right, of course. Logan stood up. “I’ll…I’ll be right back.”
He raced down the road to the wall, expecting a bullet to pierce his skin at every step. As he neared her, she saw him, then started to run away, moving into the street.
“No!” he yelled.
He sprinted after her, and scooped her up.
Chaos surrounded them as he ran with her in his arms back toward Carl and the safety at the end of the road.
He had no idea when it happened. In the over two years since, he’d gone over it in his mind, step-by-step, but he still couldn’t figure it out. The only things he knew for sure were that when he picked her up, everything had been okay, but when he reached the end of the street, a bullet had already cut its path through her abdomen.
Three Afghani women came running out of one of the homes, screaming at him and crying. They took the girl from him, leaving behind only the blood that covered Logan’s hand and clothes. He had no idea how long he stared after them before he remembered Carl.
“Did you get her?” Carl said, his voice barely audible.
Logan wiped the blood off his hand, then took Carl’s and held it tight. “Yes. I got her.”
Carl smiled, “Good,” then a moment later, the last of his life slipped away.
When they got back to the base, Logan learned that the girl died on the way to the hospital.
If he hadn’t stopped to help Carl and kept running, he was sure the girl would still be alive. If he had left the first time Carl had told him to get her, he was also sure she’d still be alive. And if he had just stayed with Carl, and done what he could, it was very possible his brother-in-law would still be alive.
But instead, they were both dead, killed by just a few seconds of inaction. His inaction.
It was news for weeks. SECURITY FIRM DEBACLE IN KABUL: 5 CIVILIANS DEAD and OFF DUTY RENT-A-SOLDIERS KILL INNOCENT BYSTANDERS. Those were just two of the headlines, many were even worse.
Trish didn’t wait for weeks, though. Two days after he’d returned with Carl’s body, when he admitted to his own perceived guilt in his best friend’s death, she walked out. “I can’t look at you any more,” she had said. “You even admit you might have been able to save him, but you didn’t. Every time I see you, I see him. I see his dead face. You took him from me. You took my brother.”
Faced with a PR disaster, Forbus went hunting for a scapegoat. Logan was the obvious choice. They made it sound like it was his idea to go on this trip. They made it sound like Carl was the one who protested. To sweeten the pot, they even floated the rumor that Logan was responsible for some abnormalities in the books. Jon Jordan himself gave him the choice: leave on his own or be publically dragged through the courts.
Logan didn’t put up a fight. He didn’t correct any of the misperceptions.
He just left.
33
At around 2:30 a.m., the train began to slow as it approached the next station. Logan was on the first class side of the dining car, so he hustled to the back of the train, and waited by one of the doors until they pulled to a complete stop.
As before, he stepped down onto the concrete pad. This time he did a few stretching exercises to get his blood flowing. Even then, his mind was still a little foggy, so he almost didn’t realized that someone had stepped off the same first class car where the others’ cabin was.
The lights on the platform left something to be desired, but the passenger did him the favor of moving down the train into the halo cast by a lamp on the outside of the station.
It was Aaron.
Logan’s first thought was that the others were getting ready to leave.
He moved back to the door, ready to jump on and grab Daeng. But none of Aaron’s companions appeared.
“Okay, so what are you doing up?” Logan said under his breath.
Aaron pulled something out of his pocket and raised it to his ear. A phone, Logan realized. Unfortunately, he was too far away for to hear what Aaron was staying, so he pulled himself back onto the train, then rapidly made his way to the smokers’ area passageway just beyond the dining car. There he leaned up to the open window and