He could hear shouts as he reloaded. There were at least two Iraqis at the back of the house, maybe more inside. He huddled behind the plow, prone, gun next to the blackened blade.
Nothing.
The dogs were quiet. Probably they’d been shot when the woman was.
How many Iraqis were there? Two? Three? Enough to outflank him, certainly. Enough to rush him from different directions.
Kill him easily here. He was better off taking it to them. Get close to the building, hope to catch them by surprise.
Dixon jumped up and ran to the corner of the house where the dead soldier lay. A clip fell off his belt but he didn’t stop for it, sliding in against the hard front of the house, crunching downwards to look around the corner.
Nothing.
He heard something behind him, spun.
Nothing.
The woman lay a few feet away in the dirt. Dixon began to slide along the ground on one knee, inching along the rough front wall toward her. As he approached, he saw a shadow edge against the doorway.
He froze, watching as an Iraqi in fresh, tan fatigues slowly emerged in a crouch, gun aimed toward the opposite hill. He had a clean-shaven face and no insignia on his uniform; his combat boots were black and shiny, as if they’d been polished that morning.
Dixon must have stared at him for four or five seconds before realizing he had a clean shot.
His first bullet missed. The man jerked his head around, stunned by the next five rounds. His chest and shoulder percolated with small explosions as he tried to straighten. Dixon jumped up, firing a last burst to finish him as another soldier came around the far corner of the building. He lifted the AK-47 toward the new target, the stream of bullets dancing in the dirt and then up through the second man’s leg and torso and face. Dixon saw the pain and then the bones splattering and giving away, the man rolling backwards. He saw the pain, and then the death rattle, and then the relief as the man died.
Or he thought he saw it. Dixon took a step, and realized the first man was still moving in the doorway, right next to him. He pulled his rifle back and fired into his head pointblank, except that he didn’t— the clip was gone. He froze, staring at the rifle in the man’s hand, watching as the Iraqi struggled to raise it. He got it about two inches off the ground, grimacing, willing himself to fire, but he had no strength left, not even enough for vengeance. Slowly, he lost the battle, the rifle sinking to the floor as his eyes rolled in his head. A faint odor of aftershave wafted up from the body as Dixon stared down at him.
If there had been any other soldiers, Dixon would have been an easy target, framed by the doorway, rifle empty and hanging down from his side. Finally he turned and walked back to the clip he had dropped, stooping down deliberately, placing, not shoving, the fresh ammunition into the gun. Then he went to the woman.
He didn’t have to lean over to know she was dead. Blood soaked the back of her dress; her eyes were agape, staring at the corner of the house.
She was in her twenties, no older than he.
The Iraqis had killed her, not him. But he felt guilty somehow, as if he had pulled the trigger when she came out of the house.
“I have to do whatever it takes,” he told himself aloud. “There are no civilians. There are no civilians. It’s me or them.”
But even as turned to go into the house, he knew the words were lies. He couldn’t change who he was, even if he could manage to do what duty told him he had to do.
As he stepped over the dead man in the small room at the front of the house, he thought he heard something in the next room. He threw himself to the floor, rolling and crashing against the leg of a wooden table, sending it into the wall.
He was in a kitchen. A pot of vegetable stew or something similar percolated on the primitive stove.
Food.
He jumped to his feet, grabbed the pot then yelled as it burned his hand. It splattered over the small gas jet, putting out the fire; the pot fell to the floor and he went down after it, spooning the hot mush out with his hands. His mouth and throat burned but his hunger forced him on, forced him to gulp it down. He couldn’t tell what it tasted like, had no idea what it might be, knew only that it was food and he was starving.
He’d eaten halfway through the pot when he heard the noise from the other room. A creak, followed by a crack.
Someone sneaking up on him.
He could escape, run away.
He’d be pursued.
He pointed the AK-47 at the doorway. Slowly, Dixon slid his knee forward, edging around the leg of the table. He leaned his torso down, the gun’s stock close to his ribs.
The view into the room was blocked off by an overturned chair. A trunk or large box sat beyond it.
Probably a bedroom.
Dixon slid to his stomach and began crawling. The smeared food on his finger made the trigger feel sticky. The place smelled of dirt and something sweet.
He reached the doorway. Curling his legs beneath him, Dixon put his shoulder against the jam and edged upwards. Then he jumped full into the room, leaning on the trigger, sweeping across. An open doorway led to the backyard, where he could see the bodies of the two dogs lying in the dirt. He pushed his head to the side, looking out the window at the empty hillside and its low brush, then scanning the small room slowly.
Nothing.
No, something, on the floor beyond the bed.
Crying.
He jumped up onto the rope mattress, lost his balance, fell back.
A boy no older than two raised his head, wide brown eyes staring at him. The child began to babble, but didn’t move.
Dixon pulled the gun back. He went back to the kitchen, grabbed the pot and found a spoon. He shoveled food into a small plate he’d found on the floor, then walked it with it back to the bedroom, setting it down in front of the toddler. The kid darted forward with a smile and began spooning the food into its mouth.
In twenty years, the kid would be a soldier, one of Saddam’s minions.
Better to kill him now. It might even be merciful— if no one found him within a few days, he would surely die.
Dixon stared at the little boy gobbling the food. There was no way he could harm him, no matter the circumstances. And yet he knew he had just done the boy irreparable harm, helped deprive him of his mother. Twenty years from now the kid would hate all Americans, and why not? An American had killed his mother.
Even if he knew the truth of what happened, he’d see it that way. He’d be right.
There was a sound from the roadway, a truck or a car. Dixon jerked his head toward the front of the house as the vehicle braked to a halt. He grabbed his gun and for a second thought of going to the front of the house. But that would be suicidal.
He thought, too, that he might take the boy with him— a stupid thought gone in the instant it occurred to him.
He pushed up and jumped through the open back door, gripping the AK-47 and running up the hill.
He was about a third of the way to the top when the house exploded in flame.
CHAPTER 31
Rosen jumped down from the weapons spar on Apache Two and gave the helicopter a good-luck pat. Then she took a few steps back, admiring the small black hulks in the dimming twilight. The Little Birds were all muscle, nothing wasted for show or ostentation; what you saw was what you got. She liked that. And what she saw now were two helos about as ready as they would ever be.
Rosen was not an expert on AH-6s; she hadn’t a clue about bolt tolerances or even routine maintenance items, like when or even if the hydraulic lines should be flushed and tested. But the two helos were working, and that answered the number one rule of technicians the world over— Ain’t Broke, Don’t Fix. Routine maintenance and touch-ups would have to wait until the helicopters returned south.