Whole Pieces Read Free Page A

dial.
    The boy.
    Hawk jerked the watch up and stared at the face. Angled it, trying to tell the time. A flicker of movement caught his eye, but he couldn’t decipher the hour. He pressed himself to the ground and hauled a tarp over his head. Bent, he aimed his tactical watch at the who-knows-how-old timepiece. Dull-green luminance bathed the watch—and his hands. Two hands!
    Focus. Time. What time?
    21:35.
    Wait. No.
    15:18.
    Huh? He squeezed his eyes and checked the face again. Trained his eyes on the glass. 21 . . . no, 15 . . . What in the world? Night, yet day. Two timelines? How could there be two times captured? That wasn’t possible.
    Neither is being here. Thirty-plus years in the past. In a trench where everyone was killed .
    But he was here.
    And there were two times on the watch.
    His heart bungeed at a sudden realization. The first time matched his present location. The other, his deathbed moments.
    Both were still ticking.
    Both . . . What? What did that mean?
    â€œHawk?”
    Were both time frames still in play?
    Wouldn’t that . . . could that mess up something? Fracture some continuum or something?
    Pain jabbed into his side. The watch fumbled from his hand.
    With a grunt, Hawk scrambled for the watch and jerked to the right. Stratham’s LPC slid away. Okay, hint—and toe of boot—taken.
    Two times. One watch.
    One me.
    Talk about a split personality. But this went to the nth degree—one life that could alter six. No, wait—Sanders had kids. McLellan had a wife and a baby on the way. Stratham’s parents and brothers!
    This moment, changing this mistake, could alter an untold number of lives.
    Hawk’s fingers coiled around the metal and tightened. God had given him this chance. To right a wrong. Save these men that he’d come to think of as brothers. He slid the watch into his leg pocket.
    â€œHawk, you okay, man?”
    On his belly, he scooted back into position with the heady responsibility weighting his shoulders. Shot a look at Stratham. Man, it was good to see him. See those clear, intelligent eyes studying him. With concern, but Hawk had no beef with that. At least he was studying, and if Hawk could just make this reversal work, his buddy could do all the studying he wanted to for the next thirty years.
    â€œYou wigging out? The hole—” he glanced at the suffocating space they’d dug into for the op— “getting to you?”
    â€œNo, I’m good.” Better than good. Ready to take down the whole sick world. But he’d settle for saving six men. “Just . . . want to get this done.” He trained his gaze on the sloping hillside, drawing in a long, stiff breath of chilly air.
    â€œYou and me both.” Stratham resumed his watch.
    Hawk couldn’t help but steal another look around him. Make sure this was real. Not a dream. That he had this chance. That it was legit. The watch pressed into his leg. Real. His breath backed into his throat, still clobbered with the truth. It’s real. Constant honest-to-God sent me back.
    If Hawk had figured out the two times, inlaid one over the other, then he had seven hours.
    â€œUnderstand, you have seven hours, only those seven. When they’re over . . .”
    I still die.
    Ashley.
    Her name alone felt like a kick to the chest. Nothing would change for her. So she was a nonissue.
    The thought spiraled crossways through him. If only he’d been a better person. All those years, living with regret and anger as his bedmates. What if . . . what if he did alter things? Would that mean something . . . good with her?
    It didn’t matter. These men, the ones holed up in a rat hole of a trench spying on enemy strongholds—they mattered. Saving them. Making sure they went home with all their parts in the right places and still functioning as the good Lord intended.
    That was his