Plague Ship

Eddie thought about this for a moment before saying, “I was with Kovac for only a minute before I escaped, but I could see that. The guy looks like Boris Karloff, with crazier eyes. I just thought of something. Kovac said that Severance gave him explicit orders not to kill Je

“They don’t know if Kyle talked to him during the time he was with us.”

“No. What I mean is, why not simply kill them both? They had the opportunity, and it would have been a lot easier.”

“Same reason. They need to know if Kyle talked.”

“Max is in for a rough time, isn’t he?”

“Yeah,” Juan said softly. “Yeah, he is.”

“What do you want me to do?” Eddie said after a lengthy pause, as both men thought about the implications of Cabrillo’s answer.

“Meet the Oregon in Monaco. I’m putting you in charge of the eavesdropping job.”

“You’re still going to the Philippines?” Eddie was surprised.

“I have to,” Juan replied, resignation in his voice. “We need some sort of leverage over Severance if we’re going to get Max back.”

“It’s going to take the better part of a day just to get you there. God knows how long to find something, even if it exists. Do you really think Max can hold out that long?” Juan’s next words were as much for his benefit as they were Eddie’s. “You don’t know this because Max never talks about it, but he spent six months as a POW during his second tour in Vietnam. The stuff they did to him during his confinement defies belief. He’ll hold out. Of that, I am certain.”

“Juan, that was forty years ago. Max isn’t a young man anymore.”

“Surviving torture isn’t about your physical strength. It’s about how tough you are mentally. Do you think Max has lost any of that? If anything, he’s tougher now than he was then. And he knows that we will do whatever it takes to get him back.”

“How did he get out of it? Was he rescued?”

“No. During a forced march to a new location, he and two buddies jumped their guards. They killed four VC with their bare hands and vanished into the jungle. Only Max found his way to an American firebase.

The other two are still considered MIA.”

JUAN WAS ON THE WING BRIDGE of the pilothouse just after dawn the next morning to watch the sun reveal the principality of Monaco and the city of Monte Carlo perched on rocky cliffs over the warm Mediterranean. One of the last functioning monarchies in the world, the tiny state had been ruled by the Grimaldi family for more than seven centuries. Only Japan’s Chrysanthemum Throne was longer lived.

Monaco was long a playground for the world’s elite and its harbor was carpeted with gleaming luxury yachts, many over a hundred feet in length, several approaching three hundred. Juan spotted the Matryoshka, the target of the eavesdropping job on Russian arms merchant Ivan Kerikov. High-rise apartment blocks rose all around the harbor, and luxury villas clung to the hillsides. He knew that real estate here was some of the most expensive in the world. From his vantage, he couldn’t see the fabled Monte Carlo casino, but he had a few fond memories of the place.

From within the i

The speedboat ate the distance to the ship at nearly sixty knots, cutting across the light chop like an offshore racer. Juan descended to the main deck near the ship’s boarding ladder. Linc was waiting for him with their overnight bags, his eyes hidden behind stylish sunglasses.

“I don’t like leaving right now,” the big former SEAL said, and not for the first time.

“This is the best way we’re going to get Max back. I’ve called Thom Severance’s office in California a dozen times, all but telling them who I am and what I know, and the bastard won’t call back. We’ve got to force his hand and to do that we need leverage.”

“Langston Overholt won’t help?”

“Not without evidence. I talked to him for an hour last night. The bottom line is, the Responsivists have a lot of money, which means they have a lot of clout in Washington. Lang won’t act on anything other than solid proof that Severance is up to something.”

“This sucks.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Why don’t we bypass the Philippines, go straight to the source, and take on Severance for ourselves?”

“Don’t think I haven’t thought of that. Lang warned me specifically about not going after Severance. And you and I both know if we get caught operating in the United States, we will never see the outside of a prison again.”

“So we don’t get caught.”

Juan looked at his friend. Linc was dead serious. “If it comes down to that, I’ll put it to the crew.” He knew every member of the Corporation would risk everything to get Hanley back, even if they knew they would never get another contract from Overholt again, which the cagey CIA veteran had threatened if Thomas Severance or his wife so much as suggested they were under surveillance.

The executive water taxi pulled up alongside the ship. As sleek and beautiful as the boat was, it was nothing compared to its driver, a young blonde wearing a blouse that couldn’t be cut any lower and a skirt that couldn’t be raised any higher. With their chopper still in pieces down in the hangar, the harbor taxi was the fastest way to shore without calling undue attention to the Oregon .

“Capitaine Cabrillo, je suis Donatella,” she called over the burble of the boat’s idling engine. Her accent sent a wolfish grin flashing across Linc’s face.

“Only in Monaco,” Juan whispered to Linc.

“You think some rich guy wants an ugly driver taking him out to his yacht after a night at the casino?” The young woman kept her craft steady by holding the boarding ladder as the two men made their way down with leather duffels over their shoulders. At the end of the twenty-foot climb, Juan tossed his bag onto the rear bench seat and stepped over the gunwale.

“Thank you,” he said.

When Linc jumped into the boat, it bobbed as if it had been hit by a wave. Donatella gave them both a big smile, her eyes lingering on Linc much longer than Cabrillo, as she reached for the chrome throttle controls.

“Chairman! Hold up!” Eric Stone leaned far over the railing overhead to get his attention.

“What is it?”

“I found something.”

“Can it wait? They’re holding a chopper for us to take us to the airport in Nice.”

“Hold on a sec.” Eric climbed over the rail and awkwardly descended the ladder while clutching a laptop computer. He noticed Donatella for the first time when he reached the boat but barely gave her a first, let alone a second, glance. Obviously, he was distracted by whatever news he had.

Juan nodded to her and she eased forward on the throttles. He went aft to let Linc chat her up while he pushed aside their luggage so he and Eric could sit. They had to raise their voices over the rush of the wind and the throb of the powerful motor.

“What do you have?” Juan asked.

Eric opened his computer. “I’ve been checking for any unusual incidents that may have occurred on ships where the Responsivists were holding their Sea Retreats.”

“Did you find anything?”

“Did I? Oh yeah. Do you remember recently how there have been reports of viral outbreaks on cruise ships, usually a gastrointestinal norovirus?”

“Seems there have been a lot more in the past couple of years,” Juan remarked.

“It’s not a coincidence. At first, I was checking passenger manifests from the cruise companies.” Juan didn’t need to ask how Eric obtained such confidential information. “I cross-referenced those to Responsivist membership lists. When I started seeing a pattern, I switched my focus to cruise liners struck by unusual illnesses. That’s when I hit pay dirt. Of the seventeen outbreaks I’ve looked into in the past two years, sixteen of them occurred when Responsivists were on board. The seventeenth wasn’t a norovirus and was traced back to E. coli found on lettuce grown on one specific farm in California. That strain also hit people in Florida, Georgia, and Alabama.”