The next day, Olivia rationed the bottle of water, but when the sun hit its high point, there was no relief. She curled into a ball at the bottom of the pit, the earth providing a modicum of cool against the torturous sun. Her legs cramped and her lips chapped.
When the sun finally moved far enough west to provide a sliver of shade, Olivia sat and pressed her back against the cool wall, wrapping her arms around her knees to make herself as small as possible. Resting her head back, she closed her eyes and swallowed the sticky saliva in her mouth.
Seeing Logan gave her the strength to keep going. She hadn’t been abandoned. The hostages were not forsaken. Help was on its way.
Misery was not new to her, though her body wasn’t used to going without food and water. Worse, the desert sucked the fluids from her like a sieve. Even with the two bottles of water from Logan, it had been a day since she last peed. She’d be lucky to last one more day.
To stay sane, she worked through long stints of meditation, focusing on life, on her heartbeat, on the freedom of birds. She believed in her purpose. She would bring this operation down. This was why she’d joined ICE—to protect those who couldn’t protect themselves. To be strong for naïve young women whose only err was to trust in social media and look for love in the wrong place.
When all she could think about was water, she drained the dregs from the bottle, then dug a hole in the packed earth with the knife Logan had given her. She smashed it flat and buried it in a shallow grave. While she still had the strength, she used the thong to fasten the sheath to her inner thigh.
By the next morning, she was in bad shape, rabid thirst trumping every other misery. When finally the grill screeched open, Olivia shaded her eyes with a trembling hand.
“Out,” hollered Jadaa as someone slid a ladder down the wall.
Blinking back the cobwebs, Olivia tried to swallow, but her throat felt lined with sand. It took every ounce of strength she could muster to pull herself to her feet. Legs cramped by two days in a pit thirty inches in diameter nearly gave way under her weight.
“Water,” she said, grasping a rung and starting her assent.
The woman produced a cup. “Come.”
The promise of a drink infused Olivia with enough strength to climb out. Steadying herself on the ladder, she reached for the cup. It wasn’t water, but tasted like raspberry cordial. Olivia didn’t care. It was wet and sweet, and streams of liquid drained from the corners of her mouth as she guzzled.
Two guards grabbed her under the arms and dragged her in Jadaa’s wake. The old woman didn’t lead them back to the harem barracks, but veered off to the enormous house in the northeast corner of the compound. Olivia’s head swam, lucid enough to realize she was suffering from heat stress. A bit of rest, a meal, a ton of hydration and she’d be fighting fit again.
But they were hauling her off in the wrong direction. The people she was sent to protect were housed on the other side of the compound. “Where are you taking me?”
“You must regain your strength.” Jadaa held the door to a blast of cool air.
Olivia nearly melted. Perhaps a few hours recuperating in air conditioning was what she needed. After walking through a corridor, Jadaa unlocked a door and gestured inside. “Rest. Eat.”
The guards released her arms but before she blindly went inside, she took a long look. If she wasn’t in the middle of hell she might have thought it to be a cheap hotel room. A bed, food on a table. There was even a television. But her eye homed in on the pitcher of ice water.
As soon as Olivia stepped inside, the door closed, leaving her alone. She staggered to the table and guzzled the ice water without bothering to pour it into a glass. Catching her breath, she wiped her mouth with the back of her arm. Before sitting, she moved to the window and pulled the drape aside.
Barred windows. She should have guessed.
Exhausted from her jaunt across the compound, she fell into the chair and regarded the food. Hummus, pita, thin-sliced lamb shawarma—a feast compared to what she’d been eating of late. Olivia ripped off a piece of pita and slathered it with hummus. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head while her taste buds exploded.
With a rush of ravenous cravings, she ate and drank like she’d been starved for a month. Food dribbled down her chin and she didn’t stop to wipe it off, she just shoveled more into her mouth. She ate so fast the food was gone before her stomach felt full. And when she finished, she stared at the empty plate, wishing for a slice of plum tart or a piece of chocolate. Five minutes later, she could barely move for the bloating. Her eyelids grew heavy and it only took a few steps to make it to the bed and drop face first where she promptly fell into a comatose sleep.
***
The ICE team of twenty highly trained operatives had parachuted into Logan’s camp in the dead of night. Logan recognized several with Stephan from Germany in the lead. He needed all the help he could get and it was good to see reinforcements arrive. Garth still couldn’t believe there were fifty-three girls to rescue. And with the news of the forthcoming battle confirmed by the US infantry, NATO assets were spread even thinner. Fifty-three meant more maneuvering in the Mediterranean. More copters, more eyes in the air, more public scrutiny if anything went wrong.
And nothing could go wrong.
As Olivia had warned, fighting had broken out near Aleppo with a barrage from ISIS IEDs. Satellites were diverted, but Garth pulled strings to ensure one stayed on the compound. It was a good thing, because she’d also been right about troops moving in. ICE had reported three trucks entering the compound. Who knew if an entire convoy of terrorists would reach their target before his op went down?
To cover his ass, Logan had insisted on more Apache air support. Mission Cat House was coming to a head, and there was no way Rodgers would be defeated. Too many innocent lives were on the line, especially Olivia Hamilton’s.
Logan stood at the table he’d been using as a command post. The troops had all filed inside, ready for his briefing.
He pointed to the red dot on the miniature he’d constructed of the compound. “Mike’s team is tasked to neutralize all enemy forces in the compound—you’ll be assisted by Apache firepower, but your job is to keep those bastards away from the hostages. My team’s objective is to secure the harem—for want of a better word. There’s no quarter given here. Each of you must shoot any perp who bars us from getting the hostages out.” He looked up. “Anyone got a problem with that?”
“No, sir,” everyone replied in unison, but Logan still made eye contact with each asset.
Once assured they were all one hundred percent on board, he pointed to the block of wood that posed as the girl’s bunkhouse. “The girls are here. Their best chance of survival is if we go in stealth. At night.” He pointed to the guard shack at the front. “We’ll start here. They man the gate with two guards twenty-four-seven.”
“What about taking them out with a sniper rifle?” asked Stephan.
Logan looked to Mike. The Scot scratched his mop of red hair. “I’m all for it if there’s a line of sight to both guards, otherwise one of them will sound an alarm before we have boots in the compound.”
“Agreed,” Mike said. “Even in daylight the chances of taking them both out bam, bam is slim to none.”
Logan continued. “Chinooks will land in the center of the compound here—where it’s not far for the hostages to run, and we’ll be less likely to lose someone to enemy fire. If we get separated, deliver the girls to the pickup area. We don’t leave until every hostage is safely aboard a copter. That clear?”
“Yes, sir,” everyone said for the second time.
“Are we all flying out, sir?” asked an ex-Ranger. “Once word gets out we’re staging an attack this close to Aleppo, rabs will be on us like flies to honey—not just ISIS either.”
“We will. We have enough helos coming in to ferry everyone out. Malik and Alif will stay with the truck and head directly west for Antakya in Turkey. If anyone goes missing, that’s where we’ll be looking for you. Contact ICE once you reach the border. Garth will give you instructions from there.”
“Isn’t the Turkish border closed?” asked Stephan.
“Not to us. They’re expecting the truck. They have a couple helos on standby to see to their safe passage as well.”
“What are we missing?” asked Mike.
Logan raked his fingers through his hair and looked at the miniature. Nothing ever went perfectly on a mission as complex as this, but there was one big unknown. “Olivia said that there’s not much hope for the hostages once al-Umari’s heroes arrive at the compound. Word came over the wire today that the fighting’s trickling off. We don’t have much time.” He eyed the twenty men who would be his backup. “Each and every one of you is trained to think fast. This is a rescue mission. We go in and we get out. Don’t try to be a hero. If a perp gets in your way, shoot him. If he runs and you don’t have a shot, do not pursue. The hostages are your first priority. Let’s take them home before they lose their lives to some radical jihadist thinking he’s going to be rewarded with heaven on earth.”
Mike shook his head. “Freaks.”
Logan looked at his watch, then held his wrist aloft. “Everyone have one of these?”
“Yes, sir.”
“We file into the back of the truck at sundown, 19:30.”