| |
We waited until the last car and escort unit left the church parking lot and then filed in behind them. We didn’t turn our hazards on or act as part of the procession. We were just following at a comfortable distance. I wanted to remain in the background as much as possible.
Jenny and I didn’t say much as we followed the funeral procession to the gravesite. A light rain started just as we neared the turnoff to the narrow asphalt road leading to the cemetery. I didn’t want to tell Jenny, but I was struggling. It felt like a knife had been jabbed into my chest, and someone was twisting it ever so slowly.
I didn’t know how to tell Jenny that we were traveling down the same road that I had driven before leaving for the Middle East. It was the same cemetery where my wife and young daughter had been buried while I was in a coma. It was the place that had driven me to a murderous rage that had taken me across the world. I was sure Jenny wouldn’t recognize or love the man I had become that day.
The memory of seeing my young daughter’s headstone for the first time came rushing back. I remembered falling to my knees as I contemplated taking my own life to join them.
“Are you okay?” Jenny asked, snapping me out of the flashback. She was staring at my hands on the steering wheel.
I looked down to see that my knuckles were white as I held a death grip on the wheel.
“Huh?”
We turned onto the narrow road toward the cemetery just as I looked at Jenny, not knowing what to say.
“I just...”
Before I could get the words out, Jenny’s eyes widened, and she suddenly pointed to the car in front of us. “Look out!”
I slammed on the brakes as I turned to see the car in front of us doing a panic stop and swerving into the ditch. We stopped just inches from the car’s rear bumper as it came to a rest in the shallow trench.
I started to get out of the car and heard a rapid succession of POP-POP-POP. At first, I thought it was a car backfiring until the cadence change, and I realized it was return fire. There was a gunfight happening a quarter of a mile in front of us at the front of the convoy.
I ran back to my truck and grabbed my Glock 19 from the holster under the seat. “Get down!” I yelled.
“What’s going on?” Jenny asked as she reluctantly complied.
“Shots fired!”
I reached in and tried to push her head down. “Get as small as you can.”
“Where are you going?” Jenny asked.
“To see if I can help,” I said as I grabbed a spare, full-size magazine from under the seat and stuffed it in my pocket.
“Troy, be careful!” she yelled as I closed the door.
I brought my Glock 19 up to the low ready and started toward the sound of gunfire. Cars in front of me began turning around to get out of the ambush zone as I ran past them.
I moved toward the tree line to flank where I thought the ambush was coming from. The gunfire was deafening. I had no idea if I was hearing both sides firing at each other or just the cops returning fire, but it sounded like a war zone.
Two cars ran into each other and blocked the road as they desperately tried to escape the kill zone. I ran back toward them, keeping my weapon out of sight as I made sure both drivers were okay, and then headed back toward the gunfire.
As I got closer, I could hear people yelling. Some were cops trying to coordinate fire and movements. Others were trying to yell loud verbal commands at the suspects. But others were screaming for help. Their pleas were haunting.
I moved out into the woods slowly, trying not to draw the shooters’ attention or the officers and deputies returning fire. I nearly tripped over a body as I reached the ambush area. He was dressed in all black and had a MAC-10 machine pistol lying next to his body in the grass. I noticed a tattoo on his neck but couldn’t make out what it was. It looked like a spider or scorpion or something similar, but I didn’t have time to examine it since there was a gunfight still going on.
I could see movement deeper in the woods and continued moving toward it. The gunfire subsided as I came across another body. It was clear the suspect was dead, so I moved his handgun out of the way and moved on.
As I stood, I heard movement to my left and looked to see three officers moving toward me with their patrol rifles raised. A bullet zipped past my head and hit the tree next to me, splintering the wood.
I ducked down and yelled back toward the approaching officers. “Get down! I’m a friendly! We’re taking fire!”
The officers took cover as I looked to find the suspect. I saw a man running in the woods and realized it was the man who had just taken a shot at my head. He was running and blindly firing behind him. I started to take the shot but thought better of it.
Instead, I pulled out my badge from my pocket and held it out with my left hand so the other officers could see. “Friendly! Suspect is running east! This one is down.”
The three officers continued moving past me in pursuit of the suspect. I turned back toward the scene of the ambush to see if I could render aid. As I got closer, I saw the bodies of officers lying on the road and in the ditch next to the vehicles. A tree had fallen in the roadway and created the roadblock that had allowed the shooters to ambush the procession.
Some officers had set up a defensive perimeter while others tended to the wounded and dead. I tucked my Glock into my waistband at the small of my back and went for the nearest unattended downed officer.
I rolled him over and saw that he had been hit with a headshot. I didn’t recognize the officer, but that didn’t make it any easier. I moved on to the next one near the hearse as I heard sirens approaching. The cavalry was on its way – too late to do anything but collect the dead and wounded.
The next victim was leaning against the front of the hearse. As I realized who it was, my heart sank. The big, burly combat veteran I had looked up to for so long was leaning against the front bumper, clutching his abdomen as he sat in a pool of his own blood.
I pulled out the small individual first aid kit I always kept in my pocket and unzipped it as I dropped to my knees next to Captain Jacobson.
“Alex?” he called out weakly as I tried to assess his wounds.
“Try not to talk, Dan. It’s going to be okay,” I said as I franticly moved his hand and poured the QuikClot into the wound.
“You’re alive,” he said, moving his bloodied hand up to touch my arm.
I pulled out the bandaging and packed the wound as best I could. “Apply pressure here,” I said as I moved his hands.
“I’m not going to make it,” Jacobson said. “Don’t waste your time.”
“Bullshit,” I said, moving to his leg as I retrieved the tourniquet from the first aid kit. He had been shot in the thigh, just above the knee. It looked like it had nicked his femoral artery. I had to stop the bleeding.
“I like the beard,” Jacobson said weakly. “You look like a Green Beret.”
“We can talk more when you get better, buddy, don’t worry,” I said as I wrapped the tourniquet around his leg.
“I’m so sorry about your family. I know you went over there because we didn’t do enough.”
“You did all you could. Don’t worry about that.”
“You’re a ghost,” Jacobson said, laughing. “I’m already dead, aren’t I?”
“No,” I said as I twisted the tourniquet. “I’m not dead, and neither are you. And you won’t die, do you understand me?”
I finished securing the tourniquet to see Jacobson staring off in the distance. It was the cold, blank stare of a man who had just crossed into the afterlife.
“Dan!” I yelled as I tried to shake him.
I pushed him down onto the asphalt and started CPR. As paramedics arrived to relieve me, I realized he was gone. I stumbled backward, blood-soaked hands shaking as the scene became even more chaotic.
An EMT tried to see to me, but I pushed past them as I stumbled back toward my truck. I was shell-shocked. Jenny leapt out of the truck and ran to me as she saw me, bloodied and shaken, approaching her.
“Troy!” she yelled as I collapsed to my knees.