She stared at him, and for a second he thought she was going to cry.
“No, don’t cry,” he said in Spanish. “I’m still going to pay you for your time and everything.”
Tears spilled from her eyes, and he realized he’d given offense where he hadn’t meant to.
“I’ll call the cab,” she said, getting up from the table. “I don’t want you to pay me. There’s no reason.”
He caught her gently by the hand, and she sat back down.
“Look, I’m not accustomed to girls like you,” he said softly. “You’re too… you’re too precious and sweet. I’m accustomed to women who are wild and reckless. Do you understand?”
She touched his face. “Tal vez es por eso que estás tan solo en el mundo.” Perhaps that’s why you’re so alone in the world.
53
Gil was still on point, moving cautiously along a rough mountain trail through the forest when Dragunov’s iron grip clamped onto his left shoulder. He froze in place, and the Russian moved up against his back, sliding his arm forward over Gil’s shoulder with his index finger pointing straight ahead. At first Gil couldn’t figure out what the hell he was pointing at. All he saw in the gray-black field of the night vision goggles were more trees and the trail leading up the grade, bearing gradually off to the left.
Dragunov wagged his finger up and down, and that’s when Gil saw it: the faint glint of moonlight reflecting off of a monofilament line at the very tip of Dragunov’s finger.
Gil began to back away, but Dragunov stood firm as an oak, trailing the tip of his finger a few inches up and to the left. Gil searched beyond the finger, studying the terrain itself, and his bladder filled with ice water. There were at least ten men stretched across their approach at fifty feet, all of them expertly ensconced among the rocks and deadfalls, absolutely motionless and appearing very much a part of the forest. Dragunov twisted at the waist to turn Gil to his right, pointing off the trail where at least ten more men were equally well disguised as natural features of the landscape.
They had walked into a textbook L-shaped ambush.
Gil knew that most, if not all, of the enemy had to be aware of their presence, the sliver of moon providing enough light for experienced warriors to easily detect movement at fifty feet. The only reason they had not yet opened fire was that they’d been ordered to wait for the trip flares that were almost undoubtedly spread across the line of advance. Tripping one monofilament line would likely send up an entire series of star clusters that would bathe the entire scene in virtual daylight, leaving Gil and Dragunov to die in a murderous cross fire.
Gil nodded and shrugged his shoulders, unsure of how else to ask Dragunov what they should do. They sure as hell couldn’t discuss it verbally, with the enemy close enough to piss on them.
Dragunov pushed down on Gil’s shoulder. The two of them lowered themselves into crouched positions and began backing away slowly. After they’d withdrawn perhaps ten feet, the forest exploded around them. They threw themselves against the ground as rifle fire and tracers from PKM machine guns streaked over their heads — close enough that Gil could feel their heat raising the hairs on the back of his neck. They shoved themselves along backward on their bellies, bullets grazing their helmets, nicking their body armor, and shattering the radio units attached to the backs of their harnesses.
Dragunov rolled from the trail into a shallow defilade and pulled Gil in after him, giving them a moment of respite.
“They were here waiting for us!” Gil shouted over the din.
“I know — we’re betrayed!”
The flares went up, and it was suddenly as bright as Wrigley Field on game night.
Gil rose up just long enough to fire a 40 mm grenade into a PKM machine-gun nest. The grenade detonated on impact, and men screamed.
Dragunov fired a grenade across the trail where the enemy was displacing to outflank them, killing three.
An RPG streaked out of nowhere, detonating against a nearby tree. Dragunov sprang up, using the pall of smoke for cover as he grabbed Gil’s harness. “We’re leaving!”
They pulled back under the cover of the smoke and hightailed it into the darkness. The firing kept up for another twenty seconds, but it was clear the enemy had lost sight of them. They kept up a good pace.
“Fucking comms are dead!” Gil hissed, tearing off the headset.
“Mine too. We’re on our own now.”
“Not that we could have trusted the extraction zone anyhow. How far up the chain do you think we’re compromised?”
Dragunov paused atop a small boulder, checking their six. “Impossible to know. It only takes one rat to spoil the pantry. Strange… they’re not following.”
“Probably looking for our bodies. Don’t worry, they’ll be hot on our asses soon enough.”
“I’m not so sure,” Dragunov muttered. “Let’s keep moving. We’ve got a long way to go before we get to friendly ground.”
They didn’t cover more than a few hundred meters before both men were cut down by a burst from a suppressed AK-105.
54
The president of the United States, along with General William Couture, Chief of Staff Glen Brooks, the secretary of defense, and assorted members of the Joint Chiefs, sat before a pair of giant high-definition television screens in Satellite Command Center 4, watching on helplessly as Gil and Dragunov walked unwittingly into the L-shaped ambush. The white heat signatures of thirty-five Chechen bushwhackers were visible to all.
“My God,” the president muttered, his palms sweating. “Can’t they see them?”
“Apparently not,” Couture said, clenching and unclenching his teeth. “If they’re not using thermal night vision, they may not see them until they’re right on top of them. It depends on how well hidden the enemy is, sir.”
One of the two figures reached out and touched the other on the shoulder, halting their advance.
“There! They see them!” Brooks piped up.
“For all the good it’s going to do them,” muttered one of the Joint Chiefs.
They watched as Dragunov pointed out the enemy positions over Gil’s shoulder, with everyone in the room guessing that it was Gil doing the pointing. The figures then lowered themselves to the ground and were in the process of backing away when all hell broke loose on the screen.
The president watched the hot tracer rounds zip across the screen, the flares going off, followed by the explosions of 40 mm grenades and men thrown dead against the ground.
“Holy Jesus,” he said, getting to his feet and making it so Couture had to push back from the table to see. “We’re going to lose him this time.”
Couture nodded, silently agreeing with the commander in chief that no one was likely to survive such a hailstorm of lead.
Brooks, who had never experienced more during his time in the Teams than a limited exchange of fire over a couple hundred meters, was filled with a mixture of dread and awe. He was sure he was witnessing the final moments of a fellow SEAL.
The RPG detonated against the tree in a white flash, temporarily obscuring their view of the battle, and everyone held his breath. A few seconds later, they saw that Gil and Dragunov had successfully broken off contact with the enemy, and they released a collective sigh.
“How the hell did they manage that?” the president wondered.
Couture frowned as he watched Gil and Dragunov run for their lives. “Shithouse luck, sir.”