Into Darkness (19 page)

Shannon stood and undid the clasp holding her hair back, then ran her fingers through her black locks, giving herself a wild look. She pulled the front of her blouse out from beneath her belt and then started unbuttoning the top of her shirt.

“What are you doing?” Ritter asked.

“Plausible deniability. Can’t tell people what we’re actually doing in here, can we?” She stopped undoing the buttons almost halfway down her shirt, exposing plenty of cleavage and the upper edge of a frilly bra.

She stood up, nodded to Ritter, and grabbed the handle. She looked over her shoulder and said, “I’m sorry about your friend.” She motioned toward the photo Cindy had sent him before she walked out the door. Ritter’s heart skipped a beat as she left. Did Shannon know there was something between him and Cindy? Shannon had an infuriating habit of chasing down facts she thought she had the business to know, like a junkie searching for a fix. She let the door stay open as she sauntered into the early evening. Ritter scrambled for the door.

“Hi, Soldier,” Shannon said to someone in a sweet voice as she walked away from Ritter’s room. Sergeant Greely’s draw dropped as she passed by; his eyes took a shameless look at Shannon’s rear. Greely looked over at Ritter, who stood in his doorway, then back at Shannon. He looked at Ritter again. A grin spread across his face as he flashed a thumbs-up to Ritter.

“Sir!” Greely said.

Ritter considered protesting, but sometimes appearances must be kept up. He winked at Greely and shut his door.

Ritter dropped his tray in the garbage bin as he left the mess hall. The cooks had put out frozen waffles and chicken tenders for dinner, a Dragon Company tradition the night before any big operation. At least the food was hot, Ritter thought. He meandered back toward his room in the full moonlight, hoping to avoid any sight or interaction with Shannon.

“Eric!”

Ritter turned around and saw Lieutenant Davis running toward him. Two female Soldiers were behind her, smoking cigarettes near the burn pit.

“Cindy? What are—Christ, who else is here?”

“Who else?” Davis asked.

“Nothing. Are you security for tomorrow?”

“That’s right. One second—” She turned to the smoking Soldiers. “Private, you two can head back whenever.” She turned back to Ritter. “Captain Shelton wants us on the buddy system while we’re here. So you’re my buddy until further notice.” She jabbed his arm.

Ritter smiled. “It’s good to see you, but I don’t know why they let you leave the pit. There are how many drones watching the event tomorrow? Three?”

“I’m not the drone wench anymore. Joe went back to the States for the funeral, and he won’t be back. He’s kind of a mess, and they’ll stick him on the rear detachment for the rest of the deployment. Someone has to handle detainee management, and I volunteered,” she said.

“How’s the new job treating you?”

“More spreadsheets to deal with. Why didn’t you warn me there are fifty different ways to spell Muhammad?”

“There’s just one way to spell that name,” he said.

“If you write it in Arabic! I spend half my time fighting transliteration errors and the other half indulging Lieutenant Colonel Reynolds’s nitpicks. At least this job gave me the opportunity to sneak off Victory base for once.” She leaned in and whispered to Ritter, “I will never complain about the food or the bathrooms at Victory again.”

The lights running along the outer walls cut out, leaving only the moon to light the base. Ritter took a step toward Cindy and cupped her elbow.

“They black out the base at night. Not sure if they warned you about that. Abu Five Rounds, the local mortar man, likes to use the light as an aiming point,” he said.

“That sergeant—Young, I think—tied to tell us something about the pissers and the shitters. That turned awkward real quick,” she said. They shared a laugh as Ritter led her toward the guest quarters, a glorified plywood shack cooled by a pair of air conditioners propped up along the walls. Ritter stopped as he caught a glint off Cindy’s bootlaces.

“You have a dog tag on your boot,” he observed. The dog tag stuck out like a puppy’s ear from the base of the laces.

“Oh, I didn’t think you’d notice.” She lifted the toe of her boot and rocked her foot back and forth.

“You need to stick it under the laces,” he said, his tone somber.

She half bent over, then quickly stood back up. She looked at the door to the guest quarters; a woman’s laugh snuck past the paltry walls. Davis chewed her bottom lip for a moment, then took a half step toward Ritter.

“Things haven’t been the same since you left. You’re out here, Joe won’t be back, and Jennifer...I know this’ll sound selfish, but I miss you—you all.” She reached out and gently took Ritter’s hand. “Then you almost get blown up in the first week and—”

Ritter gently pulled his hand away.

“I’m sorry. I forgot that you’re not one for emotions.” Davis lowered her head and turned to the door.

“Cindy.”

She stopped.

“It’s too dangerous out here for...attachment.” Ritter face burned with embarrassment from possibly the worst word possible, but he decided to continue instead of digging his hole any deeper. “But we won’t be out here forever,” he stammered.

Cindy waited in front of the door for a heartbeat, then went inside.

Ritter shook his head as he walked away. Interrogations were less complicated than relationships.

Captain Shelton nodded to yet another wizened farmer as he entered the courtyard, a woman in an all-encompassing
burka
and three small children behind him. The turnout for this mission had exceeded everyone’s expectations; more than one hundred Iraqis had come through for a cursory examination and complimentary over-the-counter medications. Everyone who came in also left with a flier featuring his or her missing men and a number to call to pass on any leads.

Shelton checked his watch. Only a half hour until they returned to base. Only half an hour for Abu Ahmet and Sheikh Abdullah to make an appearance. Ritter seemed nervous that the pair weren’t the first to arrive. He’d said that If Sheikh Abdullah wanted the
wasta
for this event, he should have been there to greet every Iraqi that came for treatment; that way the Iraqis would know who to thank for this rare service.

An elderly Iraqi had assured Ritter that Abu Ahmet was working on something important and would arrive soon. That “soon” was several hours ago, and every passing minute gave more credence to Shelton’s fear that their trip home would end in a deadly ambush.

Shelton took the radio mike from Channing and opened the frequency. “This is Dragon Six. Give me an update on drone coverage for our route back to base. Over.”

“You keep bugging the operations center, and Reynolds will reach through that radio to strangle you,” Ritter said. He pulled a small stack of fliers from a plastic bag in the back of Shelton’s command Humvee. He wasn’t wearing his body armor or his helmet, which irritated Shelton to no end. Ritter insisted on “removing barriers to rapport” but kept his pistol on a thigh holster because of Shelton’s insistence.

Shelton kept the earpiece next to his head as he gave Ritter a dirty look. “Twelve hours. We’ve been out here for twelve hours, and not one IED has gone off and not a single shot has been fired at us,” he said. “We broke the record two hours ago.”

“I can pop off a few rounds, if it’ll make you feel better,” Ritter said. Shelton ignored him as he got into his Humvee to check the battle-tracking computer bolted next to the front passenger seat.

Ritter took the fliers to the waiting line and passed the papers out to the men in line as he repeated his spiel detailing the missing men, how much their families missed them, and the substantial reward for any information leading to their rescue. Ritter knew most of the men he had spoken with that day couldn’t read or write, but the photographs of O’Neal and Brown were enough to get the message across. Ritter wondered how long it would take for one of those fliers to make it back to Mukhtar’s hands.

The wrought iron gate guarding the entrance to the school creaked open behind Ritter.

“
Captain Ritter!
” Abu Ahmet said in Arabic as he beelined to Ritter. The armpits of Abu Ahmet’s
dishdasha
were dark with sweat; the rest of the garment was dusted with ochre Iraqi earth and sand. Abdullah was a step behind him, but he peeled off and jumped the line of those waiting to see the doctors.

“
I was worried you weren’t going to show up
,” Ritter said. Abu Ahmet stopped a hand’s breadth from Ritter; he reeked of sweat and cheap cigarettes. Ritter cursed the Arab cultural norm of “standing close enough to share the same breath” as he held his ground from Abu Ahmet’s funk.

“
Karim, the other bomb maker…We know where he is. My men are watching his home; we’re positive he’s there
,” Abu Ahmet said between deep breaths.

Ritter half stepped around Abu Ahmet, keeping an eye on Abdullah as he waved to someone in the classroom, which served as the examination room for the female Iraqis.

“
Where? Can you take us there?
” Ritter asked.

Abu Ahmet shook his head rapidly. “
If Karim’s tribe sees me there, it will put bad blood between our tribes. Give me a map. I’ll show you where he is
,” he said.

“
Wait. You can read a map?
” Ritter said. Iraqi navigation was based entirely on spatial relations to landmarks. An Iraqi could explain exactly where his family farm was based off where a canal forked next to his second cousin’s goat farm and the place where Saddam Hussein once stopped for tea at the home of a former Ba’th Party official’s second wife. Asking the same Iraqi to point out a location on a map was like asking someone to explain what the color blue tasted like.

“
I spent twenty years in Saddam’s Special Republican Guard. Yes, I can read a map
.”

Ritter led Abu Ahmet to Shelton’s Humvee. Ritter bit his tongue to halt another question; Abdullah demanded more of his attention. The young sheikh spoke to Shannon through one of the female interpreters, just beyond his hearing. Shannon pointed toward the entrance as she tapped the interpreter on the shoulder. The interpreter nodded emphatically as she mimed Shannon’s gesture, taking her attention away from Shannon and Abdullah. Abdullah used the distraction to slip something into Shannon’s hand.

So that’s who her source is, Ritter thought.

Ritter opened the door to Shelton’s Humvee. His friend slapped his hand across the digital map on the tracking station when he saw Abu Ahmet standing behind Ritter. Digital tracking software wasn’t anything special, but the blue icons showing every vehicle in Iraq was something Iraqis shouldn’t see.

“I think we’ve got something,” Ritter said.

Lieutenant Davis had no idea what was going on. One minute she was giving candy to an adorable, little Iraqi girl, and the next, she and the rest of the medics had to load back into their vehicles. No explanation given. They left in such a rush that the boxes of medicine and sundry items meant for the Iraqis were left unsecured on the floor of her MRAP. She hadn’t spent much time on tactical convoys, but she knew if this top-heavy vehicle rolled over into a ditch, the loose items would ruin the day for everyone not in the front cab or gunner’s hatch.

The female doctor, a gray-haired, frail-looking major named Sutherland, hadn’t protested when they left early. She’d made it very clear during the drive from Victory that she had better things to do than catch tuberculosis from the Iraqis. She complained nonstop about the living conditions at Patrol Base Dragon and compared everything to the hospital she had been so inelegantly dragged from in the Green Zone. Davis had done her best to humor the major until the day was done.

Their convoy had left the school over half an hour ago and taken a different return route than the one Captain Shelton had briefed them about earlier that morning. The MRAP had stopped ten minutes ago and idled on a dirt road. Naturally, Major Sutherland took the opportunity to mention, for the umpteenth time, that she was a cardiologist and not meant for this sort of medical work.

Davis finally lost patience and unleashed her restraints. She stepped around her security element, a Jordanian soldier named Rasha, and crept into the forward cab.

“What’s going on out there? IED in the way?” she asked the sergeant in the commander’s seat.

“Captain Shelton thinks there’s some high-value target in a house up ahead. They’re about to clear the building right now.” He handed her a set of bulbous headphones. She unsnapped her chin strap and put her helmet between her knees. She was pulling the headphones apart, about to slip them over her ears, when a ripple of gunfire rang out from the compound.

Davis dropped both her helmet and the headset as her reflexes drove her to cower between the two front seats. Her inverted helmet wobbled on the floor between her feet as she struggled to reach it. Her body armor, designed for a male torso, lent her the mobility of a rusty tin man when prone.

The gunner spun the turret while shouting down from his cupola, asking for the source of the gunfire. Davis finally grabbed the edge of her helmet and pulled herself to her feet. The headphones beeped at her feet as a flurry of traffic jammed the airwaves. She grabbed the headset and jammed a single headphone against her ear.