by David DeLee
Tara sighed. “And he’s not done yet.”
Bannon ignored her needling. “They were used mostly by the Coast Guard during World War II. Their mission was to find and destroy the German submarines stationed off the coast of the United States, subs targeting our merchant convoys as they departed port. A number of the sub-chaser’s were later converted into patrol boats and mine sweepers. Seventeen were lost at sea. Many of them were given to our allies: the Russians, France, Brazil, Norway, and Mexico.”
Bannon said, concluding, “I’m a bit of a nautical and maritime historian. I admit it.”
“A bit?” Tara questioned. “You are so obsessed.”
Singleton folded his arms over his chest. “Fine. Great history lesson. Yay. What’s it got to do with us?”
Bannon opened his mouth to speak, but Tara cut him off. “Don’t get him started again. That float hunk of junk is here because the National Defense Reserve Fleet doesn’t know what to do with it.”
“The national what now?” the cop said.
“The National Defense Reserve Fleet,” Bannon said, gleefully jumped back in. “It’s a fleet of ships managed by the U.S. Department of Transportation that in theory can be activated within one to four months to provide shipping operations during national emergencies. In its hay day, they had twenty-two hundred ships standing by in ports around the country; New York, North Carolina, Alabama, Oregon, California, Washington.”
“And New Hampshire,” Kayla added. “Except they’re all old, decrepit, ignored mothballed ships that are barely seaworthy. Most by now have been salvaged, broken up, and scuttled.”
“How many are left?” Singleton asked.
“Sadly, at last count,” Bannon said, “less than a hundred. There’s a two-decade old legal battle over what to do with them. The DOT wants to scuttle the fleet but there’s partitions to designate them historical artifacts. Perhaps convert them into floating museums. An initiative I support, by the way.”
“Including that rust bucket out there,” Tara said.
“Hey. Some respect,” Bannon said.
“Meanwhile the Navy just wants it out of their backyard,” Kayla said.
“Great,” Singleton said. “That’s all fascinating, but what’s it got to do with…anything?”
“It’s the reason we’re here.” Bannon looked out at the old sub-chaser with pining admiration. “That’s where Billy Palmer’s being held. Out there.”
Singleton starred, his mouth agape. “How the hell’d they manage that?”
“By boat and the cover of darkness,” Tara said, following Bannon to the back of his truck.
“And you know this how?” Singleton asked.
Kayla and Tara exchanged glances.
“We talked to a guy,” Tara said.
Singleton held his hands up in the air. “Got it. I’m learning to not ask questions.”
“According to our…source, Palmer’s been there since Kwon snatched him,” Kayla said.
To Bannon, Tara said, “Bonus. Kwon showed up about forty-five minutes ago. They crossed the river in a dingy from the New Hampshire side. Probably launched from Goat Island. The Kittery Point Yacht Club would be my guess. The dinghy’s equipped with an outboard motor, but they rowed in to avoid detection by the Navy’s roving patrols here. The twins are with him.”
“Who?” Singleton asked.
“A couple of Kwon’s attack dogs,” Bannon said. “We met them on his yacht the other night. Go on, Blades.”
“We spotted a couple of sentries, at least two, patrolling the deck. One fore and one aft. They’re armed with Chinese manufactured submachine guns.”
Bannon frowned.
“That’s all we’ve seen since Kwon arrived,” Kayla added. “We have no idea how many more might be on board or how well armed they are.”
“So, what’s the play?” Singleton asked. “An amphibious assault without proper authorization or backup.”
Bannon pulled down the rear gate of his truck and climbed into the bed. “Not exactly. As I said earlier, this operation requires a stealthier approach than that.”
Near the cab was a steel toolbox bolted to the floor and sidewalls. It had two hinged tops. Each accessible from either side of the truck. In front of it was a green metal footlocker, also bolted to the floor. The word SEABEES was stenciled in faded yellow military font across the top. Bannon unlocked it. From inside, he pulled out two pairs of black diving fins and two black neoprene wetsuits.
Singleton saw the wetsuits and fins. “Oh, hell no. I ain’t no Navy frogman, Bannon.”
“Relax, Chief.” Bannon climbed out of the truck bed. He passed one wetsuit to Tara. “There’s no reason for you to get wet.”
“Good. Cause I ain’t. But if you think your charging onto that boat without me—”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Bannon took off his coat and stripped down to his T-shirt and briefs. Tara did the same.
“Oh, Jeez.” Singleton turned away.
When they were both encased in the tight-fitting neoprene wetsuits, Bannon handed Tara a facemask and snorkel. “Blades and I will snorkel over and deal with the lookouts on deck.”
“We’ve commandeered a rowboat and have it ready to go,” Kayla said, laying out the rest of the plan. “Chief, you and I will row out once the sentries are neutralized.”
Singleton visibly relaxed. “And take over the ship. The four of us will be enough for that?”
Bannon opened the driver side toolbox and began extracting items, passing out ballistic vests, three Sig Sauer pistols, an AK15 assault rifle, a Remington 870 shotgun, three black dive knives with six-inch, black titanium nitride-coated blades and calf sheaths, two flash bang grenades, and a halligan bar to force open any locked doors they might encounter.
“Jesus, Bannon, it looks like you’re going to war.”
“Trying to stop one.” Bannon handed Tara three more items.
Singleton’s jaw dropped. “Are those actual grenades?”
Tara hooked one onto each of three ballistic vests, handing the fourth vest to Singleton. McMurphy’s but it would fit the equally large cop.
“I promised Meredith Palmer I’d bring her son home alive,” Bannon said. “This is how I’m going to do.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Singleton handed the equipment, including the assault rifle, the shotgun, and the halligan bar, down to Kayla who stowed them on the borrowed rowboat.
Bannon and Tara sat on the lower dock. They put their pistols in plastic, waterproof bags. Bannon dropped a mini-Maglite into his before slipping it inside his wetsuit. He zipped the wetsuit closed. Tara also wore a black nylon belt cinched tightly around her narrow waist. Holstered on her left hip, in a specially designed sheath, she wore her duel-bladed haladie. They put their fins on.
Done, Bannon looked up at Singleton on the upper dock above him. “We’ll signal you once we’ve got the topside secure.”
“I can still get a tactical team here in,” Singleton consulted his watch. “Twenty minutes. If not the Maine State Police then—”
“New Hampshire,” Tara said.
Singleton blinked. “What?”
“Seavey’s Island,” Kayla said. “Its jurisdiction is disputed between the states. Each claim it as their own. Neither really has jurisdiction.”
Singleton shook it off. “Fine. The base is federal, an FBI tactical team then.”
“The last time we worked with the FBI,” Bannon said. “We had…issues. No. If we try to take the ship that way, the first thing Kwon’ll do is kill Palmer.” Bannon spit into his facemask and rinsed the spittle away. “Besides, this doesn’t end here.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ll explain later. For now, just watch for our signal.”
Singleton didn’t look happy, but nodded. “It’s your show. Good luck.”
He stepped back from the edge as Kayla climbed the weathered wooden ladder up to join him.
Tara and Bannon slipped silently into
the cold black water of the Picataqua River.
The wetsuits kept them warm in the frigid, dark water. Visibility was practically nil, but Bannon could make out the bright yellow stripes of Tara’s wetsuit along her legs and circling her shoulders. He circled his thumb and forefinger, giving her the universal OK sign.
She nodded and signaled back. Her black hair floated around her head like octopus tentacles. They set off toward the sub-chaser, swimming just below the surface. Only a few inches of their snorkels visible above water.
The swim didn’t take them long.
They surfaced quietly at the aft end of the sub-chaser, close to the hull. Even if someone on deck were to look straight down, the curve of the hull shielded them from detection. Tara spit out her snorkel and slipped her facemask up to her forehead. Bannon did the same.
“The dinghy’s around the other side,” she said.
Being on the portside of the ship prevented any of the Navy patrols in the shipyard from spot them. They were too far away from the New Hampshire coast for anyone to notice or care. With hands placed on the barnacle-encrusted hull and their heads barely above water, they circled around the stern of the ship.
The dinghy bobbed, tied off against the hull. A pair of rubber bumpers squeaked as the vessels bumped together in the gently lapping water. No one had been left behind on the dinghy.
One less obstacle to get through, Bannon thought.
A rope ladder had been left hanging from the gunwale. It draped alongside the ship’s hull.
Bannon smiled. They wouldn’t have to climb up the anchor chain after all, his original plan. “Looks like they left the welcome mat out for us.”
The ladder dangled from a break in the deck railing. A space that would’ve been filled with a life raft lashed across the opening back when the ship was operational. Mostly it had been stripped in the intervening years.
The first to go, Bannon pulled himself onto the first rung of the ladder and waited, letting the water drip off his body. The air was still. The slightest sound would amplify and carry. He slipped his fins off and handed them down to Tara. She quietly laid them on the bottom of the dinghy, along with her own.
Bannon pulled up to the second rung and paused. It made for slow going, but getting caught dangling off the side of the ship and they were sitting ducks. The most difficult—and dangerous—part of any boarding party mission was always actually getting onto the craft being boarded. Once there, he was confident, Kwon’s goons would be no match for him and Tara.
But, until they were on solid footing, their situation was precarious at best.
Tara followed behind him, moving as slowly as he did.
By the time he put his hand on the edge of the deck, the muscles in his shoulders and arms ached. Adding to his discomfort, the cold night air had begun to penetrate the wet neoprene, making him shiver. Still he disciplined himself to move slowly. Rushing now would only serve to get them both killed. He extended his head up until his eyes were at deck level. He scanned the open deck and saw no one.
He glanced down at Tara and mouthed the word: clear.
He pulled himself halfway up onto the deck, suddenly stopping when he realized why the opening had been left unguarded. A figure in dark clothes stood at the port side railing with his back to Bannon, urinating off the side of the ship.
The guard finished, zipped up his pants, and turned as Bannon completed his roll onto the deck.
Spotted.
Wide-eyed, the guard shouted in Chinese. His submachine gun was strapped diagonally across his back. He struggled with the strap, pulling it over his head. Getting it free, he let the strap slip down his arm as he tried to bring the weapon into position to shoot.
Bannon charged at him. His bare feet slapping across the wet deck. The space between them felt like the length of a football field.
The guard got his rifle in position. Pointed at Bannon. His eyes were wide with fear and disbelief. Bannon reached him before he pulled the trigger. He grabbed the weapon by the barrel and shoved it up in the air before it could be fired. At the same time, Bannon crashed his shoulder into the man’s chest, driving him backward.
The guard slammed into the metal tripod that had at one time supported the ship’s .50-caliber machine gun. Bolted to the deck, the tripod was an immovable object. Bannon was the unstoppable force. The guard cried out in pain. The impact caused him to lose the tenuous grasp he had on the assault weapon.
Bannon ripped it from his hand and flung it overboard, hearing the soft splash as the rifle hit the water below. He hit the man’s jaw with a powerful right cross and spun him around. He snaked one arm around his throat and hooked the other with his hand, putting the guard in a sleeper hold. He squeezed, pushing the man’s head forward as he tightened the pressure on the man’s neck, cutting off his oxygen supply. The man thrashed under his grip, gagging and slapping at Bannon’s arm.
Bannon was too strong for him.
The fight was over, the guard just didn’t know it yet.
“Let him go,” a male voice behind Bannon commanded in English.
Bannon froze, but didn’t loosen his grip.
Slowly, he turned, twisting his captive around with him.
The second guard stood just forward of the opening in the railing Bannon had climbed through. He held his submachine gun tight, the butt of the stock pressed against his hip, the weapon pointed directly at Bannon.
“Let him go,” the guard repeated.
The body Bannon held had stopped struggling. Had gone limp. Another few seconds of applied pressure and he’d be dead. Bannon tightened that pressure, grimacing as he did so.
Tara silently rolled onto the deck behind the armed guard.
She rose up like a black shadow against the darkness, so silently, even Bannon marveled at her stealth. She’d unsheathed the haladie without the guard hearing, and with a single, quick slash of her wrist, she drew the razor-sharp blade across the man’s flesh, slitting his throat.
Tara stepped back.
Blood spurted like a red bubbler from the man’s severed carotid artery.
The guard dropped his weapon, clutched at his throat, and made strangled gagging sounds. His eyes wide, he staggered forward a step then collapsed to his knees. He fell face first. Dead before he hit the deck.
Bannon released his hold on the guard in his arms, as well. The job done, he let the dead body slump to the deck. It was time to get Kayla and Singleton onboard and finish this.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Tara wiped her blade clean on the dead man’s pants as blood continued to pool under his slashed throat. She came to her feet. Silently, she went off to search the rest of the upper deck for anyone else who might’ve come up on deck or were hiding, too cowardly to attack.
Bannon unzipped the front of his wetsuit and pulled out the mini-Maglite he’d stashed in the plastic baggie along with his 9mm. At the port side of the sub-chaser, he clicked the light on and off three times, aiming it toward the dock where Kayla and Singleton waited.
They’d be ready to go, waiting for his signal.
Tara returned. “Deck’s clear.”
Bannon knelt and patted down the bodies on the deck, looking to see if either man carried a walkie-talkie. He regretted the loss of life, but felt no sympathy or remorse for the dead men. Just as in war; it was kill or be killed.
Ten minutes later, Kayla secured the rowboat to the back of Kwon’s dinghy. Singleton climbed halfway up the rope ladder. He hung there and passed the ballistic vests, weapons, and other equipment they’d brought over up to Tara and Bannon.
Bannon and Tara strapped on their vests. Singleton and Kayla already had theirs on. Bannon was grateful the big cop could fit into McMurphy’s vest, not wanting to send him into a viper’s nest unprotected. He wondered how the big Irishman was making out, not quite sure what he was up to, if he was being honest.
“Where is Skyjack?” Tara asked, as if reading his mind.
“Knowing him, he’
s probably at the Keel Haul, knocking back beers with Captain Floyd.”
Singleton boarded the ship quickly and quietly. He looked around after extending a hand to Kayla, helping her onto the deck. No one mentioned the dead bodies at their feet.
“Where do you think they’re holding him?” Singleton asked.
“The layout’s a simple one,” Bannon said. “There’s only a single lower deck. Under the pilothouse is the captain’s berth. Forward of that is a crew cabin. Behind it, the engine room midship, with the galley, additional crew quarters and the lazarette in the stern. More than likely he’s being held either in the forward or aft crew quarters or the captain’s berth.”
“Maybe the galley,” Kayla suggested.
Bannon conceded the point. “True. There’s four access points to the lower deck.” He pointed aft at a closed square hatch cover in the deck. “The crew quarter hatch there and there’s one forward, in the ship’s bow. The engine room hatch.” That one was midship, just aft of the stripped anti-aircraft gun mounts behind the pilothouse. “And one through the pilothouse over the captain’s berth.”
Singleton eyed the hatch. “Ladder?”
“Except for the captain’s berth. That’s the one you’ll take, Chief.” He handed him the halligan bar: a sixteen-inch long, two-and-a-half pound, steel bar forged into a fork on one end and an axe-like head on the other. “In case you need to force the door.”
He took it, strapped the AK15 to his back, and unholstered his Glock 19. “Got it.”
Kayla retained the shotgun. One flash bang hung form her vest. Tara had the other one.
“I’ll take the forward crew cabin,” Bannon said. “Tara, you’ve got the aft quarters. Don’t forget about the lazarette in the back.”
She nodded.
“Kayla will secure the engine room and galley.” To her and Tara, he said, “Clear your areas then make your way to the captain’s berth. We’ll rendezvous there. We have the element of surprise for now, but that goes away the second we begin our assault. There’s zero chance we don’t meet with resistance.” For Singleton’s benefit, he added, “These people will kill us giving the chance. Don’t give them the chance.”