CHAPTER 53

REECE SLEPT WELL; THE ship’s gentle roll a muted reminder of his time at sea aboard the Beneteau. That voyage seemed like years ago now. He dreamt of the ocean, how it offered him refuge, tested him, and delivered him, to what, he wasn’t yet sure.

Voices passing outside the hatch of the small stateroom rousted him from a deep slumber. Reece stared silently into the pitch-black darkness and tried to remember where he was. After realizing that he hadn’t failed BUD/S and been assigned to the fleet, he swung his feet onto the deck and felt for his Navy-supplied “shower shoes” with his toes.

The ship’s company had left a package of new white T-shirts and a blue coverall jumpsuit for him on the bunk. He couldn’t bring himself to put on the coveralls but he put on one of the fresh T-shirts and pulled on the Crye MultiCam pants that he’d worn on the Albania op. He brushed his hair back with his hands as best he could and put on a sweat-stained Padres cap he’d found under the bed. Heading out into the passageway and into the bustling heart of the ship during the morning watch, Reece asked directions to the wardroom and wandered in that direction. Navigating the internal passageways of a ship had never come easily to him.

Reece eventually found it with the help of a seaman apprentice who looked about twelve, and he wasn’t surprised to see Ox already there when he arrived. He caught some strange looks from the khaki-uniform-wearing officers seated at one of the tables and begrudgingly took off his hat. He wasn’t sure why he worried about it, the normal decorum of the officers’ mess having already been shattered by the pasty-white former Army NCO clad in a tight T-shirt and a pair of black “Ranger panty” PT shorts, far too much of his anatomy on full display. The ship’s officers apparently knew better than to say anything to the barrel-chested operator sitting by himself.

“Ox, you still wearing those Speedos in public? I think there’s a regulation of some sort against that in the twenty-first-century military. You realize there are women on Navy ships now, right? You remind me of the old chiefs at Coronado who were still rockin’ UDT shorts when I showed up as a new guy. ”

“Nothing more comfortable, brother. I’m not giving these things up. Get some coffee and come join me. ” Ox motioned to an urn full of the Navy’s best jet fuel on a table nearby.

Reece filled his cup and doctored it carefully with sweetener and milk, a bit disappointed at the lack of honey.

“Good thing they do have women on ships now, Reece; otherwise you’d have to drink it black, like a man. ”

Reece gave his friend the one-finger salute over his shoulder, then took a seat at the round table, where his friend read a computer printout of a news story through a pair of half-glasses.

“What’s happening in the world today, Ox? ”

“Well, it says here that some Albanian commandos killed the most wanted terrorist in the world in a firefight last night. ”

“No kidding? Good for them. ”

“Yeah, pretty crazy. Says here in all that chaos somebody put a single round through his lungs. ”

“Wow! Kinda sounds like when Colombian forces killed Pablo Escobar, ” Reece said with a conspiratorial smile.

Ox looked at Reece over his glasses: “Very similar, my friend. Very similar. ”

“Are we the only ones up? What time is it? ”

“Ha! It’s 0930, Reece. Everyone has been up for hours. Freddy and Vic are off somewhere doing admin, and Django is in the gym, staying huge. He must have eaten a dozen eggs this morning. You need some chow? ”

“No, I’m good with coffee for now. ”

Reece drank his java in silence, still trying to clear his mind from the fog of sleep while Ox droned on about something. Twenty minutes later, Vic Rodriguez walked into the wardroom dressed in pressed casual clothes: showered, shaved, and looking sharp.

“Good morning, Mr. Reece. Ox, glad to see that you haven’t moved in two hours. ”

“Just catching up on the news, boss. ”

Rodriguez rolled his eyes.

“Reece, is this a good time for us to talk? ”

“Good a time as any, I guess. ”

“Let’s head topside. Top off your coffee if you’d like. ”

Reece nodded to Ox, who flashed him a grin as he refilled his coffee and followed the Agency man toward the upper deck. The irony was not lost on him that, as a career naval officer, he had to follow a former soldier to find his way through the ship. Vic led him through a hatch and onto the windswept flight deck. A crew member nodded to him and pointed toward the stern; this had obviously been arranged ahead of time. The two men stopped aft of the ship’s superstructure, a few feet from the deck’s edge, the chained railing the only thing between them and a long drop into the Adriatic Sea below. They were mostly out of the wind, but it was still present enough that no one standing more than ten feet away would be able to eavesdrop on their conversation, and no member of the ship’s crew was within anything close to that distance. They had complete privacy. Rodriguez got right to the point.

“Reece, I want to thank you for what you’ve done; because of your efforts, the most wanted terrorist in the world is a corpse. Global markets are reacting to the news as we speak. We had a deal; as far as the U. S. government is concerned, you’re a free man. ”

“I appreciate that, Vic. I get the feeling there’s a ‘but’ here, though. ”

“You’re right, Reece, there’s a ‘but. ’ You don’t owe us a thing, but we sure could use you. I am offering you a job, no strings attached. You’d be a green-badger, a contract guy. You know what that means. It’s not a bad deal. And you get to see this thing through. ”

Reece took a sip of coffee and stared out at the choppy green water on the horizon.

Rodriguez continued: “Okay, I guess you’re going to make me sell it. You know what kind of evil is out there; you’ve been in these countries. Amin Nawaz was a big get for us, but someone is going to take his place tomorrow, smarter and even more determined. We need people we can count on to hunt these assholes down to the ends of the earth. And here’s the other part: that plan that you came up with to flip Mo and use him as a ‘pseudoterrorist’? It’s brilliant, but I need you here to run it or else it’ll get fucked up; you know that. Major Farooq, Mo as you call him, is on his way into Iraq with Landry right now. This isn’t over by a long shot. ”

Reece nodded and took another sip of coffee, glad his friend was still alive and well.

“Listen, Reece, I don’t know you personally, but I know your reputation. I’ve read all your EVALS, FITREPs, and medal citations, but more importantly, Freddy and Ox think the world of you. Come work for me. You do what you’re good at, and I deal with the politics and the red tape. ”

Reece looked Rodriguez in the eye: “You really think they’re going to let me go? They’re just going to forget about all the people I killed? ”

“Reece, all I know is that I can’t protect you if you’re not under my wing. Give me a few months on the job, focus on the mission, and I’ll provide top cover. If you decide later that you want to walk, I won’t try to stop you. ”

Reece was silent for a full minute as he weighed the different scenarios. He started to say no but stopped himself, looking out to sea, remembering the voyage from Fishers to Mozambique, his family, the tumor, and Katie. In the end, he made the decision for Mohammed, his friend with whom he had shared the bond of combat. This wasn’t over. Mo had been played. He’d been played by a sociopath who had found his way into an intelligence agency that gave him the freedom to feed his sick fantasies. And somebody, possibly in the Agency itself, was running that sociopath. This wasn’t over, and Reece couldn’t walk until it was. He couldn’t leave Mo halfway through the operation. To Reece, that was the same thing as leaving him behind on the battlefield. Vic was right, Reece needed to see it through.

“You forgot to mention something, Vic. ”

“Oh, what’s that? ”

“That you read my psych eval; that you knew I’d say yes. ”

Vic smiled. “Well, true, there is that. ”

Reece paused. “I’m saying yes to finishing this operation and then I’m out. ”

Vic Rodriguez smiled again and extended his hand.

“Welcome to the team, Reece. Surgery is planned either at Bethesda or at your clinic in La Jolla as soon as this is over. And by the way, you’ve got some money coming your way. We made it a condition of you coming on board that you got to keep the reward money for Nawaz. It was coming from the British government, so we worked it in as a term of your employment. It’s a sizable chunk. Figured you could use it to get a fresh start. ”

“That might just about cover my old Land Cruiser, and I owe more than a few people beers. I do have one request to make, though. ”

“What’s that? ”

“I need you to track down a phone number for me. ”

• • •

After a pause and some clicks and beeps as the Iridium satellite phone connected, Reece heard it begin to ring. He was more nervous than he thought he would be. He hoped she’d answer the strange number.

C’mon, pick up.

He thought of all the times he’d called Lauren on the same type of phone, the same clicks and beeps followed by the strange satellite-transformed voice that made loved ones sound like aliens from another world. He’d always told her that everything was okay and not much was going on, even as he looked up at the night sky following a mission in which everything was not okay. No matter how tired he was, he always made time to call, feeling it was his responsibility to use the technical advantages afforded him that were not available to his late father in Vietnam or his grandfather in World War II.

“This is Katie. ”

Pause.

“Ah. . . Katie? ”

“Yes? ”

“Ah, it’s um. . . ”

“Hello, anyone there? ”

Even through the Iridium satellite link he could detect her slight hint of an accent that most people wouldn’t even notice.

“It’s um. . . ”

Shit! What am I, in junior high?

“Hello? ” she said again.

Paralyzed, Reece remembered her on her knees with det cord twisted around her neck, with the thumb of a SEAL turned CIA operative turned mercenary on the detonator.

Reece, how did you know Ben didn’t have that detonator connected? How did you know he wouldn’t blow my head off?

“Shit! ” Reece said out loud, hitting the END CALL button.

I didn’t.

⇐ Предыдущая 51 52 53 54 555657 58 59 60 Следующая ⇒