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  Distressed: Enemy Of the State- Book 1

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  Table of Contents

  Distressed: Enemy Of the State- Book 1

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  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

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  Chapter 1

  The night air had an odd chill to it, despite the fact that it was still the dead of summer. Captain Dylan Turk attributed the cold to his ship’s occupants. The Egyptian foreigners walked the deck of the ship awkwardly, still without their sea legs. He’d fished the waters off the Eastern Atlantic Seaboard for more than fifteen years, and in all that time he’d never had a crew like this or carried such cargo as what lay in the belly of the ship.

  The fish holds that were meant to house tuna had been replaced with bombs and guns. But despite the change of cargo, Dylan still kept the same steady hand on the wheel, as though he were hauling in a full cache of seafood.

  It’d taken a few trips, but the terrorists had finally allowed him to stay in the wheelhouse unattended. It was a welcome relief from the constant guarding he’d experienced over the past week. Each ship he’d taken out had been different, but the one commonality had been the fact that they were fishing boats, which was Dylan’s area of expertise. It allowed for inconspicuous travel even in the heightened security that had engulfed the entire country.

  But the terrorists who had blackmailed him into running bombs and guns didn’t leave their fate just to the disguise of fishing ships. The technology of the boat allowed them to slide undetected through the waters, dodging the Navy and Coast Guard’s radar and making it to their destinations safely. Still, the dangers of being spotted by line of sight were always present, and they wouldn’t be able to outrun a warship.

  Moonlight shone down onto the deck and lit up the unused nets and gear below. Despite whatever cloaking device the ship carried, Dylan still made the transport runs at night and kept the ship lights off. He had more riding on these deliveries than just his own life.

  The quiet solitude of the night was only interrupted by the rumble of the boat’s engine and the strikes of doubt that screamed in Dylan’s mind. He knew what the terrorists walking aboard the deck of the ship planned on accomplishing with the cargo. He’d bargained and justified everything he’d done on the simple fact that the one life he wanted to save was worth more than the thousands of others who would die from the instruments of death he helped deliver.

  Kasaika, one of the Egyptian radical’s commanding officers, waved from the deck, catching Dylan’s attention, and pointed toward the shoreline. Dylan checked their course heading on his GPS then nodded, turning the ship toward land. The shoreline was as black as the night around them, and Dylan had to rely on Kasaika’s men to help guide him in.

  Dylan had never been this far south before. Judging from the maps, he would say that he was only a few miles north of Savannah. He made sure to pay special attention to the depths in the unfamiliar waters; with the cargo stored below, he preferred not to run aground.

  Dylan idled the engines as they coasted closer to a dock that jutted out from a cluster of trees on the shore. The ship bumped lightly into one of the dock’s pillars, and ropes were tossed back and forth to be tied down. The terrorists quickly rushed below deck and retrieved their cargo, and Dylan was summoned down to help.

  Even under the cover of darkness, Dylan felt the terrorists’ eyes watch him. The crates in the cargo hold ranged from small boxes to six-foot-long refrigerator-like cases that had to be carried out by two men at a time. Dylan hated when he had to help unload. It left a sour taste in his mouth, knowing what these vile men planned to do with the cargo. Those weapons would kill hundreds, thousands even. It would leave sons without fathers, husbands without wives, parents without children, all for the sake of one man’s madness.

  When the drop-off for the location was complete, Dylan ascended back into the wheelhouse, wiping the dust and grime from his hands onto his pants. He reached for the engine starter but paused as his eyes caught the picture of his children taped next to the throttle. He peeled the piece of tape that held the two together and ran his finger over the picture’s weathered faces. For them. To keep them alive.

  It was a mantra Dylan had grown accustomed to saying over the past week, but the words were like a noose slipping tighter and tighter around his neck. Those words were only keeping him alive long enough to kill him.

  “Hey!” Kasaika and the other terrorists gestured impatiently.

  Dylan taped the picture back to the console and reversed off the dock, leaving nothing but a wake behind them. The shoreline slowly disappeared behind them in the distance as Dylan piloted back out to sea to begin the next leg of their journey, the deckhands below busy preparing the cargo. It’d been like this for a while now, this routine, and Dylan felt an apathy toward himself grow a little stronger each day. His mind was numb and lost, buried in the seas he had navigated his entire life.

  The flash of a spotlight and the shouts of the terrorists down below triggered Dylan out of his stupor. Kasaika burst into the wheelhouse. “Keep heading south.”

  Dylan looked to the source of the light. It could be anyone, Coast Guard, Navy, another boat, but if it were the latter and they were spotted, it wouldn’t end well for anyone. “We won’t be able to outrun them,” Dylan said, pressing down the throttle as if he disregarded his own words. He watched Kasaika reach for the rifle hidden under the control dash. Dylan grabbed Kasaika’s wrist. “No!” Kasaika went to raise his hand to strike Dylan for the defiance, but before he had a chance, Dylan pulled the terrorist closer. “The moment you open fire, we lose any element of surprise.”

  The pirate puffed up at the authority in Dylan’s voice. Reluctantly, Kasaika jerked his wrist away and left the rifle where it lay. He descended back to the deck, where he echoed Dylan’s orders.

  It’d been a dogfight since the beginning with these people, but he’d managed to convince their boss that if they wanted their weapons delivered safely, then Dylan’s word was law on the water. Kasaika, along with the other Egyptians, didn’t agree but begrudgingly listened.

  Dylan kept an eye on the flickering spotlights to their east, the boat bouncing against the Atlantic waves more ferociously than before. He gripped the wheel tight, and his eyes squinted into the night’s horizon, and he desperately hoped that it was just another fishing vessel and not the military boats that had thickened the waterways of late.

  When Dylan noticed the light growing, he quickly shifted course to move closer to the shoreline, toward the shallows. The radio crackled, and his heart jumped along with the growing noise blowing through the radio’s speakers. “This is Coast Guard Cutter 4152. Cut power to your engines, or prepare to be fired upon.”

  The vessel was less than sixty yards from them now, and Dylan didn’t have a choice. He pulled back the throttle, and the engines whined to an idle. Kasaika rushed up the stairs to the wheelhouse and kicked the door open with the heel of his boot. “What are you doing?” His words left his mouth in harsh, thick whispers, his accent apparent in the angry tone.

  Dylan reached under t
he control panel and ripped out the electrical circuits to the lights. Waves rocked the deck from side to side, but Dylan made his way across the wheelhouse effortlessly. “We don’t make a move unless we have to, you understand? We comply with everything they ask.”

  Kasaika blocked the exit, and the spotlight from the Coast Guard ship flashed behind him, allowing Dylan to see only his silhouette. “You mean to have us caught.”

  “I mean to not have you kill unless we have to.” Dylan was nose to nose with Kasaika, and the Coast Guard continued to boom its warnings through the radio. Finally, Kasaika descended, and Dylan followed. Although he wasn’t sure if Kasaika was going to heed his advice.

  Four men lined the side of the Coast Guard ship, one of them manning the fifty-caliber aimed at the deckhands. They tossed lines over, and Kasaika’s men tied off, and the sailors boarded the ship. “Who’s the captain?”

  “I am, sir.” Dylan stepped forward, and the spotlight swiveled on him. The sailors’ radios crackled with chatter, radioing their position to another ship in the area. Kasaika’s men shifted uneasily as the sailor stepped forward.

  “Your running lights aren’t on.”

  Dylan eyed one of the terrorists in his peripheral vision next to one of the nets where they stored their guns. He was too close for Dylan’s comfort. “They malfunctioned on me about an hour ago. I was trying to keep to the shoreline and out of everyone’s way when you radioed.” Dylan extended his license, which was now forged with a fake name.

  The sailor handed it to another one of his men, who ran a check with the local authorities, making sure it was legitimate. “How long have you boys been out here?” The words were directed toward Dylan, but the sailor had his eyes on the deckhands.

  “Headed out this morning. Afraid we haven’t had much luck.” Truth was, Dylan had been out here for the better part of a week, but the moment they saw there were no fish in the holds, that alibi would be out the window.

  One of the sailors handed Dylan’s license back to the commanding officer and whispered something in his ear. The CO extended the papers to Dylan. “We’ll be taking a look around your vessel and citing you for having the busted lights.”

  Before Dylan or Kasaika had time to object, the rest of the sailors piled into their boat and started inspecting the fishing gear, poles, and buoys, slowly and meticulously making their way to the cargo hold. And each moment the sailors moved closer to discovering the bombs, Dylan’s eyes darted back and forth between Kasaika’s men’s hands twitching nervously at their sides and the sailors’ hands searching the boat. Both were dangerous.

  Dylan was stuck on a tightrope, with winds gusting from both sides. Any way he fell he was a dead man. And he wasn’t sure how much longer he’d be able to stay balanced.

  One of the terrorists inched closer to the net hiding the guns, and Dylan watched his fingers graze the cover of the automatic rifles that lay just underneath. A bead of sweat rolled down Dylan’s temple, and he noticed the commanding officer shoot him a glance then step closer. “Anything you want to tell me, Captain?”

  All it would take would be one word. That’s it, nothing more. But even if Dylan did tell the sailor what was happening, and even if he survived the shootout that would follow, he wouldn’t be able to get to his son in time. He wouldn’t be able to stop the lunatics who had kidnaped Sean from killing him. “No.”

  “Commander?” The voice was echoed and muffled from below deck. The sailor rushed back onto the main deck and immediately found the CO. Dylan couldn’t hear what the two were saying, and the lights had cast the commander’s face in shadows.

  Hands reaching for the guns underneath the nets were all Dylan saw in his peripherals. After that, the deck of the ship and the night air exploded with gunfire. Dylan’s boots skidded across the wet floor as he dashed for cover. He turned quick enough to see the commander fly backward, with three rounds flying into his life vest.

  The fifty-caliber on the deck of the Coast Guard cruiser blasted holes into the hull of their vessel. Each shot thundered across the open waters as Dylan scrambled to the stern. He couldn’t tell if Kasaika was still alive or not from the screams as the terrorists barked back and forth at each other between the gunshots.

  Dylan went to grab the pistol out of the wheelhouse, but before he made it out, the sailor turned the fifty-caliber in his direction, and Dylan hit the floor, covering the back of his head as fiberglass exploded all around him. With debris raining down on him, Dylan crawled back to the stairs, a few bullets punching holes in the deck just inches from his body.

  When Dylan looked down from the wheelhouse, Kasaika was below, using the cabin for cover as he fired back at the sailors. The AK-47 dripped dispensed shell casings on the deck, which rolled back and forth with the motion of the sea. Dylan had a clear line of sight on the man. All he had to do was aim and squeeze the trigger, and the terrorist would be dead.

  The fifty-caliber’s thunder boomed again, but this time in Kasaika’s direction. Before Dylan had a chance to aim, the pirate sprinted toward the stern and away from Dylan’s pistol. Dylan swung himself down onto the ladder, and the Coast Guard’s boat revved its engines, jerking Dylan’s ship with the lines still attached.

  The sudden jolt caused Dylan’s foot to slip against the wet steps of the ladder as he hurried down, the pistol still clutched in his right hand. He landed next to a cluster of bullet holes and tried listening for the thump of feet or the screams of the men around him, but all he heard was the high pitched whine the gunfire had left in his ears.

  One of the sailors rushed around the corner. Dylan collided with him, and the two men crashed to the deck. The sailor immediately went for his rifle, and Dylan smacked it away. “Stop! You don’t understand!” The two men grappled on the floor, sliding on the slick metal surface of the ship’s deck, both pairs of hands struggling to keep hold of the rifle between them.

  The sailor lifted his knee into Dylan’s stomach, repeatedly slamming into his gut. Dylan smacked his forehead into the sailor’s nose and felt the sailor loosen his grip around the rifle’s stock. Dylan ripped it away and scrambled to his feet. The sailor put his hands in the air.

  “Call them off!” Dylan held his finger on the trigger, but the sailor said nothing. Dylan edged to the corner of the wheelhouse, keeping the rifle aimed at his defenseless captive. “I have one of your men! Drop your weapons!”

  “Cease fire!” The orders were barked down the chain of command, and the firing stopped, along with the throaty hum of the boat’s engines. All Dylan heard was the lap of the waves against the hull and the fading ringing in his ears.

  “You won’t win,” the sailor said.

  Dylan watched the sailor’s eyes, the mix of anger and fear staring back at him. These soldiers thought that he was a part of the attacks. In the sailor’s mind, Dylan was just as low as the scum around him. “I didn’t ask for this. You hear me? I DIDN’T ASK FOR TH—”

  The bullets cut into the sailor and disfigured him to nothing more than a bloody stump, meat bathed in crimson. Similar shots echoed through the night air, but Dylan couldn’t peel his gaze away from the mutilated piece of flesh in front of him until Kasaika’s boots stepped over the piece of dead meat and snatched the rifle from Dylan’s hands.

  The bow of the ship was filled with the dead bodies of the sailors, along with two of the terrorists. Dylan held what was left of the wheelhouse for support as they started throwing the bodies overboard and untied the ropes holding the two vessels together. Kasaika shoved Dylan, making sure he saw the rifle in his hands. “Start the boat, Captain.”

  “They threw down their weapons,” Dylan said. “They were going to surrender!”

  “And they dropped their weapons because of you.” The words escaped Kasaika like a snarl. “Now, start the boat.”

  Spittle flew onto Dylan’s cheek from the last syllable Kasaika uttered. He wiped the saliva from his skin and felt the burn of heat flush through his body. He tackled Kasaika to the dec
k, and the two men toppled over one another, sliding across the blood and saltwater. Dylan squeezed Kasaika’s throat until he felt Kasaika’s pulse beat against the palm of his hand.

  A blow to Dylan’s temple knocked him to the floor. He stumbled on his hands and knees, the floor wavering like the ship in the middle of a storm, the ringing in his ears reaching a fever pitch. He looked to his left and saw Kasaika hovering above him.

  Kasaika slammed the tip of his boot into Dylan’s ribs, sending him flat onto his back. Dylan straightened and felt the sharp pain from his side radiate through the rest of his body. Kasaika picked him up by the collar and slammed him against the side of the wheelhouse then jammed the pistol into his temple. “When we get back to the mainland, we’ll pay a little visit to your son. How does that sound? You can sit there and watch us beat your boy for every time you struck one of us.”

  “You touch him and—”

  “You’ll what? There’s nothing you can do but what we tell you to. And after we kill your son, we’ll go after your daughter and chop down every single member of your family until you’re the only branch left on your family tree. Then, after you’ve watched them all die, we’ll kill you.”

  The pressure from the barrel’s pistol against Dylan’s temple drilled into his skull. Just before Dylan thought the barrel would punch a hole in his head, Kasaika lowered the gun, and Dylan slid to the floor, his head still ringing.

  “We need to get out of here before more show up,” Kasaika said.

  With the rest of the bodies stripped of their life vests and dumped into the ocean, Dylan climbed the shambled steps of the ladder to what was left of the wheelhouse. The windows were shattered and splintered with bullet holes.

  Dylan’s hands started the engine and found the throttle absentmindedly. His mind was drowning along with the sailors facedown in the ocean. He reached into his pocket for the picture and looked down at his son. That was his life raft. And he’d hold onto it for as long as he could.