He moved to a hide position overlooking their back trail, settled in, breathing slowed, rifle steadied.
The first pursuer appeared, four hundred meters back. Brennan squeezed the trigger. The rifle bucked. Four hundred meters away, a man dropped, gone before he heard the shot.
Brennan worked the bolt, acquired the second target, fired. Another drop.
The pursuit stopped, taking cover, trying to locate the sniper.
Brennan gave them two more rounds, two more casualties. Then he moved, relocating before they could pinpoint his position.
Evelyn and the others kept pushing forward. Garrett between Sullivan and Callahan, being carried more than walking. His breathing was labored. His skin was cold. Hypothermia setting in.
They reached a river, chest deep, freezing. The kind of cold that stopped your heart if you stayed in too long.
No choice. They had to cross.
Evelyn went first, testing the current. Strong but manageable. She crossed, established security on the far bank, then signaled the others.
Sullivan and Callahan carried Garrett across. The cold water hit him and he gasped. His body temperature, already critically low, plummeted further.
By the time they reached the far bank, he was shaking uncontrollably. Early-stage hypothermia.
Callahan worked fast. Stripped Garrett’s wet clothes. Wrapped him in a thermal blanket. Activated chemical heat packs, placed them at Garrett’s core, armpits, groin—anywhere that would warm the blood before it circulated to vital organs.
“We need to stop. Let him warm up. Another hour in this condition and he’ll go into cardiac arrest.”
“We can’t stop. The pursuit is ten minutes behind.”
“Then he dies before we reach the coast.”
Evelyn made the calculation. The impossible math of triage. Save one man and risk everyone. Push forward and guarantee one death to possibly save four.
She thought about Syria, about leaving Preacher, about the choice that had haunted her for four years.
Not again.
Never again.
“We hold here. Fifteen minutes. Warm him up enough to survive. Then we move.”
She looked at Sullivan.
“You want to make amends? Go set charges on the far side of the river. Make them pay for crossing.”
Sullivan nodded, moved back to the riverbank, started rigging Claymore mines. M18A1. Seven hundred steel balls per mine. Fifty-meter kill radius.
He placed three of them, overlapping fields of fire, covering the crossing point.
Brennan arrived, moving fast.
“They’re two minutes out. We need to—” He saw Garrett, saw the situation, understood. “Right. I’ll hold them here.”
He took position behind a fallen tree, rifle rested, breathing controlled.
The first pursuers appeared on the far bank.
Brennan’s rifle spoke. One down. Two down.
The others took cover, but they kept coming—professional, organized, using fire and maneuver, advancing under covering fire. These weren’t amateurs.
Sullivan finished setting the Claymores, ran back to the position.
“Charges set. I can detonate when they’re in the kill zone.”
The first pursuers reached the riverbank, started to cross.
Sullivan watched them come, counting, waiting for the maximum number to enter the water.
Five hostiles in the river.
Then ten.
Then fifteen.
“Now,” Evelyn said.
Sullivan triggered the Claymores.
The explosions were simultaneous, overlapping. The river erupted in steel and fire. The water churned. Screams cut short. The ones who survived the initial blast tried to retreat, only to be cut down by Brennan’s precision fire.
But then Brennan’s voice cracked through the radio.
“I’m hit. Can’t move. They’re flanking my position.”
Before Evelyn could respond, Sullivan was moving, running back toward the river, toward the enemy position.
“Sullivan, what are you—”
“I put you all here,” he said. “I’m getting you out.”
He reached Brennan’s position. The sniper was down, tourniquet on his leg, trying to drag himself to cover.
Sullivan grabbed him, threw him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.
Enemy fire erupted. Rounds impacted around Sullivan. He didn’t stop, didn’t drop Brennan, just ran.
A round caught him in the shoulder. He stumbled, kept moving. Another round tore through his calf. He fell to one knee, pushed back up, kept going.
He made it to their position, dropped Brennan beside Callahan, collapsed.
“Get him patched,” Sullivan gasped, blood pouring from his wounds. “Then get out of here.”
Evelyn looked at him, saw the pain, the determination, the man trying to earn back what he’d lost.
“Callahan, work on both of them. We’re not leaving anyone. Not today.”
“That’ll slow them,” Brennan said. “Maybe twenty minutes before they regroup and find another crossing point.”
Twenty minutes.
Evelyn checked Garrett. His shaking had reduced. His core temperature was rising. Not good, but better. Survivable.
“We move. Callahan, how’s he doing?”
“He’ll make it. Maybe. If we get him to the submarine in the next two hours.”
They pushed on. Garrett now conscious enough to half walk with support. The coast appeared ahead.
Three kilometers.
Two.
One.
The beach. Gray sand, waves crashing. And offshore, exactly where it was supposed to be, a RIB with Navy spec ops crew.
Evelyn keyed the radio.
“Rattlesnake, this is Ghost. We’re at the exfil point. I say again, we are at the exfil point.”
Carver’s voice came back, relief evident even through the static.
“Ghost, this is Rattlesnake. We have you on radar. The boat is inbound. Thirty seconds.”
But behind them, the pursuit had regrouped. Hostiles burst from the tree line, weapons firing. Rounds impacting the sand around them.
Brennan went to one knee, returned fire. Precise shots, buying time. Sullivan joined him.
Callahan dragged Garrett toward the water.
The RIB hit the beach. Navy crew members jumped out, weapons raised, providing covering fire.
“Load up! Move, move, move!”
Callahan and Sullivan carried Garrett into the boat. Brennan laid down suppressing fire, then sprinted for the water.
Evelyn covered him, firing until her magazine was empty. Then she ran.
Rounds kicked up sand around her feet. Close. Too close.
She dove into the water as a burst of fire passed through where she’d been standing a half second before.
Strong hands pulled her into the boat.
The engines roared. They pushed off the beach.
A rocket-propelled grenade launched from the tree line, arced toward them.
The coxswain saw it, turned hard. The RPG passed three meters from the boat, impacted the water behind them, exploded in a geyser of spray.
Then they were out of range, moving at forty knots, the beach receding behind them.
Evelyn collapsed in the bottom of the boat, breathing hard, every muscle shaking with adrenaline crash. She looked at her team. Brennan, rifle across his lap, checking it for damage from the saltwater. Callahan working on Garrett, starting an IV, monitoring his vitals. Sullivan sitting apart from the others, staring at nothing.
And Garrett. Alive. Broken, but alive. Conscious, but barely.
His eyes found hers.
“You came back,” he whispered.
“I told you I would.”
“Cole, Preacher. Are they…”
She shook her head. Didn’t trust her voice.
Garrett closed his eyes.
“Then it’s just us.”
“Just us,” she agreed.
The submarine appeared ahead. USS Oklahoma City, black shape on black water, the conning tower emerging like some ancient beast.
The RIB pulled alongside. The team transferred to the sub—down the hatch, into the pressure hull, into safety.
The submarine dove, disappearing into the deep, leaving no trace that they had ever been there.
Seventy-two hours later, they surfaced in U.S. territorial waters. A helicopter waited, medical team standing by.
Garrett was transferred immediately. Critical condition, but stable. He’d live. Probably.
Evelyn stood on the deck watching the helicopter disappear toward the mainland, toward hospitals and debriefs and all the complicated aftermath of what they’d done.
Admiral Carver found her there. He looked older, tired, like the last three days had aged him a decade.
“It’s done,” he said quietly. “Garrett’s alive. You did it.”
“We did it. All of us.”
“Not all of you.” He looked at Sullivan, who stood at the far end of the deck, isolated.
“What do we do about him?”
Evelyn was quiet for a moment.
“He made a choice. A father’s choice. I don’t agree with it, but I understand it. He betrayed us, but then he saved us. He used his charges to give us the chaos we needed to escape. He carried Garrett when his own guilt probably wanted him to run.
“So…”
“So we don’t hang him,” she said. “We let him go home to his daughter, and we make damn sure she never knows what he did to keep her safe.”
Carver nodded.
“You’re more forgiving than I’d be.”
“I’m not forgiving. I’m understanding. There’s a difference. I’ll never trust him again. Never work with him again. But I won’t destroy him either. He’s already destroyed himself. That’s punishment enough.”
