Page 51 of Battle Mountain

After introductions andextra-firm handshakes, Russ Anthony took his place behind the desk and motioned for Geronimo and Nate to sit. They did. Jolene perched on the arm of a chair next to the desk and leaned forward, as if she didn’t want to miss a single word that was spoken.

“Let’s get right down to business,” Russ said as he settled in andleaned back in his chair. “I don’t like to beat around the bush, especially where our daughter is concerned.”

Russ was older than Jolene by at least a decade. He had dark brown eyes, a silver crew cut, and a square jaw. He wore a sweater over a button-down shirt, jeans, and cowboy boots. His manner said ex-military, Nate thought.

That presumption was confirmed when Nate studied the photos and plaques on the walls surrounding Russ Anthony. Half of them were of Anthony with groups of fellow soldiers in tropical, desert, and arctic conditions. The other half of the photos were of a dark-eyed younger female in a contemporary dress uniform as well as military fatigues. She smiled brightly in one surrounded by fellow Marines posing in front of a bunker built with sandbags. Her no-nonsense countenance in most of the shots must have come from her father, Nate thought.

“Let’s talk about your daughter,” Geronimo said. “And then we’ll let you know why we’re here and how we might be able to help each other.”

Russ’s eyes got large and he said, “Didn’t Cheryl brief you before you left Cheyenne?”

“Not really,” Geronimo said, “except to say that you might be able to help us locate a man named Axel Soledad.”

Jolene physically recoiled at the mention of his name, Nate noted.

“If you find Allison,” Russ said, “you’ll likely find Soledad. As far as we know, she’s with him.”

“Where are they?” Nate asked the couple.

“We’ll get to that,” Russ said with a wave of his open hand.“First let me tell you how Allison got in this situation and why it’s important to us that you bring her back.”

Nate winced, and he assumed Geronimo did so as well. “Bringing her back” was a complication neither man had anticipated when they arrived.

“Allison is our only daughter,” Jolene added.

“That’s her in those photos behind me,” Russ said without turning his head. “She followed me into the U.S. Marine Corps. We couldn’t be prouder of her, even though I have my issues with the Corps these days, and especially what our so-called ‘leaders’ are trying to do to it.”

When Anthony said the word “leaders,” he did air quotes around it.

“Not now, Russ,” Jolene said, cautioning him. Then to Geronimo and Nate: “When Russ gets going on what he thinks is happening to his beloved Marines, he really gets wound up. I don’t think we have the time right now.”

Geronimo nodded his head in agreement.

“Anyway,” Anthony said, “we’re a family of Marines. Four generations of ’em. Not former Marines—there is no such thing. Once a Marine, always a Marine.”

“Gotcha,” Geronimo said. “We understand.”

“Are you two special operators?” Anthony asked.

“Affirmative.”

“I could tell by the way you come across,” Anthony said. “Only special ops guys would be comfortable coming across as raggedy-assed as you two. Marines have a little more…decorum.”

“Please get on with it,” Jolene pleaded to her husband. Shecould tell that Geronimo reacted negatively to his comments about decorum. Nate, on the other hand, didn’t react at all.

“Allison was—is—a star,” Anthony said. “She always has been. She was a three-letter athlete in high school and she aced basic training even before they dumbed down the physical requirements to add more women. She was assigned to a unique unit called Sniper Team Reaper 2. She grew up with firearms, and she’s a deadly shot. She never gets flustered.”

Anthony went on to describe Allison’s deployment to Afghanistan in the waning months of the U.S. presence there, and that her job was to oversee units of Marines and to take out any threats to them.

“Her closest friend in the Corps was a female soldier named Brittany Newsome, who happened to be from Laramie, just down the road,” Anthony said. “They entered basic together, and those two were like this,” he said, crossing the first two fingers of his right hand. “Lance Corporal Brittany Newsome. She was a beauty both inside and out, just like our Allison. Both of them were in Kabul during the debacle of our sudden withdrawal from Afghanistan.

“Then we come to August 26, 2021,” Anthony intoned. “Abbey Gate at the Kabul Airport.”

The dramatic way he said it made Nate think the man had told the same story over and over.

Anthony said, “Allison was in a tower overlooking the chaos below as hundreds of Afghans were rushing the entrance gate, trying to get to the American aircraft landing at the airport to evacuate our people, as well as the few privileged Afghan nationals who had received permission from us to leave. It was a nightmareof bodies—entire families—pleading with Marines guarding the gate to let them through. You’ve seen the photos, I’m sure. Afghan mothers handing their babies to twenty-one-year-old Marines, people trampling old men and women underfoot—it was a clusterfuck, a total disaster.”

“It made me sick,” Geronimo said. “It made me ashamed.”

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