Deadly Coast (A Tom Dugan Novel)

by R. E. McDermott

  He stood facing outward, his feet on the gunwale, gripping the waist-high rail at his back with one hand, sweat pooling in his boots not just from the heat. The end of the rope came down again, this time with a loop tied in it, and Dugan grabbed it with one hand. In a brief moment of machismo, he considered refusing the safety line. A very brief moment. He dragged the loop over his head and under his arms. Moments later he felt the rope snug up across his chest, as above, the sergeant took a turn around the handrail and took slack out of the line.

  Dugan watched the ladder swing back toward him and tensed to make the step, but at the last second his nerve failed. He clung to the rail of the fishing boat, just as Kwok overcorrected to pull a bit away from the drillship. As the vessels separated and the drillship rolled away, the rope bit into Dugan’s chest to rip him from the rail, and he saw the black expanse of the hull rushing toward him.

  50 yards from the beach

  Harardheere, Somalia

  Ahmed saw the fin again from the corner of his eye and murmured a silent prayer to Allah. From what he could see in the moonlight, it wasn’t a huge shark, perhaps five or six feet, but it was plenty big enough to kill a defenseless swimmer. And he was, for all intents and purposes, defenseless. He’d jettisoned his AK when the boat sank, and though he still had the Glock stuck in his waistband, he knew the shark would strike from the dark depths before he ever saw it. Once he was crippled, he’d no doubt other sharks would join the feeding frenzy. As if confirming that grim thought, he spotted a second fin to his left as he turned his head to breathe. Ahmed banished such thoughts and focused on the distant shore. There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, he repeated to hold dark thoughts at bay.

  First contact was a brush against his leg, filling him with terror. A terror unabated as he stroked even harder for shore and felt the brush of a large body against his side. They were toying with him, like a cat with a mouse before the kill. He felt hard contact to his chest as he was lifted clear of the water, and clutched at the gray mass below him, shocked and bewildered. A blast of air and water erupted in his face.

  Ahmed wiped his eyes with the back of a hand and blinked down at what he realized was a dolphin’s blowhole inches below his face. The dolphin submerged, and Ahmed treaded water as elation replaced terror.

  “Allahu Akbar,” he shouted into the night sky, then turned to stroke hard for the beach. Around him, dolphins rolled and leaped from the water, shedding droplets that gleamed silver in the moonlight.

  Harardheere, Somalia

  Arnett felt the bag shift on the man’s shoulder, followed by a short sensation of weightlessness—too short for her to prepare herself for the landing. She grunted as she landed flat on her back and air rushed from her lungs, and then struggled with the horrible feeling of being unable to take a breath. She heard the zipper an inch from her nose and smelled the khat on Toothless’s breath as he leaned over to unzip the bag. Dim light leaked around the edges of the duct tape over her eyes, and the canvas shifted beneath her as Toothless upended the open bag and turned her out face-down on the floor. Rough concrete scraped Arnett’s cheek and she smelled animal dung, just before rough hands rolled her onto her back.

  “Where is your smart mouth now, whore?” Toothless asked.

  Arnett sucked in air until she was able to respond.

  “You … your brea … breath smells worse than the goat shit on this floor, asshole. Don’t you own a toothbrush? Oh, that’s right. You don’t have many teeth left, do you?”

  The savage kick landed in her side, and she was unable to suppress a moan at the unseen assault. Then she sensed Toothless leaning over her again, his closeness confirmed by his fetid breath and spittle spraying on her face as he spoke.

  “That’s right, whore. Moan,” Toothless said. “Soon you’ll have even more reason to moan as I fill your holes with my manhood.”

  Her head was jerked to the left by a vicious openhanded slap.

  “Lie here and think about that,” Toothless said. “I must gather supplies before the infidels decide to strike our safe house. And perhaps I’ll have a cup of tea and a bite to eat. Whore-training is hard work, and I must keep my strength up.”

  She heard Toothless laughing as he moved away from her. The light leaking around her blindfold lessened—Toothless was apparently taking the light source with him. Moments later, she heard the complaining squeak of an un-oiled hinge followed by the rattle of a chain. Then an engine started and faded, and all was quiet.

  Arnett rolled onto her stomach and inched her knees forward, elevating her butt and grinding her face into the foul-smelling concrete. She pushed her bound wrists toward her butt, trying to get her butt through the circle of her bound arms to get her hands in front of her. The first attempt wasn’t close—nor was the twenty-first. She was sweating now, her panic rising at the thought of Toothless’s return. She made herself relax and imagined her body was rubber, stretchable at her whim. She focused on her shoulders, willing muscles to relax, glorying in each fractional gain, until her wrists were below her butt and she was—stuck!

  She was a tortured pretzel, her shoulders burning now, unable to continue or to return her hands to their previous position behind her back. Her right cheek was scraped raw on the rough concrete. Arnett threw her weight to the right and rolled up on her butt, her hands partially pinned beneath her. She took a deep breath, drew her knees to her chin, and pulled up on her arms with all her might to slide her bound wrists past her butt. Something tore in her left shoulder and she felt blinding pain, and then her wrists were under her knees. Arnett collapsed onto her right side, gasping at the pain in her shoulder, on the verge of passing out. She fought down nausea and forced herself to bring her knees to her chest once again, and worked her feet out of the circle of her bound arms.

  Her shoulder throbbed and her left arm was useless. She tried raising her bound hands to loosen the tape around her eyes, but the required movement was too painful. She had to separate her hands first so she could immobilize the left one. She tried rolling onto her left side to support her left arm on the floor, as she lowered her head and gnawed at the tape binding her wrists. The adhesive tasted bitter in her mouth, and bits of tape stuck to her lips, but finally, the tape parted.

  She moaned as she sat back up, holding her left arm tight against her side and picking at the tape circling her head with her good right hand. Her fingers found the end and picked it free. She unwound the tape quickly until she got to the last round stuck to her hair, then squeezed her eyes shut and gave one final jerk, hardly flinching as the tape tore at her hair.

  Arnett blinked in the dim light. She was in some sort of dilapidated outbuilding, one that had housed livestock from the smell. It was poorly constructed and cracks in the plank walls let in moonlight that striped the rough floor. She reached down with her good hand to free her ankles. It was a matter of feel versus sight in the dim light, but her fingers found the tiny ridge that marked the end of the tape and picked it free. It unwound in one long strip.

  Her first thought was escape, and she struggled to her feet and found the door in the dark. It yielded a half inch, then stopped with a metallic rattle, chained shut from the outside. She took a step back and the movement sent a stabbing pain down her left arm. She had to attend to that.

  Arnett retraced her steps, kneeling and groping for the discarded tape with her good hand. She found it and fashioned a large loop with part of the tape, then tore the rest of the strip away by holding it in her teeth and tearing with her good hand. She slipped the loop over her head as a sling to support the weight of her useless left arm, then used the rest of the tape to circle her slight torso twice, immobilizing her now-supported arm against her body. Crude but effective.

  Hurting and exhausted, Arnett leaned against the wall and tried to figure out what to do next.

  A half-hour later, she clutched the handle she’d broken off an old rake found in the corner of the shed behind a stack of mud bricks.
It had taken what seemed like forever to carry the bricks to the duffel bag, one at a time in her good hand. When the bag would hold no more, she’d managed to zip it. It was barely visible on the dim moonlight-striped floor.

  She knew she had to kill Diriyi. Her guess was he’d brought her here on the spur of the moment and no one knew he’d done so; otherwise, there’d be a crowd, eager to participate in her rape. If his body was found, his death would be a mystery. If found alive, he’d raise the alarm.

  Arnett pressed the end of the short rake handle against her useless left arm, testing the sharpness of the jagged point at the broken end. It wasn’t much of a weapon, wielded by an exhausted and brutalized woman with a wrecked shoulder against an armed adversary. However, the odds seemed a bit better when you considered she was Lynda Arnett, five times Isshinyru Karate National Champion in the Black Belt Weapons Division. Her weapon of choice was the traditional Okinawan short sword, the sai.

  Arnett closed her eyes and centered herself, visualizing Toothless in her mind’s eye and mentally walking through her strike a half dozen times, each time changing Toothless’s reaction and the necessary response on her part. When she’d covered the possibilities mentally, she practiced them physically in slow motion, testing every footfall, feeling the wooden rod in her hand. She’d reached the point of trying them full speed with her eyes closed when her heart leaped into her throat. A car engine!

  Diriyi smiled to himself as he parked the SUV. The town was abuzz with the news of the American attack, and the few occupants of the al-Shabaab safe house had fled, fearing an American retaliatory strike ashore. That the cowards had left in haste had been obvious, and they left plenty of food and provisions.

  It was strange how these things worked out. Mukhtar’s gamble on the drillship had gone wrong, and Diriyi’s gut told him he would never see the man again. The fool had risked everything to get the nerve gas, and for what? Fame as the most effective fighter of the jihad? Notoriety as the favored of Allah who had slain the most infidels? Such delusions of grandeur were invariably costly. Now there’d be few of al-Shabaab left, and Diriyi was the most visible. He’d no intention of becoming the recipient of the Americans’ wrath. He’d lay low awhile, then return to a life of piracy. After, of course, he’d enjoyed and killed the woman. Who knows, perhaps in a year or so he could claim a reward for leading the Americans to her grave. His smile widened.

  Diriyi glanced in the back of the SUV before he got out. He’d enough provisions for several weeks. He’d have to cut some brush to camouflage the SUV, but that could wait. It hadn’t yet begun to lighten in the east. Time for a little romp with the whore. He grew hard at the thought, and reached down to touch himself through his trousers.

  He picked his way down the path to the goat shed in the light of the battery-powered lantern. The key turned in the padlock, and the chain rattled as he pulled it through the door handle. The dry hinge squealed its lament as he pushed the door inward. Time for some fun.

  “Are you ready for some fun, whore?” he asked. He held the lantern high and moved into the shed, the complaining door swinging shut behind him.

  Diriyi stopped, puzzled. The duffel bag, obviously full, was just visible at the edge of the circle of light cast by the lantern, but he couldn’t see the woman. Then he understood and laughed.

  “So you think you can hide from me in the bag, like an ostrich with its head in the sand? You are truly a stupid bitch. Giving me pleasure is going to be the only thing of value you will ever accomplish in your short life.”

  Diriyi held the lantern high and covered the short distance in a few long strides, aiming a savage kick at where he figured the woman’s stomach would be.

  Arnett stood with her back to the wall on the hinge side of the door as the door swung shut behind Toothless, revealing his back. She heard his derisive words, and nodded as he moved forward and drew his leg back to kick the bag. It was the response she’d hoped for, and she was moving even before the toe of his running shoe contacted the pile of bricks.

  Toothless screamed as the toes of his right foot shattered, and he stumbled back, dropping the lantern, which flickered but didn’t go out.

  “Toothless!” yelled Arnett, and the pirate turned toward her, reaching for the Glock in his waistband. Too late.

  “Kiii … aiii!” screamed Arnett, just as the jagged end of the rake handle contacted the man’s Adam’s apple and she threw her hip to put all her body weight and momentum into the blow. The wood ripped through voice box, jugular vein, and esophagus, and impacted the pirate’s cervical vertebrae, forcing him backward even as he sank to the ground. Arnett drew her makeshift weapon back sharply, and arterial blood gushed from the gaping wound, spraying her before she could jump away.

  Toothless lay on his back on top of the bag of bricks, blood pumping from the hole where his throat had been, moving his lips in wordless comprehension. His eyes fluttered shut and his lips stopped moving, and the air in the shed became even more foul as he lost sphincter control. Arnett stood motionless, staring down at him in the soft glow of the overturned lantern.

  The trembling started in her good right hand and got increasingly violent. The bloodied stake slipped from her grasp, and the palsy spread to her legs, which buckled. She fell to her knees and retched, adding the stench of her own vomit to the miasma of death and goat dung. She felt an urgent need to flee and dragged herself toward the door on her three functioning limbs, the rough concrete punishing her hand and shredding her pants at the knees.

  The door squeaked as she clawed it open and crawled into the moonlight, collapsing against the rough plank wall. She was suddenly very cold, even in the equatorial night, and she shivered uncontrollably. Shivers turned to sobs—whimpers at first, then growing to deep, wracking cries of anguish and freely flowing tears. Tears of sorrow for Gomez and the other dead crewman, tears of relief that she’d escaped Toothless, and finally tears of rage at the murderers that had done this to her and her crew. She hugged herself with her good arm and let her emotions out, crying until she was drained and exhausted.

  Arnett jerked awake with the sun in her eyes, enraged at herself for falling asleep. She struggled to her feet. All her joints were stiff and her left arm and shoulder throbbed. She saw the SUV parked fifty yards away beside a dirt track, at the end of a narrow footpath through low brush and small boulders. There wasn’t a house in sight.

  She moved back into the shed, breathing through her mouth to avoid the stench, and knelt to pull the Glock from the dead pirate’s waistband. A search of his pockets yielded another full magazine, a sat-phone, and car keys. She stuck the Glock in her waistband and pocketed the other things before she turned toward the shed door.

  Arnett froze at a sound from outside, then bolted to the wall seconds before the door flew open and banged against her. The door swung closed to reveal Traitor, gun in hand, kneeling over Toothless with his back to Arnett. She raised the Glock in her right hand and drew a bead on the back of Traitor’s head. Her hand trembled not at all as her finger tightened on the trigger.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  M/T Marie Floyd

  Arabian Sea

  En route to Harardheere, Somalia

  Captain Vince Blake paced the bridge, glancing at the speed log each time he passed. A building south wind on the beam steadily increased the swell, and the old tanker had a pronounced roll now—and a speed of 13.5 knots, despite the chief engineer’s best efforts to coax more from of the tired old engine.

  Blake’s pacing was interrupted by the buzz of the sat-phone.

  “Marie Floyd, Captain speaking,” he answered.

  “Captain Blake, this is Ray Hanley. The navy boys took back the Luther Hurd last night—”

  “How’s the crew? Everyone all right?”

  “Just the two guys we already knew about,” Hanley said. “Jones, the acting captain, was injured, but not seriously.”

  “Don’t you mean acting chief mate? Arnett’s the capt …” Blake’s
voice trailed off. “You … you said there were no more deaths. Why is Stan Jones acting captain? What about Lynda?” Blake asked at last.

  “Truth is, we don’t know,” Hanley said. “They took her ashore just before the attack. All we can do at this point is hold a good thought for her.”

  Blake didn’t trust himself to respond. He composed himself, then changed the subject. “How about the other ships? Any more executions?”

  “Two days, two dead seamen,” Hanley said. “Just like the bastards threatened.”

  Blake glanced at the speed log and resisted an impulse to punch the control console.

  “Maybe we should tell them we’re coming with hostages of our own,” Blake said. “And tell them to hold off executions until we get there.”

  “Except we don’t know where all their boats are,” Hanley said. “If they figure out where all their missing buddies are before you get under the protection of the USS Carney and the other navy ships off Somalia, you can bet they’ll swarm you. Don’t forget, this little operation of ours is totally off the books. We can pull up next to the navy boys and the pirates will think we’re under their protection, but the truth is, none of the Western governments want to touch our little privateering operation with a ten-foot pole. They’ll help us by ignoring us, but that’s as far as it goes. Tough as it is, we have to stick with the plan.”

  Blake sighed. “I understand. We’re almost ready.”

  “What do you mean, almost? You should be done.”

  “We are here,” Blake replied. “Woody has the whole gang finishing up Pacific Endurance.” Blake turned as he spoke and looked across at where Pacific Endurance was keeping station with him, a mile away.

  “Hey, Junior. Get your ass up here,” Woody called down into the tank.

  Seconds later, Junior West’s head and shoulders emerged from the open expansion trunk of number-one starboard cargo tank, a welding hood tilted back and a cap worn backward under the hood soaked with sweat.