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Chapters (96)
  1. Cover
  2. Berkley titles by David Ricciardi
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. CHARACTER LIST
  6. PROLOGUE
  7. ONE
  8. TWO
  9. THREE
  10. FOUR
  11. FIVE
  12. SIX
  13. SEVEN
  14. EIGHT
  15. NINE
  16. TEN
  17. ELEVEN
  18. TWELVE
  19. THIRTEEN
  20. FOURTEEN
  21. FIFTEEN
  22. SIXTEEN
  23. SEVENTEEN
  24. EIGHTEEN
  25. NINETEEN
  26. TWENTY
  27. TWENTY-ONE
  28. TWENTY-TWO
  29. TWENTY-THREE
  30. TWENTY-FOUR
  31. TWENTY-FIVE
  32. TWENTY-SIX
  33. TWENTY-SEVEN
  34. TWENTY-EIGHT
  35. TWENTY-NINE
  36. THIRTY
  37. THIRTY-ONE
  38. THIRTY-TWO
  39. THIRTY-THREE
  40. THIRTY-FOUR
  41. THIRTY-FIVE
  42. THIRTY-SIX
  43. THIRTY-SEVEN
  44. THIRTY-EIGHT
  45. THIRTY-NINE
  46. FORTY
  47. FORTY-ONE
  48. FORTY-TWO
  49. FORTY-THREE
  50. FORTY-FOUR
  51. FORTY-FIVE
  52. FORTY-SIX
  53. FORTY-SEVEN
  54. FORTY-EIGHT
  55. FORTY-NINE
  56. FIFTY
  57. FIFTY-ONE
  58. FIFTY-TWO
  59. FIFTY-THREE
  60. FIFTY-FOUR
  61. FIFTY-FIVE
  62. FIFTY-SIX
  63. FIFTY-SEVEN
  64. FIFTY-EIGHT
  65. FIFTY-NINE
  66. SIXTY
  67. SIXTY-ONE
  68. SIXTY-TWO
  69. SIXTY-THREE
  70. SIXTY-FOUR
  71. SIXTY-FIVE
  72. SIXTY-SIX
  73. SIXTY-SEVEN
  74. SIXTY-EIGHT
  75. SIXTY-NINE
  76. SEVENTY
  77. SEVENTY-ONE
  78. SEVENTY-TWO
  79. SEVENTY-THREE
  80. SEVENTY-FOUR
  81. SEVENTY-FIVE
  82. SEVENTY-SIX
  83. SEVENTY-SEVEN
  84. SEVENTY-EIGHT
  85. SEVENTY-NINE
  86. EIGHTY
  87. EIGHTY-ONE
  88. EIGHTY-TWO
  89. EIGHTY-THREE
  90. EIGHTY-FOUR
  91. EIGHTY-FIVE
  92. EIGHTY-SIX
  93. EIGHTY-SEVEN
  94. Children of Fallen Patriots Foundation
  95. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  96. What’s next onyour reading list?

The two men returned their attention to the files on the eight pirates. If Jake and Pickens could find a few candidates for surveillance or interrogation, they could start to build out the pirate network and identify the rest of the players. Jake suspected that the eight men were not part of the tier-one boarding team that was driving the operations, but more likely support staff, given that they’d been involved in piracy during its first iteration and not off training with a foreign military.

The number of potential targets dropped quickly as Jake and Pickens scrolled through the INTERPOL dossiers. Two men didn’t have photos on file, and four of them lived in sparsely populated areas far outside Mogadishu, where the two Americans would quickly be spotted as they had been in Kitadra.

The remaining two pirates had each been accused of kidnapping and murder at sea. They’d been apprehended by international naval forces, but the high burden of proof in maritime law had resulted in their release after brief detentions.

Jake studied a high-resolution satellite image of the first man’s home. On the outskirts of Mogadishu, it was at the end of a long dirt road with only one way in and one way out. It offered a great deal of privacy for what the Americans had in mind, but it would be a death trap if the operation went sideways.

Pickens was looking at the profile of the last man.

His name was Mahad.

His file said that the pirates he’d been running with had boarded a container ship in the Gulf of Aden in 2013, only to discover that most of the crew had sealed themselves inside the ship’s citadel to wait out the attack in safety.

The crew had followed standard procedure by sending a distress call over the radio, sounding the general alarm, and shutting down the ship’s engine. They’d huddled inside the steel-walled room for over an hour, watching CCTV feeds from the ship and listening to the pirates strike the watertight door with fire axes and pry bars. When that didn’t work, the pirates lit a fire and piled a rubber life raft on top of it, trying to smoke the crew out, but the citadel had been designed with an independent air source and the smoke-out was unsuccessful.

When the assault suddenly stopped, the crew assumed that their distress call had been heard and a friendly naval force had rousted the pirates.

But reality was far worse.