Burke's Revenge: Bob Burke Suspense Thriller #3 (Bob Burke Action Adventure Novels) Read online

  It was almost midnight when the two stealth helicopters located the LZ and landed as quickly and quietly as large machines can on the edge of a rocky desert. The eight Deltas quickly dismounted and deployed, one team out each door, leapfrogging away with their weapons at the ready. The helicopters didn’t wait. They bounced once and immediately took off, banking east into the darkness. They would fly three minutes into the desert, land, and wait for the call to retrieve the Deltas. Then they would all get the hell out of Dodge.

  Koz was an infantryman, first, last, and always, and he liked being out in the field on a big-time Op like this. It was in his blood, like most of the other Deltas. The Lieutenant could say whatever he wanted about it being nothing, but Koz knew better. You don’t send eight Deltas and all this support into Indian country for “nothing”, and all the high-tech gadgets and toys that came with them were useful but they don’t win wars. It took boots on the ground and a cause worth fighting for to do that. Besides, even a Stealth Hawk could be heard, and there was no sneaking up on anyone in a place like Raqqah, not tonight and not ever.

  The Deltas headed southwest on foot and reached the hilltop that was to be their jumping-off point at what some smartass called a “tactical lope”, which was about as fast as well-conditioned troopers could run, carefully and quietly, with all that damned gear on their backs. The Barretts had been assembled and loaded with their noise suppressors and night vision scopes in place before they boarded the helicopters at FOB Sykes. The four “operators” who carried them had them slung across their backs and carried their short-barreled M-4A1 carbines, the successor to the M-16, slung across their chests, ready for close-in work. They were deployed in columns of two, leapfrogging in fifty-meter bursts, weapons at the ready, and taking turns scanning the area.

  Up ahead, the city of Raqqah lay at the end of a long downslope that led to the Euphrates River. It once had a population of over 200,000, but after the pounding it had been subjected to over the past year, it held only a fraction of that number now. Despite ISIS’s strict blackout at night, there was no hiding the faint glow around the city, which conveniently backlit everything between the Deltas and their target. That faint glow was normal for a city of that size, no matter how many rules the authorities imposed. What wasn’t normal was absolute quiet, Koz thought. He heard no barking dogs, no crying babies, loud radios, cars, trucks, or motorcycles, and there were no lights in any of the houses or buildings nearby. Nothing! That wasn’t normal, and Koz could feel the hairs standing on the back of his neck. That was his “Haji radar” and it was rarely wrong.

  When they finally got within a quarter-mile of the target the group split. Koz’s pair swung to the left side of the houses and the Lieutenant’s pair went right. They took up firing positions about one hundred meters apart, where they could observe the target, the surrounding houses, and the road. In seconds, Koz built his nest, laying himself and his rifle in a solid firing position, and began scanning the target with the scope on his rifle, while The Batman did the same with his range-finding spotter scope.

  “I got nothing,” Koz whispered. “You?”

  “Nada… and I don’t like it.”

  “Me either,” Koz agreed as he glanced at his watch. He knew the Lieutenant would have already radioed in that the Delta teams were in position. The Chinook with the Iraqi infantry would already be inbound and due to land behind the house any minute now. That was when the front door of the house opened and he saw two men step outside, light cigarettes, and stand casually on the sidewalk, smoking and talking. Koz could clearly see AK-47s hanging around their necks.

  “Fonz, Koz,” he keyed his chin mic. “Two Hajis with AKs just stepped out the front door into the street for a smoke.”

  “Roger that. I see them. Illegal, Lonzo, you got anything?”

  “Negative” and “Negative” came their quick replies.

  “It’s too damned quiet,” Koz added. “This place is starting to smell like a trap.”

  “The Chinook’s gonna be here in thirty seconds,” the Lieutenant answered. “I don’t disagree, but I need more than that to abort. As soon as I hear the bird, I’ll take out the one on the left, you take his pal on the right. On my mark. Copy?”

  “Roger. On your mark,” Koz replied as he got comfortable behind his Barrett and put his right eye to the telescopic sight. “What do you read on the scope?” he asked The Batman.

  “Three hundred meters, no wind,” the other man whispered. “Piece of cake.”

  “Roger that,” Koz agreed as he set the crosshairs on the center of the man’s forehead, shifted his finger from the trigger guard to the trigger, and waited. A piece of cake? Not out here in Indian country, and it didn’t take very long.

  “Mark,” he heard the Lieutenant’s voice in his ear and slowly squeezed the trigger until the big gun fired. A 50-caliber bullet is a powerful round, but the body of the Barrett is designed to absorb most of the recoil internally within the rifle. It produces surprisingly little kick, and with the sound suppressor, very little noise. Through his telescopic sight, Koz saw the man’s head explode. Perhaps a half-second later, the same thing happened to the man standing next to him, and both men collapsed on the sidewalk like two sacks of dead meat. Their AK-47s clattered on the pavement next to them, but even those sounds were drowned out by the sudden roar of a large, dual-bladed Chinook helicopter, which suddenly dropped out of the dark sky and landed on the open ground behind the house.

  The swirling blades of the Chinook kicked up a storm of dust and dirt as the Iraqi infantry poured from the back of the large transport helicopter. “Poured,” of course, is a relative term. In the case of Iraqi infantry, that meant creeping down the ramp, bent low, coughing from the dust. As they turned toward the house, their primary concern appeared to be staying behind each other. They pointed their recycled American M-16A rifles in every direction — up, down, and sideways, more to see if anyone was shooting at them, than to find someone to shoot at.

  “Look at that! Goddamn Chinese fire drill,” Koz mumbled, shaking his head.

  The big Chinook made too much noise to hear anything else, but neither Koz nor the others saw anything else to fire at in or around the house. Still, they could only watch in frustration as the Iraqis took more than a full minute to reach the rear door. When they did, four of the Iraqis were sent up the right side of the house to the front, and four more were sent up the left side. At the same time, two more Iraqis came barreling out of the Chinook, running toward the house and screaming like a pair of banshees. They carried a heavy two-man battering ram between them, which they drew back and sent crashing into the wooden rear door. Everyone expected the door to buckle and crash open, but it didn’t. The battering ram simply bounced off, leaving the two stunned Iraqis staring at each other.

  The other Iraqis screamed at them, so they hurriedly took a few steps back and charged the door again, slamming the heavy ram into the door a second time. That was when all hell broke loose. Literally. As the ram hit the door, the back of the house exploded, as what must have been a huge IED packed with bit and pieces of scrap metal and ball bearings detonated underneath the rear threshold. At least half of the Iraqis behind the building, the ones closest to the door, simply disappeared, and many of the rest went down from a hailstorm of shrapnel. At the same time, a dozen men dressed in black and carrying AK-47s stood up from where they had been hiding on the roof behind the parapet and began shooting down at the survivors, most of whom dropped their rifles and attempted to run back to the helicopter.

  The Deltas didn’t wait for orders. The four Barretts opened up as one, and the spotters quickly joined in with their M-4A1s, taking down most of the men on the roof. With the heavy impact of a 50-caliber bullet, it only took one hit. At the same time, the Iraqis who had been sent around the sides to the front of the house came running back, chased by even more gunmen in black. If the Deltas didn’t wait, neither did the Iraqi pilot in the Chinook. He gunned his two engines, turned the cycl
ic control and hit the thrust. The big beast wasn’t nearly as nimble as a Blackhawk or even an Apache, but the front rotor tilted sharply forward and he managed to get the back end off the ground and climbing. He ignored the Iraqi infantryman running toward his rear ramp, just as one of the ISIS gunmen on the roof stood up, pointed an RPG at the helicopter and fired. The night was lit by a bright red and yellow flash as the rocket streaked from the rooftop, struck the big helicopter low on the left side, and burst one of its fuel tanks. Between the high explosive in the RPG’s warhead and the JP8 in the fuel tank, the Chinook exploded in a huge orange fireball and crashed back down on the ground behind the house. Koz and the other Deltas continued firing and providing cover for the Iraqi infantry, taking down as many ISIS gunmen as they could see, but the flames from the burning helicopter rendered their night vision scopes and goggles less than useful, and the survivors on both sides quickly disappeared into the dark.

  “Let’s get out of here,” the Lieutenant ordered. “Pull back to the rendezvous point. Prez, you and Illegal take the point. Koz, you and The Batman cover the rear. Beer and I will cover the left flank. Lonzo and Bulldog take the right. Move out!”

  As someone observed a long time ago, it’s amazing how fast a properly motivated individual can move when he wants to. They cleared the rear of the house and vanished into the rocky desert without running into any more ISIS opposition. As they ran, however, they passed three men hiding behind a rock. Koz turned his M-4A1 on them and was about to put all three of them down, when he realized they were Iraqis. They left their rifles and equipment behind the rock and begun running away even faster than the Americans. After an instant of reflection, Koz turned his rifle away and didn’t shoot, allowing the Iraqis to disappear into the desert up ahead.

  “Bastards,” The Batman said. “Should’ve put all three of them down.”

  The Lieutenant had already radioed for the two Silent Hawks to move up to the pickup point. Five minutes later, the Deltas heard them and the two Apaches circling overhead, providing cover. The Deltas formed a circle around a flat spot and took a knee, rifles pointed outward and night vision scopes to their eyes as the two Silent Hawks set down.

  With crisp hand signals, the Lieutenant signaled for Koz, The Batman, Illegal, and The Prez to get in their bird, with Lonzo, The Bulldog and Beer Stein to get in with him. When Koz went to the door of his helicopter, he saw that the three Iraqis were already there, sitting on the floor like whipped dogs. The other three Deltas quickly piled into the helicopter as Koz turned and pointed his rifle back down the trail, looking for targets. As he did, the two Apache gunships covering them opened up. They had excellent night vision optics and a devastating M-230 chain gun, mounted below the helicopter’s chin. Its exploding shells tore up the trail and the surrounding landscape, sending shards of rock flying, and creating a death strip halfway back to the house.

  “Get in here, Koz!” he heard The Batman shout as he scanned the area one more time with his rifle. Behind him, the engine on the other Silent Hawk roared as it lifted off the ground. As Koz rose and began to turn and get aboard his, he saw the dim outline of another black-clad gunman pop out of a dark ravine and raise an RPG to his shoulder. Koz turned his M-4A1 around and put the man down with a quick burst on full automatic, but not before he fired the RPG. In one terrifying instant, a bright red-yellow streak flashed across the desert and struck the other Silent Hawk high on its engine. The blinding explosion blew the helicopter apart and dropped the pieces back down on the desert floor in a flaming heap.

  Stunned, Koz began to run toward the wreckage until he heard The Batman screaming in his ear, “No! Koz, there’s nothing you can do. Get in here!” As much as he hated to admit it, the other man was right. The shattered fuselage of the stealth helicopter was completely engulfed in flames, and there could be no survivors. Reluctantly, Koz backed away, ducked under the flashing helicopter blades, and jumped in the open door as his own Silent Hawk lifted off, tail high, and shot off into the night.

  The Lieutenant, “Beer” Stein, Lonzo, and Bulldog were gone. In his ten-year Army career, six with Delta, Koz had only been on a handful of Ops where fellow soldiers incurred life-threatening wounds, much less where Deltas were killed. It was horrible each time, and he’d never forget any of them. Delta was a very select, very close, and very closed fraternity. To lose four men in one night left him in shock, as it would be for the rest of the Unit, here in-country and back home at Fort Bragg.

  As the helicopter turned and headed back east, Koz looked back to see one of the two Apaches swing back and fire two Hellfire missiles into the dying flames of the Stealth Hawk. With twenty pounds of specialized high explosive in each, those blasts were even larger than the original, and would vaporize any parts and pieces that were left. Koz didn’t like it. He had always believed in bringing everyone back, but he understood the need to protect stealth technology. He understood, but he didn’t like it at all. Koz looked at all the technology around him — the helicopter, the weapons, communications — and knew in his gut that this had been a setup, an ambush.

  As the Silent Hawk continued to climb into the night sky, Koz looked across at the other bench and saw there were three men sitting there. Illegal was sitting on the outside to the left and Prez Washington was on the right. That was when they saw the dim outline of a dark, pudgy figure in the middle, who had shrunk as far back into the shadows as he could get. It was one of the damned Iraqis who had caught up with them and jumped aboard when they weren’t looking. The man had no rifle, no pistol, and no helmet, just a tactical vest. Koz reached out, grabbed him by the front of it and pulled him into the dim light coming in through the open doorway, and looked at his uniform. He was an officer, an Iraqi captain. Koz pulled him closer and looked deep into his eyes. What he saw wasn’t anger or even PTSD, as you might expect after what happened back there. What he saw was arrogance. He had gotten away when all of his men had been killed and he didn’t care who knew it.

  “You bastard!” Koz glared at him. “You knew it was a trap, didn’t you?” The Iraqi started chattering and arguing with him. Koz stared at him, nodded, and then threw him out the open door with one hand. As he began to fall, the Iraqi captain looked back inside with terror-filled eyes. “Sorry,” Koz told him as he watched him scream all the way down. “There’s no room in here for guys who don’t know what side they’re on.”

  Koz turned back and saw two other Iraqis sitting on the floor between The Prez and The Batman. One was an Iraqi lieutenant and the other a senior sergeant. Koz glared at them too, but before he could do anything, The Prez grabbed one and The Batman grabbed the other.

  “Do you mind?” The Prez asked. “A flying lesson is good for the soul.”

  “They’re all yours,” Koz answered as The Prez and The Batman sent the other two Iraqis out the door to join their captain.

  The copilot’s face suddenly appeared in the window between the cockpit and the rear cargo area. “What the hell did you just do, Kozlowski?” he heard the man scream at him. Both the pilot and copilot were captains. Koz and the others had flown with the pilot many times before, but the copilot was new.

  “Nothing,” Koz quickly answered him. “Not a goddamned thing.”

  “And you didn’t see nothin’ either!” The Prez turned, put his face through the window, and glared back at him. “Ain’t that right, Captain?”

  The copilot looked at the other faces in back, gave up, and turned away.

  Neither Koz nor the others had any regrets. That was the way things went out here sometimes. But when it was over, ISIS would be added to the long list of terror groups who were owed some serious Delta payback. Looking back through the open door, he saw two more bright streaks of light coming in from the west, followed by two huge explosions where that house had been on the edge of Raqqah. That didn’t take very long, Koz thought. He’d been around long enough to recognize a Tomahawk Cruise Missile attack when he saw one. Eighteen feet long and carrying one thousand po
unds of high explosives meant this payback was a bitch, and it was only the start.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Raqqah, Syria

  Once again, Abu Bakr al-Zaeim, the Caliph, the Great One, the Guide, and the Leader of the Islamic State, found himself curled up on a rickety canvas cot in the dark basement of another small house on the fringe of Raqqah, Syria, far away from home. He was a thin wisp of a man, who became depressed easily, and did not think his personal situation could get much worse. Then, he heard the door open at the top of the stairs and heard the Devil’s own heavy footsteps coming down the stairs. He didn’t need to see a face to know who it was. He had heard Satan’s long, scaly tail dragging behind him on the rough wooden stairs many times before, and smelled the stench of the strong, old-fashioned Russian cigarettes he smoked. It was Aslan Khan, the Devil incarnate.

  It had been a bad night. The cot was sway-backed, the mattress lumpy, and the dirt floor uneven, and every time he managed to doze off, another bomb or cruise missile would strike somewhere within the city. If it was close, the explosion would resonate through the flimsy concrete block walls of the house and shake more dust down on him from the floors above, leaving him coughing and sneezing. The basement had been used to store vegetables, hay, perhaps dates, fruit, and God only knew what else; so even after the bombing quieted down, those smells and the stench of damp earth and bare concrete would rise up and wrap themselves around him like a wet blanket, making it impossible for him to sleep.

  Last night was particularly taxing. They moved him to another safe house earlier in the evening, and he ate a meager dinner around the kitchen table with his guards. No one talked much, as usual. Later, around 10:00 p.m., as the guards were about to lock him in the dungeon for the night, they received a phone call, suddenly packed him up, and rushed him out of the house. The guards drove away at a high speed for a mile or so, before they began a circuitous route through the outlying villages and arrived at this second safe house around 10:30 p.m., where he was summarily dispatched to this basement. He had finally fallen into a nervous, light sleep sometime after midnight, when the bombs and gunfire resumed, much heavier this time, with several very loud explosions nearby. After that, sleep became impossible. He found himself thinking about how much he missed his children, his old friends, and God forbid, even his wife. He would never, however, miss Aslan Khan. To his eternal regret and damnation, he had made a bargain with the Devil months before, and now he must pay for it, every day and every night.