Marcus cursed the shaking of his hand as he pressed in Cade’s number on the burner phone he was using. Cade had given them each one before they’d split up and he’d gone to the airport to meet Bobbie. It was a safety precaution, so that no one would be able to track them while they were in Colombia. The shaking wasn’t due to fear. He knew that Cade wouldn’t blame him for what he had to tell him, even though he was blaming himself. The shaking hand was due to almost 30 hours without sleep, an adrenaline rush like he hadn’t felt since leaving the SEALs, and anxiety about what might be happening in the next room as he made the call.
“This is Cade.”
“Cade, it’s Marcus.”
“What’s wrong?” They had specific call times to check in and if they were busy, one of them was supposed to send Cade a quick text—just an emoji to let him know they were okay. This wasn’t one of those times, so Cade knew something wasn’t right.
“The DEA had an informant that was supposed to be in on a meeting with some of Dominguez’s men regarding some property that Dominguez wanted. We were listening in when they got there…it was a set-up. They executed both men. As soon as the shooting began, the DEA agents on the scene moved in and we were on the move. We went through a series of tunnels and came out above ground and got into an unmarked van. We didn’t believe we’d get there in time to get Dominguez, but it was a lead. But we didn’t even make it there. The van was wired and Nate was the one that pulled on the door that set it off.”
“Jesus, was anyone else hurt?”
“Not in the blast, not seriously. Pete was thrown across the street and Agent Simms was knocked unconscious but he seemed fine when I saw him in the ER downstairs. Stout and Anderson weren’t injured…it’s just Nate. He was burned and he lost a lot of blood before we got him to the hospital…” Marcus’s voice cracked and that made him angry. He hated showing his emotions, but this situation was different than most.
“Damn is he…?” Marcus knew Cade most of his life. He’d never known him to be speechless.
“He’s alive, but that’s all we know. He was in bad shape and they were doing CPR on him when they made us leave…”
“Shit. Have you told Angel?”
“No, I called you first. I didn’t know what to tell her. You know she’ll want to see him, but I can’t tell her where we are.”
“I’ll handle it. I’ll call her. Marcus…is he going to make it?”
“I don’t know, boss.” Marcus’s voice cracked again. “I’m sorry. I don’t know. Dominguez slaughtered the men at the warehouse. There are two civilians and six DEA agents presumed dead.”
“Maybe Bunker had it right all along,” Cade said almost in a growl. Before Marcus hung up, Cade told him he was on his way. Marcus wasn’t surprised. He knew that he would come. Marcus tried to tell him to stay and do what he had to there, but he was secretly relieved. As capable as he felt most of the time and as capable as he knew the rest of the team was, Cade was their rock and the glue that held them together when things fell apart. Things hadn’t been as bad as they were now, ever. Marcus couldn’t imagine going forward after losing one of them. These men were not just a team, they were family. They were brothers.
He looked around the small room where the rest of his team sat. The hospital was old and small and Marcus was afraid that they didn’t have the right doctors and nurses to treat Nate. He was afraid they weren’t trained well enough to save him.
“What did Cade say?” Grant asked him, his voice hoarse and his normally perfect hair tousled.
“He’s coming,” Billy said. Those were the first words Billy had spoken since they got to the hospital. They were all close, but Nate and Billy had always had a strong bond. Billy also had a hair-trigger temper and when he was angry, he sometimes didn’t use his best judgment. If Nate didn’t make it, Billy wouldn’t leave Colombia until he was sure whoever was responsible for what happened to him was in jail…or dead.
“Yeah, he’s on his way,” Marcus said.
“This was him,” Billy said in a growl. “Dominguez.”
“We’re still not sure what happened,” Marcus said. “But yeah, you’re probably right.”
“I’m going to kill that son of a bitch.”
“Let’s just all take a breath, be here for Nate and wait for Cade.”
“Meanwhile this bastard disappears again. He was at that warehouse. He’s in the city. We should be out looking for him instead of sitting here where we can’t do a damned thing.”
“Dominguez has had plenty of time to disappear again by now. The DEA is on it. There’s more we can do here…we need to be here for Nate.” Marcus repeated. “When Cade gets here…”
Billy didn’t wait for him to finish. He jumped out of his chair and punched the wall behind him. The plaster cracked and Billy’s fist went through the wall. Marcus and Grant stayed where they were and Billy stood there facing the wall, taking heaving breaths for a long time. They let him calm himself down and when he did, he turned back toward them.
“I’m sorry. I just don’t fucking know what to do. He’s my best friend. I’m going to be the best man at his wedding. How can we look at Angel and…how can we break her heart like this?”
“Hey,” Grant said. “You’re getting ahead of yourself here. He’s alive. He’s strong. He could walk out of here tomorrow.”
“And he could not,” Billy shot back. “Look at this place. Does it instill confidence in you?”
Grant actually looked around and then he said, “I’ve seen worse places than this and I’ve watched doctors and nurses perform miracles in them. Marcus and I are as frustrated as you are, Billy. We love Nate and Angel too. Angel is Rosa’s best friend. But all any of us can do right this minute is pray.”
Billy was rubbing his swollen knuckles. Grant went over and pushed open the old wooden door with the painted, frosted glass in it and said, “Excuse me? Can we have an ice pack?” He sighed then and said, “Ice pack? Shit. Anyone know how to say ice pack in Spanish?”
“Paquete de hielo,” Marcus said quietly. Grant repeated it to whomever he was talking to outside the door. A minute passed before he came back into the room and handed the small redi-pak to Billy. “We should debrief before Cade gets here.”
“It would be nice if one of the DEA or Counter-Narcotics agents were here,” Billy said. “None of them even seemed shocked by this.”
“They’re not here because they have their own injured and dead to deal with and they’re not surprised because they’ve been chasing Dominguez for a long time,” Grant told him. “This isn’t the first time something like this has happened.”
Billy dropped down into his chair and leaned forward, resting his head in his hands. “Okay. Let’s debrief,” he finally said.
Marcus turned the recorder on his phone on and started talking. The way their team debriefed was to tell the story from the beginning, as if someone in the room hadn’t been there for the event. As Marcus went on with the story, the other two men would offer their input until they all agreed on exactly what happened. It was amazing sometimes how the human brain and senses could perceive things so differently than they actually were when it was under stress or pressure.
“We landed in Colombia at 0704 hundred hours. There were six of us,” he named off the team, first and last names and titles. “We met with a six-man team of Colombian soldiers and were led through the jungle for five miles. We arrived at a wooden bunker in the jungle, secured by two barbed wire fences at 0825. There, we met with the DEA team we were to be working with.” He named each of those four men and then relayed what had happened while they were there, what they’d been told, and what they heard over the wire. He talked about the shooting at the warehouse and the DEA going in and walking into a slaughter.
“We could hear all the commotion over their radios and more than one of them confirmed that Dominguez was present as we were taken down a hatch in a small room of the bunker and led through a maze of tunnels. We emerged from one of the tunnels at 0950 where a white, unmarked Dodge van was waiting. Agent Simms instructed us to get in the back while he headed for the driver’s side. Nate Colvin was the first of us in line out of the tunnel. He grabbed the handle to the back end of the van and pulled on it. As soon as he did, there was a loud and powerful explosion. We were all thrown off our feet. I was on my back in the dirt when I saw Nate, still holding the door of the van, now detached, fly over my head. His uniform was on fire. I got to my feet and when I reached him, Grant and Billy were already there, throwing dirt on the fire, which was almost extinguished at that time. While we were doing that, Agent Simms or Stout, I’m not sure which one, called for emergency medical services. I assessed Nate’s injuries while we waited. His right hand was severely burned and his uniform was melted to him in places. He had about a three-inch gash in the back of his head that was bleeding profusely, and he was unresponsive. He was still breathing at that time and he had a pulse, however, as they put him into the ambulance and began CPR. They wouldn’t allow us to ride with him, so we haven’t seen him or gotten an update on him since.” He looked at Grant and Billy and asked, “Anything either of you would like to add?”
“No. It sounds right,” Grant said.
“Yeah,” Billy said in a hoarse voice. “That’s what I saw too.”
Marcus turned off the recorder and they were all silent for a moment before the door swung open and a man in a pair of blue scrubs, a blue net over his hair, and blue covers on his shoes, came in. He was carrying what looked like a medical chart and had a mask dangling around his neck. His dark eyes scanned the room, briefly taking in the hole in the wall and Billy’s knuckles before he said, “You’re with Mr. Colvin?”
“Yes,” Marcus said, already on his feet. “We’re his team and his friends.”
“Does he have family here?”
“No. Not in Colombia. Doctor, please, we are his family.”
The doctor cleared his throat, hesitated for several minutes, and said, “Anyone with type O or AB positive blood?”
“I have O,” Billy said, taking a step forward.
“Come with me,” the doctor said, “your friend needs you.”
Marcus watched them leave the room before dropping back down into the chair. He felt like he was going to be sick and wished they had listened to Nate’s objections while he was still safe in Nevada. He closed his eyes and did the only thing he could do…he started to pray.