Part 13 (2/2)

”Now?” Rhys prompted.

”Couple times, y'know, recently-couple times I'm out there with a bunch of guys, maybe even a squad, that many guys, and-” Jamie couldn't let her gaze go anywhere near Rhys. ”This was before they * 114 *

gave me second squad, Marty. Before. ” She waited for Rhys's stiffness, for Rhys's peevish withdrawal.

”And?” Rhys sounded okay. Still warm, still holding on.

”A-And,” Jamie stammered finally, ”I'm the one who's put together the mission, when to go, where to go-y'know?-and they all get whacked. Everyone's KIA, including me. Me last. I watch them all get it, one by one, hearing them scream, knowing I did this to them.

Last part of the dream both times, right before I wake up, I feel the rounds. .h.i.tting me, tearing into me. Hurts like h.e.l.l, but it doesn't take me out. Last thing I see is the knife coming for my throat-a black blade-and then I can feel my own blood on my chest. It's sticky and warm. I'm choking and getting cold and it's warm on my chest.” Jamie didn't talk about how, over the previous month, most of the dreams had been about Rhys. Rhys's throat slit. Rhys dying in her arms. She snuck a peek at Rhys. f.u.c.k. She knows.

”When did it start-the dreams? After I got here?”

”First one was after San Salvacia. After Arnie.” Jamie shook her head, focused her eyes on the dresser again. ”They got a lot worse after Lonz was. .h.i.t. I-I couldn't help him.”

”You did help him.” Rhys exhaled her relief. ”You saved his a.s.s, Jamie.”

”I should've seen the guy sooner. If I'd seen him sooner, maybe he wouldn't have got that shot off and Lonz-” Jamie's eyes were hot, stinging when she looked back to Rhys. ”And if I'd been smarter about where I sent you and Omara and Ebbers-Jeezus, I thought you were f.u.c.king dead, Marty! I thought I f.u.c.king killed all three of you.”

”Can I tell you something?” Rhys asked.

Jamie shrugged.

”You're the best G.o.dd.a.m.n marine I've ever seen.”

”Yeah.” Jamie snorted contempt. ”Right.”

”I figure you've saved my a.s.s at least three times since they hooked us up. And, by the way, I'm f.u.c.king glad I went along with you on Squeeze Play, 'cuz that was one of those times.”

”Well, I guess I should just be grateful I don't have to wear red skivvies on my head.”

”I mean it, Jamie. You're so d.a.m.n good sometimes it makes me d.a.m.n jealous. You got incredible instincts. And you're a scary-fine snipe.”

* 115 *

Jamie fidgeted. Rhys rested a hand on Jamie's chest to keep her where she lay. ”Dammit, I saw you on the bus to Parris Island. You were scared s.h.i.+tless just like the rest of us. You started out just like the rest of us. But you-I don't know how the h.e.l.l you did it, but you've got something, Gwynmorgan. And I'm just trying to-”

”I'll tell you what I got. Three months in the field with a really good teacher, that's what. Plus a little luck and a lot of worrying.” Rhys flashed a brash, unbelieving smile. ”I can help you with the worrying part.”

”Yeah? Show me.”

Rhys rolled on top of Jamie and began with a kiss.

v Rhys was right about the worrying part. After making love with her, Jamie slept free of nightmares. As Jamie woke the second time in the privacy of the Culion motel room, the sun had begun to sink beneath the watery horizon visible from their second-floor windows.

”Didn't even notice we had a view 'til right now,” Jamie said when Rhys woke, too. ”Take a look.”

Nestled together, they stayed quiet and watched the sun set, their breathing gradually synchronizing, relaxing. They were, for a little while anyway, safe. This, Jamie thought, in all the world I want this.

The dense tangle in her solar plexus began to slacken when she reminded herself that she had the evening and nine more days after that. It seemed like a lot. ”Guess what,” Jamie said soon after the sun disappeared.

”What?”

”Today's my birthday.” Jamie gazed at Rhys, smiling her thanks.

”I'm eighteen as of right now. And tomorrow we'll have been in the Marine Corps for exactly one year.”

”Well then, Sergeant Gwynmorgan, we gotta celebrate.”

* 116 *

Chapter tWelve.

attrition And remember, a barangay is a town or village that's part of a larger munic.i.p.ality,” Jamie reminded her gathered squad the day before they left Culion. ”Word is we're gonna be moving into the barangays of Puerto Princesa, which the PIA won't give up easily.” But their orders changed an hour before they climbed into the helo.

”Short detour, boys and girls,” said Daggett. ”We're going to Panay for a while. Three-Six needs some help with cleanup.” It was one of the larger Philippine islands, about 250 kilometers east-southeast of Culion, where too many of the PIA cut off during Squeeze Play had ended up, and it was easy duty because the PIA elements there were exhausted and demoralized and just as resented by the Panay locals as they were by the people of Busuanga and northern Palawan.

Jamie called it the Real Thing Lite and regarded it as a gift. More than once, her squad's virgins survived newbie mistakes that would've been fatal during the Real Thing Heavy. After two months, all thirteen squaddies helicoptered out of Panay healthy and wiser.

”Tell me why the f.u.c.k we're here again?” griped the large, blunt-featured Corporal Ramirez, one of Jamie's fire team leaders, when the helo touched down on Palawan.

”They're ba-ack,” mocked Rhys, winking at Jamie. ”Sneaking around Baheli Peak through that sieve Ninth Regiment calls a forward edge. And coming this way. Welcome to picking-up-right-where-we-f.u.c.king-left-off.”

The Three-Eight had been ordered to saturate the area around the same coastal road at the eastern end of the Palawan isthmus where * 117 *

Jamie had made what Rhys proudly called ”those three Squeeze Play sweet shots.” On the high ground prowled the Three-Eight's snipes.

Again.

Together with the platoon's two other squads on their right, second squad-now Sergeant Gwynmorgan's squad-skulked across the higher southeastern slopes of Baheli Peak to plug holes in the still-porous battle area some thirteen kilometers north of the Puerto Princesa peninsula.

Jamie's squad and third squad did fine. But one of first squad's fire teams, along with the squad's sergeant and Staff Sergeant Daggett, got slammed. First squad's sergeant suffered a go-home wound, and only days after the newly arrived Expeditionary Brigade commander had pinned one of those Squeeze Play Silver Stars on his chest, Daggett died.

So on February thirteenth, the Corps promoted Jamie again, this time to staff sergeant and Three-Eight scout/sniper platoon NCO. Rhys made sergeant and got second squad. ”Least these days when they give us the billet, we actually get the rank, too,” she said. ”Must be diddling all kinds of rules so they can jack the h.e.l.l out of our composite scores.

Or something.”

”Yeah.” Jamie forced a smile. Rhys had a right to be excited.

Maybe Rhys was even ready for a squad. As for herself, Jamie knew d.a.m.n well she had far to go before being solidly good at leading a dozen people, and now she had a whole platoon and a first lieutenant to deal with. Forty plus one. Her attempt at steady calm was all bl.u.s.ter.

h.e.l.l, maybe Rhys's bouncing excitement was all bl.u.s.ter, too.

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