exact point between her fingers. The length of string, placed on the measuring bar on the bottom of the map, gave her the distance. So far, she had been accurate.
“I’m not used to the physical labor part of the job,” she admitted, massaging her thighs in hopes of easing the burning muscles.
“I understand. I don’t expect you to be. But you have to put in your own time over the next few days doing PT, things like running, pull-ups, and sit-ups. Hell, just walk for distance. Any cardio exercises will help. The more it hurts today, the less it will hurt when we go into Taliban country. For now, just get up this hill to that next set of coordinates. And don’t make so damned much noise breaking through the brush. Up and at it, Ledford. Push.”
He had been given less than a week to get her through some rudimentary training. She could shoot but would need as much knowledge about working in the wild as he could cram into her during that short time. He had decided on using a basic escape and evasion exercise today to help her at least to recognize some of the possibilities, both good and bad.
As they climbed, he wondered if General Middleton was having any progress in his meetings with the politicians and diplomats. The State Department had promised to stop the surveillance, but refused to explain why the CT/DSS had been following Ledford in the first place. You don’t put a full-scale tight net over somebody without a good reason. For Middleton, the State plea that they were just following orders wasn’t good enough. Orders from whom, and why?
Then Commander Freedman had pulled a series of overhead satellite shots of the bridge area in Pakistan and pointed out that the heavy equipment clustered at the site was far out of proportion for simply building and improving a road. Nothing much was visible beyond a giant construction site, and the extensive flat surface of the bridge and its side apron. There was a village a mile away to the east, a bazaar to the west. Middleton was uncomfortable with the whole thing, and when the general was uncomfortable, he made sure everyone else was, too.
After Swanson completed Ledford’s workouts, they were to get over to London immediately, with next stop Islamabad. Kyle had the familiar feeling of some unseen hand increasing the tempo of events, speeding things up ever so slightly, pulling him forward.
Another quarter mile of struggling up the incline, and he gave Beth a three-minute break. She flopped down on her back, breathing hard. “I’m glad I joined the Coast Guard,” she said. “This marching and climbing sucks.”
“Well, when you finish with this little hill, you get a treat. Sybelle has arranged for a Coast Guard helicopter to pick us up. So we’ll go out over the water and I can watch you shoot from the bird, see you operate in familiar surroundings.”
“Really? Great. Do you know what kind?”
“She says it is your usual ride, an MH-68H, piloted by your buddy Lieutenant Commander Taylor, who got chopped from regular duty down in Jacksonville just to come up here and taxi you around.”
“Wow. You guys can do that sort of thing?”
“Yep. Here’s the catch. Taylor is to do a touch-and-go at the landing zone, just the kind of situation we may face in extracting from Pakistan. He will not wait. You have to have us at that landing zone, the map mark, at exactly fifteen hundred hours, or we miss our ride.”
“That’s less than forty-five minutes from now!” She was already on her feet, ignoring her aching legs and back. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
“Welcome to the world of special ops, Ledford. You’ll be told what you need to know, when you need to know it. Just follow the map and keep going. You can do this.”
“FIVE MINUTES, LEDFORD. THE LZ is straight ahead. You can see it from here. Go!” Swanson barked in a drill sergeant voice.
The toes of Beth Ledford’s boots were at the edge of a sharp gully that bisected the path, and stones crumbled down a thirty-foot drop. She hesitated, knowing she could never get all the way down there and climb up the other side in time for the pickup. “What do I do, Gunny?” Her question was urgent.
“You will never know exactly what is on the ground from reading a map,” Swanson said carefully, now in a quieter, instructive tone. “If you hit an impassable obstacle like this, don’t come to a complete halt. Do a ninety- degree offset, left or right, for about one hundred meters, counting your steps for distance, and bypass the problem. Then turn back to your original line and keep going. Now, go!”
She spun to the right and made her way along the edge of the gully. After counting one hundred and seventy-eight steps, she found a narrow point that was only about eight feet wide. Backing away, she got a running start and jumped the gap, yelping when her blistered feet hit the hard dirt on the far side, and she lost her balance and tumbled into the brush, face-first.
The thudding sound of an incoming helicopter did not allow time to catch her breath. She jumped up, but instead of going back the way she had come, she decided to cut off some distance by angling up the hill, as if drawing the hypotenuse of a triangle. In the sky, to the east, she could see the white and orange helicopter coming on fast and shedding altitude.
Swanson was on her heels and did not correct her, because she was already realizing her mistake. A thick tangle of thorny growth blocked her path, and it only got thicker as she fought through it. She looked up and saw Arvis Taylor smiling down at her. He shook his head, and Beth knew that she was not going to make it.
The helicopter landed with the engine at full throttle, but the bird never stopped. Had Beth been there, she could have just flopped through the open hatch. She wasn’t, though, and Taylor’s orders were to make it a touch- and-go, never coming to a full halt. Just as Ledford fought her way free of the clinging thorns, he finished the touchdown less than a hundred feet away and was lifting off, unwilling to wait an instant longer than ordered, even for one of his closest friends.
Beth Ledford’s shoulders sagged in disappointment, and she sat down hard on the dirt. Unscrewing the canteen, she drank some water while she listened to Swanson on his radio, reporting failure. The blades of the bird overhead were beating retreat.
“Ferrybird One. Ferrybird One. This is Swanson, over.”
“Swanson, this is Ferrybird. Send your traffic.”
“Roger. Looks like our girl missed the pickup. Divert to LZ Two.”
“Roger that. Ferrybird out.”
She bristled at hearing him call her a girl and was about to say something when Kyle was in her face. Drill sergeant time again. “You’ve blown the LZ, Ledford. Now the enemy knows where you are, so you just added three kilometers to the day and are in escape and recovery time. Get off your ass and read your map. You’ve got ten minutes to cover three klicks to the alternate LZ. This time don’t go wandering off course.”
Beth pushed herself erect, checked the map, blew out puffed cheeks in determination, and set out for the listed grid coordinates of the new LZ. The blades of the departing helicopter were still loud in the air.
Swanson did not let up but stayed right in her ear, yelling. “Move out, Petty Officer. It pays to be a winner, Ledford. Because you screwed up, now we may have to walk back. I wanted to eat some Greek food in Q-Town tonight, but if you mess up getting to the alternate LZ, I will be stuck on this damn little hill with you walking around lost in the dark.”
A bright flash drew their attention, and the smoky white trail of a surface-to-air missile lanced upward from the far treeline and drove straight for the low-flying helicopter. There was the shaking clap of a loud explosion as the missile struck the brightly colored helicopter, blowing off the tail rotor section. The front of the bird hung momentarily motionless in the air, then was engulfed in a massive fireball as another explosion ruptured the fuel tanks. It crashed to the ground, burning.
“Oh my God!” Ledford screamed and started to run toward the crash site.
Swanson saw a glitter of sunlight flashing on glass, thought
“Let’s flank him,” Beth said. “Split up, circle around, and come in from the sides.” She was breathing hard, her mind still reeling from seeing the helicopter destroyed and then being shot at almost simultaneously. Her hands were raw from skidding through the gravel and dirt as she had broken her fall.
“Negative. This is no coincidence, Beth. You were supposed to be on that helicopter, and the shooter was