Murdock had already used his Mugger to confirm that the fishing boat bobbing directly above him was in the same spot his fishing boat was supposed to be. The second confirmation was the orange chem light tied to the bottom of the boat. Even so, he and Higgins broke the surface with their weapons ready. A Sudanese crewman was peering cautiously over the stern.
“X-Ray,” Murdock challenged, his index finger resting against the trigger guard of his M-4.
“Bravo,” the Sudanese replied.
Murdock and Higgins went up the ladder, and were quickly ushered into the interior of the boat. It was a nondescript commercial fishing boat, controlled by the CIA and manned by an Arab and Sudanese contract crew that did assorted covert jobs in the Red Sea region. Just the thing for an unobtrusive extraction. But since good SEAL operations didn’t leave anything to chance, and always required an alternate means of getting out of town when the job was done, the Special Operations submarine U.S.S. King Kamehameha, a converted ballistic-missile job, was cruising beneath the Red Sea awaiting an emergency beacon signal.
In the fishing boat’s galley Murdock found Razor Roselli and the CIA maritime operations paramilitary officer sitting at a table drinking coffee. The Razor had already showered and changed into a green flight suit. He pretended not to notice while Murdock stood there dripping on the deck. Then he pretended to notice. “Oh, Jeez, Sir, didn’t see you come in,” the Razor said innocently, though his grin gave him away. He tossed Murdock and Higgins liter bottles of mineral water that they both drained dry. “Hot work,” Razor said.
“Have we got everyone?” Murdock demanded.
“You’re next to last,” said Roselli. “Everybody but Doc and Scotty are back.”
Murdock didn’t like that one bit. Ellsworth and Frazier had left before Higgins and himself, and were even stronger swimmers.
The CIA man was up and pumping his hand. “Fantastic job, Lieutenant Murdock. Chief Roselli gave me a quick preliminary debrief. Sounds as if it went like clockwork.”
“Thanks,” said Murdock, “but the chief’s been known to lay it on thick. We killed a lot of bad guys, and damn near all of them fit the descriptions, but we still don’t know if we killed the right ones.”
That didn’t faze the CIA man one bit. He continued to gush, obviously thrilled to have his name attached to a winning effort. “Once we look at the video and the documents, I’m sure everything’s going to shake out just fine.”
“Better rinse the salt water off you, Skipper,” Roselli said pointedly, meaning that standing around worrying about Doc and Frazier wasn’t going to do a damn bit of good.
Murdock sent Higgins off to the single-stall shower. The boat crew had laid on extra fresh water to accommodate sixteen SEALS. Ed DeWitt and the rest of the platoon were cleaning their equipment, which every SEAL did automatically before even thinking about eating or sleeping. They were understandably wired, and not just from the adrenaline. It had been the kind of real-world op that every SEAL dreamed about pulling off.
“Hey, Skipper!”
“You finally made it.”
“Fucking-A, sir!”
“You didn’t lose the Professor, did you?”
“Of course he didn’t, that would be careless.” So went the chorus that greeted Murdock’s entrance.
Murdock let them run on. “Beautiful op, guys,” he told them. “A first-class job by everyone. Really professional.” Then: “Thanks for bringing me along.”
The platoon got a laugh out of that and shrugged off the praise. Murdock knew that in their secret heart of hearts, most SEALS felt that officers were a fairly useless bunch of dicks whom the Navy forced them to carry along on missions. So he humored them about it, which you could do while still remaining the boss, especially since in his experience the officer was the first guy everyone looked to when the shit hit the fan. Murdock also knew the boys were secretly pleased when the lieutenant gave them an attaboy, which was why he did it.
By then Higgins had finished in the head, so Murdock rinsed off first his equipment with fresh water, then himself. A dry flight suit and boots were waiting for him when he got out. Then he sat down with the platoon and turned to his weapons and equipment, all the time worrying about Ellsworth and Frazier.
Fifteen minutes later Razor stuck his head into the compartment. “They’re back,” he announced, ushering in a soaking-wet Ellsworth and Frazier.
Murdock let out a sigh of relief at getting all his boys back unhurt. The difference between the SEALs and nearly every other military unit was that SEALs expected not to lose people. This was the very reason their selection and training were so brutal. Only thirty-three SEALs had been killed by enemy action during the entire Vietnam War. During the Gulf War no SEALs were lost despite missions that included taking down oil platforms and inserting agents directly into occupied Kuwait City. SEALs felt that if one of their own was killed, it was because someone had screwed up. That always weighed heavily on Blake Murdock’s mind.
The rest of the platoon gave Ellsworth and Frazier a warm and friendly welcome along the lines of: “About fucking time.”
“Now we can get out of here.”
“Any day, there, you two.”
“Fuck you all,” Doc Ellsworth replied.
When the din died down, Razor Roselli stepped to the fore. The crowd hushed, waiting for his thoughts. “What took you so long, Doc?” Razor asked with deep but utterly insincere concern. “You get a cramp?”
The platoon cackled. The Doc popped the shoulder straps of his dry bag and dumped it onto the deck. It was bulged out to the size of a filled Navy seabag. “This pig was weighing me down,” he said. “You’ll shit yourselves when you see what’s in it.” He opened up the dry bag, took out a nylon duffel, and unzipped it. The duffel was filled to the brim with U.S. currency, all apparently one-hundred-dollar bills.
The platoon whooped in exultation. The general consensus was that there sat the makings of a platoon party that would go down in Naval Special Warfare history, with enough left over for a new car for everyone.
Before Murdock or DeWitt could find their tongues, Chiefs Roselli and Kosciuszko took charge, the human equivalents of a bucket of ice water to the nuts.
“Razor and me,” Kos Kosciuszko announced, while Roselli zipped up the bag, “and Mister Murdock and Mister DeWitt are going to count all this. Then we will fucking seal it.”
“You sure you don’t want to reconsider that, Chief?” said a voice from the back of the mob.
“Yeah, Chief,” said someone else. “Think it over. This could be one of those once-in-a-lifetime shots you come to regret when it’s time to retire.”
Unlike most SEALS, who only took their work seriously, Kos Kosciuszko took life too seriously to accept a ribbing in the proper spirit. And, of course, the platoon knew it. “My reputation isn’t worth ten times that money,” he informed them with a murderous look on his face.
“Don’t make me blow the head off anyone who just wants to sneak in and have another little look in the bag,” Razor Roselli added with his usual evil smile. He knew most of them were joking about copping the money, but it was a lot of temptation to be sitting there at close quarters. All it would take was for one guy to get a stupid attack and do something he’d regret.
Thank God for the chiefs, Murdock thought. Then he chuckled. Otherwise he might have been tempted himself.
As it turned out, there was three million dollars in the duffel, all hundreds, all crisp and brand-new.
“You keep doing that, Sir, and you’re going to give yourself a hard-on,” Razor Roselli cautioned Ed DeWitt, who was unconsciously fondling a large stack of bills.
DeWitt whipped his hand away as though it was on fire, and everyone laughed. Then he recovered nicely. “Just practicing in case the lieutenant makes me sleep with it.”