A Gift For You:
“War brought me in. Will love push me out?.”
It’s like breathing. I don’t even need to try.
I was born to be a Navy Seal.
I knew it was my calling and wasted no time in joining up.
My training. My missions. My team.
I love every bit of it.
But I never knew I would ever want this...
A calm, quiet day. Away from it all, including my brothers.
Just to be with her. Bree.
The thought of her name makes my knees weak.
How could someone have so much power over me?
The navy didn’t prepare me for this.
And I never thought making a choice could be so hard.
What do you do when love is standing between you and the country you vowed to protect?
War brought me in. Will love push me out?
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When Mayhem Cries
Alex Howell
Contents
Prologue
1. On the Trail but Off the Reservation
2. The Lonely Outpost
3. Breaking through the Pain of the Past
4. Recovering the Initiative
5. Clara Walker’s Day Off
6. Getting Ready for Business
7. Sorting Through the Chaos
8. Heading Home
9. The Long Arm of Amigos dos Amigos
10. The Morning Pep Talk
11. Luca Looking for His Last Payday
12. Is it All Just a Coincidence?
13. The Meeting of the Minds
14. Finding Leads and Taking Names
15. Learning to Hurry Up and Wait
16. On the Inside
17. At the Festival
18. Desperate Times and Desperate Measures
19. Who Pulled the Fire Alarm?
20. Back to the Old Drawing Board
21. Love Speaks Louder than Words
22. Feeling the Verne
Epilogue
Read the Next Book of the Series:
1. Prologue Crisis Meltdown
Read the Next Book of the Series:
Don’t Forget About Your Gift
Prologue
Smoke Signals
Mason Walker was busy hacking his way through the wilderness of a Brazilian jungle when Raina Martin questioned him, “Hey Mason, didn’t Luke say that these narcos are living among the native tribes of the region.”
The “narcos” that Raina was referring to were the infamous Brazilian narcotics traffickers known as “Amigos dos Amigos”. The group is composed primarily of Portuguese speaking Brazilians but the name is Spanish for “Friends of Friends”.
But in reality, these clowns were really friends to no one. Their main MO consisted of drug running, extortion, racketeering, and human trafficking—and not necessarily in that order. Wherever Amigos dos Amigos went they left shattered communities in their wake, and now they seemed poised to expand out into the previously untouched Amazonian wilderness itself.
Some of the reaches of the Amazon are so remote that there are tribal groups of people who are said to have never come into contact with the outside world. These tribes have lived along the Amazon for centuries surviving on a simple hunter gatherer existence. Life was hard but it was at least their own.
In the past their biggest threat had been from loggers cutting down their ancestral rain forests, but now they faced a whole new menace in the form of organized crime; ready and willing to spread its insidious tentacles even into the depths of the pristine jungles of the Amazon. The indigenous peoples who had lived in harmony with nature were now themselves being uprooted, cut down, and despoiled. Their men being compelled to strap bags of cocaine to their backs as human mules of the drug cartels and their women induced to sell their bodies.
Recalling fully the briefing that Luke Simon, their mission leader had given them, Mason grunted, “Yeah—Amigos dos Amigos. The Amazon is like the final frontier for these bozos. And these perps seem hellbent on going where no other low life has gone before—introducing drug addiction and prostitution to the rain forest. Some all-around real classy guys.”
Raina Martin nodded while simultaneously swatting away a mosquito, “Uh-huh. I’ve got a feeling that there is probably some pretty major interplay between the native chiefs and these narcos as well—in fact I believe that some of the chiefs might be narcos.”
Mason was a bit taken aback by this one. A few natives getting conned into drugs or sucked into sex trafficking by these monsters was one thing, but could the chiefs really be in cahoots with dealers? The thought made Mason wonder out loud, “Really? Do you think so?”
Raina hacking her way through a branch with a machete nodded, “Yeah, I really do.” Tossing a hewn limb out of her way she then stumbled into a clearing, and remarked, “There have been recent reports of outsiders traveling back and forth between the villages and on top of that local chiefs have had a sudden influx of resources that they never had before.”
It was just then that Raina’s eye caught something that seemed to be reflecting the light of the sun on the ground. It looked like a small mirror, or piece of metal, but she wasn’t sure. She picked it up and turning it over in her hand she realized, “What? It’s some kind of tablet.”
As she examined the device, she was surprised to find that it was turned on. Placing the screen under the shade of a nearby tree she muttered, “Huh—it’s solar powered.”
She then proceeded to scroll through some pictures saved on the device and gasped, “There are pics of natives—tribal members on this tablet!” Mason turning toward her asked, “What do you mean?”
Raina then handed him the tablet and told him, “Take a look for yourself.”
Taking the tablet in his hands Mason scrolled through the pictures, and was amazed. It was indeed full of scenes of tribal life in the Amazons as if it was owned by one of the tribal groups themselves. He saw photos of natives going up the river on canoes, of sitting around their campfire and of people just being silly—basically taking selfies all throughout the untamed wilderness of the Amazon.
For a group of natives who shunned technology and all the trappings of the outside world, it was rather stunning to think that some of them were now running around with solar powered tablets. The question was—who gave it to them?
Mathew Benton who had been keeping a close
