Ricci yelled out in glee. A smudge could be seen on the horizon. Crouch fancied it was the Shoshone Star, the oil tanker these bandits had booked passage on. Crouch frowned. Oil tanker? What the hell was he missing here?
Two lead motorboats plowed the seas. Crouch could see Alicia’s bow wave and the spray that filled the air behind her boat. A terrorist caught a bullet in the neck and flew back against the bulwark of the cabin. His colleagues hefted him up and threw him over the side; too fast to have properly checked his wounds. They returned fire at Alicia’s boat. Now, the FBI were coming up alongside Alicia in their bigger, faster crafts. Everything Crouch could see back there was crowded with agents.
And they would be coming by air too, he thought. By sea.
What am I missing?
He figured they’d traveled about fifteen miles. The oil tanker was growing much bigger now, an outsize behemoth simply sitting in their way, blemishing the horizon like a squat, gray stain.
He considered the way they’d been traveling, parallel to the eastern coast of Oahu. Could there be anything else out there?
He didn’t know the area well enough to conclude anything. The gun battle raging behind was intensifying. Russo fired precise shot after shot. The terrorists shot back but hid behind the sides too, popping up only when necessary. A bullet passed through a plank of wood with a splinter and took off the top of a man’s head. Another winged a small youth, spinning him around. One more took a shot from the FBI boat; a bullet that slammed into the pit of his stomach and made him double over.
Again, he was hefted into the ocean.
Crouch’s count was eight terrorists remaining, plus Ricci. Judging by the gap between their boat and the oil tanker, they would arrive alongside in about eight minutes. That put them roughly twenty miles from their starting point.
Did Ricci have an army aboard that ship?
Did he plan to make the video and then kill himself before he could be taken?
Ricci struck Crouch as a leader, a high-level player. Not the kind of man to make such an easy sacrifice. He ducked lower now as wayward bullets flashed past their own boat, two of them slamming into the stern. Nonstop gunfire sounded from behind as the terrorists put on a spurt of speed in order to increase the gap.
Crouch looked over to Terri, a question in his eyes.
What’s next?
She saw it and shrugged. She wanted to live but had already accepted that the decision was out of her hands.
At the helm Ricci was laughing. Dragging a radio from underneath his bullet-proof jacket, he thumbed the button and spoke a single sentence.
“Our choppers are incoming. Get ready to board the tanker.”
Why the hell would he need choppers then?
CHAPTER THIRTY EIGHT
Alicia piloted the small but speedy craft with one hand, picking off terrorists with the other. All in all, if Crouch and Terri weren’t in danger, and good men and women hadn’t already lost their lives, it could be classed as a good day.
Russo backed her up smartly from the side. The return fire was poor at best; it was rare that a bullet found the hull of the boat. Alicia saw the approach of the oil tanker and worried deeper as the boats approached. Vino radioed over that more than half a dozen police choppers were on their way, backed up by a coastguard vessel and a full-size ship. In the end, Agent Merriweather had been forced to call in a huge force.
Alicia guessed they were twenty five meters behind the second terrorist motorboat when it started slowing to come alongside the oil tanker. She’d been wondering how they might board the vessel and now she knew.
Figures could be seen on deck, throwing rope ladders over the side and securing them up top. Alicia counted seven winging their way down. It was going to be a fast ascent. Ricci in the lead boat came alongside and slowed his vessel to a crawl. Then he ordered two men up, it seemed. Alicia squinted to make it all out. Maybe these men would cover for the rest. She poured on the speed, quickly closing the gap to the oil tanker.
Ricci forced Crouch up next and then jumped on right behind him. From her vantage point Alicia thought the leader appeared to be shoving the older man up, rung by rung. Other ladders were grabbed and utilized. Alicia was forced to swerve violently as men in the nearest boat opened fire on the chasing vessels.
She hit the deck, letting the wheel choose for itself. Across the way most of the FBI agents did the same.
Easily, she discerned that the number of guns being fired was rapidly dwindling. That meant all the others were heading for the rope ladders.
She rose and fired low, knowing Crouch and Terri were climbing. She allowed her aim to drift across, taking a bead on the other shooter. Before he could bring his weapon to bear on her, she put a hole through the front of his face. He tumbled backward in a haze of red, the gun falling from limp fingers.
Now she saw the scope of their task. All the rope ladders were swinging as men climbed rapidly to the top. Most were over halfway to their goal. Two were climbing over the tanker’s top rail and already taking aim. Alicia saw Crouch struggling and Terri alongside, trying to lend a hand.
Ricci jabbed his gun into Crouch’s thigh. Alicia couldn’t hear anything but guessed the threat would be ghastly, especially when she saw him turn the weapon on Terri.
Crouch climbed.
Alicia knew her ex-SAS and Ninth Division boss wouldn’t even consider leaving Terri behind, or risk her life. He would die first. She brought their boat in fast, bounced off the rear, then the side of a terrorist vessel, and then started running. She leaped from one boat to the next, landing sure-footed on the wooden deck. Russo was a shadow sprinter at her side. She climbed the boat’s rail and reached out for one of the rope ladders swinging against the side of the tanker.
FBI agents lined the climbers up.
Alicia saw them driven down by the men at the top of the tanker, probably Ricci’s best sharp-shooters. Agents loosed several shots but none found their mark. Most pinged off the side of the tanker. The cover fire raining down from above was too precise and thick to risk anything.
She took hold of the rope in both hands, put one boot on the lowest rung and started to climb. Russo grabbed the one to her left. She noticed an FBI agent snagging another. Some of the others were lining up for a rope, waiting, but most still favored their cover.
The terrorists climbed. Alicia grasped rung after rung, heaving herself up, practically running up the sheer side of the tanker. Russo fell a little behind. She found her stride and stuck to it. Her weapons were ready and within easy reach. Occasionally, she looked up to check her progress but for the most part she concentrated on the climb.
A bullet winged its way past her shoulder, continuing down into the sea. She swore. What the bloody hell are the FBI doing? A moment later she heard a sharp volley from below, the agents protecting the climbers. Far up at the top of the rope ladders the shooters flung themselves backward to cover.
Alicia saw more terrorists climbing over the rail; Ricci and Crouch getting closer and closer to the top. Terri struggled with her captor but soon stopped when he wrenched one of her arms away from a rung and pointed at the rolling sea below whilst waving his weapon.
The tanker began to thrum then, its sides vibrating just a little. Alicia glanced down at Russo.
“I think the assholes started their engines.”