Billings studied the faces of the men on his fire team and toggled the transmit button of his radio. “Russo. You copy?”

“Loud and clear, Lieutenant. “At twenty-five years old, Russo was an old man compared to the eighteen-to nineteen-year-olds on his fire team, but not nearly as old as Billings, who was twenty-eight.

Billings heard the beep tone that indicated Russo had taken his finger off his transmit button and said, “This might not exactly be a routine check-in-on-the-children op. Let’s be very careful on this one.”

“We’re careful on every one.”

Billings smiled. Russo was right. They had one of the best platoons in Iraq. They’d been in country for three months and had chalked up some impressive wins against the bad guys and no one had suffered so much as a hangnail. “Just the same, there’s something about this that doesn’t feel right. Make sure your guys stay focused.”

“Will do, Lieutenant. In fact, if Alpha team would rather stay nice and cozy inside their vehicle, I’m sure those of us with Bravo team would have no trouble sorting this one out. “There was a chorus of chuckles from the men inside Russo’s Stryker.

“Not on your life, Sergeant,” replied Billings with a smile. “When we get in there, you make sure your men watch and learn from us.”

“Hooyah, Lieutenant.”

Billings turned to the men inside his Stryker and said, “Gentlemen, Sergeant Russo seems to think we’re not needed today. He says Bravo team can handle the assignment themselves.”

“Fuck Bravo team,” said a young private named Steve Schlesinger.

Normally, Billings wouldn’t put up with language like that, but he liked his men to get pumped up before going into potentially dangerous situations. Besides, eighteen-year-old Schlesinger was their shining star. He had uncovered and helped defuse more improvised explosive devices in the last month than anyone in Iraq over the last year. The kid had a sixth sense for danger, and despite the fact that he was from Chicago and thought the Cubs were a better team than the Milwaukee Brewers, Billings liked him.

“Okay then,” replied Billings. “We’re all agreed?”

A chorus of “Fuck Bravo team” resounded throughout the lead Stryker. It was good-natured competition, and Billings knew his men well enough to know that when boots hit the ground, it didn’t matter what team they were on, the men were all brothers united against a common enemy. He had no doubt Russo was whipping his men up as well.

As Billings felt their Stryker slowing down, he knew it was only a matter of moments before they would have to step outside and try to figure out what the hell was going on.

THREE

When the Strykers finally came to a halt in the center of the village, the soldiers jumped out and took up defensive firing positions. Though no one said anything, they were all feeling the same thing having made a complete circuit of Asalaam. There wasn’t a single living soul in sight, and it had put everyone on edge.

Justin Stokes, a young, skinny private from San Diego who had a bad habit of engaging his mouth before his brain, said, “Maybe it’s siesta time.”

“At 10:30 in the morning?” replied six-foot-four Private Rodney Cooper from Tampa. “Stokes, my grandmother doesn’t even take a nap at 10:30 in the morning.”

“Whatever it is,” said Stokes, “something about this place isn’t right.”

“It’s fucked up is what it is,” added Schlesinger. “Where the hell are all the people?”

“That’s what we’re here to find out,” replied Lieutenant Billings, cutting the crosstalk short. “We’re in the game now, so let’s keep communications on an as-needed basis.”

“Yes sir, Lieutenant,” the men responded as Billings walked over to where Russo was standing. He was using the reflex sight on his M4 to look for any movement at the far end of the road.

“What do you think, Jimmy?” asked Billings.

“I think it’s too quiet,” said Russo as he lowered his weapon.

“Maybe we’re looking at an ambush.”

“I don’t think so. If somebody was going to hit us, it would have already happened.”

“So what the hell’s going on, then? Where are all the villagers?”

Russo double-checked his firing selector and said, “I don’t know, and I’ve got a feeling I don’t particularly want to know. This village isn’t our problem. We’re here to check up on three American aid workers, so let’s do that and get the hell out of here.”

Billings studied the cracked, sun-baked facades of the mud brick houses up and down the narrow road, some with their doors and windows standing wide open, and agreed. “All right. Here’s what we’re going to do. I’ll take Alpha team to the building the missionaries were using as their health center. You and Bravo team do a house-to-house search, but no door kicking. If you find one that’s already open and no one responds to a polite knock, you and your men can go inside and look around, but tell them not to touch anything. We’ll meet back here in fifteen minutes. Got it?”

“Yes, sir. Fifteen minutes,” replied Russo, who then turned to his men and said, “We’re on. Let’s saddle up.”

One of the Strykers shadowed Bravo team along the main road, while the other followed Billings and his men as they walked a block over to a worn, low-rise building that looked like it might be a school or an administrative office.

“Provincial Ministry of Police,” said Private Mike Rodriguez, from upstate New York, as he read a faded sign above the doorway. He was the only one on the team, besides Russo, with a workable grasp of Arabic.

Billings looked at the one-sheet briefing he’d been given in Mosul and cursed. “Goddamn it. They’ve got this piece of shit map flipped around. We’re supposed to be a block over in the other direction.”

“Why don’t we take a look inside anyway?” said Stokes. “It’s an official building. Maybe there’s official information inside.”

“Which we haven’t been authorized to enter or look for,” replied Billings. “We’re here to do reconnaissance only. If we find an open door, we can go in, but if a door isn’t open, we’re not going to start kicking-”

Before Billings could finish his sentence, Cooper leaned into the flimsy, weather-beaten door with his massive shoulder and popped it off its hinges. As the team looked at him, he said with a smile, ”Somebody must have forgotten to lock up.”

“The hell they did,” replied Billings. “The next person who tries anything remotely-”The lieutenant was cut short by the overwhelming stench that poured out of the building.

“Jesus,” exclaimed Schlesinger. “Don’t these people know they’re supposed to put their garbage outside for pickup?”

Billings, a man all too acquainted with the smell of death, knew that they weren’t smelling garbage. “Cooper, Rodriguez, Schlesinger, and Stokes, you’re coming inside with me. The rest of you stand guard out here and keep your eyes peeled. The shit might hit the fan very quickly.”

“It smells like it already has,” said a redheaded private from Utah as he readied his weapon and took up his watch.

Tucking their noses into their tactical vests, Billings and his men stepped inside. After clearing the vestibule, Cooper kicked in the door of the pitch-black main office, and the rest of the team buttonhooked inside. A chorus of “Clear-Clear-Clear” rang out from the different members of the team as they swept through the room, guided by the beams of the SureFire tactical flashlights mounted on the Picatinny Rails of their M4s.

The reason the room was so dark soon became apparent. The windows had been completely covered with heavy wool blankets.

Rodriguez shot Schlesinger a puzzled look and whispered, “Are those supposed to be blackout curtains?”

Schlesinger traced the edge of one of the blankets with the beam of his flashlight and shrugged his shoulders in response.