The Yakuza Gambit

  THE

  YAKUZA GAMBIT

  A BRICE BANNON

  SEACOAST ADVENTURE

  DAVID DELEE

  COPYRIGHT

  THE YAKUZA GAMBIT

  Published by Dark Road Publishing

  The Yakuza Gambit, Copyright © 2019 by David DeLee

  Cover art copyright © 2019 © lurii | Depositphotos.com

  Book and cover design copyright © 2019 by Dark Road Publishing

  The Yakuza Gambit and all works contained within are works of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any similarities or resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is wholly coincidental.

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  Semper Paratus

  “Always Ready”

  THE

  YAKUZA GAMBIT

  PROLOGUE

  It was a rare, clear October night along the New England seacoast.

  The velvety black sky sparkled with twinkling stars. A full moon hung large and bright over the tranquil Atlantic Ocean. Its light glimmered over the surface of the dark water, winking off the gentle ripples like white fireflies. The only sound an occasional splash from a leaping fish off in the distance. Visible in the distance was the dark shoreline of Hampton Beach, a small stretch of sand before New Hampshire’s eighteen-mile coastline turned rocky and dangerous in North Hampton and points north up to Maine.

  Gentle waves lapped against the fiberglass hull of the drifting twenty-one foot Yamaha ski boat as it bobbed alone in the vastness of the ocean a mile from shore. Dark. Its engines silent and its running lights shut off.

  Illuminated only by the pale glow of the instrument panel, Billy Palmer sat behind the wheel of the fifty-five-thousand dollar boat, which he’d named the Bottom Line. He puffed smoke from a thick Cuban cigar as he and his friend Alex Riggi drank cold beers from longneck bottles and enjoyed a taste of the good life.

  Alex sat in a stern seat with his long legs extended to the seat facing him. Both men were in their late twenties. Best friends since elementary school, they’d decided to brave the late October chill to take the Bottom Line out one last time before the marina pulled it from the water for the winter.

  “Mr. LaSala’s sending us on another job,” Alex said, breaking the quiet.

  Billy sipped his beer. “So soon? Didn’t you guys just do one like a couple of days ago?”

  “Yeah. Last week.” Alex shrugged. “Bennie says a big shipment’s coming in and the boss needs a lot of upfront cash.”

  Billy grunted. He left it at that. Bennie didn’t know crap about what the boss was up to or needed. He finished his beer and held the empty bottle out to Alex. “Grab me another one, will ya.”

  Alex dropped the bottle into the case under his legs where they were racking up empties. He dug through the ice in the cooler, pulled out a fresh one, and handed it to his friend.

  Billy twisted the top off and flung the cap into the ocean.

  With a final gulp, Alex finished his own beer and grabbed another for himself. He took a sip of the new one and furrowed his forehead. “You hear that?”

  Billy did. It was the whine of a high-performance engine. It reached them from across the open water, sounding like a mosquito buzz growing louder as it neared. Billy twisted around in his seat.

  “There.” He pointed, spotting a low, sleek racing boat skimming across the water to the south of them, coming out from shore. It sped along at what Billy guessed to be close to sixty-five knots.

  Like the Bottom Line, its running lights were off.

  Billy shrugged, thought, idiot, and turned back in his seat to enjoy his beer and his Cuban.

  Alex kept a wary eye on the approaching speedboat.

  As it got closer, the engine hum grew louder.

  After a few minutes, Alex said, “Billy. You might want to turn on the running lights. I don’t think that guy sees us.”

  Billy twisted around again. The racing boat was moving fast. Its sleek hull slapped the water as it powered across the surface traveling in a direct line at them.

  If he didn’t know better, he’d think they were aiming straight for the Bottom Line. This time Billy verbalized his earlier thought. “Idiot.”

  He snapped on the boat’s running lights. Red and green sidelights and the white stern lights came on, glowing brightly.

  The approaching speedboat showed no sign of slowing down or deviating course.

  Billy stood up. He grabbed the edge of the windshield to steady himself in the gently rocking boat. His lack of sea-legs had nothing to do with the six-pack he’d consumed over the past hour and a half and everything to do with the sudden fear gripping him.

  “They’re not slowing down,” Alex announced.

  “Or changing course.”

  The boat was longer than the Bottom Line. Billy estimated it to be a thirty-five-footer. Built to race, the cockpit only had two seats, room for only two occupants. Close enough now, Billy could tell there was one person behind the wheel and another standing beside him. Running without lights, it was too dark to see any more detail than that.

  “Is the guy crazy, or what?” Alex asked coming to his feet. “You think maybe we should move?”

  After a moment of indecision, the racing boat still barreling at them at full speed, Billy twisted the key in the ignition. The two, big, inboard two hundred sixty horsepower engines rumbled but failed to start. Billy stared at the instrument panel. “Are you serious?”

  “We’ve gotta move,” Alex said.

  Billy glanced at the approaching boat again, losing precious seconds.

  It continued to skim over the water, coming at them fast. No way they didn’t see the Bottom Line now with all its lights on.

  Billy swallowed hard. He twisted the key again. “Come on. Come on.”

  The engines caught with a deep throaty growl. Behind the stern water bubbled up white and frothy. He could feel the powerful engines vibrating through his grip on the wheel.

  But the racing boat was nearly on top of them.

  “You gotta get us out of here!” Alex shouted.

  Billy slammed the throttle forward. At first, nothing happened. Afraid he’d flooded the engines, He stole a glance at the racing boat. It was seconds from broad-siding them.

  The big engines finally dug in.

  The Bottom Line surged forward.

  The racing boat swerved at the last minute. Not to avoid a crash, but to initiate one. Its sleek hull slammed broadside into the Bottom Line. There was a loud renting noise. The hulls scrapped against each other, emitting a horrific screech.

  The impact threw Alex to the deck. “Son of a—”

  Billy managed to remain on his feet, clutching the steering wheel with a death grip. Knocked to one side, like a bumper boat at the amusement park, the racing boat swerved away, shoving the damaged Bottom Line violently to port.

  Billy spun the wheel, digging them out of the spin.

  On hands and knees, Alex crawled up the center aisle to the space between the passenger seat and the dashboard. Bottles rolled across the deck, spilling frothy beer that slicked the fiberglass floor. Alex used the d
ashboard and co-pilot’s seat to pull himself to his feet. He gripped the windshield, shaking.

  “You okay?” Billy asked, stealing a glance at his friend, thankful he hadn’t been knocked clear out of the boat.

  “Are they trying to kill us?” Alex asked.

  Billy wasn’t going to hang around to find out. He straightened the wheel and pushed the throttle full open. At first heading out to sea, Billy made a wide arcing turn south. He’d make a run for the Hampton Harbor Inlet. Return to the marina where he docked the Bottom Line. Report the reckless boater to the authorities.

  After striking them, the racing boat had continued traveling north.

  Billy tried to convince himself it was just an accident. A drunk or an idiot with no business being out on the water, who would now continue on his way. But it wasn’t to be. The racing boat made a tight turn, swishing its stern, sending a huge fan of water into the air. It almost laid sideways as it cut into the turn, the stern deep in the water as the long, sleek bow rose high in the air.

  The turn completed, there was no question. It was coming after them again.

  Billy held little hope they could outrun the racing boat. It was built for speed. The most he’d ever gotten out of the Bottom Line’s engines was forty-seven knots. No match for the seventy knots a racing boat like that was capable of.

  Already their pursuers had cut the distance between them to a frighteningly short distance.

  Billy gunned his engines, but the race was already lost.

  The racing boat was almost on them. The pilot swerved wide, approaching from the Bottom Line’s starboard side.

  Billy glanced over his shoulder.

  The co-pilot, little more than a black silhouette in the darkness leaned out around the windshield. He held a black shape, long and narrow, in his hands. It was all Billy could make out until he saw a bright yellow flash, followed a millisecond later by the crack of gunfire.

  A rifle.

  “That answer your question?” he shouted at Alex. “Yeah, they’re trying to kill us.”

  Bullets pinged off the windshield frame and dug into the fiberglass deck, the gunwales, and chewed through the seat cushions. Alex covered his head with his arms and dropped down into the space between the seat and the dashboard. Billy ducked, zig-zagging the Bottom Line, aiming her toward shore. He’d abandoned any hope of reaching the inlet that would take them to the marina ahead of the racing boat.

  Instead, he made a beeline for the craggy North Hampton shoreline.

  What he had in mind was a dangerous proposition. Throughout maritime history, the notoriously rocky shoal had ripped the bottoms out of numerous hulls, dashing boats into kindling, and littered the ocean floor with sunken shipwrecks too numerous to count.

  But Billy would take that, scuttling his pride and joy, over getting shot to death or run over by the homicidal pair in the racing boat. Now, if only the driver of the racing boat wasn’t crazy enough to chase them into the deadly rocky coastline.

  A big ask, yet it was the only chance they had.

  To Alex, curled into a ball under the dashboard, he shouted, “Hold on!”

  He aimed the Bottom Line straight for the rocky shoal.

  If they were lucky, they might get close enough to shore to jump overboard before they breeched on a rock. If their luck really held out, they could get hide among the dark, rocky outcroppings until their attackers tired of looking for them or help somehow arrived.

  But luck wasn’t on their side.

  Not unless one considered bad luck.

  The Bottom Line almost immediately struck a rocky protrusion hidden just below the surface. A scrapping, renting noise. The boat angled up, like it had hit a ski jump, and slammed to a stop.

  At top speed, the momentum launched Billy forward. Thrown between the open windshield, he slammed into the bow railing, the only thing that prevented him from going head over ass out of the boat. He banged his shoulder painfully. His head struck the gunwale. He tumbled back into the bow deck well. Blood from a gash over his eye streaked the seats and deck.

  Holding his head, Billy groaned.

  The racing boat slowed and gingerly made its way to the stuck Bottom Line. Angled upward, like a whale caught in mid-breach. They were dead in the water.

  As it moved up alongside, the co-pilot silently leaped onto Billy’s boat.

  Billy blinked blood from his eye. What he saw through his red-blurred vision, Billy told himself was impossible. Too outrageous to consider.

  Dressed entirely in black, the man had on baggy black pants and a black tunic tied with a black sash around his waist. He wore a black hood and mask that covered his face. Everything but his eyes.

  Billy could see the man was Asian, which was the only part of the whole senseless thing that made any sense. He’d watched enough badly dubbed martial arts movies to know a ninja when he saw one.

  Still the thought defied logic. They were being attacked and boarded by a ninja. A ninja carrying a small, black pistol in his right hand.

  The Bottom Line’s engines had stalled upon impact with the rocky shoal. The only sound came from the idling engine of the racing boat and the gently slapping waves against the hulls of the two boats.

  The ninja made his way soundlessly toward the bow.

  At the open windshield, he paused. He glanced to his left, down at the space where Alex hid. His eyes narrowed as he aimed the pistol.

  “No.” Alex pleaded. “No! Nooo!”

  The gun barked once. The bang echoed in the night air like an explosion.

  Billy jerked, almost as if he’d been shot himself. He kicked out his feet, trying to backpedal away on his hands and feet. The deck slick with seawater and blood. He had nowhere to go.

  The ninja advanced. He grabbed Billy by the front of his shirt and yanked him to his feet.

  “What…what do you want?” Billy’s voice cracked with fear.

  The ninja didn’t answer.

  Pulled to the cockpit, Billye glanced over at where Alex lay dead. Slumped in the cramped space, his friend’s arms were protectively wrapped around his head. That had done little to prevent the bullet from drilling into his forehead.

  Shoved roughly over the railing, Billy tumbled head first into the racing boat’s cockpit.

  The boat pilot, also dressed like a ninja, took the pistol from his partner and held Billy at gunpoint. The boarding ninja tied a tow rope to the Bottom Line’s stern cleats. He opened the boat’s drains then leaped back into the racing boat.

  Billy cowered in the tight space between the two seats in the cramped cockpit. Wet, he shivered in the cold, and not ashamed to admit it to himself, with fear.

  The pilot put the racing boat in reverse. The engines strained. The boat jerked several times before it succeeded in yanking the Bottom Line loose from the rock it was perched on. The accompanying renting, nails on a chalkboard, screech grated on Billy’s ears.

  Stoic, the ninja’s appeared unaffected by the noise.

  Once broken free, they towed the Bottom Line a half mile back out to sea.

  There they released the tow rope, setting the bullet-ridden boat adrift.

  Billy sat between the seats with his hands interlocked on top of his head, watching as the Bottom Line took on water. Slowly it slipped under the relentless, black ocean water. With a final gurgle, all traces of the boat were gone.

  The pilot backed away from the spot, spun the wheel, turning them, and gunned the throttle. The racing boat leaped forward.

  With the Bottom Line sinking to the ocean floor and his best friend dead, Billy could do nothing but wonder; where were they taking him and how long would it be before they killed him, too.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Dawn.

  The sun had begun its daily climb into the sky, burning low and bright over the distant horizon. The sea blue line of the Atlantic Ocean, ruler-straight against a cerulean blue sky. Sunrise bringing with it the promise of a fresh, glorious new day. Autumn in New England was one of Bri
ce Bannon’s favorite times of the year. The evenings were cooler but the days still relatively warm, usually. And the summer crowds were gone, mostly.

  On his morning run, except for an older couple strolling the shoreline, he had the beach to himself.

  Not that he didn’t like the summers on Hampton Beach, he did.

  He fed off the energy, the excitement, the atmosphere of the crowds: mostly young people, having fun, enjoying the sun, surf, and sand. But autumn in the area was special, too. Especially if one went inland and points north, to the Lakes Region and beyond. The change of season in the heavily wooded areas—the leaves, the colors—were spectacular. Legendary, in fact. So much so, it drew leaf-peepers from around the country and around the world to witness the splendor first hand.

  Wearing a gray T-shirt with the Coast Guard seal—a pair of crossed anchors superimposed by a life ring with a shield surrounded by a line grommet—and blue shorts, he ran at the water’s edge where the sand was wet and hard-packed. His sneakers slapped at the foamy white water as it rolled in and gently retreated. Six miles each morning. His daily routine, whenever he could, since his arrival at the Coast Guard Training facility at Cape May, New Jersey.

  Fifteen years earlier.

  Now, he ran even during the legendary winter storms and record cold that defined New Hampshire for a good part of the year. This morning his run took him north toward Rye Beach.

  He’d only gone about two miles when he noticed a larger than usual colony of seagulls circling overhead up where Hampton Beach became North Hampton. His first thought: A large sea animal had probably washed ashore, dead. When he caught sight of electric blue emergency lights flashing across the wet sand and the facades of the condos across the street from the beach, he revised his theory. Not an animal.

  He slowed his gait to a fast walk, looking ahead.

  Where the beach grew rocky, the land extended out, forming a small, rocky peninsular that jutted out into the water. His path through the shoal was blocked by yellow crime scene tape. It fluttered in the early morning breeze from stakes driven into the sand and out about five feet into the surf.