a position where Carlos had been sitting.
“I’ve never been on a yacht before. A sub, Gemini, Zodiac, swimmer delivery vehicle, and even a personal flotation device, but no yacht,” Carlos said.
“Not much danger of collision out here, Carlos, other than that whale we heard.” Cameron laughed. “Have you worked with the general long?”
Again, Carlos was quiet for a few moments. “Not recently. It’s a new operation and I’ve only just retired. But we’ve worked together before, some years ago.”
“I was surprised to see a general officer on this type of mission,” Cameron said. “I don’t think any of our Australian generals would be out here.” The unspoken question seemed to be, ‘ is he capable of a special operations insertion mission?’
Carlos looked at the other man for several seconds, then nodded his head. “I understand what you mean, Captain. The first time I actually worked with General Connor was about fifteen years ago. We met early one morning when he came aboard the U.S.S. Tarawa. That’s a U.S. Navy amphibious vessel specifically designed for Marine Corps operations. The following evening we dropped in to Pakistan, low roping out of a helicopter, and commenced the mission. He was a newly promoted captain and I was a new buck sergeant.” Carlos paused, as if recalling the event. “I’ve not doubted him since. He’s an outstanding warrior and he’s earned that star on his collar. I could change places with him on this mission and have no doubt it would go off as planned. Don’t let his rank fool you, Captain. He’s a field operator and only age-or a terrorist bullet-will slow him down.”
“High praise,” Cameron said.
“Perhaps, but not undeserved.”
Chapter 10
Fifteen Hundred Meters to Seaward
Off the Northeast Tip of Timor-Leste
March
Sergeant Macintosh and Carlos Castro inflated the Zodiac and lowered it over the side. Macintosh held it tight against the yacht while Carlos and Corporal Jenkins climbed aboard, then attached a small outboard to the transom. Pug passed two M-4s over the side and Macintosh stored them beneath the seats. Carlos had a small backpack and had elected to carry his own HK pistol, with an attached silencer, in a side holster.
Captain Rossiter spoke down to the small group in the inflatable. “Right then, Sean, we’ll anchor nearby and wait for your signal, then we’ll relocate back to this GPS coordinate. If Gunner is correct about activity in the house, you should be back before dawn. You know the emergency signal. If something happens, we can motor closer and pick you up near the beach, but if the Zod is operable, you’ll get out much faster in that. Good luck.”
Once it was full dark, the three men began their run toward shore. Four minutes into the run, the intermittent flashing signal from landward confirmed their contact ashore and indicated that they were on target. Macintosh revved up the engine, and as the rubber inflatable approached the beach, the surf was running low on an outward tide. Ten yards out, Corporal Jenkins and Carlos jumped into the surf, grabbed the side of the raft, and began pulling toward shore.
“Need a hand with that tube, mate?”
The voice out of the darkness startled the three men, and instantly Sean Macintosh had his weapon at the ready until he recognized Gunner striding toward them out of the cover of the brush.
“What’s the word, Gunner?” Sean asked softly.
Gunner was wearing a covert communications device with a throat mike, the earpiece in place. “Hold one, I’ll check.” The stocky, hard-as-nails Aussie faced inland, jabbed the PTT, Push to Talk button, and quietly spoke a few words, waiting for a response. He then turned back to Sean.
“It’s ‘stand by’ at the moment, Sean. Wilson says the place is still dark and quiet.”
“Right, then, let’s get this raft into the bush and you can show Carlos the way. Gunner, this is Carlos Castro, U.S. Marines. He’ll go in alone. You and Wilson are backup, outside security.”
“Right, mate.”
They pulled the raft up on the sandy beach and dragged it into the cover of a small cluster of scrub brush. Gunner took a few steps back toward Sean and Carlos, who were huddled up near the raft, whispering in the dark.
“Ready to go, Carlos? The LUP is about ten minutes over that hill,” he said, nodding in a northwest direction, “and Wilson says ‘all clear,’” he added, tapping his earpiece.
“Let’s do it,” Carlos replied.
Two thousand yards off-shore, Rainbow Blue anchored in a calm, outgoing tide. Cameron Rossiter and Pug Connor settled in to wait for the return of the landing party. Cameron went below and retrieved a tin of crackers, diced up a wedge of cheese, and grabbed two plastic bottles of water from the small propane fridge. He returned on deck and handed a bottle of water and a paper napkin with cheese and crackers to Pug. Then he sat on the port railing, and both men began to eat quietly. Cameron spoke first.
“Have you ever wondered which is worse: waiting for the team to report in, or being part of the team about to go into action?”
Pug nodded his understanding. “You mean, ‘They also serve who sit and wait.’ ”
“Something like that,” Cameron laughed, then changed the subject. “Carlos said you and he had served together before, some years ago in Pakistan.”
“We did. He’s an outstanding Marine. I’ve had my life in his hands more than once.”
“Has he always been Muslim?” Cameron asked. “I noticed him in morning prayers earlier, up on deck.”
“No, he was raised Catholic. Embraced Islam about ten or twelve years ago.”
“Do you know what took him down that path?”
“A woman.”
Cameron laughed. “Of course, what else? I’ve got two Muslims in my outfit as well. I’ve wondered how they feel about this increasing religious war. It must be tough to fight your own brothers.”
“Man has been fighting his religious brothers for centuries, but not always under a religious banner. Carlos has a good understanding of the situation,” Pug said, pausing to take a long drink. “He believes the fanatics and their Mullahs have abandoned the faith, perverted their god.”
“Is he still with the woman who converted him?”
Pug ate another hunk of cheese, sandwiched between two crackers, looking out over the ocean before he replied. “She’s dead. He met her when he was on a black ops mission in the Philippines, acting as an adviser to local forces to identify and eliminate insurgent groups. He met a young Filipina doctor. She was working to vaccinate village children when Carlos’s small Philippine army squad took some casualties. They came into the village for medical treatment. Carlos got himself assigned permanently to the local Marine unit. He fell in love with her, they got married, and Carlos spent the next sixteen months in what he calls the best time of his life. Sometimes he’d be in the jungle hunting terrorists. Sometimes she’d be in the villages providing medical assistance. She was a devout Muslim. He came to believe in the faith, and the rest was history.”
“How did she die?” Cameron asked.
“The rebel group found out that she was married to Carlos. Seven of them caught her in one of the villages, then tortured, raped, and killed her. She was carrying their first child. Over the next several months, without assistance from his local unit, Carlos found every one of them, one by one. He’s been a different man ever since, but still someone I’d trust to have my back in a tough situation.”
“Different in what way?” Cameron asked.
Again, Pug was silent, looking out over the vast expanse of the ocean as the yacht gently rolled in the off- shore waves. “He’s a natural warrior, an instinctive killer, truth be known, but once this happened, he looks for opportunities to kill the bad guys. It’s not just another mission-it’s a quest, a vocation. I think he believes he can right the world’s ills, one terrorist at a time. In twenty years, I’ve not seen a man I thought could best him up close and personal.”
