Because of You: A Loveswept Contemporary Military Romance Page 7

  “Carponti didn’t sign you up for another dating with herpes care package, did he?”

  Shane stuffed the letter back into the box like a guilty teenager as Trent walked up to him. “Nah, just another random care package from a support-the-troops organization. Jelly beans and magazines and sunscreen.”

  He nudged the box beneath his bunk, hiding Jen’s address. Something about the brief, distant contact with Jen had struck a chord with him, and he wanted to keep it private.

  Trent blew out a hard breath and sat down on Carponti’s bunk. Carponti would have kittens if he found out Trent had violated the place where the magic happened—nightly—with the woman of his dreams. Nicole apparently enjoyed sending her husband dirty letters.

  Briefly, Shane considered telling Trent what he might be sitting in then thought better of it. It was purely speculation and trash-talking on Carponti’s part, and to be honest, Shane just didn’t want to think about it. Damn, but he missed having a space of his own.

  “I suppose you’re here about Randall?”

  “Who else? I’m not really in the mood to deal with this bullshit. His or yours. So what happened this time?”

  Trent looked tired. More tired and beat down than Shane had seen him in years. He wasn’t sleeping, that much Shane knew. He often saw him up at night, pacing outside the company tactical operations center or crouched over his laptop on the other side of the bay at three a.m. The Surge was more brutal than anyone had expected. Shane and the other senior leaders in the company all pulled their weight and tried to mitigate Lieutenant Randall’s incompetence. He was unreliable at best, untrustworthy at worst.

  “Randall and Miller are fighting again. I don’t care why but I’m tired of playing mediator between whoever Randall has pissed off this week. You need to squash it. The troops are starting to notice and infighting isn’t what you need right now. No one does.”

  Anger flashed in Trent’s eyes, quickly followed by fatigue. “I’m aware of everyone’s responsibilities. But I’m at a loss about what to do about it. Because in fourteen years, I’ve never run into something like this.”

  “Two lieutenants not getting along is nothing new.” Shane nudged the box farther beneath his bunk and started lacing up his boots.

  “Believe me, that I know. But I don’t trust him. And that’s a bigger problem than you neutering him in front of the troops.”

  “Why don’t you trust him?” Shane had put the lieutenant in his place. And yeah, soldiers had seen it. So what? This was the infantry, not elementary school. Feelings got hurt. Suck it up. But he didn’t say any of that to Trent. Preaching to the choir and all that.

  “I don’t know. If I did, I’d already be talking to the battalion commander about finding a replacement. I can’t articulate why. And if I can’t define the problem, I damn sure can’t find a solution for it. The boss damn sure isn’t going to let me fire someone on a whim.”

  Shane studied his longtime friend and, not for the first time, wondered at the heavy load of worries Trent carried as an officer. Things had been so much simpler when they’d been sergeants together back at Fort Benning. “Pal, this is a tough one, but if you don’t trust him, you need to deal with it, sooner rather than later. I can tell you why I don’t trust him, but that’s not enough to go to the boss with. He’s going to get somebody else killed.” Shane stood and heaved his body armor over his head in a single movement. “This crap gets heavier and heavier every year. You coming tonight?”

  “The alternative is prying lead out of your ass,” Trent said, handing Shane his Kevlar helmet. “And not on this mission. I’ve got to go see the equal opportunity adviser.”

  “For what?” There was a time when the equal opportunity program had been value added, designed to teach tolerance and bring harmony between the races and the genders. Now, though, it seemed like it was just another way for disgruntled troops to complain when things didn’t go their way.

  “Some bullshit. Don’t worry about it.”

  Shane shrugged and fastened his gear around his torso. “Look, Trent, I think Randall is screwing up the maintenance. Parts aren’t getting ordered. I’ve still got two deadlined weapons systems. I can’t prove it. But it might be something worth checking out.”

  “All right. I’ll look. You dropped this,” Trent said, reaching down and picking up a brown, legal-sized envelope.

  “Well, crap.” The warmth he’d felt from Jen’s note flickered and died as he saw yet another sign that life was going to hell in a handbasket.

  “What is it?”

  “Love letter from my ex-wife, probably.” Shane tossed the envelope on his bunk and then shoved it beneath a couple of magazines. “I’ll deal with it later. I’ve got to troop the line before we roll tonight.”

  Trent snorted and followed him out. “You keep saying that, and she’s going to clean you out.”

  “I don’t have shit left she can take. And I’ve changed my direct deposit account information three times already, but the army can’t seem to get the money into the right account. I’m flat frigging broke until I get my happy ass over to the finance battalion and get this fixed.” Shane secured the Velcro straps around his waist, then checked his weapon and ammo.

  “You shouldn’t have let her leave with everything.” Trent clapped him on the shoulder with a sigh.

  “Yeah, well, I’m just glad she’s gone. As soon as I get finance to get off their ass and fix my pay, that part of my life will be done. There’s nothing else she can do at this point.”

  They walked outside into the bright orange and red and pink sunset and Trent shook his head. “Famous last words, brother. Famous last words.”

  Chapter 5

  The bright red sun crept over the Baghdad skyline as the dawn call to prayer echoed across the city. Shane scanned the road ahead, watching the trash that lined it for hidden det cords leading back to improvised explosive devices, and was silently amazed that he could hear the adhan over the rumble of the engine. His chest tightened as his armored Humvee approached the overpass. Not today. Come on, you motherfuckers. Cut us a break. Just this once.

  He looked up at Private Adkins, whose head stuck out of the machine-gun turret, ready to grab him if he didn’t duck down behind the defilade. Shane held his breath until they passed beneath the bridge. His lungs burned until their up-armored Humvee was in the clear and then he let his breath out in a whoosh. He wished they’d hurry up and get more of those new blast-resistant vehicles that big army kept talking about. For now, the armored Humvees were the best they had, especially since his platoon was two trucks short because of that stupid Lieutenant Randall.

  No matter what happened, Shane was determined to keep his own fears deeply buried, like the IEDs hidden across Iraq. He had told Jen he could make a difference. He’d believed his own bullshit then. Now, four months into the Surge, he wasn’t so sure. Six men from his platoon alone had already been sent home with injuries, and the overwhelming failure to stop any of them from getting hurt ate away at his soul.

  Shane’s stomach knotted as his driver, Specialist Howell, swerved around a dead dog, in case the carcass hid a deadly IED. Sweat trailed down his spine as they rounded the corner, approaching the soccer stadium.

  Once there had been professional FIFA soccer games held there. Now fresh dirt barely covered the latest bomb crater. It was like the locals didn’t want to waste money repairing something they knew was going to be destroyed again. Please, not again.

  The thought of losing another man to an IED made Shane’s bladder tighten. His platoon had been hit the last three times they’d rolled off the base. The mission had been a success and they’d captured their high-value target, but his men knew better than to relax despite the relative lack of resistance they’d run into. The sun slid higher into the sky, casting an eerie red tinge onto the buildings, amplifying the already sweltering heat.

  As if his thoughts had tripped the det cord, the earth exploded and a volcano of concrete and dirt mushroo
med beneath the Humvee in front of him. The blast overwhelmed the roar of the engines. Time froze as the explosion launched the truck into the air. It slammed into the field, grinding to a halt fifty meters away. Flames shot out from the wrecked front end.

  Shane’s blood slammed through his body, priming it for action. Training kicked in as his body reacted purely on muscle memory. Fear? He would deal with it later. Right now he had to secure the site, get the wounded out of the kill zone, and recover the downed vehicle.

  Howell slammed on the brakes as the blast wave rocked their armored Humvee. Small arms fire tinked off the armored shell like deadly hail. They needed suppressive fire before they could determine the shooters’ positions.

  “Adkins! Get that fifty rocking suppressive fire at three o’clock. Howell, give LT Miller fifteen seconds to call this up, and then call it in for him!”

  “Looks like LT Miller just got his cherry popped!” Adkins called down as he shifted fire with the heavy machine gun.

  “Watch your mouth and pay attention,” Shane shouted back. He doubted Adkins heard him. He couldn’t hear himself think over the thunder of the big gun blasting overhead, the reverb slamming against his breastbone.

  Shane jumped out of the still rolling vehicle, dropping the radio mike and raising his weapon in a single fluid movement. His gut spasmed as his men dismounted, too. But then quiet pride took over as the fire team leaders, Carponti included, ran through the react-to-contact battle drill quickly and efficiently. Shane directed the security positions to better control their position, then got the recovery team set to maneuver once they controlled their sector.

  “Enemy contact from the front and left. Security established on the left. Unknown status of wounded in Bravo Thirty-Two,” Shane called out as he rushed past Carponti and assumed a tight kneeling position and returned fire on a second-story window. Shane rushed passed him as the replay came over the radio speaker behind him. “Air weapons team will be inbound in ten minutes.”

  “Shit, they’ll be dead in six,” Carponti muttered under his breath.

  Shane swallowed hard and kept moving. He didn’t need Carponti to tell him that. He violently suppressed the paralyzing fear that slithered into his chest and tried to grip his heart. Carponti was being serious. He was never serious, unless the shit and the fan were making babies.

  Shane glanced around, not seeing the lieutenant. Shit, he hoped the LT wasn’t sitting in the truck pissing himself. Which was just as well if it meant Shane would be leading the assault team to recover their boys. “Okay, first squad needs to lay down suppressive fire. I’ll take second squad to recover our boys,” Shane shouted down the line of troops, catching acknowledgment from his squad leaders.

  Carponti relayed orders to his own fire team leaders over the pounding thunder of the fifty-caliber machine guns. Shane knelt and laid out suppressive fire as one of his boys shifted his position to get behind a mound of dirt. Where the hell was LT Miller?

  Carponti shot Shane a thumbs-up—his men were ready to move.

  Shane scanned the area and spotted the LT, standing near his vehicle, the radio handset pressed to his ear. LT Miller was three months out of Infantry Officer Basic Course and, from the looks of it, currently scared shitless. He’d spent his first two months in theater on the staff as a battle captain, writing up after-action reports. Nothing on the staff had prepared him for the chaos and smoke and uncertainty of the battlefield. It was a different ball game when the fire really burned, the inbound rounds were deadly, and the blood wasn’t a moulage training aid.

  Miller’s eyes were wide, his face a mask of fear and panic. His mouth opened and closed as he tried to get coherent words past his lips. He held the radio handset near his ear. Miller should have been the one calling in the reports, but from the looks of things, the kid wasn’t hearing anything from the tactical operations center, or from the rest of the platoon for that matter. He damn sure wasn’t coherent enough to call in a report, let alone lead the recovery operation.

  Shane took a deep breath and wondered—not for the first time—why the army, in all its wisdom, put inexperienced young lieutenants in charge. Shane snatched the LT by the collar of his body armor. He pulled him in close, so that only the wild-eyed kid could hear his next words.

  “Calm down, LT. The men are watching you.”

  Miller’s eyes scanned the tight defensive formation of their vehicles, unable or unwilling to make eye contact with him.

  Shane briefly contemplated the consequences of slapping some sense into Miller. Instead, he jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “Security is set. I’m taking second squad to retrieve the wounded in that vehicle.”

  Miller’s eyes skittered around the battlefield and Shane swore. “Look at me, Lieutenant,” he commanded. Miller finally locked eyes with Shane. “The longer we stand in the kill zone, the bigger the target on our collective asses gets. We’re not getting air support soon enough—we’re on our own for this one.”

  He watched Miller take a deep breath. Then another. And then he watched with satisfaction tinged with pride as the cherry LT grabbed his balls and started commanding his platoon like he’d been trained to do. Shane’s men fell into the maneuver positions, and Shane rushed with the retrieving element to pull their boys out of the truck, and God willing, no one would be hurt. At least not bad enough to get sent home.

  Rounds landed with sickening thuds and sent up sprays of dirt and dust as they crossed the field.

  “Damn it, Carponti, get down!” Shane demanded as Carponti jumped on top of the burning vehicle, and tried to wrench the heavy door up and open. It didn’t move. Carponti peered into the armored ballistic glass instead.

  “I can’t get this fucking door open. Try through the turret! Ross!”

  “Get off the fucking—” A hiss whizzed by Shane’s head and he hit the dirt. Facedown, his helmet absorbed the blast concussion as an RPG exploded a hundred feet away.

  He looked up in time to see a second rocket nail Carponti square in the chest. Shane’s heart slammed against his ribs as he shouted Carponti’s name. No explosion. Goose bumps raced across his skin as he rushed around the truck. Carponti was struggling to sit up, choking as he tried to catch a breath in the thick smoke. Shane grabbed him by the collar of his body armor and dragged him away from the fire.

  “Why don’t you ever listen!” Shane’s voice carried the chaos. “Are you okay?”

  “The boys back at the FOB are never going to believe this shit.” Carponti was either laughing or coughing, Shane couldn’t tell. He didn’t have time for relief.

  “Get your ass around this truck and lay down suppressive fire. Then, you’re going back with the MEDEVAC.”

  “Bullshit!” Carponti propped himself up, raised his weapon, and fired at an insurgent running across the field. One shot and a body slammed into the dirt. “There’s nothing fucking wrong with me!”

  “This isn’t a choose-your-own-adventure game,” Shane yelled back. “For once in your life you are going to fucking listen to me. Now shut the hell up and help the LT prepare the nine line.”

  He didn’t hear what Carponti muttered as he rushed low across the field back to the truck where LT Miller was alternating between talking on the radio and firing his weapon.

  What the fuck was taking the air weapons team so damn long? Shane sucked in a deep breath, forcing his lungs to release the tightness in his chest as Tully and Branyan dragged Ross out through the turret. He coughed and tried to help, but everything moved in slow motion. He’d had his bell rung, that was for damn sure.

  Another volcano of debris and dirt exploded a hundred feet away. The heat blasted Shane’s face and he’d never been so glad he had on his ballistic glasses as right then.

  As he went down, he saw his men hit the dirt, faces buried, arms tucked beneath the armor that protected their torsos. Two of his platoon’s medics fell across the bodies of the wounded, shielding them from the blast. Something burned, like someone had sliced into his legs
with a red-hot blade.

  “Damn it, that’s what I get for fucking listening! Sarn’t G!” He heard someone shout from very, very far away. His last thought was that Jen was going to be pissed at him for getting hurt.

  Then the world went black.

  * * *

  Jen surveyed the lobby near the emergency room entrance. Damn but she’d be glad when the new hospital was built. Sometime in 2012, or so they said. If the wars were still going on then, it was going to be sorely needed. The old lobby was too small, and the emergency room inadequate for the sheer size of the population the hospital was expected to service. And don’t even get Jen started on Labor and Delivery. For what was arguably the busiest maternity ward in the nation, the number of beds was appallingly inadequate, but somehow, women rarely gave birth in the hallway. Across the way, Nicole waved and then focused back on the nervous wife in front of her.

  “I’m sorry. We’re still getting conflicting reports,” Nicole was saying as Jen approached. “We think we know who’s coming in, but we’re just not sure.”

  There was a flight of soldiers due in today, and Jen was part of the team responsible for getting them processed and triaged. Some would be easily treated. But others would need to go directly to surgery. Controlling the chaos around the soldiers’ arrival was part of her job. Laura and Nicole had been among the first to arrive when word got out that Reaper battalion soldiers were among the wounded. Over the last few months, Nicole had become part of the fabric of her life, so much so that she didn’t remember what life had been like before they’d been friends.

  She needed to add three new names to Nicole’s list, then scrub it against Laura’s to make sure they matched. It was all admin until the wounded actually arrived.

  Nicole held up her finger as she pulled her phone out of her pocket. “Vic? I am so glad to hear your voice.”

  “Ask him if he can get us a confirmed list of who’s on the manifest,” Laura said. She walked up from the edge of the crowd that seemed to be growing. So far, they were tracking only five soldiers en route. “There’s five passengers, but only three names.”