What Lies Within Read Free Page A

meters ahead, buildings took shape.
    The team tightened up as they moved into the city. They walked down the debris-scattered dirt road, scanning the buildings lining the road. The city might as well be a ghost town for all the activity they found there.
    “Ghost town. How appropriate.”
    Rafe shook off the dark voice taunting him—until he noticed the street suddenly narrowed. Buildings seemed to spring up out of nowhere, looming over them left and right. Debris and abandoned cars—perfect booby traps—lay scattered all around. And Rafe knew.
    This was it. What he’d been dreading.
    He opened his mouth to warn the Pride when dust kicked up around his feet.
    “Contact!”
    Rafe turned at Jesse’s yell, looking up, and flinched as something sang through the air from above. Bullets. It was raining bullets. “They’re on top of the buildings!”
    Through the fog Rafe saw the hazy forms. How many he didn’t know. Nor could he tell who was shooting and who wasn’t.
    “Ah, the rules of engagement. Hard to comply now, wouldn’t you say?”
    Rafe’s teeth clenched.
Shut up. Shut up before I
shut
you up!
    But again, Death was right. Soldiers in the U.S. military could only fireon those they knew were firing on them. That meant waiting for a muzzle flash in the fog.
    And that would be too late.
    Images flooded his mind. His men, bloodied, broken, dead eyes wide as their limp bodies were dragged through the streets by hooting Iraqis—
    No!
The Pride was
not
going down here. “Suppression fire! Thales, call for support!”
    Moving into a tight three-sixty of defense, the team peppered the top edges of the buildings on either side, sending their attackers diving for cover as they made their way back out of the city.
    Rafe heard Thales radioing in, yelling out their location. But he knew, as the others had to, as their grim features attested, that there wasn’t time for support to reach them.
    They were in a kill zone.
    The street, the walls, everything channeled the enemy fire. The abandoned cars around them offered no cover; they were probably booby trapped. All their attackers had to do was keep shooting. Eventually, if Rafe and his team stayed there, they’d go down.
    They had to get out of this on their own.
    “Move out! Back the way we came!”
    Still firing, Rafe looked behind them, measuring the distance. Ninety meters to safety. The hardest target to hit was a moving target, so—
    “Move!”
    His men responded without hesitation. Eighty meters to go. Sixty. Forty. Yelling and gunfire all around. Deafening. Bullets hitting walls, bricks, sending chips flying like tiny daggers.
    Twenty meters. Ten! They were going to make it. Just a few more feet—
    The searing pain came out of nowhere, exploding in Rafe’s knee and hip.
    Everything shifted to slow motion. Rafe looked down. Saw, as though it were some perverse scene on TV, the bullets pierce flesh, driving deep, shattering bone. As he fell, he watched the red gush forth. Soak his cammies. Seep into the ground, flowing across the desert, ballooning until everything was angry red—the color of his heartbeat.
    “Man down!
Man down!
”
    Rashidi’s cry echoed around him. Rafe clawed at the ground and screamed, as much in anger as pain. Screamed and screamed again—
    “God!”
The cry ripped from Rafe’s gut, echoing in the darkness of his room as he sat bolt upright.
    Images shimmered behind his lids. Swirling sand and fog faded into muted darkness. The debris-littered street morphed, then settled into more benign shapes. A dresser. Bedside table. Lamp.
    Muzzle flashes glittered and died. Became the first rays of daylight streaming in through his bedroom window.
    Home.
    He was home.
    It was a dream. Again. The same dream that had tormented him for nearly four years.
    Breathe. Memories can’t hurt you
. He threw back the covers, moved to slide out of bed, and winced. Yeah. Memories may not hurt, but torn tissue and muscle, damaged bone …
    That hurt. All