Taliban at his shoulders.

“See, Scott, you never know who’s working for who.

I work for the Taliban. And so does Harruck. In fact,

the whole Army’s in bed with them, everyone except

you. You’re the only idiot who didn’t get the memo.”

I wrote my report in the morning, hating myself with

every word I typed. I lied about the time of the attack and

about me resisting Warris’s attempts to take my command.

174 GH OS T RE CON

But more important, I lied about Private Thomas Hen-

drickson’s death. He’d been shot point-blank in the back,

but no one would question that. An AK-47 had been

used, and seasoned Special Forces operators were vowing

that the kid had been in the wrong place at the wrong

time. Hendrickson was a private, a cherry, with barely any

experience. That he’d gotten killed would hardly raise a

brow. I couldn’t help but do some morbid research on the

kid. And what I’d learned just broke my heart.

After a few conversations with the others, I felt cer-

tain that no one else had seen Ramirez shoot the kid.

At breakfast, Ramirez avoided me like the plague,

and then, afterward, I asked him to join me on a ride up

to see the construction site.

Oh, he knew it was coming.

“Maybe we should talk about this elephant in the

desert,” he said.

I couldn’t help but snort. “The elephant? You mean

the one being ridden by a murderer?”

He slammed the door on the Hummer, and I drove.

We left the main gate and headed about halfway down

the desert road, and then I pulled off to the side, and we

just sat there in the growing heat. I was reminded of the

times when my dad was mad at me and would take me

out for a drive and a talk. In fact, it dawned on me only

then that I was doing the same thing . . .

After breakfast, I’d put in a call to my sister and

brothers and was still waiting to hear back on Dad’s con-

dition. I could only pray for an improvement.

CO MB AT O P S

175

“Scott, before you say anything, can I talk?” Ramirez’s

voice was already cracking.

“Go ahead.”

“As soon as you started having problems with Har-

ruck, he came to me and Matt, set up a conference call

between us and the battalion commander. Basically,

they were trying to recruit us as spies and allies. They

were trying to convince us that our mission was going to

do more harm than good here.”

I chuckled darkly. “I’m not surprised.”

“You know what we told them to do with that

offer . . .”

“Good.”

“But still, they put a lot pressure on us. I don’t think

Matt ever caved in, but I know they’re gunning for you

and gunning hard. Not sure if you’ve made an enemy

upstairs or what, but I started thinking that maybe this

whole mission to get Zahed is just a way for them to get

rid of you.”

“Whoa, now you’re getting paranoid.”

“Scott, I don’t think I could do this without you. If

you’re gone, I’d just drop out of the Ghosts. I would. I

wouldn’t trust anyone else.”

“That’s crazy. But Joey, listen. None of this is justify-

ing what you did—and do you really understand what

you did?”

He lowered his head. And my God, he began to cry.

Special Forces operators never say quit. And we cer-

tainly do our best NOT to cry.

176 GH OS T RE CON

“He was going to burn us,” he said. “I could tell. I

just snapped. And I did it.”

“Did you know anything about him? About how his

dad fought in the first Gulf War, about how he’d come

from a long line of military guys? Did you know he had

a girlfriend who’s pregnant?”

Ramirez shook his head, turning away from me to

sink his head deeper into his hands.

“You know, being in Special Forces is one thing. But

we were chosen to be in the Ghosts because we don’t

just talk about the tenets of being a great soldier, we live

by them. We live by the creed. And I quote, ‘I will not

fail those with whom I serve. I will not bring shame

upon myself or the forces.’ ”

I guess hearing myself say those words was a little

too much to bear. I screamed at the top of my lungs,

“JESUS CHRIST, JOEY! JESUS CHRIST! WHAT

THE HELL DID YOU DO?”

“I don’t know! I don’t know! Please don’t turn me in.

I got nothing else. You know that. This is my entire life.

Scott, please . . .”

“I lied in my report. Do you realize the position

you’ve put me in? I need to call Gordon and tell him you

killed that kid to protect me.”

He backhanded tears from his eyes, then looked at me,

trying to catch his breath. “Why do you need to do that?”

“Because I swore an oath. Because you swore an oath.”

“If you go to them, they’ll make me talk. They’ll

make me tell everything. You refused to be relieved.

That’ll come out. And we’ll both be burned.”

CO MB AT O P S

177

“I know.”

“Then what the hell, Scott?”

“Joey, I just can’t believe any of this . . .”

“How about I make it easier for you to stay quiet. You

can blame it all on me. I’m telling you right now, that if

you turn me in, you’ll be hanging from the rope next to

me. I’ll make sure of that, not because I want revenge, but

because you’re too damned good of a leader for the Ghosts

to lose. Don’t you get it, Scott? I killed a guy for you! You

can’t just throw your life away now! I killed a guy!”

“I don’t know what I’m going to do. I really don’t. I

thought I had enough going on already. I didn’t expect

this. Not from you, Joey. Not from you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Tell that to the kid’s family.”

SEVENTEEN

We returned to the road and reached the construction

site about ten minutes later. A tent village had been

erected behind the half-built school, and there I noted

about twenty or thirty children seated in neat rows on

blankets and listening as two teachers took turns read-

ing to them. The kids were surprisingly attentive, still

wiping their noses and scratching themselves, but their

gazes were fixed on the storytellers. Many of them had

no shoes or simply thick socks. The boys wore short hair

and the girls had scarves draped over their heads. Chalk-

boards stood on easels, and several small tables held

other props like balls, water pitchers, and clay pots. Plas-

tic crates brimmed with dusty, weather-beaten books.

In truth I’d gone to the site in part because I thought I

CO MB AT O P S

179

might run into Anderson again. I needed a pretty face to

help temper all the ugliness around me. She was watching

a group of laborers erect the walls of the school on the

broad concrete foundation. Just behind her stood the

sandbagged machine gun nests my team had helped build.