ELLE JAMES
Prologue
Four years ago...
Afghanistan
* * *
“Hey, Mo,” Bryce Collins’s voice sounded in Navy SEAL Maurice Boucher’s ear. “Did you ask her?”
Maurice, aka Mo, stood with his M4A1 rifle with its sound suppressor aimed at the alley ahead of him as Perez leap-frogged forward to the corner of the next building. “Yeah.”
“And?” Collins prompted.
“And we’re in the middle of a mission,” Maurice reminded him.
“Was it yes or no?” Rusty jumped into the conversation.
“You’re supposed to have Scott’s six,” Maurice stalled.
“I’ve got Scott,” Rusty assured him. “Did you get the girl?”
Maurice focused his night-vision goggles on the green silhouette of Perez and the shadows ahead of the man. “She said yes.”
“Well, damn,” Collins whispered. “Another hot medic taken out of the dating pool.”
“We’re not dating,” Maurice said. “You know it’s strictly forbidden in theater.”
“Fraternization...blah...blah...blah,” Rusty said. “Like it doesn’t happen.”
“Don’t know why she chose you when she could’ve had me,” Jason Tingle said.
“It’s probably his Cajun accent,” Collins said. “Girls like an accent.”
“I got an accent,” Ray Scott said. “She didn’t pick me.”
“She couldn’t understand you,” Rusty said. “What exactly are you saying when you say you ‘Pawk ya caw’?”
“Better than what all you Texans are constantly spewing,” Scott fired back. “It’s not even a word.”
“And pawk is?” Rusty countered.
“Bogey on the rooftop, my two o’clock,” Perez reported.
All chitchat ceased as the SEAL team moved into the small Afghan village. Intel had it that a Taliban held two US Army soldiers in a building near the center of town. The two men were the sole survivors of a supply convoy that had hit an IED en route to a forward operating base.
The SEAL team’s mission was to find the building, extract the soldiers and take out as many Taliban as possible.
They’d split up, entering the village from different directions, moving in simultaneously. The idea was to get in and out as quietly as possible to avoid waking villagers, thus minimizing chaos and collateral damage.
Perez waved Maurice forward while he pointed his rifle ahead.
Maurice joined Perez at the corner of the building and stared up at the rooftop.
A dark silhouette of a man’s head and shoulders appeared. As he turned, Maurice saw that the man carried a rifle.
“Take him,” Maurice said.
