Finding Elodie Read online

Mustang reviewed the list of employees on the Asaka Express. Slate had marked those men he believed had been on the bridge, and thus had likely been killed, leaving just two officers and all of the engineers unaccounted for. Along with Rachel Walters.

  They’d received a list of relatives of everyone onboard, as well as copies of the rudimentary background checks that had been done on everyone. Everything looked copasetic…except for Rachel’s.

  “There’s nothing in her background beyond three years ago,” Pid said.

  Mustang nodded.

  Everything listed was pretty generic. Her college graduation year, the fact that her parents were both deceased and she had no siblings. She’d been working at a restaurant in Los Angeles before taking the job aboard the Asaka Express. There was a glowing letter of recommendation, supposedly from the owner of the restaurant where she’d worked, but when Pid had run that man’s name, he’d not been able to find any record of him owning any kind of restaurant anywhere in the country.

  “Remember when we asked her name and she stumbled over it?” Midas asked.

  “She’s not who she says she is.” Aleck pointed out.

  “But does that make her an accomplice to what’s going on now?” Jag asked.

  “Can we please stop talking about her as if she’s in cahoots with the damn pirates?” Mustang asked in frustration.

  “Look, none of us really think she helped set this up,” Aleck said reasonably. “But everything we’ve found so far leads us to believe she’s keeping some big secrets.”

  “It would make sense that she took a job on a cargo ship if she’s trying to hide from someone,” Slate said.

  “Like an abusive ex,” Midas threw out.

  “She could’ve changed her name because she’s deep in debt,” Jag offered.

  “Does any of this matter right now?” Mustang asked.

  “No,” Midas said immediately. “As far as we’re concerned, at the moment, she’s as much a victim as anyone else on the ship. But that could change once we take control of the situation.”

  Mustang sighed. He knew that. If she was on the run, or trying to hide from someone, this situation had made it very difficult for her to lie low. The authorities would want to interview her, the media might want her side of the story, not to mention the US Navy would need her statement as well.

  “She seems to have taken a liking to you,” Midas said. “I’m thinking when we get onboard, you should be the one to track her down. If she trusts you, she might open up to you. Tell you what’s up.”

  “And if we can help, we will,” Aleck added.

  “I hate bullies,” Pid muttered. “If she’s hiding from one, I’m all for keeping her hidden.”

  “Seems the last thing she’d want is a spotlight on her if she survives this,” Jag agreed.

  “There’s no if about it,” Slate said. “If darkness would hurry the hell up already, we could end this shit.”

  This was why Mustang loved working with these men. They were true champions of those who needed help. It was why they were all SEALs in the first place, to try to right the wrongs of the world no matter where they might be.

  Mustang had no problem being the one to search for Rachel, ensuring her safety. Hell, just the thought of her relying on any of his friends was…unsettling. There was something about her that intrigued him. Made him want to get to know her better. Shield her from any danger on that cargo ship.

  He didn’t know Rachel’s story, or if Rachel was even her real name, but he was curious to find out. He hadn’t known her very long, but he was a good judge of character, and how someone acted in the face of a true crisis said a lot about who they were as a person. And Rachel Walters seemed to have a spine of steel.

  Mustang sat in the back of the Zodiac and held on as the pilot steered them closer and closer to the huge cargo ship.

  Throughout the day, officials on the USS Paul Hamilton did their best to talk to the pirates, to no avail. They weren’t answering the hails from the various US Naval ships around them. They had to know they were screwed. They had to have seen on radar the armada of ships surrounding the cargo ship they’d taken over. But so far, they hadn’t communicated with anyone.

  It looked like the Asaka Express was floating dead in the water. The current would eventually push the massive ship closer and closer to the shoreline of Djibouti. Government officials were contacted, but they refused to get involved, saying until the ship was officially in their jurisdiction, they weren’t willing to act.

  It was frustrating and infuriating, but there was nothing Mustang, his team, or the US officials could do. If the pirates didn’t talk to them, give them some idea of what their plan was and what they wanted, there would be no way to negotiate for the lives of the employees onboard.

  Now darkness had fallen, and the SEALs could finally make their move. There were indications that over a dozen small boats were making their way toward the stricken Asaka Express from the northern part of Djibouti. US intelligence experts assumed they were more pirates, coming to pilfer as many goods as they could from the cargo onboard the ship.

  Mustang and his team were in a race to get there first. Once they had the cargo ship secured, the US Navy would bring their warships closer and protect the vessel until it could be made seaworthy once more. They were also going to intercept the smaller boats if possible. Prevent them from adding to the chaos onboard the Asaka Express.

  The plan was simple. Get onboard, then play hide-and-go-seek with the pirates, taking them out one by one. They’d been given permission to shoot to kill anyone onboard the ship illegally. The Navy wasn’t fucking around.

  The pilot of the Zodiac slowed the boat as they neared the eerily dark cargo ship. There were lights flickering in the bridge, but the team had approached from the port side, the side closest to the shore, undetected. Amazingly, the ladder the pirates had used to originally go aboard was still hanging from a railing.

  “I’m sure that’s how they’re planning on the others getting onboard,” Midas said.

  “Most likely,” Slate agreed. “We’ll ditch it once we’re on. No sense making it easy for more pirates to join the party.”

  No one had even the slightest thought to use the ladder to get aboard themselves. It could be booby trapped or monitored. Mustang ordered the pilot to move fifty feet forward from where the ladder swung back and forth with the movement of the waves.

  “You think they’ll be dumb enough to try to join their friends onboard?” the pilot asked.

  “They’ll try,” Aleck said with a nod.

  “Their only motivation is the bottom line,” Pid agreed. “But the Navy won’t let that happen if they can help it.”

  “Less talk, more action,” Mustang said, looking up. They were lucky this cargo ship wasn’t any bigger. It wasn’t going to be easy to make their way up the side of the ship as it was. Jag moved to the side of the Zodiac and took a deep breath, then he was moving.

  Using top-secret, super-spy type gear, Jag made it up the side of the ship within minutes. As they’d planned, he threw down a rope after securing it on the deck, and one by one, the team shimmied up onto the cargo ship. The Zodiac pulled away as silently as it had arrived the second Slate’s boots had left the bottom.

  Mustang and his team plastered themselves to the side of the shipping containers, fading into the shadows. He gestured with his head to the aft of the ship, and Midas and Aleck quickly headed in that direction. Pid and Jag began the long walk toward the front of the ship. They’d gotten the specs and blueprints of the Asaka Express while on the USS Paul Hamilton. It was over three hundred feet long and would take three or so minutes walking at a normal speed to get from the back to the front.

  There were also fifteen lashing bridges, five cargo holds, and the engine room was four decks deep. The captain had been right, there were innumerable places for the crew to hide, and Mustang prayed they’d all been able to do just that. They were obviously doing everything in their power to make th
ings difficult for the pirates, dropping the watertight doors below decks, shutting off the engine, and cutting the lights.

  Darkness might be a disadvantage for the pirates, but it wasn’t for the SEAL team. With their night-vision goggles, they could see almost as well as if it was daylight. Mustang and his team were on a hunt. They’d take out the pirates and hopefully this hijacking would be ended swiftly and with only one outcome— dead pirates.

  Mustang usually wasn’t so bloodthirsty, but this was war. If the pirates hadn’t killed anyone, their orders might’ve been different…capture and interrogate. But because they’d upped the stakes by killing the captain and the other officers, they’d sealed their own fate.

  Each of the men were wearing radios in their ears. They were voice-activated so they could quickly and easily communicate with the rest of the team.

  “Ladder’s disabled,” Midas informed everyone.

  The plan was to secure the outer decks before heading straight to the bridge. By throwing the ladder the pirates had used overboard, they’d made it more difficult for additional pirates to climb aboard and taken away a method for the current pirates to flee.

  They’d take out anyone who was on the bridge, then search the rest of the ship. They had no idea how many pirates were wandering around, but they’d eventually find everyone and exterminate the threat to the employees onboard.

  Midas and Aleck would continue around the back of the ship, while Pid and Jag secured the front before heading aft. Mustang and Slate would clear the mid-deck, then make their way back to the bridge, as well.

  Through the radio in his ear, Mustang heard his team reporting the all-clear as they moved about the ship. No one was on the outside decks, which made for a quick and silent trip to the bridge. As he and Slate approached the rear of the ship, he saw Midas and Aleck already hunkered down, waiting for their arrival. The four of them would storm onto the bridge from starboard. Pid and Jag would hang back on the port side, out of the line of fire, in case any of the pirates attempted to flee the bridge on their side.

  Mustang moved around his teammates, not reluctant in the least to take point. He held up his hand and counted down from three. He heard Slate say “go” through the radio even as he swung the heavy metal battering ram they’d lugged onboard for the sole purpose of knocking down the door to the bridge.

  It flew open with one hit, and the four men poured into the space, overwhelming the two pirates who were inside.

  The first reached for the rifle hanging around his body, but never had a chance to get ahold of it. Mustang’s bullet pierced his head and he fell to the floor without a sound.

  The other man immediately turned and went for the door on the opposite side of the room, firing blindly behind him as he ran. Mustang and the rest of the team took cover behind whatever they could. The man ran out the door and two shots rang out, indicating that Pid and Jag had done their job.

  The entire operation was over within seconds.

  Standing, Mustang surveyed the bridge. There were six men, obviously dead, lying in a heap along the back wall. Even though they weren’t wearing uniforms, Mustang knew they were the captain and his officers. That meant there were still sixteen Asaka Express employees onboard.

  “Only two?” Midas asked as he entered the bridge with Aleck.

  “Yes,” Mustang agreed.

  “Fuck. That means there’s probably still a handful of them wandering around then,” Midas said.

  Mustang’s belly rolled. Normally he wouldn’t care so much, might have even looked forward to the cat-and-mouse game they were about to engage in. But he felt differently now, knowing Rachel was onboard. The thought of her being hurt, or killed, was unacceptable. He’d briefly checked in with her another time or two before sundown. Probably less than an hour’s worth of conversation, all told, since her first hail. And she’d somehow made this mission personal for him, which wasn’t something he’d ever experienced before. He wanted to know her better. Know what made her tick.

  “Should we use the intercom to inform the employees we’re here?” Jag asked.

  Mustang pressed his lips together. On one hand, it would be a morale booster for everyone to know help was at hand, but on the other, he didn’t want to inform the pirates they were aboard…and he didn’t want anyone to let down their guard and possibly get shot before their team could hunt the pirates.

  “I think no, not yet,” Mustang said after a beat.

  “We could use channel three, the one Rachel said the crew uses to communicate,” Slate suggested.

  Mustang nodded. It wasn’t perfect, but it might prevent the employees from mistakenly thinking they were the bad guys. There was no way of knowing if anyone would be listening, but it was the only way they had to communicate with the crew without tipping off the pirates.

  He pulled out his radio and turned to channel three. “Asaka Express crew, this is a representative of the US Navy. We have secured the bridge and will be sweeping the ship for tangos. For the moment, stay where you are. I repeat, stay where you are.”

  Mustang nodded at Slate, who he heard reporting back to the USS Paul Hamilton. He knew, after the bridge and outer decks had been cleared, the plan was for additional personnel to come aboard to help secure the ship. Not only that, but because the cargo ship was floating adrift, they were sending someone who could pilot the large ship so it hopefully wouldn’t run aground. Slate and Jag would stay on the bridge to keep it secure. If any of the pirates returned, they would take them out.

  Pid and Aleck would patrol the outer decks until backup could arrive and take over. For now, it would be only Midas and Mustang patrolling the lower decks. They’d work as a team, searching room by room for the missing pirates. It was disconcerting that they didn’t know how many men they were looking for, but ultimately it didn’t matter. They’d find them all and make sure they weren’t a threat any longer.

  “Stay in contact,” Mustang told his team unnecessarily.

  They all nodded. Their team leader wasn’t telling them anything they didn’t already know.

  Mustang once again took point as he and Midas headed for the door that led to a set of stairs right outside the bridge. The second the door closed behind them, they were plunged into darkness. It was dark on the bridge and outer decks, but with the stars and moon overhead, they’d still had a bit of light. Being in the interior of the ship afforded absolutely no ambient light whatsoever.

  Pulling the night-vision goggles over his eyes, Mustang gave himself a moment to adjust to the green world that suddenly appeared through his lenses. Then he slowly began to walk down the stairs toward the first floor they had to clear.

  This was obviously where the officers’ and the captain’s rooms were. The doors were all open and the rooms had been ransacked. Drawers had been emptied and the men’s belongings were strewn all over the floor of each room. The pirates had searched for anything worth stealing.

  Anger welled up inside Mustang. He’d seen a lot of awful things in his time as a SEAL, but nothing got him more riled up than needless violence and death. The pirates didn’t have to kill the men up on the bridge. They could’ve locked them inside one of these rooms if they wanted to make sure they didn’t get in the way of their mission. But instead, they’d ruthlessly snuffed out innocent lives.

  Midas and Mustang found no evidence of any pirates on the first floor and made sure to lock and close each of the doors after they’d searched the rooms. The last thing they wanted was someone sneaking back up here and hiding out, forcing the SEALs to re-clear the area.

  The next floor looked much the same as the previous, individual living quarters that had been ransacked. Mustang and Midas painstakingly made their way through each room, checking every nook and cranny for anyone who might be hiding out, then locking and closing the doors. They reported back to the others, informing them of their progress.

  Mustang itched to reach out to Rachel, but he didn’t dare. He concentrated on the job at hand, and co
uld only hope she was lying low, safe, wherever she’d decided to hole up.

  Elodie cursed herself. Why had she left her hiding space? Because she was stupid, that was why. She hadn’t heard anything in so long and had needed to use the bathroom. She figured it was safe enough—but she’d been wrong. The second she’d come out of the small restroom next to the officers’ mess, she’d heard someone in the galley.

  For just a second, she’d had the hope that it was Scott and his team. That the Navy SEALs had finally arrived and everyone was safe. But then she’d heard the man muttering in a foreign language and knew she was in deep shit.

  She froze, looking around for a place to hide. But the officers’ mess had nothing in it but a long table and chairs. There weren’t any cabinets or any other place to hide. She could go back into the bathroom, but she’d be a sitting duck in there. And she’d already been lucky whoever was in the kitchen didn’t seem to have heard her exiting the small room.

  If she could make it to the officers’ pantry, she might be able to get into one of the lower cabinets, but the pirate would definitely hear her moving around.

  Elodie panicked. Any second, she was going to be seen. The man would walk into this room and find her there. The only thing she had going for her was that it was dark. She wanted to kiss whichever engineer below deck who’d had the great idea to turn off the electricity.

  An idea struck her then. It was risky as hell, and if she made any noise, she’d surely be caught, but at the moment, she literally had no other options.

  Moving slowly, she felt her way around the large oval table in the middle of the room. Elodie moved the chairs on the far side so they were a little closer together, making sure not to scrape the legs against the tile floor. When she thought they were positioned where she wanted them, she got down on her hands and knees and crawled under the table. She’d never been so thankful that whoever had furnished the ship had been too cheap to get chairs with armrests.

  When the man in the other room seemed to finish whatever he was doing in the galley, she heard him enter the officers’ pantry. He was only one room away from her right now, and she knew if she’d gone into that room to try to hide, she would’ve been caught.