Taking Fire Page 5

  Grif crouched beside Max in the portal, waiting for the skids to touch ground. He squeezed her shoulder.

  “Keep your head down, Deuce.”

  “Planning on it,” Max yelled. She had jumped out of birds into hot zones plenty of times before, and she didn’t worry about what might happen. She couldn’t stop a bullet if it had her name on it. “You get those medics with the litter on board. That must be the hospital tent up ahead. I’ll check it.”

  “Roger, Deuce.”

  Closer now, Max could make out the features of the woman at the front end of the litter. She wore plain tan hospital scrubs and field boots. Her thick blond hair escaped from a twist at her nape and thick curls flew about her face in the wind. Her eyes were wide, her mouth open, and she appeared to be panting in panic or exertion. Not Rachel Winslow.

  Max brushed aside an unexpected twinge of disappointment and jumped the last five feet, landing next to Ollie. Automatic weapons chattered all around her. Another man and woman broke from the jungle twenty yards away and ran toward her, shouting, “We’re Red Cross. Help us!”

  “Get into the helicopter,” Max shouted, waving them toward Ollie and Burns, and raced toward the people carrying the litter. A wizened old man, or possibly a very malnourished young one, lay on the litter, his eyes glazed. “Are you the doctor? How many more patients are back there?”

  “Yes, I am Maribel Fleur,” the woman said with a hint of a French accent. She gulped for breath. “We have another non-ambulatory and two children.”

  “We’ll get them. You two get on board,” Max said.

  “You will need help. I will go back—”

  “No! I’m a doctor. I’ll handle it.” Max waved for Grif to grab the litter, signaling him to get both the old man and the two French medics into the bird. “They’ll need you to look after them inside. Go. Go.”

  She didn’t wait to see that the woman followed her instructions. Grif would take over. She held her rifle close to her chest and sprinted for the hospital tent. Just as she reached it, another woman and man pushed through the opening bearing a second litter with a thin, white-haired woman on it. The woman carrying the litter was young and dark-haired with a smooth caramel complexion. The man with her was white, in his mid-forties with a day’s worth of reddish beard and terror in his eyes.

  “The children,” the young woman gasped. “Two of them inside.”

  “I’ll get them,” Max said. “Where is Rachel Winslow?”

  The woman shook her head. “I don’t know. She went to the headquarters tent.”

  “Headquarters. Which one is that? The other big one?”

  “Yes. Yes.”

  “When?”

  “Ten minutes ago? Then there was shouting and more shooting. I was afraid to go after her.” The woman’s face contorted with fear and guilt. “I shouldn’t have let her go alone.”

  Max pointed to the Black Hawk. “It’s all right. I’ll find her. Go to the helicopter. Hurry.”

  The man shouted something in French that was lost in the wind, and the two of them rushed toward the Black Hawk with the litter bobbing precariously with every step. Max shoved inside the tent, swept the room quickly with her weapon ready, and spied the two toddlers, a boy and a girl of about three, standing in a common crib. Their faces were smeared with tears and splotched with blisters, and both were wailing.

  “All right you two, you’re all right.” Max slung her rifle onto her back and scooped up one under each arm. They grabbed onto her with surprising strength, their legs settling on either side of her hips. “We’re gonna run for it. You’ll be fine.”

  A boom sounded from somewhere close by. Big caliber rocket or shoulder-launched mortar shells. If one of those took out vital parts of the Black Hawks, none of them would be getting into the air again. They didn’t have much time. Maybe none at all.

  “Hold on! We’ll be okay!” The kids wouldn’t be able to understand her, but they’d know she wasn’t afraid. She only hoped Ollie, Burns, and the gunners on the second Black Hawk had cleared the LZ because she couldn’t fire her weapon and carry the kids too. Looking neither right nor left, she fixed on the belly of the bird and raced across the open ground, the air thick with dust and smelling of hot metal and death. The kids clung to her like limpets. Neither of them cried. The French doctor, hair flying and face set, jumped from the bird and rushed to meet them. She held out her arms. “Give them to me.”

  Max handed over the children. “Stay in the helicopter this time!”

  The blonde pointed in the direction of headquarters where two bodies lay in front of the tent. “What about them? There are injured—the rest of our team is out there somewhere!”

  Max’s chest tightened. Was one of those bodies Rachel Winslow? Maybe all this was for nothing. No, not nothing. Two old people, the French medics, a couple of civilians, and two kids were safe. Almost safe, anyhow. If the Black Hawks got up into the air and out of there soon, they would be. “I’ll see to them. You’re out of this now.”

  The blonde looked like she might argue. She clearly was not afraid. Or not afraid enough. The little boy started crying again. The blonde hugged him and the girl to her chest, nodded curtly, and scurried back to the Black Hawk.

  Fox’s voice came over her radio. Ground fire is getting heavy. They’re firing RPGs. We need to get airborne.

  Max ducked behind a tent. The flimsy barrier would at least keep her from being a visible target. She touched her mic. “Five minutes. I can’t find Winslow, and there may be more wounded.”

  We didn’t plan on this, Fox said. Burns took a round to the shoulder. We need to get him and these civilians out of here. It’s too hot to land the other bird. I’ll give you as long as I can.

  Grif skated around the corner of the tent with a collapsible litter balanced on his shoulder. His smile gleamed through a layer of camouflage paint and dirt. “Good day for a jog.”

  Max snorted and pointed toward the bodies in front of the big tent. “Rachel Winslow might be over there. Let’s go.”

  Heads down, they ran across the clearing, skirting the smoldering fire pits.

  Two men in plain khakis lay on the hard-packed earth. One was still breathing, and they rolled him onto the litter. Blood bubbled from a wound in his chest. Max knelt next to the other one. A large chunk of his neck was missing—probably torn away by a rocket grenade fragment. His eyes were fixed and staring, and he was beyond any help she could provide. She needed to get inside the big tent to search for Rachel Winslow. She called back to Grif, “Get him stabilized and give me one minute to check inside. If she’s not here, we’ll get him back to the bird.”

  “Go ahead. I’m good,” Grif said, opening his IFAK with practiced efficiency and withdrawing bandage packs and an IV.

  Bounding up, Max ran for the tent, shouldered her rifle, and burst inside, fanning the room with her weapon, half expecting to find the rebels pointing weapons back at her. A woman in a torn, grimy white shirt and black cargo pants spun around, her eyes wide with adrenaline and shock. She stared at Max’s rifle.

  “Rachel Winslow?” Max rasped. Her throat burned from the smoke and dust and her voice came out a low growl.

  Rachel couldn’t answer, her father’s warning resounding in her memory. If you are kidnapped…kidnapped…kidnapped. The intruder’s face was indiscernible beneath the layer of grease and grime that covered every exposed inch. The rifle pointed at her was quite recognizable, though. Rachel glanced past the soldier toward the opening in the tent. Could she get out? She would never make it across the camp, even if she did somehow elude this soldier. She searched the dirt-caked uniform for some kind of insignia. Rebels wore uniforms too. She couldn’t make out a patch, a name, a flag—no, wait—a glint of gold at the collar. Rachel stared at the twin snakes encircling the staff. A caduceus. A medic. She drew in a breath, felt as if she had just surfaced after having been held underwater for hours. “Yes. I’m Rachel Winslow.”

  The rifle lowered. “Come with m
e.”

  “Who are you?”

  The soldier—the woman soldier, Rachel realized as she calmed down and took a closer look—gave an impatient shake of her head and strode toward her in three long steps. A hand closed over her upper arm. “Commander Max de Milles. US Navy. Come on. There’s no time.”

  “I’m not going anywhere.” Rachel yanked her arm free. “I’ve got to get back to the hospital tent. Amina is over there. The patients, my team—”

  “They’re taken care of. You’re the last one. Let’s go.”

  Max tugged and Rachel stumbled outside. The encampment still looked very much the same at first glance. A few of the tents had been shredded and their torn canvas flickered in the wind like skeletal flags. She sucked in a breath and everything changed. Dacar lay on the ground a few feet in front of the tent. She grasped the hand gripping her arm and tried to break free. “Let me go. That’s one of our people.”

  “He’s dead. You will be too if you keep fighting me.”

  On the far side of the camp, a helicopter hovered a few feet off the ground. Gunfire clattered from a second one, circling higher up. Amina appeared from behind the closest tent and ran toward them. “Rachel! Rachel, I can’t find the others! I think Mahad is dead!”

  “That’s one of our security team,” Rachel said. “We need to check—maybe he—”

  “There’s no time.” Max dragged Rachel toward another soldier who knelt over a wounded man. “Status?”

  The medic looked up and shook his head. Rachel felt a hand in the center of her back pushing her forward, and Max said, “Get her into the bird, Grif.”

  “What about you,” Grif yelled, jumping to his feet.

  Max ignored him and said to Amina, “Show me.”

  “Deuce,” Grif said, “forget it. It’s too hot down here. We need to get out of here.”

  “We’ll be right behind you. Get Winslow on that bird!”

  Rachel tried to pull away, but Grif was bigger and stronger even than Max de Milles had been. “I’m not leaving until everyone—”

  An explosion of gunfire and rocket bursts drowned her words. The ground kicked up around them, splattering her with bits of dirt and rocks. Her cheek stung and blood ran down her face.

  “Sorry, ma’am,” Grif said, practically carrying her now. “We’ll come back for the others. You can count on—”

  He grunted, stumbled, and fell, pulling Rachel to her knees beside him. Blood shot from his upper thigh in a brilliant red arc. Rachel instinctively pressed both hands on his leg. Crimson fluid, warm and thick, oozed between her fingers. She pressed harder.

  “No,” he groaned. “Leave it. Get to the helicopter.”

  “I can’t! You’re bleeding.” So much blood. Rachel leaned down with all her weight, terror closing her throat.

  Behind them, the roaring grew louder and dirt swirled in thick clouds. The helicopter rose, and a few seconds later a fusillade of gunfire filled the air with endless metallic clattering. The jungle on the far side of the camp seemed to disintegrate. Tree trunks splintered, leaves split into confetti-sized pieces, and mounds of dirt heaved upward. Rachel crouched over Grif, expecting to be struck by a bullet at any second.

  “Get into the tent,” Max shouted, pushing Rachel aside. “That’s cover fire—they won’t shoot at the tent.”

  Amina grasped Rachel’s arm. “Come, come inside!”

  “I can’t,” Rachel said. “His leg—”

  “I’ve got it. Go, goddamn it.” Max ripped open a hemostatic pack, pulled out a pressure bandage, and slapped both onto Grif’s leg. She gripped Grif under the arms and pulled. His heavy body lurched forward slowly, and he groaned.

  “Leave it, Deuce,” he gasped.

  “Shut the fuck up and push with your good leg. If I try to carry you, that bandage is going to give way.”

  Rachel pushed Amina toward the tent, ran back, and grabbed Grif’s ankles. She looked up and saw surprise in Max’s clear blue eyes. “Pull. I’ll get his legs.” Overhead, the helicopters grew smaller until they were just black smudges against a brilliant red sunrise.

  Chapter Six

  Max spared one quick look into the sky. Both Black Hawks lifted higher and swung away in sharp curves to the north, to safety. Good. The mission had gone to hell, but they’d managed to salvage part of it with only two casualties on their side—Burns and Grif. The civilians had not fared as well. Two Somalis dead and another injured or dead that she knew of. The other three were either dead in the jungle, captured, or hiding. She had an unknown number of rebel forces who might close in at any minute, and she had to keep Grif and the rest of them alive. The firing had stopped and the silence was like a vacuum, leaving the air thin and empty. She scanned the encampment. Nothing moved except the fluttering of torn canvas, weary banners celebrating a questionable victory. The battle was over for the moment but the mission objective had not been achieved. They’d failed to extract Rachel Winslow.

  “You need to get to cover,” Max said.

  “You can’t carry him alone.” Rachel Winslow’s gaze never wavered, locked on Max’s face like a laser-guided missile. Her face was set in a mixture of defiance and controlled fear—pale lips slightly parted, teeth clenched, pupils so wide the black eclipsed the green Max remembered from the photo. Grif was a former Iowa State linebacker—six-five, two hundred and forty pounds of muscle—but Rachel held Grif’s legs off the ground by the ankles as if he weighed nothing. Adrenaline strength.

  Max should order her to get inside. Not that she had any faith Winslow would listen to her. She didn’t have any choice but to give in. Grif’s life was in the balance, he was only intermittently conscious, and if she tried getting him up onto her shoulder, the leg wound was going to blow wide open. That fountain of blood spelled arterial tear, and a big one. He might still bleed to death at any minute. She needed help, Winslow wasn’t going anywhere, and no place here was safer than the other.

  “On my count,” Max shouted. “Lift his legs and keep your damn head down.”

  Rachel nodded, keeping her focus on Max, on the sharp hard strength in her eyes. The pressure in her chest eased enough for her to breathe, and the scream that threatened to erupt from her raw throat faded. The horror was out there, a few feet away in the bodies of her friends and the still-echoing clatter of thousands of bullets crackling through the air, but she could push the awfulness back to the shadows if she just held on to the certainty in Max’s eyes. “I’m ready.”

  For no reason that made any sense, Max felt a wave of calmness flow through her, calm she had no right to be feeling in the midst of chaos and carnage. Strength suffused her muscles. “Three. Two. One!”

  Max lifted and so did Rachel, and between them they half carried, half dragged Grif’s big frame the twenty yards to the headquarters tent and inside. As soon as they stretched him out on the packed-dirt floor, Max unslung her rifle and pushed it into Rachel’s hands. “Guard the door.”

  Rachel looked from the rifle to Max and her expression widened in disbelief. “I don’t know how to shoot this thing.”

  “You’ll learn quickly when someone shoots at you,” Max said, not looking up as she ripped open her IFAK and pulled out a bag of saline and the attached tubing. “If you see someone coming you don’t know, point and pull the trigger. The weapon will do the rest.”

  “I am a noncombatant.”

  Max paused as she knelt in the dirt, while the blood of her friend seeped through her pants, and spared the woman a fleeting glance. She had no time to debate or reassure or explain. She needed Rachel to follow her orders. “We’re all combatants now, or didn’t you notice the people trying to kill us? The people who were killing us?”

  Rachel’s mouth set in a thin line but she turned, went to the doorway, and crouched behind the folded back flap. Something about the set of her shoulders made Max think she could handle what might come at her from out of the jungle, and right now she needed someone to watch her back. She’d have to trust her, and trus
ting anyone except one of her fellow troops didn’t come easy. Resolutely, she focused on Grif.

  Winslow’s friend, the young woman with the dark compassionate eyes, approached and knelt on Grif’s other side. She said softly, “What can I do to help you?”

  “What’s your name?” Max asked, cutting Grif’s sleeve open from wrist to shoulder with her knife.

  “Amina.”

  Max handed her the IV bag. “Hold this up in the air, Amina. As soon as I get the IV line in, squeeze it. He needs fluid.”

  “Yes. All right.”

  Max pushed a plastic catheter into one of the big veins on Grif’s forearm. Fortunately, he had veins like tree branches and they hadn’t disappeared despite his blood loss. She was in in seconds and slapped a piece of tape over the tubing. “Squeeze.”

  She checked his BP again—eighty over nothing. His pulse was thready and his color pasty. He was just this side of shock. She grabbed another bag of saline and shoved a second IV into his other arm. “Can you handle this bag too?”

  “Yes,” Amina said, and took the other bag.

  The pressure bandage on Grif’s thigh was saturated. Blood seeped from beneath it and ran down his leg in rapidly widening rivers. She needed to control the bleeding or she’d still be playing catch-up while he bled out.

  “Keep squeezing.” Max found an ampoule of broad-spectrum antibiotics, popped it into the accompanying syringe, and snipped Grif’s pants from knee to hip. She plunged the needle into his ass and pushed the ampoule home. He grunted and his eyelids twitched open.

  “Jesus Christ,” Grif groaned. “What the hell happened?”

  “You took a round in the thigh.” Max loaded up another ampoule with intravenous Demerol.

  “Fuck. What about my balls?” Grif fumbled for his crotch, stretching the IV tubing extending from his arm.

  “Stop fussing. I haven’t checked them personally yet,” Max said flatly, “but from the location of the entry wound, I think you’re safe there.”