Chapter 2
“Unknown overwatch,” the SEAL commander said again. “Identify yourself now.”
Cassidy breathed once through her nose.
“Name won’t help you. Staying down will.”
The commander’s voice hardened.
“This is SEAL One. I don’t take orders from ghosts.”
Then another voice cut across the channel.
Command.
Cold.
Clean.
Too far away to smell the dust or hear the bullets before they arrived.
“Negative, SEAL One. No friendly assets in your sector.”
Cassidy’s eye narrowed.
There it was.
The denial.
The erase.
The same mistake that had gotten men killed before.
The SEALs went still behind the rocks.
She could feel their confusion through the radio silence.
If command said no friendly asset existed, then who was the woman on the mountain?
A local informant?
A trap?
An enemy with a stolen radio?
Cassidy shifted half an inch and tracked the RPG gunner.
He had risen higher now.
The tube was coming up.
His shoulder set.
His body turned toward the rocks where the SEALs had taken cover.
A few seconds more, and the whole team would be gone.
Cassidy keyed the mic.
“Then your map is wrong.”
Command snapped back immediately.
“Unknown caller, cease transmission. You are interfering with an active operation.”
Cassidy almost laughed.
Active operation.
That was what men in safe rooms called it before other men bled out in the dirt.
Below her, the SEAL commander spoke again.
“Command, confirm. You have no sniper element assigned to our overwatch?”
“Confirmed,” Command said. “No friendly assets.”
Cassidy’s scope moved from the RPG gunner to the SEALs.
The commander was crouched behind a split boulder, one hand on his radio, his head just low enough to survive.
For now.
She knew his type.
Disciplined.
Suspicious.
Alive because he hated surprises.
But even he could not see the ridge above him.
May you like
Cassidy could.
Read Part 3 to see what happened when the RPG gunner finally raised his weapon.
