Page 12 of Soul on Fire
She shook her head, and he kept swiping, moving past columns of armed men, technicals—trucks with machine guns mounted in their beds, the favorite vehicles of insurgencies and light armies around the world—and men wrapped in checked scarfs, their faces barely visible.
“Wait!” She grabbed his wrist. “Go back. There, there!” She squeezed his arm, grabbed his wrist again. “That’s him! That’s the man who made me open the bucket! He is the leader’s man. Who he trusts the most.”
Peter spun the camera and took him in. He was African, slender and tall, wearing sunglasses and faded olive fatigues stolen from an African military supply convoy. His face was chiseled from obsidian, carved with high cheekbones and a jutting jaw. “Do you know his name?”
She still held his wrist. He could feel the heat of her through the latex layers and over the tape securing the gloves to his plastic gown. Her hands were wet, sweat-soaked. She was practically leaning on him, hauling herself up to look at his camera.
Antoinette’s skin was furnace-hot. Her breath fogged his goggles. He wiped them with his gloved hands. They were sticky and wet. “His name,” she said, hatred poisoning her voice, “is Majambu. I saw that face often.” She clutched his arm and leaned close to his masked face and made him understand.
Peter’s jaw moved behind his mask, not making a sound. “I’m sorry,” he breathed. His hand rose, fingers grazing across her cheekbone—
“What are you doing?” Dr. Ngondu roared. A hand landed on Peter’s shoulder and ripped him backward, sent him sprawling to the dirt. “You took off your gloves!”
“I had to—”
“Itoldyou! Younevertake your gear off! Do you want to be infected?”
“No, I—”
Dr. Ngondu grabbed his wrist and yanked. The tape holding his gloves down was frayed and no longer sealed to his gown.
“This is why you never take off the gloves,” Dr. Ngondu hissed. “The heat and the sweat make the tape loose. It’s only good for an hour.”
Peter’s breath shuddered. His gaze darted to Antoinette and back to Dr. Ngondu.
“Get out! We must take you to decon right away!” Dr. Ngondu dragged him from the tent, holding his hand up like it was poisoned.
“I had to talk to her. I had to show her something,” Peter stuttered. He nearly tripped behind Dr. Ngondu.
“Was it worth your life? If you have a break, any break in your seal, you will be infected.”
Again, his eyes met Antoinette’s as he ducked out of the tent. “Yes. It was.”
* * *
Chapter Six
USSKearsarge
Indian Ocean off the east coast of Africa
“Sir?”Elliot made his way through the Combat Direction Center to Rear Admiral Sam Kline’s side. Kline stood with his arms folded, staring over the backs of a dozen computer stations stacked in a downward sloping tier and facing a wall of electronic displays showing radar, imagery, satellite, drone feeds, and more. “You asked to see me?”
“Lieutenant.” Kline’s eyes narrowed. Elliot took it, not blinking. He wasn’t out of hot water yet for losing the RHIB and blowing off Captain Watkins, but he wasn’t second-guessing himself. He’d been there with his team. Captain Watkins—and Kline—hadn’t.
When he’d requested a recovery from the pirates’ dead-in-the-water vessel back to theDallas—and had to explain about losing the RHIB—there’d been hell to pay. Captain Watkins dressed him down for a full hour, keeping him at attention the whole time. Heyes ma’am-edeverything she said, keeping his eyes glued to the bulkhead over her shoulder.
He was right, she would have ordered him to back off if there had been hostile contact. She would have ordered the cruiser to intervene and use the overwhelming firepower and superiority of theDallasto crush their spirits. Then they wouldn’t be out a RHIB, down a hurt SEAL, and no closer to understanding the flow of weapons into Africa, would they?Yes ma’am.
Now it seemed that Kline had him flown to theKearsarge, the Task Force’s command ship, for a dressing down, too. He was in the shit, for sure.
But this wasn’t that. “I want you in on this planning session, Lieutenant,” Kline said. “We’re standing up a NEO downrange in the Congo.” Kline’s expression hardened. “And it’s about as hairy as you expect.”
A NEO—noncombatant evacuation operation—happened when a country went to shit in a hurry and all the Americans had to get out and get out fast. Usually it was the ambassador that called for a NEO from in-country, routing the request through State before it made its way to the closest military unit. And usually, it was the embassy that was evacuated, staff, dependents, and essential personnel from the host country.
“The Congo, sir? Aren’t we on the wrong side of the continent for that? The embassy is in Kinshasa, on the Atlantic side.”
“Glad you know your geography, Lieutenant.” Kline motioned for him to follow, leading the way to a digital briefing table. Two captains from Task Force 151—Watkins and Saito—and a commander in Kline’s staff were already there, frowning at the display. Video feeds from drones looped, circling above miles of tents: a refugee camp perched between a lake and the impenetrable Congo rainforest.
