Captain Rachel Trayhern was five steps away from Bravo Base
Operations and the control tower when the first Taliban
grenade struck the tarmac.
The hot August sun beat down upon her, and their mission had
just ended.
A sudden disruption made her flinch, and she whirled around
at the hollow "thump" sound. Panic raced through her
as she anticipated the fall. Lieutenant Susan Cameron, her
copilot, had already gone inside to file their Apache
gunship flight report. At least she might be safe.
The enemy grenade landed squarely on her helicopter. The
ensuing explosion sent booming shock waves rippling across
the landing area. Cheating death once more, the crew that
was coming to hitch the Apache up with a motorized cart
drove in the other direction. Fire flew toward the sky.
Metal erupted and became deadly shrapnel in every direction.
Thick, black smoke rolled outward and upward.
A second, third and fourth grenade popped into the sky.
Rachel hit the asphalt hard, her helmet bag flying out of
her hand. The August sky had been clear blue. Now, as the
well-aimed grenade launchers hit the second Apache and a
CH-47 Chinook that had landed a few minutes earlier, the
whole airport was under siege. Attack!
Gasping, Rachel kept her hands over her head. Her helmet bag
lay nearby but not close enough. The smoke was thick and
choking. She heard the surprised cries of men as the attack
continued. Return fire began. Bravo Base was one of the most
forward CIA operations in Afghanistan, not more than fifteen
miles from the line between this country and Pakistan. And
it was always a target of the Taliban.
Crawling to try and find some kind of protection, Rachel
heard another thunk and knew the enemy had launched
yet another grenade. She was out in the open and completely
vulnerable. A piece of shrapnel could kill her as easily as
a grenade exploding nearby. More shock waves rolled across
the air facility. Shrieks of wounded began to fill the air.
Oh, God, let me get out of this alive. The Apaches
roared and burned, creating smoke so thick she couldn't
see one foot in any direction. Rachel heard the pounding of
feet across the tarmac. Orders were screamed above the
devastating attack. She felt strangled, helpless. Her brown
hair fell loose from its knot, and tears ran down her face
as she continued to crawl blindly along the edge of the
tarmac. So far, Ops wasn't hit, but she knew the Taliban
would try and take it out. She was in real danger.
With return fire of heavy artillery in full force, thumping
sounds filled the smoke-clogged air. Special Forces had to
be heading for the edge of the base to engage the Taliban.
Bravo was surrounded by two ten-foot tall walls with
razor-blade sharp concertina wire on top. Somehow, the
Taliban had gotten close enough to inflict major damage. The
heavy chutter of machine gun fire began in an attempt to
ward off the Taliban located at the end of the runway.
Hacking and choking, Rachel crawled swiftly away from the
control tower. Her elbows and knees smarted with pain, the
asphalt hard on them. Her mind spun with shock over the
violent attack. Somehow, she managed to scramble off the
tarmac and into the weeds and dirt. She was a good fifty
feet away from the tower, which was an obvious target. She
worried for her copilot, Susan, whom she hoped had escaped
in time.
A hot, black cloud of smoke overtook her. Burying her head
in the grass, Rachel could barely breathe. She felt as if
she were going to die. As she continued to crawl, blind and
constantly coughing, she knew her only way to live was to
escape the attack. The roar of the burning helos, the return
fire from heavy machine guns reverberated against her
unshielded eardrums. Her strength began to dissolve. She was
barely getting any oxygen, so she thrust her face down into
the weeds, the only place with clean air. Fire sucked and
ate up oxygen. Heat from the flames rose.
The wind shifted toward her, a bad sign. Pushing forward,
her flight boots digging into the hard Afghan soil, Rachel
felt the small rocks and stouter weeds poking into the chest
and belly of her green flight suit. She thrust out her hand,
fingers like claws digging into the resisting earth. It
rarely rained in August at eight thousand feet. The land was
hard and unyielding.
No! I can't die! Rachel gasped like a fish out
of water, saliva drooled from her mouth as she tried to suck
up the life-giving air. Oh, God, don't let me die
like this! Her vision began to gray. More smoke rolled
toward her, hot and stealing her oxygen. The breeze across
the mountains where the base was located was constant. Now
it blew toward where she tried to crawl.
Her senses dulled and tears ran down her face. Trying with
all her might to escape the smoke, she began to sob. At
thirty years old, she had her whole life ahead of her. And
even though she'd been an Apache gunship pilot for the
last five years, she'd never thought that she'd die
crawling across the ground.
Weakened, she lay still for a moment, fighting to get her
consciousness back. The smoke was an oxygen-sucking monster.
The heavy chut, chut, chut of machine guns spitting
out their bullets became distant. The flames and roaring
fire sounds lessened, too. Her aching ears seemed filled
with cotton, erasing all the noise that had pounded
relentlessly seconds earlier. Rachel collapsed, her face
pressed to the ground, small rocks biting into her
cheekbone. Even that pain seemed to float away. She was
losing consciousness because she couldn't get enough air
into her lungs. No matter what she did, she no longer had
the strength to pull herself forward. The last thought she
had was that after the fires were put out, they'd find
her body in the weeds.
It was an ignominious end, Rachel decided. She was a combat
pilot. A damn good one. She'd battled through Apache
flight school and nearly got kicked out thanks to Captain
Tyler Hamilton, who hated her. And yet, she'd fought
back and remained to graduate.
Shutting her eyes, Rachel thought of her family. Her father,
Noah Trayhern, danced before her closed eyes, his smile
making her feel better. And her mother, Kit, who was a
police detective, had a sharp and alert gaze. Praying, her
lips moving, Rachel didn't want her parents to hear from
the Army that she'd died of smoke inhalation on a
barren, godforsaken mountaintop in Afghanistan.
As her world grayed, her body went slack and consciousness
receded. Darkness was complete.
And then Rachel felt someone standing at her side. She
couldn't see who it was, but she felt love radiating
from this being.
Welcome, Rachel, the being said to her. You are
all right now. You're here to review your life. Are you
ready?
This had to be a dream. There was no voice she could hear.
But she could feel the words. Confused, afraid, she looked
around. Everything was a bright white light, but not so
bright as to make her squint. Finally, she said mentally,
I guess I am ready
.
She began to see the moment when she was conceived. Her
mother was very young, very beautiful. Her father was in the
Coast Guard, a commander of a cruiser. The love they had for
one another overwhelmed Rachel. Her heart opened powerfully.
You were brought into this world with love, a voice
said.
Rachel felt hot tears come to her eyes. She loved her family
so much! Her given name was Melody Sue Rachel Trayhern. She
laughed when she saw herself as a ten-year-old girl talking
to her mother, stubbornly telling her mother that she hated
the name, Melody Sue. She wanted to be called Rachel, her
middle name, because that was her grandmother's name.
And Rachel fiercely loved the elder. She saw her mother
smile and laugh. From that point on, everyone called her Rachel.
Everything moved swiftly for Rachel as she reviewed her
life. She saw four more sisters born to her parents. She was
the oldest. And they'd had a very happy childhood.
Rachel, the pathfinder for the family, as her father
referred to her, wanted to go into the military. She'd
been allowed into West Point and had been one of the top ten
officers to graduate from that military academy.
Rachel's gut tightened as she saw her orders were for
Fort Rucker, Alabama, the flight school. She had dreamed of
being a pilot, of flying, all her life. Her father told her
that flying was in the blood of the Trayherns. Rachel
remembered her powerful reaction to that information.
Rachel felt her heart slam shut with pain. She saw her first
days at the Apache flight school. Her anger rose as she saw
her instructor, Captain Tyler Hamilton. He stood in front of
her company, arrogant, a real bastard, who hated women on
the same tarmac with him. And he'd singled out Rachel
because she was doing better than the other men learning to
fly the Apache helicopter. More rage rose as she watched
Hamilton plot her demise. Sheer hatred, that's what
flowed through her. This son of a bitch was going to flunk
her out of school. The dream of flying was dying.
Rachel, the voice said gently. Until you make
peace with this man you cannot leave.
Confused, Rachel looked around. She was surrounded in a
white-and-gold glowing fog. How she wished again she could
see who owned this voice.
That way she could explain face-to-face that she could never
forgive Hamilton. He tried to ruin her.
He'd said the Trayhern family was always trying to get
what they didn't deserve. Well, that wasn't true.
She'd worked damned hard to get her wings at Fort
Rucker. She was a good pilot. That bastard wouldn't take
her dream away. The Trayhern family served its country with
pride and honor. No way would she stand there and let him
kick her out.
Because of your ongoing hatred, you must go back and
work through this with him.
Before Rachel could say a thing, she felt a powerful,
whirling sensation, as if she were in a funnel, spinning
around and around. Then she fell and everything grew dark.
The gold light disappeared, and the blanket of love
dissolved. Suddenly, it was as if an anvil were sitting on
her chest. She gasped and coughed violently.
Her eyes flew open. The sunlight nearly blinded her, and she
found herself on her back in the dirt and grass. Someone was
kneeling at her side, gripping her shoulder. He was looking
into her eyes, panic in his. His mouth opened and he raised
his head, screaming for a medic.
Rachel felt the strong touch of his hand, saw the care and
fear in his blue eyes. Her mind refused to work properly.
She continued to gasp, grabbing her chest as if to force air
into her lungs. Weapons continued to fire in the distance,
and she heard men and women calling out orders. The sky.
Staring up at the blue sky, Rachel blinked as her chest
heaved. No more smoke! The smoke had moved. She was alive.
Alive!
Mind barely functioning, Rachel heard the man at her side
calling for help once again. He sounded desperate. Afraid.
For her? And then as her consciousness grew, Rachel felt a
shock wave of another kind roll through her. This one took
her breath away. The man at her side was Captain Tyler
Hamilton, the instructor pilot who had almost gotten her
flunked out of Apache flight school. What the hell
was he doing on her base? Rachel's mind shorted out, and
she struggled to make sense of what was happening. Was this
a nightmare?
Groaning, Rachel couldn't handle the emotional tsunami,
and she blacked out. The last thing she felt was his
protective hand on her shoulder. He was the last man on
earth who she ever wanted to touch her.