by Spell, David
Both of the American girls screamed and fell to the floor as the blast shook the house. The grenade, while not being fatal, had done its job with both the coeds and their captors being completely disoriented.
The SEALs and the federal police officers rushed through the shattered door, smoke and dust from the explosion swirling in the air. A group of armed men and two blonde women had just exited a room to the right adjacent to the living room but the flashbang had stunned them, causing them to pause momentarily. The girls had fallen to the floor, huddling close to each other as they covered their ears and cried. The pounding of heavy footsteps coming down the large stairwell up ahead of them let the warriors know more cartel soldiers were about to join the fight.
Corona’s escaping group was led by a beefy man armed with an MP5. He fired blindly on full-auto towards the attackers, eliciting a grunt from one of the SEALs. Lieutenant Dye fired two quick rounds into the big Mexican’s head, sending him to the floor. The number two SEAL engaged the next bodyguard, also killing him with a double-tap to the face.
Gunfire erupted from the stairs as additional defenders rushed down from the second floor. The Navy warriors were forced to turn their attention towards them. Lieutenant Roger’s squad added their firepower, dropping two of the newcomers halfway down the steps. The rest fled back to the second level.
There was a slight lull in the shooting which allowed Chuck and Andy to move towards Tiffany and Holly. Pepe’s third bodyguard had ducked into the bedroom but now stepped back into the open, raising an M-16. McCain fired two shots into his sternum, with a finisher to the thug’s head as blood sprayed the white wall next to the doorway.
Suddenly, Pepe Corona pushed himself to his feet, having taken momentary cover behind a large leather couch. The gangster looked around for his Uzi, having dropped it when the grenade went off, and was still disoriented after the explosion. Pepe saw the two men advancing towards the girls and drew his .45, unsteadily swinging the pistol towards them. Chuck sighted in on the cartel leader’s head, his finger on the trigger, but held his fire.
Almost instantaneously, two shots came from beside him, both of Andy's rounds catching Pepe low in the abdomen. The pistol clattered to the marble tile as the old man doubled over in pain, gasping, his eyes bulging. He brought both hands to his belly, attempting to staunch the flow of blood. Corona backed up to the wall and slid down it to a sitting position.
Dye glanced over, confirming that McCain and Fleming were OK and that they were about to recover the captives. One of his men had taken a round to the arm. It did not appear to be a serious wound, however, and he prepared to follow his teammates up the stairs.
“McCain!” the lieutenant yelled over the gunfire. “You and Fleming secure the girls in that room while we clear the rest of the house!”
“Got it!” Chuck answered.
The big man knelt beside the two women. “We’re Americans and we’ve come to take you home. I need you to come with me.”
Holly and Tiffany were both in shock, stunned by what was happening around them. They allowed themselves to be led back into Pepe’s bedroom. Fleming watched Corona for another thirty seconds until the criminal bled out and died, his eyes staring blankly into the darkness. As Andy moved toward the safe room where Chuck was guarding the girls, three more cartel soldiers burst down the hallway, unaware of the former Marine’s presence.
“Señor Corona, tenemos que ir!” one of them yelled, rushing towards their boss’ bedroom.
Fleming raised his rifle, setting the selector to ‘Auto,’ and cut the three gunmen down with a long burst. As Andy quickly changed magazines in his rifle, the sounds of yelling and gunfire echoed down from the upper level. Fleming checked the bodies of the gangsters in the living room, making sure they were dead and then took his place with McCain. Lieutenant Rogers had also sent Gray and Matthews to help guard the hostages until all the other threats had been eliminated.
Pepe Corona’s mansion, two miles south of Rosarito, Mexico, Friday, 0435 hours
After almost a full half hour of gunfire, silence settled over the compound. McCain kept expecting to hear the approach of sirens, but the Mexican president had evidently decided to go along with the American president’s order not to get involved. El Presidente must have accepted the money and let the gringos rid him of the three men who had long been thorns in his side.
“Alpha One to all squads, status check.”
“Alpha Two, we’re inside the front gate. Seven in custody, vehicles secure.”
“Bravo One, eleven in custody, second floor of the main house. Ismael Pérez is under arrest and sustained a non-life threatening wound. Six of the eleven we have are women.”
“Bravo Two, we just cleared the servant’s quarters. We’ve got sixteen in custody including the household staff.”
“Alpha One clear. We’ve got three more in custody on the lower level of the main house. Evac is enroute, ETA eight minutes. All units proceed to rally point one.”
McCain made sure he got photos of the very dead Pepe Corona and Baby Face Fuentes so that the warrants could be marked ‘Exceptionally Cleared.’ This indicated that the two cartel leaders were killed during an attempt to serve the arrest warrants. Matthews and Gray did a quick walk-through of the mansion, looking for any evidence that might be useful later. They took Corona’s laptop and several notebooks. Josh also bagged up a quantity of white powder laying on the cartel leader’s desk.
One of the SEAL medics spoke with Holly and Tiffany, gently asking if they were injured. The young women would get a thorough medical screening later but were able to let the medic know they were relatively unscathed. Lieutenant Dye put the trembling coeds in the middle of his platoon with the four feds around them, giving the signal to head back to the beach. The girls had not said much of anything up to this point, still not sure that their nightmare was really over.
The cartel soldiers who had wisely thrown down their weapons and surrendered were left flex-cuffed, both wrists and ankles, where they lay. Several of the gangsters were wounded and the SEALs ministered to them as best they could before the warriors had to go. The bodies of the dead cartel members were left in place for the Mexican Federales. Alpha Two disabled all of the vehicles at the location to prevent any of the criminals from escaping.
Just as the two platoons met on the beach behind the mansion, a sound of thumping rotors carried over the breaking waves of the Pacific and Lieutenant Rogers activated a flashing infrared beacon. His platoon and half of Dye’s formed a large perimeter, their rifles pointed outwards as the Seahawk hovered over them before touching down on the beach.
Tiffany and Holly were helped aboard, along with the unconscious, flex-cuffed Chico, who was strapped onto a backboard. The SEALs had cut down the two bodyguards in his room, with one of the many bullets flying through the air striking the Sinaloa Cartel leader in the right shoulder as he had cowered behind his bed. As soon as the lead stopped flying, the medic stabilized Chico and knocked him out with a shot of morphine.
Chuck and his three men climbed onto the helicopter, as the surviving cartel honcho was now their responsibility, along with the two young women who had been rescued. The wounded SEAL from Alpha One argued with his boss about getting onboard. A 9mm bullet had caught the naval warrior in the triceps, ripping a chunk of flesh out of his arm. The medic had bandaged him up as soon as the firefight was over and the commando did not want to get into the helicopter, preferring to stay with his teammates. Lieutenant Dye was not in the mood for a discussion, though, ordering the commando to accompany the feds, telling him they would see him aboard the destroyer.
As soon as the Seahawk was airborne, the two SEAL teams separated and everyone broke into a jog, heading for their RIBs a mile away.
Ten minutes later, the helicopter made a soft landing on the rear of the USS Michael P. Murphy. The ship’s captain, several of his officers, and the reserve SEAL platoon met the aircraft. Two hospital corpsmen, both of them female, helped t
he young women onto the deck, quickly ushering them below where they could be examined by a Naval doctor, also a female. Sandra Dunning had taken it upon herself to place a woman doctor onboard the destroyer before they left San Diego. Dunning had no idea what the two kidnap victims had been through but she could imagine and wanted to make them as comfortable as possible.
Three male corpsmen muscled the backboard containing Pérez onto a stretcher, rolling it towards the sickbay. Two MPs followed, having been ordered to guard the cartel leader until they got back onto US soil and the suspect was offloaded to the base hospital. The wounded SEAL walked towards the sickbay under his own power, two of his friends from the reserve platoon accompanying him. Chuck and his companions gave the remainder of the SEALs and the Navy brass a quick synopsis of what had transpired, knowing they would have a formal debriefing later.
As the adrenaline wore off, McCain suddenly felt spent. How long can I keep doing this? he wondered to himself. It was awesome, rescuing the hostages and taking out the bad guys, but I’m starting to feel my age, he realized.
Chuck looked around and saw that it was now just him, Andy, Eric, and Josh standing together on the deck, the others having wandered off to await the arrival of the Zodiacs containing the rest of the SEALs. The sky was starting to lighten back towards the east, sunrise a half hour away.
The four men discussed the operation and Matthews expressed his frustration that he didn’t get a single shot off during the firefight, eliciting laughs from his companions.
“Don’t worry about it, Rookie,” Fleming smiled. “You’ll get plenty of other chances.”
Gray had managed to get in on the action, shooting one of the cartel soldiers in the head as he had rushed down the stairs from the second level of the mansion.
“Look on the bright side: you don’t have to worry about cleaning your rifle,” the former gunnery sergeant added with a grin.
Sensing that Andy wanted time with the boss, Eric nudged Josh toward the galley below in search of breakfast. When it was just the two of them, Fleming stuck his hands into his pockets and stared intently into McCain’s eyes.
“So what happened in there? Why didn’t you shoot that bastard?”
McCain shrugged. “I figured you’d want the honor. I mean, yeah, he sent a team to kill me, but I got the best of that one. But he came too close to taking out your family. I was gonna give you about a second or two to make the shot before I capped him. And nice touch, by the way, of gut shooting him. That had to hurt!”
Andy just nodded, looking out over the ocean as the sky got brighter with the coming of the new day.
“Are we sickos or what?”
“Maybe,” Chuck answered. “But like they say in Texas, ‘Some folks just need killing.’”
Fleming grinned, turning back to his friend, his right hand extended. “Thanks for letting me have him. It’s nice to know that we put Señor Scumbag out of business.”
Chuck nodded. “That’s right. Plus, I killed Fuentes and Pérez will die in an American prison. And we got those girls out of there. All in all, a good day. I think I’m ready for a cup of coffee and some Navy chow.”
As the two weary warriors turned to go below decks, they were met at the hatchway by Tiffany and Holly, now in blue scrubs and still looking a bit dazed at being free.
“Ladies,” McCain smiled, taking a step back to let them go by.
Instead, the women stopped in front of the two heavily armed men, both still wearing stunned expressions, as if they could not believe they were actually going home.
“You were with them, right? You rescued us?” one of the girls asked. In their tactical gear, the men all looked alike to the coeds.
Chuck couldn’t remember which one was which. They were both close to Melanie’s age, he realized. Their parents must have been sick with worry. Though they had both been pronounced physically fit, the emotional scars would likely require a different kind doctor.
“I’m Chuck, this is Andy. Yeah, we were a part of the team. The Navy SEALs were the main ones behind the operation. Andy and I are federal police officers. Besides coming to get you, we also went in there to arrest three cartel leaders.”
“Three cartel leaders?” the taller girl parroted. “We only knew Pepe,” she said, hanging her head. “He was over the Tijuana Cartel.”
The second girl spoke up. “What happened to him? Did you arrest him?”
“No,” McCain shook his head, seeing a shocked look on the two former captives’ faces.
“What happened? Did he get away?”
“Pepe’s dead,” Chuck answered. “He was killed in the gunfight.”
Holly and Tiffany held each other tightly, tears streaming down their faces.
“You’re sure?” one of them asked, softly.
“No question about it. He’ll never hurt you or anyone else again.”
The young women continued to sob, clearly relieved that their tormenter was dead. McCain gave them a moment to regain their composure.
“Andy and I were just about to go find some breakfast. Would you care to join us? We can give you a little idea of what you can expect when we get back to San Diego.”
Pier 3, Naval Base, San Diego, California, Friday, 0835 hours
As soon as the Naval handlers secured the USS Michael P. Murphy to the pier, the gangplank was lowered. The Summers and Mason families were anxiously scanning the crowd for their long-lost prodigal daughters, while Naval, FBI, and intelligence personnel waited patiently for the rest of the crew to disembark. Chuck and Andy escorted the two young women down into the waiting arms of their parents. The cops stood awkwardly off to the side amidst the tears and laughter. Shaun Taylor strolled over and spoke softly to McCain. The big man nodded.
He and Fleming herded the two joyous families into the waiting black GMC Yukons. Tiffany, Holly, and their parents had been alerted that the girls would need to be interviewed by the FBI and that it might take several hours. The sooner the former hostages got it over with, the sooner they could go home.
After the SUVs pulled away, corpsmen loaded Chico into the back of a waiting ambulance. Eric and Josh would escort the cartel leader to the base hospital and make sure the security was tight around the medical facility. Agents from the United States Marshals were already on their way to take custody of the prisoner, but for now military police would make sure no one attempted to rescue the gangster. While Pérez’s shoulder was destroyed and would require surgery, he was scheduled to make his first court appearance within the next two weeks. At 1000 hours, all of the participants from the mission would meet at SEAL HQ for a final debrief of the operation.
Just south of San Diego in the small community of San Ysidro, Kevin Clark, Scotty Smith, Jay Walker, and Hollywood Estrada sat around the living room of the CIA safe house studying the mission dossiers they had been provided and sipping coffee. The men had arrived under the cover of darkness the previous evening and were waiting for the fifth member of their team.
“How’s Nicole?” Scotty asked Jay, flipping through his file.
The former SEAL smiled. “She’s good, buddy. I don’t know what I did to score her, but we’re traveling to Dallas next month so I can meet her family.”
“That sounds like its getting serious.”
“I guess it is,” Walker nodded.
Nicole Edwards worked for the CDC and was one of the world’s leading epidemiologists, overseeing a team working on a vaccine for the zombie virus. She and Jay had met just before the operation to eradicate the cartel in Atlanta. If it wasn’t love at first sight, it was close, and Walker transferred from the CDC team in Washington to Atlanta to be near her.
Kevin stared out the window of the safe house. He couldn’t see it from where he was but the southeast corner of San Ysidro contained the busiest border crossing point between the US and Mexico. The San Diego suburb contained two homes rented by the agency that could be used to interrogate detainees or a place where agents could stage before an operati
on south of the border. Over the last few years, a number of Middle-Eastern men had been captured crossing into the United States. After the zombie virus had been deployed, the level of vigilance around the border was at an all-time high.
Both the FBI and the CIA maintained a quiet presence in the area, responding as needed to assist the Border Patrol in determining if the detainee was a legitimate threat or not. A number of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay had been caught trying to get into America after background checks had determined their links to terror organizations.
Clark and his team had no idea who they were expecting. The colonel had only been told that an agency operative would be joining them at the safe house, who would escort them into Mexico, and help them complete their mission. Kevin would never voice his concerns to the other three men in the room, but these kinds of ops scared him. He wasn’t scared in the sense of worrying about his own safety. He was a career military man and had long since come to terms with the possibility of being killed or wounded in the service of his country.
What concerned him was working with people he did not know, especially spooks. I guess I better watch what I say, he thought, because I’m a spook now, too. As one of the three current Assistant Directors of Operations, Admiral Williams had brought Clark on to oversee the Agency’s international clandestine ops.
With the recent terror threat to the West Coast, the colonel and his team were helping out wherever they could. He still had several of his best contractors providing security at Fort Belvoir, but planned to pull them in the next few days. This current mission that they were about to undertake in Mexico was really the exact type of operation that Kevin was brought on board for and he felt the familiar tingle of adrenaline as he continued to read the file.
Scotty knew Kevin well, having served with him for several years in the Army. He glanced over at his former CO.