The two-story bungalow was gray-white in the night vision with a welcoming front porch where the owners could sit and sip lemonade. Except the house was owned by Cipher and the only thing he used it for was planning evil.
“Two lights on inside. Ground-floor front room. Upper left bedroom,” Ash informed the team from the layout they’d memorized an hour ago.
He pressed his body behind a wide oak, rifle trained on the northeast corner.
Chickie’s voice came low in his earpiece. “I don’t like this.”
“Something stinks,” Steele agreed. “This feels too much like Apollo.”
The name and what it meant to the team hit Ash. During a raid that should have been routine, a member of the Blackout Charlie team—Apollo—had been killed in action. Or so they allbelieved for months, until it was discovered that the mangled body they’d found wasn’t Apollo, and that the man had really gone even deeper undercover to stop another terrorist.
Ash let out a grating noise. “Not today, Charlie. I got your six. If I have to sweep every damn inch of this house, I’ll make sure every last one of us comes out.”
Silence throbbed over the comms as though what he said had stunned them.
He locked his jaw and waited for Con’s signal.
When it came, they moved.
The flash-bangs went in through the ground-floor window. The sound was a concussivecrackthat flattened the night. Then Con’s voice—“Go, go, go”—and Ash was in motion.
He took the back door with a single kick, high and hard, just above the lock. The wood splintered, and he went through fast and low.
He swept the kitchen and hooked left into the hallway.
Shouting came from upstairs. Orders flooded Ash’s ear.
“Two down. Moving to stairs.”
Ash held the hallway with Sinner pulling up on his six.
“Clear, second floor east.”
“Clear, main room.”
“I’ve got one in the yard,” Steele said over comms. “Request backup.”
“Copy. Moving.” Ash backtracked through the kitchen and circled to the door he’d come through. Instantly he picked out the target in his night vision—male, crouched, trying to be invisible.
Ash signaled Steele with two fingers.
They rushed in and had the man pinned down before he could even think about running. While Ash held him in his sights, Steele zip-tied him.
“Got him,” Steele informed the team.
“Five for five,” Con’s voice filled their ears. “Threats neutralized.”
Ash looked at the house. It didn’t appear to be so ordinary now. He could no longer see normal people sipping lemonade on that porch. Now, it was one less link in Cipher’s network. Five fewer men under Cipher’s control.
He let himself take a deep breath, lungs filling with pine and clean air.
He felt the shift of his mind, from war back to reunions.
He let himself take a deep breath, lungs filling with pine and clean air.
The sharp edge of battle faded a fraction, his mind easing out of the hard focus that kept men alive and shifting toward something else. Something he hadn’t allowed himself in a long damn time.
When he returned to base, it wouldn’t be to an empty room.
