Piranha (Oregon Files 10)

“How far?” Linda asked.

Eric looked at his GPS, then craned his neck and pointed. “That should be it up on the left.”

The sign above the shop read “Buceo De Diego.” Next to the name was a red flag with a white diagonal slash through it, the international symbol for scuba diving. It had the reputation for the best equipment outside of Santo Domingo.

They all got out of the PIG and entered the shop. It wasn’t a huge establishment, but the walls were lined with all of the latest tanks, regulators, fins, and buoyancy vests.

The athletic shopkeeper, who looked like a diver himself and was busy unpacking a box of masks, said, “Buenos días. Can I help you?” The four of them obviously weren’t locals.

“Oh, good, you speak English,” Linda said as if she were a tourist relieved not to have to break out her broken Spanish.

“We get many Americans here, of course. Are you and your friends interested in a dive trip?”

“We are, but we’re planning to go on our own, so we’d like to buy our equipment.” She withdrew a thick wad of cash from her pocket.

That made the shopkeeper jump to his feet and forget his unpacking duties.

“You will not regret it,” he said, trying in vain not to stare at the pile of American dollars. “We have many of the best reefs in the world in the Dominican Republic.”

“Actually,” Linda said, pointing at a Nomad side mount tank rig, “we want to go cave diving.”

Although the sky was clear, the deck of the aging 200-foot cargo ship Reina Azul, or Blue Queen, bucked in heavy seas churned up by a storm east of Nicaragua. Dayana Ruiz longed for her sleek frigate Mariscal Sucre to slice through the waves, but this mission required a covert command. She’d selected a handpicked crew of her most trusted officers who’d collaborated with her on the smuggling operation. Their naval uniforms had been left behind in Venezuela.

For her absence, she’d given the excuse that she would be observing the UNITAS joint exercises from the deck of a Cuban frigate. A Cuban admiral who owed her a favor would provide a convincing alibi.

They were ten hours from the coast of Haiti. The Doctor had assured her that the Oregon’s destination was somewhere along the western shore, although he wouldn’t explain how he knew. Ruiz found the entire situation oddly unsettling. She wasn’t used to being kept in the dark about information. Information was power and in regard to the Doctor she had very little of either. However, the video images that he infrequently sent her showing the Oregon and her crew convinced her of the accuracy of his information but also enraged her every time she saw them. The most recent showed the ship departing from Puerto Plata on a westerly course toward Haiti, and she would make certain this would be their last rendezvous.

Taking the Mariscal Sucre into battle outside of Venezuelan territorial waters had been out of the question, especially when Ruiz was planning to attack so close to another country’s coastline. Subterfuge had been the only alternative. With a top speed of just fifteen knots and no defensive capabilities, the Reina Azul was obviously no match for the Oregon in a one-on-one duel, but hiding on her deck in plain sight was a secret that would give Ruiz the opportunity to sink her.

She scanned the horizon and saw no ships. The rudimentary radar on board confirmed that they were alone.

“Begin the test,” she said to the captain.

He relayed the orders, and Ruiz trained her eyes on a gray cargo container bolted to the deck. It looked exactly like all the other cargo containers on board, but this one held a hidden surprise.

“Raising to firing position,” a voice on the intercom said.

The roof of the container pivoted up and four green tubes two-thirds the length of the container began to rise from beneath it, forced into place by a hydraulic ram. Encased in each tube was a Russian 3M-54 Klub-K antiship missile armed with a six-hundred-pound warhead. The turbojet engine enabled it to cruise no more than thirty feet above the waves until it got within three miles of the target, at which point its multistage solid-fuel rocket fired to propel it to s

upersonic speeds. Each missile was extremely difficult to evade or shoot down and she had four of them.

She had acquired the concealed weapons system to sell to a Hezbollah cell that planned to target Israeli shipping. One of the few pieces of hardware Juan Cabrillo hadn’t managed to destroy in his raid would end up sending him to the bottom of the Caribbean.

“Report,” Ruiz said after the tubes had stopped at their fully vertical launch position, conveniently hidden by the stacks of containers on either side.

“All systems functioning normally,” said the missile officer inside the cargo container’s tiny control room. “But Admiral, the targeting radar is completely dependent on the ship’s system, which is too crude for a lock, especially if there are multiple ships in the area. The missile will have to make target acquisition once it’s in flight, so we can only fire one at a time.”

“What?” she shouted. “Unacceptable!”

“I’m sorry, Admiral,” came the stammering reply, “but we’re not very familiar with this weapons system.”

“Fine,” she said, stewing in anger. “Then we will have to attack when there are no other ships around the Oregon.”

“Aye, Admiral.”

“Good. Close it back up.” She turned to the captain. “Have you heard from our escort ships?”

He nodded. “They will meet us in the Canal de la Gonâve near Port-au-Prince. All they know is that they are to sail alongside us.”