Page 11 of Fighting for Valor
“You think me a fool, Isaad?”
No, I think you’re a sadistic fuck who gets off on torturing people.
“No, Amir Faruk, sir. I think you are an intelligent and compassionate man.” Even as I say the words, I know they’re useless. Faruk realizes I’ve betrayed him. “Let me try to find out why the coordinates are wrong. I will fix this.”
“No. You will not.” Faruk jerks his head at Zaman. “Take him—”
I lunge for the laptop, and before either one of them can stop me, I slam it into the wall, shattering the screen and sending bits of plastic and glass flying around the small room. I can’t let them see what I’ve done. All of my little rebellions. All preserved on a server no one will ever find. The money I hid for the doctor. The code that adjusts the GPS signal. The bits of video footage I deleted to hide my own plan to kill the man in front of me.
I still have a hold of the laptop’s guts, the keyboard and hard drive, and I bring it down on Zaman’s instep. He spits out a curse, and I push to my feet, then catch Zaman in the knee with a sweeping kick. He’s got fifty pounds on me, but the movement shocks him enough to make him stagger back. Muscle memory takes over, and I spin around and land a punch to Faruk’s chest, close to his sternum. But I’m off, just enough, and he doesn’t go down.
I don’t have anywhere to go, sandwiched between Faruk and his most lethal man. As Zaman grabs me and forces me to my knees, Faruk kicks me in the stomach. “You have forgotten your place, Isaad. And I am going to remind you.”
Chapter Six
Isaad
Another of Faruk’s men joins Zaman, and the two of them muscle me through the house and across the courtyard. I’ll do anything to stay out of the well—even die right here—but Zaman smashes the butt of his gun against the back of my head, and I see stars.
“Down. Or I will throw you down,” Zaman growls at me once the ladder’s in place.
“Do it.” Except, what if the fall doesn’t kill me? After he punches me in the gut, I crawl over to the ladder and make my way to the place of my nightmares. The rope slithers back up, taking my last hope with it. Panic courses through me, my entire body shaking, but unlike every other time I’ve been down here, no one replaces the wooden cover.
What the fuck am I supposed to do now? Faruk is going to “remind me of my place.” That means more drugs. More time locked in that tiny room, not knowing up from down, with Faruk’s voice the only one I hear.
Sinking down against the stone wall, I draw my knees up to my chest and close my eyes.
He won’t destroy me again.
I remember my name now. Jackson Richards. But no one called me Jack or Jackson. To my team, my family, I was always Ripper.
“You won’t break me this time, pig-fucker!” I shout to no one. I don’t care what he does to me. I know who I am, and I’ll die down in this shithole before I let him take that away from me again.
I made it through the night. The light of the stars was just enough for me to see my feet. And the scorpions as they skittered towards me.
I crushed every one of them under my shoe. The crunch as the little fuckers died brought me a bit of satisfaction. Revenge.
Now, there are ten squashed bodies around me. The scorpions hide in the heat, and for a while, I’m safe from their stingers. Sinking down against the wall, I let my head fall back and stare up at the cloudless sky. It’s quiet, and I let myself drift into a dreamless sleep.
When I wake, my throat is parched. It’s evening, and the temperature has to be over forty-five. No. I’m a damn American. I need to think like one. Over a hundred and fifteen. How long are they going to leave me down here like this? As the last bit of light disappears from the sky, footsteps crunch over the rocky ground above. A shadow moves around the edges of the hole, and then a bottle of water hits my foot.
“Fuck you!” I croak as the footsteps fade away. I’m not eating or drinking anything Faruk gives me. Not anymore. I’m ready to die. It’s a hell of a lot better than losing myself again. I twist open the cap and dump out the entire bottle.
As determined as I am right now, I can’t take a chance that in twelve hours, I’ll be so desperate, so weak, that I’ll give in. Staring up at the first stars overhead, I say a prayer to the God of my youth—the one Faruk tried to make me forget.
“Help me be strong enough to die.”
Midway through the night, I’ve picked up that fucking empty bottle four times, praying for a single drop left inside. The scorpions are out. I’ve killed two more, but I’m dizzy, and I can only manage to slap at them with my shoe in my hand. Standing…didn’t work out so well the last time I tried it. Rubbing the gash on my forehead I opened when I pitched into the wall, I gaze up at the stars. This…would be a good night to die. I’d like to see the moon one more time. After that…I don’t care anymore.
Don’t you die on me, brother!
Ryker. Commander of our ODA. The only reason I survived Hell. He kept us going. Me and Dax. The three of us were closer than brothers when we were captured—even closer after all of Kahlid’s torture. Watching one another be flogged, burned, beaten. Tapping out messages on the stone walls of the caves.
Ry protected us. Taunted Kahlid, tricked him so many times into bypassing Dax and me to focus on him instead.
My eyes burn, but I’m too dehydrated to cry. After all Ryker sacrificed, one stupid moment of distraction, and I got him and Dax killed. I deserve everything that’s happened to me since, and as a scorpion stings my calf, I relish the pain while I slam my shoe down on top of the bastard.
Someday, if there’s an afterlife, I’ll see him again. Or…I won’t. Because if there’s a heaven, Ryker McCabe is in it. And me? I’m going somewhere else. Somewhere I’ll burn.
