Max Byrd, the handyman, and Richard Wagner, the leasing agent, were all that remained of the original five—six if Benny Kinder was included.

Investigators arrived to take over the crime scene investigation. Bomb control was called to tackle the fridge. Teague and Burns gave statements, then returned to HQ to share what they’d learned.

With their success at Little Creek, a SEAL with a bomb-sniffing dog was sent to check the empty houses at Dam Neck too. Other bases in the area were doing the same, but they all believed—hoped, really—only Little Creek and Dam Neck were targets.

Teague was driving to HQ when they received word that explosives had been detected in a refrigerator at Dam Neck.

Two bases. How many bombs?

Teague felt the clock ticking. It was four hours to sunset.

Max Byrd. Richard Wagner. Generic names. Wagner was one of the most popular surnames in the US in addition to being a name associated with the recent coup attempt in Russia.

The name Byrd tickled at his brain. It was an English name, not Russian or German like the others.

It was probably an alias, but why choose Byrd?

After the final safety check, in which everything was declared in order, the barge left the dock to get into position for the show. The pyrotechnician and six crew members rode on the tugboat for the hour-long journey. 

Two SEALs were concealed in the tug—unknown to the seven men who would be on the barge. More would join them, swimming to board the barge in the final hour before the show.

Teague remained on base with the rest of his SEAL team. They had just over three hours to find where the explosives had been planted.

He studied the photos of the fireworks barge on the screen in the conference room.

Long wires connected tubes loaded with shells that contained a lift charge, burst charge, and stars that were marble-sized pellets that exploded in patterns and gave the fireworks their size, sparkle, and color.

The main fuse for each shell would ignite the lift charge and slow-burning fuse to allow the shell to reach a specific altitude before blowing apart.

This was familiar to all of them—the explosives they used on a regular basis lacked the pretty stars, but they exploded the same. Black powder had been used for centuries for both fireworks and killing, inspiring the lyrics in the “Star Spangled Banner” describing the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air.

Propellants the military used to launch their explosives ranged from those used in simple guns to what was employed in shoulder-fired rocket launchers and massive cannons mounted to ships.

The tubes that held the firework shells were simplistic cannons. Long wires connected those cannons to a control board with hundreds of electrical circuits, which the pyrotechnician would use to manually control the display.

He thought about the dishwasher and range and the wires and tubes that were spilled on the floor of the vacant house. Everything was in packaging. Brand-new.

Teague pulled out his phone and checked the photos he’d taken at the scene.

To the room at large, he said, “Do you have photos from the house on Little Creek yet? Of the appliances?”

The captain checked the computer and said, “Just the ones you uploaded. The crime investigation unit will take a while.”

“Put my photos up. Burns’s too.”

It was easier to see on the big screen. The odd note. “Look at that wire. It’s not coiled like the others. Different color. The range uses a massive 220 plug. The dishwasher needs only hoses. The electrical cord is attached.”

Another SEAL sat forward, clearly seeing what Teague had. “That’s an electrical wire. Like the kind they’re using on the firework barge.”

“The fireworks on the barge are set up to be fired manually, not remotely,” Teague said. “But…with the proper setup of a shell without lift charge or stars—pure explosive power, wired to a control board that has remote access—could a person on the barge remotely set off explosives on the base timed to match the display?”

“Yes. Absolutely. The extra circuits would blend in. It would hardly be noticeable that they weren’t wired like the others.” This was stated by one of the explosive experts in the room. All SEALs knew explosives; some were more expert than others.

“Does the person on the barge have to be complicit,” another sailor asked, “or could the remote controls be hidden among the manual circuits even from the pyrotechnician?”

“Not sure, but either way, both the bombs and the circuits on the control board would need to be set up already,” the explosives expert answered.

Burns leaned forward, his gaze on the screen. “This is how we find the bombs. Once the barge is in place, it’ll be easy. Run a safety test of the circuits. Signal intelligence can pick up any circuit that sends a signal to a charge on Little Creek or Dam Neck. It’s as simple as grabbing the location from the air.”

Chapter Sixty

Chris’s heart thrummed as ten bombs were identified, two on Dam Neck, eight on Little Creek. On Dam Neck, two bombs had been planted near the NSWC Dahlgren Division headquarters, while on Little Creek, the targets were spread out: the power substation, sewage treatment plant, a club that was open late for the holiday, the home of Underwater Construction Team One—aka the Seabees—along with an engineering building, a Navy barrack that housed more than 300 sailors, the Coast Guard station, and the HQ building in which the team was currently sitting.

All ten targets had been identified when the circuit test pinged shells that were not on the barge.

None of the buildings on the Little Creek base map were conveniently labeled NSWC, but given that all the individuals had worked on base for months, they’d done a decent job of identifying vulnerable targets. One could only assume the club was added to make up for the fact that the attack would be after hours and most Navy employees would be off work, enjoying the holiday.

Several teams of experts were out locating the explosive devices. Along with searching for bombs, they were also searching for the two remaining conspirators. The base was on quiet lockdown. No vehicle left without being inspected. IDs had to be presented. Security had photos of Byrd and Wagner, and their IDs had been flagged.

A call came in, and a hush fell as a SEAL announced they’d found Wagner. His body was in a ditch near the sewage treatment plant.

And then there was one. The one they’d suspected was the most likely to have the skills to wire the explosives, the maintenance employee, Max Byrd.

More calls came in as explosives were found. Dam Neck’s two bombs had been the first identified. Next, they’d found the one placed under a car outside NSWC headquarters—a half a dozen shells lined up to go off in sequence, just like a firework. According to the test on the barge, that charge and the two on Dam Neck were supposed to explode twenty-eight minutes into the display, at the start of the finale.

The next target was the barrack, then the club—maximizing casualties—before moving on to infrastructure targets like power and sewage. Last would be the Seabees, Engineering building, and Coast Guard.

“Given what we’ve learned from Lieutenant Fallon and Dr. Hanson,” one of the strategists in the room said, “I wonder if we can sabotage Kulik and Laskin in a way that makes them believe they were successful, giving them time to quietly take credit in Russia for being behind an inside attack on a US Navy base on the Fourth of July.”

“What do you suggest?” Captain Huang said.

“Replace the explosives with ground burst simulators. Start with M-80s, then get louder as they go off in sequence. A small amount of C4 or coiled det cord on a stick, high enough off the ground so it won’t throw rocks and cause damage. Make a lot of noise, fill the air with smoke. Controlled explosions on Little Creek and Dam Neck. Big and loud enough to make headlines about unexplained explosions on both bases during the show. Blackout the press. Pump even more smoke in the air near all ten targets. Turn off power strategically in some quadrants so the media sees dark squares as they try to figure out what happened.”

Another strategist sat up straight. “Easy enough to release a poorly written press release that suggests something big. A cover-up. Declare a no-fly zone over all the bases in the area that stretches far beyond our boundaries. We’d have until dawn to convince Laskin he succeeded. It’s now 0130 in Malta. They wouldn’t learn the truth—no visible damage anywhere on base and the fireworks show went off without a hitch—until sometime after noon their time.”

Silence settled in the room for a long moment. Finally, someone said, “Get Fallon and Hanson on the line so we can run this idea by them.”

Kira paced the salon as the minutes ticked down to the start of the fireworks display. What if they’d missed something? What if there was another target?

She liked the plan Captain Huang had presented. Tomorrow morning, an hour before dawn broke in the US, her brother was in for a big surprise, but still, she felt a little sick now.

Had it been too easy?