Page 59 of Stand Fast

“Yeah, seems like it,” Freeman murmured, angling his head as he studied the seam around the door. After taking a good look, he withdrew his sidearm and looked back at the others. “Nothing on the outside.”

Hamilton nodded. “You take point. Khan, Colebrook and Prentiss will back you up. The rest of us will cover you from out here.”

Colebrook and Prentiss hopped down into the five-foot deep pit and took up their positions, rifles pointed at the door as Freeman reached for the handle. In the silence the metallic squeak of the handle turning seemed loud.

Zaid stood to the left of the door, weight balanced on the balls of his feet, sighting down the barrel of his weapon. Freeman was at his most vulnerable right now, backlit by the early dawn light filtering through the dwelling’s open door.

Freeman eased the door open a few inches, his body carefully angled to the side to minimize damage from a possible IED and make himself as small a target as possible should anyone be waiting to shoot from inside. When nothing happened, he eased it open farther with his boot. Zaid peered into the darkness ahead of him with the tac light on the end of his weapon illuminating what appeared to be a tunnel about four feet high and three feet wide.

Moving quietly, Zaid stepped over to Freeman and placed a hand on his teammate’s shoulder while Colebrook and Prentiss moved in behind him. A solid hand landed on Zaid’s shoulder and squeezed, and Zaid did the same to Freeman’s, alerting their point man that everyone was in position and ready to go.

Freeman paused for another moment, then stepped through the doorway. Zaid followed, getting his first good look inside. It appeared as though the tunnel walls had been hacked out by hand with shovels and pickaxes, rather than blasted. More labor intensive, but a hell of a lot quieter, and it made sense that whoever had built it would want to keep as low a noise profile as possible.

It stretched about twenty yards in front of them before curving to the right. Freeman stopped a few yards from it and hugged the wall.

The distant scrambling of feet echoed ahead of them, out of sight. Men, trying to escape.

Zaid would bet they’d been guarding something. Or someone.

His pulse rate kicked up as he followed Freeman around the bend in the tunnel, while Hamilton quietly alerted the SEALs over the radio to apprise them of the situation. Could The Jackal be waiting up ahead?

“Copy that. Stay in your location. We’ll take over from there,” the SEAL said.

“Roger,” Hamilton replied.

Freeman stopped abruptly and Zaid looked past him to zero in on what lay ahead of them. A wave of surprise burst over him. Ahead of them in what appeared to be a surprisingly large room carved out of the rock, was the mother lode.

“Holy hell,” Zaid muttered, stepping closer.

Bricks of what had to be hashish sat wrapped in black plastic and stacked floor to ceiling. A few million dollars’ worth, at least. There was also a big pile of weapons, including a few RPGs.

“Someone’s gonna be pissed that this didn’t make it across the border,” Colebrook said from behind him.

“Makes me feel all warm inside just to imagine it,” Zaid said.

He couldn’t wait for Jaliya to find out. Her confidence had been badly shaken by the SF team op the other night. If anything could boost it, this would.

The SEALs joined them several minutes later, glanced at the hidden cache and then carried on down the tunnel to try and capture their prey. Zaid and his teammates took a closer look at what the smugglers had left behind, then catalogued everything before hauling it all out of the tunnel.

When the area was secure an hour later and everyone was accounted for, the mood got even more festive when the SEALs returned with prisoners—one of them on their high value list.

Standing before the pile of dope and weapons, Hamilton grinned at Zaid and held out the sat phone. “You do the honors and call it in. I got a few things to wrap up here anyway.”

Zaid took it with a smile and immediately dialed Jaliya’s cell number. As far as he knew she wasn’t scheduled to be overseeing this op directly, and she deserved to be contacted first.

“Rabani,” she answered.

“Hey, it’s me.”

A startled pause followed. “Zaid?”

God, he loved the sound of her voice. Could still remember the taste of her on his tongue and the bite of her nails in his scalp as he made her come. He couldn’t wait to see her again. “Yeah.”

“Where are you?”

“At the target village.”

“What are you doing, calling me?” She sounded flustered.

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