Hunter didn’t seem to hear. “I think we need to catch up with them,” he said. “I don’t want to get left behind.”
Tyler evaluated everyone’s reaction to be within the same sleeve as his own: “Are you out of your mind?”
“What?” Hunter said. “Why are you looking at me like that? Do you want to be abandoned? If we follow them, we have a chance to get off this island. We have a chance to save our lives.”
“I’m staying here,” Tyler said, and he wanted there to be no doubt about his commitment. “Rattlesnake and Straight Shooter—whatever the hell their names are—are out looking for a fight. I am the very opposite of that. I am proud to declare myself a devout coward.”
“That’s not true,” Jaime said. “You dared to escape.”
Tyler accepted the kind words with a nod. The fact that he left Annie behind was a big asterisk on that particular act of bravery.
“You,” Hunter said. “Jamie, is it?”
“Jaime.”
“Right. Jaime. How did you get up here? Do you have a golf cart, too?”
Jaime looked to Tyler, who said nothing. He knew that Jaime had his own personal transportation, but that was not for him to reveal or conceal.
“I do,” Jaime said. Tyler didn’t think his friend was capable of telling a lie, but this seemed like a good time to start.
“Let me borrow it,” Hunter said.
Jaime pointed to a spot beyond and behind the restored hut. “It’s back there,” he said. “But I think you’re making a huge mistake.”
“And why is that?”
“Because we’re safe here, at least for now. People with guns are already looking for us. Why would you deliberately piss off the only armed friends we have on the island?”
“Listen to them,” Lori said. “I think they may be right.”
Hunter’s mouth set in a thin line. “Look, I don’t like this guy. I don’t trust him. We’ve already caught him in lie after lie. Why should we trust him now?”
“Because he saved your life?” Tyler offered.
“No,” Hunter said. “Even that’s a lie. He saved his own life. We were just there. And he wasn’t happy about it.”
“So, what is your plan?” Jaime pressed. “You follow them and find them without getting caught or getting shot. Then what? It seems to me that you’ll only get in the way of whatever they’re trying to do.”
“That’s the part I want to know,” Hunter said. “That’s the part I don’t trust.” He turned to Lori. “Are you coming with me or staying with them?”
Tyler felt sorry for her. She looked like she wanted to stay, but she stepped off with Hunter.
“What about you two?” Hunter said.
“I think I will stay here,” Jaime said.
“Yeah, I’m good,” Tyler replied.
“We won’t wait for you, you know,” Hunter warned. “If we get the opportunity to sail away, we’re gone. No looking back.” He didn’t wait for an answer. He turned on his heel and led Lori into the darkness behind the shed.
“Not a lovable guy,” Jaime said.
Tyler coughed out a laugh. “Yeah, no shit.”
* * *
Venice’s computer dinged with an incoming message at the precise moment Boxers slammed his way into the Cave and strode into the War Room. “What do we know?” he said. If he saw Dom sitting in the chair nearest the door, he made no indication.
“And good morning to you, too,” Venice said. After one look at Big Guy, she abandoned her effort to lighten the moment. He was amped and in no mood for small talk. “We know they’re healthy, and we know that their island resort is under assault.”
Her telephone rang. She looked at the caller ID. “And we know he’s on the phone.” She pressed the speaker button. “Hello, Scorpion. I’m here with our Special Friend and Big Guy.” It was a long-standing tradition to avoid the use of real names when dealing with any aspect of the business that might involve shooting. Special Friend was the unofficial covert handle for Father Dom.
“The hell’s goin’ on down there, Boss?” Boxers said.
“Still trying to figure that out, Big Guy. I apologize to the entire world for interrupting your ever-critical beauty sleep.”
“At least you’ve got a few thousand miles of separation,” Dom quipped.
“Yeah, ha, ha,” Boxers said. “But seriously.”
“Mother Hen, I just sent you a picture of the ship that transported our bad guys to the island. I’ll take whatever you can figure out, as quickly as you can figure it out.”
“You got a plan?” Boxers asked. His body language screamed that he was ready for a fight.
“Sort of,” Jonathan said. “Gunslinger and I are going to board the vessel and see what we can see.”
The big screen at the end of the conference table lit up with the picture Jonathan had sent. According to the bow markings, they were looking at the Olympia 3, and the flag of registry was from Denmark.
“You’re being invaded by Danes?” Boxers said with a chuckle.
“I wouldn’t trust any of the official markings,” Jonathan said. “We want to get on board and out in as little time as possible, so if you can somehow give me an idea of the layout, that would make things a lot simpler. Personally, I think it’s some kind of old minesweeping ship.”
“Got it,” Venice said. The big screen danced again, and now the display showed a black-and-white twin of the ship in Jonathan’s message. “It appears to be a YMS Class minesweeper, circa early 1950s.”
“How did you do that?” Jonathan asked. Off-mic, they could hear him relaying to Gail that Venice had already identified the type of boat.
“There’s a thing called the Internet,” Venice said as she continued to type. “It’s searchable and they’ve got pictures and everything.”
“What are you going to be looking for?” Boxers asked.
“Whatever we can find. I want to know who we’re up against.”
“Pretty high-risk fishing trip,” Boxers said.
“I don’t know that it is,” Jonathan said. “There doesn’t seem to be a security contingent around the ship. I can’t imagine that to be the case, but whatever they’ve left behind is a small crew. The bulk of their forces are deployed guarding guests and whatever else they’re doing back at the resort.”
“That sound like there’s some distance between you and them,” Dom said.
The screen at the end of the table changed again, and there was an annotated aerial photo of the Crystal Sands Resort, courtesy of the island’s publicity department. “I just pulled up a map of your resort,” Venice said. “I presume you’re down at the piers?”
“Exactly.”
The island was roughly the shape of the letter C, oriented with the open part facing south. Beaches surrounded the entire landmass, with lowlands at the east and western ends, and hills in the middle. The piers were located on the easternmost side, with the resort structures on the western side.
“Boss, I gotta tell you that I think it’s a mistake to try to take down a vessel that size by yourself.”
“First of all, I’ve got Gunslinger with me, and second, I’m not going to take it down. We’re going to get in and out and gather some intel.”
“How about you just hunker down and wait for the cavalry?” Boxers suggested.
“Easier said than done,” Venice said. That drew the attention of everyone in the room. “Our Special Friend arranged for me to have a chat with Wolverine a little while ago. The Crystal Sands Island is privately held, but it is loosely a possession of Costa Rica.”
“So, the FBI has no jurisdiction,” Jonathan said, jumping ahead.
“It’s even more complicated than that,” Venice said. “Costa Rica is one of just a handful of countries on the planet without a military. Even if they wanted to come and get you, they’d have no forces to do it with.”
When she was done, Boxers and Dom both stared with expressions of disbelief. “Tell me that was a joke,�
�� Big Guy said.
“Wish I could,” Venice said.
“That sort of sucks,” Jonathan said.
“Baker Sinise’s brochures brag about an anything-goes resort,” Dom said. “I guess that helps explain how he gets away with it. There’s no one around to enforce whatever laws they might have.”
“How big is your OpFor, Boss?” Opposition force.
“I estimate something north of two dozen.”
“You can’t win that fight. Not without force multipliers.”
“It won’t be pleasant,” Jonathan agreed, “but we don’t have a whole lot of choice. For now, we’re just gathering intel. We’ve found a place to hole up and stay out of the way during daylight hours.”
“Then just stay there,” Venice said.
“I don’t think we can,” Jonathan said. “We killed two of their guys. They know they have armed resistance on the island, and they’re going to have to come looking for us.”
“Are there more than just you and Gunslinger?” Dom asked.
“Affirmative. We’ve joined up with two other guests and two guys who work here.”
“That makes six,” Boxers said softly. Venice thought maybe he was thinking out loud. “Better than only two.”
“That’s another reason to board the ship,” Jonathan said. “Between the two of us, we’ve got two rifles, two handguns, and barely a hundred rounds of ammo. I’m hoping they’ll have a weapons locker on board.”
“If they do, I believe that’s where you’ll find their security contingent,” Boxers said.
“I believe you’re right. Mother Hen, how are you coming on those deck plans?”
A set of drawings appeared on the screen. “I have some,” Venice said, “but I have to tell you that there seems to be a lot of variation on what’s where. That model ship is old enough that it’s likely been reconfigured.”
“It’ll be what it is,” Jonathan said.
An idea smacked Venice out of nowhere. “I think I might have a plan. Does Gunslinger have a phone, too?”
“Yes, but we’ve turned it off to conserve on battery.”
“Okay, turn her phone on and hang up.”
“That’s a plan?” Jonathan said.
“Yes, it is,” Venice said. “I’ll call you back as a conference call. We’ll all come along as you board the ship. If you end up at a dead end or something, maybe I’ll be able to talk you out of it or around it.”
The line went dead.
“You really think that will work?” Dom asked as Venice waited to redial.
“Sure. I mean, I don’t see how—”
“This is bullshit,” Boxers proclaimed, and he shot out of his chair. He headed for the door.
“Where are you going?” Venice asked, startled.
“I’m going to rescue them myself,” he said.
“How?” Dom asked.
“I’ll raise my own goddamn army,” he said.
CHAPTER 9
GAIL SETTLED HER BLUETOOTH RECEIVER INTO HER EAR AND POWERED up her phone. “This is bizarre,” she said as she waited for the phone to boot up. “Surreal.” They’d discussed the rules of engagement, such as they were, and they could not have been simpler. If challenged, shoot. If spotted by a stranger with a gun, shoot. Then, gather weapons and ammo as you go along. When she’d agreed to rejoin the covert side of Security Solutions, with many months of physical and psychological therapy in her rearview mirror, she hadn’t imagined that she’d be knee-deep in a tactical situation so soon. She’d certainly never considered that it would be run by conference call with not nearly enough equipment.
Gail and Jonathan had been watching the ship for over ten minutes, and had yet to see any activity. A gangplank led from the pier to a spot amidships, and in the glaring lights, she could see the markings and logo of the Crystal Sands Resort on the canvas strips under the gangplank’s handrails. It appeared to be the very one by which they had disembarked from the resort ship barley thirty-six hours before.
“I don’t believe for a minute that they left this unguarded,” Gail said.
“That’s what we have to assume,” Jonathan agreed. “Maybe they figured that by focusing their manpower on wrangling guests, they wouldn’t have to worry about guarding the ship.”
Gail’s phone buzzed first. She answered, and then ten seconds later, Jonathan’s buzzed.
“Are we all on?” Venice’s voice asked.
Jonathan and Gail confirmed in unison. “Are you up for a run?” he asked her.
The truthful answer was that she had her doubts, but this was not a time to express them. This was the time to take her physical therapy final exam. “We’ll all find out together,” she said. “I’ll do my best to keep up.”
“All right, then, let’s do this. Remember to zigzag.” It was at once one of Jonathan’s most annoying and endearing traits that he always felt the need to explain the obvious.
With this much ambient light, thanks to the massive floods that illuminated the pier, speed meant more than stealth. Even for an experienced shooter, a running person was a hard target to hit, especially when the person ran an unpredictable course. Throw in the fact that whoever the sentries might be, they would be startled to see that they had company, and a snap shot was even harder to make.
Of course, there was always the dumb-luck factor that made Jonathan’s world more interesting than he often preferred it to be.
“Okay,” Jonathan said. “Three, two, one . . .”
Jonathan bolted out into the open, digging in hard as he sprinted down the pier and slid to a stop at the base of the gangplank. Gail took off a second later. The legs felt strong, even though the hips were stiff. Nothing too bad. She could do this. With her M4 pressed into her shoulder and the safety off, she scanned mostly behind as they ran. She trusted Digger to take out the targets along the rails of the ship and what they could see of the superstructure, while she looked for targets that might sneak up from the rear. Nothing yet.
She slid into place at the base of the gangway only three or four seconds behind Digger. Good lord, she wanted some form of cover. She felt so open out here in the bright light.
“Howya doin’, kid?” Jonathan asked. “I’m clear.”
“I’m clear, too. So far, so good.”
Jonathan said, “We’re going up the gangplank now,” and then she heard the electronic version through her earpiece half a second later. She knew this information to be for Venice back in Virginia.
“Three, two . . .”
Jonathan moved first. His footfalls sounded like drumbeats on the stainless-steel and aluminum gangplank, but there was no avoiding the characteristic clanking sound, and her strides were nearly as loud. By the time Gail arrived on the covered deck—promenade?—Jonathan had taken a knee and was sweeping the length of the ship with his muzzle, both forward and aft.
“I’ve got the rear,” Gail said as she squatted behind him. She never felt comfortable using many nautical or military terms, not in the least because she felt that there was a high likelihood that she would screw them up. “And I’m clear.” Now that they were aboard the vessel, she couldn’t keep herself from whispering.
“Also clear,” Jonathan said.
And for both of them, that was something of a lie. Their views were limited, at best. While they had a clear view of the starboard side, a roof overhead masked whatever may lie above, and a heavy bulkhead obscured everything else.
“Okay, Mother Hen,” Jonathan said. “We are on the covered exterior passageway on the starboard side. There’s a door roughly amidships.”
“Take it,” Venice said. “If that design mirrors the one I pulled up from the Internet, you’ll be in the dining area.”
Jonathan turned to Gail. “I’ll go in first and swing right. You follow and swing left.”
She nodded.
“Now.” Staying in a low crouch, she watched Digger shift to a left-handed grip on his M4, tilting it to the right to keep the red dot’s reticle in line
with his dominant right eye. He led with his muzzle, swung the corner, and squirted through the open door into the relative darkness beyond. Gail wondered if the reason he chose to take the right was specifically so that she would not be put into a position to shoot left-handed.
She was right on his ass as she cleared the opening and spun left.
They were in a twelve-by-twelve-foot room that had been outfitted with four picnic tables, complete with attached bench seating. The lingering stink of greasy food and greasy men—and could that be urine?—combined to form a stomach-churning cloud of offensiveness.
At the rear of the space, in Gail’s sector of the room, a dark shadow concealed a corner that may have been a pantry. She advanced on it with her M4 ready.
And after three steps, she was face-to-face with a crewman, no more than five feet away. “Get down!” she yelled as she aimed her rifle at his face. “On your knees, now!”
The guy looked terrified. Not yet twenty-five, he wore only a pair of boxer shorts, and his hair was a mess. Clearly, he’d recently been in bed. He froze at the sound of her commands, dropped his empty coffee cup.
“Don’t make me shoot you!” she said. “Down! Now! On the floor!” She motioned with the muzzle of her rifle, in case he didn’t speak English. Automatic weapons were universal translators.
He dropped to his knees and laced his fingers behind his head. “I-I am no gun,” he stammered in very broken English. “I am no weapons.” It sounded like weepons.
Jonathan darted over to be next to her. “Why are you here?” he said.
Behind him, on the opposite side of the space, they heard the clear sounds of frantic movement from the other side of a closed door.
“Ah, shit. People are home,” he said. He smashed the crewman in the cheek with the butt of his rifle and dropped him. He pivoted and said to Gail, “Stay close.”
Mother Hen said, “Are you still in the mess area?”
“Affirmative,” Jonathan said.
“The bunk room is directly across the hall.”
“That explains the commotion,” Gail said.
“Fast and hard,” Jonathan said.
Stealth was no longer important. From here, containment was key.
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