Rev It Up (Black Knights Inc. #3)(4)
What the hell have I done? Again, the question blasted into his head, and waves of guilt and recrimination washed through him, compounded by the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
“Fall back!” Boss shouted and, once again, fall was exactly what they did.
The mountainside below the outcropping of trees was even steeper—if that was possible—and controlling their descent proved hopeless. Soon, all four of them were rolling and tumbling like clothes in a dryer. Sharp rocks and debris grabbed onto straps and gear, snatching it away, and all the time bullets rained down from above.
They landed in a giant heap of screaming muscles and tangled limbs at the foot of the mountain beside the tiny village houses. Boss and Rock both made for one helluva hard landing spot, but Jake figured Preacher, who’d ended up on top of the pile, would say something similar about him.
The four of them managed to untangle themselves only to fire and retreat, fire and retreat, leapfrogging each other as they raced toward the village.
Thankfully, they weren’t met with any resistance from the village’s inhabitants. It seemed all the guys with guns were on the side of the mountain.
Well, mahalo to the Big Kahuna in the sky for small miracles.
As Jake, Preacher, and Rock laid down covering fire, Boss planted one of his big boots against the door of a little mud-brick house and, two seconds later, they all stumbled inside.
It was blessedly empty.
Again, Jake took the right, Preacher the left, and Boss held steady smack dab in the middle while Rock covered their six. They kept plugging away at the approaching army, acquiring targets and squeezing their triggers. During a small lull in the action, Jake felt for his cell phone and came up empty-handed. Damn! He must’ve lost it somewhere on the long tumble down the mountain along with two extra clips, his M203 grenade launcher, and his pack.
“I lost my phone!” he yelled, and watched from the corner of his eye as Boss, Rock, and Preacher started patting pockets, searching for their phones, their one and only chance of making it out of this god-awful situation alive.
Both Boss and Rock came up with a big handful of nada. Thankfully, Preacher hit the jackpot.
He held up the device triumphantly, but Jake could tell by the look on his face, they were too close to the side of the mountain to get reception.
“Cover me!” Preacher yelled.
Before any of them could stop him, Preacher raced through the front door and down the packed dirt street. Bullets slammed into the road all around him, kicking up great puffs of dirt as he serpentined his way toward the open poppy field at the south end of the village where his chances of acquiring a cell signal would be the best.
It was the bravest thing Jake had ever seen, but he didn’t have time to watch the heart-wrenching spectacle because he had to keep shooting, keep disposing of as many of the men operating those AKs as he could so Preacher could make the Hail Mary call back to base.
He didn’t know how much time passed. It seemed like days but was, in reality, probably only about fifteen minutes.
Then, the most delightfully welcome sound he’d ever heard came thundering down the valley. A couple of U.S. Air Force boys in stealth fighters began dropping twelve-hundred-pound bombs on the side of the mountain beyond the village in a beautiful, tightly packed barrage of fire and death.
The blasts were beyond belief, the concussive effects loud enough to render everyone deaf for long moments afterward.
In their little house, the three SEALs warily eyed the roof as one entire mud wall cracked and splintered like shatterproof glass. The ground beneath them heaved in a series of rolling waves but, thankfully, the roof held. And when the bombardment finally ceased, they peeked from the door and windows.
The main body of al-Masri’s men was obliterated. Nothing left but gaping, charred holes where previously whole groups of men had been firing. Only a few Taliban fighters, dazed and wounded, stumbled upright to try and continue the battle.
Jake took aim and started picking off the survivors. They needed to finish this and find Preacher.
The guy had been gone too long. Outside. Exposed.
When no more fighters popped up to aim rusted-out AK-47s in their direction, they abandoned their cover and hoofed it down the dusty road toward the poppy field. They pushed into the middle of the field just in time to see one of al-Masri’s men jump up and take aim at Preacher’s unprotected back.
“Preacher!” Boss and Rock yelled at the same time Jake shouted, “Steven!” They raised their M4s, but not before the gunman squeezed off two rounds.
Preacher spun as the scorching lead slammed into his body, and Jake freight-trained it toward the Taliban fighter, screaming like a berserker as he plied his trigger again and again.
The man jerked as round after round tore through his flesh, but even after he’d fallen to the ground, Jake didn’t let up. He continued to riddle the body with bullets.
His monster was free for the second time today…
When he got close enough to see the man’s face, he squeezed the trigger one more time, putting a round right between those evil, sightless eyes as he spit on the corpse and cursed the bastard to hell.
Of course, the person he should be cursing was himself.
If only he hadn’t been such a chicken shit, so scared of the thing he was becoming that he couldn’t make the tactically sound decision—which would’ve been to kill al-Masri on the side of that mountain—they could’ve made it to the plateau before al-Masri’s army, and from their superior position, they might’ve held off the fighters until an extract team arrived.