Crusader One (Tier One Thrillers Book 3) Read online

  OTHER TITLES BY BRIAN ANDREWS AND JEFFREY WILSON

  Tier One Thriller Series

  Tier One

  War Shadows

  WRITING AS ALEX RYAN

  Nick Foley Thriller Series

  Beijing Red

  Hong Kong Black

  OTHER TITLES BY BRIAN ANDREWS

  The Calypso Directive

  The Infiltration Game

  OTHER TITLES BY JEFFREY WILSON

  The Traiteur’s Ring

  The Donors

  Fade to Black

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2017 by Brian Andrews and Jeffrey Wilson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781477809051

  ISBN-10: 1477809058

  Cover design by Mike Heath | Magnus Creative

  For Jim and Buz, men of action, honor, and character. Terrific fathers who first taught us the value of service and made us into the men we are. We love you.

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  PART I

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  PART II

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  PART III

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  GLOSSARY

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  PROLOGUE

  Mediterranean Sea

  October 23, 1995

  0140 Local Time

  Lieutenant Commander Kelso Jarvis ignored the burn—the burn in his quadriceps from this marathon finning session, the burn in his eyes from the salt water, and the burn in his lungs from exertion. He was a SEAL, and his capacity to overcome pain, fatigue, and injury with willpower was what separated him from the rest . . . the rest being pretty much everyone else. For men like him, it wasn’t the desire to win—it was the refusal to lose. Under fire, under pressure, and under inhumane conditions, that refusal was the difference between victory and death. The outcomes of missions like the one he was leading were binary.

  Bullets simply don’t negotiate.

  As he kicked, he arched his spine into an airfoil shape to minimize the drag of his pack through the water. He had precious little body fat left and was anything but buoyant, but with speed and body position, he could compensate. Choppy waves buffeted his torso, trying to roll him, but he used his hands like the ailerons on an airplane to counter the surface action and maintain stability. Despite the speed he was making through the water, the downward-curving fins he wore over ultra-low-profile combat boots never broke the surface, thereby ensuring a silent approach to the target.

  Behind him, four members of the Israeli Defense Force’s Shayetet 13—the IDF’s equivalent of the US Navy SEALs—followed in a tight V formation. Under normal circumstances, these men would not fall under his chain of command. He was seven and a half weeks into a six-month Defense Personnel Exchange Program to facilitate cross-training between US and Israeli Special Operations. Until tonight, the program had tried his patience, leaving him languishing in a purgatory of inaction as an “observer” of field ops. This afternoon, after his request to join tonight’s operation had already been rejected, something mysteriously changed. Not only had he been placed on the mission, but he was given command of a squad.

  He had chosen not to question this divine providence, because this was where he belonged, leading from the tip of the spear. Like most SEALs, Jarvis had a visceral need to be in the action, but unlike most, he knew that he had been born for something more than just door kicking. This tour was about learning and teaching, but more important, it was about making connections. He had a destiny beyond the Teams, a destiny that would permit him to use all his gifts for the good of his nation.

  And her allies.

  Tonight’s target, the Muharram, meaning Forbidden in Arabic, was a medium-size freighter anchored off the coast of Limassol, Cyprus. The Israeli Intelligence Corps had confirmed that the ship was carrying Iranian-supplied rockets destined for Gaza and the Palestinian Liberation Organization. For the IDF, a mission like this served two purposes: first, to intercept enemy rockets before they could rain down on Israel’s civilian population, and second, to expose and stymie Muslim nations like Iran that supplied arms to terrorists bent on destroying the Jewish state. The implications of the Oslo Accord—a supposed declaration of peace between Israel and the PLO—being signed in Washington, DC, probably helped explain his host unit’s reluctance to involve their American guest in this operation. Hopefully the person responsible for reversing the policy and letting him get wet would be revealed to him after the op.

  Tonight, Jarvis and his four Shayetet 13 commandos—call sign Mercury—comprised the boarding party. Phase one of their mission objective was to board the Muharram, quietly and invisibly, and then provide eyes and fire support for the helicopter INFIL of an additional dozen operators—call sign Neptune. During the chaos of the assault, Mercury would then transition to phase two, securing the bridge and taking control of the vessel. It was a classic Tier One SEAL mission, the type of operation he’d conducted with his American unit many times. And even though he was a transplant tonight, he trusted the four operators with him implicitly. They were well-trained professionals with as much, if not more, operational experience as his own unit back home. For us, the drive for perfection is born from necessity, one of the Shayetet 13 operators had explained to him. We sacrifice our lives so that Israel may persevere.

  They reached the stern of Muharram without detection. Jarvis looked up. From the water, the anchored vessel towered overhead, the freeboard at the stern equivalent to a three-story building. A fingernail crescent moon hung high in the hazy night sky. He decided that the moon, along with the ambient glow from the vessel’s anchor lights, would provide just enough light that NVGs would not be necessary for the op. He finned to maintain a static hover, his head barely above the water, while his Israeli teammates moved in beside him. He slipped his goggles into a pouch on his vest,
then checked his Suunto watch—they were ninety seconds early. During the brief hold, the team scanned the deck rails overhead for threats and indications they were being watched.

  On the mark, Jarvis signaled to the operator beside him. The Israeli unstrapped a cylinder that looked like a tiny bazooka and aimed it upward. With a dull, quiet whump, a grappling projectile sailed skyward, arcing up and over the side of the ship, trailing a flexible assault ladder behind it. The hook landed on the deck with a soft thud, and then the Israeli commando slowly and methodically reeled in the nylon webbing until the rubber-coated tines of the hook snagged the rail. The operator tested the connection using his body weight. A beat later, he gave Jarvis a thumbs-up. Jarvis nodded and signaled to the others to commence boarding.

  After securing his fins to his pack, Jarvis pulled himself up and onto the ladder. Constructed from black nylon strapping, the ladder had stiffeners woven inside the rungs to keep its rails from collapsing inward and regularly spaced, black rubber bumpers to minimize the noise against the side of the ship. Yet despite all its genius, the narrow, twisting ladder was a bitch to climb, and it took all his core strength to keep it from spinning and swaying as he ascended. Hand over hand he worked his way up, all the while fighting to keep his M4 assault rifle from clanging against the steel hull.

  He reached the top and slid quietly over the rail onto the deck. Dropping into a combat kneel, he scanned his assigned sector for threats. The first two Shayetet assaulters had already cleared the immediate vicinity. Moments later, the remaining two commandos were up and on the deck beside him. The bridge tower of the Muharram was located aft of midships, creating an approximate sixty-forty split of the vessel’s main deck, with two cranes forward and one crane aft. The ship’s aft deck was flat to the stern, punctuated by two large cargo holds with removable covers to facilitate loading cargo below deck. The main deck was free of stacked cargo, thereby providing excellent sight lines in every direction. The five-man team quickly cleared the aft deck from the boarding point all the way to the stern without resistance or detection.

  With the stern secure, Jarvis pointed at two of his men and chopped his hand left, right, and then forward. Then, he pointed to himself and gestured to a generator box located on the starboard side, approximately fifteen meters from the stern. Acknowledgment came via four silent nods, and then his team spread out as directed, with Mercury Four and Five remaining aft and Two and Three dashing forward to take up covered port and starboard positions along the outboard. Jarvis hunched beside the three-foot-tall metal generator box, covering his advancing teammates and scanning the bridge tower for movement and silhouettes.

  Nothing.

  He checked his watch and keyed his radio. “Neptune, Mercury One. In position,” he whispered into the mike boom resting beside the right corner of his mouth. “Fantail is clear.”

  “Roger, Mercury One,” came the reply in English from the lead Israeli chopper pilot. “Leaving orbit. Six minutes out.”

  Any minute now, two Israeli Yanshuf S-70A helicopters would materialize on the horizon. The helos would scream in low, hover over the deck just long enough for the Neptune assaulters to fast-rope in, and then bug out. Behind Neptune, two fast boats carrying additional QRF assaulters—call sign Jupiter—were standing by to help in the event things went to hell. Neptune’s arrival would be the most dangerous part of the mission. When the birds showed up, the noise would alert the ship’s crew to their presence. They’d lose their stealth, and during the drop, both the helos and the fast-roping assaulters would be vulnerable.

  But Jarvis had a plan for this.

  When two minutes had ticked by, he spoke into the mike again.

  “Two and Three—forward with me. Four and Five, hold and cover.”

  The two forward operators popped up into combat crouches from hides where they had been completely invisible. They advanced swiftly and silently along the port and starboard rails, while Jarvis followed, drifting left to stay in the shadows. In a few seconds, Two and Three had reached the corners of the ship’s main superstructure and cleared the narrow walkways that reached forward on either side. Two oval hatchways, both of which appeared to be shut, provided port and starboard side access to the bridge tower. The Israeli commandos took mirror-image positions, sighting around the corners toward the bow along the walkways. Jarvis dropped to a knee behind the base of a static crane and scanned again for human figures on the catwalks and in porthole windows on the superstructure. In his mind, a countdown timer silently ticked off the seconds in the background, an uncanny skill he’d first realized he possessed at the Naval Academy. At the two-minute mark, he keyed his mike. “Two, Three, reposition inboard.”

  He watched the two commandos check the side rails one last time and then move away from the corners, both taking a knee inboard of the hatches with their weapons at the ready.

  He shifted his radio to VOX. “One minute.”

  The unmistakable thrum of helicopters on approach rumbled like a storm in the night. It wouldn’t be long until the noise reverberated loud enough that it was audible inside the superstructure, and when that happened their enemy would finally wake up. A beat later, night turned to day on the main deck as Muharram’s floodlights kicked on. An alarm wailed overhead, ear-piercing and angry. Jarvis spied movement on a catwalk high above him; a hatch swung open, and two men emerged holding assault rifles. Jarvis put the dot of his holosite on the forehead of the first shooter and squeezed the trigger, dropping the man. He shifted his aim to the second sniper and this time sent two rounds into the torso of the figure, who dropped his weapon and crumpled in a heap against the railing.

  On the main deck, the port and starboard superstructure hatches flung open, and enemy sailors began pouring out onto the cargo deck with AK-47s at the ready.

  “Two, Three—stand by. Shooters coming at you,” he whispered. “Engage at will.” Gunfire and muzzle flash erupted from his two commandos. In seconds, all thirteen AK-47-armed terrorists were bleeding on the deck, having gotten off only a few stray shots in the confusion. Jarvis scanned the catwalks and bridge wings for more snipers. Seeing none, he said, “Two and Three . . . Commence phase two.”

  Behind him, the helos had arrived, and Neptune assaulters were executing their fast-rope drops. Jarvis sprinted toward the bridge tower as Two and Three breached the port and starboard hatches, disappearing out of sight. He anticipated a second wave of enemy shooters topside any moment. When he reached the bridge tower, he angled his weapon around the corner and fired several bursts along the port walkway, before popping his head around for a quick look.

  Clear.

  As he moved toward the hatch, gunfire erupted and bullets ricocheted and sparked around him. He glanced up and saw a shooter on a catwalk two levels up firing at him through the grating. A round from an unseen Israeli teammate took care of the problem, and he dashed through the open hatch into the superstructure unscathed. Scanning over his rifle, he had three choices: take a passage leading forward, take a passage leading athwartships, or take the ladder up. Schematics had shown the bridge on the 0-4 level, so he needed to go up. Two was nowhere in sight, which meant the Israeli operator had already advanced up to the 0-2 or possibly 0-3 level.

  Jarvis climbed the ladder, sighting over his M4. Before he’d made it halfway up, gunfire erupted somewhere above. He paused a beat, and then, leading with his muzzle, he broke the plane to the next level. He cleared the passage left and right, only his torso sticking out of the ladder well. A door swung open and a bearded figure stepped out into the passage, still securing the sling to his rifle. When he saw Jarvis, the enemy crewman spun on a heel and ran. Jarvis’s 5.56 round plowed through the back of the man’s head and sent him pitching forward down the passage.

  “One, Two. Set on level four,” came a voice in his ear.

  “Check,” he said. “Coming to you.”

  More gunfire echoed above, heavier this time. “One, Three. Engaging.”

  Jarvis climbed a c
ouple more ladders to the 0-4 level and joined Two, who was in a combat kneel sighting down the narrow port-side passageway leading to the bridge. The intensity of gunfire coming from the starboard side was picking up.

  “Looks like we picked the easy side,” Jarvis said with a wry grin.

  “He’s unlucky that way,” the Shayetet commando said with a heavy Israeli accent, referring to Three. “Just ask his last several girlfriends.”

  “Poor bastard. I think we should give him a hand.” Then into his mike boom, Jarvis said, “Three, One. Coming to you.”

  “Roger, One. I’m caught in a cross fire in the middle of the passage. I have a shooter forward, and a shooter aft.”

  “Copy, Three.” Then, turning to Two, Jarvis chopped a hand forward. Next, he pointed to himself and chopped his hand toward the crossing passageway. “Let’s flank them.”

  The Israeli nodded and they split—Two advancing and Jarvis crossing via the rearmost passage to the other side of the ship. He moved in a combat crouch, scanning over his weapon and pausing at a shut hatch in the middle of the passage. With Three caught in a cross fire, taking time to clear the room was problematic, but so was leaving himself open for an ambush from behind. With his left hand he pulled a tactical mirror from a pocket on his kit and angled it for view inside the porthole. The room appeared empty, so he checked that the hatch was dogged shut hard into its stop and then ducked to cross beneath the porthole. He advanced the remainder of the passage to the intersection, where he stopped and used the mirror for a glimpse around the corner. He saw Three pressed into an alcove on the port bulkhead, ducking behind a water fountain and taking fire from both sides.

  Muzzle flares flashed at the forward end of the passage.

  There’s the forward shooter . . .

  A beat later, he watched a torso angle out from a nearby doorway, fire a burst up the passage at Three, and then disappear behind a door frame.

  And that’s the aft shooter.

  Jarvis commenced a silent count: One, two, three . . .

  AK-47 gunfire—forward shooter.

  Four, five . . .

  Return fire—that’s Three.