Wild Ocean

by Tripp Ellis

  I looked back through the rear window, looking to see if anyone followed. The hospital grew tiny and became a distant memory. Blood was already spotting my green shirt.

  The cabdriver asked if I was a doctor.

  I nodded my head.

  We sped south on Rodrigo Gomez Avenue, then east on Xcaret which wound around to Kukulcan. It didn’t take me long to realize where I was—Cancun. I watched the glimmering teal water crash against white sand beaches as we headed to the resort area. There was no better cover than a tourist.

  In the last few years, organized crime and violence has skyrocketed in the lush resort. The American government has even issued a travel advisory. The violence rarely happens in the tourist areas, but now and then a body is found on the beach or a back alley. It’s usually taken care of quickly without much fanfare. That kind of thing is not good for business.

  Acapulco used to be the playground of the rich and famous. Now it’s the murder capital of Mexico. The east coast may face a similar fate if the tourists get scared away. It’s getting to the point where it’s almost impossible to operate a business without paying the cartels for the privilege. Cross the cartels and they will make a public demonstration of you. It’s not uncommon to see their victims carved into multiple pieces and left in a public space with a warning message.

  At my hotel, I played dumb-drunk-tourist and pretended I lost my key card. I had another one within minutes and was directed to my room. Things were starting to come back to me in bits and pieces. The hotel looked familiar, and so did the room.

  Despite having left a do not disturb sign on the door, the maid had refreshed the room. The curtains were wide open, and the tropical sun blasted into the room. The balcony offered a stunning view of the crystal waters. I moved to the sliding glass door and pulled the blackout curtains shut. Then I moved to the safe and punched in my pin code.

  It’s the same pin code I always use. I know, bad spy-craft, but it comes in handy in situations where your memory is a bit dodgy. I pulled out a small black travel wallet that fastened around the waist. Functional, but also very touristy. I unzipped the tear resistant nylon and dug through the contents of the bag. It was filled with cash—both dollars and pesos. There were multiple passports with different cover IDs and a Bösch-Hauer PPQ-X2 9mm. It’s one of the finest polymer, striker fired handguns available. Light and compact. It has one of the smoothest triggers, and a short reset that makes rapid firing a dream. It was my preferred handgun.

  There were a few burner phones in the bag. It was time to call my handler and find out what the hell was going on?

  4

  “Start explaining,” Isabella said in a sharp tone. Her angry voice filtered through the cell phone speaker, piercing my ear.

  It was never a good idea to get on her bad side. She was a capable woman with immense resources. She expected jobs to be carried out to perfection. No screw-ups. No mistakes. No excuses.

  She didn’t suffer fools.

  We always had a good professional relationship. I delivered my assignments on time and to the letter. Perhaps that was the only reason she indulged my call. Anyone else would have been instantly blacklisted.

  “There were unforeseen complications,” I said.

  I wouldn’t be able to stall for long, but I didn’t feel comfortable coming right out and saying that I had no recollection of the last few days.

  Isabella was my contact point at a black ops organization known as Cobra Company. It was an organization of former spooks and spec-war operators contracting jobs for government entities that wanted plausible deniability. There were plenty of on-the-books, legitimate contracts. Mostly private security details for high profile government officials in foreign territories. But the organization also specialized in less public operations. High value asset recovery. Snatch and grabs. Assassinations. Arming and training insurgent armies. All the types of things in which you would typically utilize spec-war operators. We were hired by the three letter agencies on a regular basis. The benefit was no congressional oversight, and if things went wrong, no one got dirty.

  But things often got complicated.

  Sometimes you needed to prop up a local drug kingpin because his trafficking operation funded rebels who were going to topple the current dictator that you needed out of power.

  War makes strange bedfellows.

  “Your objective was to recover Julio Ruiz and bring him back to the United States for debrief. What part of that did you not understand?”

  At least I knew what the objective was. Now I had to figure out what went wrong? The event was still an empty void in my memory.

  “Are you hurt?”

  “No,” I lied.

  “No? That’s not what I hear?”

  “What do you hear?”

  “My sources say you were admitted to the hospital with a gunshot wound to the chest.”

  “Exaggeration. Merely a superficial wound with a low caliber. No bone, no major arteries.”

  “Look, I’m going to shoot it to you straight because we have a long history,” Isabella said. “You’ve always been a good performer. Cartwright said you lost control. He said you stormed into the room, shot the federal agents and the witness. He said he was forced to shoot you.”

  I was silent for a long moment, processing the information. “Cartwright is a terrible shot. And have you ever known me to lose control?”

  After a moment, “No.”

  “Cartwright is lying.”

  “Why?”

  “How should I know?”

  Isabella was silent for a moment. “Where are you?”

  “I’m not saying.”

  “As if I can’t find out.”

  “I’ll be gone by then.”

  “Come in for debrief.”

  “No.”

  Isabella sighed. “You’re smarter than that, Tyson. Let me explain to you what happens if you don’t come in.”

  “I know what happens if I don’t come in.”

  “So, you’re perfectly fine with being hunted by both the CIA and the cartels?”

  “I’ll take my chances. We both know that you have no choice but to take me out to save face. If you don’t, the client will. Either way. It’s bad for business if you let me live.”

  I put Isabella on speakerphone and changed into a white T-shirt, covered by a loud Hawaiian shirt, and cream cargo pants that hung in the closet. Every second counted, and I knew she was triangulating my position as we spoke. She knew what city I was in. It wouldn’t be hard to pinpoint my exact location. Knowing Cobra Company, there were likely operatives close by. I expected a hit squad within the next few minutes.

  “You’re a valuable asset, Tyson. I hate to lose that.”

  “It’s been fun, Isabella.”

  “Just one more thing…”

  I cringed the moment she said it. I could tell by the tone in her voice she had something juicy to say.

  “I know you’re going to run. You’re a good agent. You might even avoid capture for quite some time. But if you refuse to come in. I will be forced to use other means of persuasion.”

  “Elaborate.”

  “I believe your sister lives down in the Keys, doesn’t she?”

  I clenched my jaw. My blood boiled. “Leave her out of this.”

  “You know I have to exploit all available opportunities. Make this easier on everyone. Come in, have a little chat, and nothing happens to your sister.”

  “I swear to God, if anything happens to her, you will regret it.”

  Isabella chuckled. “That’s what I like about you, Tyson. You got balls.”

  She hung up the phone, and I knew they were coming.

  I burst out of my hotel room with my pistol in the small of my back. Wearing dark sunglasses, a wide-brimmed hat, and a goofy outfit, I looked like every other tourist in the resort.

  I took the battery out of the phone and tossed the device into the pool as I passed by.

  The situation was all coming back t
o me, and it wasn’t good. Ruiz was the head of one of the most powerful cartels in Mexico. The CIA had provided intel and assistance that allowed him to circumvent Customs, the FBI, and the Joint Interagency Task Force on drugs. They essentially gave him a free pass to ship billions of dollars worth of product into the United States. In exchange, the cartel supplied Venezuelan rebels with weapons and munitions. If that information ever became public knowledge, the political blowback would be catastrophic. Powerful people would do anything to keep it quiet.

  It had long been speculated by various news outlets that the CIA was working with the Mexican and Colombian governments to intervene in Venezuela as it descended into a deepening crisis. They had spent considerable effort distributing funds to opposition groups and disseminating propaganda, as well as engaging in various PSYOPS. The US had a long history of meddling in Latin American affairs.

  Speculation on interference was one thing. Proof of collusion with drug cartels was another.

  I ambled up to the bar beside the pool. It was a thatched hut with every imaginable brand of flavored rum. I ordered a piña colada, sat on the barstool, and waited for the show to start. I was always a fan of hiding in plain sight.

  Within a few minutes, four operatives descended on the resort—two from the north, two from the south, moving in a cover formation. They were locals who tried to look inconspicuous, but they stuck out like a sore thumb. They certainly weren’t here for the surf and sand.

  I watched as they made their way to the stairwell and ascended toward my room. I took a sip of the piña colada and pain stabbed through my chest. It hurt to do just about anything, but the stitches were holding, and other than some minor drainage, I wasn’t bleeding much. The white T-shirt I had on under my Hawaiian shirt absorbed most of the blood before it spotted the loud print.

  After a few moments, the hit squad emerged from my hotel room and made their way back across the property. One looked right at me on his way out.

  It was like I was invisible.

  Chalk one up for the tourist outfit.

  There was no doubt that Isabella would have local operatives waiting at the airports, and my picture had probably been disseminated far and wide.

  My cover identities were solid. I made them myself, so I knew Isabella didn’t have them. I could book a commercial flight, but it would be risky. I needed to get back to the states as soon as possible and look after my sister. And I needed to prove to Isabella that I didn’t fuck this operation up.

  5

  “You are not going to believe the little honey I’ve got rolling now. She has got the sweetest little p—”

  “Jack, I need you to focus,” I said. “I have a little bit of a situation here.”

  I gave him the short version of the scenario.

  Jack Donovan was an old Navy buddy of mine. He retired from the Teams as a Lieutenant Commander, then did a little private security consulting before getting out of the game entirely. Now he ran a charter boat service in the Keys. But he still had plenty of contacts at the CIA and DEVGRU.

  He was the kind of guy that knew everybody, never met a stranger, and was full of tall tales—most of them had a grain of truth. He had long blonde hair that was well on its way to gray. He looked like an aging rock star and was confused for one on more than one occasion. He’d smile and sign autographs and accept the free drinks that came with it.

  JD had a habit of dating women that were above the no-go line on the hot/crazy matrix. He seemed to like the drama.

  The way I was dressed for my cover ID was the way Jack dressed on a daily basis—Hawaiian shirt over a T-shirt and cargo shorts. He had a leather jacket that was straight out of a 70s cop show that he wore to dress it up if he was going out at night.

  He was the only person I knew I could trust. We had seen some pretty heavy combat together. Nothing like bullets to bond a friendship.

  “Did I ever tell you about the time I went down to Cancún with Jeffery?”

  “Focus, Jack!”

  “Right, what do you need?”

  “I need you to look after Madison.”

  “Madison’s a firecracker. She doesn’t need anybody looking after her.”

  “They’re going to kill her if I don’t cooperate,” I said.

  “In that case, I’ll get right over there.”

  Madison owned Diver Down, a waterfront bar on Coconut Key Island.

  “Also, I need a way back to the Keys as fast as possible.”

  JD thought about this for a moment. “You remember Tom Mahoney? Team guy. Tall. Sort of crooked nose.”

  I searched my mental archives. “Yeah. Operation Thunderstruck. Good guy.”

  “He retired to Playa. He’s got a Cessna 172—flies tourists around on day trips. Let me give him a call and see what we can work out. He could probably have you back in the Keys in four hours. You’ll have to go through Customs, but that won’t be a problem, will it?”

  “Not a problem. My cover ID is clean.”

  “From what you’ve told me, you’re going to have every three letter agency looking for you, as well as Cobra Company, and the cartel. Are you sure coming back here is such a good idea? I mean we’re just a hop skip and a jump from the Joint Interagency Task Force. There're all kinds of Feds running around down here.”

  “They threatened Madison.”

  “Isabella is a powerful enemy,” JD cautioned.

  “So am I.”

  There was a long pause.

  “You should have gotten out of the business when you had the chance.”

  “Shoulda, coulda, woulda,” I said.

  JD made a few phone calls and set things up. I made my way up to Playa and connected with Tom Mahoney. His single-engine Cessna was painted like a World War II era bomber with aggressive shark-mouth nose art.

  We met on the tarmac as he prepped his airplane. I winced when I shook his hand, and Mahoney instantly noticed my discomfort.

  “Tom, good to see you. I really appreciate you doing this.”

  “Anything for a Team guy.”

  I hadn’t seen him in nearly a decade and he had aged considerably. The sandy blonde haired man that I remembered had mostly gray hair now. His skin was tanned and leathery from too much sun. His blue eyes caught sight of a bloodstain seeping through my shirt. “Still in the business I take it?”

  “Something like that.”

  “You don’t look so good. Are you sure you’re okay to fly?”

  “It’s nothing. Just a fishing accident.”

  Mahoney knew better. “I don’t want to have to explain to the US customs why I’ve got a dead man in my passenger seat.”

  I tried to suppress a chuckle but failed. Another jolt of pain shot through my chest. “If I die on the trip just shove me into the ocean. No one’s going to miss me. And it will frustrate the hell out of my enemies that they can’t find me.”

  Mahoney laughed at that one. “Deal. I’m not gonna ask any more questions. The less I know the better.” He paused for an uncomfortable moment. “I hate to bring it up, but… I did have to cancel my afternoon flights, and this trip is going to burn a lot of gas. I understand if you’re in trouble, but if you could—”

  I stopped him right there. “Money is not an issue. How does $5000 US sound?”

  Depending on fuel prices, the cost to operate the plane was somewhere around $100 an hour when you factored in insurance, maintenance, and storage. The flight to Coconut Key was 457 nautical miles. With a top speed of 140 miles an hour, that would put us in Coconut Key in roughly 4 hours, give or take, depending on the weather and how hard Tom wanted to push it.

  Mahoney’s eyes brightened. “More than fair. That goes a long way down here.” His initial enthusiasm quickly faded as he thought more about the offer. “Just how hot is your situation?”

  “Hot enough.”

  “Let’s get wheels up as soon as possible.”

  I agreed.

  Mahoney went through his preflight checks and filed an ICAO flig
ht plan. The weather was good and there were no storms in the Gulf. With any luck, it would be a smooth flight.

  I hit the head before we left and bought a couple tacos for the trip. I also grabbed a pack of gum and bought a T-shirt that had two palm trees and a sunset and read: Playa Del Carmen. I wanted to have something to change into before we landed. A bloodstained shirt would arouse suspicion from the customs agents in Coconut Key.

  It wasn’t long before Mahoney had the single engine prop plane in the air over the Gulf. A wave of relief washed over me. I was relatively safe for the next several hours. Nobody was going to try to shoot at me up here.

  6

  The sun was dipping down over the horizon when we landed at the Coconut Key Municipal Airport. The amber globe sparkled the water and cast hues of pink and purple across the sky.

  German shepherds sniffed around the airplane but didn’t indicate. The Customs Agents looked over my passport. I was traveling as John McInerney. I flashed a brilliant smile, wearing my ridiculous Playa T-shirt. The customs agent looked me over and searched my travel bag. I had tossed out my pistol during the flight. No sense in raising eyebrows with a stolen weapon upon re-entry to the states. The only thing I had left in my zipper bag was a little bit of cash, two cell phones, and some chewing gum.

  He waved me on, and that was that. Mahoney decided to refuel and fly right back. He had a full slate of tourist flights scheduled for the next day. I thanked him profusely, and he said to look him up the next time I was in Playa Del Carmen.

  I didn’t plan on going back anytime soon.

  I called Jack and waited in the passenger pickup area. Within a few minutes, he pulled to the curb in a red Porsche 911 convertible—the wind blowing his long hair. Pop music pumped from the stereo. He yelled at me, “Get in, you vagrant.”

  It seemed like the charter business was treating JD well.

  I pulled open the door and carefully slipped into the fine hand stitched leather of the bucket racing seats. The car was meticulously crafted. Black leather with red stitched seams, aluminum accents, racing steering wheel. I pulled the door closed, and it shut with a solid thunk. It didn’t wobble or rattle. It was built like a tank.