Pap also taught me that I wasn’t to stand idly by when someone was being hurt or bullied. Pap was a Marine like me and Dad. He’d fought in World War II and Dad was killed in Vietnam. Both men took up arms when good people were being threatened by bad. As had I.
“I’m feeling like an impatient buzzard, Colonel,” I said, knowing that Travis was still listening in.
A moment later, Travis’s voice came back. “Alpha One, go comm Zulu.”
There was a slight buzz over the earwig, then Travis said, “I agree, Jesse. It’s just me, Deuce, and you guys out there listening now. As of now, Alpha Team is weapons-free. You are clear to engage targets on sight. I repeat, no warnings and no waiting for them to shoot first. Does everyone understand? Sound off.”
One by one, each of us acknowledged that we understood the change in our rules of engagement. This was a whole new game now. It’s what most of the team members had joined up for. Not that they enjoyed killing indiscriminately, but the ROE on the battlefield leaves the warrior at a severe disadvantage that could cost him his life. When Waldrup agreed, Travis said, “Chyrel, you can bring the two listeners back online now.”
Two listeners, I wondered. Then it dawned on me. Plausible deniability. Travis has only two people above him: the secretary of DHS and his boss, the president. Our communications were being monitored in the situation room of the White House, possibly even by the president himself. By shutting them out of the change in the ROE, Travis had taken full responsibility and given whoever the listeners were a way to say they honestly knew nothing about it.
As we drifted, I listened as Andrew reported that they’d made landfall and Scott was taking over the lead. Little was said as the men leapfrogged one another until they had a fifty-foot perimeter set up around the spot where they brought the Zodiac ashore. Then they hunkered down to wait for the satellite.
The wait wasn’t very long.
The whirring sound of an electric motor woke Darius. He didn’t know how long he’d been asleep, but it was dark outside, several bright stars visible through the window.
Earlier, as the files were downloading, one of Ilya’s men made sandwiches, putting them and several bottles of water in a small cooler. Darius had then been allowed to return to the cabin without an escort. Oleg met him at the door, and once Darius was inside, Oleg locked the door and left.
Darius and Celia had eaten in silence, then stretched out to rest. That was in the early afternoon, so Darius knew they must have slept for several hours, at least.
“What’s that noise?” Celia whispered, lying next to him on the small bunk.
“I don’t know,” Darius replied, rising from the bunk. “But the boat’s no longer in danger of rolling over.”
Listening, Darius could hear people talking outside. The whining noise was joined by the sound of an engine starting and then a loud clanking.
“They’re hoisting anchor,” Celia said. “We’re leaving.”
“For Cuba,” Darius said. “The download must have finished.”
“You shouldn’t have agreed.”
“We had no choice. They were going to kill me and sell you as a sex slave.”
“I’d have fought them every step and they’d have had to kill me too,” Celia said, resolutely.
“I couldn’t let that happen. Besides, from what Ilya said, we might come out richer than we would have selling the suit to our own military.”
In the faint light of the moon filtering through the window, Darius saw his wife look at him with an expression he’d never seen her display. Not quite revulsion, but something close to it.
“Better a dead patriot than a live traitor,” she muttered.
“How can you say that?” Darius asked, crossing to the window and looking out. “We’re alive. And soon, we’ll have enough money to live very comfortably in some Third World country without an extradition treaty.”
Celia joined her husband at the window. “I don’t want to live in some cesspool of a country. And I don’t want to be rich if it means what we do might cost American lives.”
Turning to her, Darius looked into her eyes by the light of the moon. There was a hardness there he’d never noticed before.
“They don’t have the disable code,” he said softly. “It’ll be months at least before they even know they need it. That buys us some time. Maybe we can find some way to get away before then. But, if it means us staying alive, I’m going to give it to them.”
A grinding noise emanated from behind the cabin they were in. The boat lurched suddenly, and Celia stumbled into Darius’s arms. As they looked out the window, they could see that the boat was slowly starting to move.
Celia had seen the change in her husband over the last few years, especially this past year. All his decisions and actions lately had been financially motivated, where before he’d been a staunch supporter of the military and his only concern had been manufacturing things that would better protect them on the battlefield.
“How far is it to Cuba?” Celia asked, turning away.
“I don’t even know where we are. But if I had to guess, I’d say this island is part of that group of islands between the Florida Keys and Cuba. Anywhere from twenty to fifty miles.”
“It doesn’t look like a very fast boat.”
“No,” Darius replied. “We probably won’t get there until daylight. Ilya said we would go to a town called Caibarién, a hundred and twenty kilometers from here, but I don’t know how far that is.”
“It’s seventy-five miles,” Celia replied, getting a curious look from her husband. She shrugged. “The distance of three marathons.”
“Of course,” Darius said. “All that running you do. No sooner than sunrise, then. I don’t see this boat going more than ten miles an hour.”
“It’s only eighty-some miles from Key West to Havana,” Celia said. “Could this be one of the islands in the Keys?”
“I think this Caibarién is further east, along the Cuban coast.”
Outside the cabin, they each heard the sound of footsteps and turned toward the cabin door. The lock clicked and one of Ilya’s crewmen swung the door open.
“Ilya say you are free to move around on boat,” the man said in thickly accented English. “Food is in one hour.” Darius led the way, stepping out into the hallway with the man. “The ladder is forward,” the man grunted, pointing. “I go aft for sleep.”
He left them standing in the hallway then. “Should we try to get up to the deck and jump?” Celia whispered.
“No,” Darius replied. “They would just turn around and pick us up. We’ll have to wait. Maybe when it gets later we can steal a dinghy or something.”
Having no other options, they went up the ladder to the kitchen area, which was empty. Through the windows, they could look down on the side decks, where several men were working. More than Darius had originally thought were aboard.
“Up here,” they heard Ilya say and turned toward the sound of his voice. They climbed the short ladder to the pilothouse, which afforded a view of the whole working deck below. “Dinner will be shortly. We need all hands to watch as we exit the cove.”
A man up in the bow pointed and started waving anxiously, yelling something in their language. Ilya calmly spun the wheel and pushed on the throttle for a moment. The heavy boat responded sluggishly.
“How far are we from Cuba?” Darius asked point-blank.
“In a direct line?” Ilya said. “About sixty kilometers. To Cuban waters, about forty. But, where we are going is further east along the shore. We’ll sail due south until we’re inside Cuban waters and arrive in Caibarién several hours after sunrise.”
The lookout on the bow signaled again, and Ilya spun the wheel in the opposite direction. A moment later, the man in the bow turned and waved both arms, then started walking aft. The boat was equipped with a cheap depth finder, like bass boats use, and Darius could see that they were in deep water, which was getting deeper very fast.
As th
e boat rounded the tip of the island, Darius could just make out the sound of another boat. It was very faint and sounded like one of those powerful racing boats. Probably way too far away to see the boat they were on, though. Knowing how well sound carried over water, he estimated the boat was a good five to ten miles distant and seemed to be slowing, the sound growing fainter.
If Ilya had heard the other boat, he didn’t let on.
After drifting in mostly silence for twenty minutes, Deuce’s voice came over my earwig. “Alpha Two and Three, the boat is not in the cove.”
Waldrup stood quickly, bringing the monocular to his eye again. “The boat’s gone?”
“We’ll find it,” Deuce said. “Zooming out and switching to thermal.”
It was at moments like this that Deuce’s natural calm and methodical leadership skills really shone through. I’d seen him operate in a few other dicey situations and was impressed with how he maintained a cool head—a trait he’d inherited from his father.
I waited patiently, drifting in the darkness, but realized I was holding my breath with my hand on the starters. Slowly, I released the air from my lungs as Waldrup sat down. A calm fell over the man, as it did me. For him, it was perhaps the result of his training. For me, it was a mixture of my own training, and my confidence in Deuce and the others in the team.
“Got him,” Deuce finally said. “Five nautical miles due south and traveling south at seven knots.”
“That’s getting really close to Cuban waters,” I reminded him.
“Twenty-five miles from the coast,” Deuce replied.
At seven knots, the target would be inside Cuban waters in about two hours. At full throttle, I knew we could be on top of them in just a few minutes. We all waited for Deuce’s plan.
“Alpha Three, head for the structure and investigate,” Deuce ordered. “I see no heat signatures on the island at all. Alpha Two, swing inside and be ready to pick them up in the cove. The latest nautical charts show no shallow obstructions and eight to ten feet of water at high tide, which was thirty minutes ago.”
“Roger that,” I said, starting the engines. I engaged the transmissions, and we were up on plane in seconds, turning toward the wide gap between Bellows and Anguilla Cays. The Cigarette quickly accelerated and I turned south on the lee side of the Anguillas at seventy knots, hoping that Deuce’s nautical charts were really new.
Scott and his team made it to the small shack we’d seen in just a few minutes. “Alpha One, the building is secure, nobody around. We did find signs that someone has been here recently, though. Several zip ties, which appear to have been cut, lying on the ground in two different spots. Plus, a few pearl buttons scattered at one of those spots.”
“Head west to the cove,” Deuce replied.
A few minutes later, I slowly brought the go-fast boat down off plane and idled into the cove where the target boat had once lain hidden from view.
Watching the depth finder closely, I brought the Cigarette to a stop in four feet of water, the insertion team already wading out to us. As each man neared the gunwale, Waldrup simply reached down and lifted them out of the water and they scrambled over the gunwale.
“Insertion team is aboard,” I said as Andrew sat down in the second seat.
“Head due south,” Deuce said. “We might be able to board from behind.”
I thought about the pictures Deuce had taken. He was right—the stern of the Última Esperanza was low, and with the Cigarette matching its speed, our bow would be high. Looking over the windshield at the foredeck, it looked really narrow.
Tapping Andrew on the shoulder, I pointed ahead to the foredeck. “The only handholds are the two cleats about five feet back from the bow.” Andrew stood and looked where I was pointing, while I tried not to hit anything leaving the cove.
Once in deeper water, I sat down and slowly brought the boat up on plane. When Andrew sat back down, I yelled, “Hang on.”
Then I shoved the throttles to the stops and the powerful engines launched us like a rocket. Reaching eighty knots in just a few seconds, I brought the throttles back a little to reduce noise.
“It might work,” Andrew said. He turned in his seat and discussed his idea with the others.
“Three miles ahead and closing fast,” Deuce said. “They’re still ten miles from Cuban waters. When you’re within sight, slow down and visually recon the situation, then we’ll decide. Thermal imaging shows the engine as a large hot spot on the stern, so anyone there is lost in it. Looks like three or four people in the pilothouse and three more up on the foredeck.”
Within minutes, I could see the boat about a mile ahead and began to slow down. The Cigarette dropped off plane, settling in the water and riding bow high. Both Andrew and I had to stand to see over it as we idled along at ten knots.
Through the night vision, the rear of the boat was awash in light from inside the cabin. I could clearly see into what looked like the galley. It appeared to be vacant, as was the aft deck area.
“I don’t see anyone at the stern,” Andrew said. “It’ll be a little different than how we’ve trained, but I think it’ll work.”
“Alpha One, keep a close eye on the three tangoes up on the foredeck,” I said, nudging the throttles a bit. “Let me know if anyone moves aft.”
At thirteen knots, we were going nearly twice as fast as Última Esperanza and gaining quickly. When we were within four hundred yards, the bow of the Cigarette was nearly blocking my view of the fishing boat and I slowed to just ten knots.
Andrew stood and slung his MP-5 on his back so that he could bring it forward quickly. Then, stepping up onto his seat, he went up and over the windshield. Jeremy took his place by the second seat as Andrew carefully moved forward on the deck, finally dropping onto all fours and crawling the last few feet.
Once Andrew was lying spread-eagle on the bow, holding a cleat in each hand, Jeremy followed and took up a position behind him, holding both ankles, his legs extended straight back, forming a cross.
Scott and Jeremiah followed right behind, each taking a spot on either side of Jeremy’s legs. They grasped one another’s forearms over the back of Jeremy’s knees and locked their inboard ankles together. Their outboard hands gripped the rails, as did the toes of their outboard boots. This effectively locked all four men into position on the narrow foredeck. It was about as secure as they could be, in case we had to take evasive action.
Slowly, I put a little forward pressure on the throttles, and the sound of the burbling engines ticked up a notch. Waldrup came up to stand in front of the second seat, training the monocular on the stern deck of the boat ahead, his Tavor at the ready.
“No movement,” Waldrup said.
“Forty meters,” Deuce said. “Rate of closure is one meter per second.”
I remembered the pilothouse had portholes in back, but this close, the long roof of the cabin would block anyone from seeing us. I hoped. I did a slow count to thirty in my head, then put a little back pressure on the throttles, slowing the boat just a hair. I could no longer see most of the fishing boat, our bow blocking the view.
“Come left for a second, then back to the right,” Andrew instructed.
I barely moved the wheel, held it for a second, and turned it back the other way for another second before bringing it back to center.
“Perfect,” Andrew said. “You’re lined up with the left side of the stern. She’s a single-screw.”
I’d been hoping it was a twin-engine. A single dome of water pushed by one big prop is harder to ride up on. I guess Andrew had chosen the port side to allow me to see our approach better. Still, all I could see of the boat ahead was the starboard rail, so I was completely relying on Deuce and Andrew to bring us close enough that the men could jump down to the aft cockpit of the fishing boat.
“Ten meters,” Deuce said, and I put a little more pressure on the throttles. “Alpha Three, go at one meter.”
He started a count from five meters as I slowed the C
igarette just a bit more. On the foredeck, Scott and Jeremiah cocked their outboard legs a little, preparing to stand and charge forward.
We’d practiced this a few times, but boarding a variety of boats from the Revenge, with its handrails and high pulpit. We had actually taken down a boat this way once. But the narrowness of the Cigarette’s foredeck made this maneuver a bit different.
Falling overboard at eight knots was unlikely to cause injury, but the delay in picking a man up might allow the Esperanza to make it to Cuban waters, which would open up a whole new set of problems. Not the least of which would involve patrol boats and MiG fighters.
Just as Deuce said two meters and Andrew began to stand up, two shots rang out, followed closely by two more.
“Hang on,” I shouted, turning the wheel hard to starboard and dropping the throttles to an idle. When I felt the thrust from the other boat’s prop begin to push the bow sideways, I jammed the throttles. The engines roared and I spun the wheel back to the left, hoping we were clear of the big boat. The props caught and the boat launched up onto plane instantly.
Next to me, Waldrup fired two successive short bursts from the MP-5, and when I looked back, I could see a man hanging limp out of one of the lower portholes, near the stern. Waldrup must have hit something else of importance too, because there was smoke coming from the stern.
“So much for a covert boarding,” Andrew said, still hanging onto the bow cleats. “You wanna slow this thing down, so we can get up?”
We were a half mile from the other boat and had no lights on. There was no chance they could hit us from a moving boat, even with a night vision-scoped rifle. I slowly brought the Cigarette down to an idle, and the four men on the foredeck scrambled back to their seats.
“Someone shot at us, Deuce!” I said, dropping any pretense at covert communication. Not that it mattered. Our comm was encrypted, and Chyrel had once told me that even during training ops, she switched the whole team’s frequency every few minutes.
Fallen Tide: A Jesse McDermitt Novel (Caribbean Adventure Series Book 8) Page 17