All extraneous thought is banished. He focuses. He doesn't think. He simply employs his training. He will fight until his heart stops.
Total focus. This is it. All those years of sweat, of agony, of having someone screaming that you can't do something but actually expecting that you will do it better than anyone ever has. All for the next three minutes. Because that's probably how long it will take to declare a winner in this one encounter between desperate men. If you multiply all these individual fights to the death by a factor of a million it will add up to something called a war.
He lets their gunfire pass. The rounds ping off American Humvee armor. Others rip past his head sounding like miniature jet fighters. One grazes his left arm, a totally unremarkable wound among all the others. He will find out later that another rifle round whipsawed off the armor plates on his flak jacket, ricocheted off the toppled Humvee, reversed course, and found purchase in his neck after losing most of its juice. To the docs it will look like a big metal zit, right underneath the surface of his skin. Right now, he doesn't even notice. Doesn't care.
And then John Puller raises his weapon once more...
CHAPTER
23
AS ALWAYS, Puller didn't jerk awake. He simply eased off his thin mattress at Annie's Motel. He was in control, his movements measured, steady. He was not on the outskirts of Kandahar fighting turbaned killers. He was in American coal mining country looking for perhaps homegrown killers.
He didn't have to check his watch. His internal clock told him what he needed to know: 0430. He showered and took an extra thirty seconds under the hot water to lift the stench of a years-old memory. But it didn't work. It never did. He was just going through the motions. He dressed in what had quickly become his uniform here: jeans and CID polo shirt, but he substituted an old pair of his beige Army jump boots for the sneakers. It was already hot outside. It likely never grew cool overnight. But no matter how hot it ever became, nothing could come close to Afghanistan or Iraq in summer. That was a heat that was impossible to forget. Especially when it was fueled by diesel fire. By the screams of men burning to death. Turning black and raw and then disintegrating right in front of you.
His cell phone rang. The office. Or maybe Cole. Maybe something else had happened. He checked the ID on the screen. His expression changed from one of alertness to something else, something diminished.
"John Puller."
"You never called me back, XO."
"Out on a mission." He paused, but only for a second. "How you doing, General?"
John Puller Sr.'s voice was like the bark of a large, big-chested dog. It was an Army myth that the man could kill men simply with his voice, by making their hearts seize up with fear.
"You never called me back, XO," he said again, as though he hadn't heard Puller's reply.
"Was going to today, sir. Problems?"
"My command is going to shit."
Puller's father had had his sons later in life. He was seventy-five now and in failing health.
"You'll whip them back into shape. Always do. And they're good men. They'll respond. Rangers lead the way, General." Puller had long since given up trying to reason with his father, tell him that he no longer had a command of any kind. That he was old and sick and dying far faster than he believed. Or it might be the old warrior didn't think he was ever going to die.
"I need you down here. You can get them in line. Always count on you, XO."
Puller had joined the military on the tail end of his father's illustrious career. They had never served together. But the old man had kept a close eye on his youngest son's accomplishments. Things had not been made easier for him because of his connection to the lieutenant general. In fact, they had been made infinitely harder.
"Thank you, sir. But as I said, I'm on another mission." He paused again, checked his watch. He was behind schedule. He didn't like to use this card, but he did when he had to. "I saw Bobby the other day. He told me to tell you hello."
The line immediately went dead.
Puller closed the phone and slipped it into its holder on his belt. He sat there for a few more seconds, gazing down at his boots. He should go, he really should. Instead, he slid his wallet out of his pocket, flipped the photo out.
The three Puller men were all in a row. All tall, but John Jr. was the tallest, beating his old man out by a bare half inch. The general's face was carved from granite. The old man's eyes had been described as hollow-point ordnance with max loads. You could do pull-ups on his chin. He looked like Patton and MacArthur rolled into one, only bigger, meaner, and tougher. He'd been a son of a bitch as a general, and his men had loved him, died for him.
As a father he'd been a son of a bitch too. And his sons?
I love him. I would've died for him.
Senior had been the captain of the Army basketball team at West Point. They'd never won the championship during his father's four years. But every team they played went home bruised and battered. And those that ended up beating his father's team still probably felt like they'd lost. "Getting Pullered" was an expression often used back then. On the basketball court. On the battlefield. To the old man it was no doubt the same thing. He simply kicked the shit out of you until the buzzer sounded.
Or the armies ran out of ammo and bodies to throw at each other.
Puller's gaze held briefly on the spot in the photo just to the left of his father. There was no one there, though there should have been.
There should have been.
He put the photo away, gunned up and slipped on his CID jacket, and locked the door behind him.
The past is just that.
Gone.
CHAPTER
24
OUTSIDE, as Puller started to get in his ride, he saw the light on in the motel office. Being naturally curious, he decided to check. He eased the door open. The old lady was sitting in a chair in front of the counter. Her right hand gripped her chest. She looked scared, her chest heaving, her face reddening, with tinges of gray skirting the edges. as Puller started to get in his ride, he saw the light on in the motel office. Being naturally curious, he decided to check. He eased the door open. The old lady was sitting in a chair in front of the counter. Her right hand gripped her chest. She looked scared, her chest heaving, her face reddening, with tinges of gray skirting the edges.
He closed the door and moved closer. Her lips and the skin around her nose weren't blue. So no cyanosis.
Yet.
Puller slipped his phone from his pocket and thumbed 911 without looking at the pad.
"How long you been this way?" he asked her.
"'Bout ten minutes," she mumbled back.
He knelt beside her. "Happened before?"
"Not this bad in a long time. Then I had my quadruple at the hospital."
"Bad ticker, then?"
"Pretty bad, I think. Yeah. Surprised I lasted this long." She moaned, gripped her chest harder.
"Like a heavy weight there?"
She nodded.
"Any shooting pain in your arms?"
She shook her head. Tears dribbled out of her eyes.
A big sign of myocardial infarction was an elephant on the chest. Next big sign: sharp pain along the left arm. Not always the case and not always the left, particularly with women, but Puller wasn't going to wait for it to happen.
The dispatcher came on the line. Puller described the situation in staccato sentences containing precise details and closed the phone.
"They're on their way."
"I'm scared," she said, her voice breaking.
"I know. But you're going to be okay."
He felt her pulse. Weak. No surprise there. Bad pump meant reduced blood flow, and that equaled a crappy pulse. A stroke was also possible with someone her age. She felt cold, clammy. The veins in her neck were bulging. Another bad sign. She might be clotting.
"Just nod or shake your head. You nauseous?"
She nodded.
"Can't catch your breath?"
She nodded again.
He said, "You on any meds for your heart?"
She nodded again. He could see beads of cold sweat lining her brow like a nearly invisible pearl necklace. "I got some nitro too. But couldn't get to 'em."
"How about aspirin?"
"Same place."
"Tell me where."
"Bedroom nightstand." She pointed with a shaky finger to her left.
Puller was back in ten seconds with the bottles of pills in hand.
He gave her aspirin with some water. If she had a clot, aspirin was a good way to prevent platelet clumping. And it kicked in fast. And it didn't screw with your blood pressure.
The problem with nitro was that it only treated symptoms, not the underlying coronary disease. It would help with her chest pain, but if her blood pressure was already low the nitro would push it lower still; that's just the way it worked. That could significantly worsen the heart problem and also cause organ shutdown. He couldn't risk that. He had to know first.
"You have a blood pressure cuff here?"
She nodded, pointed to a shelf behind the counter.
It was one of those battery-operated devices with a digital readout. He grabbed it, slipped it on her right upper arm, hit the on switch, and watched the cuff inflate. He read the results.
Not good. Pretty low already. Nitro might kill her.
He looked her over. No sign of retaining fluids, swollen feet, or vascular problems. "You on any diuretics?"
She shook her head.
"I'll be back in ten seconds," he said.
He raced to his Malibu, popped the trunk, grabbed his first aid bag, and ran back, his long legs chewing up the distance.
When he got back she looked worse. If the heart crashed now, the EMTs, instead of saving her, would pronounce her dead when they arrived.
He opened the kit, readied his equipment. He talked to her the whole time, trying to keep the old woman calm. One ear listened for the ambulance.
He had done triage in the middle of nowhere with guys who looked like red chunks of meat. He had saved some, lost others. He had made up his mind he was not going to lose her.
Puller swabbed her arm with alcohol, found a good vein, and inserted the needle, taping it securely to the inside of her forearm with white medical adhesive. He screwed the other end of the line into the IV bag of saline he'd pulled from his kit. Fluids got the blood pressure up. Same method the docs used to save Reagan after he'd been shot. It was a liter bag with an eighteen-gauge line. It was a gravity feed. He held it above her head and opened the feed wide. It would take twenty minutes to empty the bag. She had five liters of blood total. A liter of saline would boost her by twenty percent.
When the bag was half empty he punched the on button on the cuff again. He read the numbers. Both were up to safer levels. Whether safe enough he didn't know, but he didn't have much choice. She was gripping her chest tighter. Her moans both deepened and lengthened.
He said, "Open your mouth." She did and he slipped the nitro tablet under her tongue.
The nitro pop worked. A minute later she was calming; her chest stopped heaving. She took her hand away from it. With heart distress, your artery was undergoing spasms. The nitro knocked that out. With the spasms gone lots of good things could happen, at least until the ambulance arrived.
"Take long, deep breaths. Paramedics are on the way. Aspirin, nitro, and fluids have helped. You're looking better. You're going to be fine. Not your time yet."
He hit the cuff button again. Read the numbers. Both up. Both better. Her color was improving. It was a mini-miracle in the middle of coal country.
"Hospital is a long way away," she gasped. "Should've moved closer."
He grinned. "We all have regrets."
She smiled weakly, took his hand. He let her squeeze it as hard as she wanted. Her fingers were tiny, weak. He barely felt the pressure, like a rippling breeze. He could see her face relax. Her teeth were yellowed, black in places, gaps in other places, and nearly all the remaining teeth were crooked. And yet it was a nice smile. He appreciated seeing it.
"You're a good egg," she said.
"Anything you need taken care of around here? Anybody I should call for you?"