Silver Stars (Front Lines #2)(63)

Jack and Rio leap and tumble over the barrier, Rio plowing into Geer and twisting instantly to stand and fire back. Bang-bang-bang! Three quick shots to give the Germans pause.

The German fire stops, and Rio quickly checks her position. It’s open on both flanks and behind. The beach is twenty yards to their left. The plane is mostly to their right now, a hundred yards away.

Enfilade, defilade.

Strand lies directly between the squad and the still-unseen Germans.

“They’ll either come along the beach or circle the plane,” Rio says. She’s panting. They’re all panting.

“Or both,” Geer says.

“Petersen, make the call. Tell them we’ve made contact, force unknown. Joe, Guttierez?”

“Five minutes!” Joe answers. The two flyers are feverishly stripping the hanging bits of mounting from the machine gun. They’ll have to rest it on the unsteady log.

German fire resumes, bap-bap-bap-bap, with bullets tearing through foliage and sending leaves and chips of wood flying.

“How many guys in the Kraut patrol?” Jack asks.

“Can’t be more than a dozen,” Rio says, hearing the fear and excitement in her voice.

“They’re keeping us occupied while they flank us,” Jack says.

“. . . with every Christmas card I write . . .” Strand, of course, as the bullets fly inches above his nose.

“Beach or woods?” Rio asks Jack.

“Bloody hell,” Jack says, and crawls toward the beach cradling his rifle.

“Petersen, anything?” Rio asks.

No answer.

She turns to find Petersen sitting up with his back against a tree, his radio propped in front of him. Petersen is staring. Unblinking.

Jack’s M1 opens up, rapid firing, fast as he can squeeze them off. Rio still can’t see the Krauts, but she can guess their approximate position. They’re coming along the beach, looking for a quick conclusion.

“Right there!” she yells to the flyers, and chops the air to show direction. A bullet dings her helmet and ricochets away.

The flyers are ready, and their big .50 caliber blazes, stabbing tracer rounds into the trees.

“Watch your ammo!” Rio warns. “Short bursts, they aren’t fugging Messerschmitts!”

For no more than a minute both sides blaze away, a mad cacophony of explosions, the flit-flit of passing slugs, the softer thunk of bullets hitting wood, and then a cry of pain from the Germans.

The Germans stop firing, and Rio yells, “Cease firing. Cease firing. Jack! Can you see them?” The air stinks of gunpowder, a cloud of it hovers around them.

“Just one,” Jack yells back. “I think I got one of them!”

If there were a dozen Germans, then there are only eleven now. But on her side she has six people, one machine gun, and four rifles or carbines. If the Krauts have a mortar, this will be over as soon as they get it set up. But what are the odds of a Kraut patrol dragging a heavy mortar through the woods?

No, they have no mortar, and they have no machine gun either, though they have at least two Schmeisser submachine guns. But they may well have a radio and someone to operate it. Unlike Rio.

“Geer, check on Petersen.”

Geer crawls back, and his report comes immediately. “Shot right through the radio,” he yells and comes crawling back. “Deader than shit!”

Pull back and leave Strand to his fate, presumably at a German POW camp for the remainder of the war? Or fight it out, risking all their lives?

As if reading her thoughts, Guttierez yells, “I ain’t leaving the skipper behind!”

The skipper meanwhile has lost the thread of the lyrics and is drifting into “Jingle Bells.”

For just a split second Rio hates Strand Braxton.

Morphine. Not his fault.

Eleven Krauts to six, but those eleven are Wehrmacht. They could be veteran troops, men who’d fought the Russians and British.

Professionals.

“Preeling. Get out on our right a hundred yards, and in three minutes you start blasting away. Throw a grenade but away from the plane,” Rio says. “Jack, stay put.”

“Certainly,” he says. “It’s damp, but the view is magical.”

Despite herself, Rio grins.

Within the small shelter of the fallen trees it’s the two flyers on the left, Geer and Rio in the center, with Jack on the left flank, Cat on the right. It’s all Rio can do. If the Krauts flank far to her right, they can circle around and come up from behind, but there’s nothing she can do about that. She doesn’t have the people to cover every approach.

The math is terribly clear in Rio’s mind. There is no way. The barricade is a joke, there’s limited ammo for the machine gun, and she’s likely facing veteran soldiers. No way. Sooner or later the Krauts bring up more men or call in artillery or simply flank them.

Her father’s words come back to her.

There will come a time when you’ll have a choice between staying in your trench and crawling out of it to save a buddy . . . When that moment comes, you stay down.

This is not a World War I trench, Father, and that’s not a buddy, it’s Strand.

Rio loosens the pins on two grenades. She pops a fresh clip into her rifle.

“Richlin?” Geer asks.

“Soon as Preeling opens up,” Rio says, “you lay down fire. Keep it aimed high and to the right.”