Choe depressed a button on the device and the door to the outside opened up, the bright sunlight overpowering him. He shielded his eyes before putting his car back into gear and easing onto the gas.
After ten minutes, they exited the canyon and found their way to the main road. Choe came to a halt at the traffic light.
“Where do you want to go?” Choe asked.
“Kimchaek,” Hawk said without hesitation.
“Kimchaek? That’s at least three hours from here.”
“Do you need gas money?” Hawk asked before handing over a stack of U.S. one hundred dollar bills. “There’s ten thousand U.S. dollars for you.”
Choe picked up the cash and smiled as he flipped through the money. He placed it up against his nose and inhaled.
“Ah, the smell of money in the morning,” Choe said. “There’s nothing like it.”
“Well, there’s plenty more for you where that came from—if you can help me identify who hired you to initiate this attack on the U.S. Senators.”
“I don’t know much about him. That’s how it is in this business.”
Hawk tossed another stack of bills on the passenger seat next to Choe. “Try to remember.”
Choe pulled onto the road and stomped on the gas, the car lurching forward as they sped east toward Kimchaek. “I don’t deal with people on a first and last name basis,” Choe said. “I only go by their handles on the internet.”
“And what was the handle of this particular gentleman who hired you?”
“He went by the name of Undertaker757.”
“Remember anything else?”
“Yes,” Choe said. “He worked for the U.S. government.”
CHAPTER 9
Somewhere in the Sea of Japan
THE YACHT ALEX CHARTERED to pick up Hawk at a rendezvous point in the middle of the Sea of Japan churned through the choppy waters. She directed the pilot Currant assigned for the mission to land on the small island of Ulleungdo. The South Korean territory sat seventy-five miles off the eastern shore of the mainland and served primarily as a tourist destination. Alex thought it was the perfect place to charter a fast yacht without raising an eyebrow.
She borrowed a computer from Currant and attempted to get back online to communicate with Hawk. However, she couldn’t get it to function properly. That combined with the spotty satellite coverage in the middle of the water made for a futile exercise.
The captain of the yacht barely spoke any English, though she didn’t mind. With all that was going on, she didn’t feel like talking to anyone. Her stomach was tied up in knots as she wondered if Hawk was alive or dead. The possibilities of his current state of being rolled through her mind—and she gravitated toward the darkest of places.
They had scheduled to meet at a certain GPS location, agreeing that no ship captain in North Korea would be willing to take them all the way to Japan. The risks were simply too high for anyone commanding a boat out of the communist country. But a short trip off the coast to drop off a passenger for a big stack of money? They both thought their contact on the coast could discreetly sell that idea to at least one willing soul with a seaworthy vessel.
Alex brooded for a few minutes before deciding that she needed to get her mind off the hypothetical and focus on one thing she could do: get the coms working again. She kept tinkering with them until she realized that she needed to tweak one of the channels. Once she did that, her test results came back showing that they were now working properly.
“Hawk, this is Alex,” she said. “Do you read me?”
A laugh followed by a shout pierced her ears.
“Loud and clear,” he said. “I was beginning to wonder if you had hopped on a flight to Bali and just abandoned me.”
“And go cliff diving without you? Where would be the fun in that?”
“I don’t know, but I sure am glad to hear your voice. Please tell me that you’re on your way to the extraction point.”
“We just arrived,” she said. “How far away are you?”
Hawk gave her his location and estimated that it would be another hour before they would connect. She exchanged her ship’s present course, and they planned to meet along the way.
“What happened?” Hawk asked.
“It’s a long story,” she said. “I’ll have plenty of time to tell you on the way back to the mainland.”
“Fair enough,” he said.
A little over half an hour later, Alex’s boat came upon a fishing vessel floating listlessly in the water.
“Hawk,” Alex said over the coms, “are you there?”
He groaned in pain before speaking. “I’m hanging in there.”
“What happened?”
“I ran into a little issue with the crew.”
“A little issue?” she asked. “What kind?”
“The kind where they want to all kill you. I was just minding my own business below deck when one of these knuckle-draggers walks in and starts yapping at me in Korean. I could barely understand him but got the message loud and clear when he pulled out a knife and started pointing at my bag. I pinned him against the wall, knocking the weapon out of his hand before I tied him up. But that wasn’t all.”
“There’s more?”
“I’m only getting started,” Hawk said. “Then two more guys returned, this time armed with guns, but I was ready. I shot both of them, which drew the attention of a couple of other sailors who were milling around on the deck. They came after me as well.”
“So, what’s happening right now?”
“I’m sitting in my quarters, reading a book, and praying that the anchor would keep me from drifting too far off course.”
“You had to take out the captain, too?”
“Apparently he was the ring leader,” Hawk said. “But at least I got all my money back.”
“Well, steady the ship because I’m about to come aboard and get you.”
“That’s not necessary.”
“I didn’t give you an option.”
Alex hustled outside and then tied off a rope along the top of the fishing boat’s deck. She secured the cord to the yacht and climbed up to Hawk’s vessel. Hawk stood in the doorway leading down the stairs to the hull. He was leaning against the side and grinning.
“You’ve always wanted to rescue me, haven’t you?” Hawk asked.
She strode up to him and gave him a hug and a kiss.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve done this, you know,” she said, punctuating her remark with a wink.
Hawk furrowed his brow. “You’ll have to refresh my memory about the other time this happened.”
“Other times,” she said. “If it wasn’t for my quick thinking, you might still be drifting along out here, hoping that someone would come along and pick you up.”
“If you hadn’t abandoned me on the coms when I really needed you, I may not have been in such a dire situation in the first place.”
Alex chuckled. “Just change the subject or deflect—that’s one way to move off the topic. But, for the record, my equipment was stolen on base. I would never abandon you.”
“Stolen?” Hawk asked as he stopped and looked skyward.
“What is it?” Alex asked.
“They’re coming for us,” he said, rushing toward the edge. “We need to get the hell outta here.”
“Who’s coming for you?”
“The North Koreans,” Hawk said, scanning the horizon. “That’s one of their jets screaming this way.”
“Are you sure?” Alex asked.
Hawk continued to peer out across the water. “I’m positive.”
“And how would they know where you are?”
Hawk frantically searched his pockets and after a few seconds dug out a small device about the size of a collar button.
“This,” he said, holding up the device. “Choe must’ve slipped it into my jacket somehow. Maybe when we stopped to get gas and I had to use the bathroom. I bumped into him. That could’ve been when he
did it. At the time, I thought it was simply awkward.”
“Apparently, it was far more than that.”
After placing the tracker down, Hawk finally looked back up before identifying the jets, which banked hard to the right before heading straight toward them.
“We need to get out of here right now,” he said.
They scrambled over to the other boat and implored the captain to open up the throttle and move as quickly as possible, but he was barely awake, nursing a bottle of whiskey.
“We need to go now,” Hawk said.
With eyes glazed over, the man stared at Hawk.
“What?” the captain asked, barely coherent. “What’s happening?”
Hawk grabbed the man’s bottle and tossed it into the water. After pushing the man out of the way, Hawk shoved the throttle forward. The boat slowly built speed as he tried to put more distance between them and the other vessel.
“Come on, come on,” he said.
He checked over his shoulder again and watched as the two North Korean fighter jets lined up with the fishing boat and dropped low, no more than a hundred feet above the water. Hawk could hardly breathe as the planes obliterated the other vessel. Shards of wood zipped through the air in every direction, escaping a fireball at the center of the hull. Hawk said a little prayer as the jets roared overhead. He watched as they banked west and then turned all the way around, this time heading straight toward the yacht.
Alex looked at Hawk. Her eyes seemed to beg for a shred of hope, which was something he was in short supply of.
“If they hit us—” she said.
“I know, I know,” Hawk said.
“Well, do something.”
The only way Hawk could do something meaningful would be to pull out an RPG and light up the planes. Anything else he did would just be to make himself feel better. And that was an empty gesture given the circumstances.
Hawk turned the ship east and carefully watched the skies above to see how the jets responded. They both maintained their original flight pattern.
After taking one more pass over the wreckage, the jets lit their afterburners and took off toward the mainland.
Hawk exhaled and looked at Alex, who was wide-eyed.
“That was too close,” Alex said.
“Yes, but we’re still alive—and that’s what really matters. And I also have the handle of the perpetrator, so it couldn’t be much better, to be honest.”
“Dodging North Korean fighters in the Sea of Japan? It can get much better than this.”
The ship’s captain stumbled toward Hawk again.
“This is my boat,” the man said, slurring his words. “Why are you in the captain’s seat?”
“We needed to get the hell outta there—and you were smashed on something,” Hawk said. “And from the looks of it, you still are.”
“I’m fine,” the captain said emphatically. “Now let me take us home.”
“Not on your life,” Hawk said before cold cocking the man.
He stumbled backward and then crumpled to the deck.
“Where did you find this guy?” Hawk asked Alex.
“He came with the boat,” she said. “I wasn’t too concerned at the time since he wasn’t drunk when we started out.”
“Never trust a man who names his boat Wild Turkey,” Hawk said. “Now let’s get back to work. We’ve got a lot to do if we’re going to put a stop to this threat.”
CHAPTER 10
Osan Air Base
Pyeongtaek, South Korea
THE SHORT FLIGHT back to the base from Ulleungdo was spent rehashing the details of what went wrong for both Hawk and Alex. However, Hawk wasn’t crazy about returning to Osan and warned Alex against saying anything about the details of the operation to anyone, even Lt. Col. Currant. With Obsidian having infiltrated a U.S. outpost in South Korea, Hawk grew increasingly uncomfortable when he considered just how wide reaching the organization’s network was.
“Do you think Currant was behind any of this?” Alex whispered in an effort to maintain a low profile and keep the pilot from eavesdropping.
“We can’t rule out anyone at this point,” Hawk said. “Not even Currant, even as much as I like him.”
As they circled the landing field, the lights below winked in the early evening darkness. The tires chirped as the plane landed before the pilot navigated the aircraft to a nearby hangar. Currant was waiting for them with his hands clasped in front of him. As soon as Hawk and Alex exited the aircraft, Currant hustled up to them.
“You made it back in one piece,” Currant said. “Must’ve been a successful mission.”
“I heard things got a little weird here,” Hawk said, ignoring Currant’s leading statement. “Have you been able to review any surveillance footage and figure out who stole all of Alex’s equipment?”
“We’re still working on that,” Currant said. “As you know, these security systems are designed to be difficult for people to hack. We’re doing the best that we can to figure out how this hapened.”
“They might be difficult to hack, but they should be simple to review for people who have all the right access codes,” Alex said.
“That’s right, but we still haven’t located them. Two members of our team are at a security conference today, and the other one holding down the fort went home sick this morning. We’ve been unable to reach him since.”
“That sounds suspicious,” Hawk said. “Who is this guy?”
“It’s a woman, actually,” Currant said. “Lyla Givens is her name, but we’ll handle it on our end. I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for all of this.”
“Perhaps, but it seems like you have a mole in your midst,” Hawk said. “Entire computing systems don’t just manage to vanish into thin air by accident.”
“I promise you that we’ll get to the bottom of this.”
“We appreciate that,” Alex said.
“Is there anything else I can do for you?” Currant asked.
“Just let our pilot know that we need to prepare for departure within the next ninety minutes,” Hawk said.
Currant clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “I can definitely handle that. Want me to tell him where to file flight plans for?”
“We’ll tell him ourselves,” Hawk said, extending his hand to Currant. “We appreciate your hospitality here.”
“Any time,” Currant said, shaking Hawk’s hand then moving to Alex. “Sorry about the mishaps, but I’ll let you know once we’ve located your equipment. I’m sure it was just a miscommunication of sorts.”
Alex nodded knowingly before she and Hawk turned around and headed back toward the hangar.
“We need to call Blunt,” Alex said.
“I’m not calling anyone until I’m outside and sure that no one is listening,” Hawk said.
They marched across the tarmac in silence while planes both rocketed skyward and roared along the runway after touching down.
The brief break in conversation gave Hawk a chance to think. He wasn’t sure if Currant was simply trying to be helpful or if he had designs on sabotaging them. If Obsidian’s web stretched far and wide across the globe, a base commander on the organization’s payroll wasn’t a farfetched idea.
They walked about fifty meters behind the hangar to buffer the noise before placing a call to Blunt. Hawk put the audio on speaker so Alex could listen in. Blunt grunted as he answered the phone.
“We’re calling to give you an update on the latest operation,” Hawk said.
“You don’t have to,” Blunt said. “I already know it was a success.”
“Who told you that?” Alex asked.
“I got a call from the security team over at the Capitol Building,” Blunt said. “All the attacks originating from North Korea suddenly stopped earlier today. I’m assuming you had something to do with that.”
“We did,” Hawk said. “It wasn’t easy though.”
Blunt chuckled. “It never is, is it?”
&n
bsp; “Most definitely not,” Alex said. “I even had to deal with the loss of all my equipment during the middle of the operation.”
“What happened?” Blunt asked.
“It’s a long story, and, to be honest, we still don’t know all the details. But in short, my computer and all my other electronic equipment was stolen.”
“Can you wipe the hard drive remotely?” Blunt asked.
“I already initiated that protocol through a backup web portal,” Alex said.
“I look forward to a full report when you return, but I’m glad you called because I need to talk to you about another operation.”
“What now?” Hawk asked. “Did you get any other leads from the Orlovsky contacts?”
“No,” Blunt said. “But I did receive intel that Admiral Adelman is in Hong Kong for a meeting with members of Obsidian. Apparently, a large number of their mid-level and upper-level leadership will be in attendance.”
“This ought to be an interesting reunion,” Hawk said. “I’m sure my former Navy SEAL commander will be surprised to see me.”
“Adelman has a lot to answer for.”
“So we’re going to crash the party?” Hawk asked.
“In a manner of speaking, yes,” Blunt said. “It’s probably going to look a little different than most of your other missions.”
“How so?”
“I want you to enter through the front door with everyone else,” Blunt said.
“And how exactly would we do that?”
Blunt exhaled loudly. “Do you remember when we started Firestorm and I told you that there were three assassins that I kept on that team?”
“I remember you saying that, but I only remember meeting one other one—the one I had to kill,” Hawk said.
“Your path never crossed with the third assassin, who worked alone on cases that required a smaller footprint and more discretion,” Blunt said.
“Who is he?”
“His name is Titus Black, and he’s been working deep undercover for quite some time, trying to infiltrate a dangerous shadow organization. When he started, we didn’t know the name Obsidian, but now we know that’s the group he was tracking.”
Any Means Necessary Page 6
