Christmas at Steel Beach

by M. L. Buchman

  In answer, she added one more item to her requisition list and handed it over to him.

  He read down to the bottom of the list.

  Then he aimed that sideways smile at her and just melted her heart.

  Chapter 14

  Sly and his crew had really done it up. Gail had never seen anything quite like it.

  She crossed down from the vehicle garage and stood at the head of the garage ramp where she’d done her soup kitchen service. At the foot of the ramp sat the LCAC with its front and rear gates down. Twinkle lights and Christmas garlands had been strung from the steel structure of the underside of the Hangar Deck. The hovercraft’s deck sported dozens of tables, most made of supply cases of one sort or another, each overlaid with red-and-white checked tablecloths.

  Dave had made tiny wire Christmas trees for the middle of each table.

  Gail looked up at the LCAC’s control tower and could see her little Christmas tree aglow in the window. She was getting very possessive about certain things, but now that she knew she would be staying here, that was okay. There had been nothing to become attached to at SUBASE Bangor or the Reuben James before that. In sharp contrast, aboard the Peleliu there was so much to get attached to.

  And in three-and-a-half short weeks, she had become so.

  She crossed through the LCAC and descended onto the planking of the Well Deck. Games had been set up here, darts, ping-pong, several foosball tables had been dug out of the 02 Deck recreation area and brought down. It was shortly after dawn, end of shift for most of the crew.

  Jerome and Nika were taking on Tom and Dave at an air hockey table. Sly stood watching them.

  “Why aren’t you playing?” she asked as she came up beside him.

  Sly smiled down at her. “I think that making my living as pilot of a hundred-ton air hockey puck has spoiled me for the game.”

  Down one side of the Well Deck, Tanker and her crew were setting up a long table of all the trimmings: baked beans, coleslaw, fried corn bread, stewed sweet potatoes, sheet pans over heaters of baked mac and cheese…

  The crew had really gone all out. She’d done the major brush strokes, helped each chef tune their seasoning and production methods—there were still six hundred souls aboard after all—but each chef had really owned their own dish. She couldn’t be prouder of them.

  The rear ramp of the Peleliu had been lowered, tilted down into the once-again calm, warm seas. Sailors, male and female, were diving off the steel beach. A fierce game of water polo was raging back and forth across the ocean’s surface.

  And to either side of the very stern end of the Well Deck were the two big barbeque grills. Hers was to starboard, Sly’s to port. Each had a vat of sauce that was cooking on the back corner.

  The supply ship did indeed have fresh-butchered hogs—the Navy really did try to put out for those stuck onboard over Christmas. She and Sly had each taken over a grill and spent much of the day tending their individual hogs. By unspoken agreement, they’d done no tasting of the other’s preparation.

  On a third grill, they spread out chicken quarters, half with her sauce, half with his.

  “Ma bien-aimée!” Matheo Chastain’s call gave her little warning before being wrapped in a bear hug.

  She returned it happily, and wondered that it was now no more than the embrace of a dear friend. It had been distilled of all other meaning by a Chief Petty Officer from, God help her, North Carolina.

  Matheo stepped her back but kept his large hands on her shoulders as he inspected her. “So, it is as I feared. Who is he?”

  “That would be me,” Sly stepped up beside her.

  Matheo clasped Sly’s hand with both of his. “Now this is a man lucky beyond price.” Then he dropped Sly’s hand and turned to the inspect the grills.

  Sly looked at her in surprise.

  She offered a shrug in return, “Food is always his top priority.”

  This was Matheo. There was no one else like him. And while she appreciated him, he was not the man for her. Why it had taken so many years for her to know that was a question she wasn’t going to ask.

  “I hear that you order up hogs and I know I must come taste. I must see what ma cherie does. Though why you cook dinner with the rising of the sun; it is still le mystère.”

  “This one is mine,” Gail dipped a ladleful of sauce from the steel canister on the back of the grill, and slathered it over the chicken, then more on the pork. “The other is Sly’s.”

  Matheo turned back to Sly. “So, that is how you catch her heart? She whose heart is always been held so safe. You cook that good?”

  Sly looked thoroughly flummoxed so Gail rescued him.

  “I don’t know. I haven’t tasted his food yet.”

  “Ah. But I can tell there is still no hope for me.” He offered a great heaving sigh. “I must taste these.”

  He reached out and Sly pushed his hand aside.

  Matheo looked at him.

  “Cooks don’t eat before their crew.”

  Matheo laughed and hugged Sly and pounded him on the back, “Oh, bien-aimée! I see why this one you like so much. The straight arrow. He is of course right.”

  And Matheo pitched in and helped with the service as the crew of the Peleliu streamed by the laden tables, filled their plates at the grills, and moved to the picnic tables on the LCAC or sat down on the steel beach.

  Lola stood near Gail’s grill while tasting the pork. “Oh, girl,” she sighed with closed eyes. “Oh. You are doing the South proud today.”

  Gail felt terribly chipper that her new-found friend so approved. Near the end she was worried that there wouldn’t be enough. But finally—after the last plates were filled to be run up to the on-duty watch crew—she, Sly, Matheo, and some of the officers from the carrier—who’d come over to help coordinate the off-loading of the plane’s passengers—landed at one of the LCAC’s tables. Dave’s little Christmas tree lit their table cheerily as they all dug in.

  “Merde! but this is so good!” Matheo licked where sauce had dribbled down his hand.

  Gail sat opposite Sly. By silent mutual consent, they’d each taken the other’s barbeque. She bit in and savored.

  “I really want to scoff at this, Sly. I really, really do.”

  Sly’s smile acknowledged that she couldn’t. And the way his eyes closed as he ate hers left her with no doubt of how much he enjoyed it.

  “It doesn’t solve our problem, does it?”

  “No,” she agreed. “I still can’t tell you which is better.”

  “I can,” one of the officers spoke up and they all turned to look at him. He glanced over at his companion who nodded his agreement.

  “What? Which one?”

  “The USS Peleliu.”

  She looked at Sly. If there was some joke here, he didn’t get it either.

  The officer looked to Matheo. “You, sir, are very lucky that this mess is in the ‘Large Afloat’ category, rather than the ‘Aircraft Carrier’ category.”

  Matheo opened his mouth and then closed it again looking deeply chagrined, but nodded his head in agreement.

  The officer leaned forward to look around Matheo. “We’ve been eating your food for two days, Chief Miller. I shouldn’t say this yet, but there is absolutely no contest anywhere in the ‘Large Afloat.’ Despite the adverse conditions of an overwhelmed staff and galley due to your unexpected passengers, you keep an exceptional mess. And to top it off with this…” he raised a chicken drumstick dripping with sauce.

  One of hers she noted with some pleasure that she’d tease Sly about later.

  “…this is some of the best food I’ve ever eaten. In or out of the Navy.”

  Gail looked at the officer and his companion but couldn’t seem to make sense of the words. There was something she was missing.

  Sly kicked her under the table and mouthed, “Admiral Ney Award.”

  Gail looked back at the grinning officers as it registered. She searched for a response.

&nbs
p; She really did.

  The one that slipped out surprised her as much as it did everyone else at the table—all of whom burst out laughing.

  “Holy shit!”

  # # #

  Sly sat at the head of the Peleliu’s stern ramp and watched the sunset. The lazy waves sloshed up and down the steel beach with a soft murmur. The Christmas party had run through most of the day despite it being everyone’s “night.”

  A late mail call had reached the carrier and great bundles of packages and letters from home had arrived at the Peleliu adding to the merriment.

  Gail’s crew had made a vast number of pumpkin, apple, and pecan pies, all of which had been consumed.

  And now, at long last, the Well Deck was quiet. And clean, this was the Navy after all, and they were always on call.

  He didn’t need to hear her to feel her when she approached.

  Gail sat down close beside him and laced an arm through his.

  “That was some fine barbeque, Chief,” she whispered it like a secret.

  “Damn good, Chief,” he acknowledged.

  “I didn’t get you a Christmas present, Sly. But I did find a couple of these in ship’s stores.” She held out a pair of candy canes.

  He accepted one with all due grace and they both unwrapped them and began to lick the red and white stripes. They paused for a peppermint kiss that was as good as any he’d ever had in his life.

  “I got you something.”

  “Oh, man,” she sighed.

  “You say it that way, it doesn’t sound like much of a complaint.”

  “A girl does like a good present. It’s not something big is it? I’ll be bummed if you got me something big.”

  “No,” he assured her. “Not big. Quite small really.” He went back to sucking on his candy cane and watching the sunset turn the wave tips gold.

  “Okay, Chief. Give.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Really sure?” God he so loved teasing this woman.

  “Yes!”

  He reached into his pocket and pulled out the contents of the package that had arrived for him in this morning’s late mail call. He’d been waiting all day for a moment alone with Gail to give it to her.

  He kept his hand closed.

  “Okay, that’s pretty small,” she acknowledged. “Smaller than the candy cane I gave you. I can work with that without feeling too awful.”

  He opened his palm and waited for her to look down.

  Sly heard the small gasp.

  “It was my grandmother’s. I asked Mama to express ship it out…Will you marry me, Gail Miller?” Not the most elegant words, but he figured asking her plain and simple was the best way. It’s what fit her.

  She looked up at him, studied him with those eyes he always got so lost in. So lost that he’d never be able to find his way back.

  Then she looked back down at the ring.

  He wondered if she’d been struck speechless. Or if she’d swear again as she had over the Admiral Ney Award, though they’d both been told it was Top Secret-classified until the official announcement. Which had only made it all the more real.

  Then Gail looked back up into his eyes. And that smile, which had bowled him over the first moment and left his butt soaking wet, shone brightly upon him.

  She held up her hand for him to slide on the ring.

  “I will.”

  He slipped the ring on her finger and leaned in to kiss his peppermint-flavored fiancé.

  “Thanks, Chief.”

  He couldn’t have said it better himself.

  About the Author

  M. L. Buchman has over 30 novels in print. His military romantic suspense books have been nominated for the RT Reviewer’s Choice of the Year award, and been named Barnes & Noble and NPR “Top 5 of the year” and Booklist “Top 10 of the Year.” In addition to romance, he also writes thrillers, fantasy, and science fiction.

  In among his career as a corporate project manager he has: rebuilt and single-handed a fifty-foot sailboat, both flown and jumped out of airplanes, designed and built two houses, and bicycled solo around the world. He is now making his living as a full-time writer on the Oregon Coast with his beloved wife. He is constantly amazed at what you can do with a degree in Geophysics. You may keep up with his writing by subscribing to his newsletter at www.mlbuchman.com.

  Bring On the Dusk

  the story of the USS Peleliu and her crew contine as Colonel Michael Gibson

  finds true love (coming March 2015)

  There were few times that Colonel Michael Gibson of Delta Force appreciated the near-psychotic level of commitment displayed by terrorists, but this was one of those times. If they hadn’t been, his disguise would have been much more difficult.

  The al-Qaeda terrorist training camp deep in the Yemeni desert required that all of their hundred new trainees dress in white with black headdresses that left only the eyes exposed. The thirty-four trainers were dressed similarly but wholly in black making them easy to distinguish. They were also the only ones armed which was a definite advantage.

  Their dress code made for a perfect cover. The four men of his team were dressed in loose-fitting black robes like the trainers. Lieutenant Bill Bruce wore dark contacts to hide his blue eyes and they all had rubbed a dye onto their hands and wrists, the only other uncovered portion of their bodies.

  Michael and his team had parachuted into the deep desert last night and traveled a quick ten kilometers on foot before burying themselves in the sand along the edges of the main training grounds. Only their faces were exposed, each carefully hidden by a thorn bush.

  The mid-day temperatures had easily blown through a hundred and ten degrees. It felt twice that inside the heavy clothing and lying under a foot of hot sand, but uncomfortable was a way of life in “The Unit” as Delta Force called itself, so was of little concern. They’d dug deep enough so that they weren’t simply roasted alive, even if it felt that way by the end of the motionless day.

  It was three minutes to sunset, three minutes until the start of Maghrib, the fourth scheduled prayer of the five that were performed daily.

  At the instant of sunset the muezzin began chanting adhan, the call to prayer.

  Thinking themselves secure in the deep desert of the Abyan province of southern Yemen, every one of the trainees and the trainers knelt and faced northwest toward Mecca.

  After fourteen motionless hours—less than a dozen steps from a hundred and thirty terrorists—it was a challenge to make his movement smooth and natural as he rose from his hiding place. He shook off the sand and swung his AK-47 into a comfortable position. The four of them approached the prostrate group in staggered formation from the southeast over a small hillock.

  The Delta operators interspersed themselves among the other trainers and knelt, blending in perfectly. Of necessity, they all spoke enough Arabic to pass if questioned.

  Michael didn’t check the others as it might draw attention. If they hadn’t made it cleanly into place, an alarm would have been raised and the plan would have changed, drastically. All was quiet, so he listened to the muezzin’s words and allowed himself to settle into the peace of the prayer.

  Bismi-llāhi r-rahmāni r-rahīm…

  In the name of Allah, the most compassionate, the most merciful…

  He sank into the rhythm and meaning of it—not as these terrorists twisted it in the name of murder and warfare—but as it actually stated. It was moments like this one that drove home the irony of his long career to become the most senior field operative in Delta; his finding an inner quiet the moment before dealing death.

  Perhaps it was the same experience for them in their religious fervor. But what they lacked was flexibility. They wound themselves up to throw away their lives if necessary to complete their pre-programmed actions exactly as planned.

  For Michael, it was an essential centering in self that allowed perfect adaptability when situations went kinetic—Delta’s word for the
shit unexpectedly hitting the fan.

  That was Delta’s absolute specialty.

  From a place of zero preconceptions, in either energy or strategy, it allowed for the perfect action that fit each moment in a rapidly-changing scenario. Among the team they’d joke sometimes about how Zen, if not so Buddhist, the moment before battle was.

  And, as always, he accepted the irony of that with no more than a brief smile at life’s whimsy.

  Dealing death was one significant part of what The Unit did.

  U.S. SFOD-D, Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta, went where no other fighting force could go and did what no one else could do.

  Today, it was a Yemeni Terrorist Training Camp.

  Tomorrow would take care of itself.

  They were the U.S. Army’s Tier One asset and no one, except their targets, would ever know they’d been here. One thing for certain, had it been The Unit unleashed on bin Laden, not a soul outside the command structure would know who’d been there. SEAL Team Six had done a top-notch job, but talking about it wasn’t something a Delta operator did. But Joint Special Operations Command’s leader at the time was a form STS member, so they’d gone in instead.

  Three more minutes of prayer.

  Then seven minutes to help move the trainees into their quarters where they would be locked in under guard for the night, as they were still the unknowns.

  Or so the trainers thought.

  Three more minutes to move across the compound through the abrupt fall of darkness in the equatorial desert to where the commanders would meet for their evening meal and evaluation of the trainees.

  After that the night would get interesting.

  Bismi-llāhi r-rahmāni r-rahīm…

  In the name of Allah, the most compassionate, the most merciful…

  # # #

  Captain Claudia Jean Casperson of the U.S. Army’s 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment—commonly known as the Night Stalkers—finally arrived at the aircraft carrier in the Gulf of Aden after two full days in transit from Fort Campbell, Kentucky.

  The Gulf of Aden ran a hundred miles wide and five hundred long between Somalia in Africa and Yemen on the southern edge of the Arabian Peninsula. The Gulf connected the Suez Canal and the Red Sea at one end to the Indian Ocean on the other, making it perhaps the single busiest and most hazardous stretch of water on the planet.