Ricochet (Renegades #3)(84)
Author: Skye Jordan

A goat darted into the road fifty feet in front of them. All five men raised their weapons in perfect choreography, then froze. Ryker’s heart rate spiked. The senses he’d thought were already alert peaked to hypersensitivity. Silence stretched taut across the team. He peered into the shadows of the abandoned tents filled with food and jewelry and fabric, their canvas flaps blowing in the wind. Squinted through the dust skittering along the gravel.

“Where’d he come from?” Carmello asked, his voice low and tight.

No one answered the hypothetical question they were all thinking. Movement dashed through the corner of Ryker’s vision. He glanced up and to his left without moving his head. A young Afghani man, early twenties, appeared on the top of a building backing to the street used for the village’s farmers’ market.

“Dekker.” Ryker called to the man on his far right. “We’ve got eyes. Ten o’clock.”

Dekker’s weapon swept upward to get a look at the possible threat through his scope. “Got him,” Dekker responded. “Appears unarmed.”

The brown and white spotted goat stood in the middle of the deserted road, bleating, looking lost. It took a few steps forward, a few steps back, and bleated again.

“Sarg?” Dog said. “Want me to take it out?”

Ryker’s stress escalated. He scanned the area near the animal, but couldn’t see any evidence of an IED. With townspeople looking on—including a bevy of kids—Ryker weighed the pros and cons of shooting the goat. This war was a goddamned political minefield.

He was just about to give Dog an affirmative, when the goat startled and darted through the tents on the opposite side of the road. When nothing exploded, Ryker’s shoulders eased.

“Keep moving,” he said. “I want to get the hell off this street.”

“Roger that,” Dekker said.

Ryker started forward again, his gaze focused hard on the ground at his feet.

No disturbances, no divots, no soft ground.

Step.

No wire, no metal, no plastic.

Step.

“Sarg,” Dekker said, his voice rippling in a way that made Ryker’s gut turn to ice. “Eyes just pulled out a phone.” Then his voice rose, and he yelled, “Put it down! Put the phone down, now!”

The man held both hands up as if in surrender, but still held the phone in one. And grinned. Dekker continued to yell, this time in Pashto. “Preebáasem baabat!”

The goat darted back into the road. This time behind them, and only ten feet away.

Red flags spiked in Ryker’s mind. He spun, aimed at the animal—

A child broke through the barricade and came running toward the goat, screaming, arms outstretch. A boy. Maybe six or seven.

Ryker swore and hesitated.

A woman struggled in the crowd behind him, frantic, calling to the boy in Pashto. Telling him it wasn’t his goat, and ordering the boy back to her.

Alarm shot up Ryker’s spine. He grabbed Carmello’s arm with his free hand, lowered his weapon, and screamed, “Cover!”

But the last half of his word never made it out of his mouth. The goat startled and ran—straight for Tagger. The animal was just two feet from Ryker’s teammate when the explosion detonated. In slow, vivid, horrifying color, the goat came apart at the seams like a ragdoll in the jaws of a wolf.

The force of the blast rocketed Ryker off his feet. He hit a wall, bounced off, and collided with another member of his team. They ricocheted again, this time off each other. Ryker was thrown back into the fruit stand. He shook it off and saw Carmello rolling away from him, toward the middle of the street.

Ryker rolled to his belly. Panic burned through his body. His vision blurred, dimmed, but he belly-crawled toward Carmello. “Mike! Get out of the street! Mi—”

Another blast rocked the ground and stabbed at Ryker’s ears. Debris rained down, trapping him in darkness. He fought to get out. Shoved bricks and poles and pots off him. Struggled out from the tangle of a canvas tarp.

And found carnage.

Tagger was gone. Just gone. Ripped pieces of gear and uniform and bloody body parts scattered everywhere. Dekker lay in a heap nearby, missing legs and the center of his torso.

Ryker screamed for Dog and Carmello but heard nothing—not even his own voice. Reality warped around him like funhouse mirrors. Grit filled his lungs until he couldn’t breathe. He forced himself to move, sluggish and painful. He found Dog first, the top half of his body strewn across a vendor’s shattered fruit cart, the bottom half twisted in the road surrounded by a pool of blood.

“Ry!”

The yell came to him like he was underwater. He turned, found Carmello, his eyes wide with horror, three of his four limbs scattered around him.

“Ry! Are you okay? Where are the others?”

Ryker crawled over rubble and smashed fruit and unidentifiable debris to reach Mike. He sat up, scanning Mike’s body over and over, but he couldn’t understand why he was incomplete. Why he was missing pieces. The desire to put him back together like a puzzle consumed him, and he glanced around for his limbs.

“Ry,” Mike screamed, jerking Ryker’s jacket with his one arm. His only arm. Ryker couldn’t understand. “You’re bleeding. Are you in shock? Why are you looking at me like that? Where are the others? Ry, where’s our team?”

His gaze jumped to Carmello’s. His buddy’s dark eyes were filled with terror. Something clicked inside Ryker. Nothing clear, nothing concrete, but he started moving—dragging tourniquets out of his tactical vest and using every ounce of strength he had left to tighten them around what was left of Mike’s limbs.

“What are you doing?” Mike screamed through the pain.

“Have to stop…” he muttered, securing the tourniquet, “the bleeding.”

“They’re dead, aren’t they?” Tears filled Carmello’s eyes and spilled down his cheeks, creating a pale river through the dirt and blood. “Oh my God, oh my God. They’re dead. They’re all dead.”

The tormented pitch of Carmello’s voice reached into Ryker’s chest and yanked. Mike’s eyes were closed, his face twisted with the torment, his head rolling side to side. His words slurred.

“Carmello!” Ryker yelled, fisting the man’s bloody jacket and shaking him. “Carmello, stay with me.” He lifted his gaze from the ground for the first time and found people swarming everywhere. Military, Afghanis. “Medics! Where are my fucking medics?”