Collateral Damage

Kaylea Cross

Copyright © 2015

by Kaylea Cross

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Cover Art by

Sweet ‘N Spicy Designs

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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the author.

ISBN: 978-1-928044-09-3

Dedication

This one is for my readers. You guys are incredible and I appreciate you all so much. Thank you for your support of this series, and for falling in love with my Bagram characters as much as I have. I’m going to be sad to say goodbye to these guys!

Also to Kim, to whom I’m eternally grateful to for checking my military details. Your courtship with D helped inspire part of Honor and Liam’s story, so I hope I did it justice.

With love,

Kaylea

Author’s Note

As the saying goes, all good things must come to an end, and so too must my Bagram series. This final installment is a real emotional rollercoaster ride, so better buckle up before you start reading. Some things are not easily forgiven. It’s not easy to get over past hurts and still be willing to open your heart to the very person who broke it before, but that’s exactly what Honor and Liam have to do. I hope you enjoy this last book of the series, where you’ll catch up with the entire Bagram crew.

*Important Note*: This story picks up at the end of Danger Close, justprior to the epilogue. The last part of the book takes place after Lt. Erin Kelly returns stateside once her tour at Bagram is done.

Lastly, as always I’ve tried my best to get all the military details right, but any mistakes I may have made are my fault and no one else’s.

Happy reading!

Kaylea Cross

Glossary of Terms

SOAR: 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment. Also known as the Night Stalkers. Special U.S. Army regiment that provides helicopter support for special operations forces.

FE: flight engineer. Part of a military aviation crew, and responsible for monitors and operates the aircraft systems.

OPSEC: operations security.

60: refers to Black Hawk helicopters.

WOCS: Warrant Officer Candidate School.

ST6: SEAL Team Six, or DEVGRU. The most badass of the SEAL Teams and the guys who took out Bin Laden.

LZ: landing zone, area where a helicopter sets down

DAP: Direct Action Penetrator, a heavily armed Black Hawk helicopter used to escort more vulnerable aircraft on a mission

Triple-A (AAA): anti-aircraft artillery gun, usually mounted on a vehicle

AFSOC: Air Force Special Operations Command

CCT: Combat Control Team. Members of AFSOC tasked with calling in and directing fire from aircraft during battle, such as air strikes, close air support and fire support.

JBLM: Joint base Lewis-McChord, located outside of Tacoma, Washington

PJs: Pararescue Jumpers. Members of AFSOC. Advanced combat medics tasked with the recovery and medical treatment of personnel in both combat and non-combat/humanitarian missions.

CSAR: combat search and rescue

TLZ: tactical landing zone. Areas on the battlefield designated for insertion of troops and/or supplies

FLIR: Forward Looking Infrared camera, usually mounted on aircraft, uses thermal imaging to create a “picture” on a video monitor to allow pilots to fly at night.

47: nomenclature designating a Chinook helicopter

NVGs: night vision goggles

64: nomenclature designating an Apache attack helicopter

JoP: justice of the peace

CCTV: closed circuit television, usually used for security purposes

DHS: Department of Homeland Security

OPTEMPO: Operational Tempo, or the frequency at which operations are happening

AHA: ammunition holding area, where ammo is kept on base

RPG: rocket propelled grenade

Chapter One

Honor felt like she’d barely fallen asleep before a series of high-pitched beeps made her eyes fly open in the near darkness. She rolled to her side on the bunk and reached for the pager on the floor beside her boots as a groan and the creak of bedsprings sounded from the next cot over.

“’s that you or me?” Erin mumbled sleepily from beside her.

“Me,” Honor murmured. “Go back to sleep.”

“”kay.” More creaking springs as Erin turned back over and pulled the covers over her head.

Of all the roommates Honor had had over the past two deployments here at Bagram, she was closest to Erin. And now her friend’s tour was almost up. In ten short days she’d be going home and Honor would be lonely as hell.

Running a hand over her face, Honor sat up and peered at her pager, recognizing the code calling her in to manage something. The dial on her watch read oh-three-twenty-one hours. She’d only hit her rack at just before midnight.

Withholding a groan, she threw back the covers, ran her fingers through her hair and slipped the elastic band on her right wrist up to gather it into a short ponytail at the nape of her neck. She got to her feet, her aching muscles protesting the movement and lack of sleep, and grabbed a bottle of water for the walk over to the hangar.

Slipping on her utilities and tucking her sidearm into its holster on her right thigh, she eased the door of the B-hut open and glanced over her shoulder. Erin was securely burrowed beneath the covers and well on her way back to sleep, maybe to dream about her man. Wade Sandberg had saved Erin last spring when she’d been caught in a terrorist attack while on leave back stateside. The dirty bomb had detonated at CIA headquarters in Virginia, killing scores of innocent people and contaminating the area with radiation. If not for Wade, Erin would likely have died that day.

The bunk next to Erin’s was empty. Ace would be flying a night mission, hunting down tangos with the rest of her Spectre 130 gunship crew, using their FLIR and other cool gadgets and advanced avionics. Once they engaged a target, the incredible firepower on that machine made short work of enemy forces on the ground.

Man, Honor freaking loved that aircraft. Sometimes she wished she’d become a pilot, rather than an aviation maintenance technician. But she’d always had a knack for all things mechanical and most times she loved her job.

Just not as much lately, though her reasons were mostly non-work related.

Outside in the pre-dawn darkness, the air was surprisingly brisk for May and scented with the usual smells that inhabited Bagram: a mixture of earthy dust, the faint scent of aviation fuel, and the occasional whiff of sewage from the porta-potties that would only intensify as the day wore on and the temperature climbed into the nineties once more.