True Devotion (24 page)

“There is no access from the engine room or staterooms into the holds?” Wolf asked.

Cougar shook his head.

“So if we control the deck, we control the device,” Wolf concluded.

“Exactly.”

“They have to lift it out by crane?”

Cougar nodded. “There are two, built into the ship structure.”

“That’s the ship. What about the island?” Boomer asked. “Where’s the best terrain for a strike?”

“The satellite pictures show we’ve got a lot of thick tree cover,” Wolf mentioned.

“The forest has grown up to touch the old runway. We can take the shipment at the pier, in transit to the runway, or once it is loaded on the plane. As long as we keep that plane on the ground, the terrain means we can make our move anywhere we desire.”

“The plane is scheduled to arrive at sunrise,” Boomer cautioned. No SEAL wanted a mission run in the daylight if they had the option of attacking in the dead of night.

Wolf pulled over the latest images of the runway. “I doubt they’ll try to bring the plane in early, while it’s still dark. This runway shows signs of having been cleaned up, but I don’t think they can risk the plane being damaged by trying to arrive at night.”

“If they have been working on the runway, we have to assume they have a number of people already on the island, that we will be dealing with more than the men on the boat,” Cougar pointed out.

“Then we should let Grant’s platoon hit the boat while it’s still in international waters. That would limit the number of tangos to the men on the boat,” Boomer decided.

Joe stepped in. “Having Grant take the boat at sea best limits the opportunity for casualties, but it would also alert Raider very early on that we know his plans, and we’d miss the first opportunity we’ve ever had to grab him. The guys in Washington may want to take a little more risk if there is a chance we can get Raider too,” Bear assessed. “For now, let’s assume Grant’s platoon is not available. Assume there are an unknown number of men on the island we’ll have to deal with. What’s the best option? The harbor?”

David, the platoon’s radioman, pulled over the nautical map. “One option: We wait here, outside the coral reef, for the ship to enter the harbor. We come in behind it and hit while they are moving to unload the device. That leaves all the threat in front of us.”

“But it could be a nasty threat,” Wolf assessed. “Until the time the plane arrives, the harbor will be the center of attention for any men on the island. There is not a lot of cover to work with; it’s a wide beach, and they would have the advantage of being above us from these rocks.”

Boomer ran his finger across the map. “What if we wait? Let them unload the device? Because of the terrain they would have to bring it to the airfield along this route. We ambush them here at this choke point, take the device, and return back up this ridgeline and call in a helo to take us out. We would have the cliffs at our backs, and they would have to come uphill toward us to attack.”

“How do we get there unseen?” Wolf asked.

“I doubt they would be expecting a threat to come from the cliffs. We climb, set up on the trail, and we wait,” Boomer replied.

Joe watched the reaction, saw the nods around the room. It was an interesting option even if it meant a steep rock climb in the dark to pull it off. It could get them in position without being detected.

“We don’t know for certain what time the boat will arrive. What if they haven’t moved the device from the boat and it’s getting close to dawn?” Cougar asked.

Boomer studied the terrain. “We could sweep down this way and hit the boat, then secure the device there. We put men into the water to come up behind the boat; others use the boathouse for cover and cut off anyone on the beach from coming back up the pier. We can control the decks and seal anyone on the boat below deck; we can control the pier and cut off anyone onshore. If possible, we then steal their own boat and take the device out that way. If they have sabotaged the engine room or the control room, we get the device out over the side for pickup.”

“Complex,” Bear remarked. “Tell me about the runway options.”

“Assume the plane lands shortly after dawn. We could disable the plane, seize the device, and retreat back to the far end of the runway, then call in a helicopter to extract us,” Wolf offered.

“We could wait until the device is aboard and then steal the plane,” Cougar added. There was laughter at that option, but it was actually worth considering.

Joe looked around the room. “Let’s switch objectives for a moment. Raider. How do we identify and capture him?”

“The problem is getting him to the island,” Boomer replied. “If we move on the device before the plane lands, assuming he’s coming in by air, the odds are he would get a message alerting him to our attack, and the plane would divert.”

“The plane has a point of no return when the fuel on board requires it to land,” Wolf noted. “If it can’t turn around because of bingo fuel, they may have no choice but to come onto the island.”

“If they plan their flight right, it could probably divert to the Philippines,” David suggested.

“We could track it and intercept it on the runway there if it diverts,” Wolf replied.

Boomer got up to pace. “What about this? We take it in two stages. Stage one is the urgent reality—the device. The best odds are if we hit in the dark, when the device is in transit from the harbor to the runway. It gives us the element of surprise and better terrain. So we do that first and get the device out of the equation. Stage two: Raider. He is either on the boat or coming in by plane. We bottle him up. We remove the urgency on us to engage. We sabotage the boat, and we disable the plane when it lands. If they divert the plane, we follow and take the plane when it lands. We then have a group of men stuck on an island with no way off and no particular urgency on our side. A Naval exercise run out of Okinawa could effectively blockade the island until they were all arrested.”

Joe liked the idea. He wanted a mission that had a reasonable expectation of no casualties. Bottling Raider up would be as effective as a capture. They had enough general details of a plan to begin working specifics. “Let’s split into three groups. Boomer, work up snatching the device in transit from the harbor to the runway. Cougar, look at the fallback of taking the device at the boat if for some reason they don’t start to move it and we are running short of time. Wolf, assume we can get the device out of there—what’s the cleanest way to bottle them up? Everyone pay special attention to asset logistics. Equipment has to already be in Okinawa or able to fly out with us Friday.”

The men moved into teams to begin working on the details. Joe watched Cougar and Wolf tackle the assignments he had given them. He was confident the plans they developed would be comprehensive. They were the two who would someday take his and Boomer’s places in leading the platoon. It would be in good hands.

Someday. Joe wasn’t ready to give up his role yet. While the teams worked on the details, he turned his attention to the device they would be transporting. There would have to be more than a few precautions taken. Raider had shown his preference for compartmentalizing information. The odds were good this device was going to get moved around by men who had no idea what they were moving. He had to plan to deal with a device in less than stable condition.

Joe glanced at his watch and knew something was wrong. 0710.

He closed his eyes.

He had just blown off Kelly.

Twenty-Two

* * *

Kelly waited until almost 7 a.m. before accepting Joe was not going to meet her or call. He had forgotten they were going to run this morning. The disappointment was sharp. It would have been better if he had joined her and growled at her for the pace she set during the run than to realize he had forgotten her.

She was tempted to pull off her tennis shoes and go back inside and not run, but it would be an admission that she was running because of him. She had done that yesterday, had made a total fool of herself by trying to run his pace and not embarrass him.

Kelly locked the door, pushed her keys into her pocket, and set out for the sand. She needed to run for herself. The workout would give her time to think.

No one had ever said dating would be easy. She had forgotten how hard it was on the ego to wonder what someone else thought of you.

Had she ever been this uncertain about Nick?

She was surprised to realize she never really had been. Nick had chosen her, and she had known early on that she was his girl. When they had gotten engaged, then married, it was wonderful and exactly what she expected.

She was out of step with Joe. She was the one who had said
I love you
. Trying to impress him was a good way to get her heart broken. She let her shoes kick up sand and forgot about the fact she was running while she thought about Joe.

She loved him. More now than ever before. She had let herself begin to dream about a future with him, let herself believe it might come true. Maybe tonight after they did the wallpaper, she could talk him into driving up to Sunset Cliffs to watch the moon rise. That would be so romantic.

Did Joe know Nick had proposed there? It probably wasn’t fair to duplicate locations she had gone to with Nick, but having lived all her life in Coronado, it was impossible to avoid them. At least she had that in her favor; Joe wasn’t jealous of Nick.

He
was
jealous of Charles.

If she knew she would be dating Joe, she would have returned the dress. But what was done was done. While she wished the situation with Charles had not evolved as it had, it was providing an interesting contrast. Charles was what she could’ve had if she wasn’t choosing Joe, and she found herself relieved that she wasn’t even interested in pursuing the civilian choice. She wanted Joe, even with the risk of being involved with a military man again.

She was still thinking about the kiss from last night. She hadn’t had her toes curl like that since the last time Nick had come home from deployment. She hadn’t imagined it would be like this dating Joe. They had been friends for so long she had never thought that dating would so easily ignite a firestorm inside. He wasn’t just Joe anymore. He was her Joe, and being close to him was becoming the center of what she was thinking.

She would fix him dinner tonight. It was easy not to think about the fact she was running as she planned the evening.

* * *

As the evening wore on, Kelly told herself to stop watching the phone, but it did no good.

“I’m sorry, Kelly. I didn’t mean to blow you off without a phone call this morning.”
Joe’s voice on the answering machine earlier that day had sounded frustrated.
“I won’t be able to run with you tomorrow either. Listen, I’ll call you back later, after you get home from work. I hate talking to a machine.”

He hated talking to a machine; she hated
listening
to a machine.

The day was practically over and Joe still hadn’t called back. Kelly couldn’t get herself occupied, and trying to work on her finances simply added to her frustration. She got up and paced. Joe was like Nick, not one to forget to call. That meant Joe was occupied and couldn’t call.

The roses were beginning to droop just a bit. She took twenty minutes to refill water in all the flower vases. Ryan and Lynnette had stopped by earlier to say hi on their way to a movie, Lynnette’s mom playing chauffeur for the early part of the evening. Kelly wondered how their evening was going, wondered what Charles had thought of Lynnette.

She finally chose to retreat outside and curl up on a lounge chair.

The phone rang inside and she jumped up, afraid she would miss the call. It had to be Joe.

“Hello?”

“Kelly, it’s Charles.”

She felt disappointment and was ashamed at her reaction. “Hi, Charles.”

“Are you busy?”

She glanced at the kitchen table. “Working on my finances.” She wove the telephone cord around her finger. “Thanks for interrupting.”

“I’m just up the street at North Island. I’ve got a few minutes to kill before I pick up Ryan and Lynnette from the movie. Can I invite myself over for coffee?”

She was surprised and she hesitated. She owed it to Joe to remove any question of where her loyalties were. “Sure. Need directions?”

“I’ll find you. Thanks, Kelly.”

She started the coffee. Charles arrived, and she was surprised to see him in jeans and a casual shirt. His hair was wet.

“Racquetball tonight. I got trounced,” he explained as he stepped inside.

“Intentionally?”

“No, tonight I was trying my best. The admiral will sign off on a hundred million dollar joint project with Her Majesty’s Navy regardless; I shouldn’t be disappointed with losing a simple game.”

“But you are.”

“I like to win.”

“I wondered how you’d spend your evening with Ryan off on a date,” she said. “They stopped by here.”

“Did they? I like Lynnette. And yes, I noticed you were playing matchmaker for my son. Thanks.”

“I wasn’t sure you would react that way.”

“Give me some credit. You’ve got good taste.” He followed her into the kitchen. “You’ve been painting.”

“Joe and I started last night. Wallpaper on that wall is next.”

“It looks really nice.”

“Thanks. You should have seen Joe’s dog—she managed to sneak inside the house and get paint all over her coat. We ended up throwing her in the bath.”

“I’m sure she loved that.”

“Hated every moment.” Kelly got down the mugs. “How do you take it?”

“Black is fine.”

She nodded and brought him a mug.

The phone rang. “Excuse me a minute.” She took it in the living room. “Hello?”

“I’m sorry, Kelly. I didn’t mean to call this late.”

“Joe.” She was relieved to hear his voice. In the back of her mind had been the small suspicion that he was hurt. “I knew you would call if you could. Are you home?”