The Butcher's Bill (The Linus Schag, NCIS, Thrillers Book 2)

by Martin Roy Hill

  "I've never fired an AK," Schag said, holding up his Glock. "I'll stick with something I know."

  Butcher shrugged, slung the rifle, and shoved the .45 into his waistband. He went forward to the small cabin again, and returned with extra AK magazines he took from the guard. He nodded at the ladder. Schag motioned him to go ahead.

  Butcher brought the AK to his shoulder and quietly climbed the stairs, his eyes scanning the top of the gangway and the entry port for signs of a second guard. Schag followed behind, his attention and his pistol searching the gunwale behind them. They reached the entry port without seeing another soul and stopped, crouching behind the gunwale. Butcher scanned as far aft as he could and saw no one, then moved to the other side of the entryway and scanned forward, still seeing no one. He signaled Schag to enter the ship first, and move to the left while he would follow and move to the right. On three, he mouthed. He held up one, then two, then three fingers.

  Schag dashed through the entry port in a crouch and swerved aft, taking up position behind a crane. Butcher came behind him, moving toward the bow, and taking cover behind a giant valve. They scanned the deck, looking for any movement.

  Schag was no stranger to cargo ships. On occasion, he had to investigate crimes aboard Navy freighters and tankers, those civilian-manned ships of the Military Sealift Command that fed the fleet food and fuel. Those ships were miniscule compared to the Mars Venture. The tanker's main deck was immense, rivaling the Halsey's flight deck. But where the Halsey's deck was flat and wide open when no aircraft were aboard, the Mars Venture's deck was a confusing tangle of pipes and valves.

  Amidships two, maybe three pipes as thick as phone poles ran fore and aft atop an elevated platform. Smaller diameter pipes branched off from those, running athwartships. Spaced along both sides of the ship were cranes, like the one Schag was using for cover, which handled the hoses that fed and emptied the huge cargo tanks below decks. At the stern, rising like the White Cliffs of Dover, stood the superstructure, its white facade gleaming in the glare of the deck lights. Painted in four-foot black block letters on its front were the words: NO SMOKING. As if someone needed reminding of that on this ship, Schag thought.

  Schag scanned the long, elegant bridge wings stretching out from the wheelhouse the entire width of the ship, but saw no one. He studied the bridge itself, its wide expanse of glass slit dimly from within, and still saw no one. He looked back and found Butcher staring at him with a blank look.

  "What's wrong?" Schag asked.

  "It's so damn huge. Where do we start?"

  "That's the bridge and crew quarters," Schag said, pointing to the superstructure. "Everything below us here is cargo space. Oil tanks and bilge tanks." He rapped his knuckles on the deck plate. "And aft will be the machinery spaces."

  Butcher nodded toward the superstructure. "So that's where they’ll be holding Yolanda."

  Schag nodded. Butcher crouched a little higher and raised the AK to his shoulder.

  "Okay. Let's go."

  CHAPTER 27

  SATURDAY

  Aboard the Mars Venture

  Anchored off the San Diego coast.

  0420 Hours

  AIDAN BLACK STARED INTO THE darkness, rubbing the new bruise on his left cheek. That bitch had blindsided him with a right hook that damn near knocked him down. All he wanted was to talk to her, get her to tell him the best way to contact her husband and arrange an exchange, and she fooled him. She seemed willing to work with him, but as soon as he let his guard down, she walloped him. Next thing he knew, she was running out of chief engineer's cabin. The guards outside, however, learned their lessons from her earlier escape attempt and were ready for her. The instant she barreled through the door, they grabbed her and pushed her back into the cabin.

  "All right," Black growled as he flung her to the floor. "No more fucking around. You tell me how to contact your goddamn husband, now."

  "Why? So you can kill him and me both? You won't exchange me for Bill. You'll kill me, too. You have to. I'm a witness." She shook her head, her long black hair twisting angrily with the motion. "I'm not luring Bill into a trap for you. So, you may as well kill me now."

  He looked at her, took a deep breath, and let it hiss through his teeth. She was smarter than he thought. Looks and brains. And tough. Black, however, knew she had a weakness. Every mother does.

  "Your children are staying with your sister in Texas." Black spoke with acid in his voice. "Your mother and father, too. Your brother-in-law's a cop, and he's protecting them." He watched Yolanda's dark eyes grow wide with understanding.

  "How do I know that?" he said. "That's what you're thinking, isn't it Mrs. Butcher?" He circled Yolanda, keeping a safe distance from her. "The world is full of Judases, all lining up for their thirty pieces of silver. And I have a lot of silver to pass around."

  He stopped, hitched up his pants legs, and crouched in front of her.

  "Now, if you play nice and tell me what I want to know, and if—" He wagged his index finger at her. "—if you don't throw anymore tantrums, then your children will be fine. But if you don't . . ."

  He didn't need to say any more. Sometimes a threat was more powerful if left unsaid. Let the victim's mind conjure its own horrors. Basic psychological operations,

  That had been ten hours earlier, and at that moment he was resting in the captain's cabin. Yolanda had given up the secret way she and her husband communicated through the online game. Pretty damned clever, he had to admit. He'd have to use it himself someday.

  There was a knock at the door.

  Black rose from the couch he was lying on and snapped on a table lamp.

  "Enter!"

  Hans Jürgen, the Gideon operator in charge of the guard detail on the tanker, entered the cabin. He was a tall, thin German. A cigarette hung from his mouth, its ash growing by the second. His right hand rested on a handgun slung in thigh rig. He'd been in the German army's special forces—the Kommando Spezialkräft—until they learned he was an ardent neo-Nazi and kicked him out.

  "We've got visitors, sir," he said in a thick accent. "Meier's standing lookout on the bridge, monitoring the CCTV monitors. He reports seeing a port service boat come alongside."

  Oh, crap, Black thought. Did Bennett decide to come back aboard?

  "And?" he demanded.

  "Meier reports two men came up the gangway," Jürgen said. "And they are armed."

  Black blanched at the news.

  "Who are they? Cops?"

  Jürgen shook his head and shrugged. "One man is bearded," he said. "The other wears a tactical vest but no markings are seen."

  "Bearded?"

  "Yes, sir," Jürgen said. "Meier's said he has red hair and a beard."

  "Don't you have a man patrolling on deck?"

  Jürgen frowned and cleared his throat. "Yes, sir. Melito. But we . . . don't know where he is. And . . ." Jürgen paused with discomfort. "The bearded man is carrying an AK like the one Melito was carrying."

  Black took a deep breath, sighed, and shook his head.

  "Get everyone up and armed," he ordered in a low, angry voice. "Post them in every ladder way. We'll let them come up to us."

  "Yes, sir," Jürgen said, turning.

  "And . . ."

  Jürgen stopped and turned back to Black.

  "Sir?"

  "Bring that damn bitch up to the bridge."

  ☼

  As he crossed the massive main deck, Schag felt like he was moving through No Man's Land after the sheltering darkness is shattered by a star shell. Only the exposing light on the main deck didn't fade away after a few seconds. The glare of the powerful deck lights never ended. Though he scanned the deck in front and behind them, Schag couldn't shake the feeling they were being watched.

  Reaching the superstructure, they crouched against the bulkhead and rested, taking deep gulps of air to slow their heavy breathing. Schag was glad to hear Butcher's breathing was as heavy as his own. Over their breaths, he could hear the familia
r hum of machinery below decks, though it was not as loud as he knew it would be if the ship was underway and its single, gigantic diesel engine was making turns. Schag figured only the main generators were running to supply power to the lighting, pumps, and ventilation systems.

  He turned to say something to Butcher but laughed instead. Butcher looked at him oddly.

  "You know you're still wearing that beard and wig?"

  Butcher felt his chin. "I'd forgotten," he said, grinning. He pulled the fake hair from his face and head, tossed it on the deck, and rubbed his skin with the palms of his hands to remove any lingering adhesive.

  Schag glanced around their immediate surroundings. They were crouching in an air castle, an opened area covered by the first of five upper decks towering above them. Stairs, called ladders aboard ships, rose at an acute angle from the main deck to the first upper deck. Additional ladders zigzagged their way up to the four remaining decks. A hatch stood open next to Butcher. Schag stood and saw the bulkhead he was leaning against was a cutwater, a short, pointed wall designed to keep any waves coming over the bow from striking the superstructure with their full force.

  He looked over the cutwater and muttered a curse.

  "What is it?" he whispered.

  Schag lowered himself, a look of disbelief on his face.

  "It's a swimming pool," he said. "They have a damn swimming pool on board."

  "Nice work if you can get it," Butcher muttered. He was looking through the opened hatchway to his right. "Should we go in here?"

  "Wait." Schag moved past Butcher and stood listening at the hatch. It opened into a passageway. Midway down the passageway stood another set of stairs. He raised an index finger to his lips.

  A ship is never quiet. Besides the always-constant cacophony of machinery, there's the dull ring of boots on the rungs of metal ladders, and the murmur of voices reverberating off steel walls. Living conditions on merchant ships are much better than those aboard warships. Wood paneling lined the passageways, and the furniture was as plush as any found in a hotel. Nevertheless, for those not accustomed to moving about a ship, remaining quiet is near to impossible. Schag could hear the dull echoes of hurried boots, muffled voices, and the clang of weapons carelessly banged against equipment. The latter made Schag frown. Metal on metal contacts can cause sparks, something to avoid aboard ship, particularly when the ship was a floating pipe bomb. He crouched next to Butcher.

  "Too many people in there, going up and down an internal ladder." He pointed to the first flight of stairs leading to the deck above. "We'll clear top to bottom."

  Butcher nodded, stood, and stepped to the ladder. Shouldering the AK, he moved up the stairs. At each landing, they paused, Butcher sweeping the deck with his rifle. Once confident the deck was clear, they climbed the next ladder, moving swiftly but quietly, taking each rung flat-footed to reduce noise.

  At the third deck, they passed a lifeboat perched on a ramp canted at a 45-degree angle to the sea. Schag had seen them before. In an emergency, the crew would enter the enclosed boat from a stern hatch and strap themselves into chairs. When ready, the coxswain would pull a lever, releasing the boat, and letting it slide down the ramp and free-fall to the ocean below. Though it sounded like an amusement park ride, it provided a much faster escape than conventional lifeboats held by davits and cradles along the sides of the ship. Merchant sailors appreciate speedy escapes, especially when the vessels they're sailing have a tendency to explode.

  They reached the fifth deck, which housed the bridge from which the crew piloted the tanker. Butcher scanned the landing, saw no one, and stepped up onto it, followed by Schag. The open deck encircled the wheelhouse, and Butcher signaled Schag to go along the back of the bridge and enter it from the port side. Schag nodded his understanding, moved behind the bridge with his weapon raised while Butcher advanced on the starboard bridge door.

  A loud electronic screech made both men freeze.

  A voice boomed from an unseen speaker.

  "Welcome, gentlemen," it said. "Mr. Butcher, I see, and I assume Special Agent Schag of NCIS. Won't you join us on the bridge? We've been waiting for you."

  CHAPTER 28

  SATURDAY

  Aboard the Mars Venture

  Anchored off the San Diego coast.

  0420 Hours

  BLACK NOTICED A FRESH BRUISE marred Yolanda's face when Jürgen brought her onto the bridge. He also noticed two parallel scratches on Jürgen's face, still oozing blood. He smiled inwardly. There was no sense of chivalry in the German mercenary. He would repay kind with kind, plus change. Jürgen held Yolanda's arm twisted behind her back with his left hand while his right hand tightly clamped the back of her neck, his fingers digging painfully into the nerves there. A slight smile of approval twitched on Black's lips.

  "She's a bit of a fighter, this one," Jürgen said, almost with admiration.

  "That she is," Black said, nodding, and fighting the urge to rub his own bruised face.

  The bridge spanned the entire width of the ship, and was a quarter deep as it was wide. Large windows ran the entire width of the compartment, providing the kind of view one expected from the heights of a high-rise building. The windows let in enough light from the deck lights to let Black see the darkened bridge. He knew nothing about ships and expected to see a large steering wheel, maybe with wooden spokes, and a large brass binnacle holding a compass. This bridge, however, reminded him more of an air traffic control tower than his fantasized idea. A control station set back from the windows wrapped itself in a semicircle in the middle of the bridge. Video displays lined the panels of the station, overlooked by two space-age chairs. The steering station stood back from the control station, a simple metal podium with its own electronic displays and a stainless-steel wheel smaller than found in the family car.

  How the hell do they steer a ship this size with that little wheel?

  In fact, an automatic pilot steered the ship, leaving the helmsman available to stand lookout.

  Meier, the man who had reported the intruders, sat in one of the control station chairs. He stood, caught Black's eye, and waved him over. He pointed to a split-screen video display in front of him. CCTV cameras linked to the video screen looked out over the ship, giving the bridge crew a quick 360-degree view of the weather decks. In one section of the display, Black saw two men climbing a ladder from the main deck's starboard air castle to the second deck. Black recognized the large bald man as Bill Butcher. The second Black guessed was the NCIS agent. What was his name? Something strange. Linus, like the character in the Peanuts comics he grew up reading. Linus Schag.

  "Where's the bearded man?" Black demanded.

  Meier shrugged. "I don't know, sir," he said. "I saw the guy in the black vest come up the companionway with the bearded guy, then I lost sight of them when they entered the air castle. Maybe the bald guy boarded from the stern?"

  So, there are more than two, Black thought. At least three, perhaps more. No, probably more. But who? Not NCIS. They wouldn't work with Butcher. Black's mouth twitched. And how the hell did they know we had Butcher's wife out here? It had to be the woman.

  Black turned to Jürgen and Yolanda.

  "How did you tell your husband where we were?" Yolanda said nothing. He stepped closer, his jaw muscle twitching and his lips pressed thin. "You had to tell him where we were. How?"

  Jürgen pressed his fingers deeper into Yolanda's neck until she yelped angrily. "I couldn't I tell him anything," she said. "I don't know where the hell we are."

  Black thought about that, but decided it didn't matter. He looked at the German.

  "Alert the men we've got at least three intruders, and there may be more," he said. "Tell them to watch for a guy with red hair and a beard as well as these two."

  "Yes, sir," Jürgen said. "Meier!" The lookout turned and Jürgen nodded toward the stairway. "Go tell them."

  Meier nodded and rushed from the bridge.

  Black stared at the video display, watching
the approaching men. Their element of surprise was ruined. It was his chance to unnerve them, and give himself an unexpected advantage. That was when the idea of using the public address came to him. As he lowered the microphone, he smiled. Psy-ops.

  ☼

  Linus Schag popped open a pouch on his armored vest, tugged something out, and held it up for Butcher to see. It was an olive-drab cylinder about as long as the width of his palm, with what appeared to be holes along its side, and a handle held in place with a pin attached to a ring. Butcher nodded, recognizing the flash-bang grenade, and motioned with his left hand for Schag to continue around the back of the bridge to the port wing. Butcher approached the opened starboard door and peered inside.

  There were three men on the bridge, and Yolanda. One he recognized as the Gideon CEO Aidan Black. One man stood behind Yolanda, one arm restraining her. In his free hand, he held a large automatic. The third man stood near Black, shouldering an AK aimed at Butcher.

  "Well, Mr. Butcher, I applaud your audacity for storming our little ship nearly single-handedly," Black said. "Please come in, and bring your friends, too. All of them."

  Black must have seen a look of surprise on Butcher's face and added, "Yes, we know there are at least three of you on board. You, Agent Schag, and a red-haired man we don't recognize." Black pointed to the CCTV screen on the control center panel. "We've been watching you since you came aboard."

  Butcher realized he held the attention of all three men, a bad tactical error on their part. On the far side of the bridge, he saw a shadow dip below a window and understood Schag had reached his position. He looked at Yolanda. Her eyes were large, fearful, but also angry. Better yet, expectant. He nodded to her.

  Yolanda shouted, "Bill!" as loud as she could and jerked forward, trying to break from Jürgen's grip but he was expecting the move and followed her motion. That's what she expected him to do. She reversed her forward motion and pushed back against Jürgen, stepping backward, and placing her right leg inside his legs. Then she bent forward, twisting to her left. The move caught Jürgen unprepared. He rolled across her back and landed on the deck. Yolanda leaped over him, running toward her husband. She crashed into her husband, and the two turned and ran toward the ladders.