Airman First Class Curtis Oglethorpe bounced his beat-up jeep down the road, pushing it faster than was safe. Well, safe for the jeep, that is. As for Curtis, he needed to get off the lonely highway leading from Soto Cano Air Base to Tegucigalpa, the nearest city to his miserable station.
An air traffic controller for Joint Task Force–Bravo, he’d paid his roommate to take his shift, which wasn’t exactly kosher as far as the chain of command went. But then again, Curtis never found the rules worth following. Far from it, he was what was known in military parlance as a shitbag. The guy who could always be depended on to disappear whenever extra duty came around. Which gave his father no small amount of fits.
The son of the current secretary of defense, Curtis had been given everything—the proverbial silver spoon jammed up his ass from birth—and had done everything in his power to reject it. Not out of any pride in making his way on his own, but simply out of laziness. When he’d failed out of Dartmouth—a school that had been no mean feat to get him into in the first place—his father had had enough. He’d told Curtis in no uncertain terms he was joining the military or getting cut off.
Being a little bit of a coward at heart, Curtis had agreed, searching out the least “military” occupational specialty he could find, eventually settling for air traffic controller in the Air Force. The recruiter had told him it was all gravy, with nothing but stateside assignments and nine-to-five work, then he’d been shipped off to JTF–Bravo in the stinking jungles of Honduras, controlling flights targeted against the drug trade, along with a multitude of other taskings.
Not his idea of the cush life promised by the recruiter.
The work was grinding, and the base grew tiresome within a month. He’d spent every waking moment he could haunting the bars in Tegucigalpa, searching for some companionship. In that, he’d failed, with the women seeming to smell the broken promises in his DNA. He’d started hunting Honduran women in Internet chat rooms and had found one who had taken a liking to him. So much so she’d agreed to meet him in Tegucigalpa at a place called the Bull Bar. The catch was he had to come tonight. Which meant he had to get out of his shift. Which also meant he had to get off the two-lane highway that led to the city.
JTF–Bravo was a small place, and if he passed anyone coming back from Tegucigalpa, they’d recognize his jeep. Then realize he was supposed to be on duty right now. And that wouldn’t be a good thing.
The old jeep groaned down the road, the suspension complaining at every pothole, the rusted holes in the body whistling with the wind. Curtis fought the vehicle, straining to keep the four wheels on the rutted blacktop at a speed that caused the jeep to become nearly unstable. He began to pass houses, then side streets, then entered the city itself, breathing a sigh of relief.
He wound through the small town to his rendezvous at the Bull Bar, the fear of getting caught now replaced with the hormones of getting laid. He parked out front and took a quick look in the mirror, smoothing back his longer-than-regulation hair, then sauntered inside.
It was fairly early, the sun still in the sky, and the bar looked old and worn without the cloak of darkness. But Curtis cared little about ambiance. His head on a swivel, he looked from the bar to the tables, finally settling his eyes on the mechanical bull in the corner. He saw nothing but a couple of males at the bar sipping whiskey out of highball glasses.
He approached and took a seat on a stool, seeing the men were inebriated. He turned back to the door, and one leaned over to him, saying, “Where you from, bud?”
He heard the accent but couldn’t place it. He said, “America. You?”
“America! Land of the free! Home of the brave! We just came from there. We’re from Dublin, on the great Emerald Isle.”
“Emerald Isle?”
“Ireland, friend, Ireland. The land of the leprechauns. Let me buy you a drink.”
Curtis took another glance around the bar, still not seeing what he wanted. He said, “Sure. Whatever you’re having.”
“Irish whiskey. What else? Although the bog down here isn’t exactly pedigreed.”
The bartender poured and his new friend picked it up, turning a complete circle to hand it to him, staggering as he did so. Curtis took a sip and nodded. “Good stuff.”
The Irishman clinked his glass and said, “Who are you here to meet?”
“Supposed to hook up with a girl here.”
“A horny little lass? Some hot Honduran gee?” He gave a drunken wink, and Curtis took another sip, wondering how he was going to break contact from the sots when his date showed up.
Curtis said, “Well, I just met her online . . .” He stopped, unable to continue his train of thought, his head beginning to swim. What the hell? I only had two sips.
He focused on the Irishman and saw double, the room starting to swim. The Irishman said, “What’s the girl’s name? Is it Esmeralda?”
His head was spinning, and he was fighting the bar stool as if he was riding the mechanical bull in the corner. The only thing that penetrated was the name.
Woozily, he said, “You know her?”
“Yes. I do.” The Irishman smiled, not looking nearly as drunk as he had a moment ago. “Sorry, bud. She’s not coming.”
Curtis started to slide off the stool and felt someone grab both of his arms. Then he felt nothing.