Page 85 of Under Fire

Brooke turned the camera back to the little girl, who was starting to hyperventilate.

“I love you so much,” Warren assured her, hearing people calling for him in the background. “I’ll be back before you know it.”

“Promise?”

“I promise,” he said with a confident smile that he didn’t feel, coinciding with an ugly realization.

He’d already missed so much of her life. How much more was he going to miss?

Then Brooke ended the call, texting him that she would do her best to work with Katy on the situation, asking him to keep in touch.

Struggling, Warren put his phone away, unable to even think of calling Alisa. He couldn’t take anymore. Gazing over the airfield, he sucked in dry, desert air. He liked that air.

He settled back into work mode…into focus. As he marched toward the plane, signaling to his crew, he felt a sense of comfort settling into his chest. Warren turned to see Master Chief Rose standing nearby in fatigues.

“Chief.”

“Sir.” Warren nodded amid the busy scene on the tarmac.

“Your retention bonus was approved,” the master chief said. “Commensurate with your rank and amount of service, a fresh two-hundred-and-fifty thousand should be sitting in your account this morning.”

Warren pretended to laugh at the quip, nodding his head in understanding.

“It’s a small price to pay,” the master chief continued, “to have you sign up for another five years of service.”

The truth was that it was a small price to pay to get Alisa out of debt, Warren thought. To get her safe. That retention bonus was going to be withdrawn nearly as soon as it was deposited.

“If I wasn’t in service, what the hell would I be doing?” Warren shrugged.

His attempt at humor was met by a dark look from the master chief.

“What about a life? What abouther?”

Warren shook him off. “Guys like me—this is all I’ve got. This is all I’ll ever have. My brothers are out there, fighting. I need to be with them. I need to be fighting.”

“I don’t believe that. Neither should you.”

“I’ve got to do this.” Warren motioned his chin up at the plane.

“You arechoosingthis life.”

“I don’t have a choice anymore.”

Warren knew that he’d made his bed. He’d issued that check, taken that bonus. Things were already in motion that couldn’t be stopped. He was going.

He turned to march to the plane. No one understood why he’d chosen to go back to that same place, deployment after deployment—why he kept fighting, why he couldn’t let go.

Warren motioned orders at his crew. As he drew closer to the plane, he stopped dead on the tarmac, glaring around. He always did that—one more look at his home soil in case he never came back.

Stomping up the plane’s ramp, he addressed his men, getting guys settled. Then, he signaled to the airfield crew to draw the ramp up. It was time. They were ready to go. The plane’s engine roared in preparation.

For the first time in a thousand deployments, all he could think of was how weird it was leaving when, for the first time, he was realizing how much he meant to a few key people back home—Alisa and Katy.

They love me.

He felt something crack in his chest, forcing him to buckle forward. Shooting out his arm, he growled at the airfield doorman.

“Wait.” He motioned to stop the ramp.

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