A Devil Is Waiting Read Online Free PDF Page B

Sangin for some time before the Marines took over.”
     
    “I’m so glad,” the attendant said. “Let me get you your drink.”
     
    She went away and Sara stood up, took her shoulder bag out of the locker, removed her laptop, and put it on the seat beside her. She replaced the shoulder bag and sat down as the flight attendant returned and gave her the champagne.
     
    “This Sangin place? It’s okay, isn’t it? I mean, Ron always says there’s not much going on.”
     
    A good man, Ron, lying to his family so they wouldn’t worry about him. She’d been through two tours attached to an infantry battalion that suffered two hundred dead and wounded, herself one of them. But how could she tell that to this girl?
     
    She drank her champagne down and handed the glass to her. “Don’t you worry. They’ve got a great base at Sangin. Showers, a PX, burgers and TV, everything. Ron will be fine, believe me.”
     
    “Oh, thank you so much.” The girl was in tears.
     
    “Now you must excuse me. I’ve got work to do.”
     
    The attendant departed, and Sara opened her laptop, feeling lousy about having to lie, and started to write her report. At the Arizona military base, location classified, she had beenobserving the new face of war: pilotless Reaper drones flying in Afghanistan and Pakistan but operated from Arizona, and targeting dozens of Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders.
     
    It took her around two hours to complete. When she finished, she replaced the laptop in her shoulder bag. It had been a hell of an assignment—and where was it all going to end? It was like some mad Hollywood science-fiction movie, and yet it was all true.
     
    Her head was splitting, so she found a couple of pills in her purse, swallowed them with some bottled water, and pushed the button for attention.
     
    The young flight attendant appeared at once. “Anything I can get you?”
     
    “I’m going to try to sleep a little. I’d appreciate a blanket.”
     
    “Of course.” The girl took one out of the locker and covered her with it as Sara tilted the seat back. “Sweet dreams.”
     
    And how long since I’ve had one of those?
Sara thought, and closed her eyes.
     
    T he dream followed, the same dream, the bad dream about the bad place. It had been a while since she’d had it, but it was here now and she was part of it, and it was so intensely real, like some old war movie, all in black and white, no color there at all. It was the same strange bizarre experience of being an observer, watching the dream unfold but also taking part in it.
    The reality had been simple enough. North from Sangin was a mud fort at a deserted village named Abusan. Deep in Talibanterritory, it was used by the BRF—the Brigade Reconnaissance Force—a British special ops outfit made up of men from many regiments. The sort who would run straight into Taliban fire, guns blazing.
     
    It was all perfectly simple. They’d got a badly wounded Taliban leader at Abusan, a top man who looked as if he might die on them and refused to speak English. No chance of a helicopter pickup, two down already that week, thanks to new shoulder-held missiles from Iran. Headquarters in its wisdom had decided it was possible for the right vehicle to get through to Abusan under cover of darkness, and further decided that a fluent Pashtu speaker should go in with it, which was where Sara came in.
     
    She reported as ordered, wearing an old sheepskin coat over combat fatigues, a Glock pistol in her right pocket with a couple of extra magazines, a black-and-white checkered headcloth wrapped around her face, loose ends falling across the shoulders, leaving only her eyes exposed.
     
    The vehicle that picked her up in the compound was an old Sultan armored reconnaissance car, typical of many such vehicles left behind by the Russians when they had vacated the country. Three banks of seats, a canvas top rolled back over the rear two, and a general-purpose machine gun mounted up front. It