Open Season by Cameron Curtis (early reader books TXT) 📗

dirt, halfway to the communal outhouse. Do that for a full deployment, no one can live around you when you get home.

Ask me why I love living on a plantation in the Philippines. Sipping pineapple juice.

Now I lie in bed, staring at the ceiling, listening to the cargo planes take off and land. The interceptors are all-weather, but apart from scheduled combat air patrols, there are few strike missions this late at night.

The hut is quiet. The street outside is quiet.

That is a C-5.

That is a C-17.

That is a Huey. The distinctive thud of the ancient helo’s two-bladed rotor. It’s been out of service for years. Wonder who the hell is operating one out here.

That is a woman screaming.

I roll out of bed, stuff the Mark 23 in my waistband. Jerk open my bedroom door, bang through the front. There, across the street, lights are going on in the women’s quarters. Another scream. Throaty—a mature woman. Not a girl, not Robyn.

A man dressed in dark clothing, wearing a balaclava, strides from the rear of the women’s hut. Must have left by the back door. He looks left and right, then back. I break into a run. He draws a pistol from his jacket and fires. There is the rapid-fire popping of a small-caliber pistol. A nine-millimeter.

I throw myself onto the pavement. Skin my knees and elbows. The muzzle flashes fade. The man runs for the long road that borders the runway.

A shout from behind. “Breed!”

Koenig chases after me, a Mark 23 in his hand. Behind him, Takigawa and Ballard. Ballard is running barefoot, his camouflage shirt open. He’s forgotten to put on his glasses.

Focus on the fleeing figure. There’s no traffic on the border road. It’s separated from the airstrip by a two-foot-high fence of metal pipe six inches in diameter. Lights are embedded in the tarmac at fixed intervals to mark the runway.

A C-5 Galaxy accelerates for takeoff. The roar of its engines is deafening. The figure turns and fires at me again. This time, I refuse to hit the dirt. He’s running hard. The odds of him hitting anything offhand are slim to none.

The figure crosses the road, hurdles the fence. The C-5 hits V1, pitches nose-high, and lifts into the air. A quarter mile to our right, a Globemaster pulls onto the runway, bathing us in its taxi lights.

I’m gaining on him.

The figure dashes onto the runway. Turns and fires. Again, the ridiculous pop of the tiny nine-millimeter rounds. With one mighty effort, I hurl myself forward and tackle him. My arms close around his waist. He stumbles with the impact and goes down, the gun flying from his hand.

Bathed in the Globemaster’s blinding lights, we grapple. I want the son of a bitch alive, but he’s strong. A bodybuilder or powerlifter. I try to get a wrist lock on him. He twists out of it, throws me on my back, lurches to his feet. I twist on my side and draw my knee back to kick. The man reaches into his boot and draws a six-inch Gerber. Razor-sharp, double-edged. Hurls himself at me.

Two sharp cracks, a double-tap. The heavy-caliber rounds drill the man in the chest, damn near the same hole. He crumples to the tarmac. I get to my feet, step on his wrist, and twist the knife from his grasp. He stares at me, coughs blood all over his wool balaclava.

With one jerk, I tear the ski mask from his head.

Lopez.

The medic’s face is ghastly silver in the airplane’s headlights. A rope of blood hangs from the corner of his mouth. The sight fades from his eyes.

Koenig is holding his Mark 23 in a perfect isosceles stance. “Are you okay?” he asks.

I could have disarmed Lopez, but feel like I owe Koenig. “Yes, thanks.”

Koenig snorts. “What the hell was he doing?”

I look from Koenig to Ballard and back. “Trainor was right all along,” I say. “He killed Grissom.”

“And tried to kill her,” Ballard says.

Sirens are whooping. Military Police and ambulances. I sprint back to the women’s quarters. The hut is ablaze with lights. I find the back door open. Inside, a small bachelorette kitchen, a mirror of ours. The communal showers and toilets are on the right. A single corridor, and six barrack rooms, three on either side. Designed for two soldiers apiece. With the force reductions, they have become private rooms.

A sturdy woman with cropped red hair squats at the door of the room on the left. Looks inside. The room must be Robyn’s. “Who are you?” she asks. Her accent is Australian.

“Breed,” I say. “I’m with Sergeant Trainor’s team. How is she?”

“She’s not breathing.”

I poke my head into the room.

Robyn is lying on the floor, dressed in a t-shirt and white cotton underwear. She’s face-up, but her eyes are closed. A middle-aged Latina woman with dark hair is kneeling over her. The Latina is dressed in camouflage pants. Barefoot, a pink sweater pulled over a white t-shirt.

“What’s wrong with her?” I ask.

“All the signs of a morphine overdose,” the Latina says. She’s bent over Robyn, giving the girl mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. “Breathe, baby. Breathe.”

My eyes scan the room. Robyn fought for her life. She was dragged off the bed. Or tried to hang onto her attacker while he tried to escape. The other women rushed to the room to help. The intruder was stronger. He either held them off physically, or threatened them with a weapon. Then he walked out the back door. A cool operator, calculating the angles.

There, in a corner, next to one of the metal bedposts—a glass syringe. The plunger has been depressed, but there remains a quarter inch of clear fluid in the barrel. I show it to the nurses. “What is this?”

“Probably morphine,” the Australian nurse says. “He’s given her enough to drop a bloody horse.”

The Latina speaks with a New York accent. She turns to the Aussie. “Go meet the medics. Make sure they bring naloxone.”

The Aussie runs to the front of the hut.

“Damn,” the Latina curses.