“All right, all right, we’re good to move in!” Soto cried over the intercom. He removed his helmet and tugged on his gas mask, as the others had already done.
The Black Hawk banked hard, causing Moore to tighten his grip on the edge of his narrow seat. The three FES troops seated directly across from him, their knees nearly banging against Moore’s, grew wide-eyed. In addition to their alien-looking masks, they wore black combat helmets and matching fatigues, with heavy Kevlar vests beneath their shirts and the tactical web gear that covered their chests with pouches for knives, spare ammo, grenades, zipper cuffs, flashlights, compass, and canteens, and beneath that they wore their heavy pistol belts. Moore was dressed similarly, with patches on his shoulders, back, and chest that IDed him as “Marina.” His two trusted Glocks were tucked into a pair of TAC SERPA holsters at his hips, though he’d detached the suppressors. He had also been given a choice of an AK-103, an M16A2, or an M4 carbine. Did they have to ask? Of course, he chose the M4A1 with SOPMOD package, including Rail Interface System (RIS), flip-up rear sight, and Trijicon ACOG 4x scope. SOPMOD stood for Special Operations Peculiar Modification, and Moore considered himself a peculiar kind of guy, well suited to such a weapon. Besides, the rifle was exactly the type he’d often fielded on SEAL missions, and while the M16 he’d fired on Zúñiga’s roof had felt like home in his hands, the M4 felt like a million bucks. Now, with the gun balanced between his legs and his breath coming hard through the mask, he waited as they wheeled around once more and began to descend, the chopper’s engine revving.
At the far south side of the gardens and higher up the hillside stood a smaller building, a two-car detached garage that served as both a lawn and maintenance equipment storage facility and an armory for the guards.
A few of them were dashing toward the building when the pilot pulled back up and called out the targets to the crew chiefs, both of whom unleashed hell, their barrels rolling, the guns booming, tracers lashing out like red lasers toward the building, which began to shatter under the barrage of 7.62-millimeter fire. The portside gunner jerked his rifle to the left and cut down three guards. They were nearing the garage, just as motion-activated lights above the doors clicked on to reveal their bodies, bloody and still writhing.
Before Moore could fully take in that scene, the pilot cut the stick once more and descended sharply, bringing them in over that second-story sundeck at the southwest corner of the house.
The crew chief on the starboard side slid his arm under the first of two fast ropes attached to a support arm extending from the chopper’s open bay door. Each rope had been created out of a four-strand round braid that reduced kinking, created an outer pattern that was far easier to grip than any smooth rope, and allowed operators to better control the speed of their descent through a towel-wringing motion as they slid down. Each rope had been coiled into a loop with the diameter of a truck tire, and the crew chief sent the first one flying over the side, followed by the second.
Moore wasn’t just a little experienced with fast-roping out of a helicopter. He’d spent entire weekends doing it over and over and over again until he could fast-rope in his sleep. When the Navy was dropping you off somewhere, there was never any time for long good-byes or thanks for the hospitality. They booted your ass out of a helicopter, and down you went. As many a crew chief had advised him: Be ready.
“Ropes out,” the chief hollered in Spanish, then glanced over the side. “Ropes on the deck. Ropes clear and ready. Go, go, go!” He pointed at Moore and Towers, who threw off their safety harnesses and got to their feet.
Moore slid the M4 over his back, making sure the single-point storm sling was secure, then he shifted over to the rope on the right side, while Towers took the one on his left.
“One more radio check,” said Towers.
“J-One, this is J-Two, gotcha,” Moore answered. A toothpick-thin boom mike ran down the side of his cheek and was attached to an earpiece even smaller than the average cell phone’s Bluetooth headset.
“This is Marina One, I got you, too,” Soto added over the channel.
“All right, this is J-One. We are good to go!”
Moore braced himself, making sure his heavily padded gloves felt secure on the line. He leaned forward, then swung himself out of the chopper, beginning his descent, the rope firmly guided between his boots. He glanced over and saw Towers on his line, just a meter above. Allowing himself to slide a little faster, Moore craned his head down to better judge his speed and approach.
And that’s when something struck the helicopter with a muffled thud, followed by an ear-shattering explosion that sent Towers and Moore sliding wildly down the ropes.
Moore could barely see what was happening above him, but he felt a rush of heat and suddenly the rope was dragging him away from the sundeck and toward the lawn.
When he glanced up, he saw only smoke and flames.
Fernando Castillo lowered the rocket-propelled grenade launcher from his shoulder, then rushed back into the house, through the sliding glass patio doors. He began to cough, to feel sick to his stomach, because he’d breathed in a bit of the gas before putting on the gas mask and fetching the RPG from his closet.
As Jorge Rojas’s right-hand man and chief security man, Castillo had planned for every scenario his imagination could muster, and an assault using tear gas — or whatever kind of chemical agent the Navy was using against them — was not very creative.
He’d already called his boss, ordered him to go to his own closet gun safe, arm himself, and don his own gas mask. He would get down to the basement, where they would go through the vault within the vault and take a tunnel that led back up the hillside to the two-car garage, where inside was parked Castillo’s armored Mercedes. Castillo would try to hold off the attackers for as long as he could.
Beyond the doors, the helicopter plummeted in a great conflagration, crashing onto the hillside beside the garage, the rotors snapping off as though they were made of plastic, the secondary explosion and burning fuel igniting across the slope and creating walls of flames.
Castillo had but another second to turn away, drop the RPG, and lift his rifle. Waves of gunfire tore through the windows and, as he hit the deck and hunkered down behind a sofa, another volley blasted through, followed by the heavy footfalls of approaching soldiers.
After hearing the gunfire, the hissing of gas, and the much louder droning of the helicopter, Jorge Rojas had gone to his window and had spotted the truck across the street with the soldier launching grenades onto his property. Then Castillo had called.
God, it seemed, had come for Rojas.
And Rojas wished he had the courage of his brother to simply go out there and face his attackers, confront them head-on, but he had to escape. That was everything.
So he’d donned his bulletproof trench coat over his silk pajamas, fetched an AK-47 and spare magazine from his gun safe, along with the gas masks that Castillo had insisted they wear, then told Alexsi to meet him in the basement. She was frightened out of her mind, of course, and twice he’d had to scream at her: “Get to the basement!” She tugged the mask on and dashed off.
Rojas reached for his phone and speed-dialed Miguel. His son did not pick up, and the call went directly to voice mail.
Then what sounded like a great thunderclap came from the backyard, rattling the walls and throwing Rojas off balance.