by Eric Meyer
“Hi, Chief,” Talley greeted Nolan. “Come and join us for a beer.”
“Yeah, I will, but I need to have a word with you guys.”
Art Winkelmann, the retired Navy Master Chief who ran the bar, poured him a beer, and the Seals moved to a quiet corner table. Nolan explained their suspicions about the characters the kids’ school.
“If these guys are targeting our families, Seals or Navy families, it could be the start of a new terrorist attack. On the other hand, it may be a revenge hit against me personally, for something in the past. Either way it needs to be dealt with, and fast. I told Detective Carol Summers, and she’ll be taking a look into it. But I figure it may need more than that, something more direct, and I’m not talking NCIS. Those guys were no help before.”
“So the kids will be away on vacation until this is resolved, until it blows over?” Talley asked, his face grave with concern.
“Yeah, that’s right.”
“Good. Listen, Chief, whatever needs to be done, we’ll get it done, you know that. But we’re due to ship out in a couple of days, so right now, it will have to be handed over to NCIS. I’ll talk to ‘em myself, and make sure they do a job of it this time.” He looked at the others, who were staring at him in surprise.
“Where’re we going?” asked Will Bryce. “This is news to us.”
Talley looked around the bar, but there was no one within earshot.
“You’ll know soon enough, so I guess there’s no reason in keeping it secret. A senior jarhead, Major General Allan Hicks, USMC, his nephew was murdered down in Ciudad Juarez. There’s a new gang in town, Colombians, the Salazar family. They’re trying to take over the opposition. And that means killing them off.”
The men grimaced at the name of the infamous murder capital of Mexico. Ciudad Juarez.
“That shithole,” Carl murmured.
“Yeah, tell me about it. The poor guy was undercover with DEA. He got caught up in the crossfire between rival drug gangs, and they executed him.”
“And the good General wants revenge,” Bryce nodded.
Talley shrugged. “I believe the brass would call it justice, but yeah, something like that. I think they’ve got a point. If these criminal gangs think they can go around bumping off US government officials, well, we need to disabuse them of that notion. But that’s not my decision. We go where they say, do or die.”
“Theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die,” Will Bryce intoned.
A line from Tennyson’s poem about the ill-fated Charge of the Light Brigade, Talley grinned.
“Yeah, well, I expect we’ll do better than those poor bastard cavalry. We leave in forty-eight hours, and the mission is to find these people, these Salazar brothers who’re responsible for killing this General’s kid. They want ‘em out of business, permanently.”
“So it’s another kill mission?” Kyle asked quietly.
Talley nodded. “It’s vital that we entirely destroy their infrastructure, and that means their equipment, transport and personnel. Everything and everyone that’s connected to their operation is toast. We go in, hit them hard, and get out.”
“Ciudad Juarez is a major battleground,” Nolan pointed out. “The drug gangs have whole armies of soldiers, and they’re well armed and equipped.” He looked thoughtful. “We’ll need to keep the mission objective real tight, get in hard, and get out fast. A protracted battle would hurt us badly.”
They all nodded as Talley continued. “I agree, and that’s exactly what I told the brass. They’re giving us plenty of support. The General made it clear. He wants their people taken down, so anything we want; it’s ours. But this operation in Ciudad Juarez will hit only a small part of the wider drug empire. It’ll hit the tip of the iceberg. If this one goes well, and the brass decides on follow-up operations, it’s something we’ll likely be involved in later.”
“ What about the Mexican government, do they know we’re going in?” Nolan asked.
Talley shook his head. “Not this time. If we tell anyone over there what we’re planning, especially the local cops or Federales, we may as well tell the Salazar brothers direct. No, this one is under the radar.”
Nolan was thankful his kids would be away while he was working. There were dangers across the border and possible dangers here in California. He wondered who the hell was targeting his family. During his long service, he’d taken out a number of America’s enemies, so it could be any of them. Terrorists, drug dealers, or even a pedophile gang, although the latter would fall inside the province of the San Diego PD. And that meant Carol Summers. So if it were pedophiles, he’d have to rely on her people. He shuddered. It would be better for those particular undesirables if he never got his hands on them. He looked up as he realized the men were talking quietly about the coming mission.
“We’ll be taking the new guy, Roscoe Bremmer. It’ll be his first live mission with the Seals, so keep an eye on him,” Talley was saying.
“Are you sure he’s ready?” Will asked him. “The kid’s got a lot to learn. I’m not totally convinced.”
Like Will Bryce, Roscoe Bremmer was black. But unlike Bryce, he was from wealthy middle-class parents; his father was a successful dentist. And also unlike Bryce, he had a chip on his shoulder a mile wide, which he used to constantly needle and irritate those around him. Talley knew exactly what Will meant.
“Let’s give him a break, I think he’s ready.”
The Lieutenant looked at Nolan, who shrugged. “It’s your call, Boss.”
“But you’re not comfortable with taking him along?”
“I didn’t say that, no. He’s been well trained, and he has to start somewhere. I guess he’ll learn.” He looked at Bryce. “Will, you need to cut him some slack.”
“If you say so,” Will mumbled. “I guess he’d go screaming to the ACLU if we didn’t take him along.”
“Okay, that’s settled,” said Talley, quickly ending the discussion. “Chief, I’ll talk to the NCIS guys in the morning. We’ll get them looking into this business with your kids. I think that takes care of everything. We’ll have a detailed briefing in the morning. I suggest we don’t waste any more of our drinking time.”
Nolan was thoughtful as he drove home afterwards. He hated being separated from the kids when their security was threatened. But he had a job to do. He resolved to talk to Carol again in the morning. But in the event, he didn’t have to wait quite so long. In the early hours, he was awoken from a restless sleep by the ring of his cell.
“Yeah, who is it?”
“Kyle, it’s Carol. I’ve been looking at this business of these characters hanging around the school.”
He looked at the clock on his bedside; the expensive alarm clock that Grace had bought him when he joined the Seals because it was so reliable. It had a small motif on the front, a smiling dolphin. It was an insider joke. He noted her voice sounded weary.
“Christ, Carol, it’s three thirty. Are you still at work?”
“Yeah, that murder case took some time to sort out, but we’ve got the guy safely locked away now. I pulled everything we’ve got on reports of middle-east type strangers in the area. Traffic stops and violations, petty crime, that sort of stuff, anything that links to an Arab name or ethnicity. The thing is, one of our officers did stop a Toyota compact night before last, a Corolla. He took details of the driver and passenger, and he called them in. They were fake.”
“Did he arrest them?”
“He tried, but they waved a gun in his face and drove off. This officer said they were possibly Afghans, but he couldn’t be sure. We had another report they looked like South Americans, Colombians. We’re looking for them now, and there’s an APB out, but so far no luck.”
So they could have been anyone, Afghans or Colombians, or maybe someone else entirely.
The only thing he was sure of was that it was revenge for some mission he’d carried out. He’d done a good few operations in Afghanistan and South America, including Colombi
a, so there were more than a few people with reason to be pissed. He heard Carol’s voice as she continued.
“I will keep working on it, Kyle. Are you planning on calling round my place?”
“I can’t.” He told her about shipping out and felt a wave of disappointment down the phone line. “Can I take a rain check?”
“Okay.” Her voice was cool, expressionless. “I’ll send you a text if I get anywhere with it. What about the kids?”
“Their grandparents are taking them on vacation, Santa Barbara.”
“Yeah, that makes sense. It’s a good distance from San Diego. Listen, Kyle, if I do find out anything more, how do you want to play it? I mean do you want me to tip you the wink first, or get my people onto it straight away? I know it’s sensitive, with you being a Navy Seal.”
Christ, they’re trying to harm my kids! I want to kill them!
“I’ll handle it, Carol, don’t worry. When I find these characters, they go down, and personally, I don’t give a shit about jurisdiction. I won’t need warrants, lawyers or any of that crap. There’s nothing in my life more important than the kids, nothing. Not even the Seals. Nothing.”
There was a silence on the line, and he realized he’d been less than generous to her.
Why didn’t I include her? After all, she means a lot to me. I’ve lost too many people who were close to me. Maybe that’s it. I can’t lose any more.
Even so he should have reassured her, but it was too late, he’d dropped the ball.
“Yeah, right, I’ll keep in touch, Kyle.” Her voice had cooled even more, if that was possible. “Good luck on your mission, wherever it is.”
“Yeah, thanks.”
When he hung up the phone, he had a lot to think about. How could he return any warmth and affection, godammit! He’d told her it was too soon, on more than one occasion. He’d lost so much! And now there was a threat to his kids he had to take care of! They weren’t just his son and daughter; they were the only real link back to his wife Grace, their mother who’d been killed in a drive-by shooting during a drug war. When he looked at them, he saw Grace. He knew that for her memory, even if for no other reason, he’d do anything to keep them safe.
And my career in the Seals; am I being selfish? Should I be thinking of giving up to spend more time with Daniel and Mary?
No, he didn’t even need to think about that. The Navy Seals existed to keep Americans safe from outside threats, all Americans, so his work directly contributed towards Daniel and Mary’s safety. If it came to it, he would resign from the service, but he knew he could do more for them by staying in. Without access to the immense resources of the Seals, his family could be rendered almost defenseless against these anonymous threats. And that was all that mattered to him, Daniel and Mary. All that was left of Grace, all he had to come home to. He’d give his life for them if necessary. Yet Kyle Nolan was no fool. He understood that while he was on the Ciudad Juarez mission, the people who’d been watching the kids may have something planned, something he would be unable to stop if he was a long way away. He mentally shrugged. He’d do everything in his power to prevent it happening, whatever it was. And they were up in Santa Barbara, well away from any threat. He couldn’t do any more.
Chapter Two
The slaughter in Ciudad Juarez had made the newspapers, but there’d been no mention of any DEA involvement. That would send up a flag that the US might retaliate. Bravo Platoon assembled in an abandoned truck depot they’d ‘borrowed’ in El Paso, Texas. It was stripped almost bare, just an empty, dusty space, with a pile of old truck tires stacked in one corner. The air was stale, and stank of dust, oil and rubber. Lieutenant Abe Talley, platoon commander, called the men to listen as he went over their final mission briefing.
“Here’s the deal. It’s just as I told you last night. Our mission brief is to disrupt and destroy this Salazar operation. That means if anyone gets in our way, they go down. These guys have got to pay.”
Vince nodded. “They kill our guys, there’s only one way for ‘em to go, and that’s down.” He was holding his rifle as if it was a baby, which in a sense it was, A Mk11 SWS, a sniper weapon system with a twenty-round box magazine and a Leupold Vari-X Mil-dot riflescope. As he was listening to Talley, he screwed on the QD sound suppressor so that the weapon was ready for its primary purpose; a bringer of silent death, or to use the sniper slang, ‘a weapon to reach out and touch someone’.
“When do we go over?” Nolan asked. “Our jump off time has been changed twice already.”
Like Merano, Nolan carried an identical SWS fitted with the QD suppressor. Each Seal was a specialist, and as well as being Talley’s number two, Nolan was a sniper. Some said the best there was, and in a service where top snipers were thick on the ground, it was some compliment.
Talley checked his watch. Like them all, he was dressed in night camo with a flak vest over his CGF Gallet half helmet, and NVS night vision goggles in position ready to swing down for instant use.
“We have a definite go. The Border Patrol will ignore their surveillance returns in exactly one hour from now. We have fifteen minutes to get over, and then all bets are off. Their agents have directed us to a break in the fence. We’ll go through there, and they’ll seal it up after we’re through.”
He pointed out the route to the fence, then the narrow path that wound through the Ciudad Juarez backstreets to their objective.
“This is where we’re headed. It’s the Salazar warehouse. Intel suggests they’ll be in there, so we go straight in and take ‘em down. Will, you’re the breach man, that okay?”
Will Bryce looked back at him from deep, almost black, piercing eyes under thick, bushy eyebrows topped by wiry black hair. Bryce was a man with tremendous physical strength, but he carried authority too.
“Suits me, Boss.”
None of them knew what they’d find when they got to the objective. Breachers were highly skilled, and the man responsible for forcing their way into closed buildings. Will Bryce was skilled in the use of a range of specialized explosives, called breaching charges. They were shape charges designed to be surgical in the application of force to send the preponderance of their blast forward into the room, and not back at the assault team. Breachers were also expert in using the lockpicking kit they carried if stealth was needed, and a heavy sledgehammer for operations where blunt force was required. As was expected to be the case now, Will had a sledgehammer on the floor beside him. Just in case.
“I’ll need a pair of shooters in the assault team, so…”
“I’ll go in with Will.”
Talley stared at the man who’d interrupted, a new man in the platoon, and a replacement for casualties in the last mission, Roscoe Bremmer, son of a Los Angeles dentist. He was black, like Will, but there the resemblance ended. Will was tall, whereas Roscoe was short, although he was formidably strong, like a miniature Joe Frazier. And Will was confident, calm and totally self possessed; he dealt equally with everyone, white and black. Bremmer, despite his wealthy upbringing, still viewed the world as ‘us and them’, black and white. For all that, he was a good man, and his training scores were impressive. Talley gave him his chance.
“Okay, you’re good to go, Roscoe. Zeke, you’re first in too, with Will and Roscoe.
Zeke Murray nodded. A trim six-footer with curly black hair and shiny teeth, his mother was first generation Mexican; a factor they’d used before on missions south of the border. Talley looked at the waiting men.
“Chief, you and Vince cover us as usual. Find a good stand and if anything looks out of order, shoot first, and ask questions afterwards. I’ll follow the first team in with Dan, Carl and Dave.” Dave Eisner, Carl Winters and Dan Moseley. All three were veterans of countless missions, and they nodded quietly. Carl was the demolitions specialist, and his job would be to prepare the building for destruction after they’d secured it. Talley looked at the last man in the squad, Brad Rose. “Brad, you’ll stay back with the Chief and Vince. I want yo
u on the commo, in case anything changes.”
“Hey, Boss, I’m okay, really. I’d sooner go in with the assault team.”
Talley smiled at the unit dandy. Long hair tied with a bandana to keep it off his face, he was as handsome as he was tough, and expert at every aspect of Seal operations.
“No way, I want you out in the bleachers for this one. Next time maybe, but you were hit hard out in Afghanistan, and you need more time to get over it.”
“That’s a load of crap, Boss. I’m as good as ever, you know…”
“End of discussion, Brad. If Salazar’s people come a running when the shooting starts, you’ll have plenty to occupy your mind, so do your job. Are you carrying Beowulf rounds?”
Rose nodded. “Yep, locked and loaded. Carl’s carrying the same.”
“Good, we don’t know what they’ll throw against us, so be ready to use them.”
The Beowulf round was a rifle cartridge developed for use in a modified AR-15 or M-16 family rifle. The cartridge was a variant of the .50 caliber Action Express, a cartridge originally developed for the Israeli Eagle pistol. But the Beowulf had significant modifications to improve its firepower. The result was a round with massive stopping power. Against a vehicle body or engine block, it had no equal in the arsenal of portable, lightweight weapons carried by Special Forces. If the Mexicans pursued them with heavy vehicles, even the armored vehicles they were known to possess, the Beowulf would sure slow them down.
“That’s it, carry out your final weapons checks and be ready to move out,” Talley ended the brief.
They walked through the El Paso night, careful to follow a pre-prepared route that would keep them away from prying eyes. They came to the border fence, just off the wide, well-lit Cesar E Chavez Border Highway. The fence was built of layers of reinforced steel planks laid edge on edge and supported by steel girders. Either side was a wide, open space to make it difficult for folks to cross without being seen, at least, being seen in the day; or at night when the night vision devices and infra red scanners were being monitored. Talley led them to a place between two posts, each marked with seemingly random graffiti. It wasn’t random; they were territorial markings for local gangs. And they marked the place where the fence had been breached. The Seals moved aside a section of the steel planks that had been pre-cut at some earlier time by smugglers to allow access into the US, climbed through, and replaced them. They were in Mexico.