Into You

Chapter 73

Zero Hour – 1 Day

The next day dawned with a watery sun, lost in a cloudy haze that obscured the view despite the evening's rain shower having ended sometime after she dozed off. It wasn't the kind of weather she'd want for a holiday, but she really didn't care. She was actually hoping that the weather would be shitty for the next couple of days.

Shitty weather is great cover for the combat soldier, and cover is exactly what they were going to need if we were going to pull this off without any hitches.

She lay on the thin cotton sheets, staring up at the electric fan that was fixed to the ceiling; trying to enjoy the cooling breeze that was passing over her sweating body. This was it, the planning was over, and there was nothing to do now but head off to the border and hope that the bribes that Sinu and Sofi had made to Camila's contacts in the Government had got the boys, and their equipment, there unmolested.

For her, this was the critical part of the mission. Without the equipment, this mission was a non- starter. She would fight her way into the compound with nothing but her teeth if she needed to, but she also knew that they needed more than that to get Camila out alive without casualties of their own.

This was the part that she could do absolutely nothing about and she fucking hated it. She had absolutely no control over what might have happened in the last few hours and that didn't sit easily, or help her sleep. One snotty official, one overzealous soldier and they were scuppered. If the equipment the guys were carrying was discovered, it was all over, and Camila was as good as dead...

...and that wasn't something she was prepared to accept.

Wop, wop, wop, wop, wop.

She lay staring at the fan, listening to the rhythmic beat and thinking her way through the mission one more time. It was complex for sure, but she had a good team with her and she knew it would succeed. All they had to do was get there.

Realizing that her mind was just running around in circles, she dragged her protesting body from the bed and into the bathroom, heading straight for the shower. A twist of the faucet and the steam started to build as she allowed the water to flow over her body; soaking away the sweat and the tension and everything that was in her head, pouring it down the drain like the waste it was. With a twist of a handle, she turned the water to as hot as she could stand it and scrubbed away; cleansing herself as best she could from the dirty feeling of last night's nightmare before twisting the handle the opposite way, and standing under the freezing cold water until her lips were blue.

She emerged from her shower rejuvenated and feeling ready to face the day. It was a good feeling, one that she had experienced many times before; that mixture of nerves and adrenaline that told her she was ready; her head was now clear... game on.

There was a knock at the door as she dressed and she pulled her t-shirt over her head quickly and peered through the security lens before opening the door wide.

"Morning, Lauren..."

Sinu stepped into her room, her face somber; the joy she'd seen in it when they first met destroyed by the events of the last few days. She could see it clearly now, how every message that arrived, every barrier that appeared to confound them had taken away another piece of her, added another line to her face. Even now with the end in sight, she looked jaded, exhausted, damn near broken.

"Have you slept at all, Sinu?" she asked as she closed the door behind her, looking at the dark circles that had appeared under her baggy, tired looking eyes.

"Not really," the woman admitted, "too many things to worry about, Lauren, mija, far too many things. I don't think I've had much more than three or four hours sleep last night, the worry of it all is getting to me, I'm afraid. Sofi was terrified last night and it was really hard to stay strong for her. "