Sealed with a promise Read online

  “Ta­ke him down, Do-Lord,” Jax or­de­red qu­i­etly.

  The rif­le the bad guy ho­is­ted wasn’t ter­ribly ac­cu­ra­te, and it was pro­ne to jam­ming, Do-Lord as­ses­sed with ab­sen­t­min­ded pro­fes­si­ona­lism. The man held the sho­ul­der on which he res­ted the stock too high. Not a pro­fes­si­onal then. May­be not tra­ined. Vic and Lit­tlet­ree we­re con­ver­ging on him, but the as­sas­sin co­uld pro­bably get a few ro­unds off be­fo­re they tac­k­led him.

  It was Do-Lord’s an­s­wer. The ter­ro­rist was a we­apon al­re­ady aimed at the man Do-Lord wan­ted de­ad. One slight he­si­ta­ti­on. The ter­ro­rist co­uld be the in­s­t­ru­ment of Do-Lord’s re­ven­ge.

  Jax wo­uldn’t or­der an­yo­ne el­se to fi­re in­to a crowd this den­se, but the ter­ro­rist men­ta­lity had no such scrup­les. He wo­uldn’t ca­re how many of his own pe­op­le wo­uld be cut down by the spray of bul­lets. He didn’t ca­re that his was a su­ici­de mis­si­on. He pro­bably didn’t ca­re whet­her he kil­led the se­na­tor or not. His obj­ect was to ca­use fe­ar, dis­rupt nor­mal li­fe, and for­ce the U.S. to tie up re­so­ur­ces.

  “Do- Lord, ta­ke him down,” Jax re­pe­ated. His vo­ice so­un­ded al­most bo­red, but fle­xib­le and de­adly as a ra­pi­er, it cut an­y­way.

  Do- Lord co­uld see run­nels of swe­at ma­king lig­h­ter stre­aks thro­ugh the dirt on the man’s che­eks. From the mo­ment he had the tan­go in his sco­pe Do-Lord had be­en un­con­s­ci­o­usly trac­king his own slow he­ar­t­be­ats. He in­ha­led, fo­und the spa­ce bet­we­en one he­ar­t­be­at and the next, and squ­e­ezed the trig­ger.

  “What the hell to­ok you so long?” Jax as­ked. Sho­ul­der-to-sho­ul­der they we­re jam­med in­to the Hum­vee to be tran­s­por­ted back to the ba­se on the out­s­kirts of the city ne­ar the air­port.

  “Co­uldn’t get a cle­ar shot.”

  SE­ALs lie. They suc­ce­ed in the­ir dan­ge­ro­us and de­adly work by not ap­pe­aring whe­re they are ex­pec­ted and by not be­ing what they ap­pe­ar to be. A cyni­cal SE­AL sa­ying was: “Ne­ver tell the truth, when a lie will do as well.”

  Lying didn’t bot­her Do-Lord. He hadn’t told the truth much sin­ce he was ten ye­ars old. But un­til now, he’d ne­ver li­ed to Jax. Do-Lord pas­sed a hand over his fa­ce, pres­sing his thumbs aga­inst his eyes, fig­h­ting the ur­ge to we­ep.

  “God, I’m ti­red,” he sa­id.

  “Ye­ah,” sa­id Jax, slum­ping be­si­de him. “And we’ve lost al­most twel­ve of the twen­ty-fo­ur ho­urs we had to get squ­ared away be­fo­re we le­ave.”

  “Grab so­me rack ti­me when we hit the ba­se. I’ll wri­te yo­ur af­ter-ac­ti­on re­port for you.”

  Jax grum­b­led and sho­ok his he­ad.

  “Shut up.” Do-Lord cuf­fed him lightly on the arm. “You know I wri­te bet­ter than you do. I can do it in half the ti­me. It’ll be wa­iting for yo­ur sig­na­tu­re be­fo­re chow.”

  Jax didn’t an­s­wer, but pac­ked to­get­her as they we­re, Do-Lord felt him re­lax and his bre­at­hing be­co­me mo­re re­gu­lar. To let Jax nap for a few mi­nu­tes, Do-Lord an­g­led his sho­ul­der to bra­ce his fri­end aga­inst the jolts of a ro­ad that was mo­re pot­ho­le than pa­ve­ment.

  In his bo­nes he still felt the de­ep tre­mors whe­re past and pre­sent, li­ke tec­to­nic pla­tes, gro­und to­get­her. When he’d ma­de his vow, he’d be­en thin­king li­ke a kid, bo­iling with a vi­olent com­po­und of gri­ef and te­ena­ge tes­tos­te­ro­ne, pres­su­ri­zed by his she­er po­wer­les­sness.

  But he wasn’t a kid an­y­mo­re.

  He had a pro­mi­se to ke­ep. It was ti­me he stop­ped re­ac­ting and star­ted thin­king li­ke a SE­AL.

  Chapter 1

  Lit­tle Cre­ek, Vir­gi­nia

  Fu­ne­rals, yes. He’d pul­led ho­nor gu­ard duty at too many of them. But in all his thir­ty-two ye­ars, Ca­leb “Do-Lord” Du­la­ude had ne­ver at­ten­ded a wed­ding. In a sur­p­ri­se de­ve­lop­ment, ba­rely fo­ur months sin­ce the pla­to­on’s re­turn from the ‘Stan, Jax was get­ting mar­ri­ed, and Do-Lord had to be the best man at one.

  Mel­low No­vem­ber sun­s­hi­ne tric­k­led in­to his cu­bic­le from the win­dow in the hal­lway, and his sto­mach grow­led. He pus­hed back the cuff of his gray and tan de­sert ca­mo BDU’s to check his watch then rif­led the pa­ges of the eti­qu­et­te bo­ok open on his desk to see if he had a chan­ce of fi­nis­hing it in ti­me to get so­me lunch.

  His bat­te­red 2002 Blu­e­j­ac­ket’s Gu­ide, a chi­ef petty of­fi­cer’s bib­le, spe­ci­fi­ed in de­ta­il how to ren­der mi­li­tary ho­nors at a fu­ne­ral, but it hadn’t hel­ped much with a wed­ding. It sa­id very lit­tle abo­ut his du­ti­es du­ring the ce­re­mony, only that he wo­uld be in char­ge of the arch of swords, which wo­uld ta­ke pla­ce out­si­de the church. He fi­gu­red the­re was a lot mo­re to a wed­ding than that, es­pe­ci­al­ly among the up­per-crust of North Ca­ro­li­na.

  This bo­ok on eti­qu­et­te was the third he’d re­ad. In his palm pi­lot he had a twen­ty-six item list of his du­ti­es as best man. He wo­uldn’t ne­ces­sa­rily ne­ed to know all, but it was al­ways the lit­tle things that got you kil­led. Sin­ce he had no idea which de­ta­ils wo­uld pro­ve to be cru­ci­al, he ig­no­red the rum­b­ling of his sto­mach.

  Har­der to ig­no­re we­re his bo­re­dom with what he re­ad and the tiny nig­gle of fe­ar that the two sta­ves on which he had de­pen­ded, fe­eding his mind’s thirst for in­for­ma­ti­on and the en­g­ros­sment of SE­AL li­fe, we­re fa­iling him.

  The tall whi­te ca­ke typi­cal­ly ser­ved at wed­ding re­cep­ti­ons to­day was on­ce the bri­de’s ca­ke, whe­re­as the wed­ding ca­ke was a fru­it­ca­ke, fil­led with nuts…

  “I lo­oked for you in the NCO mess.” Burly Mas­ter Chi­ef Lon Swa­les, al­so dres­sed in ca­mo, in­ter­rup­ted him. From the first, al­t­ho­ugh he didn’t ta­ke well to re­gu­la­ti­ons, Do-Lord had lo­ved the Navy’s pres­c­ri­bed dress co­de for every oc­ca­si­on. He al­ways knew exactly what to we­ar in or­der not to draw at­ten­ti­on to him­self. “What are you mis­sing lunch to re­ad?”

  Do- Lord slid the yel­low hig­h­lig­h­ter thro­ugh his fin­gers whi­le he con­si­de­red lying. His fel­low SE­ALs ac­cep­ted his re­ading ma­nia. He had a pa­per­back stas­hed in a poc­ket an­y­ti­me he wasn’t in com­bat ge­ar-and a lot of ti­mes when he was. In des­pe­ra­ti­on, af­ter he’d ex­ha­us­ted all ot­her prin­ted mat­ter, he’d even re­ad pa­per­back ro­man­ces whi­le in Af­g­ha­nis­tan. Sin­ce pic­tu­res of scan­tily clad wo­men we­re of­fen­si­ve to Mus­lims, the co­vers of many had be­en torn off, ad­ding a new la­yer of me­aning to the term “bo­di­ce rip­per.”

  Ever­yo­ne wo­uld re­al­ly razz him, if they fo­und out he’d mo­ved on to eti­qu­et­te bo­oks. On the ot­her hand, the raz­zing wo­uld be wor­se if the guys le­ar­ned he’d li­ed abo­ut re­ading up on eti­qu­et­te.

  “Emily Post. Re­se­arch. Bo­ning up for Jax’s wed­ding.”

  The we­at­he­red skin aro­und the Mas­ter Chi­ef’s eyes fol­ded in­to de­ep crow’s fe­et, and his lips qu­ir­ked, but the ex­pec­ted te­asing didn’t co­me. In­s­te­ad, with per­fect se­ri­o­us­ness, he as­ked, “Ha­ve you re­ad Ser­vi­ce Eti­qu­et­te?”

  “Swartz, Fo­urth Edi­ti­on? Re­ad it first. When I’m in­vi­ted to the Whi­te Ho­use, I’ll sho’nuff do you pro­ud.”

  Lon chuc­k­led at Do-Lord’s ton­gue-in-che­ek re­fe­ren­ce to the fact that Ser­vi­ce Eti­qu­et­te co­ve­red pro­to­col for every so­ci­al oc­ca­si­on a per­son in the mi­li­tary co­uld en­co­un­ter, no mat­ter how un­li­kely. “Stran­ger things ha­ve hap­pe­ned.” He to­ok a se­at in the stra­ight me­tal cha­ir in front of Do-Lord’s desk, and in
an al­most gen­t­le vo­ice he as­ked, “How’s it go­ing?”

  “Tell you what…” Ca­leb let the sen­ten­ce hang whi­le he tos­sed the hig­h­lig­h­ter on the desk and rol­led his desk cha­ir back to stretch out his legs. “It’s bo­ring as hell, but it’s not as bad as that out­bo­ard mo­tor ser­vi­ce ma­nu­al you ma­de us re­ad du­ring Hell We­ek.”

  Do- Lord saw with sa­tis­fac­ti­on he’d struck the right no­te with the Mas­ter Chi­ef. Twel­ve ye­ars ago, Lon had be­en a BUD/S in­s­t­ruc­tor to the class that in­c­lu­ded Jax, an en­sign, and Do-Lord, ex­cept he hadn’t ear­ned his nic­k­na­me yet.

  “Hey, I was just trying to help you stay awa­ke.” Lon set­tled in­to his cha­ir and ho­oked his thumbs over his belt, his in­no­cent to­ne be­li­ed by a de­vi­lish grin.

  “Ye­ah, right.” Du­ring Hell We­ek the tra­ine­es we­re al­lo­wed a to­tal of fo­ur ho­urs sle­ep. Du­ring so-cal­led rest pe­ri­ods, harsh con­se­qu­en­ces wo­uld des­cend on an­yo­ne who fell as­le­ep and on all tho­se ne­ar who al­lo­wed him to nod off. Lis­te­ning whi­le so­me­one re­ad alo­ud was bad eno­ugh, sin­ce few pe­op­le did it well. Trying to stay alert whi­le bo­ring ma­te­ri­al was re­ad alo­ud wo­uld turn the­ir few mi­nu­tes of res­pi­te in­to tor­tu­re.

  Lon’s ex­p­res­si­on grew tho­ug­h­t­ful, his eyes on a dis­tant past. “Until that night I didn’t think you we­re go­ing to gra­du­ate. So­me guys ne­ver get it that be­ing a SE­AL isn’t abo­ut ta­king pu­nis­h­ment, or en­du­ran­ce, or even be­ing the best or the bad­dest.”

  Tho­ugh fe­wer than twenty per­cent gra­du­ated from the to­ug­hest tra­ining in the world, it wasn’t be­ca­use in­s­t­ruc­tors tri­ed to wash a tra­inee out. They did, ho­we­ver, use any me­ans to ma­ke a tra­inee awa­re of his we­ak are­as and the ne­ed to over­co­me them. “You we­re do­ing yo­ur part, but that’s all you we­re do­ing. For all the physi­cal stuff we do, ul­ti­ma­tely, ma­king a SE­AL is men­tal. A man must de­ci­de he’s per­so­nal­ly res­pon­sib­le for the suc­cess of the te­am and the wel­fa­re of every mem­ber. He has to find wit­hin him­self wha­te­ver ma­kes him ab­le to do that. You we­re hol­ding back, si­de-step­ping op­por­tu­ni­ti­es for le­ader­s­hip, let­ting yo­ur bo­at crew not do as well as they might ha­ve, be­ca­use you didn’t li­ke be­ing no­ti­ced.” Lon’s eyes twin­k­led. “So we no­ti­ced you-a lot.”

  “That’s why you han­ded me the ma­nu­al to re­ad alo­ud!” Un­til this mo­ment, Du­la­ude had ne­ver sus­pec­ted the in­s­t­ruc­tors had in­ten­ded to ma­ke him un­com­for­table by sin­g­ling him out. He sho­uted with la­ug­h­ter at the do­ub­le irony. For Du­la­ude, be­ing ma­de to re­ad was a “get out of ja­il free” card. Thin­king only of him­self, he had known exactly how Br’er Rab­bit felt in the bri­ar patch. He co­uld easily pre­tend to mum­b­le thro­ugh it.

  “Yup. We fi­gu­red you’d be mi­se­rab­le trying to re­ad alo­ud, and you’d ma­ke ever­y­body el­se mi­se­rab­le.” Lon chuc­k­led in re­mi­nis­cen­ce.

  But Du­la­ude had lo­oked out at the fa­ces of the men gat­he­red in the mess hall at 3:00 a.m. Of a star­ting class of one hun­d­red twen­ty-ni­ne, aro­und fifty red-eyed, bat­te­red men re­ma­ined. Mo­re wo­uld qu­it be­fo­re the night was over, be­ca­use the pa­in, cold, and ex­ha­us­ti­on wo­uld only get wor­se. Whi­te with fa­ti­gue, sho­ul­ders slum­ped, ne­it­her ho­pe­ful nor in­te­res­ted, lon­ging only for sle­ep, they had wat­c­hed him with fa­ces set to en­du­re.

  Except for Jax. His eyes had be­en so blo­od­s­hot he lo­oked li­ke a cre­atu­re from a hor­ror mo­vie, but still they lit with ex­pec­ta­ti­on. He se­emed to think Du­la­ude in­ten­ded to do so­met­hing to ke­ep them awa­ke.

  Du­la­ude had glan­ced down at the ma­nu­al Chi­ef Swa­les had stuf­fed in his hands. Gray print on flimsy gray pa­per, it was de­sig­ned to blind any re­ader it didn’t ren­der co­ma­to­se. Ho­we­ver, Du­la­ude co­uld re­ad a pa­ge at a glan­ce and had so­met­hing clo­se to eide­tic me­mory. Up to now, he had con­ce­aled his re­ading abi­lity as he had his re­al IQ. He had le­ar­ned early that both ma­de him stand out, and dra­wing the at­ten­ti­on of aut­ho­ri­ti­es was ne­ver a go­od thing.

  A crazy idea ca­me to him, one that wo­uld blow his “ave­ra­ge” co­ver fo­re­ver, but wo­uld get ever­yo­ne el­se thro­ugh the next fif­te­en mi­nu­tes.

  “My brot­hers-s! Lis­ten-n to the word-d of the na­val com­mand-d,” he be­gan with the over-ar­ti­cu­la­ted ca­den­ces of a tent pre­ac­her. “Ve­rily I say un­to you, this”-he wa­ved the ma­nu­al-“is what you must know abo­ut the 175 hor­se­po­wer fo­ur-st­ro­ke out­bo­ard, and if you ha­ve fa­ith, it is all you ne­ed to know.”

  A mur­mur went thro­ugh the as­sem­b­led men, a rus­t­le, as awa­re­ness that so­met­hing no­vel was hap­pe­ning pe­net­ra­ted the­ir ti­red bra­ins.

  “The out­bo­ard is se­cu­red with fo­ur three-inch bolts- fo­ur, did you he­ar me brot­hers, fo­ur!”

  “Pre­ach it, brot­her!” yel­led Jax, a hu­ge grin bre­aking ac­ross his fa­ce.

  “Hal­le­lu­j­ah!” so­me­one in the back exul­ted.

  “Which sho­uld al­ways be tig­h­te­ned-”

  As they ca­ught on to the joke, mo­re jo­ined in­to the ir­re­ve­rent fun. The­ir in­s­t­ruc­tors did pur­sue sa­fety and equ­ip­ment ma­in­te­nan­ce with so­met­hing clo­se to re­li­gi­o­us fer­vor.

  “Be­fo­re and af­ter each use-”

  “Thank you, Jesus!”

  “Or af­ter fo­ur ho­urs elap­sed run­ning ti­me.”

  “I be­li­eve! I be­li­eve!”

  “Pra­ise the Lord!”

  “Ye­ah. Pra­ise Du­lu­ade!” Jax ad­ded.

  Lon ro­se la­ug­hing. In­s­t­ruc­tors ma­de tra­ining as to­ugh as they co­uld, but they glo­ri­ed to see tra­ine­es de­mon­s­t­ra­te the out-of-the-box thin­king that was the SE­ALs’ hal­lmark. “Met­calf, le­ad us in a clo­sing hymn.”

  “I’ve got a ho­me in glory-land that out­s­hi­nes the sun.” Met­calf’s rich ba­ri­to­ne be­gan the old chur­ch-camp song, so easy an­yo­ne co­uld sing along. When he got to the cho­rus of “Do, Lord, oh do, Lord, oh do, re­mem­ber me,” the mess hall rang with clap­ping and stom­ping.

  “That’s when the guys nic­k­na­med you Do-Lord, isn’t it?” Lon bro­ke in on Do-Lord’s tra­in of tho­ught, re­tur­ning him to the pre­sent. “And you and Jax ha­ve be­en fri­ends sin­ce BUD/S.”

  “Ye­ah, the Phi­la­del­p­hi­an with a sil­ver spo­on in his mo­uth and the Ala­ba­ma crac­ker, ra­ised in tra­iler lo­ca­ted on the hind end of now­he­re.”

  The ol­der man’s eyes shar­pe­ned. “Ala­ba­ma?”

  “Su­re. You knew that,” Do-Lord de­epe­ned his drawl. “That’s why I talk this way.”

  Lon snor­ted and cros­sed his arms over his chest. “How much you drawl de­pends on how much bul­lshit you’re spre­ading.”

  Do- Lord nod­ded gra­vely. “That too. Why did you co­me lo­oking for me?”

  “I just got the re­port on Del­vec­chio’s con­di­ti­on.”

  “Car­mi­ne? How is he?” Car­mi­ne was a tra­inee who had fi­nis­hed BUD/S but who still had a six-month ap­pren­ti­ces­hip to ser­ve be­fo­re he wo­uld be a full-fled­ged SE­AL, re­ady to ope­ra­te.

  Lon to­ok a de­ep bre­ath, eyes squ­in­ted with pa­in. “He’s be­en mo­ved to Bet­hes­da. He’s got le­uke­mia.”

  “ What?” Do-Lord’s eyes nar­ro­wed in dis­be­li­ef. “I told him to re­port for sick call-th­ree, fo­ur days ago, but I didn’t think an­y­t­hing was wrong with him. I was ti­red of him sa­ying he was ti­red.” Do-Lord slam­med the stu­pid bo­ok on eti­qu­et­te shut, dis­gus­ted that he had be­en stud­ying the so
­ci­al cus­toms of the up­per class whi­le a man he was res­pon­sib­le for had be­en se­ri­o­usly ill, and he hadn’t re­ali­zed it. “I tho­ught he was gol­d­b­ric­king. Sho­wing up la­te lo­oking li­ke hell. Pho­ning in his PT.” Do-Lord pus­hed his ha­ir back from his fo­re­he­ad, a ges­tu­re left over from Af­g­ha­nis­tan. Dark red ha­ir li­ke his wasn’t un­com­mon among Af­g­ha­nis, so whi­le the­re he’d let it grow, and with his mo­re rangy than stocky bu­ild he’d blen­ded in bet­ter than so­me of the dar­ker guys. SE­ALs, who might ha­ve to le­ave the co­untry un­der­co­ver at any ti­me, we­re al­lo­wed re­la­xed gro­oming stan­dards, but Do-Lord had cut his ha­ir as so­on as he re­tur­ned to the U.S. “The po­or SOB.”

  “Cut yo­ur­self so­me slack. You to­ok the ap­prop­ri­ate ac­ti­on when you had ca­use to do so. You know how the­se gung-ho kids try to co­ver up.”

  “That’s right. I do know.” Do-Lord wasn’t go­ing to let him­self off the ho­ok. “I’ve se­en men trying to run on bro­ken legs and sho­wing up for roll call with one-hun­d­red-fo­ur-deg­ree tem­pe­ra­tu­res. I sho­uld ha­ve sus­pec­ted so­met­hing el­se was go­ing on.” Do-Lord felt li­ke bre­aking so­met­hing, but SE­ALs don’t ma­ke vi­olent ges­tu­res. When they’re vi­olent, it’s for re­al.

  “I sho­uld ha­ve be­en pa­ying bet­ter at­ten­ti­on to his mo­ti­va­ti­on.” Ma­in­ta­ining smo­oth fun­c­ti­on of the te­am on a day-to-day ba­sis was do­ne by chi­efs. The blend of skills and per­so­na­li­ti­es that wo­uld meld a pack of all-al­p­ha dogs in­to a co­ope­ra­ting te­am was as dif­fi­cult to anal­y­ze as an al­c­he­mi­cal for­mu­la. A man who­se per­for­man­ce was lac­k­lus­ter might be out­s­tan­ding if as­sig­ned to a dif­fe­rent gro­up. “And don’t bot­her re­min­ding me the pla­to­on Jax led in Af­g­ha­nis­tan was tight,” Do-Lord went on. “Unu­su­al­ly so, even for SE­ALs. It’s bre­aking up now, scat­te­ring to dif­fe­rent posts. It’s nor­mal for us to re­sent the new guy, al­t­ho­ugh he isn’t the ca­use of the chan­ges. It wo­uldn’t be ra­ti­onal to ex­pect him to fit in.”