Easy Day for the Dead (17 page)

Alex pulled himself out of slow motion and quickly walked out
of his room, hurried to Cat's room, and knocked on the door. No answer. He knocked again. No answer. He thought about returning to his room, but he knocked again. The door opened and there stood Cat. Her eyes were red.

“Can we talk?” Alex asked.

“I already told you, I'm through with you,” Cat said.

“But you said to come back when I was finished with Leila.”

“Did you screw her?”

“Can I come in? People might hear us.”

“Why? I want the whole world to hear what you are—a jackass.”

“No, we didn't have sex.”

“I'm not just talking about tonight.”

Alex didn't say anything.

Her face became hideous with anger. “That's what I thought!” Cat slammed the door in his face.

Alex heard laughter. He turned to see who it was.

Pancho and a redhead in a black raincoat stood arm in arm in the hallway. The raincoat was buttoned in the middle, but so many buttons were open at the top and bottom, and she showed so much skin, that it appeared she wasn't wearing anything under the raincoat. Pancho laughed at Alex. At six feet two, Pancho was tall, but his date was the same height as him. “Sorry, amigo,” Pancho said, “but that shit is just too funny.”

Alex wanted to punch him.

Pancho strained to stop laughing. “Come on, Xenia, let's see how fast we can drive on the autobahn.” He broke into laughter again as he led Xenia into his room.

Bastard.

A
lex slept on and off—mostly off. When Wednesday morning came, he was already awake. He checked his secure email. Although his team needed to launch the rescue mission as soon as possible, he secretly hoped for another day to try to fix things with Cat. When he saw there was no email, it gave him hope. He needed to show her that he was serious. All he needed was a chance.

He called John to ask him to give Leila shooting lessons. Who knew, maybe the two of them would be able to rekindle whatever they'd started at the kitchen table.

Alex showered, shaved, picked up a large manila envelope with information about Cat's role on the mission, and headed out the door. On his way to Cat's room, he spied a
DO NOT DISTURB
door hanger lying sideways on the carpet in front of Pancho's room.
Bastard.

Alex knocked on Cat's door. There was no answer. He knocked again. The door opened. “Why can't you just leave me alone?” Cat asked.

“This is important.”

“You just keep dragging my heart on a chain tied to your SUV.”

Alex didn't like the imagery.
Am I really that cruel?
“Please.”

“I know if I let you in, you'll hurt me again,” Cat said. “You always do.”

“Just give me this one chance,” Alex said. “If what I have to say hurts you, I won't bother you anymore.”

“So you can make a fool out of me?”

“Please.”

She shook her head and opened the door wide. Alex walked in and they sat on stuffed chairs in her room.

“What is so important?” she asked.

“I never should've let you go. I never should've agreed to seeing other people while we were apart.” He gulped. “I was a fool.”

If his admission had an effect on her, she didn't show it. “I go where I want, and I see who I want.”

“I should've tried harder.”

“It doesn't matter. You're committed to the Team, and I can't compete with that.”

“I know.” He handed the envelope to her. “We're planning a rescue mission. And then we'll take out an Iranian biological weapons lab.”

Cat threw it on the floor.

Alex didn't pick it up. “Just listen. Please. After this mission, no more missions for me. I'm coming up on my reenlistment. I'm going to request a transfer to become a BUD/S instructor. I know the XO at BUD/S—he wants me out there. I'll have most nights off. Weekends and holidays, too.”

Cat looked down at the envelope and then back at him. There were tears in her eyes. “Do you realize what you're saying?”

Alex nodded.

“You can only be satisfied if you're killing terrorists.”

“I've killed enough,” Alex said. He meant it, too.

“What about Sarah?”

A tear came to Alex's eye. “I've done enough for Sarah. You told me that once. I think, no, I know, Sarah would agree.”

“Have you told the guys?”

“Pancho doesn't want me to leave, but John says I should do what I want.”

“But you'd be in California, and I'd still be in Virginia. We'd be on opposite coasts.”

Alex had thought about that. Regular relationships were hard enough. Long-distance ones were pretty much impossible. “If you're willing, I'm sure I can get you transferred to Coronado with me. I want you to. I'm coming up on my reenlistment—the Navy wants to keep me. What we've done as the Outcasts has gone a long way in restoring all of our careers. They might say we're expendable, but I think that's just so they don't have to pay us the big bucks.”

Cat started to smile, then stopped.

“You're really serious about this, aren't you?”

“Deadly. I've thought about what I want, and I want you. After this mission, you are my number-one priority.”

She shook her head. “You hurt me, and I let you make a fool of me.” Tears welled up in her eyes, but she didn't let them fall.

“You don't have to decide anything now. I just want you to know that I'm really sorry. And I'm serious about us.”

“I don't know.”

Alex wanted to take her out for the day, but that would be too much for her to agree to all at once, so he simplified it: “Can we eat breakfast together?”

“I've been crying and I look terrible.”

“You look beautiful,” Alex said, realizing that on a planet with more than three billion women, she truly was the most beautiful in the world.

“My eyes are all red.”

“You can wear sunglasses.”

She didn't say anything.

“Please,” he said.

“I'm not very hungry.”

“Lunch?”

“I guess.”

“Any requests?”

“You know Germany better than I do.”

“How about the Black Forest?”

“There's a restaurant called the Black Forest?”

Alex smiled. “In the Black Forest. Would you like to find a restaurant in the Black Forest?”

“Is it far?”

“It's a little over an hour from here.”

She nodded.

Thirty minutes later, they rode a taxi off base. They left the snowy, vine-covered hills of Stuttgart and traveled southwest for an hour and a half until they came to the Black Forest. “With all the snow, it looks like the White Forest,” Cat said.

Alex smiled.

“Why do they call it the Black Forest?” she asked.

“Because when the Romans saw it, that's what they called it. Compared to Rome, I guess the Black Forest was thicker and darker than what they were used to. Over time, man and nature took away many of the trees, but the forest still stands.”

“Yes, there are more open areas than I expected, but it's beautiful.”

The driver stopped at the Liftverbund Feldberg.

“Looks like a ski resort,” Cat said excitedly.

“It is. I thought we could eat lunch here.”

“You didn't tell me there was a ski resort.”

Alex paid the driver, and they walked inside the main lobby. “We're a little early for lunch. Would you like to ski a little before we eat?”

“Yes!”

They rented ski equipment and went outside.

“Beginner, intermediate, or advanced?” Alex asked.

“You choose.”

He didn't want to start out on something that was too challenging for her, but he didn't want to insult her, either, so he chose the intermediate slope.

As they rode the ski lift high off the ground, it exposed them to the chilly wind, but Cat was smiling. It felt good to be near her and especially to see her smile again. When the lift reached the ramp at the top of the ski run, Alex and Cat skied off. She skied effortlessly, but Alex had to work in order to keep up with her.

After skiing the intermediate slope for an hour, they took off their skis and stood in line for the gondola leading to the advanced runs. When Alex and Cat reached the front of the line, their gondola came around, and they put their skis in the rack. Then they hopped inside and sat on a bench. Another couple joined them in the gondola. They sat on the opposite bench and held hands. Alex and Cat turned around and looked through the window at the view behind their gondola. As they rose higher and higher up the mountain, they could see the snow-covered resort, scattered houses in the distance, and roads through the Black Forest. It reminded Alex of the snowy streets of downtown Zermatt, Switzerland, where he first kissed Cat.

Cat still seemed happy. Alex put his hand on hers. She pulled her hand away. He glanced at the couple, but they were so absorbed in each other, they didn't seem to notice. Cat was enjoying skiing in the Black Forest, but she wasn't enjoying him.

Near the top of the mountain, they departed the gondola, took their skis, and carried them past a pile of chopped wood, where they put their skis in a rack outside the restaurant. Inside, they sat between a warm, crackling fireplace and an enormous window that gave a panoramic view of the Black Forest from the mountain to the valley in the distance. Speakers filled the dining room with the music of Bach.

They ate Black Forest ham for lunch.

“It's so red,” Cat said.

“They cold-smoke it with a fir tree's wood and leaves. That's why it keeps its red coloring.” Salt, pepper, garlic, berries, and other spices seasoned the ham. With the ham they had
Kartoffelsalat,
a warm potato salad made with vinegar, oil, and bacon bits.

She tasted it.

“How is the kartoffelsalat?”

“It's really good.”

They drank German hot chocolate, which was thicker and heavier than American hot chocolates. For dessert, Alex and Cat ate Black Forest cake.

“This cake tastes divine,” Cat said. “Chocolate cake, cream, sour cherries—and something else. What is it?”

“A sour cherry brandy called Kirsch, short for
kirschwasser,
meaning ‘cherry water.' ”

The environment had everything for romance—warmth of a fireplace, a panoramic view, tasty food, good music, and a beautiful woman—all except for the passion.

“How'd you learn to ski so well?” Alex asked.

“My father.” Alex knew she grew up in Idaho, but she never talked about her family. “We lived in Ketchum, which is right next to the Sun Valley ski resort.”

“When you go back home, do you still ski together?”

Cat drank her hot chocolate. “When I was fourteen, he was killed in a car accident.”

“Oh.”

“I really miss him.”

“I'm sorry. It must've been hard on your mom, too.”

“She was a perfectionist, and after Dad was gone, she just got worse. Every night, she rode me about my homework. If I didn't get straight A's, she would yell at me and ground me. Dad and
I liked the outdoors, but Mom didn't. After he was gone, she wouldn't let me go out hardly at all. For four years, I just became numb. I felt like a zombie. I never told anyone. Then I joined the Navy.”

Alex didn't want to say the wrong thing, so he kept quiet.

They finished their drinks, went outside, and grabbed their skis. From the restaurant, they skied down a gentle slope. Ahead of them in the trees, a bird chirped.

“Is that a cuckoo bird?” Cat asked.

The Black Forest was famous for cuckoo bird clocks, but Alex didn't know what a cuckoo bird looked like. “I don't know.”

The gentle slope turned left, and they skied down the advanced slope. Cat sped off, leaving Alex in her mist of snow spray, and she didn't look back. He tried to catch up to her, but he realized he was trying to ski beyond his ability. If he broke a leg, he'd be off the mission.
Maybe I should be off the mission.
He thought about hurting his ankle in the Lut Desert. Then he thought about Leila, but he quickly blocked her out of his mind. He wanted Cat, and he wasn't going to let himself get sidetracked.

Alex continued alone making runs down the advanced slope for the rest of the afternoon. As Cat passed him, the sunlight illuminated the tips of her blond hair sticking out of her white wool hat and blowing in her wake. Her speed looked so effortless.

Later, as the ski lifts neared closing, Cat rode the gondola with him to the top. Instead of leaving him in her dust, she skied down the mountain with him. Even though now they were physically together, Cat remained distant.

They returned their ski rental equipment, and Alex called a taxi. Soon Alex and Cat rode it out of the ski resort.

“I enjoyed skiing in the Black Forest,” she said.

“Thank you for coming.”

During the hour-and-a-half ride back to Stuttgart, instead of
resting her head on his shoulder, she rested it on the side of the cab. The distance between them was palpable to Alex.

When they arrived in Stuttgart, Alex took her to a nice restaurant. Although the dinner was first class, eating with Cat was awkward. He just wanted to go back to his room and forget about the day. The magic between them was gone.

A
lex woke Thursday to see the morning sun enter his room around the curtains' edges. He checked his secure email. There was a message from JSOC.
Mission approved. Phase One: rescue the scientist's husband, Hassan Khamenei. Phase Two: locate Iranian biological weapons lab and destroy. Phase Three: capture or kill General Behrouz Tehrani. Attached are the photos of the general. Note: After Phase Two is completed, don't worry about any scientists who might escape. We can deal with them later. Focus on the general.
Alex opened the attachment and looked at the general's photos.