Front Lines (Front Lines #1)(116)

A hand touches her arm and she flinches; the hand does not pull away but tightens its grip. “Honey, are you okay?”

Rio stares at Jenou, blinks at her as if there is something about this person she should recognize, but she can’t quite place the face.

“Who shot him?” Rio asked.

“What?”

“Who shot him? This one.” She looks down and carefully begins disentangling her feet.

“I think it was Stafford.”

A sharp sob. Rio takes several deep breaths, but the trembling is upon her again, the same as her first shots, her first kill. Tears come fast and hot, streams of mud down her cheeks. She dashes them away and shakes her head and throws off Jenou’s comforting hand.

“I’m okay,” Rio says.

“Yeah, well, I’m not,” Jenou admits softly. “I can’t do this, honey. I’m not made for this like you are.”

It’s not meant as an insult, it is admiring and a little awestruck, but Rio flares and says, “Don’t say that, Jen. Don’t say that, we are . . . we’re . . . I’m okay. I’m okay. You’ll be okay.”

For that moment Rio has convinced herself that she is done, that she has performed her duty. She has done all that can be asked of her. She closes her eyes and she is home. She is home, she is in the barn with her mother, and they are laughing while the cows moo in outrage, demanding to be milked.

Her father is there, too, but not laughing. We’re your family. Whatever happens, we’re your family. Whatever happens, this is your place, this house, this town.

You’ll need that.

Sergeant Cole yells to Luther and Pang to check the German bodies. “The dead ones, make sure they’re dead, then strip them of their water and food. Any that are alive take their weapons, use their bootlaces to tie them up.”

“Aw, why can’t Richlin do it?” Luther complains.

“She’s the one who made them dead, most of ’em,” Cole says. “You just make sure they stay that way.”





38

RAINY SCHULTERMAN—TUNISIAN DESERT, NORTH AFRICA

Three German vehicles are burning, more are disabled, and the dramatic pink light of morning highlights a white flag flying from the antenna of one of the surviving tanker trucks.

“Well, I will be well and truly damned,” Sergeant Garaman says to Cole, shaking his head in disbelief at the carnage there at the end of their line. “You got some people who can fight, Jedron.”

“That I do.”

Rainy, no longer able to tolerate hugging the sand at a safe distance, has crawled forward. She sees helmets barely poking above foxholes. She sees Garaman standing, shielding his eyes, peering intently. Then she sees the bodies, maybe a dozen in German uniform, lying in the weird and horribly comic poses of violent death.

“I need ammo!” Sticklin shouts.

“Magraff, distribute ammo!” Cole shouts. “Pang, give her a hand.”

Geer, his voice choked, says, “My kitten! Miss Pat!”

Rainy risks standing herself and realizes the toll fear has taken on her: her muscles scream from tension and rigidity.

“What now, Sergeant?” Rainy asks Garaman. “Where’s Lieutenant Helder?”

“Deader than hell, Headquarters.”

“Shit,” Cole says. “He was okay. I guess you’re it, Garaman.”

“I fugging know it,” Garaman says bitterly. “Okay, I’ll tell you what’s next, Headquarters, we blow the hell out of the remaining trucks, scrounge what we can, and get the fug out of here before that tank column shows up.”

Off to the southeast a sandstorm whips up intermittent tornadoes, a brownish smear across the horizon, dirtying the sunrise, but it’s a mile off and not heading this direction.

Rainy says, “Sarge, I’m with S2 and I want to look for papers, maybe interrogate some prisoners.”

Cole snorts and shakes his head. “Well, I sure wouldn’t want to harm the war effort by denying you the opportunity, Sergeant . . . what was your name?”

“Schulterman.”

“We’re just going to make sure this isn’t a trick and . . .” He falls silent because three German soldiers are carrying the white flag forward. One appears to be a senior officer.

Weapons are trained on the advancing enemy but no one fires, and a sort of collective sigh of relief rolls down the line. Rainy hears relieved laughter, nervous and uncertain.

Cole lights his stubby cigar with his Zippo and to Garaman says, “All right then, boss, what is the protocol for accepting the surrender of an enemy officer?”

Garaman lights one of his foul cigarettes. “See, that’s why we need officers, to handle this kind of—”

“Sarge,” a man from Third Platoon says, high-strung and upset. “We got wounded. Six men, two of which is a woman. I mean, two are women, plus four men.”

“Well, we ain’t got a doc, so you’re going to have to do what you can. You got any medical skills, Headquarters?”

“No,” she says. Rainy is not about to let herself be turned into a nurse. That is a German colonel advancing under the flag of truce, and she is determined to do her job as a military intelligence sergeant.

Said German colonel stops fifty feet away. He speaks no English, so Rainy avoids nursing duty by stepping in as translator.