Prologue
Stuart Knight
Years ago, behind enemy lines…
The gun felt right in my hand. Heavy and tight. My back pressed against the dusty wall of the stone shelter where we waited, watching.
We were pulling out. It was our last day in the camp, our last day in country. Conflict hadn’t ended, but we were handing over the fight to the local military. Still, we were Marines. First in, last out. Our final job was to provide support, watch for any sign of ambush, before we made our way to the airfield.
The majority of our men had gone ahead with the convoy, but I stayed back with our CO. He was a good leader, and we’d been together since the beginning. While I sat on the gritty floor, he stood by the square window staring out at the miles of tan desert. I was pretty sure I knew where his mind was.
Bending my outstretched leg, I rested an arm on top of my knee. “Thinking about home?”
Derek blinked once and looked down before turning steel blue eyes on me. “Eighteen months is a long time with only a week at Christmas.”
“Women make you soft, soldier.”
His mouth tightened, and I had to laugh at his reaction. I was pretty happy to be headed home myself, even if I didn’t have a girl waiting on me.
“You’re the only shithead I’d let get away with a crack like that.”
Calling each other “soldier” was an ongoing joke between us.
“It’s because I’m your best man. You’d have lost an arm without me.”
He exhaled a laugh, and I put the butt of my rifle on the floor, wrapping the shoulder strap around my wrist.
“Keep talking, fucknut.” His elbow bent, and he pinched his top lip. “I’ll be waiting to laugh when a sweet pair of baby blues knocks you on your ass.”
“Not happening.” Using my gun, I pushed myself to standing. “I’m more of a hazel guy.”
Derek’s arm dropped, and he smirked. If I was happy, he was three times as glad to be pulling out. Only I’d be back. Being stateside was just a break for me.
I walked over to stand by the window. “This is my life, and it’s no kind of life to share.”
“Are you questioning my loyalty, Corporal Knight?”
“Not at all, Lieutenant Alexander. You’re a great Marine. But guys like you do your time and retire. Go home, get married, have kids.”
“You’re a lifer.”
“Damn straight.” I straightened my back to stretch my tired muscles. “Only way I can give one hundred and ten percent is not to have somebody waiting on me.”
A shadow moved around the corner of the bungalow across from us, catching my eye.
“My dad was a lifer, and he had a family.”
“Mine too. And we both know how shitty it was growing up with them leaving, Moms crying.”
Long nights, sitting against the wall staring into darkness, we’d shared just about everything to pass the time, to keep from going insane from the monotony combined with the stress of knowing at any time we could be blown up or shot. We were walking targets, and we’d been lucky.
“You’re right,” he exhaled, looking away again, out at the sea of beige. “I’m proud of my service, but when the time comes, I’ll walk away.”
“You’ve got another road ahead of you.” I didn’t think any less of him. Some guys in this outfit didn’t have the right stuff, the right attitude or the honor, but that could never be said of this guy. “I’m glad we served together.”
“Now who’s getting soft?” His deep laugh was the last sound I heard before the staccato clank! of a grenade dropped into the space with us.
We had seconds, if that long. No time to speak, only time to act. Reaching down, I grabbed it, and threw it as fast and hard as I could. It was just out the window when the BLAST! threw us both against the opposite wall.
My back had been curved from the throw, and I hit a bare space. I was winded, but not hurt. Derek was out cold. White smoke filled the room. Our luck had run out, and we were under attack.
Shots fired outside as I made my way through the blindness to where his dark body was slumped on the stone floor.
“Fuck!” I shouted. He was as big as me and twice as heavy, but I’d be damned if I left him. With a deep grunt, I hauled him onto my shoulders.
His voice was a groan in my ear. “Stuart. Go on. Go.”
“You’re not dying today, soldier,” I shouted back.
Months of working out and not much else between the explosions and the darkness had me strong as a damn mule. I went up the short flight of steps to the exit. I had no idea what I’d be stepping into when I went through that door, but they knew we were in here. We couldn’t stay.
I held Derek steady on my back as I peered into the smoke and dust filling the air. Two bodies in robes right ahead of us. Not Americans. We couldn’t do anything for them, but I would do something for us.
A convoy had been preparing to transport the last of us two houses down. If I could make it that far, it was possible we’d be safe. I couldn’t see a damned thing as I made a break for it. My thighs burned with the exertion and the extra weight, and my lungs seized from the smoke. Derek was a fucking dead weight on my back, but I barely noticed with the adrenaline pumping in my veins. I was born for this.
Blinking hard, I could just make out the hulking shapes of the armored trucks waiting to take us away.
“We’re almost there,” I shouted, even though I was pretty sure he was out again.
Taking the first step, I dug in with my heel, trying to gain speed
with traction. Combat boots, thirty-seven pounds of weaponry, ordnance, spying shit, and my commanding officer. I ran as fast as I could to the symbol of safety. I was just there when my feet went out from under me. My ears rang with the noise of the explosion, and pain shot like fire through the lower half of my body. I flew forward and landed on my chest in the dirt.
I couldn’t stop shaking. It wasn’t fear—it was adrenaline combined with the effort I’d been pushing to get us to safety faster. My brain tilted on its side. The trucks were near, but they couldn’t see us in all the smoke and confusion. Bodies were running all around us. I needed to get up, but I was dazed.
God dammit! I was made for this. I tried to force myself to get up, but my body didn’t respond. I was above myself looking down. Derek lay on my back exposed, unprotected. What the fuck was happening to me? I fought against this pansy-assed flake-out. I had to get back down there. I had to carry my brother to safety. I was stronger than this.
Somebody had to see us, but the whole place was in confusion. Another whistling rocket, another explosion. I struggled to open my mouth and yell for backup. Nothing came out. I saw a truck jolt and fly back. It was hit.
Then, like an old-fashioned television switching off, everything blinked to black. I didn’t see anything anymore.
Scene 1: Leaving
Stuart
Six years later…
The pickup rumbled down the highway in the direction of Bayville, New Jersey. I needed to get away, but I had one errand to do before I left. Just in case I never came back.
After I left Nikki’s, I went back to Derek’s place and tore through a bender. When I opened my eyes again, two days had passed. I was sitting on the bedroom floor with an empty bottle of Belvedere, an empty prescription bottle, and the few mementos from after my dad died. As the oldest son and the only Marine to follow in his footsteps, Mom had given them to me.