by Cliff Ryder
“Satellite triangulation shows the call originated about fifty miles to the south-southwest, near the Keys. They aren’t too far away,” Kate said. “Karen, put the entire crew on overwatch. They might pull a double cross or strike early, attempt to get the cargo without paying.”
“Should we break out weapons?” Karen asked.
Jonas responded, “Let’s not arm the crew openly. We don’t want to spook our boys, the hostiles or both. Distribute the pistols and make sure everyone keeps them covered.
Also, everyone should know where the hidden weapons are and try to stay near them if possible.
“Kate, how do you want these people handled? If the deal was to go through without a hitch—which I doubt—then the cases are bugged, so they can be easily tracked. However, if they try to pull something—”
“You and your team are authorized to respond with whatever force is necessary to retain your cargo and capture or eliminate the hostile force,” Kate said.
“Understood. We’ll report in after the meeting.”
“Right, and, Jonas, Karen—be careful.”
“Always.” Jonas cut the connection and turned to Karen.
Her mouth was set in a grim line. “Let’s prepare a suitable welcome for our guests, shall we?”
“I didn’t know you were a nautical man, Major.”
“There is much you do not know about me, Sergeant.”
“That is true. I do know, however, or strongly suspect, that if we take this boat onto the open ocean, we may not return.”
Nodding, Damason had no choice but to agree. The craft they had been assigned might once have been a fisherman’s skiff. Perhaps twelve feet long, to call it white would have been a relative term, as the entire hull had been scraped clean by years of water and salt air, leaving only bare wood behind. The once smooth planks had been attacked by barna-cles, and boring worms had left pits and scores of tiny holes along the sides. The outboard motor had to be at least thirty years old, and the dented, rusty cowling appeared to have suffered through every single day. Damason shuddered to think what the engine itself looked like underneath.
“Sir, with respect, I still think this is a very dangerous idea.”
“Acknowledged, which is why you’re coming with me.”
Damason was just as wary about their upcoming meeting.
They were both dressed in civilian clothes for this night run, but were armed under their loose shirts.
Only a few hours earlier he had shared the news about the supreme commander’s tour of facilities outside of Havana. The person on the other end had been pleased, but then had informed him of the upcoming meeting, and stressed that he wanted Damason to attend. When he had protested, saying he needed to be available in the event of sudden changes to the leader’s schedule, the voice had stated that Damason needed to meet the people he would soon be working with over the next weeks. The tone had made it clear this was not a request, and Damason had been left with no choice but to agree.
As much as they were concerned about meeting with their illegal contacts, they were just as worried about the clearance they had received for the trip in the first place. Damason had bulled it through by saying he wanted to view the coastline from the sea to ensure that there would be no possibility of an assassin shooting at their supreme commander from the ocean. His colonel had approved and gave him papers stating he was to have carte blanche access to anything that the Cuban Border Guard had available. But even with the signed documentation, Damason had already thought of several ways the whole thing could go awry, starting with the possibility that the Border Guard wouldn’t have any suitable boats for an ocean trip. Even worse, that they would have a boat but no fuel was a more likely possibility. After a brief meeting with a guard on duty, which included the requisi-tion of enough gas for their trip, Damason and his sergeant now stood in front of the boat that was supposed to carry them. They were staring at it in disbelief.
“You’re sure we have a clear route to sea?” Damason asked.
Lopez looked pained. “Major, I am embarrassed that you would even ask such a question, but yes, I have the Border Guard’s planned patrols this evening. I don’t know whether God is looking over our shoulder, but apparently there is a large group of citizens that will be attempting to leave the homeland tonight. The majority of the guard in the area will be on hand to take them into custody.”
I know, I called in the tip to make sure they were caught this evening, Damason thought. Normally he tried not to get involved in people fleeing the country, but he knew tonight had to go smoothly, and the distraction would remove most of the patrols from the equation. He shook his head, knowing Lopez would assume he was sad about the impending capture—which he was, but it was also because of the guilt he carried, as well. “Soon that will no longer be necessary.”
“Amen, Major, amen. I thought the Coast Guard was seizing boats from refugees and drug runners,” Lopez said.
“What they haven’t sold outright, they’re using elsewhere.” Damason examined the waterline in the wan light, trying to see any bubbles or rotten wood. Finding nothing out of order, he took a deep breath as he stepped aboard. He was surprised to find that the deck was solid and dry under his feet. “Seems sound enough.”
“Then let’s get this potential death trip started,” Lopez said.
He untied the bowline and tossed it into the boat, then jumped in after it—making Damason wince as he landed on the deck with a thump. The vessel shuddered a bit, but held together.
“Always a positive attitude with you, Sergeant,”
Damason said.
“If you liked that one, you’ll love this—I hope the engine doesn’t explode when I try to start it.” He filled the external tank and wound the old-style pull cord around the starter.
“Here goes.” Tugging with all his might, Lopez almost fell over as the old engine clattered into relatively smooth life, with no smoke or sputtering. It was very loud, but if that was the only issue, Damason wasn’t about to complain.
“Sounds decent enough,” he shouted over the racket.
Pointing Lopez to the bow of the boat, he took the tiller and twisted the throttle. The decrepit-looking vessel responded, if not on a dime, reasonably well enough that Damason thought they might actually make it back in one piece.
He piloted the boat out of the harbor and headed due north, relying on Lopez’s guidance to avoid the coastal patrols. The intelligence was right on the money. The channel waters were deserted, with only widely scattered lights on the horizon. The engine settled into a steady thrum, and the boat cut through the water with ease. Damason kept a sharp eye on the engine, looking for smoke, leaks or anything else that might suggest a long swim back. But so far, the boat handled well enough. The only downside was that he suspected the engine’s deafening clamor might eventually split his skull open.
Damason looked up to see Lopez waving at him, then point to a pair of flashing lights, one white, one blue, off the starboard bow. According to his contact, that was the signal for the party he was supposed to meet. He turned the boat toward the lights.
Five minutes later, he pulled up alongside a forty-foot cigarette boat, its stylish hull painted midnight-blue and black, making it look like a huge arrowhead in the water.
There were three people aboard—a large white man with close-cropped blond hair, along with two other very dark-skinned men. None were visibly armed, although Damason had the feeling they were all carrying some kind of hidden weapon. All of them had the wary nonchalance of men who had killed before and would do so again with relative ease.
Lopez tossed the rope to the other boat, but none of the men moved to pick it up.
“Who are you?” the solidly built man called out.
“A man who wants to change his country’s direction,”
Damason said as he stood with his hands on his hips.
The blond man nodded and grabbed the rope, pulling the two boats together. He held out his hand. “We
lcome aboard.
I’m Theodore.”
“Very well, you can call me Daniel. This is Julio,”
Damason said, pointing to Lopez.
The other two men eyed Damason’s boat with incredulous expressions. One of them asked Theodore a question in a singsong language, which he used to answer the man, as well.
“He says you must be brave, to come all the way out here in that.”
Damason smiled, not showing his teeth. “All Cubans are as at home on the water as ducks.”
The other man said something, and held out his hand.
Damason shook it, and the man laughed, the humor not even coming close to his eyes. Theodore also smiled a bit as he translated again. “He says it is good to meet you, because now he knows there is at least one person he knows not to kill once we are ashore.”
Damason pointed at his sergeant. “What about him?”
Theodore asked the man a question. He replied by holding his hand out palm down and waggling it back and forth.
“Apparently they like you, but he may be on his own.” He smiled, showing large, white teeth. “That is good, because your friend will have to stay here.”
Damason’s hackles rose. “What do you mean by that?”
“We’d like you to accompany us on a little trip north. We have to pick up some cargo, and our leader has instructed us that you are to come along. However, since we cannot take that—” he waved at the boat with a dismissive hand
“—your friend will have to remain behind. Don’t worry, nothing is going to happen to you. You’re far too important to the operation. We should be back in about three, maybe four hours.”
Damason glanced at Lopez, who stood casually, his feet planted on the bobbing deck, one hand at his side, one hand behind his back. He knew that if he gave the order, Lopez would draw his pistol and do his best to kill all three of these men, even if he died in the process. He walked over to him.
“I want you to stay here—” Lopez looked as if he was about to cut him off, but Damason held up his hand. “If I am not back in four hours, you are in charge of the operation. All of the information you need is in my desk. The equipment you would need is in the air duct in my office.
Carry out our plan as far as you can, and trust in God that the rest will happen. The mission is larger than any one of us, and must succeed, no matter what stands in our way.”
“Yes, Major.” Lopez started to cross back to the small skiff, but Damason stopped him, speaking again in low, rapid Spanish.
“And if for some reason I do not come back, be sure to find and kill these three bastards.”
Lopez nodded and stepped into the small boat. Damason knew he was taking two huge chances. If his sergeant had been playing along with him all this time, he could return to find soldiers waiting to arrest him on charges of treason, conspiracy and much, much more. But Damason was sure that wouldn’t happen. He and Lopez had been through too much together—hell, he had already given the man enough information to have gotten him arrested ten times over now. The only reason he wouldn’t have done so already was if he was trying to get as many conspirators as he could in the sting.
Damason shook his head. He certainly hoped that wasn’t the case.
The other chance was accompanying these men on what seemed to be a risky mission for very little gain. However, whatever he had to do to prove his devotion to their cause, he would do if it was within his power.
“Let’s go.” He took a seat in the corner of the boat and didn’t look back as the powerful engines rumbled to life, and the speedboat roared north into the night.
Jonas stood on the aft deck again, surveying the water around them with a pair ofYukon Ranger digital night-vision binoculars. He knew the bridge crew was on the radar to watch for approaching craft, but he also believed in using every available asset, and often there was no substitute for eyes on the deck.
His cell phone vibrated at his side. Jonas kept scanning the waters around them as he activated his wireless earpiece.
“Yes?”
It was Carla, one of the two-person boat team he had sent to return Castilo to shore. “Subject and escort are away, but, um, I’m afraid we won’t be returning to the boat for a while.” She sounded embarrassed and frustrated.
“What’s the matter?” Jonas asked.
“The engine’s been compromised.”
He heard muffled conversation, and then a “Damn it!”
followed by a thump.
“Tell Brett to stop kicking the engine—that boat’s not ours. You have any idea what’s wrong?” Jonas asked.
“Brett thinks the big guy sabotaged it somehow, even though he was in plain sight the entire time—” from the extra emphasis on the words, Jonas figured they were being said for Brett’s benefit as much as his “—but he can’t figure out how. Everything looks fine, but when we tried to leave the dock, the engine wouldn’t turn over.”
“Not bad, not bad, indeed,” Jonas muttered.
“Sir?”
“All right, both of you calm down. What’s your take on this?”
He heard a deep intake of breath. “That there’s no such thing as coincidence. If they are planning an assault, then removing two of the crew would make their job easier—less potential hostiles,” Carla said.
“Right you are. I want you both to secure the boat—get the harbor patrol’s help if you have to. Once ashore, I want you to go to the address I’m going to text to you, and begin surveillance. Keep your distance, and above all, don’t get made. Someone will relieve you by dawn. Otherwise, if that doesn’t happen, go to the second safehouse. Watch for tails.
They shouldn’t be following you—there’s really no reason to—but stay alert regardless.”
“What if the primary leaves the building?”
“If you know it’s him, and I don’t mean you just saw his car, but you visually ID him, then follow. Unless someone contacts you first, call in at 0800 hours, and we’ll go from there.”
“Yes, sir.”
Jonas cut the connection and called Karen, who answered on the first ring. “Yes.”
“Theodore sabotaged the Tiara, leaving two stranded ashore.”
“Bad company is coming,” Karen said.
“Yes, inform the crew quietly, and have everyone vest up. They all need to stay on their toes—these guys will be playing for real.”
“You got it.”
Jonas flipped the phone closed and returned it to his belt, then kept an eye on the dark, calm waters around the ship.
Now that his hunch had been confirmed, there wasn’t much to do but wait. That hadn’t been a problem for him for many years, but he imagined the younger operatives were running through their own internal scenarios about what might go down and how they might react to it. Room 59 operatives came from all walks of life—law enforcement, intelligence, military, diplomatic corps—and for some that meant extensive weapons and unarmed-combat training before joining, for others, the bare minimum. All trainees went through rigorous self-defense and firearm courses, held at a training facility so secret that they didn’t even know its location. For some, this would be their first ex-posure to armed assailants who would probably try to kill them. Of that group, some would rise to the challenge and some wouldn’t. It was the nature of the beast. Jonas only hoped that none of them got killed while trying to do their jobs. Karen and he would do everything they could, but when it came down to it, the mission was the primary goal, and if any of them didn’t understand that, then they were in the wrong line of work.
As he looked out over the dark waters, Jonas remem- bered a time when he had been a bit scared on an operation, not for himself, but for someone else—during a mission that had happened not too far away.
June 19, 1973
JONAS HELD the shuddering Marisa close. To her credit, she didn’t sob or cry out, but just wept into his shoulder for a minute, then pulled away, clamping down on her emotions with iron control.
�
��Sorry,” she whispered.
“It’s all right. The first time I had to kill a man, I threw up, so you’ve already got me beat.” His attempt at humor was feeble, but it distracted her for the moment. “I’m afraid we’re not done yet. Can you give me a hand?”
She nodded, wiping her hands on the dew-laden grass, then stood. “What do we have to do?”
Jonas grabbed the body of the dead guard and pulled him out of the truck cab, letting him fall to the ground in a limp heap. Marisa grimaced, but didn’t look away as he stripped the man of his pistol, canvas web gear and extra magazines.
“Let’s get him into the bushes.” He helped as much as he could with his ankle, but Marisa proved surprisingly able to haul the body, dragging him into the undergrowth without complaint.
When Jonas commented on her ability, she replied, “I cut and haul sugarcane all day. He’s just floppier.”
They went around to the other side of the truck and disposed of the other guard, as well. Hobbling back to the cab, Jonas took stock of their new weapons, two loaded AK-47s with two extra magazines apiece, the Makarov pistol with two additional magazines, two bayonets and four grenades.
He tried contacting the team again, but got nothing but static.
“Well, now we’ve got a chance to stop them. At the very least, we’ll make enough noise and fire to warn the team off, and meet them at the secondary extraction site. I don’t suppose you’ve ever fired an AK?” Jonas asked.
She shook her head.
“All right, I’m going to give you the basic rundown.” In five minutes he taught her about the safety, single-shot ver-sus automatic fire and how to reload and cock the weapon.
“Don’t worry about aiming—you’ll be supplying what we call suppressive fire.”
“Just trying to keep their heads down?” she asked.
“That’s right. Snug the butt into your shoulder and keep it tight. Don’t forget to lean into the rifle a bit, as the autofire will kick. Fire short bursts, then, when the weapon is empty—” He watched as she removed the banana magazine, inserted another and pulled the charging lever back, readying the rifle for action. “Very good, and don’t forget to move after emptying each magazine. Look for muzzle-flashes from the clearing, and aim in that general direction. If you hit anyone, great. If not, no big deal, they’ll take cover either way.”
