The Devil's Waters - By David L. Robbins Page 0,96

bounded on the Valnea’s wake, attached to grappling hooks over the rail. Jamie trained his M4 on the starboard corner while Wally mopped up. LB pivoted away to do his part and guard the starboard passage.

Six pirates were dead so far. One Serb. More to come. No one and nothing could stop the tempest of this night. Jamie, the youngest of the PJs, was handling himself well in close combat. This underscored how foolish LB had been to separate from him. There was no such thing as a milk run.

Wally and Jamie moved beside LB. Wally checked his watch. Even in the poor light, blood dotted the rim of the suppression tube on his M4.

LB asked, “Something you said before. On the radio.”

“What?”

“You said Doc assaults the bridge if we run out of time. What’d you mean?”

“I should’ve told you earlier.”

“Told me what?”

“We got forty-four minutes. At oh-two-one-oh, a Reaper’s going to sink us if we haven’t secured the ship.”

“Us? You mean, like, us?”

“Hostages, pirates, us. Presidential order. It’s got to be done in deep water and before we get in range of the coast. They’ll blame the pirates for blowing up the ship. All very neat.”

That it was. With a drone locked and loaded, invisibly high, the PJs had no choice down here on the ship. They were locked in, too, along with the Somalis. Neither side had any way out but to kill the other. This was worse than combat. It was gladiatorial.

Jamie asked LB, “You know what’s on this ship?”

“Yeah. I do.”

“Don’t tell me. But does this make sense to you? To blow it up rather than let the Somalis keep it?”

“Yeah.”

“Well,” the young PJ said, “at least that’s something.”

Jamie flipped the NVGs over his eyes. He crouched, facing the bow, instantly ready. “Where’s the next one?”

Chapter 34

Wally kept his mouth shut about it, but LB was useless.

He couldn’t fire the Serb weapon; one burst from the loud Zastava, and their position would be compromised. He wore no body armor. Creeping along the corridor, Wally had to keep him in the middle, protected between himself and Jamie. LB knew where the Somalis were, but Jamie’s NVGs showed him better than LB’s whispers what lay ahead.

LB had little stomach for the killing. He had bloodstains on his pants and shoulders, and maybe that was enough for him. LB winced at the blood Wally was taking on, splashed on the muzzle of his suppressor, sprayed over his boots. Wally couldn’t be sure all the distance shots he and Jamie took were lethal. He had to put the Somalis down to stay, couldn’t risk a wounded pirate sounding the alarm or sneaking up on them from behind. Killing was terrible work, but it was the mission.

They crept past the starboard stairwell where Jamie had made his first shot, a clean takedown. Since then, Jamie, younger than LB and Wally by more than a decade, had held himself in check. He could’ve moved faster without the two of them in tow, but PJs didn’t operate alone. LB had known this when he sent Jamie back on the chopper.

Thirty yards along the narrow passageway, passing the crane towering over the ship’s midsection, Jamie flattened to the deck.

“Down.”

LB and Wally dove for the steel floor.

The next pirate to die trod their way, lit well in the goggles.

Jamie set up the shot, propped on his elbows, eye pressed to the infrared sight. The thin emerald rail that only Jamie and Wally could see reached out to the pirate’s heart. Wally couldn’t bring his own weapon into play without sitting up straight, couldn’t back up Jamie’s shot because of LB lying in front of him.

“Let him come,” Wally whispered into the radio. “Wait till he reacts.”

The pirate closed to ten yards before his arms moved to bring up his Kalashnikov. His sandals skidded a backward step. Jamie’s single round continued the Somali’s reversal, lifting him off his feet and dropping him faceup.

Wally pushed off the deck, careful to stay below the rail. LB leaped to his feet and beat him to the pirate. Kneeling, LB pushed two fingers into the man’s carotid for a pulse. His hand was there when Wally drove the M4’s barrel into the Somali’s chest and pulled the trigger.

“Goddammit,” LB whispered from his knees. “He wasn’t dead.”

Wally threw the pirate’s AK over the rail. He answered LB with a fresh glance at his watch.

“Oh-one-twenty-nine. Let’s go.”

Jamie resumed inching along the starboard passageway, and LB turned to follow. Wally bit back the