Commander-in-Chief

75

The Spinnaker II had spent the last two days anchored off Salt Island in a remote cove. The six-man security team watching over Kate and Noah Walker had seen no threats to their operation whatsoever, and they’d reported the lack of action to their employer, the Russian who called himself Popov.

Still, Popov told them to keep their guard up, so to this end one of the Steel Securitas men was positioned on the flying bridge at all times with a pair of binoculars in his hand. A second lookout remained on shore, high on a hill overlooking the cove.

As far as they were concerned, the measures they had taken were already an absurd overkill. Yes, they’d killed the old man following them around the islands, but since then their jobs had given them plenty of time to work on their tans.

Be that as it may, Popov had informed the men the night before that the following day the Dutch couple who’d been involved in the original kidnapping would return to add another layer to the security.

The South African in charge of the operation pointed out to the Russian that there was no place for two more people to sleep on the boat, but he was informed they would stay on their own boat, nearby but out of sight, and they would be used in case of any new threats.

Now it was six a.m., and only a faint glow above the hills over Salt Island revealed the morning. The South African was in his bunk, as were the German, the Chilean, and the Romanian.

The American was on watch on the flying bridge, and the Cuban was up on the hill overlooking the bay. Both sentries were awake, but neither was quite alert.

After all, there was nothing to worry about.

John Clark ascended the last few feet under the dark water; then he placed his hand on the bottom rung of the ladder next to the sea stairs on the bow of the Spinnaker II. He took a moment to listen to the noises of the boat here, checking for the sound of any voices.

When Adara found the cobalt-gray catamaran the afternoon before, she’d also noticed the man sitting on the hill above it. She’d taken pictures of the entire scene, and from these Clark had confirmed this man was one of the mercenaries taking part in Kozlov’s operation, so he knew he’d have to board on the far side of the boat from the island.

This, he saw, wasn’t going to be a problem. The catamaran had swung around with the morning tides to the point that Clark could ascend the sea stairs without fear of being seen by the man onshore.

He wasn’t so sure about the man on the flying bridge, however.

Once he climbed onto the ladder he let his scuba gear sink to the bottom. It was only thirty feet deep here in the bay, so he could retrieve it if he had to, but for now he wanted to leave no hint that he was on board until he was ready to reveal it for himself.

He wore a shorty wetsuit and this he peeled off to reveal black cargo shorts and brown T-shirt. He’d kept his dive knife strapped to his ankle, and Adara had given him her compact Glock-26, which he’d just tucked into a side pocket of his shorts. He rose from the water and crouched low behind a dinghy suspended at the back of the boat, and he looked to the flying bridge ahead and above.

He could just barely make out the top of a man’s head there, but from what he could see, the moment Clark stood up, the sentry would see him easily.

Shit, Clark thought. He considered slipping back into the water to try to climb up at another part of the hull, but the gunwales were higher on the side, and there were no ropes or ladders.

If he were twenty-five years old he could board this damn boat fifty different ways, but those days were behind him.

He sat tight, watching the sky get lighter as he willed the man above him to turn around.

At six a.m. he got his wish. The sentry on the flying bridge stood up, stretched, and gave a quick wave to the man a hundred yards away on the hill. Clark couldn’t see if the wave was returned, but soon the lookout climbed down from the bridge and disappeared into the cockpit.

Clark couldn’t believe his luck. He drew his pistol, remained low, but rose to a crouch and then headed toward the cockpit behind the sentry, his back aching from the wounds he’d received three days earlier.

It was darker in the cockpit than it was on deck, but Clark realized the man he’d seen above had climbed down into the saloon. Clark trained his weapon on the space, then made his way over to the helm. Quickly he looked over at the controls, determining in just seconds that he’d have no trouble piloting the boat.

He heard noise on the stairs and he stood there in the half-light calmly.

Clark recognized the American who’d called himself Joe. Along with the South African he had come aboard Clark’s Irwin the other day to threaten him. Now Joe had a cup of coffee in his hand, and he was moving carefully so he would not spill it.

He was all the way up the stairs in front of Clark before he looked up and saw him.

Clark spoke softly. “Put the coffee on the table. Raise your hands.”

The man did as he was told, but he raised his hands only to chest level. “What do you want?”

Clark smiled a little. “How about we start with my pistol?”

The American looked down to the waistband of his board shorts and saw what Clark was referring to. The grip of the big SIG Sauer handgun he’d taken from the sinking boat the night he left the man in front of him there to die jutted out of his pants.

There was no way the man who called himself Joe could deny he’d been on board when the man was attacked, and that meant, to the American mercenary, anyway, that he was going to have to make a play for the pistol.

“Look, sir,” the American said, playing for time, hoping to find an opening.

Clark said, “You going to tell me you were out for a swim when two pounds of steel floated by?”

“No, sir.” Clark could tell the man was thinking about a move.

Clark said, “If you give me the gun, and you tell me where the Walkers are, without raising your voice, I will let you live.”

The man said nothing.

“Or don’t. You can guess what happens then.”

The American seemed to relax a little. Clark saw him glance back down at the full cup of coffee on his right. “You won’t shoot. It will make too much noise.”

“I’ll shoot. Then I’ll hang out up here with my gun on the companionway, drop the next asshole that comes through.”

The American shook his head. Still weighing the situation. “They’ll kill the hostages.”

“No,” Clark replied calmly. “Only an idiot would do that, give up their one bargaining chip, knowing a killer is waiting up here with a tactical advantage. They might be that stupid, but I’m going to guess that you are the idiot on this crew.”

“What makes you say that?” Before he finished speaking the man’s right hand went for the coffee mug, he got his hand on it, and started to fling it up toward the man by the helm.

Clark shot the man in the forehead. His head snapped back and he dropped to the floor of the cockpit.

“The first guy to die usually is.”

The sixty-seven-year-old man moved quickly now, rushing to the dead man on his back, pulling the SIG from his waistband and the radio from his front pocket. He then returned to the helm and began to flip switches, powering the navigation aids, starting the engine.

A second man appeared at the companionway stairs. Clark shot him dead before he could even focus on the situation.

He heard shouting from the hill now, and then over the radio a man with a Hispanic accent called for a status report.

Clark crouched behind the helm, pointed his gun at the entrance down to the saloon, and keyed the radio.

“I want to see guns tossed up out of the saloon. A lot of guns. Then I want you up here one at a time, hands high. I have a feeling you boys are working for a paycheck. Trust me, now that I’m on your boat, you aren’t getting paid enough for this shit, so I’m going to let you quit.”

He doubted he’d get the response he wanted, but he waited for a moment. Then he heard a woman scream.

Braam and Martina Jaeger stood at the Beef Island/Tortola heliport, watching the pilot of the Robinson helicopter conduct his preflight walk-around of his aircraft. The Dutch brother and sister yawned and stretched their arms; it had been a long flight in the rented Falcon from Amsterdam.

Braam’s mobile began ringing. “Hello?”

“It’s Popov! Listen carefully! The boat is under attack!”

“Where?”

“I’ll send coordinates to your phone. The crew is under fire. They have control of the hostages but haven’t been able to remove the threat. Get there and fix it.”

Braam hung up the phone and took Martina a few feet away from the pilot. Seconds later, both came back to him.

Martina asked, “Where can we get parachutes?”

The pilot seemed surprised by the question, but he said, “There’s a skydiving club here. Their shack is over by the terminal, but it won’t be open today till eight.”

Martina turned and headed for the terminal.

Five minutes later she returned with two packed chutes. The pilot said, “What the hell? Did you steal them?”

Braam produced a Steyr handgun from inside his luggage. He leveled it at the pilot. “Take us here.” He held up his phone with his other hand, showing a spot on a digital map next to Salt Island.

John Clark watched the head of Kate Walker appear up the companionway stairs. Just as he expected, there was a pistol jammed against her throat. Behind her, Clark recognized the South African, struggling to keep as much of himself hidden as possible.

When they were at the top of the stairs, the mercenary said, “Drop your fucking gun or I’ll shoot this bitch.”

Clark rose up behind the helm and took careful aim.

“No you won’t,” he replied.

“The hell I won’t, man. I’ll shoot her!”

Tears rolled down Kate’s face. Clark saw this and said, “Ms. Walker, don’t worry. He’s not going to shoot you. He’s going to get himself in what he thinks is a better position, then he’s going to turn the pistol on me and use you as a shield. When he moves the barrel of the gun off of you… I’ll take him, and this will all be over.”

The South African said, “You’re fucking crazy, man! I’ve got three more men who aren’t going to let you out of here.”

Clark said, “They can’t wait for you to die so they can get away from this fucked-up mission. C’mon, asshole. Go ahead. Turn your gun on me.”

Clark wasn’t focusing on the man’s eyes, he was just looking at the front sight of his weapon, making sure it was centered on the little piece of forehead he could target to the right of Kate Walker. But he knew what he’d have seen in the man’s eyes. Panic, indecision, and then… slowly… determination.

The barrel of the man’s pistol shot out toward Clark. Clark fired a single round, and the man lurched back, tumbling backward down the companionway.

Kate Walker collapsed.

Seconds later, pistols began flying up out of the saloon and dropping on the deck at Clark’s feet.

Five minutes later the two surviving mercenaries on the boat had tossed the bodies of their three mates overboard, raised the anchor, and then themselves leapt off over the gunwale into the bay. Clark turned the boat around expertly and pushed the throttle forward, moving the powerful engines up to full power, and leaving the three mercenaries behind on the deserted island.

Kate went downstairs to untie Noah, and Clark called Adara Sherman to let her know he’d be at the marina in Tortola in just over an hour. He then called Gerry and gave him the news. Gerry told Clark the other operatives were on their way back from Belgium on a U.S. government Learjet, after capturing a terrorist tied to Russian intelligence.

Clark said, “And I thought I was the one having all the fun.”

Gerry laughed and hung up.

Soon Kate was back on deck with Clark. “Noah will be up in a minute, but first I have questions.”

“I can imagine.”

“What do I call you?”

“Call me John.”

“Who are you?”

“I’m a friend of your husband.”

“My husband doesn’t have friends like you.” She said it flatly. A challenge to Clark.

He did not disagree with her. Instead, he said, “It’s not too late to change that. He’s been dealing with some dangerous people, but the people who took you did so because he wanted nothing to do with them. He can help us out now that you are safe, and he has promised to do so. I just have to get you out of here, then we just have to get Terry away from his captors.”

She looked him over for a long time. Clark had a feeling he knew what she was thinking, and when she spoke, she confirmed his suspicion.

“By yourself?”

Clark looked out to the open water in front of him as he manned the helm. “God, I hope not.”

Twenty minutes later, Kate brought John a cup of coffee and then she and Noah went back down below. Clark sipped slowly while focusing on getting as much out of the engines as he possibly could. His speedometer on the multifunction display of the boat read thirty knots, two and a half times faster than the top speed of the Irwin he’d sailed around the BVIs earlier in the week. It was an impressive machine, Clark thought, except for some blood on the floor and the pervasive scent of a half-dozen mercenaries.

He’d just taken a sip of coffee when he heard an unmistakable thud on the aft deck of the boat. More curious than concerned, he flipped on the autopilot, scanned the water ahead for a moment, then went to investigate.

He had just passed through the rear cockpit door when he felt something grab him from above. A line from one of the sails had been lowered around his neck, and now it choked him as whoever held on to it pulled him so hard his feet left the deck.

Straight ahead of him, at the stern of the boat and just in front of the dinghy, he saw a woman with auburn hair unfasten a parachute harness. She already had a pistol in her hand, and she raised it at Clark.

Clark struggled with the line around his throat, and while he lurched his head back, trying in vain to break the hold, he saw a man lying on the flying bridge just above him, reaching over with the line and heaving it with all his might.

The woman said, “Who else is on board?”

Clark couldn’t have replied if he wanted to, he just held on to the line digging into his throat, trying to keep his airway open. For one brief moment he reached down to his cargo pocket trying to pull his Glock, but the auburn-haired woman recognized what he was doing, so she stepped forward and removed the pistol before he could get to it. She racked the slide, ensuring there was a round in the chamber, then pointed it at Clark’s face. “How many more of you on board?”

Clark’s hands went back to the line, clawing into his own skin to get some relief from the pressure against his windpipe. He was seconds from losing consciousness. He’d left the SIG in the cockpit, and he couldn’t reach the knife on his ankle.

From nowhere, Noah Walker appeared in the cockpit just behind Clark, his eyes wide with terror when he saw the woman who had kidnapped him days earlier.

Martina Jaeger saw the kid and rolled her eyes. She took a step to the side and raised Clark’s Glock pistol toward the boy; she didn’t give a shit if the Russians wanted him alive anymore, because clearly the Russians couldn’t manage one fucking aspect of this operation.

Her gun arm reached by Clark, a foot from his left shoulder, and when he saw this he kicked with both feet, swinging as hard to his left as he could. He dropped both hands from the noose strangling him to death, and these hands fired out toward the Glock, surprising the woman aiming at the boy.

Clark grabbed the woman’s wrists, yanked back and torqued them around, and shoved the hands and the pistol they held under the lip of the flying bridge above him, slamming the barrel into the ceiling of the cockpit directly under the big man lying there above him holding the line around his neck.

The force of the impact between the pistol barrel and the cockpit ceiling caused the woman’s finger on the trigger to jerk, and the weapon fired, point-blank, into the ceiling. The bullet went through the wood, into the flying bridge, and directly into the chest of the man lying there holding the sail line around Clark’s neck.

The big man released his hold and Clark dropped to the ground, still holding the woman’s wrists, controlling the gun only enough to keep it away from him and the boy.

Noah disappeared down the companionway.

Clark and Martina wrestled on the aft deck, but only until the big man above them called out in a hoarse shout, “Ik ben neergeschoten!” I’ve been shot!

Martina Jaeger let go of the gun and stood, raced up the ladder to the flying bridge, and knelt over her brother.

It took Clark nearly half a minute to stand back up, since he could still barely breathe. When he stood he raised the Glock and saw the blood dripping into the cockpit through the bullet hole in the ceiling.

Above, the woman knelt over the wounded man, sobbing hysterically and then screaming in rage.

What the hell? Are these two assassins a couple?

Clark couldn’t see her, he could only hear her. He had no idea if there was a gun up there, so he retreated into the cockpit, directly below her.

Kate appeared in the companionway now, and tried to come up on deck, but Clark sent her back down, told her to take Noah back into the stateroom and lock the door.

This wasn’t over.

Clark knew he could fire through the ceiling again, and perhaps hit the woman, but if he missed he would go a long way toward revealing his exact location. Instead he moved out of the port side of the cockpit and tried to sneak a look above. Just as he did so, he saw the woman standing with a silver automatic pistol in her hands. Clark ducked back into the cockpit as a shot rang out. He had his Glock in his hand and pointed up at the ceiling, but he still didn’t dare fire up into the flying bridge above him, because she could easily return fire and kill him. He was a sitting duck below her.

As he considered retreating down to the saloon, the woman fired down, sending bullets into the sofa of the cockpit.

Clark aimed at the origin of the shots and opened fire now, dumping round after round straight up through the lacquered wood.

After nine shots he heard the woman’s pistol fall and bounce on the flying bridge above him. He ceased fire, listened as carefully as his assaulted eardrums would let him. Seconds later the woman fell off the bridge and onto the foredeck, slamming hard on her side. Clark kept his pistol on her as he approached, but soon he lowered it. She was unarmed, lying on her back with a gunshot to her stomach, and two more in her legs. Tears ran freely from her eyes, and blood filled her mouth.

Clark knelt down, laid the Glock on the deck behind him, well out of her reach, and lifted her by the head.

She looked up at Clark, blinked away tears. “Help me, sir. Please. I beg you.”

Clark didn’t know if there was much he could do, but he lowered her head back down and pulled out his emergency medical kit. There would be more first-aid supplies somewhere on the boat, but he didn’t want to take a chance looking for them. He opened a thick wad of bandages to put pressure on her stomach, then looked to the woman, saw her looking back at him through the tears. Clearly she realized she was being helped by the man she had just tried to kill, and she seemed surprised by this, but happy.

“Thank you, kind sir. Thank you so—”

Her eyes flitted away from Clark, focused to a point over his shoulder.

The eyes widened now. “No!”

Clark spun around on his knees. Above and behind him he saw Kate Walker, standing with the Glock pistol in her hand, leveled coolly at the wounded woman on the deck of the Spinnaker II.

“No one threatens my child and lives. No one.”

She fired once; the gun jerked and sprayed smoke and fire. Clark ducked down low, falling away from the wounded woman onto the deck. When he looked back, he saw that Kate had shot the woman high in the chest. Her eyes remained open, locked on the Australian mother standing above her, while a low, guttural gurgle came from deep in her throat.

Her eyes rolled back in her head and her breathing stilled.

“Give me the gun, Kate,” Clark said, holding his hand out for the pistol.

She did as he asked, then turned away, went back to the cockpit, and sat down on the sofa.