Delta_Ricochet Read online

  Contents

  DELTA: RICOCHET

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  WHAT'S NEXT?

  BOOK CLUB NOTES

  AUDIOBOOKS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  COPYRIGHT

  DELTA: RICOCHET

  New York Times Bestselling Author

  Cristin Harber

  CHAPTER ONE

  Bullets sparked like fireworks against the metal container ship above Colin Cole’s head. Rough waters churned as Delta team waited on the edge of the tactical raft, listening for the signal to drop into the Indian Ocean’s choppy black depths.

  Adrenaline pumped. There was no telling how many men waited on the well-guarded cargo ship.

  “Delta team, you have a green light to go.”

  Even with the wetsuit, the frozen water wrapped around Colin at once, and he kicked forward, breathing into his mouthpiece. Again, the flash of machine gun fire sparked against the cargo ship.

  “Get eyes on the target,” an unfamiliar voice from the partnering SEAL team crackled in Colin’s earpiece. “Neutralize all targets.”

  Firepower sprayed. Cold water splashed as Colin kept pace as the cargo ship picked up speed as it left port.

  “Delta’s in place,” Brock reported while Colin swam toward the breach point with his teammates as bullets rained, pelting too close. They sliced into the water, unseen except for sparks and pings against the carrier’s metal hull. “Eliminate the threat, or my team pulls back.”

  Ping. Ping.

  The well-aimed shots had been unlucky. Their shooters had the equipment and the know-how to guard the cargo liner against a stealth assault.

  Second by second, gunfire slowed and stopped. The salty water crashed in heavier waves from the cargo liner.

  “Threat neutralized,” whispered in Colin’s earpiece.

  “Delta, you’re a go,” Brock commanded.

  Colin unharnessed his MP7 sub-machine gun with the rope and claw-end, double-checked the line was still attached to the carabiner on his utility belt, and angled back.

  “Make it easy on me,” he muttered and released the trigger. His rappelling line flew through the chilly night, chasing the cargo liner until its sharp, clawed hooks snagged and jerked his torso. “Not easy.”

  Colin pulled himself hand over hand until his feet found purchase along the side. The waves beat him as he fought to scale the cargo liner. His arms burned from fatigue, and he powered up the wet rope, lifting out of the cutting water. A quick glance to the side confirmed his team was on the move too.

  One, two, three... Colin continued to count off the team hauling ass up the side of the vessel like they were sprinting up Mt. Everest: Luke, Trace, Javier, Grayson, and Ryder.

  “All right.” All there. Colin yanked higher. Hand over hand, he walked up the side of the hull.

  “Team two, you’re a go. Breach, breach.”

  Delta team knew nothing about the second team, except—possibly—for Brock. This job had come from a confidential informant on short notice, and Titan Group pulled a special team out of nowhere to help. Delta would likely never see them again.

  Colin pulled himself over the rails, crouching and searching the perimeter. The cargo liner was longer than three football fields, a significant reason why they needed backup. “On board, all accounted for.”

  “Team two breaching.”

  Their plans were simple. Delta would take command while the second team, whose commanding officer referred to as assholes once or twice, provided defensive coverage as needed.

  But that was only to secure the ship. The real work would start after they took control of the vessel, but neither team had been told what that would be, despite their top-secret operational clearances.

  “Team two on board and covering your asses, Delta.”

  “Roger that.” Colin raised a fist as a signal to hold and watched for his team to find him.

  “You’ve got a green light,” Brock said.

  Colin dropped his fist and gave the move-out motion. Delta climbed from the ship’s outer plating. Colin forced himself from the last one up to the first one forward, moving to assess the deck-side threats before his teammates could stare down the barrel of an assault rifle. Clear as far as he could see—nothing but cargo containers stacked end upon end. “Delta, we’re clear.”

  They stayed low, switching their water gear for close-quarter weapons. Colin signaled to move for the bridge deck.

  The ship was eerily perfect, nothing out of place. Too clean, too quiet.

  Trace grumbled. “Where the hell is everyone?”

  “Hell if I know.” Luke moved toward a tight corner, providing cover as they slipped by.

  Colin took the next corner. “Home base, you hear this? No one is on deck.”

  “Roger that,” Brock answered.

  “Roger,” team two’s CO said. “My team? What’re you seeing?”

  “Same. Like a ghost ship.”

  “Quarterdeck ahead,” he apprised Brock.

  Space was cramped. Grayson and Javier came forward while Ryder trained his weapon on the door. Luke turned to watch the Aussie’s back.

  Colin nodded to his coverage. “Let’s do this.”

  Javier knelt, ready to pull the door where captain and crew had to be.

  “If Titan Group sent us on a ghost run, we’re having words, Brock.” Grayson angled high.

  “Keep your eyes open,” their team leader said. “No one’s leaving this ship unattended.”

  “That bodes well,” Javier mumbled.

  Adrenaline-fueled blood thumped in Colin’s ears. A blind op with a team he didn’t know, an unfamiliar location with a green light to engage—what the hell was Delta team doing in the Indian Ocean on a cargo liner? Tracking stolen Mercedes or fake Prada purses?

  “On my count,” Colin whispered.

  Javier and Grayson nodded.

  “Three, two, one, and—”

  Javier yanked the door, dropping down with his weapon trained as Colin rushed t
hrough with no idea what was waiting on the other side of the windowless door.

  Three men froze in place, two standing and one in his chair. A cigar smoked in an ashtray. Dinner and drinks sat on a table and bar.

  “Hands up! Hands up!” Colin shouted, motioning with his gun. “Hands in the air.”

  Grayson went right, Javier the other way, their voices loud and demanding the same thing: compliance or else.

  In Colin’s earpiece, the second team’s words flew. Hostile fire. Heavy engagement. But they had Delta covered.

  Colin surged forward, reissuing Delta’s orders. Two men had AK-47s within their immediate reach. One man stayed at his dinner with a steak knife and fork in hand.

  “Drop the knife,” Colin ordered.

  The man stood slowly, not dropping his utensils.

  The other men didn’t talk, didn’t look at one another, but their faces were the same. Dead eyes. Parted lips. But their look wasn’t desperate. It wasn’t fear.

  Javier shouted in language after language. Grayson layered orders for hands up with aggressive gestures. Taking anyone on the ship alive had been a direct request, but those weapons were too close.

  “Update,” Brock questioned Colin quietly, relying on him to be his eyes because their live feed from the weapons cam had a significant delay.

  Colin couldn’t explain the unmoving silence, how the three men were the living dead, smothering the tight space.

  “We’re not here to hurt you,” Colin explained without lowering his weapon. “Hands in the air. We just want to talk to you.”

  The man at dinner drove his knife into his own chest. An agonizing cry gurgled into a drowning cough.

  Colin gasped. “What the—”

  “Hell!” Grayson shouted.

  The two men reached for their weapons, and Delta fired. Blood splattered. Heavy thuds of guns hit the ground before the men toppled, dead.

  Colin’s lungs raced. “What just happened?”

  “Report,” Brock snapped.

  Colin took his finger off the trigger and glanced at his sides. Grayson and Javier stared, as dumbfounded as he was.

  “Yeah.” Colin cleared his throat. “Clear.”

  “I asked for a report, damn it.”

  He ran a hand over his face and let his weapon hang. “Three tangoes down. One suicide. Delta accounted for.”

  Both team leaders cursed. Orders had been to take anyone of value alive, if possible.

  “Brock,” Colin asked quietly. The two men had been outmaneuvered and outgunned. Why had they reached after the first one killed himself? Made zero sense.

  His team leader groused. “Yeah?”

  “We’d tear apart this room, but—” Colin circled. “It’s barren. You want us to start searching now?”

  “Yeah,” Brock muttered. “Let’s get a move on. Time is of the essence.”

  All right. That wasn’t much to go on. Maybe something with a timer or a detonator. “What are we looking for?”

  Brock’s long breath carried through the earpieces, as though he, too, were tired of their fight tonight. “Containers.”

  “Got about a thousand of those,” Javier added. “Anything more specific when we look inside?”

  “You’ll see people.”

  CHAPTER TWO

  “This is the one.” The second team radioed in. “We’ve found the container ID.”

  Colin and the Delta team came to a standstill, listening to the report from the opposite side of the carrier.

  “Roger that,” their CO responded. “Get Delta your location.”

  “Second level, top side, deck grid 404.”

  Colin circled his fist in the air, and they changed directions, eyes still wary and on the lookout. Given the Kamikaze situation in the quarterdeck and the amount of fire the second team had taken, he was taking no chances. They moved swiftly but with an overabundance of caution.

  “Eyes up—fangs up.” Colin’s trigger finger remained ready as they advanced. “Keep your heads on a swivel.”

  They hustled with light steps, but still their boots creaked on the metal ladder rungs. Old, metal catwalks moaned under their collective weight. Each rusty scrape drifted into the salty wind, warning any rogue crew of Delta’s whereabouts. “We’re thirty seconds out.”

  And there was no telling what—or how—the inside of that container might be protected. What else could be on this ship? Were people worth that much money?

  Delta rounded the corner, and Colin slowed, lowering his assault rifle as they approached. Sparks flew. Flame torches worked in tandem with the bolt cutters as they cut multiple locks on the container.

  “Delta’s here.” But Colin shook his head, not wanting to report the obvious. The intel was dead wrong. Or the contents were simply dead because not a sound, not a cry for help, a plea, wail, or sob came from inside.

  Delta had rescued enough human trafficking victims to expect panicked and cautiously hopeful bangs and kicks against the old metal walls. By now, the heartbreaking pleas of victims would wail, begging their saviors to stay.

  The final lock fell, and the metal-on-metal clang bled so lonely into the gusty night that no one moved. They killed the flames, and the bolt cutters dropped. The metal clunk clamored in his ears, and he dropped his chin to his collarbone, slicing away a fraction of the airflow to his lungs. He didn’t want to watch, dreading what he should be hardened to. Colin steeled his mind to bear witness to another human tragedy.

  “Hell, sir,” team two muttered. “Not sure if we’re here in time.”

  “Open the door,” Brock ordered.

  A man cleared his throat. “Roger that.”

  His team stepped forward, the lack of energy and hope palpable. Delta closed in behind them as everyone prepared for a handful of dead bodies taken against their will and placed in the most absurd circumstances Colin had heard of: an ocean liner. It was un-survivable—inhumane and torture at best. Breathing and eating? The elements? Freezing or the heat? It would be unpredictable. They’d be cooked alive or frozen solid—no telling—depending on the surrounding freight containers and the shipping route.

  “Here we go.” One man pulled off the final lock while another pried open the door assembly.

  The rear door swung open—nothing but crates marked “imports.”

  “Nothing here,” someone muttered.

  A moment of relief pushed fresh oxygen into his blood. A high hit so quickly it felt like injecting a drug. But the diversion was a ruse. They’d seen obstacles’ deceptive appearances too many times before, though for now, they didn’t have the machinery to move pallets of warehouse goods and still hadn’t heard any signs of life.

  But if there’s a chance… Colin eased next to the operative directing the second team, and they exchanged knowing looks. Both were of the same mindset. Colin clapped his hands. “Let’s go.”

  Both teams appraised the rear-end and top-side frames and the sidewall and top panels, while others inspected the wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling, plastic-wrapped barrier, breaking into smaller teams to move pallets by hand or tear apart the metal container.

  They grunted and unslung weapons, getting better grips on the cargo, tried again, and stripped off more gear. The two teams lifted a plastic-wrapped pallet of god-knew-what and pitched it over. The plastic-wrapped pallet cracked and splintered as building materials poured free, but with the gaping hole they’d created into the shipping container, a putrid stink rolled out in a cloud of filth.

  Colin gagged. Both teams recoiled, cursing and gasping, and their boots shuffled away. “Holy shit.”

  Death stained the air they’d breathed, and he didn’t blame those who choked on its foulness.

  “Report,” Brock ordered.

  Colin didn’t want to take the breath needed to give a report. His eyes watered as more than one man donned a facemask. “Rancid decay.”

  “Survivors?” the second team’s CO demanded.

  “Not possible.” At least he hoped not. Col
in wiped his eyes and spat the taste of bile from his mouth.

  Colin didn’t know was why they weren’t given a heads up on this assignment. This was nightmare inducing, the type of scene that would stop an operative in his tracks. What could be so confidential that they’d risk two teams going in blind to find intel or for a simple enough rescue had anyone been alive?

  Colin turned around, following one of the many escaping from this gate of hell—

  “Saa’adinii?”

  His mind processed the scared, unknown whisper before his boots stopped moving. His ears tingled. The man to his right froze as well, and Colin cocked his head, hearing nothing but the crash of angry waves and the clomp of disgusted operatives stealing down metal catwalks to anywhere but here.

  His skin pricked. The hollow metal wheezed in the frigid wind. Colin pivoted, as did the man next to him.

  “Delta, hold up,” he hesitantly said.

  The other team’s commander offered the same.

  But no one advanced, wary of what had to be the impossible: that Colin had heard the quietest cry for help whispered from the black hole of hell.

  Certainty surged through Colin, and he pulled his facemask up and grabbed his mag light off his hip. With a prayer, he hoisted himself into the container, crawling on top of the bottom crate and crawled toward the darkness. “Hello?”

  “Hww-llo?” a young voice mimicked.

  He carefully aimed his flashlight toward the ceiling then at the sidewall panel. If they hadn’t seen a bright light in days, it would hurt. “My name is Colin. I won’t hurt you.”

  “Hang tight,” Brock said. “Parker tried to pull that audio and may’ve got it. He sent Nicola an audio clip.”

  Nicola Garrison, on Titan’s main team, could pick up a language and dialect faster than most people could use Google Translate. A minute later, thanks to Parker and Nicola, Colin was repeating very poorly spoken Arabic variations of, “I’m a helper. Here to help. A good person. Will rescue you,” before allowing his light to fall into the container.

  His stomach turned with the first pass of his flashlight. Unsure he could find his voice, Colin let his nausea pass before he admitted, “This is bad, boss.”

  “We’ve seen bad. You guys will get through this.”

  “Not like this.” Only a few young ladies were still standing. There were enough dead on the ground that they stacked on top of each other, and when all had been alive, they had been packed in like cattle—literally, like animals. His flashlight followed the top of the container where a metal rigger looked as if it held a water supply that could be accessed the way his grade-school gerbil had in its cage. “We’ll do what we have to do.”