Covert Christmas (17 page)

December 23, 1507 Zulu

J
ack grabbed Cass's arm, halting her. “They're not charging us,” he hissed, eyes fixed on the herd. “Elephants can't take inclines like that slowly. But whatever you do,
don't run
—out here, only food runs. Now slowly go up onto those rocks, take Christmas and work your way a little higher. They won't climb those boulders. We can watch them from up there.”

“
Watch
them?”

He laughed softly, eyes bright, clearly exhilarated by the sight of the prehistoric gargantuans. “We're sure as hell not going anywhere else as long as they're in our path.”

From up on their rock ledge, they watched the elephants coming down to drink and splash red mud over each other. Awe overcame Cass. “They're so quiet,” she whispered. “We never even heard them coming.”

Jack nodded. “So much for making a noise like an elephant.” He put his arm around Christmas and pointed. “See? That one's the matriarch, Christmas. She's the boss, and the family
has to listen to her no matter what. It's their best chance of survival.”

Cass smiled and cleared her throat theatrically. “Maybe we should take a lesson from that.”

He looked at her, grinned, his gorgeous blue eyes twinkling like a summertime lake. Her chest tightened. They'd almost kissed, and it had just happened. And she'd really wanted it to.

She glanced at his hand, the gleam of gold around his finger. Tears welled as easily as the smile that had sneaked up on her. She swiped them angrily away, turning her head so he wouldn't see.

She still loved him. Dammit.

She still wanted him and she couldn't have him, because it could never work.

“Cass?”

She sniffed, wiping her nose, but wouldn't turn to face him.

“What is it, Cass?” He touched her arm, his strength, his power suffusing into her, like it always had.

Still turned away, she said, “Why do you still wear the ring, Jack?”

“Why don't you wear yours anymore?”

“Why should I?” she said quietly.

“Because we're not divorced.”

She turned slowly to look at him. “That's only because neither of us wanted to face each other long enough to go through with it.”

His mouth flattened. “Speak for yourself, Cass.”

They fell quiet as they heard Christmas laugh at the antics of the two baby elephants. A baboon watched them, too, a short distance from the water's edge where a crocodile had disappeared under the surface.

“Do you want to do it—” he said, eyes on the herd “—make a commitment to end it, now, on our anniversary? It's an appropriate enough day to deal with it.”

Bitterness laced his words.

“What I want to do is save this boy,” she replied, her own words crisp.

“I wear the ring, Cass,” he said very quietly, “for the same reason I still carry this.” Jack removed the crumpled, tattered photo from his breast pocket, held it out to her.

She turned to look.

And her heart punched.

In Jack's hand was a photograph of Jacob—Cass's arms around him, a huge smile on her face, happiness twinkling in her eyes. She'd carried more weight then, and it was flattering. They were seated in front of a Christmas tree at Cass's parents' home—in the mountain town where they'd married. “Christmas town,” Cass had called it, because in winter it always looked just like a perfect Christmas card.

It was the last Christmas they'd ever had together. It was the Christmas before Jacob was killed.

The pain that twisted through Cass's chest was so powerful and so sudden, she couldn't breathe for a moment. Slowly she tore her eyes from the frozen, crumpled memory to meet Jack's gaze. And she noticed for the first time the new stress lines that fanned out from his eyes, the way the creases that bracketed his strong mouth had grown deeper. It was a rugged, handsome face, and she loved it with all her heart.

She began to shake inside, afraid to say anything, to go further down this dangerous path, but could not turn away, either.

“And I wear our ring, Cass, for the same reason I always find a small church somewhere in the world at this time of year, where I remember. And I pray for a way to find reason, to make sense of it all. For a way to make it right.”

Guilt twisted through her.

Jack had suffered as much as she had. She looked at Christmas, who was still watching the elephants. And an uncanny feeling of unreality wrapped like the hot mist around her. “It should have been me who died in that plane crash, Jack,” she whispered. “Not my son.”

“
Our
son, Cass.”

Her mouth tightened. She knew what she was doing. She was trying to protect herself by locking him out, holding her grief to her chest, private, personal, all her very own. As if letting it go would somehow betray Jacob's memory.

It was her way of keeping her son alive.

“You should have gotten professional help, Cass, like the docs said. You have some kind of survivor's guilt. That's why you keep running, chasing these stories, isn't it? You're daring the world to kill you—as if it might make it right that it took Jacob instead.”

“Damn, you, Jack.” She got up, arms tightly folded over her stomach. He was forcing her to an edge, an abyss. Holding on to her pain was the one thing that held her together.

But he was right, and she knew it.

Her doctors had told her to see a shrink after the plane crash in Alaska—she had been in denial then, and perhaps she still was now. She had never moved beyond that first stage of grief towards acceptance. Suddenly she felt Christmas's warm little hand reaching up for hers, tugging to go closer to see the baby elephant being bathed. Emotion pricked into her eyes. Somehow that path up ahead into the jungle and over the border into Ivory Coast seemed more daunting than ever.

And this little boy was urging her to take the next step.

She had to do it, go forward. And she had to allow Jack to guide them. Again Cass wondered what strange fate of magic had brought them all to this juncture at this particular time.

Jack stood up, came to her side, touched her shoulder. “We should move,” he said.

“It won't work, Jack,” she said quietly. “You know it won't.”

“Just keep moving forward, Cass.”

December 23, 1800 Zulu

Night fell like a hot velvet curtain and thirst plagued them as they trekked yet higher and higher, Jack hacking a path with
a machete, his muscles gleaming in the light of his headlamp. Cass swatted bugs away from her face.

Wildlife and terrain now presented a different kind of danger. The sound of frogs filled the air, a shrill rising and falling chorus. Something rustled through the leaves at Cass's feet. She gasped as Jack spun round and whacked his machete down, severing the head of a brown snake, thick as her leg. Its body continued to writhe. “Gaboon viper. Stay back from the head.” He ordered crisply. “A reflex bite could still kill you.”

“Oh, dear God,” she whispered as she gathered Christmas into her arms.

“We'll stop for the night, up ahead,” Jack said, watching her in the light of his headlamp. “Looks like we could all use some rest.”

He found them a large bombax with buttress roots big enough to make caves. Clearing the forest debris out of one of the deep pleats in the smooth trunk, he checked it was safe. Jack gave them bug juice, and together they huddled into the small enclosure, protected by the giant roots.

Jack didn't sleep. He listened to the sounds of the jungle, marveling at how it felt to have Cass in his arms, the smooth swell of her breast against his chest, the sensation of her hair against his face. He loved her even more, if it was possible. Christmas curled at her side, snoring softly as he slept. Jack's heart went out to the child. He wondered what the future would hold for the small boy once they crossed the border—an orphan in Africa, sadly, was nothing out of the ordinary.

Just before dawn, Jack tensed at a particular sound, different from the ambient chorus of the jungle. He shook Cass awake gently, put his finger to his lips, whispered in her ear, “Soldiers coming. Don't move—keep Christmas quiet if he wakes.”

She jolted upright, eyes wide. “Where are you going?”

“Up into the tree over there, where I can get a good shot, just in case. Best scenario, they don't see us.”

Or smell us.

Jack was worried about the distinct scent of bug spray on their skin. A good tracker would pick it up instantly.

He shimmied up the tree, positioned himself in a fork. Within minutes he heard voices, growing louder. Kigali language. Raucous laughter. From the sounds of it, the troop was merry—maybe high on drugs and drink. They'd be lethal in this condition, but maybe not alert enough to notice Cass and the boy, or him up in the tree as they passed beneath. He motioned to Cass again to stay dead quiet. Her eyes were huge. She nodded, hugging Christmas to her chest.

The pale gray light of dawn fingered and dappled down through the canopy just as he caught sight of the first man. Glistening skin. Red bandanna.

Rebels.

Jack's throat tasted bitter as he saw blood on their fatigues. He could smell death and old sweat on them, but he held steady as seven men passed beneath his branch. The man at the rear paused suddenly, and Jack's pulse kicked.

The solider turned, raising stock to shoulder as he scanned the undergrowth—he'd detected something unusual. Slowly Jack lowered his eye to his gun sight, curled his finger against his trigger. He'd taken care not to hack a path into their night hide with his machete, but the men would have seen their earlier tracks.

But just as he was about to squeeze, the men up ahead yelled for their comrade. The man took one last glance around, and moved on.

Relief washed through Jack. He slid down the tree, went to Cass, cupped her face. “They're gone.”

“Oh, thank, God, Jack. Thank you. I can't believe we're still alive, that nothing ate us in the night.”

Her eyes were luminous, soft like he hadn't seen them in years. And she looked unusually vulnerable. Even all messed up like this, she had never been more beautiful to him. And Jack could not help what came next. He bent down, and brushed her lips softly with his.

December 24, 0620 Zulu

J
ack felt her sharp catch of breath, then to his surprise, Cass opened her lips a little more, welcoming his kiss, and inside he melted. His heart wanted to say,
I love you. I always have.

He wanted to try to do it right this time, now that they were battle-scarred and world-weary—now that he'd learned what was truly important in his life.

He'd give it all up if he could have her again. If she'd let him. And the answer he could feel in her body bolstered and fueled and strengthened his resolve. “I'm going to get you both out of here,” he whispered against her lips.

A small tear leaked out from the corner of her eye and he felt her hand seeking his, slipping into his. He felt her fingering his wedding ring.

“I'm afraid,” she whispered.

“I'll protect you.”

“It's not the jungle I'm afraid of, Jack.”

He looked into her eyes. And he knew what she was talking
about. “Trust in me, Cass. We can do this. We—” He was interrupted by a radio transmission, which stirred Christmas awake.

Jack surged to his feet, keyed his radio. “Come in—”

Cass dug into her backpack as Jack stepped slightly away. She removed a military ready-to-eat-meal pouch, and tore off the top. She handed it to Christmas, showing him how to eat it. “And guess what, Christmas,” she said with a smile, “it's turkey, and today is Christmas Eve. How cool is that?”

Christmas studied her uncomprehendingly with large, round eyes as he tucked heartily into the meal.

Jack kept an eye on them as he listened to his commander, who was now at the Ivory Coast staging camp from where the Marines were flying personnel out to the
U.S.S. Shackleton.

“Bannister, we just got news that the entire Kigali royal family was assassinated in the early hours of yesterday morning—all apart from the youngest son. And we've learned that King Savungi's cousin, General Charles Zuma, is behind the coup. Word is also leaking out that a local television news reporter, Gillian Tsabatu, a cousin of the King's youngest wife, fled with the sole surviving heir to the throne—five-year-old Christmas Savungi.”

Jack's fist tensed; his eyes shot to Cass.

His commander continued in his trademark staccato voice. “Tsabatu has been found dead in her home, along with cameraman Samuel Sekibo. A CBN foreign correspondent, Cass Rousseau, was seen leaving the U.S. residential compound with Sekibo yesterday, during the evacuation. Is she the one with you?” he demanded. “Does she have the king?”

Jack's skin chilled under his perspiration, his gaze falling to the wide-eyed boy eating his MRE.

Christmas was the new king of Kigali?

He cursed to himself, his attention shifting to Cass who was watching him intently, her entire body wire-tense. Damn her—
she knew!

“If you have the boy, Bannister, I need you to stand down stat, remain exactly where you are until I receive orders directly
from Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington, because Zuma has issued a statement saying that if the U.S. is harboring the king, he will consider it an act of war on the part of the United States and all its European allies. He will start by killing the American staff at a diamond mine he has already taken hostage in the south. A staff of seventy. General Zuma will also give orders that any foreign national should be slain on sight.”

Jeezus, this was about to blow. There could be hundreds of foreign nationals still stationed in Kigali. Jack glowered at Cass. She knew exactly who Christmas was and she never told him. She had not trusted him enough.

“I repeat, Warrant Officer Bannister,
do
you have the boy?”