“Wow, Dad. It’s so beautiful. Thanks!”
She kissed him again and bounced around in a circle with her arms in the air and her new watch on her wrist. “I feel like a princess.”
“It looks great on you. You here alone?”
He watched Jenny’s mood change on a dime. She sighed loudly, and reached out and held his forearm. “Dad, Holly left yesterday,” she said softly. “There’s a note for you on the kitchen counter by the mail. I’m so sorry.”
A wave of sadness almost knocked him off his feet. Leaning against the kitchen wall, he read:
“Dear Tom: I’ve moved in with my friend Lena. I’m sorry things didn’t work out between us. I’ll always love you, but I can’t live with you anymore and be fulfilled and happy. I’ll come over Saturday for the rest of my things. Love, Holly.”
He felt something give way in his chest, followed by relief mixed with profound hurt and disappointment. He’d opened up his heart to her and loved her, but it wasn’t enough.
Jenny squeezed his hand and said, “You’re a good man, Dad, and I love you, if that’s any comfort.”
He put his arm around her shoulder, hugged her, and said, “Of course it is. I love you, too, with all my heart.”
As tears gathered in his eyes, he knew that somehow he had to find the strength to soldier on. He didn’t know how, but he would. It was what he did best, and what he would always be. A soldier, through and through.
Acknowledgments
Don and Ralph would like to thank our agent, Heather Mitchell, and the talented professionals at Mulholland Books / Little, Brown who have made this book possible, including Wes Miller, Pamela Brown, Joshua Kendall, Ben Allen, Kapo Ng, Tracy Williams, Chris Jerome, and Morgan Moroney. They would also like to extend a special thanks to their loving and supportive families and friends.
About the Authors
DON MANN (CWO3, USN) has for the past thirty years been associated with the U.S. Navy SEALs as a platoon member, assault team member, boat crew leader, and advanced training officer, and more recently as program director preparing civilians to go to BUD/S (SEAL Training). Until 1998 he was on active duty with SEAL Team Six. Since then, he has deployed to the Middle East on numerous occasions in support of the war against terrorism. Many of today’s active-duty SEALs on Team Six are the same guys he taught how to shoot, conduct ship and aircraft takedowns, and operate in urban, arctic, desert, river, and jungle warfare, as well as Close Quarters Battle and Military Operations in Urban Terrain. He has suffered two cases of high-altitude pulmonary edema, frostbite, a broken back, and multiple other broken bones in training or service. He has been captured twice during operations and lived to talk about it.
RALPH PEZZULLO is a New York Times bestselling author and an award-winning playwright and screenwriter. His books include Jawbreaker and The Walk-In (with CIA operative Gary Berntsen), At the Fall of Somoza, Plunging into Haiti (winner of the Douglas Dillon Award for Distinguished Writing on American Diplomacy), Most Evil (with Steve Hodel), Eve Missing, and Blood of My Blood. His nonfiction book about the shadowy world of private military contracting with former British Special Forces commando Simon Chase, Zero Footprint, will be published by Little, Brown next year.
Books by Don Mann and Ralph Pezzullo
The SEAL Team Six series
Hunt the Fox
Hunt the Jackal
Hunt the Falcon
Hunt the Scorpion
Other titles
Inside SEAL Team Six: My Life and Missions with America’s Elite Warriors
Thank you for buying this ebook, published by Hachette Digital.
To receive special offers, bonus content, and news about our latest ebooks and apps, sign up for our newsletters.
Sign Up
Or visit us at hachettebookgroup.com/newsletters
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Welcome
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Acknowledgments
About the Authors
Books by Don Mann and Ralph Pezzullo
Newsletters
Copyright
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Copyright © 2015 by Don Mann and Ralph Pezzullo
Author photographs: © Will Ramos (Mann); © Bernard Wolf (Pezzullo)
Cover design: Kapo Ng
Cover copyright © 2015 Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Mulholland Books/Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group
1290 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10104
mulhollandbooks.com
twitter.com/mulhollandbooks
facebook.com/mulhollandbooks
First ebook edition: May 2015
Mulholland Books is an imprint of Little, Brown and Company, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Mulholland Books name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to hachettespeakersbureau.com or call (866) 376-6591.
ISBN 978-0-316-37749-2
E3