Read Online Support and Defend by Tom Clancy, Mark Greaney - Free Book Online

more trouble sitting back down than he had standing. Sherman was by his side immediately, helping him down onto his back. She then lifted his legs and put them on the sofa, covering them with a blanket.
    He breathed a long, relieved sigh. Having his feet up reduced the pain in his ribs considerably.
    “Thanks.”
    She did not reply. Instead, she buckled him into the sofa bed, moved quickly to the hatch and shut it, then conferred with the pilot and copilot for a moment. Within a minute the aircraft was moving and Adara was back in the cabin, buckling herself in to a jump seat by the door.
    A S D OM LAY ON his back during takeoff, it occurred to him that this was not the first time he’d been injured and strapped down to this exact same sofa. He’d been shot in Pakistan a couple years earlier, and the long flight home had been an uncomfortable one. This time his wounds were not as severe, but there was another key difference between the two events. Back then the mood on the flight home had been ebullient, he and his teammates had just prevented a nuclear detonation, and it seemed his wound had been a small price to pay for the success of the operation.
    This time he was going home knowing a family of four, people he had come to care for a great deal, had died a fiery death, and he had a feeling he would be second-guessing his every action and reaction during the fight for a long time to come.
    The Gulfstream leveled off over India, heading east toward the Bay of Bengal. Their flight plan would take them over Thailand and Taiwan, then over the Pacific Ocean, to the U.S. West Coast. They’d stop in San Diego to refuel, and then fly the rest of the way back to the aircraft’s home base of Baltimore, arriving home sixteen hours after departing Kochi.
    Five minutes after takeoff, Adara returned to Dominic, who continued to feel like a piece of luggage. In an attempt to push the image out of his mind, he decided to press the issue of getting a drink.
    “Adara, I could use a Maker’s Mark on the rocks.”
    She knelt down and unfastened the restraining straps on the sofa, then began unbuttoning his shirt. “Sorry. It will have to wait. You don’t need a stewardess right now as much as you need a medic. I’m going to check you out, see what we need waiting for us back in D.C. I had the Indian hospital e-mail me your films and assessment, and I looked them over during takeoff. Nothing broken, but I want to look at the bruising on your chest.”
    Dominic reacted with restrained anger. “I’m fine, Sherman. I’ve spent an entire day in the hospital. I’ve been evaluated.”
    “Not by me, you haven’t.”
    “All I need is a drink and to be left alone.”
    But Adara Sherman did not back down. “If you are going to be an asshole about this, it will only take longer for me to do what I need to do.” She paused, and her tone softened slightly. “This is my job, Dominic. Now be a big boy and let me check you out.”
    Dom realized he was taking out his frustrations on Adara. He slowly sat up enough for her to get his shirt off.
    “I’m sorry. Tough couple of days.”
    She looked at his bruised torso. The right side of his rib cage was black and blue. “Yeah, I’d say so. What happened here?”
    “Fell down some stairs. Think I might have hit something on the way down.”
    She cracked a little smile. “What gave you your first clue?”
    After unwrapping the bandage on his chest and cleaning and debriding the puncture wound there, she did the same with his bandaged forearm. She then directed her attention to cleaning some smaller cuts and scrapes on his chest with antiseptic.
    “You don’t trust the Indian doctors?”
    “I trust them fine. But one thing I learned in Afghanistan: Wounds can’t be too clean.”
    Dom knew the woman had been a Navy corpsman, which in her case had not meant sitting on a ship passing out Dramamine. She had served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, treating U.S. Marines, sometimes under fire