The Gatekeeper

Seventeen

Jake strapped on his vest, checking out the rest of the team under lowered eyelids. Four men who all had that Delta Force look, close-cropped hair and cold eyes. Probably former Special Ops soldiers who survived the fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq, finished their tours and decided they were done with the military. That’s what his brother tried to do, after more than twenty years of active service. What they didn’t realize was that life and the experiences that came with it weren’t things you could just walk away from. Most of them ended up returning less than a year later, either reenlisting or working for a private sector company like Blackwater that offered a real paycheck. Or, apparently, with The Longhorn Group.

“Any of you done hostage rescue before?”

They all raised their gaze in unison. He practically expected them to bark, “Sir, yes, sir!”

The one closest to Jake, a kid who couldn’t have been more than twenty-five but looked like he ate nails for breakfast, said, “My unit was in Afghanistan for two tours, sir. We did more than ten snatch and grabs.”

“Yeah? I thought only one hostage total had been rescued in Afghanistan.”

They exchanged glances. “One that you heard of,” someone muttered.

Jake ignored the jab. “So how many of those were considered successful missions?”

“They were all successful, sir. That doesn’t mean everyone survived.”

One of the other guys grunted a laugh. They went back to checking their gear.

Jake made sure his HK USP.45’s clip was full and that he had two backups. He wasn’t crazy about this plan. Without doing any recon they were going in blind. There could be two guys holding Madison, or twenty. They might be dealing with a couple of hack ex-cons or well-trained mercenaries. And they didn’t even have time to get the lay of the land.

Twenty minutes earlier Syd had left to requisition a boat. Jake heard a dull roar in the distance and saw her at the helm of a Zodiac, skirting the waves. She’d originally wanted to approach as a dive team to maintain silence and the element of surprise, but Jake wasn’t keen on the idea. It was going to be hard enough getting on the boats without having to deal with thirty pounds of dive equipment as well as the rest of the stuff they needed. When she announced the change of plans, he’d gotten a few glances from the Delta guys. He shrugged it off. Didn’t matter what they thought of him. The important thing now was to get Madison out alive. If they hadn’t killed her already.

They were on the outskirts of Benicia, about forty miles northeast of San Francisco. Jake gazed across the water. Suisun Bay was a ship graveyard, where decommissioned naval vessels were stored until someone decided what the hell to do with them. Dubbed “The Mothball Fleet,” everything from Liberty ships to destroyers were tied side by side in daisy chains. Proud warriors of decades’ worth of wars, they were now rusted and fading, all but forgotten. Apparently someone had remembered them. It was the perfect place to stash a hostage. Barely monitored and protected from prying eyes thanks to their distance from shore. And once aboard, you were in the ultimate defensible position. It wasn’t a location someone like Mack Krex would have come up with on his own, that was for sure. Jake wondered again who the hell they were dealing with.

Syd waved them over. One of the Delta guys grabbed the bowline, holding it while the rest of the team passed their gear into the boat. Syd kept the engine running. As they climbed in, the boat rocked and sank almost to the gunwales. Syd was dressed the same way they were: gray camo, armor, weapons at both hips and an ankle holster. Her blond hair was tied back, cheeks flushed with excitement. “Let’s go,” she said.

They were approaching from the far side of the bay, to lessen the chances of being spotted. They’d debated going in street clothes, hiding the weapons until they were on board, but decided against it. Not many people would believe this group was out for a pleasure cruise.

Jake clutched a rope strung along the port side and watched the ships grow larger. It was hard to ignore his growing apprehension. He chalked some of it up to the usual nerves before an operation, but partly it was also the sense that this had spun out of his control. Syd was clearly holding the reins now. Even though this had been her case to begin with, her personal connection, he wasn’t sure he liked that. She seemed to be enjoying herself a little too much, especially considering what was at stake.

There were eighty-four vessels total, strung together in clusters ranging from nine to eighteen. And Madison could be on any of them. If the GPS signal was still active they could have pinpointed her location, but even from this proximity Syd wasn’t getting a read. It could take them all day to search, risking discovery by the Maritime Administration guards who periodically patrolled. All in all, Jake figured they had a hundred to one chance of everything turning out okay. Not the kind of odds he’d bet a life on.

They neared the first string of boats. Everyone stiffened, straightening slightly in their seats. They were about a nautical mile offshore. The water was flat and gray around them, matching the hulls. The sheer size of the boats was awesome. They rose out of the bay like giant monoliths, cold and impersonal.

“How the hell do we get on board?” Jake asked.

“I’m going to anchor at the far side, we’ll throw a line up and climb,” Syd responded. The rest of the team nodded as if this was something they did twice every day. Jake groaned internally and wished he’d spent more time in the gym. He wasn’t exactly in rope-scaling shape.

Syd eased the Zodiac around the port side of the last boat in the chain, the farthest point from shore. She was careful to stay in the shadows. Jake had to hand it to her, she was good. Impetuous but careful, an odd combination. As they rounded the stern, Jake caught a movement. He squinted against the reflection off the water, raising a hand to his eyes.

“Holy shit,” he said.

Syd followed his gaze. In the next line of boats a hundred yards away, they saw a small figure racing across the deck of a destroyer. A larger, lumbering man was in pursuit. Syd raised a set of binoculars to her eyes.

“That’s her!” she said, throttling the motor. “Looks like it’s game on, boys!”

Madison felt like her chest was about to explode. When she jumped off the ship, she hit the wooden block separating the boats hard, almost falling into the water below. She edged along it, then stood and gathered herself, vaulting a four-foot gap to reach the deck of the next boat. She landed funny, twisting her ankle. She rolled and clutched it, gasping in pain. Lurch’s head popped into view less than ten feet away. His initial expression of shock quickly transformed to rage, and he clambered over the railing, prepared to make the same jump. Madison scrambled to her feet and ran.

She’d had to repeat the maneuver twice already, bracing herself before jumping, praying she wouldn’t miss and drop into the chasm between the boats, hitting the icy water stories below. She didn’t look down, focusing instead on where she needed to land. Her ankle throbbed with each step but she ignored the pain. She didn’t let herself think about what she’d do when she reached the final boat. The shoreline still looked impossibly far away, and she’d never been a strong swimmer. But she wasn’t going to give up now.

Madison heard a loud thud and swiveled, hopping awkwardly on her good foot to take some of the weight. Lurch had nearly missed the last jump. He was hanging from the wooden block by both hands, fingers flexed as he struggled for a purchase. He looked at her, eyes wild. “ Madison! Help!”

She took a step toward him, then caught herself. What was she, insane? If she helped save him, he’d kill her. Already she could see him straining, trying to haul one leg up and over. She turned away. Another dozen feet to the next jump. She took a deep breath and started running again.

No one spoke. The roar of the engine would have drowned out their words anyway. Syd was alongside the ship where they’d seen Madison. Unfortunately the looming hull blocked their view of what was happening on deck.

Syd pointed two ships down. “We board there!” she yelled. “By that time she’ll have reached us.”

“Unless she falls first,” Jake said, eyeing the gap between the ships. Jesus, the kid had some nerve. He wondered how she’d gotten away. They’d only seen one guy chasing her, so maybe that was all they’d have to deal with. It was almost too much to hope for. Hard to believe someone who had organized the rest of this operation so well would only assign a single guard.

Less than a minute later, Syd had maneuvered the Zodiac alongside their target. The rest of the team was ready; one of them already held a grappling hook with a rope attached. He balanced carefully as Syd cut the engine and they drifted. Aiming, he spun it twice in a circle to build momentum before releasing it. The rope flew up, unraveling as it went. It cleared the gunwale and he tugged until there was no slack. After leaning back to test it with his body weight, he nodded to the others. It was a stirrup line, Jake noted with relief, a sort of rope ladder used for scaling buildings. A hell of a lot easier than trying to muscle his way up with jumars. One after another the team climbed.

Clearing the gap between the ships was becoming increasingly difficult. Madison was tired, and her ankle throbbed. Running, she kept most of the weight on her good foot, glancing off the toes of the other and ignoring the twinge. But to jump she had to use both, and it was hard to land without at least bumping her bad ankle.

She took a deep breath and focused on the opposite deck. Bent her knees and launched herself in the air. The same terror in her belly as the gap opened up beneath her, a hundred-foot drop to icy waters, seconds that felt like minutes as she waited to plummet downward, cartwheeling off the hull…then she was clear of the gunwale and hit the metal deck hard, trying to catch herself on one foot. But this time she tripped, and something snapped. Her left foot hung off to the side at a strange angle. Frustrated, Madison pounded the deck with her fists, willing herself not to black out.

Her head reeled when she tried to sit up, and she awkwardly shifted onto one hip. She eased to her knees and pressed back on the ball of her good foot. Madison straightened slowly, but in spite of her precautions the injured foot shifted and she gasped in pain. There was a roaring in her ears as she forced herself to stand, this time balanced entirely on her right foot. She hopped forward one step, then another. Tears streamed down her face but she kept going. Another hop. The approaching footsteps slowed. She made it three more feet before an arm wrapped around her from behind.

“Stupid bitch,” Lurch said in her ear.

“She didn’t make it this far,” Jake said, scanning the deck. He hadn’t heard a splash, but it was a big fall, he might not have. He peered across the decks of the other ships but couldn’t see anything.

“All right. I want to fan out, clear each deck before we go on to the next boat,” Syd said, keeping her voice low. “Remember, objective is to retrieve the girl alive.”

The men spread out. Jake crossed to the far side of the ship and climbed up on the cable rigging. He scanned the waters below. Aside from seagulls bobbing and the gentle slap of waves against the hull, there was nothing visible. He waved to Syd, indicating that he was going on to the next boat. She shook her head vigorously, but he ignored her.

“Jake, hold back,” Syd’s voice crackled from his waist. Damn, he’d nearly forgotten about their MBITRs. They each had a Multiband Inter Team Radio clipped to their vests. Syd had ordered them to maintain radio silence until they got a lock on Madison ’s position. Jake decided this was the perfect time to heed that request and turned his volume knob off.

He cleared the gap in a single leap, landing in a crouch on the three-foot wide wooden block separating the boats, then vaulted again to land on deck. He straightened slowly, gun ready, scanning from side to side. It was amazing how that training came back, years later he still moved instinctively when the situation called for it.

He moved forward as silently as possible, although he had to assume the kidnappers heard the Zodiac approach. He cleared the first turret, checking quickly to see if anyone was hiding behind it. The deck appeared empty. Jake heard a hard thud on the deck behind him, glanced back and saw two other members of the team. They fanned out around him, weapons drawn and held at chest level.

They were about to jump to the next ship when Jake heard a sound. It was dull and muffled, but definitely came from below. He caught Syd’s eye and motioned down. She followed his hand, nodded that she understood and exchanged a series of elaborate hand signals with the others.

They were on a Fulton class submarine tender. As a teenager Jake had gone through a brief obsession with naval warships, probably since living in central Texas made the ocean seem as remote as the moon. He’d flirted with the idea of entering the navy, maybe even becoming a SEAL like his older brother. When he discovered that diving made him claustrophobic, he turned to the FBI instead.

But he could still picture the layout of this ship. There would be twelve ways to go below deck. Syd and one member of the team headed for the far end of the ship, and two others tackled the middle of the boat. The last Delta guy appeared beside him. Jake thought his name was Maltz, but introductions had been quick.

“You want to go first?” Maltz murmured.

Jake really didn’t, but damned male pride made him nod. He yanked open the door. A blast of air from inside, cold and dank. The sweat under his vest immediately chilled and he repressed a shudder. It was pitch-black. He switched on his flashlight, held it next to his gun the way he’d been taught-training again, he thought. Sometimes being turned into a mindless robot was something to be grateful for. He tried not to think of a crypt but that’s what the must and cold reminded him of.

He descended the metal steps to the berth deck as silently as possible, Maltz at his heels. It had been a long time since he’d done anything like this, and sweat seeded his brow despite the cold.

Jake reached the bottom of the staircase and swept his light across the hallway. Shadows leaped away from him. Maltz’s light crossed his, illuminating the far wall. They were in a long, narrow corridor. Another hallway branched off to the left. Their flashlights only penetrated a few feet into the gloom.

He felt a tap on his shoulder. Maltz was gesturing down the hall. Jake was a little unclear on the hand signals but it looked like he wanted to split up. Not Jake’s favorite course of action, if ever there was a perfect set for a horror movie, this was it. But the ship was enormous, it could take hours to search it. He nodded acquiescence and Maltz slipped toward the stern. Jake steeled himself and walked forward.

Another hallway branched off to his left, the middle corridor bisecting the ship. He debated for a minute. The hallway he’d been following was empty, no places to hide. It was mainly used to get quickly from the bow of the ship to the stern. Here, on the other hand, every few feet a door was set in the wall. Heavy steel, rust chewing through the gray paint. Crew quarters, thought Jake. He cocked his head to the side, listening. If someone had grabbed Madison, they’d probably holed up somewhere below deck. And the only way to find them was to check each room.

Jake faced the first door on the left. Three deep breaths before he decided he wasn’t getting any more ready, might as well get it over with. He threw the door open and braced his shoulder against it. Quick sweep of the room, left to right, then behind the door. Nothing but a broken chair and metal bunk bed frames welded to the wall.

“One down,” he said quietly, closing the door behind him. He followed the same drill with the door opposite: quick sweep, all clear, nothing but junk the navy hadn’t bothered selling for scrap.

Jake was halfway down the hall when he heard a shout. The ship’s acoustics distorted it, he couldn’t tell if it was male or female. He darted back to the main corridor and strained his ears…another yell, garbled, and he suddenly remembered the radio. He spun the volume dial and heard Syd barking out instructions.

“Syd? Where are you?”

She was speaking rapid-fire, other team members chiming in. Jake was about to throw the radio against the wall in frustration when footsteps pounded toward him. He spun. Maltz was running, talking into his radio. As he passed Jake heard him say, “Op tango objective princess located? Say again.”

“What’s going on?” Jake asked, falling in step beside him.

Maltz shook his head and quickened the pace, their flashlights shining frenetic beams of light down the dark corridor. Jake hustled to keep up.

They were almost at the bow when shots rang out.

Madison huddled in the dark, tears streaming down her face. The despair was crushing. She’d come so close to escaping, only to fail. Plus her left leg was in agony, it was hard not to scream from the pain.

After grabbing her, Lurch slung her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing. Madison battered at him with her fists, but he laid one hand on her broken foot and she almost passed out.

“Be good,” he snarled, “or I’ll make it worse.”

At that moment they both saw people on the next ship. Her heart leaped, thinking she might be rescued after all. Lurch swore and dragged her downstairs. They were crouched in a tiny room, smaller and darker than the one she’d been held in before.

She tried to choke back her sobs, but the weight of her failure combined with the pain from her ankle made it nearly impossible.

“Shh!” Lurch said, breathing heavily in her ear. His hand gripped her arm tightly.

Dust disturbed by their entry still whirled in the air, tickling Madison ’s throat. She coughed.

“Jesus,” he hissed. “What, you want to die?”

“You’re going to kill me anyway,” she choked. “Don’t pretend you won’t.”

“If I was going to kill you you’d already be dead,” Lurch said. “I could have tossed you overboard, shot you in the head.” She caught a glint of light off something, realized he was showing her a gun. “I’m trying to save you, dipshit.”

“The other guy…”

“Ralph was always an asshole,” he muttered. “Hated that guy.”

“Where is he now?” Madison asked after a minute.

“Dead.” The word was hard, flat. Lurch seemed a little surprised by it himself.

“How?”

“Doesn’t matter. But the rest of them are coming. You want to live, you’ll stay quiet.”

Madison tried to sort out what was happening. “So you’re trying to save me?” she asked, puzzled. “Why?”

“I didn’t sign up to kill no kids,” Lurch said. “Now shut the fuck up, or you might change my mind.”

She hunkered down, nearly overwhelmed by this new knowledge. Signed up for what? she wanted to ask.

A sound in the corridor outside. Madison pressed herself farther back into the shadows. She heard Lurch suck in a gulp of air, then his gun clicked. This was insane, she thought. After everything that had happened, she was going to die in a shoot-out.

The door slid open an inch. A slice of light penetrated the shadows. Madison ’s heart still pounded so hard people onshore could probably hear it. A second passed, then the door eased shut again. She released her breath, relaxing, and felt Lurch do the same. He leaned in to say something.

The door was suddenly flung wide. Madison flinched as light blinded her. Lurch dragged her to her feet. Something pressed against her temple and her heart sank. He’d been lying about saving her, she should have known better.

The light lowered an inch, enough for her to make out two figures.

A female voice ordered, “Drop it!”

Lurch’s voice was full of surprise when he asked, “Who the fuck are you?”

Jake tore down the hall after Maltz, who quickly outpaced him. He seemed to have an exact read on where the shot originated. They passed another corridor, then Maltz darted down the next one on the left. Jake followed, adrenaline providing a burst of speed. Suddenly Maltz stopped dead. Figures blocked the entrance to a room. Jake’s flashlight caught on blond hair, then a camouflaged back. Inside, someone was crying. He took another step forward, arching his head to see inside…

“We’re here for Madison,” the woman said. Madison stiffened at the sound of her name and felt Lurch shift behind her, the cold press of the muzzle easing up.

“Who sent you?”

“Her father. Just let her go.” The woman sounded sure of herself. Commanding. Madison blinked at the mention of her father. She tried to place the voice, but it was completely unfamiliar.

“You the Feds?”

“No. Friends of the family.”

The term was so incongruous, Madison laughed. It was the wrong reaction. Lurch moved suddenly, dragging her with him. Then an explosion, impossibly loud in the confined space. She swiveled in time to see Lurch cave backward as if punched. His arms swung out in front of him, as if grasping for the second shot. He hit the wall before slumping to the floor. Madison touched her hand to her face and it came away sticky.

Blood, she thought, fainting.

“Is it her?” Jake asked, realizing immediately how inane the question was. Of course it was Madison, who else could it be? “Is she okay?”

“She’s fine,” Syd said. She crouched beside the girl, using her sleeve to wipe off her face.

Jake peered past them toward the crumpled form in the corner. One of the commandos was checking for a pulse. “Dead,” he said with finality.

Madison was crying, probably from the shock. Jake shoved past the two men blocking the door and knelt beside her. “ Madison. It’s going to be okay now,” he said, trying to sound soothing. The words bounced off the metal walls, echoing back at him. “You’ll be okay.”

Madison collapsed against Syd, shoulders heaving. Her ankle was at a strange angle, probably broken; other than that, she appeared dirty and shaken but otherwise unscathed. Jake released a breath and slumped down, head in his hands. They’d found her, and she was alive. Chalk one up in the win column for The Longhorn Group. He reached for his cell phone to call Randall with the good news.

There was a commotion at the door. Jake glanced up to find that the other team members had vanished. Voices down the hall, the sound of arguing. Quickly regaining his feet Jake stepped back into the corridor.

“Who are you people?”

It was a middle-aged man dressed in a uniform that sagged around his knees. He held an enormous SureFire tac light in one hand, the other was raised as if warding them off.

“Stand down!” Jake ordered, noting the commandos’ raised guns. “For Christ’s sake, stand down. It’s just the MARAD guard.”

It took ten minutes to sort out the situation, and another twenty for the medevac chopper to arrive. The MARAD guard had muttered about jurisdiction and losing his job. Syd took him aside, and whatever she offered calmed him down. Probably money, Jake thought.

Syd climbed in the chopper with Madison, headed to the nearest E.R. for her ankle to be examined. The paramedics administered a sedative. Tears still streamed down her face but she had finally stopped wailing. Her expression was unnerving, though. Jake wondered if she’d really be okay, there was no telling what those guys had done to her over the past week.

Audrey wept when he called, tears that sounded oddly bereft despite the good news. He couldn’t reach Randall, left three messages on his cell and at work before giving up. The rest of the Delta team slipped away in the initial confusion, per Syd’s orders. She didn’t want them involved. Jake protested that they were going to have a hell of a time explaining the situation as it was, allowing their employees to leave the scene would only make matters worse.

“I got it covered,” she’d said, nodding toward the MARAD guard.

More police boats were arriving. Jake slumped against the rail, watching as a swarm of uniforms slowly climbed the rope ladder. A dead body below deck, and here he was carrying three weapons of questionable legality. Jesus, he thought, shaking his head. He’d assumed that most of their cases would occur on foreign soil. Abroad, a few well-placed bribes let you avoid this sort of situation. He’d used that to his advantage while working for Christou.

But here he was left holding the bag, forced to explain to Benicia P.D. what the hell had happened. He’d be lucky not to get thrown in jail. Syd had left him with the number of a local defense attorney just in case. At the moment, that was small comfort. At least they’d gotten Madison back alive.

Jake’s cell rang and he checked the number, smiling before clicking it open. “Hi, honey,” he said. “How was your day?”