But his family had died for nothing, killed in their sleep.
No other father should go through such pain. No other family should suffer in vain without the chance for honor, for pride. The chance to sacrifice their lives for the preservation of the Empire of the Rising Sun.
“General Yamada, you asked me to develop a weapon of last resort, one to be used when all other hopes and prayers have gone unanswered. I have done just that.” He thumbed the glass vial again and peered at the crumpled body of the infected nurse. She’d been frail, weak. A lowly servant, nothing more. But with the Amanojaku inside her, she’d been a warrior worthy of highest honor.
“If the Americans or Soviets set foot on our soil, every man, woman, and child of the Empire would be proud to defend their homeland.” Matsumoto held up the vial. “And with this, not only will they have the pride and honor, but they will have the ability to do so.”
-1-
Gulf of Guinea
Present Day
The plastic explosives detonated, and the hatch burst inward. The acrid scent of the charges stung Dominic Holland’s nostrils as he charged into the pilothouse of the MT Elizabeth. A band of Nigerian pirates, bristling with AK-47s, had taken up positions around the wheelhouse of the massive oil tanker. Once inside, he ducked under the chart table. Bullets pinged across the walls and shattered the windows overlooking the tanker’s decks and the crystal-blue Atlantic.
Miguel Ruiz peeked around the doorframe, taking several careful shots. Returning gunfire lanced into the wall. A round tore into his left forearm, and he staggered backward.
“Careful!” Dom yelled. He rolled to his right and shouldered his rifle. Without proper cover, the pirates were easy targets. He shot two in the chest before a third and fourth returned fire. The noise in the pilothouse swelled with the crack of automatic gunfire.
Grunting, Miguel leaned in again and squeezed off two more shots, picking off the final pirates.
“Nice shooting.” Dom stood, brushed himself off, and sauntered over to Ruiz. He smacked Ruiz’s left arm, the one that had been shot. “Be more careful, buddy. Could’ve been your good arm.”
“This is my good arm.” Miguel winked and pulled back his sleeve over the complex prosthetic. He’d lost his flesh-and-blood arm in an IED blast during his time as an Army Ranger in Afghanistan. The Army wouldn’t have him back on the ground, but Dom didn’t have any such prejudices against wounded warriors when it came to his Hunters, the group of men and women who served beside him on any mission requiring firepower. They made up just one unit of his private covert ops organization, which specialized in combatting biological and chemical warfare.
“Glad to see that’s all it was.” Dom patted him on the back. “Don’t do something that stupid again.”
“Whatever you say, Chief.” Miguel pulled a photograph from his pocket and compared it to the four men sprawled across the floor of the pilothouse. None matched the dark complexion, piercing brown eyes, and eyebrow scar of Molih Klisman.
Dom glanced across the ship’s deck, scanning the latticework of pipes and beams. Across it, a spidery man ducked under and jumped over the veritable jungle gym. Klisman.
“Hector, Jenna? Do you read?” Dom barked into the microphone secured to his collar, his comm link with the rest of the men and women in the Hunter squad aboard the MT Elizabeth.
“Here,” Jenna’s smooth voice rang back.
“Aye, aye, Captain,” Hector said. “Hostages are secure. Took down the pirates camping in the mess hall but no sign of Klisman anywhere.”
“Klisman’s moving across the deck, headed toward the bow,” Dom said. “We need to take him down.”
“On it,” Jenna said.
Dom raced out of the pilothouse and leapt down the stairs toward the deck. Miguel sprinted after him. Klisman had almost reached the gunwale, where the pirates’ rope ladder led to their rust-pocked speedboat. Dom fired; the bullets ricocheted off the pipes. Klisman dove for cover, and Dom narrowed the distance between them.
“Keep him down!”
“I’m working on it!” Miguel’s voice boomed as he fired off several potshots.
Dom raced forward, his lungs burning and his chest heaving. Sweat trickled down his back and across his forehead, the salt stinging his eyes. He had no intention of letting Klisman get to his boat. The Nigerian pirate was suspected of funneling money toward the development of chemical weapons. He made these funds by holding ships like the Elizabeth hostage and selling the weapons he helped develop to Al Qaeda.
Klisman turned back, spraying rounds from his AK-47. Dom bent low and charged, hurdling over a series of pipes. He fired a salvo before Klisman disappeared behind a large steel drum near a set of stairs. Focusing on the drums, Dom approached in a stealthy crouch, his gun shouldered. He hugged the walls and then curled around the drums toward where he’d last seen Klisman. The pirate was gone, but his AK-47 remained. He picked it up and checked the magazine. It was empty.
Then a heavy weight fell on him. He crashed to the deck. Klisman had climbed into the latticework above and tackled Dom. The pirate pummeled him until Dom knocked him off with a powerful left hook. He swept out one leg, and Klisman fell, his head hitting the deck with a sickening thud. But the blow didn’t keep the man down. He jumped to his feet and pulled a crooked knife from his waistband. He sprinted and leapt at Dom.
Two gunshots rang out.
Klisman crumpled. His knife clattered away, and blood poured from the two holes in his side.
Jenna lowered her weapon. “Don’t need a pirate making Dom sushi today, do we?” She marched toward him, training the barrel of the FAMAS on Klisman in case the pirate made a final attack despite his fatal wound. The French assault rifle had become a favorite of Jenna’s since Andris Jansons, a former French Foreign Legionnaire originally hailing from Latvia, had joined Dom’s Hunters. She brushed a hand over her short-cropped blonde hair. Her blue eyes gleamed under the unrelenting sun hanging over the Atlantic.
“Thanks,” Dom said. “But—”
“Yeah, I know how it goes. You could’ve handled him.” She rolled her eyes. Jenna was one of the first women to go through Ranger school after the US armed forces had opened up the Special Forces to women. “You going to send confirmation of the elimination to Webb?” she asked.
Dom held up his smartwatch, snapped a picture of the grisly scene, and transmitted it. An error message popped up, proclaiming the message could not be delivered.
“Strange,” Dom said, nonplussed by the notification. He tapped the smartwatch’s face to save the image. “We’ll have to confirm with Webb later. Problem with the watch.”
Jenna’s brow scrunched in worry. She didn’t say anything, but Dom read her expression. They both were surprised anything would go wrong with their technology. Back aboard his ship, their technical operations comprised a talented team of computer scientists and electrical engineers. They ensured all devices worked properly on and off the vessel. His smartwatch’s face glowed green, indicating an incoming call from one of the communications specialists, Chao Li.
“Dom, something’s up.” Chao’s voice was crystal clear. “We got a transmission from Webb.”
Meredith Webb was Dom’s contact at the CIA, responsible for supplying work to his agency of private covert contractors. “Antsy, isn’t she? We’re just wrapping up here.”
“No, it’s not about Klisman. It’s something else. Something bad, I think. A new directive.”
“Man, she doesn’t waste any time.” Dom inhaled slowly, soaking in the smell of gunpowder and oil mixing with the ocean air. “But we got to earn a paycheck somehow, huh?”
***
Dom ran toward the AW109 helicopter in a hunch. Hector, Jenna, and Miguel followed him to the bird. He climbed inside and looked to the cockpit where Frank Battaglia was waiting.
“Ready to get the hell out of this joint?” Frank asked.
Dom gave him the thumbs-up, and they lifted into the air, accelerating w
estward over the Atlantic. His thoughts strayed toward Chao’s words. Meredith had always kept her communications with them brief. She’d warned him his relationship with the CIA was tenuous at best. She was their sole connection to the agency, and their business could be severed without warning if her superiors deemed Dom and his Hunters a risk to national security.
If they failed a mission, there wasn’t anything to prevent the CIA from eliminating all evidence they’d ever done business with Dominic Holland and his crew. Such a move would leave him a sea-bound vagabond, not dissimilar to the recently deceased Klisman. But unlike the Nigerian pirate, Dom’s primary motive wasn’t jihad or profit. He’d proudly served his country as an agent in the CIA, and he still found immense satisfaction in defending the world against the threat of biological and chemical warfare. But now he found his thoughts straying toward his daughters, Kara and Sadie, back in their Maryland home with his ex-wife, Bethany.
He wanted to provide for them, and this was the best way he knew how. He’d already managed to use the earnings from his life as a contractor to create an enormous trust fund that would take them through the rest of their lives. With Kara already at the University of Maryland, he hadn’t yet told her how he was paying for her education and wouldn’t until he’d retired from his covert services for good.
“There she is,” Frank’s voice crackled over the comm systems of the helicopter.
The chopper banked hard toward a sleek ship prowling the ocean. Its gray hull was that of a Visby-class corvette, a ship equipped for stealth. A half dozen of the ships had been ordered by the Swedish Navy, but they had cancelled the sixth ship. In reality, the project had never been scrapped. Rather, Meredith Webb had pulled a few strings and procured the ship for Dom’s organization. He had aptly named it the Huntress. Its composite-material hull and angular design minimized its prominence via radar. The shape also reduced the chances of being visually spotted. Below decks, there was a medical bay complete with a science laboratory for the detection and characterization of biological and chemical weapons along with a workshop for electronics and computer gadgetry. It was equipped with a helipad suitable for the eight-person AW109 Frank now piloted toward the deck. If stealth failed, the Huntress was fitted with surface-to-air and anti-surface ship missiles.
Dom proudly referred to the Huntress as his seaborne, forty-person Batmobile.
The landing wheels of the chopper hit the helipad with a jolt.
“Thanks for traveling with Flying Dutchman Pirate Catchers today,” Frank said in his mock airline pilot voice. “We appreciate your business.” He saluted Dom and his Hunters. They piled out as the twin engines whined and the rotors slowed.
Thomas Hampton, the ship’s next-in-command and second mate in charge of the day-to-day operations, beckoned at Dom from the hatch nearest the helipad. He had a cigar drooping out of one side of his mouth, giving him the grizzled look of an old sailor who couldn’t tear himself away from the sea. The cigar was not a good sign. Dom knew the man only smoked when he was stressed; it was never a celebratory gesture.
Beside him stood Chao, who looked unsteady on the open deck.
With the Hunters in tow, Dom rushed to his side. “What exactly did Webb say?”
“Not much to me,” Chao said, leading them into the Huntress. “She said she’d only speak directly with you. Sounded urgent.”
Their feet clanged against the metal stairwell as they descended. Hector and Jenna split off while Miguel followed behind Thomas.
“Didn’t even want to talk to me,” Thomas said with mock disappointment. “Whatever she’s got cooking, you know it’s got to be good.”
Chao led them through the narrow corridor in the ship’s lower deck. They passed the armory and medical bay. He opened the door to the electronics workshop, where the crackle of radios and humming computers greeted Dom. The chorus of electronic chirps often sounded like a noisy mess more grating to the ear than drunks singing off-key pub songs to him. But Chao had often described it as a melodic chorus, each sound speaking to him and the rest of the techies hunching over their stations.
Dom followed Chao to one of the workstations, where four computer monitors glowed before them. The techie made an encrypted video call to the private access line Dom had with Meredith. The line rang only once before she accepted the call.
“Dom,” she said. Her long red hair and stern face came into focus. She wasted no time with perfunctory greetings. “How soon can you be in Bermuda?”
-2-
CIA Headquarters
Langley, Virginia
Meredith watched Dom’s face on her computer monitor. The chisel-jawed covert operator gave no indication of the curiosity or questions that must be roiling in his mind. She had always respected that stoicism in their long combined partnership—and friendship—working in the field of intelligence.
“We’re still in the Gulf of Guinea,” Dom answered. “It’s not going to be soon. What’s up?”
“I’ve got...a strange request,” Meredith said. “But it’s urgent. Like, I wish I had a team on this yesterday, urgent.”
Dom nodded. “Understood. Wish I could change the laws of physics to be there today. Can you give me a couple days at least?”
Meredith wanted Dom on this case. He ran the best covert group she knew, but she feared time was already running out. “It can’t wait.” She ran a hand through her hair. “But I still want you to head that way. I’m going to send another team for now, but I’d appreciate it if you were on standby.”
“Standby? Damn, Meredith. I hate being your next-in-line.” Dom smiled. “I thought what we had was better than that.”
“Sometimes a woman can’t wait around, Dom,” Meredith said, “and now is definitely one of those times.”
“Can you at least tease me with something? Give me some idea of what the hell you want me to wait around for.”
She always gave her contracting groups as much intel as possible. Files, maps, briefings...enough to fill textbooks. Whole libraries of textbooks. But this time what she’d discovered was far from ordinary. “I don’t have much.” She lowered her voice and added, “But I’m worried I found something potentially polluting.”
Dom’s eyes widened for a brief second. She saw he recognized their code word. What she’d found might be tied to the United States—potentially even the CIA. It was why she’d blocked his early transmission aboard the MT Elizabeth. Maybe she was being paranoid, but she needed to limit communication with him and ensure everything was airtight. Hell, for all she knew, she might already be under surveillance.
“I hear you,” he said. “Can you at least give me a more precise heading so I know where you need me?”
“Will do. Chao should receive it as soon as we’re done here. I’ll keep you up to date on what I find. Stay safe out there.”
“You, too.” Dom grinned and ended the transmission.
She drummed her fingers across her desk before picking up her phone. The strange memo that had started her frantic search lay across the polished wood. She glanced at it once more and dialed the number for another, smaller covert group run by a man named Jay Perry. A silent prayer ran through her head as she hoped Jay would be ready to do her bidding. He answered and agreed to her terms, promising her he was already out the door and en route.
She breathed a momentary sigh of relief after ending the call. She’d played her cards. Now it was time to see if someone around her offices actually knew what the memo meant—or more importantly, if they’d be willing to clue her in.
Meredith made her way through Langley’s corridors. She eyed the Biological and Chemical Warfare Defense sign on Chief Special Agent David Lawson’s slightly ajar office door. She rapped softly on the wood frame when she saw he was on the phone.
Her boss, phone to his ear, waved his hand. His message was clear: I don’t have time for you now. Despite the scowl on his face, Meredith seated herself in front of his desk. In one hand, she clutched the memo with its simple
transcription:
International Biologics at Sea Laboratory dark. Risk assessment: Immediate catastrophe. Crew affected by agent. Limited to: Global. Termination permission requested.
A set of coordinates with a location in the Atlantic Ocean followed.
Lawson held up a finger and put his hand over the phone’s mouthpiece. “I’m on a conference call with DARPA. Can we do this later?”
Maintaining her poker face, Meredith stared hard into Lawson’s steel-gray eyes. She slid the single sheet of paper across the surface of his desk. “What the hell is this?”
When Lawson’s gaze dropped to the memo, he ended the call without saying a word. His reaction alone set Meredith on edge. With such an ominous memo, the International Biologics at Sea Lab wasn’t the only thing left in the dark. She’d never heard about this project or institution or whatever it was.
Lawson unclipped a pair of reading glasses from his front pocket and twisted the paper so the words faced him. He mouthed them as he read the memo with his brow furrowed.
Acting, Meredith thought. The surprise now seemed feigned. She watched a drop of perspiration drip from his receding hairline.
“I have no idea what this is,” Lawson said, pushing it back toward her.
“Bullshit,” Meredith said. “What the hell is this International Biologics at Sea Lab?”
“Sounds pretty innocuous.”
“The worst ones always do,” she said.
“I haven’t heard of it.”
“So something as cryptic as this just shows up at the agency, and you, grand master of science and research, haven’t got a clue?”
Lawson’s fingers tapped across his keyboard. He twisted his computer monitor so Meredith could see. “Take a look.”
He’d inputted the name of the lab in their classified and unclassified known research institutions database. The results window displayed a glaring No Matches Found.
“Don’t pull that one on me,” Meredith said, taking the paper back. He’d performed the query on a database that included information accessible to any agent or operative a full security clearance below both of theirs. “Search again, but this time use your credentials. Not the open access agency search.”
The Tide (Tide Series Book 1) Page 2