The Devil's Waters (35 page)

LB started to answer, but Wally held up a hand.

“This is Captain Bloom. Yusuf Raage?”

“I am waiting for you on the bow.”

Wally sped his gait, carbine up and ready. LB followed close behind. On the port rail, Doc and Quincy would be sprinting forward right now.

“Captain.”

“Yes?”

“I have Iris Cherlina.”

Off the radio, Wally cursed. LB passed him in the narrow corridor to break into a run. They flew past the bodies of pirates. Nearing the end of the passageway, LB leaped across the corpse of the thin Somali he’d shot ten minutes ago up on the cargo deck. How did he get here?

Reaching the end of the companionway, LB and Wally pulled up. From behind cover, LB scanned the bow through the NVGs. Yusuf Raage stood in the open between two hawsers, at the point of the hull. In the milky light of the moon and the tall beacon on its mast, the Somali could not see the pair of infrared beams pinning him from Doc and Quincy standing to port, weapons trained, one to his cheek, the other on his chest. Both dots glowed dangerously close to Iris Cherlina’s head, framed inside Raage’s elbow, a knife at her throat.

LB raised his goggles and lowered his weapon. Wally did the same. Both walked into the open, closer. Doc and Quincy stayed back to keep the pirate covered.

LB spoke first. “Iris, this is Captain Bloom.”

Wally dipped his brow. “Ma’am.”

Yusuf Raage answered by tossing the walkie-talkie overboard. He yanked the back of Iris’s hair, stretching her white neck. He shaved the blade up her flesh. She breathed hard through her nose, blinking wildly.

LB held up a hand. “You don’t want to do that.”

Yusuf eased his head beside hers, as if to whisper in her ear. “Ah, Sergeant. You have no idea how badly I do.”

Wally asked, “What do you want?”

Off to starboard, the warship
Nicholas
approached with the great mumble of her engines. Yusuf tucked the knife tighter under Iris’s chin. She stood stiffly, quiet.

“Have your men lower their rifles. If they raise them again, I will kill her. You may do as you like after that.”

With a wave of Wally’s hand, Quincy and Doc lowered their M4s.

Yusuf shifted his dark eyes to LB. “Did you kill my cousin?” Wally gestured for LB to give no answer. LB ignored him.

“Yeah.”

The Somali nodded before returning his attention to Wally. “I will make a trade.”

“No.”

Yusuf Raage slid the blade sideways under Iris’s chin. She jerked at the sting. A dribble of her blood soaked into his sleeve.

“You will throw your weapons overboard. Then you and your men will get off this ship. He will stay behind. When I am satisfied, I will release the woman.”

Wally said again, flatly, “No.”

The Somali wagged his great head. “Captain. This woman has offended me in enough ways. I will slit her throat and take a bullet for it. So be it. She will die at my hand. Or he will. Either way, I am a dead man, I know that. The question is, who joins me?”

Wally did not hesitate. He raised his M4, looking keen to put a round between Yusuf’s eyes.

“Quincy, Doc. Dismissed.”

On the port side of the bow, both PJs held their ground.

The pirate did not duck Wally’s raised muzzle. He dug the edge of his blade deeper into Iris’s flesh. He showed his teeth when he said, “Captain, I’ve warned you.”

Wally yelled at Doc and Quincy. “Dismissed!”

The two PJs wavered, unsure. Wally did not shout when he said to LB, “You, too.”

The Somali waited. Another red drip pulsed down Iris Cherlina’s throat.

LB lifted the Zastava’s strap off his shoulder. With a spinning heave, he tossed it over the gunnel into the night.

Wally did not shift his stance.

“Doc, Quincy. Escort LB off the bow. Now.” Wally lowered his voice. “I’ll put you in the brig later.”

LB called across the bow to the two PJs. “Hold.”

Doc and Quincy steadied, both fixed on Yusuf Raage.

“Wally, he’ll kill her.”

“And I’ll kill him. Now leave the bow.”

“You got to be kidding.”

Swiftly, Wally lowered his M4 from Yusuf Raage. In the same motion, he drew his Beretta sidearm to point it at LB’s chest.

“Back off. That’s an order.”

“Or you’ll shoot me?”

“Yes. Then I’ll shoot him.”

LB drew himself to his full height, still a head shorter than Wally.

Wally spoke down the short barrel of the pistol. “I’m going to count…”

“What are you, my fucking mom?”

LB stepped closer to Wally. The pistol’s muzzle lifted to his eyes.

“That others may live, Wally. Others. Any order you get or give that contravenes that is not worth following. So go ahead and count. I’ll get you started. One.”

The Somali’s gravelly voice interrupted. “Captain.”

Wally did not turn to the pirate; the Beretta stayed on LB.

“What?”

“This sergeant you point your gun at. You wear the same uniform. You are clan.”

“I suppose.”

“The men you killed on this ship, they were my clan. Two were my family. Aim your gun only at me.”

Wally glanced for a moment at the pirate. When he returned his focus to his pistol hand, LB had sidestepped away from the barrel.

Wally holstered the pistol.

He said to Yusuf, “Let her go. We’ll all walk out of here alive, all right? You’ve got my guarantee.”

Yusuf did not release his headlock on Iris. “Thank you for that gesture, Captain.”

“Then let’s go.”

“But you know it’s a lie. I will die here or in some African jail. My life is worth nothing in your hands, just as yours would be worthless in mine. At this moment, I prefer vengeance to keeping my life. I’m sure you think that barbaric. It may be. Now throw your weapons overboard. Leave the bow, then leave the ship. The sergeant stays behind.”

Wally lowered his head and sucked his teeth. He hardened his stance, spreading his boots on the deck. Before he could bring the M4 up again, LB stepped close to stop him.

“Listen, listen to me.” LB pushed the carbine down. He urged, just above a whisper. “You lift that rifle again, he’s gonna kill her. You know he is, right in front of us. Let me stay.”

“No.”

Before LB could say more, Wally grabbed his tunic to drag him strides away. He dropped his voice to a hiss.

“It’s your turn to listen. I have orders, direct orders, to eliminate this pirate.
This
specific pirate.”

“Give me that order. I can do it.”

Wally loosed a long sigh. “I can’t say yes.”

“You can. Just send me in. You’ve done it a hundred times before. It’s a rescue. I’ll do what I have to do, then I’ll come back. I always do.”

The pirate spoke. “Captain. Your answer?”

LB leaned his face beneath Wally’s, looking up. “You know that little talk you wanted to have? About what I did in those jungles while you were pissing your pants waiting for me to come back? Let’s have it now.”

“Now’s not the time.”

“I think it is. They weren’t just recon missions. They were black ops. There were targets. I killed people in those jungles. Drug lords, commies, revolutionaries, kidnappers, all on orders. All to prop up some local tyrant, or some political bullshit like this ship. After a while I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t blink without seeing a face. So I stopped, Wally. I put it down and I became a PJ. I saved myself. The only way I can sleep at night is knowing I save people.”

LB spun to Yusuf Raage. “You’ll let her go, right?”

“My word.”

“Wally, she doesn’t deserve to die like this. She didn’t sign up for it. We did.”

Wally pursed his lips. “Shit.”

LB said again, “I can do this.”

Wally turned away, to the forward rail. He lifted his M4 off his shoulders to drop it into the black gulf. He gestured for Doc and Quincy to toss theirs. Both PJs looked to LB before following the order. He nodded, and they splashed their rifles.

Wally had not yet tossed away the Beretta. “It’ll take us a while to get off the ship.”

Yusuf Raage laughed. This struck LB as a deranged thing to do.

“I think not.”

“Why?”

As if in answer to Wally’s question, an explosion rumbled out of the freighter’s stern, the detonation felt in the deck as much as heard. Doc and Quincy swung around, empty-handed, trying to find the source of the blast, looking to the sky. The freighter rolled to port.

What had just happened—had the Predator struck anyway? They’d called the drone off; they’d beat the deadline! LB shouted at Yusuf Raage, “What the hell was that?”

The pirate kept his grip on Iris but eased the knife from her throat.

“This ship is going to sink.”

The blast rocked the ship so hard the Americans adjusted their stances. Three of them searched the night sky while the captain leveled his pistol at Yusuf.

“How’d you know that was going to happen? Did you do this?”

Only for a moment Yusuf considered telling the Americans what he knew, what he’d drawn from Iris Cherlina on the tip of his knife. She set the explosives. She would sink the ship.

He could ruin the woman, cut her throat, and die after her. Pressed against her from behind, he felt her lungs working, her heart race.

“I want to know right now. Did you blow this ship?”

He could tell the truth. But that tale would mark Yusuf Raage as a fool. A woman’s puppet, if he named Iris Cherlina.

He chose instead his own name.

“Yes.” He spoke left and right at all four soldiers. “I have sunk your ship. I put all the machines you send to Iran on the bottom of the gulf. I send the bodies of my clansmen there too. Stay on this ship with me, Americans. Come to the bottom with us. Or go.”

He pressed the blade again under Iris Cherlina’s neck. She lifted to her toes.

“Throw away the pistol, Captain. And Sergeant, you remove your radio and headset.”

As they were told, the American officer flung his gun overboard, the sergeant stripped himself of his communications gear.

“Take your men, the crew, your dead, and leave. When I’m convinced you are gone, I will release the woman. Then the sergeant and I can conclude our affairs.”

No one moved. Out of the breezeless half-lit dark, a great groaning creak from the stern made the Americans shuffle their feet. Inside his arm, Iris Cherlina shivered. The deck rose under Yusuf’s sandals. Even the
Valnea
was going to die.

“Go, Captain. The faster you get off this ship, the better this woman’s chances are to survive.”

The three Americans backpedaled. The sergeant gave them encouraging nods as they abandoned him. Departing, the captain issued orders into his radio to begin evacuating the freighter, for the warship to come closer.

The sergeant, a short and burly man, squatted onto his haunches like a toad. He spoke to the woman.

“It’s gonna be okay.”

Yusuf lowered the knife a bit from her throat. Iris Cherlina came down off her toes. Inside Yusuf’s arm, her head leveled.

“It will not be okay,” Yusuf said to the sergeant, “for you.” The soldier knit thick fingers between his spread knees. “Don’t talk shit. I have to be nice to you right now. Soon as you let her go, that stops.”

“Do you have a knife?”

The man hiked up his pants leg to slide a blade from a hidden sheath. He twisted the knife in the little light, in the fashion of a man who knew how to use one.

“Excellent,” said Yusuf.

At the foot of the stairwell, Wally ordered Doc and Quincy to stay on deck.

“
Nicholas
is going to send lifeboats. Find life jackets and put ’em on. We’ll send the crew down to you. Get them into the rafts. Watch your asses till we’re off this ship.”

Wally turned for the staircase. He couldn’t trust the elevator, not with the ship going under. No telling when the power was going to cut out.

Doc stopped him. “Wally.”

“Make it quick.”

“Let me grab a rifle. I can head back to the bow, stay out of sight until Raage lets her go. I can put a bullet into that fucker and get LB out of there.”

Wally came down the few stairs he’d climbed to rest a hand on Doc’s shoulder. He spoke mildly.

“I already thought of that. Raage kept my NVGs; he’ll be watching. You and I both know he’ll cut her throat if he sees anything he doesn’t like.”

Doc opened his mouth to argue. Wally cut him off.

“This ship is going down. I want my men off it. LB made the right call. He can do this. I know he can. So do you.”

Wally turned for the staircase. With the slow tilting of the ship, the steps grew steeper as he labored up the six flights. The wounds in his back and legs almost tripped him several times. Out on the water, an acre of froth bubbled around the settling hull from a breach somewhere below the waterline.

Wally radioed Jamie on the port wing that he was coming up.

Reaching the bridge, Wally caught his breath. The lights had been turned on inside the pilothouse. The carnage and destruction made for a grim scene. The crew had dragged the two murdered hostages away from the windshield to lay beside Drozdov below the chart table. Four dead Somalis had been hauled out to the starboard wing. Trails of blood crisscrossed the floor, which sparkled with shattered glass. The crew had gotten on their feet now, still huddled, except for the fat Russian with the chest wound. While Wally watched from the doorway, Dow and a Filipino hoisted the Russian by the arms to skid him away to the chart table beside his crewmates. Another red track marred the floor.

The chief engineer, Razvan, stood at the dash, palms planted in front of a computer screen. He wheeled on Wally approaching.

“Captain. We are listing two percent by the stern. My engine room is flooding. Explain.”

“She’s sinking.”

The engineer stabbed a finger at his screens. “Yes! This I know!”

“Call the warship. Alert them we need assistance for evacuation.”

“This has been done. I must ask you.”

“What?”

“Who has done this?” The Romanian’s tone turned belligerent. “You? America? Did you decide to hide your secrets?”

“The pirates did it.”

“Pirates? I think America. Grisha with bullet in chest, he tells us before dying. Everything! The machines, Iran, the pirates, and Iris Cherlina.”

Wally grabbed the engineer by the lapel. “Come here.”

Razvan stumbled behind him. Wally dragged him through the shot-up door onto the port wing.

Wally jammed the engineer into a steel corner. He sent Jamie with his two bandaged thighs to find Sandoval and get him down the stairs.

Wally took his hand off the engineer. Razvan lost his bellicosity, cowed now by the bloodied soldier pressing him.

Wally drew his words out slowly. “What did he tell you?” He laid a finger into the engineer’s chest as if pushing Play.

Razvan sputtered a fast story about Iris Cherlina, the Chechen Mafia, Somali Sunnis, the accident on board the
Valnea
, and Yusuf Raage. Iran was to receive an illegal shipment of electronics from America, Israel, and Russia. Iris Cherlina had made up her mind to stop it. She’d sabotaged the ship and arranged to have it hijacked and exposed to the world.

When Razvan was done, Wally yanked again on the engineer’s shirt. “Listen to me good. You tell your crew that no one says a thing about any of that, to anyone. They stop talking about it right now, even to each other. You understand?”

“Understood.” Wally let him go. Razvan collected himself. “Captain.”

“What?”

“Is it true?”

“I don’t know. And trust me, you don’t want to know. Let it go.”

“Did you blow up my ship?”

“No. We didn’t. The pirates did.”

“This makes sense to you?”

“Shut up.”

Razvan recognized the end of this discussion. “I will arrange crew to evacuate.”

Wally asked, “How long until she sinks?”

“Hard to know. At rate of incline, I suppose thirty, forty minutes. The first half will take the most time. Once bow is in the air, the rest,
pff
, five minutes.”

“Then get moving. Can your men carry the bodies?”

“Yes. But Captain, not the Somalis.”

“Yes. The Somalis.”

Razvan turned to his duties with a mutter: “
Du-te dracului.
”

A hundred yards off the
Valnea
’s port side, the warship eased into place, sweeping her searchlight down the freighter’s hull. The first lifeboats arrived. Before going back into the bridge, Wally cast his eyes far forward to the bow. He could not make out LB and the pirate under the steaming light; the last cargo gates blocked his view. In his imagination, LB sat quiet, the way he always did before a mission.

The crew were strong, carting the nine corpses down the staircases. Drozdov and the pair of dead Filipinos were carried across the shoulders of unwounded sailors, then traded off as fatigue set in. The five dead Somalis were thin, bony men. Dow carried the machine-gunned boy. Grisha was the only burden too heavy to be taken away alone; three Filipinos hefted him. The crew said not a word leaving the ship, stalwart bearing their dead and their killers. Wally wanted to relieve the chief engineer carrying Drozdov, take the captain across his own shoulders. But his wounds vexed him, and his hands needed to be on a weapon until all were safely off the ship.

By the time they reached the main deck, the freighter’s pitch was clearly accelerating. The floor sloped badly toward the stern, and each moment brought the bubbling water closer to the super-structure. Quincy and Doc handed out life vests from a locker to every crewman and PJ. Vests were secured on each corpse. Two at a time, the crew leaped over the side, followed down by the spotlight from
Nicholas
. Three rescue craft from the frigate hauled the sailors aboard. The warship had divers in the water to assist. Dow and Mouse stepped up to help drop the corpses to them.

The PJs waited until one last crewman remained on the ship, the body of Drozdov. They gave the captain the honor of letting him stay to the end, then released him into the night air. His corpse did not bob up quickly but stayed underwater for long seconds, perhaps caught in the drag of the great hull slipping below the surface. The spotlight found him in the froth, face-down, as if watching his ship slide away.

Fitz eased the RAMZ into place below the PJs. Wally teamed the wounded with the unhurt. Sandoval jumped with Mouse, Jamie with Doc, Quincy with Dow. Below, Fitz helped each over the side. Robey’s body lay curled in the bow.

Wally was poised with the toes of his boots over the edge, the team waiting below.
Nicholas
’s spotlight hit him. He felt like he’d been through a grinder, his uniform full of holes. In the searchlight, his hands appeared washed out.

Deep inside the ship, a giant fist seemed to beat once against the hull, followed by a trailing groan. The next moment, the emergency lights around Wally extinguished. Far forward, the steaming light on its tower snuffed. All the power on
Valnea
was finished.

“Good luck,” Wally said to LB. He stepped into the air, to plunge in the spotlight away from the
Valnea
.

The salty gulf was an instant sting in his many wounds, then a soothing, cooling stroke. Fitz motored to him quickly, and Quincy hauled him in.

Wally arranged himself on the inflated edge. Robey had the bow to himself; the PJs kept toward the stern. Away from the freighter now, the big ship’s backward slide into the deep was even more dramatic. She retreated into an acre-wide skirt of bubbles and white roiled water.

Fitz pivoted the Zodiac in the spotlight cast down by the
Nicholas
, powering for the warship. Wally stood dripping as the inflatable swung alongside the lowered gangway platform. Before stepping out of the raft, he reached down for Jamie.

“Come on.”

The young PJ leaned away from Wally’s outstretched hand.

“Not till we find LB.”

Sandoval and Quincy, the other wounded PJs, nodded in agreement.

Wally stepped onto the platform by himself. “Okay. Stay on the water till you recover LB. And the woman, Iris Cherlina.”

Doc said, “Roger.” Fitz motored away, back into the spume rising from the sinking freighter.

A contingent of armed marines met Wally at the top of the gangway. A sergeant approached to salute.

“An honor, sir.”

“Sergeant.”

“Captain Goldberg would like to see you on the bridge.”

Wally motioned the guards onward.

The marines led him inside the superstructure. Wally climbed the stairs slowly. The guards were patient with him. Goldberg waited out on the port catwalk, watching the
Valnea
.

Goldberg offered a hand. “Captain.” He shot a glance over his shoulder at the dark freighter a hundred yards off. Her bow rose above the waterline, the bulb fully visible.

“Makes no sense,” Goldberg said, “sinking a ship like that. Pirates.”

“None.”

Goldberg surveyed Wally. “You okay, Captain?”

“I could use a day off, thanks.”

The warship’s spotlight swept the dark waters between the two hulls. The light found the PJs in their Zodiac, plying the foam around the disappearing freighter.

Goldberg turned on Wally. “Captain, why are your men still on the water? Is everyone off that boat?”

“Dismiss your guards, Captain.”

Goldberg sent the pair of marines off the catwalk.

“All right. What’s going on?”

Wally pointed midship at the big spotlight. “I need you to turn that off, sir. And I need you to back away one mile.”

“Do what?”

Wally asked, “Sir, what are your orders?”

“Once your men are on board, I’m to put a total blackout on you. You’ll have no contact with any of my crew. I’ll post guards outside your quarters. I apologize. I reckon it’s not the welcome you were looking for.”

“I understand. Start the blackout now. Cut off that light. Everything that happens on that ship is classified.”

As Wally finished speaking, the searchlight slid up the freighter’s exposed hull. The beam scanned the blank, falling face of the cargo deck. It snagged on a lone figure running downhill along the starboard corridor. The beam followed Iris Cherlina over the rail, her quick drop into the foam. Fitz wheeled the Zodiac around to fish her out of the water.

“Hold it,” Goldberg said. “Are there more survivors on board?”

“No, sir. There are not.”

Goldberg hesitated, going against his instincts.

“Sir, do it now.”

Goldberg snatched up an intercom phone. “Bridge, kill the spotlight.”

The beam shut down. In the returned darkness, the
Valnea
receded into a skirt of pale water, gasping as she sank. From this distance, her backward slide was plain. She reared her head as the stern disappeared, dragged down by propeller, engine, and the inrushing void. Water reached the base of the superstructure, flowed up the corridors. Two life rafts had already popped to the surface, inflating automatically. The
Valnea
screeched, echoing in her filling hold.

Goldberg spoke into the intercom. “Helm, hold distance of one mile from that ship.” He hung up. Wally thanked him. Goldberg raised a silencing hand.

“Don’t say any more to me, Captain. Stay here as long as you need. I’ll have your marine escort waiting inside.”

Goldberg entered the bridge. Wally set elbows on the rail, watching the
Valnea
rise and recede. He took off his helmet to let the breeze cool his wet hair.

Iris Cherlina was safe. On the lifting bow, the battle had begun.