by Ted Bell
He studied the water’s swift flow against the piling. The tide was running, well into the ebb. If they could manage to stick to their mission schedule, the entrance would be fully exposed when they exfiltrated at high speed.
They would have the newly freed hostages in tow behind the speeding sub, an idea Hawke had gotten on that first day, watching a blue fishing boat towing a string of white dinghies. The sight recalled a favorite children’s book, one his mother had brought him as a present from America. Make Way for Ducklings, it was called. There was a problem with the idea, however. When you have your ducks in a row, they make for a very easy target.
If all went well, though, the machine guns would be silent, the twin towers by then a heap of rubble, brought down by massive charges at the base rigged by Chief Charlie Rainwater. Egress from the fortress via the main gate would be blocked. The tunnel the only way out. It might work.
And the dock he was swimming beneath would no longer exist. He reached up and attached an MK-V Limpet assembly module to the underside of the dock. The module contained more than one hundred pounds of high explosives. He set it to detonate in the standoff mode at 0330 hours. By that time, it was expected, the infiltrators would be gone.
That, at least, was the plan.
Hawke submerged once more and located the pinpoint violet beam they had affixed to Bruce’s nose. Two seconds on, two seconds off, invisible from above. Hawke had a portable version, a pencil light sheathed in rubber. He signaled three times rapidly, flashing the all-clear, and saw three short flashes in return from the SDV. Stoke had acknowledged and was proceeding directly toward Hawke.
The tricky part now would be maneuvering the cumbersome vehicle in reverse at one knot. Once they’d gotten the thing inside the tunnel, they’d be backing down until they reached the powder magazine. It had been agreed that Stoke, who had trained in undersea warfare at Little Creek with both an early version of the vehicle, the Mark VII, and newer, larger versions, would now pilot Bruce from the navigator’s helm on the port side.
They would run dead slow. Swimming, Hawke would position himself at the new “bow,” grasping the handhold and kicking off from sides of the tunnel to keep them on course as they moved deeper within. The screeching sound of metal on stone was to be avoided at all costs. So was damaging the props and disabling the vehicle, which would be disastrous.
“Anything exciting up in the real world?” he heard Stoke say in his headset. Bruce was now hovering just ten feet from the surface and five yards outside the underwater entrance. Hawke swam over and grabbed a rail running the length of the vessel.
“Negative. Let’s turn this brute around.”
“Jaws of death, man. Come to call.” Stoke was psyched; Hawke could hear it in his voice.
Stoke reversed the port motor and shoved the starboard throttle half ahead. The painted nose began to swing slowly to the left and Hawke, using his flippers, started kicking, helping to push the nose around. After five minutes of heavy exertion, they had the thing correctly positioned, stern-to, just outside the entrance. Time for Bruce and his unexpected guests to go calling.
Hawke checked his watch. He and Stoke were due to meet up with the rest of the force in less than twenty minutes.
On the surface, things were going pretty much according to the plan Hawke and McCoy had agreed upon. Everybody was awake and sober, nobody had fallen overboard, and nobody was shooting at them as of this moment. This, based on FitzHugh McCoy’s vast experience of the counterterrorist trade, was an exceedingly dangerous state of affairs. Something was bound to happen in the next thirty minutes or so that would blow all his plans out the window and everything else to hell and gone.
He imagined Hawke and Stokely had the sub just inside the tunnel now. In twenty-two minutes, they would all regroup inside the large ammunition storehouse just inside the entrance to the fort on the left. A stone staircase led down from that storeroom to the old powder magazine and the tunnel. If there were to be trouble for Hawke, it would most likely be on those steps leading up from where he moored the sub. If an alarm sounded, if the garrison realized they’d been breached, that’s the first place armed guards would go. It was a weak point in the plan but it couldn’t be helped.
Fitz was standing on the bow of the good ship Obaidallah in his Arab regalia. His hands were on his hips, his eyes were everywhere as the battered supply boat slowly approached the docks just below Fort Mahoud. He could feel many pairs of eyes on him, imaginary death beams coming from the gunners manning the tops of the twin towers.
The old boat was running dead slow, black smoke leaking aft from her stack. She had only her running and navigation lights on. A reddish glow illuminated the first mate, Abu, standing at the wheel. His would be the familiar face to anyone on the docks. Fitz had told him to angle the overhead light so that his face was clearly visible from the dock. To a casual eye, Fitz believed, all was precisely as it should be aboard the weekly supply ship.
Two men, dockhands, were lounging on the dock silently watching their approach. One of them leaned casually against a bollard, smoking a cigarette. He looked just like he should look, Fitz observed, sullen and lazy. Both men had lines loosely at the ready. There was nothing at all about their body language or facial expressions to cause Fitz any concern.
It was two-thirty in the morning.
Except for the soft yellow lights at either end of the dock, it was pitch dark in the little marina. The docks, as anticipated, were empty. The French patrol boat had left the dock on schedule, fifteen minutes earlier. Fitz checked his watch again. Forty-five minutes, roughly, until the cutter returned. Enough time to do this thing, maybe.
Fitz had his eyes peeled, taking it all in. These rascals with the dock lines had probably been roused again from their bunks to greet the delayed supply ship. They’d be cranky and sleepy, nothing more. He hoped.
Brock’s man, Ahmed, who was standing on the stern, lifted his right hand in a vague greeting as the boat neared the dock. He muttered something in Arabic to one of the dockhands as the vessel bumped up against the pilings. The hand tossed him a line, and Ahmed made it fast to a stern cleat. The other line came aboard amidships and Abu stepped outside and handled that one. The old diesel was still throbbing, and Captain Ali shut it down.
Ahmed stepped easily onto the dock and after a brief exchange sent one of the two hands scurrying for the hand carts. He remained with the other, amiably chatting him up. Ahmed was their point man in dealing with any Arabs they encountered. Without him, Fitz had told Hawke, this mission would have been virtually impossible.
Fitz remained on the bow, checked his watch, and did a surreptitious weapons check beneath his loose-fitting white garments. He had two weapons at the ready. A Heckler & Koch MP 5 machine gun. And a Fairbairn-Sykes fighting knife in a leather sheath.
The knife was the pride of the McCoy armory back home at Fort Whupass in Martinique. Designed by two British officers based on their close-quarters combat experience with the Shanghai police, it was designed specifically for striking accurately at the target’s vital organs. It had been a standard weapon for commandos during World War II. Fitz touched the hilt, reassured by the well-worn smoothness of the leather wrapping.
He looked aft. Abu and Brock had gotten the heavy iron after hatch open and the first of the supplies were being passed up from the men below. The words SUGAR and RICE were stenciled on burlap sacks. Some actually contained sugar; many others contained satchel charges, Semtex explosives, and nine-millimeter cartridge belts. The dockhands had returned with dollies and were loading up the carts under the supervision of Ahmed.
Rainwater stepped suddenly out of the shadow of the wheel-house and joined Fitz standing on the bow. With his dark skin and flashing black eyes, Charlie Rainwater looked like some children’s book illustrator’s vision of a terrifying Barbary pirate. All he needed were brass hoops in his ears and a flashing scimitar.
“Looks good,” Rainwater murmured under his breath.
“Doesn’t it just?” McCoy said, also keeping his voice low.
“You see the guys up in the towers?”
“See ’em? I can feel their fooking breath down my neck. Don’t look up there. They appear to have lost interest in us.”
“Here’s some good news. That metal surveillance platform that runs around the top of the tower? They can’t see me rigging charges down at the base unless they happen to lean way out over the rail and look down.”
“I noticed that. I thought you’d be happy. You like your privacy when you work.”
“I’m ready to do this, Fitz. Now. I like the timing. I’ll throw a sack of ‘Semtex sugar’ over my shoulder and take a casual stroll down the dock. Have the charges rigged at both towers in five minutes or less.”
“I agree wholeheartedly, Chief. Do it. Go.”
An ad hoc change of plans was not unusual in McCoy’s world. Thunder and Lightning as a counterterrorist group was still alive and kicking butt the world over precisely because they weren’t afraid to toss the best-laid plans right out the window. Rainwater disappeared aft, careful to maintain a lethargic pace as he made his way past the wheelhouse. Although blowing the towers wasn’t scheduled to occur until just before egress, it made sense to set the charges now while everybody was so relaxed.
Fitz made his way aft to check on the Frogman. Froggy and his men were doing the unloading. The wooden crates containing the automatic weapons were coming up now. The Frogman, a squat, tough ex–French Foreign Legionnaire, had been with Fitz since the very beginning. He was a founding partner of Thunder and Lightning. He and his sidekick, the Great Bandini, with the help of Abu and Captain Ali, were all stacking crates on the dock and sending them off as fast as they were handed up.
“Froggy?” Fitz said quietly.
“That’s the last of it, Skipper. Shall I bring the boys topside?”
“Not yet.”
Fitz cast his eyes quickly up at the twin towers and around at the docks one last time. The eight commandos, all dressed in Arab kaffiyehs, were more than ready to emerge from the stifling hold. Each man had given a brief, imperceptible nod to Fitz, who’d looked each in the eye one last time before going up on deck. They were bloody ready. But something didn’t look right. One of them was missing.
“Where the hell’s Ahmed? He was here on the dock not two minutes ago!”
Froggy said, “He and Brock went with one of the dockhands to open up the gates and the storehouse.”
“Damn him,” Fitz said, more in shock than anger, “He’s supposed to remain here. Brock, too. Oversee this lot. Deal with contingencies.”
“There was a lot of Arabic going back and forth with Ahmed and Brock and the dock guys,” Froggy said. “Maybe there was a problem.”
“Brock doesn’t speak Arabic.”
“He does now.”
“Arrow?” Fitz said into his lipmike. “Where the hell are you, Chief?”
“Base of the north tower. Charges set, both towers. Front door is wide open. No tangos visible. I’m headed back to the boat to collect Froggy and company,” Rainwater said.
“Belay that. Stay where you are. We’re coming to you. Is Ahmed with you?”
“Negative. He’s inside. Said he and Brock were headed for the storehouse for the rendezvous with Hawke.”
“For fuck’s sake. All right. One minute, mate. Keep your bloody eyes open. I don’t like this.”
“Affirmative. Hold on, Skipper, I think something—”
That’s when the staccato sound of automatic weapons came from inside the fort. The moment when all the lights went on and all the alarms started screaming like Irish banshees announcing that everyone within spitting distance was going to die.
That’s when the real goat-fuck got started; when anything and everything turned to pure, unadulterated shit.
And FitzHugh McCoy realized too late he’d had a man named Judas aboard his boat. I’ve just got no fooking clue which man was the traitor, he thought.
But if he was a betting man, right now he’d be betting heavily on Harry Brock. Hawke said he’d been in a Chinese prison for three months. A lot can happen to a man’s brain in one of those bloody hellholes. They rewire the damn things!
Chapter Fifty-one
Southampton, New York
“WELL! THAT WAS CERTAINLY CHEEKY,” DIANA SAID, TAKING his hand while sipping from a fresh flute of champagne. Not that he was counting, but it was her third. Or fourth. He’d lost track. It was that kind of party. No half-empty glasses. Frantic, but intimate in that odd way truly large parties can be. Since he knew absolutely no one, he could be alone with Diana, two blithe spirits, apart in the midst of the social whirlaway, in an imaginary space of their own making.
“What was certainly cheeky?” Ambrose asked, leading her toward the sand dunes. “Mind your step. There’s a broken board here and there.”
They’d left the raised wooden walkway that stretched out from the lawn and were on the steps leading down to the beach proper now, threading their way through clumps of wild sea oats that dotted the sand dunes. Beyond, the surf was pounding gently, its low rumble a blessed relief from the all-too-familiar strains of “Jeremiah Was a Bullfrog” and “Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown.”
“That man passing the champagne was cheeky,” Diana said. “One of the wait staff. You must have seen him. The one who looked like that wonderful English actor, what’s his name.”
“What is his name?” he said, his eyes bright with happiness. She did look so pale and lovely in the moonlight. She wore an emerald-green dress, satin, with a deep neckline that was positively awe-inspiring, and a simple necklace of diamonds.
“Don’t make fun, Ambrose. You know exactly who I’m talking about. Michael Caine! That’s the one I mean.”
“Ah. Alfie.”
“You did see him then? The waiter? The one with the thick black glasses?”
“No.”
“Well, he winked at me. You must have been looking the other way at some other woman. Winked at me and said something rude. Like ‘bang’ or something like that. I think that’s rather cheeky, don’t you?”
“Bang?”
“I don’t know. I couldn’t hear him in the middle of that riot. Bangbang, maybe.”
“It’s damned rude, Diana. Also, given the circumstances, a bit unnerving. Which one is he? I’ll go have a word with him.”
“Oh, don’t go back there. I don’t want to make a fuss. I want to walk along the beach and look at the stars. The moon. It’s a wonderful night. Magic. Let’s forget about it.”
“Very well, Diana. Just point him out when we get back. I’ll say something to Jock. I don’t think he’d find it amusing. At all.”
“Don’t be stuffy. Come on! I’ll race you down to the water! There’s something I want to show you down there. Come along, now…”
“Diana, don’t—”
But she’d flung her shoes off, hiked up her skirts, raced ahead, and disappeared over the dunes. Ambrose was not fond of walking in sand, much less running in the stuff. Still, he sat himself down and began unlacing his shoes and rolling up his trouser cuffs.
“Come on!” she cried, “You must come and see this moon!”
“I’m coming as fast as I can,” he said, getting to his feet and trying to brush the sand from the seat of his trousers. What was the attraction? People seemed to flock to beaches in droves and—
“Ambrose! What are you doing?”
When he caught up with her, Diana was strolling barefoot through the surf, her face turned to the moon, her hair falling in lustrous ribbons on her pale shoulders. He reached out and put a hand on her—
“Oh! You frightened me. I didn’t hear you coming.”
“The strong, silent type.”
“Ambrose, isn’t it beautiful? The waves. The moon on the water. I’m so glad you could come.”
“So am I.”
“Will you hold me for a second? I haven’t been held in the moonlight in a very long time.�
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“Well, I—”
“Are you shy, dear?”
“No, no. It’s just that I—well, to be brutally honest, I haven’t held anyone in a very long time myself.”
“One step at a time, then. Put your arms around me.”
“Like this?”
“Perfect. Maybe just a wee bit closer.”
“You said you wanted to show me something…”
“Shh. Now. I lift my chin to a certain angle.”
“I must tell you, Diana, you are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known. I simply—”
“I said ‘shh.’ That means be quiet in English.”
“Sorry.”
“Ambrose?”
“Yes?”
“It’s time.”
“Ah.”
“Go for it.”
“Yes.”
“Do it.”
He did it. He kissed her. He’d meant it to be brief, that kiss, but it seemed to take on a life of its own. It grew warmer, and longer, until there was simply nothing else on earth he knew about or cared about, nothing at all in his world except Diana’s warm lips. His hand moved down her back and he felt the curve of her hip. He pulled her to him and kissed her harder, fearful he was hurting her, but she was crushing her lips against his and he felt her tongue darting about and he parted his lips.
Later, he would not remember how long that first kiss lasted. Only that it was seared in his memory and that it was filled with promise. And that it came within a hair’s breadth of being the very last kiss of his life.
“Golly.”
“My sentiments exactly.”
“I had no idea.”
“So that’s what all the fuss is about.”
“We really must do that again sometime.”
He wouldn’t remember who said what to whom in those few moments afterward, only that they clung to each other for a brief while, just whispering silly things, feeling each other close, and then somehow started walking along the wet sand, seeing the silver reflection of the moon in the waves that rushed up over the beach in a froth and then slipped away.
