Chapter 3

Chapter Three

Focused on getting Marlowe up and into a TEAM helo as quickly as possible, Asher ran the steep uphill trek as fast as he could, with Beau covering his ass. Fortunately, the narrow cave opening they'd entered through now faced away from the bastards chasing them, and for the most part, dense brush blocked the view of their retreat. If all went well, this woman would be on her way home by dark. At the least, given the shape she was in, she'd be at the Army hospital in Ramstein, Germany.

Asher was halfway to the Team's previously agreed-upon rendezvous point when he felt a sob jerk out of her. Even silent sobs were hard to miss. Damn those assholes. What he wouldn't give to go back in time and kill them before they'd done whatever they'd done to her. A woman, for heaven's sake.

He didn't know the extent of her injuries. There hadn't been time to thoroughly assess her needs, and she'd been too volatile to allow it once he'd cut her down from that ceiling. But he worried now. Were her shoulders dislocated from being hung like she'd been, or was something worse going on? How many days had she been hanging there? How long had they tortured her? Surely, she had a concussion, but was he causing further harm by jolting her with every step trying to save her? Had he put her neck and spine at more risk when he'd moved her? Were there internal injuries in play? The very real fears plaguing Asher now could only be quieted by the fact that he'd had no choice. Playing it safe hadn't been an option. Only running for her life.

The steady whomp-whomp-whomp of heavy-duty rotor blades cut the air as two Sikorsky UH-60A Black Hawks cleared the nearest peak and descended to the rendezvous point, a flat outcropping without boulders or trees. Relieved to see those beautiful birds with no logo or lettering stamped anywhere on their muted black bodies, Asher dug into the last of his reserves and kicked into an all-out run to the finish line.

Tracer rounds lit up his peripheral. God bless Agents Renner and Heston, two of Alex Stewart's finest snipers, who were right then laying down suppressive fire at the new group of assholes intent on killing Marlowe. Asher had no idea why so many Taliban soldiers wanted her, but if it was the last thing he did, she would go home to America alive. Not in a pine box.

"Medic!" Asher ordered over his earpiece, alerting every man on his team. "We're coming in hot and we need someone ready to assist when we get there. One female. American. Marlowe Rich. Weighs a buck ten and she's in rough shape. Definite concussion, head trauma, possible dislocated shoulders and internal bleeding, half-frozen, and hell, I don't know what else. She needs a neck and back brace and heated blankets. Make it happen."

"Copy that," Murphy replied evenly, as if he hadn't just taken orders from an underling.

In minutes, Asher was at the nearest helo and handing Marlowe up and into the strong arms of Agent Lee Hart, while making sure he hadn't left Beau behind. These magnificent helos were combat-ready, praise God, and thank you, Alex. Designed to carry twelve fully equipped troops into combat, the birds were capable of extracting every last woman and child they'd just rescued from this stinking country, as well as blowing the adversaries on their rear to dust if push came to shove. Sikorsky Black Hawks were American soldier's guardian angels, and these two birds had been outfitted to Alex's specifications. Complete with Gatling guns at the side-door, a fully armored undercarriage, and an integrated weapon system, these helos allowed a pilot to lay down suppressive fire and launch any number of rockets or missiles from the cockpit.

As quickly as Asher climbed aboard, he dropped to the floor beside Marlowe. Lee had a huge med kit already splayed wide next to the padded gurney he'd laid her on. The helo's door was still open, the wind buffeting everyone inside the hovering aircraft.

Mentally, Asher rolled through the five points of tactical field care, aka MARCH .

Manage Massive hemorrhaging .

Ensure Airways were clear. He knew for certain nothing obstructed her airway.

Monitor patient for Respiratory issues , Circulation impairment , and lastly, the silent killer Hypothermia .

"Hold this," Lee ordered, handing him a full IV bag, while he swiped a disinfectant towelette over the back of Marlowe's dirty hand and flicked his fingertips against her ghostly white skin, searching for a vein. "She's damned cold. Beau, grab another blanket. Keep her covered and wrap her feet while you're at it. Handle whatever trauma you find, understood?"

"Copy that," Beau replied easily, then breathed, "Fuck. She's got nothing on but this stupid dress."

"We've got clean flannel coveralls, if you need one," Murphy shouted. He was old school and the flannel coveralls were his idea when dealing with injured female agents, to give them the decency they deserved.

"Jesus, look at her feet!" Beau snapped.

As quickly as Lee inserted the IV, Asher hung the bag on an overhead hook in the ceiling and dropped back to the floor to help Beau. Jesus, was right. The bottoms of her feet were hamburger, speckled with thorns and studded with tiny stones that looked like they'd been pounded in. "There isn't time to clean them. Wrap them up with ice packs for now."

"On it," Beau answered.

Asher turned back to Lee as, together, they assessed the rest of her fragile body.

"Christ, they worked her over," Lee muttered. "One shoulder's dislocated, multiple trauma to the left side of her face and head, possible eye damage. Broken nose. Can't do anything about that right now."

"You already gave her something for pain, right?"

Lee nodded. "As soon as I had her inside, yes. She's got a couple fractured ribs, maybe a fractured skull, and—"

"Crap. And I ran like hell all the way up this damn mountain, with her poor head—"

"Did you have a choice?"

"No, but—" Everything he'd done to save Marlowe had hurt her. Badly.

"Heston, Rory, Renner. You guys smoke the yahoos downhill yet?" Murphy asked through their earpieces.

"Nope," Rory replied. "Only persuaded them to run and hide."

Renner snickered. "Yeah, like chicken shits all over the world."

"You boys aboard the other bird and strapped in?" Leave it to Murphy to refer to his men as boys.

Rory came back with a respectful, "Copy that, Boss. How's our fair lady doing?"

"She's in rough shape but she'll be okay," Murphy said.

Asher hoped his boss was right. How Murph maintained a positive outlook on life, after all his time dealing with Army politics, amazed Asher. Asher had served far less time than Murph, but he'd dealt with the same bullshit, from HQ on down to field COs. Dirty politics behind the scenes had finally soured his patriotic zeal. Asher grew up wanting to serve, but these days, it seemed the guys and gals dying in the field were inconsequential to most five-stars. Soldiers, Marines, and Airmen were expendable, and what happened at Abbey Gate proved it.

"Pretty sure her lower back's badly injured, too," Asher advised Lee. "We need to stop whatever's bleeding."

"She's bleeding all right. The back of her dress is soaked."

"It is?" Asher asked, like a dolt. How had he not noticed that?

"Headsets everyone," Murphy reminded his team. "Take off in three, two…"

The bird's skids lifted up, the noise of its rotors drowning Murphy's, "One."

Tipping against the helo's inner wall to keep working on Marlowe, Asher paused long enough to trade his earpiece for the noise-canceling earphones Beau tossed his way.

"Help me logroll her," Lee said. "Toward you, on one, two… shit."

Asher pulled Marlowe against his thighs. The poor woman's back, mostly her lower back and bare backside, had been whipped raw. "Hemostatic dressing. Everything you've got. Hurry, Lee. Christ!"

"No shit." Lee reached into an open overhead compartment, broke open a full box of field dressings, and tore several foil packets apart. Tossing one to Beau, he ordered, "Glove up. I need something to lay these dressings on. Now, damnit!"

"Already gloved up." Beau broke open a pack of sterile towels and laid one on the floor in time for Lee to dump the compressed bundles of specially formulated, absorbable gauze, consisting of oxidized regenerated cellulose, on the towel. "We should've killed those bastards faster, Ash," Beau muttered as he and Lee pressed squares of expandable hemostatic dressing over and into the open flesh on Marlowe's back.

"I should've checked her better as soon as I had her," Lee growled. "I knew she was bleeding, but I needed to—"

"Stop it. Both of you. Quit! Just quit!" Asher ordered, leaning over Marlowe now and helping staunch the flow of those open wounds. There were so many. "We can only do what we can, when we can. We might still lose her so—" He stopped short of telling his friends to shut the fuck up because he should've known she was bleeding to death. He was the bastard who had fucked up this rescue, and Marlowe was paying the price. If she died—

No! Asher slammed that what-if out of his stupid head, refusing to let the guilt clawing up his spine get even the tiniest toehold. He'd done all he could amidst a shitstorm of very few options. She would live, damn it. She had to.

Little by little, they got the worst of the bleeding slowed, leaving him cowed by his negligence and pissed all over again.

"Thanks, guys," Lee breathed, swiping the back of his gloved hand across his forehead. "Shit. There was so much blood. I thought we lost her."

Lee had lived through torture at the hands of a notorious Taliban banker years ago. This had to be hard on him, seeing a woman treated as badly as he'd been back then. But he wasn't to blame. This death would've been on Asher, and he knew it.

As soon as the mighty craft was airborne, it pivoted a quarter circle west, toward the small army of terrorists once again gaining altitude below. The mechanical gears to the door-side Gatling guns clinked loudly as those weapons automatically zeroed downhill on the terrorists, thanks to the proprietary system on every bird in Alex's fleet.

"Send 'em back to hell, Boss," Beau growled through the shared comm links via the headsets, spraying hand sanitizer over his palms as he stepped over to the open door, his feet spread wide for balance.

"Negative," Murphy answered evenly. "Only if they're dumb enough to fire first. Then they'd have to be damned good shots to hit us all the way up here."

"I could hit 'em, easy." Beau gripped the overhead frame with both hands. Was he making himself a target? Sure looked like it.

"Let it go, guys," Murph ordered. "We've got everyone we came for, plus one. Let's call it a day and put this shithole behind us."

"Incoming," Beau bellowed, just as—

W HOOSH! A Hellfire air-to-surface missile screamed past their helo and zipped down the rocky terrain, obliterating the tightly-packed group of terrorists in a cloud of black smoke and orange fire.

"Guldarn it, I said only if they fired first, Deck," Murphy bellowed.

"Keep your panties on, Murph," Decker Edison, former Air Force colonel, A-10 pilot, and the man at the stick of the Black Hawk behind them, yelled back. "The moment they stopped climbing, I knew they were up to something. Turns out they were shielding the jackass with the anti-tank missile launcher on his shoulder. I did what I had to do."

"Get us out of here before we cause an international incident," Murphy grumped.

"Think we already did," Beau quipped, shutting the side door on the scene below.

"She won't make it to Ramstein, Murph," Asher told his boss.

"Already taken care of, son. You guys get her into that flannel coveralls while we head for the American Embassy in Islamabad. They've got a medical emergency team there. Miss Rich is going to be okay."

"There's only so much we can do, Asher. Hold her tight while I…" Snap. Lee corrected her dislocated shoulder without waiting for assistance. She didn't groan or cry out, but Asher winced for her.

"Forget the coveralls. She needs blankets," he muttered, smoothing out the wrinkles in the layers already covering her and wishing like hell he could comfort her. That he could tell her how sorry he was that he hadn't rescued her sooner. There was no sense maneuvering her poor battered body into coveralls. She was in shock, plugged into an IV, oxygen, and a heart monitor. All Asher could do now was hope she survived and pray like his life depended on it.