Prologue 1
Lee
Eight years ago
The deep boomof artillery reminded me of the movieJurassic Parkas the Tyrannosaurus Rex got closer and closer, the kids would see water in the puddles shake with each step the monster took. As the ground rumbled beneath our feet, I imagined the monster getting closer and closer, only this time it was the man-made monster of artillery fire, not a dinosaur.
Rounds landed close enough to spray us with dirt and rocks, even hidden as we were between the sun-bleached house and a stone wall. Beyond the wall, the war-ravaged farms and village were broken only by occasional colored vegetation. My eyes watered and turned the scene in front of me to a bleary smear of reds, yellows, and browns.
We'd come to this small community in Afghanistan, to a supposedly "safe" landing zone to pass out medical supplies and food to villagers who had been cut off from the outside world for almost six months. We'd only been on the ground about an hour when we'd come under fire from insurgents.
Mack – James Macklin, my best friend and lover of almost four years, peered around the corner of the building, taking careful aim atour attackers before picking off one of the men intent on killing us. His gray eyes twinkled at me with mischief, totally out of place in this hellhole as he ducked back around the edge of the house.
The building we sought cover behind was a single-story affair, its walls chipped and bullet-ridden, its gaping windows dark and empty. Whoever had lived there before the war had long ago sought someplace safer.
We were caught in a space between the house and a low stone wall, ducking out to take shots at the insurgents that had us pinned down. A single lucky artillery hit had taken out the chopper, and our commanding officer with it. As soon as the attack started, we’d lost track of the other members of our team, their radio silence making me fear the worst.
As return fire pinged into the wall and knocked chips of stone into the air, the fragments rained down on my helmet. Mack grinned at me, that devil-may-care smile that made me fall for him the day we'd met in basic training.
We'd hit it off right away. It helped he was a little older than me, a little more experienced (in many ways) and we'd found we had a lot in common: computer games, science fiction, comics, and, oh yeah, hunky men in uniform.
Mack went through pilot training, while I studied to become a Navy medic. When he’d been deployed to Afghanistan before me, I'd been worried out of my head. Yet strangely, when my own deployment orders came just a few weeks later, all I felt was relief. At least maybe we'd have the chance to watch each other's back.
When we were both assigned to the same Combat Aviation Brigade a year earlier, I got down on my knees and thanked God, the Powers that Be, and the Naval Command that we were together. The countdown was on. We only had a few more weeks and we'd both be headed stateside. We were both done with the Navy and ready to make a life together back home.
We had already made plans for our lives post-military: Mack was moving to Ohio to be with me. His only family was a sister in Seattle he wasn't close with, not after she'd tried to "pray the gay away" whenhe came out to her. My sprawling family, on the other hand, had taken Mack in with open arms. Once they knew we were serious, my parents had simply counted him as one of their brood.
Even my brothers and sister, who had given him a hard time at first, had backed off. He'd been home with me on leave a couple of times, and we were excited about building our lives together in a world unconstrained by "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."
"ETA?" I asked, taking my turn to fire off a few shots from around the corner of the building. I figured I was more worried about getting us out of this alive than whether I'd sacrificed my protection under the Geneva Convention. I didn’t think these guys had read it anyway.
He keyed his radio, listening.
"Ten minutes out," he said, his grin intensifying. "Ten more minutes to give us a chance to pop these bitches."
"Better watch that mouth," I snarked back at him. "Mama D or Mama K find out you called them that, they'll take your ass down hard." Diana and Kyra Devereaux (Mama D and Mama K respectively) were my parents, and they'd both threatened to put any male in our family who used the term "bitch" on their butts. Since they both held black belts in Tai Kwan Do and Karate, we knew they'd do it, too.
"Who's gonna tell them?" He grinned back, "You--" Mack sprang forward suddenly, knocking me to the ground and grinding something into my hip.
"What the fuck, Mack!"I yelled, startled and angry. This was no time to be screwing around. He rolled away from me, his torso against the stone wall. I reached over and grabbed him, pulling him back behind cover.
His eyes were wide as he looked at me, the blood draining from his face. His normally dark gray eyes seemed almost silver in the afternoon sun. His rifle fell from his fingers.
"Mack?" I said, questioningly. Mack never dropped a weapon.
"Lee…" he wheezed, looking down. A bloodstain began to spread across his chest. "I don't think... the moms will... have the chance..." he got out as he slid down the wall. His eyes flew open wide, focusing onsomething behind me. A sharp cough came out of his mouth, and blood splattered us both.
"Look—!"he got out, trying to shout a warning before he collapsed.
"Mack!"I spun around to see the shooter who had crept up behind us. Almost without thought, I took him out. The bullet hole between his eyebrows was small, but so damn effective. I scrambled over to my fallen lover, ripping supplies out of my pack and desperately trying to stem the alarming flow of blood from his chest.
"Lee," he wheezed again, his hands scrabbling at his chest.
"Shut up, asshole! I've got this!" I smacked his hands away and ripped open bandages to press down on the wound in his chest. Helicopters approached our location; the thud of the rotors audible even above the explosions around us.
"They're on their way, Mack!" I yelled. "Evac will be here soon, just hang in there!"
I wiped the blood away from the entry wound and slapped an Asherman seal over the hole in his chest. I felt for his pulse and cursed as I felt it stutter under my fingers as his heart desperately tried to pump blood he didn’t have.
