Chapter 12

Asher completely destroyed the mirror before he calmed himself down enough to realize he had to stop. He leaned into the sink, hyperventilating. Sweat dripped off of him again and his entire body shook. That should have been his last mission. The doctors in Germany had tried to send him home after that. He had almost left until he found out another one of his men needed him. He was trying to make up for Freddie. Freddie shouldn’t have died.

He took several deep breaths until he got his breathing back under control and then he grabbed a towel from underneath the sink. He ran cold water over his hand, watching as the blood mixed with the water and swirled down the drain. He held it there as if in a trance until the water finally began to run clear. Then, he took the towel and wrapped it around his hand. He left the mess in the bathroom for later and headed back across the small living room and into the kitchen. He poured water into the coffee machine and added the coffee grounds. While it dripped into the pot he rested his head forward on the cupboard. He tried to still the thoughts in his head, but it was pointless. They invaded his brain when they wanted to and not even the meds he took could stop them. He poured a cup of coffee and took it out on the front porch. As he sat there and looked at all of the beauty around him, his mind went back to that ugly place.

Seventeen years. He had given seventeen years of his life to the United States Government, Special Ops in the Army. It had been his way of escaping his life. After he had given his mother that last dose of morphine and after he had gotten his best friend drunk, effectively causing the accident that killed him, after he had looked into Mia’s beautiful, accusing eyes, he had know it had been his only choice. The fact was he might have been looking to do something to make up for all of the mistakes he had made in his past. It may have been that he had thought he could make up for the deaths he caused by preventing others or, it may have even be that he was suicidal. He didn’t know any longer and he didn’t care. He had lived; because he was good at what he did, he was the best. He was a sniper. A killer. It was the one thing he was good at. Death. He sucked in a deep breath as his mind drifted off to the past once again.

He was released from the hospital four days after the incident on the roof with the doctor’s recommendation that he be discharged home. He was considering it, right up until he made it back to Iraq and the Sergeant First Class had told him where his team was. They had pulled out of Iraq, but then they had been sent on one last mission to the mountains of Afghanistan in the Ghanzi Province. It was early fall when Asher had arrived and rendezvoused back with his team.

The mission had been to go into the mountains and bring out the last man standing from another team who had gone up to intercept supplies from the infidels. They had been attacked by the Taliban before they had even made it to their rendezvous point and the entire team had been wiped out except for one man. He had been able to maintain radio contact up until two days ago as Asher’s team searched for him but for the past two days there had been nothing but silence. Asher’s first two days there he had reassumed command of his team. Mack was gone and so was Freddie. They were down to six. Six men who had done over twenty tours between them. Six men who were being told that they had one more day to find the lost soldier and bring him home or the operation would be shut down and he would be left on the side of a goddamned mountain in the middle of hell alone. Asher and his men were determined not to let that happen.

Perched high up on a snowy ridge-line surrounded by scenery that would have been fitting on the front of a Christmas card but tonight none of them had the capacity to find the beauty in it. It was just hovering around twenty degrees Fahrenheit and they knew if they didn’t find the soldier they were looking for soon all hope would be lost.

Night operations were a Special Ops specialty. The conditions didn’t matter. The location was irrelevant. Ranger battalions were always combat ready. They were mentally and physically the ‘toughest’ of the lot. They were prepared to fight the war on terrorism at any cost, in any place and in any conditions. The Regiment is a volunteer force, but only those who can pass an intensive screening process and even more intensive combat-focused training are selected. Unfortunately for these men who craved action so badly, they became the elite. The watching and waiting was a huge chunk of their job. It was excruciating at times, but like the rest of it they handled it like the professionals they were.

It was just after two a.m. and Asher was about to call it a night and order his men to shelter for a few hours until they set back out. He had picked up his radio just as it crackled to life. “Staff Sergeant…” Crackle… “We have hostiles at our six o’clock…one point five miles out…” Crackle…static…Gun fire…the radio went dead. Asher was already on his feet, weapon in hand. The two men with him did the same. No questions were asked as they followed him over the rocky outcropping to the other side of the hill, towards where the other three of his men had been posted.

They were about half a mile out when they heard the gunfire. Rapid pop-pop-pop. Just before they got to the top of the hill the deafening sound of an approaching jet drowned out everything else. Jesus! What the fuck are they doing here? It was one of their own, Asher could tell by the sound of it. He knew what was about to happen before it happened. He yelled at his men to take cover, but he kept running. He had to make sure his other men were okay.

He shuddered hard, sloshing the hot coffee over the side of the cup and onto the hand he hadn’t beat up earlier. “Fuck!” He threw the mug over the porch railing and watched as it smashed into a million pieces against the cottonwood tree in his front yard. This shit had to stop. He was teetering on the edge of losing his mind. He had to make some changes.

That time when he woke up in the hospital, they didn’t give him a choice. He was being honourably discharged. He would leave with a Purple Heart and a Distinguished Service Cross; two of the highest honours the military bestowed. He tried to fight it. He had no idea what he was going to do when he left the Army. It had been his life for half his life. The life he had known before was so far in the past and he had been so young and so innocent. At least up until he had killed his mother. He couldn’t go back there, but he couldn’t think of any other options. After that night on the mountain he had would up with metal in his hip. He had ribs that had been shattered and replaced with titanium. His body was riddled with scars but the biggest concern the doctor’s and his commanders had, were the scars that his mind would never be able to get rid of.

Asher had come down off that mountain carrying the only two living members of his team and the hypothermic man they had been looking for, back to safety. When they were picked up by the medical transport helicopter the medics couldn’t believe he was still on his feet, much less that he had carried others to safety. That part was a blur to him. He remembered refusing to leave until his men were all out, even the dead ones. By the time Asher was discharged from the service, five of his eight man team who he had fought with for four years were dead. He had watched them all die. He had over a hundred confirmed sniper kills and that didn’t count the unconfirmed ones. He was a killing machine and although that was never a title he had been proud of or comfortable with…it was all he knew. When he had put his boots back on the ground of American soil, he had felt instantly uneasy. He felt like he was in a foreign land and he didn’t know where to go or what to do.

He had called Dean. Dean had been the last person he spoke to in Haddenfield before he left. Actually, Dean had been the one that helped him get enough money together to leave town after his mother and Travis’s funerals. Dean was surprised and happy to hear from him. They had met in a restaurant in a place in South Dakota where Dean was attending a real estate conference. Dean was thrilled to see him and urged him to go home. Home was as foreign to Asher as not being in the army was. Instead, he convinced Dean to hook him up with one of his colleagues who sells real estate in South Dakota. He had spent several months looking for the perfect place before he found it.

The little farm sat on half an acre. It was pretty much self-contained so that Asher’s trips into town wouldn’t have to be frequent. His neighbours lived miles away and he could have the solace he craved. For the past four years, he had managed to keep it that way. He loved the peace and quiet. He loved the fact that there were no screams other than his own. There were no gunshots and on the rare occasion that he had to go into town, there were very few people he had to interact with. Most important of all, there was no one here he cared about. There was no one here to watch die.