Who Dares Wins

So that bought me back to not too far from where I'd started from, when all my carefully laid plans went to pot. I'd intended to link back up with my group on their way back from their mission, so imagine my surprise when a telephone call to check everything was OK, told me what had actually happened.

New Intel had come in that someone high in the Taliband, and close to Bin Laiden himself was in a house in that very village that we were due to attack. Top Brass in their infinite wisdom decided not to risk the frontal attack with the possibility of Bin's mate escaping in the turmoil. Instead of the high level bombing proposed, they laid on a precision attack on the house that he was reputedly sleeping in, nicely targeted by the laser target spotter that my four mates kindly provided. All well and good and the house went up in a cloud of dust, but the full attack never took place and the glorious 7th Cavalry never turned up to give them a lift home.

Result?

They were somewhere out there in the desert making their way home on foot, and I was up the proverbial bloody river without a paddle.

But at least I at last had the time to sit back and reflect on what Jill's reaction would have been just a short few hours previously, when she woke up to her situation.

Imagine it!

Waking up naked to find yourself handcuffed to a very solid bed, which was soaked through in blood from the very dead lover lying beside her.

Yuk!

My position suddenly didn't seem so bad after all.

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It all worked out of course, or else I would be somewhere even less comfortable than the grotty tin shed where I am now. My 'contact' let me know that my pals had been located and a helicopter was being sent out to pick them up. It was diverted to pick me up beforehand, the crew assuming that I was going along to check them out and debrief them, and my mates could hardly believe it when we dropped the bird down to collect them and my smiling face was looking out at them.

Back at base, and suitably attired and of course debriefed by the guys, I left the chopper with the four of them as if I'd never left their side, and was counted back in by the same Major who had counted us out. To my eternal embarrassment as the squad sergeant, it was me who that had to shake the hand of the American three star General the following day. It was to thank us for enabling them to eliminate an enemy of the Western nations.

I took the praise and I wasn't even there for Christ's sake.

My mates were most amused. They never risked saying anything, but couldn't help grinning every time I looked at them.

Good job they didn't give me another bloody medal.

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It was three days later that I was called in to see the padre, though quite how he landed the poison chalice I don't know.

"Delicate matter to discuss with you Sergeant Adams," he started in.

"What's that then sir?" I asked.

"It's about your wife," he proceeded nervously.

"What about Jill?" I shot back, half rising from my seat. "She's Ok isn't she?"

"Relax sergeant," he tried to assure me. "She's perfectly fit and well, but something happened while you were away on that last mission."

Once he'd quietened me down again, he explained that the police station had got concerned when her superior officer had not reported in that day and couldn't be traced. Questions were asked, and when Jill's absence was also noted, someone put two and two together and got five, so obviously somebody in her police force knew about their trysts. When a squad car was dispatched to our house and broke in, then the scene they found ........ Well you can use your own imagination. Apparently Jill was in an awful state, and spent a week in hospital recovering from her ordeal.

And of course --------- Nobody even connected me with it. How could they? I was thousands of miles away fighting the good fight for the UK and it's allies, wasn't I? A hero of some sort, even as my dear wife was back home cheating on me.

A couple of my pals back in UK were questioned, as I guess they thought I was involved in some way, but nothing's come of it so far, and I dare say in time the case will have to be quietly shelved.

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So what for the future you may ask.

I told them I was in no hurry, but they're sending me back to Blighty on compassionate leave in a few days time.

What am I going to say to her?

Don't know, and I'm not sure that I'll even see her. I say that because I don't think she'll want to see me.

You see what I didn't tell you before, was that when I cuffed Jill to the bed head, I took my wedding ring off and slipped it onto her finger.

So she knows you see ----- She knows!

She can't prove it, and is probably too frightened to try to.

But she knows and she'll have to live with that fear that I might come back for her one day, for the rest of her god damned life!

WHO DARES WINS!

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