by Brent Towns
The dead man had nothing in his pockets, so Kane came erect. He hit his TRANSMIT button and said, “Midnight One-One? Reaper One, copy? Over.”
“Roger, Reaper One, we read you.”
“We’d like to take you up on your offer about now. The sniper threat has been neutralized.”
“Copy, Reaper One. Midnight One-One is inbound. Out.”
“Let’s move, Chief.”
They started down the stairwell and were almost at the bottom when Teller came over the net with emergency traffic. “Break! Break! Break! Reaper One, hold your position. I say again, hold your position. There are hostiles outside on the street, about to breach, over.”
“How many?”
“Ten to fifteen tangos.”
“OK, everyone hold. Bravo Three, is the roof big enough for a helo extraction?”
“Roger. But I doubt it would take the weight.”
“It doesn’t have to. Get hold of Midnight One-One and give him a sitrep. We’ll start climbing.”
“Copy, Reaper One. Bravo Three, out.”
They made their way back up the stairs. Behind them, they could hear the cartel soldiers start their own rowdy ascent. At the top of the stairs, a sealed door blocked their exit. Kane put his shoulder to it, but it was stuck fast.
“Shit, this is all we need.”
Hunt turned around to his man. “Pop-Eye, slow them bastards down.”
“Copy.”
The SEAL started back down the stairs, and within thirty seconds, the first crack of the M110 was heard. Meanwhile, Kane rammed the door with his shoulder once more. It still refused to budge.
Arenas came up a couple of steps and asked, “Do you mind if I try?”
Kane shrugged. “Be my guest.”
Arenas pointed his 416 at the door and unloaded a full mag into it. Chips and splinters flew off with every bullet strike. Spent shell casings jingled on the concrete steps as they landed in a torrent. Once the deafening roar ceased, the ex-special forces commander reached out with his left hand and pushed the door. It swung free, and he walked through it.
Hunt leaned over the rail. “Pop-Eye, on me.”
The team exited onto the roof just as one of the UH-60 Black Hawks swept overhead, the whop-whop of its rotor beating loudly at the air.
Pop-Eye took up a position behind an old airconditioning tower to watch the doorway. Arenas did the same. Kane and Hunt walked to the edge of the building and looked across at the parking garage. The second Black Hawk had touched down on top of it and was picking up all who were there.
“Midnight One-One? Reaper one, over.”
“Copy, Reaper One.”
“We’re in position for extraction, over.”
“Roger, Reaper One. As soon as Midnight One-Two finishes we’ll be right with you. Out.”
“Contact!” Pop-Eye’s voice snapped right before he squeezed the trigger on the M110. Suddenly, the rooftop was filled with the noise of automatic fire, the sound of the AKs standing out above the rest. Hunt and Kane took cover behind the cooling towers and set about returning fire.
One of the cartel soldiers was down in the doorway while others leaned through the gap, and sprayed bullets with wild abandon across the roof, hoping to be lucky enough to take down a target. Two more of them tried to break free of the confined space of the stairwell only to be cut down before they’d traveled ten feet.
“These guys are fucking fanatical,” Hunt shouted.
“We’ve probably got a bounty on our heads,” Kane called back.
“Reaper One, Midnight One-One is inbound. Copy?”
“Roger, Midnight One-One. Come in from the east to stay out of the line of fire, over.”
“Are you calling a hot LZ, Reaper One, over?”
“Affirmative.”
“Copy. Midnight One-One out.”
Kane watched as the Black Hawk swept around and approached from the east. It flared, and the pilot came in and placed one wheel on the roof while the rest hung in midair. Reaper pressed the TRANSMIT button on his mic and said, “Carlos, you’re up. Hunt follow him, and then Pop-Eye. I’ll cover your six.”
One after the other the three men fell back and boarded the helo. While they did so, Kane kept up a steady rate of fire on the doorway to keep the cartel men occupied. Hunt’s voice filled his ear, “You’re up, Reaper. We’ll cover you.”
After he fired a final burst, Kane turned and ran towards the Black Hawk. He’d made it halfway when he heard Arenas shout over the radio, “RPG! Left side!”
No sooner had the words escaped the ex-commander’s lips when the Black Hawk lurched violently up and away as the pilot worked the cyclic and the collective with experienced hands. The rocket-propelled grenade slid past its tail rotor and into the distance. Kane dropped to the dirt and collection of grime on the rooftop.
The cartel soldiers!
He quickly rolled onto his back in time to see them pouring through the doorway. AKs opened fire and bullets spanged off the rooftop around him. Kane squeezed the trigger on the HK, and his attackers dived for cover. One of them cried out and clutched at a bloody leg.
Reaper scrambled across the rooftop and found himself back at his starting point behind the airconditioning tower.
The Black Hawk had pulled off station and was circling back about a mile out. Kane’s radio crackled to life, and the pilot’s voice came to him. “Reaper One? Midnight One-One, Copy?”
“Copy, One-One.”
“We’re coming back around, Reaper One. We’ll not be touching down, and you’ll only get one shot at this.”
“Copy. What do you propose? Over.”
“You’ll know it when you see it. Keep an eye on us. Midnight One-One inbound. Out.”
Bullets beat a loud staccato on the metal of the cooling tower and made Kane duck automatically. He leaned out and fired another burst.
He looked back at the Black Hawk and saw it start its approach. It was coming in low and fast. Kane leaned back out to fire again and managed one shot before the magazine went dry. He tossed the HK416 aside and pulled his Sig Sauer M17 handgun. He blew off four fast shots at a target then glanced back at the inbound helo.
Kane frowned. “What the …?”
There was something dangling from the Black Hawk, and it took a moment to work out what it was. A Fast Rope! Something designed for insertion, not extraction. Then he remembered how the pilot told him that he wasn’t putting down. “Shit.”
The sound of the Black Hawk rotor grew steadily louder above the shooting. Kane leaned out and fired twice more before checking the helo again.
“This is going to be wild,” he murmured and rammed the M17 into its holster as he realized that the Black Hawk wasn’t actually going to pass over the building. It couldn’t for fear of getting the rope hooked on something, thus killing everyone on board.
Then he was up and running towards the edge of the building. His arms and legs pumped furiously. Bullets filled the air all around him. Kane felt one tear at a flap on his tactical vest.
Twenty feet!
Kane reached the precipice.
Ten feet!
He jumped out into the abyss!
Team Reaper HQ
El Paso, Texas
“What kind of fucking Indiana Jones bullshit was that, huh?” Ferrero seethed at Kane.
Axe slapped him on the back as he walked past and said, “That was way cool shit, Reaper. You can fly, man. Awesome.”
Ferrero glared at him. “Frig off, Axe, or you’ll be next.”
Kane fixed his stare on his boss and said, “Are you pissed at me, or the fact we lost an HVT because of others’ incompetence?”
“What do you mean by that?” Turner asked.
“Where would you like me to start, sir? The fact that we were driving out of a hostile area when we should have been extracted by air in the first place? Or how the cartel managed to shut down whole city blocks to set up their little ambush? Or even how they keep getting enough firepower to supply a fucking
army?”
“We can’t do anything about that,” Turner growled at the tone of Kane’s voice.
“Yes, we can. It’s what we do. It was what we were formed for. Attack the bastards on their home turf. Grab their drugs, their money, disrupt their operations. We’re a covert operations group. Deniable operators. The problems start when you involve others. Especially those who are in the pockets of the fucking cartels.”
Turner’s voice softened. “I can’t do anything about that. The team is still on a short leash. The people above us still aren’t sure about what we do.”
“And if we were CIA, they wouldn’t give two shits about it.”
They turned to face Cara. She continued, “We need to be able to make calls on the ground. If it hadn’t been for the general today, we’d have all been killed. Just because some asshole behind a desk interferes. I thought that was what Reaper was supposed to do. He’s in charge on the ground; he makes the calls.”
“It doesn’t work like that, I’m afraid,” Turner said.
“Well, it damned well should.”
Turner shrugged.
“Luis,” Kane said, “You know that it’s right. There are too many links in the chain.”
“My hands are tied, Reaper.”
Kane turned to the one person who’d said nothing the whole time since the discussion had started. Spencer sat in a chair off to the side. “What about you?”
“Me? I follow orders, just as you should.”
Kane nodded and turned back to Ferrero. “All right. I’m due a couple of days off. I want to take it now.”
“Why?”
“Something I need to take care of.”
“All right. The whole team can have the week. After what happened today, I dare say you could all use it.”
Cara caught up with him in the shower room. He’d just taken his vest and shirt off. She stared at the scar on his chest, courtesy of a sniper in the Philippines. She said, “You were lucky today.”
“We all were. I like the SIG by the way. That was a good pickup. Better than the USP.”
“Let’s hope the rest of the team think that way.”
He turned away to hang up his vest. On Kane’s back was a large tattoo of the Grim Reaper. It was the source of his nickname. He turned back and stared at Cara. “Out with it.”
“Where are you going?”
“That’s what I want to know?” asked Axe.
Behind him stood Arenas. “Me too.”
“I’m taking a couple of vacation days is all.”
Cara removed her own vest, revealing her lithe form beneath it. She shook her head. “Nope, I know you better than that. You’re up to something. And, if it is going to affect the team, then we deserve to know.”
Kane sighed. “All right, I’m going to Washington.”
“Why?” Cara asked as she removed her T-shirt.
“To see Jones.”
“And why would you need to see him?”
Ferrero!
“Christ,” Kane hissed.
“Everybody out. All except Reaper.”
Cara replaced her T-shirt, gave Kane a worried glance, and followed the other two from the room. Ferrero stared hard at Kane and said, “This better be good, or by Christ, I’ll have you out of here so fast you’ll think you were shot.”
“I’m going to see General Jones, Luis. We need to get out from under this three-headed umbrella and answer to only one man. Not the attorney-general, the secretary of state, or the president. Just one man. Someone who knows what it takes to get things done. None of those assholes have been on the ground before and know what it’s like. They’re going to get us all killed.”
“And you think Jones can help?”
“If anyone can, it will be him.”
“I agree with you, totally. But this is for me to do. Not you. If we can’t trust each other, then we may as well shut the whole show down right now. So, I’ll go to Washington and talk to Jones myself. In the meantime, if you ever try to pull shit like this again and go over my head, I’ll shit can you. Understood?”
“Understood.”
“Good. By the way, Swift got a hit on that dead merc.”
“Yeah?”
“Looks like Chief Hunt was right. The man’s name was Colter, ex-ranger. He’s tied in with a bunch of ex-military assholes under the command of a Captain Ward Collins. He used to be a sniper before he was discharged under suspicious circumstances. The Mexicans call him The Gringo.”
“Now they work for the cartels?”
“It would seem that way.”
“Damn it. That’s all we need.”
Ciudad Juárez
The streetlights flicked by the armored Tahoe as it sped along the street. In the back, Sandoval remained silent for a long time before he spoke to Collins.
“I was unimpressed by your team today, Gringo.”
“Sometimes things go that way.”
“Sí.”
More silence. Then, “I have heard from my contact. The jefe will be ready one week from today.”
“That don’t leave much time.”
“No.”
“Is everything in place?”
“Sí.”
“I guess we better leave tonight then.”
“It would be best.”
Chapter 3
Outside Embargo Tennessee, Two nights later
The eighteen wheeler roared as the driver dropped it back another gear and turned off the interstate onto a single lane blacktop which would take them around Embargo instead of through it. Its headlights swept across the landscape until finding the road once more.
The driver accelerated and started to work his way back up through the gears until he had the vehicle up to fifty. Beside him, his passenger shook his head. “Damned if I know why we just can’t drive on through the blasted town.”
“Company policy,” the driver said. “You already know that though.”
“Yeah, but still. It ain’t like anybody knows what the hell we’re carrying.”
“I don’t make the rules, Billy. I just follow them.”
“It’s still crap, Harry. What happens if on one of these backroads someone wants to jack us just for the hell of it?”
Harry ignored the last comment. He’d been doing this for five years and had experienced no problem before.
A mile further along, the road climbed slightly to navigate the hills behind Embargo. The roadsides became festooned with trees and vegetation, and the blacktop narrowed. They crossed a bridge over a deep creek, and the road dropped down a hill then turned sharp left.
Harry grated through the gears to make the turn, and as soon as he’d traversed it, they were confronted with a roadblock. Flashing red and blue lights danced off the roadside trees. A sheriff’s cruiser!
Harry cursed and started to bring the rig to a halt. In front of the cruiser stood a single deputy with a flashlight. When the eighteen wheeler finally stopped, he approached the truck from the driver’s side.
“What the hell is this?” Billy growled.
“Must be a wreck or something,” Harry stated as he opened the door, and the interior light blinked on.
He climbed down to the road and approached the deputy. They swapped a few words, the deputy pointed up the road, and they talked some more. Then Harry turned around and started back to the truck.
Billy watched on in horror as the deputy then pulled out his sidearm and shot Harry in the back of the head from close range.
The truck driver fell forward onto the road, the lights from the truck illuminating his body.
“No!” Billy screamed. “No! No!”
He grabbed at the door handle, and his hand slipped off it. He tried again, and this time the door flew open. He scrambled from the cab and slipped when he hit the blacktop. He felt his pants rip at the knees and skin peel away. Pain shot through his legs and into his brain.
Ignoring it as best he could, his jaw clenched, Billy came to his feet and started to ru
n back along the truck’s trailer. He was almost to the rear of it when another man appeared and stopped him in his tracks.
“Oh Christ,” Billy gasped when the man before him brought up a handgun and pointed it at his head.
The weapon spat flame in the darkness and Billy’s head snapped back. He fell to the ground, and the man looked at the other one in the deputy’s uniform.
“Get the truck up here,” Collins snapped. “We need to get this thing unloaded.”
“Yes, sir.”
The man disappeared, and Collins went around to the double-doors at the back of the trailer. He waited there until their truck was in position. One of his men used bolt cutters to cut through the padlock on the doors.
Collins swung them open, and the man who’d been dressed as the deputy shone his flashlight up into the back of the trailer.
“Nice,” he said in a satisfactory tone.
“Get it changed over,” Collins snapped. “I want to be moving within twenty minutes.”
“Yes, sir.”
The Pentagon
Washington DC
“I’m sorry it’s so late, Luis, but it’s been a bastard of a day.”
“That’s OK, General. I don’t mind waiting. You kind of get used to it if you spend enough time in Washington.”
General Hank Jones nodded. “I forgot you’d been haunting the streets up here until recently.”
Jones was a big man in his late sixties. Much bigger than he seemed when on the screen. He reminded Ferrero of the former general, Norman Schwarzkopf. His office was a traditional wood-paneled affair with a small American flag on a staff in the right rear corner next to a large window.
“Tell me what I can do for you, Luis,” Jones said. “What brings you here?”
“I need your help, General.”
“OK, before we start, call me Hank.”
“All right, Hank. Like I said, I need your help.”
Jones frowned. “I’ll help in any way I can.”
“You know about the other day. About what went down, and if it hadn’t been for you, my team would be dead.”
“I’m sure they would have handled the situation.”