CHAPTER ONE

There was always something he liked about the stillness of a high-desert night, black as pitch and scattered with stars. Its stillness seemed to allow other people’s minds to run wild with all sorts of imaginative notions. Either the night was cool and magical, filled with the serenity people dreamed of attaining, or it was inhabited by a litany of creepy-crawlies, ancient ghosts and demons that terrified the mind into a kind of supernatural rigor mortis. But that, he imagined, depended on which godforsaken sandbox you were being forced to play the game of survival in and in what clusterfucked part of the world it was located.

He navigated his way through the sandy terrain’s juniper bushes, buckwheat tufts, and uneven footing, creating his own path leading from the vehicle he had tucked safely away in a small wash a few klicks away. Sprouts of Mormon tea and rice grass crunched under his boots as he made his way toward a tall sandstone ledge he had determined would give him the best viewpoint and angle of fire. He climbed over large chunks of rock that remained where they had fallen centuries before, picking his hand- and footholds carefully, as he lurched his way up the craggy wall, all the time trying to keep the battle rattle to a minimum—not that these kids would even know what that was or what it sounded like. Hell, they weren’t even old enough to enlist. But they were old enough to be a problem.

When he reached the top of the ledge, he let his biceps carry all of his weight as he lifted himself over. He flung his right leg up in one fluid motion and steadied his boot on the rough sandstone surface. The strength of his leg took him the rest of the way before he crouched and ran quickly across the top of the shelf. As he hit the edge of the incline, he dropped silently and belly crawled the rest of the way, the night vision attached to his helmet doing everything it could to keep his field of vision green.

Sprawling himself out on the sandstone ledge, he thumbed each button to release the legs of the rifle’s bipod, listened for the recognizable clicks of their mechanisms, and locked them into place. Reaching up with one hand, he lifted his optics into the upright position and let his eyes adjust to the darkness. He removed his helmet, laid it on the ground to his right, and replaced it with a tan recon ball cap that he pulled from his combat desert jacket. Since leaving the ranks, he had been looking for something that would satisfy his itch for combat by utilizing his training and finely honed skills. After all, he reasoned, what else did he know how to do? He had become a kind of problem solver, an exterminator of unwanted pests. And selling himself to those in need of his services was capitalism at its finest.

Turning the cap’s bill to the rear, he shut himself off from the surrounding world, letting his fingers flip up the lens covers on both the objective and ocular ends of the rifle scope. He rested his right cheek against the folding buttstock, its cold familiarity cupping his face like the caressing palm of a woman’s gentle hand. His fingers nimbly navigated the dials of the scope, clicking in the windage and elevation. There was no need to utilize the rifle’s BDC; a bullet drop compensator wasn’t needed to take out two teenagers. This was New Mexico not Afghanistan.

His eye focused quickly as the boys moved with a juvenile purpose around the dancing campfire that silhouetted them behind his crosshairs. Keeping his breathing steady and controlled, he lay silent on the rocky hide of the rise four hundred yards away from them. He raised his head away from the long scope for a moment to watch the yellow flames flicker in the distance halfway up the sandy slope that led to the rock towering over the boys. Their elongated shadows danced up the slope and onto the wall of the formation looming behind his primary and secondary targets. His eyes darted around the blackness that surrounded him, one last operational evaluation of the field of fire. He glanced up to see the sky lit now by only the waning light of a last quarter moon and a smattering of stars that dotted the night sky during the witching hour.

He felt no breeze against his face, smelled no aromas floating on the chilled night air, so there would be no need to consider wind as a factor. But, as always, there was that undeniable smell of sand and rock—a fragrance he knew he could never delete from his olfactory hard drive. It had been formatted long ago along with the sounds of the crowded streets and the stench of outdoor markets and food cooking over an open flame.

He was grateful he hadn’t felt the need for the bulky drag bag tactical case for this op. He always preferred to carry his weapon using the sling strap and his hands, even if it did chafe his neck. It held the weapon close to his body and, for him, it simply felt more natural and comforting after all his years in the combat zone.

As his dominant eye rested comfortably again behind the glass of the scope, he began lining up his primary target. He repositioned his legs, then he let the bipod carry the weight of the rifle as he adjusted the weapons elevation turret a few more clicks. He had removed the muzzle break and cranked on the suppressor before he had left; he didn’t need a dust signature blowing back in his face, nor did he want the sound of the supersonic round bringing anyone nearby out of a sound sleep, especially whoever lived in the small house he had seen back by the open gate as he had driven up the narrow dirt road. Although, at this distance, he figured the decibel level didn’t really matter because it would resemble the soft hum of a kitchen refrigerator. There would be a resulting echo, even from this distance, and would mean he’d have to work quickly. After the first shot, his element of surprise would be eliminated; the next round would have to follow immediately.

He wrapped his right hand snugly around the finger-tooled rubber grip and felt it seal against the dry skin of his palm. Fisting his left hand, he brought it close to his right shoulder and let the bottom of the folding stock rest on it. Instinctively, he slid his index finger gently through the trigger guard and ever so lightly caressed the curvature of its two-stage mechanism. With his eye securely behind the scope, he allowed his breathing to slip into its state of Zen, as he called it. So much so that when his breathing had expelled down to nothingness, his finger felt the click of the first stage of the trigger. His heart began to race as he took another measured breath. Slowly, he let his finger squeeze the second stage of the trigger just as his breath came to an end.

The familiar jolt that rocked his right shoulder and filled his plugged ears with the muffled explosion coincided with the adrenaline pumping through his chest. Instantaneously, the acrid smell of propellant swept through his nostrils. Another aroma he would never forget, but one that satisfied him nonetheless.

He had taken the first of two shots. He watched through the scope as his primary target’s head exploded like a ripe watermelon at a target range. Reflexively, his right hand grabbed the bolt knob, jerked it up and back, then rammed it forward in one quick, fluid motion. With another round from the magazine now chambered, he watched his secondary target begin to run as his newly measured breath again came to an end and the second shot took flight.