Page 12

Fuck.

While the sniper in the window began to take aim at me, the sound of approaching Humvees shook the ground beneath me. As the approaching convoy came to a halt, the whizzing sound of a bullet and a puff of dust bursting from the street beside me told me the shot he had taken was off by no more than a few inches.

There was no doubt he was choosing to shoot me over shooting the arriving Marines.

As I heard them loading the wounded Marines into the convoy, I took aim at the one remaining threat.

“Jacob, hold tight. I’m sending two men to get you,” I heard a voice shout.

I lifted my left hand in the air and clenched my fist.

If they tried to cross the street, he’d cut them down one by one.

“Do not approach. That is a fucking order,” I shouted as I closed my left eye and attempted to gain sight of my target.

The shrill impact of the bullet into the hood of the truck I was using for cover startled me, and the following pressure in my left leg assured me that although the steel hood may have slowed the path of the bullet, I had been hit.

Son-of-a-fucking-bitch.

As the bullet burned into my flesh, I knew I had to act fast if I was going to kill him before he killed me. I tightened my jaw and steadied my rifle.

“Tandy, Rickman, get him out of there before he gets himself killed,” I heard someone shout from the direction of the convoy.

“I gave a fucking order, and I’ll see to it that you are god damned court-martialed if you cross that fucking street,” I shouted over my shoulder.

“Get my fucking Marines medevac’d. You can drag my corpse out of here after I shoot this prick,” I said through my teeth.

The impact of another bullet into my upper back pressed me into the ground, but I could tell it wasn’t a through shot, probably either a ricochet or a deep surface wound.

You. Mother. Fucker.

I felt like a piece of Swiss cheese. I could no longer hear anything. Either from the massive amount of adrenaline I was producing, from being shot repeatedly, or from the loss of blood, I had gone completely deaf, but the warmth of my own blood pooling beneath me made my loss of hearing seem inconsequential. As I saw a few of the vehicles pull away out of my peripheral, I exhaled the remaining breath in my lungs. It didn’t matter if he shot me again or not, I fully realized I had only a few minutes to live either way.

You either put me here to die, or to administer your will.

I don’t know which it is, but all I need is one more shot.

A bullet slammed against the heel of my boot. It felt like I had been hit in the foot by a sledgehammer. Out of time, completely out of energy, and almost out of blood, I regained my line of sight, exhaled, and squeezed the trigger just as he was preparing to take another shot at me.

As I watched his body collapse over the edge of the window opening, everything around me slowly disappeared.

And the sweet smell of Suzanne’s perfume engulfed me.