Truthfully, his messed-up knee was the reason there were five SEALs on this mission instead of the four they would have normally sent. Headquarters wanted another person on the mission in case things didn’t go as planned. It wasn’t merely concern that his knee would give out at the wrong moment. Noah was smart enough to know HQ was nervous about how he’d respond under fire after almost getting killed. He couldn’t blame them. Hell, he hadn’t done anything more than low intensity training in two months. They needed a back-up plan if he mentally checked out.
Noah was over the wall and pulling the silenced M4 off his back in one smooth motion. Dropping to a knee, he locked and loaded a round in the chamber, then clicked his mic one time. When four other clicks followed, he was up and moving for his designated entry point—a window on the southeast corner of the building.
There were more guards patrolling the compound than he’d seen from the rooftop across the street a few minutes ago, but he only had to engage with one of them as he transversed the shadowy space between the wall and the building. He and the bad guy spotted each other at exactly the same time, but Noah was faster getting his weapon up and the guard hit the ground with little more than a grunt and a thud.
M4 in hand, Noah ran the rest of the way to the building. The window squeaked a little when he opened it and he held his breath, sure more guards would come running. But when nothing but silence continued to fill the thick night air, he hopped up on the window ledge and slipped inside.
He scanned the place with his NVGs, realizing he was in a storage room. The large space was lined with heavy steel shelving loaded to the ceiling with hundreds of boxes. The writing on the side of the boxes didn’t mean anything to him. Shoes, maybe?
Noah quickly moved over to the door, opening it a fraction of an inch and peeking out. He cursed when the lenses of his NVGs flared so brightly it nearly blinded him thanks to the light in the room on the other side of it saturating them. Reaching up, he flipped them up so they locked back against his tactical helmet.
Making sure the coast was clear, he stepped out of the storage room and into the main part of the building. It was stuffed with more shelving units and while he could hear voices all around him, the heavily loaded shelves blocked his view and made it impossible to know for sure exactly how many bad guys they were going to have to deal with.
Plans for these types of operations tended to be basic. No need to get too complicated when everything went to shit once the shooting started. But the concept he and Chasen had worked out was that Noah would get inside the building first and find a position that’d allow him to see as much of the building as possible—preferably from someplace high up—where he could cover his Teammates when they came in.
Noah scanned the room for options, locking in on the rough metal stairs leading to the second level. It overlooked the main floor and would give him a great vantage point to keep an eye on things. He carefully headed in that direction, praying no one saw him. Luckily, no one did.
The second floor was dark and while there were a few crates and pallets of cardboard boxes here and there, there weren’t any bad guys in sight. He slipped between two of the crates near the railing overlooking the first floor, wedging himself forward on his stomach until he had a good view of the area below him.
From here, Noah could see that the lower level was the size of a basketball court with half a dozen long tables lined up down the middle surrounded by all those shelves. Computers covered two of the tables while electronic gear he couldn’t hope to identify occupied two more, and a mountain of pristine looking smart phones took up the rest. Ten men packaged up the phones in boxes that didn’t look much different than something you’d find at an Apple store. Damn, the whole operation was way more high-tech than he’d envisioned, that was for sure.
Nearly fifteen additional people moved amongst the shelves, some pulling boxes down, others loading them on. Most of them were armed with guns, which was a hell of a lot more than Interpol and the Treasury intel had implied would be here.
Why was he not really shocked?
“I’m in overwatch position on the second floor, south end,” Noah murmured into his mic. “Approximately twenty-five people in all, ten carrying pistols and four with AK-47s. I’ll take the guys with the rifles when the shooting starts.”
Chasen, Sam, Wes, and Lane all confirmed with single clicks.
“Any sign of Magpie?” Agent Woods murmured.
“Negative,” Noah replied.
True, he didn’t know what the guy looked like, but seriously, no one down there looked like a rich, powerful terrorist financier.
Thirty seconds later, he caught sight of movement in the far reaches of the warehouse. His Teammates were moving into position. Lane took the first armed man down without firing a shot, slipping up behind the guy among the shelves and dragging him down without a sound. But then the shooting started, and Noah didn’t have time to think about anything other than lining up his weapon’s optical sights on targets and pulling the trigger.
He focused on dealing with the four men armed with
