Iraq
"Damn ... and I thought Twentynine Palms was bad. It's paradise compared to this place."
Captain Christopher Knowling couldn't agree more. Nothing but sand wherever they looked. No trees. No bushes. Just sand. Gritty, dry, clog-your-throat, blind-your-eyes sand. And their Marine convoy kicked up more of it heading toward the next town. The dust trail they stirred was a giant bull's-eye.
"Suck it up, Ski," he said with a laugh. "Only a hundred and fifty days to go."
"Might as well be forever," the young corporal shot back, then added, "Sir."
"Quit bitchin', Ski." Gunnery Sergeant Merriman rapped his knuckles on the back of Rudolfski's helmet. "Your wife's in the next truck, normally only one tent over in camp. You're not hurting all that bad."
Christopher could write a book on that kind of ache. He'd been without Lydia for a month. Thirty days of not being able to roll over and into her hot, tight body. Thirty days of not hearing her cry out when she came, of not hearing her say, "I love you."
Emotion choked him as much as the sand. Fuck, don't start crying in front of your men.
"You guys think this is bad--"
The ground in front of their truck exploded, cutting off Merriman's words. Shrapnel sliced through the windshield and into the driver's head. Christopher dove for the side with his men. Another explosion hurled them down. Someone screamed. Rifles and mortar fire blasted out in response to the attack.
He dug his hand into the loose sand, trying to pull away to safety. Moving was impossible. Pain seared him from neck to hip. A woman's scream pierced his ears. Rudolfski's wife.
God, he's dead. Dead.
Ski's wife kept screaming and screaming.
"Lydia," he whispered. Tears poured freely down his face, mingling with the sand beneath his cheek.
He loved her more than life. How could it end like this? Flashes of her grief tore at his gut, hurting him as much as the wound gaping down his body.
Someone stop that woman's screaming! But the words couldn't leave his throat.
Lydia ... baby...
He couldn't stand to think of her like that, grieving like that.
I won't put her through this. I won't.
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