward. The pilot cranked the stick hard to the left, sending the helicopter screaming downward into the valley.

Renee looked at the green slip of paper she’d wadded up in her hand. It came from one of the waterproof notebooks soldiers carried. Written on it in black marker was “Mason Kane.”

T
he sun was setting over Benghazi when Mason and Zeus pulled the dusty BMW into the small garage of the safe house. They had been on the road for the last eighteen hours, and Mason’s mouth tasted like the car’s ashtray. Both men had taken an amphetamine tablet halfway through the drive, and their minds were sharp despite the fatigue of their bodies.

Mason knew he could go another day without sleep but hoped that Tarek’s plan wouldn’t take that long.

Once inside the garage, Zeus set about switching the car’s plates, while Mason pulled a toothbrush and a bottle of water from his assault pack.

It was amazing how brushing your teeth could make you feel like a new man. And the house actually had running water and a Western bathroom. No holding himself over a hole in the floor. Life’s little luxuries. Mason judged his reflection harshly in the bathroom mirror. He despised the cold, hateful eyes, which stared at him like a mongrel guarding a trash pile. The face looking back at him was a mask he wore to hide from the things he’d lost. He thought about the last time he’d seen his ex. He’d surprised her by coming home early, and they’d gone out to see if there was anything left to talk about, or if they could maybe even try again.

Mason had spent most of their dinner nervously drinking Jack and Cokes while she laid out the problems with their sham of a marriage. He’d listened, nodding his head occasionally, but it was a one-way conversation for the most part.

The first sign that he’d changed more than even he had realized came when the movie started. He was reaching for the popcorn when there was a huge explosion on the screen. He thought he was in control, but the deep rumble that came from the massive speakers lining the ceiling of the packed theater sent him sprawling to the floor.

“What are you doing?” she asked, clearly freaked out.

“Holy shit, that was real.” He grinned drunkenly from the floor.

“Mason, what’s going on?”

Mason looked around, a deep feeling of shame burning its way across his face. He was supposed to be tough, and here he was lying on the floor like he belonged in a psych ward.

He didn’t care whose feet he stepped on as he climbed to the end of the aisle and staggered toward the exit. She tried to grab his arm, but he pulled it free with a jerk. He needed air.

“Mason, stop, where are you going?” She grabbed him by the back of his shirt as the glass doors banged against the outside of the building. At the curb he doubled over, his mouth stretched into a mask as he vomited.

“Oh, Mason. I’m going back in to get you some water. Just wait here. Don’t go anywhere.”

As soon as she went inside Mason pushed himself up and, fighting off the world spinning around him, stumbled into the shadows.

That was the last time he’d seen her. But he knew that it was better that way.

Mason heard Zeus enter from the garage and go into the kitchen, where he began banging around in the cupboard. Drying his hands, he flipped off the light and went to meet his friend.

“Do you have to make so much noise?” he asked, walking into
the kitchen. The Libyan was filling a black kettle with water, and he squinted as the cigarette smoke got into his eyes.

“Why does it matter? I’m making tea, not going to the mosque. Maybe you can make less noise fixing us something to eat.”

“Who’s going to pull guard if I’m cooking food?”

“The only people coming to this house are those that we bring here.” Zeus might as well have added “idiot” to the end of the sentence from the way he said it.

“Well, shit.” Mason shrugged and started searching through the cabinets for something to cook. Tarek had ensured the safe house was fully stocked with everything they could possibly need, including cabinets full of food. Mason found a box of rice, some beans, and dried dates. Throwing the rice and beans into a pot, he added bottled water and placed it on the gas stove.