The Summer House(103)

The sheriff scooted her metal chair up closer to the bars. “You damn idiot, how do you think that Pike fella got that fentanyl to your stepdaughter? Huh? By accident?”

He closed his eyes. He wanted to break down this cell door and kill this smug sheriff sitting in front of him.

But that wasn’t possible.

“All right,” he said. “My mouth is shut. The same for my guys.”

“Then you get free that Wednesday morning, and your mouths stay shut.”

Jefferson said, “All right. Me and my three guys…that’s what we’ll do.”

The sheriff grinned, slapped her hands together in satisfaction, stood up. “Wonderful. Hey, no hard feelings, all right, Staff Sergeant? You and your Rangers were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

He said, “Sheriff, that’s our damn job description.”



Jefferson snaps to, keeping an eye on the judge, feeling the eyes of the sheriff nearly bore a hole into his unprotected back. So what? With Vinny Tyler dead, the deal has changed. It’s on him, and only him. His guys go free, and he’ll keep his mouth shut. And right now, he’s sure Major Frank Moore has kept his promise of working with his aunt Sophie to move his stepdaughter, Carol, to another, safer facility.

Jefferson will do anything and everything to protect his remaining guys and Carol.

A dark, deep memory, of his dying wife, Melissa, her whispering, You protect my girl, Caleb Jefferson. You do that.

“Staff Sergeant Jefferson?”

“Sir?” he asks.

The judge says, “Before we proceed, I just want to ensure that you are here of your own free will, that you have decided to waive counsel, and that you plan to represent yourself. Is that correct, Staff Sergeant Jefferson?”

He says the words with force and certainty. “Yes, Your Honor.”

“All right,” the judge says. “We will proceed.”





Chapter 96





Afghanistan




I GET UP, coughing, touch my forehead, pull away my hand, and see bloody fingers. My ears are ringing. The men are shouting. Smoke and clouds of dust are drifting away. Two more explosions—thump, thump—hit the other side of this peak, the ground shaking from the impacts.

I scramble up, cough some more, find my rucksack.

A heavy, thrumming noise bursts out, like a high-speed M134 Minigun, its rotating barrel shooting out thousands of rounds every minute, and I duck and scramble across the rocky surface, thinking, When in the hell did the Taliban get that weapon? as a black Little Bird helicopter roars up into view from a deep ravine, circles, and then flares down to a landing, its engine sounding just like a weapon.

I grab my rucksack, lower my bleeding head, and run as fast and as best as I can to the churning little aircraft that represents my way out of here, my way to get the Rangers free. Dust and gravel roar around me, and the passenger door opens up. Chief Cellucci is leaning across the empty seat. I can’t hear what he’s yelling, but I’m sure it’s Move, move, move!

Unlike before, I have no difficulty getting into the Little Bird. I toss my rucksack into the rear, get into the seat, grab the crash helmet. The next few seconds are a crazed blur as Cellucci lifts the helicopter before I can even get the seat belt and harness fastened. The Little Bird seems to fly up just a score of meters or so, Cellucci wrestling with the controls, before it dives fast and to the right, dipping into the ravine.

I clench my teeth, trying hard not to vomit. The helicopter bounces up and down as we skim over another wide peak, and I get my seat belt and harness fastened, cinching it as tight as possible.

It takes two good tries to get the helmet on, and I fumble with the communications gear before Cellucci’s voice comes through loud and clear.

“Did you get what you needed?” he asks.

“Yes.”

Cellucci swears, hops us up over another rocky ridge. “Good. Because they’re about to get hammered. Saw lots of movement heading their way.”

I say, “How long before we get back to the FOB?”

“Ten, fifteen minutes if I push it,” Cellucci says.

“Push it,” I say. “Can you raise the Ranger detachment there? Major West?”

“I’ll see—”

A flare of light just ahead of us.

Tracer rounds come from a heavy machine gun set in the rocks before us, reaching up and up, wanting to touch us and— Cellucci swears.

Powers us to the left.

We dive, desperately trying to get ahead of the tracer rounds.

The ground is so close it looks like it can reach up and slap us hard.

Instead the bullets get to us first.

It sounds like a sledgehammer is pounding the metal.

Alarms start sounding from the instrument panel.

Flashing red lights.

Cellucci says, “Brace for—”

We hit, bounce.

Upside down.

Hit again.

Go dark.





Chapter 97



SITTING COMFORTABLY ON the crowded bench in the Sullivan County courtroom, Sheriff Emma Williams doesn’t mind being closed in. She feels like she’s in some sort of religious ceremony, where the powers of right—meaning her, of course—are about to get their due.