Down and Dirty: SEAL EXtreme Team Short Story Read Online Free Page A

How’d she know exactly what he needed?
    He tasted, savored, and enjoyed
everything about Jill Connor. And for a moment, he let go. The guilt, pain,
terror, blood, all flowed away, and he became whole. Not a hero, not a warrior,
just a man kissing the woman he’d fantasized about for weeks. Jill Connor.
Hell, he would’ve given everything he owned to stay in that moment forever.
    But fate enjoyed punching him
in the balls.
    His ears started ringing, and
his vision tunneled. It was happening again. Before he could stop it, the
vision hit him like an IED from the past.
     
    ****
     
    Nick was back in the passenger
seat of the Humvee, leaning out the window and returning enemy fire. Gunfire
blazed out of two trucks gaining on them. Sniper David Watson had his boot
pressed hard to the gas pedal while taking the occasional wild-assed shot with
his Sig 226.
    Nick’s shots were missing altogether.
“Do you have to hit every pothole, Watson? You drive like my Granny Mo. It’s
pissing me off.”
    “Not my fault this road is a
gonad smasher,” David complained. “I didn’t make it.”
    “Just get us back in one
piece.”
    “Copy that.”
    Breacher Billy Connor covered
their six. He stood in the ring mount, getting the missile launcher ready. He
fired off a round of ammo and tossed a grenade. The grenade hit its mark and a
hostile’s vehicle caught fire behind them. “Hooyah! One down.”
    “Nice. How about taking out the
other truck too? I’m sick of this shit.”
    Billy laughed. “You’re just
hungry, Nick. You get grumpy when you haven’t eaten your Wheaties.”
    They were returning from a
pre-sunrise scouting mission. Local HUMINT had said Taliban had moved back into
caves previously cleared by the Marines. Nick’s team had been asked to do a
little housecleaning and take out any trash that still remained. Everything had
been quiet in the caves. Apparently, human Intel had been mistaken, or it had
all been a set-up.  Sometimes it was tough to know the difference.
    “I am hungry. Let’s bury these
turds.” Nick leaned way out the window, aimed for the truck driver, and took
his shot. By the grace of God, Watson didn’t hit a pothole, and the bullet was
dead on. The truck swerved and went off the road.
    “And the last one bites the
dust,” Watson said. “I’ll slow down to stop jostling the junk—“
    “Hole!” Nick pointed at a
big-ass Humvee-swallowing hole in the middle of the road.
    “I see it.” Watson steered
around, going to the far left.
    “No!” Nick registered the
mistake in slow motion. “Turn, turn, turn! It’s a trap—” He grabbed the
steering wheel, but it was too little, too late.
    They drove right over a buried
IED. The fiery explosion lifted the Humvee off the ground and booted it into
the sky as if it were a plastic Tonka truck. The crash and rollover went on
forever. On the second complete 360 a thought flashed through Nick’s head—The
Only Easy Day Was Yesterday . Hell, why was the motto always true?
    Nick blacked out.
    He woke face down in the dirt
several feet from the Humvee. Everything was smoky, eerie, and silent. His ears
weren’t ringing—they were completely deaf. “Watson, Connor! Report!” he
screamed, blinking away the dirt and crap streaming out of his eyes.
    He tried to get up, but his legs
didn’t want to work right. He crawled to the left, hands outstretched, feeling
for David Watson in the pieces of the wreckage. He found him. His sniper hadn’t
survived the crash.
    “Son of a bitch!” He pounded the
ground with his fist and then stiffened when pain shot through his body. He was
hurt, how badly he didn’t know. He wouldn’t stop to find out. “Connor, where
are you, man? Report!”
    There was no answer. Or maybe
his screwed up eardrums couldn’t hear the answer. He’d go with that. Nick
crawled, sucking in great gulps of dusty, smoky air, ignoring the edges of
darkness creeping into his vision. He couldn’t pass out. Billy needed him.
    Humvee