"Forget Me Not"
A Warner Forever Release
December 2004
ISBN: 0-446-61482-3
©2004 by Marliss Melton
Suddenly, Miller pivoted. The butt of his Heckler and Koch flashed before Gabe’s eyes and made stunning impact with Gabe’s right cheek. Pain lanced through him. He staggered back, losing his footing on the oil-slick floor, and went down hard, the air knocked out of him. He tasted blood in his mouth.
What the fuck?
Miller bent over him, grabbed him by the belt, and turned him forcibly onto his stomach. Gabe struggled to inflate his lungs. He struck out a foot, landing a blow to the XO’s knee. The man cursed and grabbed him harder.
The pain in Gabe’s head seemed to swell, making thought impossible. What the hell is happening? He couldn’t get beyond the question. Why was Miller turning on him? A tie-tie, a plastic cuff, snared his left wrist, then his right. Blood filled his mouth. He spat out a tooth and sucked a painful breath into his lungs. “What the hell are you doing, Miller?” he growled, thrashing as the man groped in the dark to latch his ankles together.
Miller didn’t answer him. Through the waves of pain beating at his skull, Gabe was aware that Miller had immobilized him. The gunfire that had compelled their retreat had ceased. That held some significance, but in his pain-filled haze, Gabe couldn’t fathom what it was.
Miller yanked his head back. Gabe could feel a tremor in the man’s hands as he fumbled with duct tape. A sticky strip imprisoned his mouth, making speech impossible. He gagged on the blood that had nowhere to go but down his throat.
Miller released him and turned away. Gabe watched with dawning horror as the man stepped into the open and gave an all-clear gesture to the men on the crosswalks. Over the pounding in his head, Gabe heard their approach.
But his eyes were glued to Miller’s back as he grappled with the realization that his own XO was the one stealing weapons worldwide. For months now, SEALs had gone to interdicts various armaments, only to find them missing. And it was Miller who was stealing them. Weak-willed, sallow-faced Miller!
He could hardly believe it. But there he was, telling the shadowy figures around him to take the SAM in its packaging out the side exit and be quick about it.
Gabe fought to remain conscious, to identify the other looters. But the darkness hovering at the corners of his eyes warned him that he was about to pass out. Miller turned, looking at him one more time before he, too, drifted away, presumably to rendezvous with Gabe’s unwitting teammates.
Gabe lay with his left cheek in a puddle of oil. The NVGs had been knocked askew and were lying across his right ear. His arms and legs were bound. His mouth continued to bleed. He would never have the chance to tell the world who was stealing weapons.
For whatever reason, Miller had left him here to die. Why? It took a moment for his battered brain to supply an answer. It had to be the memo he’d found on Miller’s desk pertaining to the requisition of an additional sub. He’d queried Miller about it, thinking the man was too inept to know that one sub provided sufficient cargo space for four missiles. He’d never suspected his XO was plotting to take one for himself.
With oil oozing between his eyelids and into his Kevlar diving suit, Gabe heard a noise that made every hair on his head stand on end. Someone somewhere struck a match. And he realized, if he couldn’t find a way to get out of there, he was going to burn like coal doused in lighter fluid.
He didn’t know what was worse--burning alive or realizing he’d never have the chance to tell Helen he loved her.