he’d completed the whole course of the detox treatment itself. Feeling better. Almost human. Okay, maybe not that good, but getting there.
At the sight of the plane, he stifled a groan. So much for feeling human. He wished he had a dollar for every time he’d had to strap himself onto one of those hard-as-rock, spine-cracking cargo seats that lined the walls of the giant flying warehouses, while headed out on a mission too covert to risk flying commercial. He’d be a rich man.
Even richer than he was now. Hazardous-duty pay wasn’t bad, and he’d earned plenty of it. The numbers added up quickly when you were never home to dip into your portfolio.
Too bad he probably wouldn’t be around to enjoy his nest egg now that he’d finally found something . . . someone . . . worth spending it on.
But despite the fragile hope he’d momentarily let slip to Rainie, this Sudan mission would be a bitch to survive. Realistically, he probably wouldn’t.
Afghanistan had been bad enough, but at least that theater had been full of regular US military support. When his spec ops ZU team had been ambushed trying to take out the fanatical al Sayika leader Jallil abu Bakr, help was just a walkie-talkie hail away. That wasn’t going to be the case in the Sudan. The closest thing to friendlies he’d find there would be the wandering Bedouin, and a few refugee camps scattered around the Sahara Desert, such as the Doctors for Peace camp that his buddy Nathan Daneby had started a hundred clicks or so south of the Egyptian border.
Kick wondered if Nate was still there at the DFP camp. He doubted it. Last he’d heard, his tireless friend was helping the UN set up another field hospital somewhere down by the equator. The Sudan was a huge country—three and a half times the size of Texas—and it seemed every inch of it was being ravaged by some kind of pestilence, drought, or war. And now the virulent terrorist Jallil abu Bakr had come to add his sick agenda to the country’s burden of problems.
Kick’s mission was to rid the world of the scumbag once and for all. He’d failed last time. This time he wouldn’t fail. So help him God, he wouldn’t.
On the way to the airport, CIA weasel Jason Forsythe told Kick he would rip up his Zero Unit employment contract once and for all, if Kick completed this one last mission for them. Free at last, free at last. He could only pray Forsythe was telling the truth. But in all honesty, Kick really hadn’t needed the extra motivation.
Somewhere in the fog of unconsciousness during the past twenty-four hours, fighting to save himself from the toxic drug that had been slowly ravaging his flesh as a consequence of that last failed mission in A-stan, he had finally realized he would never be truly healed, in body or in soul, until abu Bakr was dead and buried. Like his team and his best friend, whom abu Bakr had brutally murdered. On Kick’s watch.
To get his self-respect back, to get his life back, he had to finish that ill-fated mission. Nothing else would help. If that meant going to the Sudan to face conditions that would test a healthy man, let alone one barely able to stand on his own, so be it.
Kick needed the closure.
No. What he really needed was . . . revenge.
THE SUV came to a halt beside the C-17 and Kick climbed out into the New Jersey night, followed by Rainie and the lone guard that had come along with them. Apparently the ZU trusted him now. Or maybe they knew he couldn’t fight his way out of a paper bag at the moment.
Forsythe slid out of the front seat and waved the driver to the back of the vehicle, where he pulled out three backpacks and a couple of long duffel bags, depositing them on the tarmac. The burly guard picked up the whole lot and strode through the darkness toward the C-17.
Kick took a deep breath. This was the part he’d been dreading. Saying good-bye to Rainie. He sucked big-time at this stuff, especially when the person meant something to
At the sight of the plane, he stifled a groan. So much for feeling human. He wished he had a dollar for every time he’d had to strap himself onto one of those hard-as-rock, spine-cracking cargo seats that lined the walls of the giant flying warehouses, while headed out on a mission too covert to risk flying commercial. He’d be a rich man.
Even richer than he was now. Hazardous-duty pay wasn’t bad, and he’d earned plenty of it. The numbers added up quickly when you were never home to dip into your portfolio.
Too bad he probably wouldn’t be around to enjoy his nest egg now that he’d finally found something . . . someone . . . worth spending it on.
But despite the fragile hope he’d momentarily let slip to Rainie, this Sudan mission would be a bitch to survive. Realistically, he probably wouldn’t.
Afghanistan had been bad enough, but at least that theater had been full of regular US military support. When his spec ops ZU team had been ambushed trying to take out the fanatical al Sayika leader Jallil abu Bakr, help was just a walkie-talkie hail away. That wasn’t going to be the case in the Sudan. The closest thing to friendlies he’d find there would be the wandering Bedouin, and a few refugee camps scattered around the Sahara Desert, such as the Doctors for Peace camp that his buddy Nathan Daneby had started a hundred clicks or so south of the Egyptian border.
Kick wondered if Nate was still there at the DFP camp. He doubted it. Last he’d heard, his tireless friend was helping the UN set up another field hospital somewhere down by the equator. The Sudan was a huge country—three and a half times the size of Texas—and it seemed every inch of it was being ravaged by some kind of pestilence, drought, or war. And now the virulent terrorist Jallil abu Bakr had come to add his sick agenda to the country’s burden of problems.
Kick’s mission was to rid the world of the scumbag once and for all. He’d failed last time. This time he wouldn’t fail. So help him God, he wouldn’t.
On the way to the airport, CIA weasel Jason Forsythe told Kick he would rip up his Zero Unit employment contract once and for all, if Kick completed this one last mission for them. Free at last, free at last. He could only pray Forsythe was telling the truth. But in all honesty, Kick really hadn’t needed the extra motivation.
Somewhere in the fog of unconsciousness during the past twenty-four hours, fighting to save himself from the toxic drug that had been slowly ravaging his flesh as a consequence of that last failed mission in A-stan, he had finally realized he would never be truly healed, in body or in soul, until abu Bakr was dead and buried. Like his team and his best friend, whom abu Bakr had brutally murdered. On Kick’s watch.
To get his self-respect back, to get his life back, he had to finish that ill-fated mission. Nothing else would help. If that meant going to the Sudan to face conditions that would test a healthy man, let alone one barely able to stand on his own, so be it.
Kick needed the closure.
No. What he really needed was . . . revenge.
THE SUV came to a halt beside the C-17 and Kick climbed out into the New Jersey night, followed by Rainie and the lone guard that had come along with them. Apparently the ZU trusted him now. Or maybe they knew he couldn’t fight his way out of a paper bag at the moment.
Forsythe slid out of the front seat and waved the driver to the back of the vehicle, where he pulled out three backpacks and a couple of long duffel bags, depositing them on the tarmac. The burly guard picked up the whole lot and strode through the darkness toward the C-17.
Kick took a deep breath. This was the part he’d been dreading. Saying good-bye to Rainie. He sucked big-time at this stuff, especially when the person meant something to
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