Balance of Trust Read online

  BOOKS BY

  CHARLES GEOFFREY

  Coming in 2018…

  Jerome Bender Thrillers

  Balance of Trust

  (free novella on website)

  Force of Bullets

  Blood of Assassins

  Chris Clemmons Thrillers

  Kill Sight

  DEDICATION

  For all the men and women who keep our country out of harm’s way…

  COPYRIGHT

  Copyright © 2018 by Geoffrey Saign

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Cover by Damonza

  Interior design by Lazar Kackarovski

  For email updates from Charles Geoffrey go to

  www.charlesgeoffrey.com

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  BOOKS BY CHARLES GEOFFREY

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Excerpt from FORCE OF BULLETS

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  “Love begins by taking care of the closest ones—the ones at home.”

  ~ Mother Teresa ~

  (1910–1997)

  Chapter 1

  Op: HELLFIRE

  Major Jerome Bender stepped off the plane and onto the tarmac, his thoughts turning to three terrorists he had to kill.

  He immediately slipped his black Lycra hood over his head so only his eyes and mouth were visible. A Jeep pulled up beside him. He got into the front passenger seat and ignored the driver, who did the same to him. The sun had already set, but the late July heat felt good.

  They stopped at a two-prop amphibious seaplane, where he climbed the steps to a rear passenger seat and buckled in.

  He needed a clear head so he allowed Carol’s words to float through him once more: You promised to quit after Afghanistan. Your daughter needs you. I need you. We should be your priority. You need to choose.

  Carol and his daughter Rachel were disappointed that he had left on another Op six months after returning from Afghanistan. He couldn’t tell them that he had been asked to leave Army Special Forces to secretly enroll in the newly-formed Blackhood Ops.

  However, he didn’t think he needed to choose family over Ops. They both mattered. And Blackhood didn’t put his family at risk—eliminating terrorist threats made Carol and Rachel safer. Satisfied with his logic, he let it go and closed his eyes to get some rest.

  An hour later the copilot said, “Get ready. Twenty minutes.”

  On the floor was a large duffel bag. Bender unzipped it. From it he retrieved a sheathed Ka-Bar seven-inch fixed blade knife—he liked the leather handle—and attached the sheath to his belt.

  Next he pulled out a Glock 19 with attached suppressor and side holster, along with a SIG MCX Rattler—the rifle-caliber machine gun had a red dot sight, suppressor, and carry strap. Its folding stock and short barrel made it easy to conceal. Both guns had their serial numbers filed off.

  He put on the hip holster and slung the Rattler carry strap over his head. He also had a Benchmade 3300BK Infidel auto OTF blade in a horizontal belt-sheath against his back, beneath his untucked flannel shirt.

  Lastly he pulled out a medium-sized waterproof sling bag made of tough Cordura, which he also looped over his head. He quickly slipped into the harness of his square parachute and slid open the side door. The night air was cool. He was glad he had a waterproof windbreaker over his flannel shirt. His jeans kept his legs warm.

  In a minute the copilot said, “Go.”

  He jumped.

  Waiting only a few seconds, he pulled the rip cord. The chute opened softly with a small tug on his harness. The moonlight allowed him to see the water shimmering below. Using the steering lines, he aimed toward a narrow beach at the eastern edge of the lake.

  As he neared his destination he noted the wind was out of the north. He steered into it, slowing his forward motion. The fresh scent of lake water drifted up to him.

  In a minute he landed on his hiking boots, walking forward with relative ease. He yanked on a line to collapse the chute. Working fast, he bunched it up and carried it to the tree line where he covered it with brush and sticks. He would retrieve it when the boat came for the extraction at midnight the following day.

  He unzipped the sling bag. Its inner pockets held beef jerky and protein bars, a compass, canteen, small flashlight, binoculars, heavy-duty black zip ties, night vision monocular, first aid kit, and two spare mags for each gun.

  He also had a small battery-operated wireless radio, a throat mike, and an earpiece. No long-range radio or sat phone.

  The U.S. government didn’t want an international crisis with an ally so they would be communication silent. And given the low-tech nature of the impending terrorist attack, there would be no real-time tracking with drones or satellites. For security, the general running Blackhood Ops didn’t want any record anyway, preferring to minimize the number of personnel who knew about the Op.

  He slid the mike around his neck, attached the earpiece, and pocketed the small radio.

  Before he left home, he had memorized the target location and the rendezvous point. The other two men had come in from different areas of the country. Colonel Danker had been ordered to restrict the number of operatives to three since they were in Canada. Blackhood also believed the targets were not highly trained.

  Bender estimated he had two klicks to reach the rendezvous point.

  He lined up the compass and walked into the birch and pine trees. Looping the canteen over his head along with the sling bag, he kept the moon over his left shoulder. The ground was soft beneath his boots, his pace constant over low hills and through gullies.

  In the distance a northern saw-whet owl gave its high-pitched too-too-too. He paused to listen. Otherwise the forest was quiet, calming him. He had a deep abiding love of wildlife and nature.

  He also loved the night. Moving in the dark was second nature to him after caving for decades. That ability often provided another advantage over the enemy.

  Colonel Danker had briefed him early in the morning to lead the first Blackhood Op in hurry-up status, which had left him little time to prepare with his virtual reality program. The military had developed the VR program to increase Blackhood operatives’ skill development. He had used it obsessively for six months to hone his elite skills developed in martial arts, Special Forces, and Delta Force.

  He practiced using a full-body haptic suit—including boots, gloves, a headpiece, and goggles. The VR program could simulate inclines, uneven ground, temperature shifts, pain, and any kind of fighting he might encounter with either hand to hand or weapon scenarios.

  He loved the program and had convinced his superiors to allow him to install it in his barn. It gave him a level of preparedness that he had never thought possible.

  His thoughts turned to the mission. An ISIS splinter group had recruited three Canadians to cross the border into Minnesota. Colonel Danker had said intel indicated the terrorists intended to use pipe bombs to hit random crowded areas or cause train derailments. Blackhood analysts believed the s
uspects would be supplied with munitions in Minnesota.

  Bender had listened to Danker, imagining Carol and Rachel in their favorite restaurant for breakfast, ending up bloodied or dead. He wouldn’t allow these men to bring that kind of chaos to his country.

  Blackhood Ops had tracked the three suspected terrorists during overseas trips, where it was believed they made contact with the ISIS splinter group.

  Still, Canada didn’t agree that the intel was solid enough for an arrest and refused to incarcerate the men—especially since the three suspects were Canadian citizens without any criminal or military background. In addition, since ISIS had been largely routed out of Iraq over a year ago, many countries viewed the terrorist organization as less of a threat.

  Even if Canada arrested the suspects, Blackhood Ops determined that the charges would be dropped based on lack of evidence. Meanwhile Blackhood had learned the trio were on their way to a remote cabin owned by one of the suspects. The cabin wasn’t far from the U.S. border.

  The highly classified Blackhood Ops charter gave the President permission to terminate suspected terrorists on foreign soil if they posed an imminent threat and couldn’t be brought to a successful closed trial. Thus he had signed off on the covert mission.

  In a half-hour Bender reached a river. He followed it fifty yards south and stopped, waiting.

  In a minute a small flashlight blinked three times ahead of him. Digging out his flashlight, he gave three blinks back. One blink returned. He gave two blinks in response. The signals had been prearranged to exclude any possibility of one of them being captured and someone else using the radio.

  He still approached the destination carefully, moving from tree to tree until he saw two men standing on the shore of the river beside a canoe. They both wore similar Lycra hoods.

  Blackhood operatives weren’t allowed to see each other’s faces or share any personal information or names. They also were not allowed to make contact during an Op with anyone except their fellow operatives. Bender appreciated the precautions because they helped maintain Op secrecy and protected the operatives.

  Walking in closer, he stopped twenty feet away, studying them both carefully. He gave his call sign. “Al.” He gave the Op name next, which also served as the code name. “Hellfire.”

  The stocky man answered first, his voice calm and steady. “Brad.”

  Brad was a few inches shorter than Bender’s six-two frame and also wore jeans and a drab green pullover beneath a hooded rain jacket. Maybe forty. He was second in command, should things go south.

  Brad pointed to the other man. “Charlie.”

  Wiry and a bit taller than Bender, Charlie wore black jeans and a dark green plaid flannel shirt beneath a black jacket. Sounding as if he was in his late twenties, he lifted his chin in acknowledgment and said, “Al.”

  Brad had a Rattler slung over his shoulder, but Charlie had a silenced HK416 carbine fitted with a holographic laser sight. Holographic sights had high accuracy, but a shorter battery life than a red dot—still adequate for a one-day mission. They both had Glocks, knives, sling bags, throat mikes, and earpieces.

  “How long have you been waiting?” asked Bender.

  “An hour,” said Brad. “What’s the plan, Al?”

  “Cross the river and walk east three hours before we camp.”

  They pushed the canoe out, got in, and paddled across, watching the far bank carefully.

  Bender was in the stern, scanning the opposite shoreline. His daughter, Rachel, would love a night hike and paddle like this. He resolved to take her and Carol to a cabin when he returned home.

  After crossing sixty yards of water, they beached the canoe and pulled it up on shore to hide it. They were now in Canada. Bender checked the compass and moon, and then led the others east.

  Thirty minutes later soft sounds to the north startled him. He dropped to his knees behind a tree with the others. Charlie and Brad immediately had their guns up. Bender noted Brad’s steady grip on his weapon and his relaxed breathing, while Charlie regripped his gun.

  Using the night vision monocular, Bender scanned north. “Black bears,” he whispered.

  A mother and two cubs. He enjoyed watching them, glad to see them move off farther north. He mentally played out several scenarios of the bears blundering into their path on the way out. Not a problem. But they would have to be alert. Rising, he continued hiking.

  After another two and a half hours he found a suitable clump of trees for camp.

  He motioned to the others. “Brad, you and Charlie get some rest. I’ll take first watch, Brad second. We leave before dawn.”

  Both men moved toward a tree to unpack and sleep.

  Bender found a tree to sit against, placing the guns beside him on the moss-covered ground. The north side of the tree had more moss on it—typical due to less sunshine hitting it.

  By his calculations they were four hours south of the target cabin. Blackhood wasn’t sure of the terrorists’ entry point into Minnesota. Due south made the most sense but wasn’t a given.

  He had to silence concerns about not knowing who he was working with. Brad moved with practiced strides, held his weapon with confidence, and scanned his surroundings continually. Charlie seemed more reactive—which could be a problem in a tense situation. But Colonel Danker had insisted both men were highly skilled.

  He drank some water. Brad relieved him in a few hours to take watch.

  Bender fell asleep in minutes.

  He woke to movement on his left. Charlie was a dark figure squatting down by his gear. Time to go. He stretched, drank water, and chewed jerky. Brad was kneeling, readying his gear.

  Brad stood and stepped close to Bender. Charlie quickly joined them.

  Bender talked tersely. “We hike north for eight klicks. The three targets are at an isolated cabin on a lake. All males, mid-to-late twenties. We’ll assess strategy when we arrive. Intel suggests they’ll have small arms and plan to acquire more weapons once they cross the border. We want to take at least one of them alive for interrogation. Termination follows. No one else is expected to be there. Noncombatants are expendable if they support the terrorists or threaten mission success. Questions?”

  Charlie and Brad remained silent.

  Bender nodded. “Brad, you take point. I’ll bring up the rear.”

  Brad turned and led them into the woods at a steady pace.

  Bender followed Charlie, preferring to keep both men ahead of him. He wanted to make sure they weren’t followed. That seemed unlikely, but he had learned long ago to expect the unexpected.

  As dawn approached, the forest slowly awoke. Cardinal songs and blue jay cries broke the silence, along with crows cawing among the spruce and aspen trees. A northern flicker pounded a trunk in the distance and the scent of pine filled the air. Normally Bender would stop to enjoy the beauty. All of it had a peaceful quality, at odds with the mission he was leading.

  Brad kept a brisk pace through the trees for several hours. When he stopped, he held up a hand and whispered into his mike, “Lake just ahead, cabin visible to our west.”

  Bender didn’t want to be spotted by anyone in the cabin. “Circle west to a hundred yards from the rear door, Brad.”

  “Roger that.”

  Brad led them for another ten minutes at a fast pace to the northwest, stopping at the bottom of a forty-five-degree incline of twenty feet. He raised a hand.

  Charlie stopped and surveyed the eastern terrain, while Bender walked past him and Brad. Gripping the Rattler, Bender continued a dozen yards and knelt to survey the forest to the north.

  Brad crouched and hustled up the hill, stopping near the top. In one smooth motion he went down to his knees, and then his belly, slowly crawling out of sight over the top of the hill.

  In a minute Brad’s voice came through their earpieces. “Cabin just ahead. Back door facing west with two small rear windows. No targets visible. There’s a trip-wire attached to a claymore a few feet ahead of me.”
>
  Bender didn’t like it. The claymore suggested the terrorists wanted to guarantee there were no surprise attacks. They were waiting for something. He discarded the Blackhood intel that the terrorists were just amateurs recruited for random acts of violence in the U.S. The claymore suggested something bigger was at stake.

  He quickly ran through options in his head, keeping his voice a whisper. “Brad, signal when the claymore is cleared, eyes on the back door. Charlie, after Brad signals, head east to the lake. I’ll take north. We’ll come in from all three directions. Watch for trip-wires and command-activated claymores closer in. Give the cabin a wide perimeter. Charlie and I on the front door. Brad, the back door.”

  Charlie nodded, and Brad responded with, “Roger that.”

  Bender strode another ten yards north, surveying the forest, while keeping an eye on the top of the hill. Charlie walked ten yards east and took a knee, slowly swinging his gun along his sightline.

  In a minute Brad’s voice came through Bender’s earpiece; “Claymore secured.”

  Bender watched Charlie walk east, and he strode north.

  A loud whomp! split the air.

  Chapter 2

  Bender flinched and stopped, recognizing the sound of a claymore.

  The forest turned silent.

  Charlie froze. Bender pointed to him and then up the hill.

  Charlie crept up the incline, on his belly at the top. He turned to Bender and shook his head, circling his face with a finger and drawing the same finger across the front of his neck.

  Bender shoved down his distress over losing his best man. Also the terrorists would be alerted now. He pumped a fist up and down and pointed due east—which should take Charlie outside any claymore trip-wires and get him to the lake to cover any attempted escape.

  Charlie took off running.

  Bender bolted northwest in a crouch, moving fast while keeping a wide distance from the cabin. Brad must have triggered a second claymore. There was a good chance his body was visible from the cabin. He hoped the terrorists hadn’t set explosives farther out.