Survivalist - 15 - Overlord by Jerry Ahern Read Free Book Online Page A

nail anyway.
    As she walked down the stairs of the dormitory and toward the greenway which dominated the center of the Hekla community, she realized she had never cried so much in — not since —
    John was away, with Natalia and Paul.
    And Michael was away. And she was pregnant and chronologically, though she was only a few years older than her twenty-eight-year-old daughter, she was old enough — too old? She didn’t think she was too old. But why did she cry all the time?
    It was deathly quiet, and she could hear the rustling of the fabric of her skirt, feeling stupid all the more with the gunbelt —enlarged —worn with it. The skirt was navy blue, the blouse she wore a pale blue, the shawl a medium blue. She could see Annie ahead with the Icelandic police unit that they laughingly called the SWAT Team. But Annie dressed this way by preference and didn’t feel stupid, she thought, feeling her cheeks flush. Her cheeks flushed more these days. But Doctor Munchen, who had personally taken charge of the medical aspects of her pregnancy, had told her that her blood pressure was normal and her nurse’s instincts had told her that too.
    Sarah Rourke stopped at the edge of the knot of Icelandic police, the two Germans who assisted Annie with the training and the SWAT Team. Annie turned and looked at her, sensing her presence again perhaps, or perhaps just hearing her coming.
    “Hi, momma.”
    “A symphony in blue reporting for duty, ma’am,” Sarah grinned.
    Annie laughed.
    Beyond Annie, others of the German advisors were marshalling more of the Icelandic constabulary, while some of the actual German units sent to assist in the defense of Hekla were disappearing in the distance toward the rim of the
    volcanic cone. “German or American?” Annie asked, gesturing toward the stacked assault rifles near her.
    “I’m a traditionalist —American,” Sarah answered, starting to walk now toward the nearest stack of M-16s. And Sarah Rourke laughed at herself—she did that a lot these days too. She had never gone into combat before dressed for a Gay ‘90s lawn party.
    Annie Rourke Rubenstein had determined that the more experienced of the Icelandic personnel, counting herself and her mother and the two Germans who had aided in the training, could best serve the defensive needs of Hekla by guarding the President, Madame Jokli having finally, after much urging, consented to taking shelter in the cellar of the presidential palace with her maid and some medical personnel who had set up a field hospital there.
    Annie cradled the M-16 in her left arm as she walked along the porch at the height of the main entrance steps. So far, there had been no sounds of gunfire. But soon there would be. She wondered if the Russians would attempt to infiltrate first or merely attack in strength. If they tried a repeat of their earlier gambit to take Madame Jokli and perhaps some others as hostages, the battle would be here before it began near the rim. But she was ready for it. The German sergeant and herself had taken six of the twelve men of the SWAT Team, the SWAT Team personnel looking nearly as incongruous as did she and her mother. Like the typical Icelandic police officer, they wore their green tunics and carried their swords. Her mother and the German corporal had taken the remaining six to guard the rear of the building, the more difficult of the two posts if there were trouble, but the least likely to be first attacked.
    At her waist was her pistol belt, the Detonics Scoremaster .45 in one holster, the Beretta 92F military pistol in the other. The Detonics had been a present from her father, the
    Beretta a “trophy,” if that were the correct term, from Forrest Blackburn, the Soviet infiltrator who had first brought her to Iceland by kidnapping her from Eden Base during an attack.
    She had come to like the 9mm as much as the .45. Michael carried two of them himself. Slung crossbody from right shoulder to left hip was a musette bag,