Page 30 of The Forgotten SEAL (The Real SEAL #1)

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Smith

I left Carina sleeping in our bed. The windows were wide open, and the fresh air was cool and smelled like morning.

Her naked body was half concealed by white sheets, and parts and pieces of her skin played peekaboo.

Long brown hair fanned across her pillow and mine.

Her eyelids fluttered as a signal of deep sleep.

As I stood there debating on whether I wanted to wake her up to kiss her goodbye, I took stock of everything I love.

Every breath passing through her plump pink lips.

All of her: every last fragment. The weak ones, the strong ones, the ones that can’t be defined.

I left her sleeping. I didn’t wake her. I didn’t kiss her for fear of waking her and disturbing the perfect moment. I didn’t say goodbye.

“Epp. Epp,” someone calls.

I turn toward the voice, dragging myself from my daydream. I raise my brows and nod in my chief’s direction. “What’s up?” I ask.

“You need to go sit in on the brief. Now,” he says. Everyone is on high alert. The offices are bustling with people who aren’t usually here. Phones are ringing off the hook, and smiles and jokes are replaced by serious expressions and goddamn briefs. I always do as I’m told.

“Yes, sir,” I reply with a quick head tilt. I set off for the conference room and walk in to a bunch of men in uniform talking loudly.

There are always reports of horrendous attacks that may happen.

Few actually come to fruition, but today, we’re dealing with intel of something larger.

Something much, much larger. Moose slides me a tablet when I take a seat next to him.

Zane, a SEAL seated on my other side, rambles curse words under his breath at record speed.

“It’s happening,” I say, as much as I ask.

I’ve been preoccupied, my mind revisiting making love to Carina on replay.

We had sex in three rooms of our house last night.

I took her in every position imaginable.

I came more than twice in one night, and I’m still hard just thinking about it.

So while this horrible news isn’t unexpected, it’s surprising.

I click on one link. And then another. Sweat beads on my forehead even though this is the conference room where the AC is broken, and it runs constantly. Maybe it’s purposeful. I’m not sure of anything right now. I can’t be.

Zane murmurs back in my direction, “It’s happening.”

I click another link. There are photos attached here.

My mind goes black. When I’m inside the situations, it’s different.

I’m in control. There are several plans in case one goes bad.

What I’m looking at now is something I can’t control.

Something I can’t fix. Not in the present, anyway.

It does, in fact, remind me why I became a Navy SEAL to begin with.

I was a precocious little boy with wide eyes and a penchant for getting into mischief.

Not real trouble, though. The kind of trouble you get into because you’re always trying to figure something out.

Always asking questions. Always trying to fix things.

Even if they aren’t broken. It reminds me I’m due for the yearly apology to my mother for blowing up our washing machine when I was thirteen.

The whir the noisy machine emitted was normal, but I tried to fix it anyway.

I don’t think she’ll ever forgive me for that.

I grew up in an upper-middle-class neighborhood where a lot of us planned on going into the military after high school graduation.

Living in SoCal, the allure of the Navy was close geographically and emotionally.

After 9/11 happened, it strengthened my resolve to serve even more.

I watched those towers crumble to the ground in a pile of smoke while sitting in my high school English class.

We weren’t sure right away what it meant or why it happened, but it didn’t take long for the pieces to fall into place.

No one wants to believe a tragedy so great can occur.

Especially on American soil. The news portrays these types of disasters, but typically they’re always in another country.

Might as well be another planet for all that it directly concerns us.

September 11 showed America that it can happen here, and it can happen easily.

My soul was forged in fire and dipped in iron when our president confirmed they were attacks of terror.

I would become the terror and reflect it back onto anyone who threatens our way of life. Anyone who doesn’t fight fair. Anyone who is owed deadly retribution. Hell Week was hard, but I knew what I would face after it would be more difficult than anything a screaming BUD/S instructor could deal out.

There was an even divide with my peers. September 11 either sent them far away to college to study for a degree that would keep them away from the trenches, and then there were the men like me, who wanted nothing more than to dig the trenches, shoulder to shoulder, to help defeat the traitorous monster regardless of the cost.

“The televisions. Turn on the news,” Moose says, next to me. I’m gripping the side of the tablet harder than I should, and the case makes a straining sound.

People are going in and out, and all of the phones in the room are in use. Someone is teleconferenced in and is on the screen on the wall—face blank and words monotone. I can’t hear above all the chaos, and I stand from my chair.

“It’s real time. We’re getting the intel only minutes before it happens,” Zane says. He glances from his tablet to the television. “It’s unreal,” he finishes, eyes wide.

I bend over the screen in front of me and click another link. Another terror attack. And another. The news broadcaster on the television announces the one I read a few minutes ago. Another link pops up in our system. “Another one,” I whisper.

Moose is sitting down next to me, scribbling a list as he goes. “Chicago, Tulsa, Austin, San Francisco, Miami, Vegas, Biloxi, Detroit, Phoenix, Virginia Beach,” I say, reading over his shoulder. “There’s no pattern,” I mutter.

Next he starts another list with the international terror attacks happening right now.

He can’t write as quickly as they’re happening.

No one can. Hundreds, then thousands of huge attacks in minutes.

It’s like a spiderweb encompassing the entire planet.

My breath is stolen. My whole body feels weak.

The images are coming faster than I can process.

“They’re sporadic in location but planned in action.

This was planned. It was planned. How did we not see this coming?

” We did. My god, we did. We had so much warning, but how could this possibly be stopped?

Our enemy has no rules of war. They don’t fight fair. They’re organized, and yet they aren’t.

The tragedy in this room is deafening.

Guns. Suicide bombers. IEDs. Bombs in suitcases.

Cars turned into bombs. Every imaginable and unimaginable way to create mass death is reflected on every surface in the room.

Airports, sports venues, parking garages, the Statue of Liberty, the Eiffel Tower, Times Square, Plaza Mayor, trains, Tower Bridge, subways, the Chunnel, grocery stores, hospitals, Musée D’Orsay, cruise ships, theme parks—nothing, nowhere is unscathed.

The terrorists have stolen freedom and lives in every corner of our world.

The attacks are happening quicker and more frequently than anyone knows. The ones we aren’t hearing about are probably the worst. No survivors to report anything.

I hear someone throwing up in the corner.

Others have tossed their tablets aside in favor of calling their loved ones.

I can’t stop watching the tablet, the live video feeds of terror happening and destroying.

How many lives are gone right now? Morbid curiosity rears its ugly head.

How long was this planned? Not long. To have such a stronghold and so much power to be capable of this is terrifying.

“San Diego,” someone shouts. “San Diego has four right now.” That draws my gaze away from death. That makes my heart kick into a gear I didn’t know existed. It steals my breath.

“Where?” I ask.

“World War III, men. This is it. Grab your ready bags. We are shipping out. Orders are in directly from the president,” the officer says.

He’s a tall guy with always perfectly manicured hair.

He’s stoic and no-nonsense. I trust him.

“Our priority will be the home front. We will go to the major cities and locate leaders, financiers, anyone who is remotely connected will hear from us.” A couple of excited shouts echo.

“This will be different from anything we’ve ever dealt with. Be ready to improvise.”

I hear orders, and I understand them, but I can’t go there yet. “Where in San Diego?” I ask louder. Someone must know. We are in San Diego.

Zane clears his throat. “Balboa Park. The museums, Gaslamp, and a mall.” This is where my world comes apart at the seams.

“Which mall?” I fall back into my chair, the weight of today adding a hundred pounds.

How was everything fine ten minutes ago?

I drove to work. The air was nice. The traffic wasn’t bad.

Life was beautiful. This can’t be reality.

It can’t. I’m trained in death and destruction, and I can’t grasp this. “Which fucking mall?”

I put my head into my hands to cover my face.

I already know what he’s going to say. This is how it ends.

It’s how it has to end. Carina is at the mall with Megan.

Today was their meeting. It’s impossible to push everything else aside to think about my own interests completely.

“This can’t be fucking happening.” It’s an odd combination of terrified honor.

The large picture and what this truly means for the world takes a back seat to the fear I feel for Carina.

“Everything tech is pushing through is shaky cell phone video feed and Twitter updates,” Zane says, lowering his voice.

Men funnel out of the door quickly. Others linger on phone calls.

Some, like me, are glued to the spot. “But it’s Fashion Valley, the food court at the very least. Possibly another IED in the west parking garage. ”

With wide, terrified eyes, I turn to Moose. He’s already busy trying to get an outside line out, a strained look on his face.

I glance at my watch. She’s there. They’re there.

The tables in this brief room are structured in a big square wrapping around the room.

I hop into the middle pocket to reach the closest free phone and dial.

The infrastructure outside of the base has to be in complete disarray.

Cell towers will be down and flooded with unanswered calls.

Cable and electric companies inundated, if they even have the capacity to be inundated, that is.

Several attacks were on or around power plants.

Memorizing phone numbers isn’t something I’ve ever done, but I know hers.

I call her even though I know I won’t get a response.

I dial her to comfort myself—calling my girlfriend is a normal, everyday thing to do.

Calling Carina means she has to be okay—her cell phone ringing in her oversized bag right next to her notebook full of words.

I get her voicemail. “It’s Carina. I can’t reach my phone. You know what to do after the beep!”

She can’t reach her phone. The harmless phrase makes my head swim. I lean over the desk, placing my palms flat against the cool metal. Taking deep breaths, I hang my head. I catch sight of my trembling hands. They remind me of what can be lost.

“I couldn’t reach Megan,” Moose says.

I see his boots between my legs, standing behind me.

I can’t respond. I close my eyes as the shakes that were contained in my hands stretch up my arms and into my shoulders.

I grab a forgotten tablet in front of me and find the San Diego info.

I scroll through panicked social media messages and find the clearest video.

Screams of terror ring out as the black smoke skews the camera’s view.

In between wisps of smoke, you can clearly see it is indeed the food court at the Fashion Valley Mall.

I need to see it for myself. I watch it again and again, trying to discern the screams of death and terror.

Is it Carina’s cry? I’ve never heard her voice in that particular pitch.

It angers me I can’t decipher it. I can’t confirm. Or deny.

“Goddammit, Carina. Be okay,” I whisper.

A funny thing happens while I’m worrying about Carina and the state of her being.

I contemplate life without her, and the sick feeling in my stomach wreaks havoc on the rest of my body.

I let her die in my mind and taste that pain, let it leak out of every single pore on my body.

It’s unbearable. Then it happens. The cruelness of my own reality overrides everything else.

I remember.

I remember Megan.

I remember everything.