Snakeheads

By Marvin J. Wolf

Against a backdrop of rising military tensions with North Korea, Chelmin and Spaulding, based in Seoul, confront the work of a madman who puts bombs on bullet trains and on US Army buses.

With thirty Americans dead, the CID agents uncover a viper who used bombs to manipulate the stock market for fun and profit. The CID joins forces with an incorruptible senior ROK officer, only to learn that the killer is the son of a very powerful official. Determined to rid themselves of an honest cop who knows too much, the killer’s father outsources his problem to the Snakeheads, a lethal international gang, who mount successive attacks on the CID agents and their ROK police ally.

The agents realize that the only way to find justice for the Americans killed by bombs is to somehow lure the bomber out of South Korea, where his father has no power. Help arrives from an unexpected source: The killer's sexy sister, who hates her brother. She breaks into his computer and sends the CID pages of incriminating evidence, enough to get a US judge to issue a sealed arrest warrant.

Now all they have to do is find a way to lure the killer to America...

Especially for fans of Tom Clancy, Lee Child, and James Rollins, this explosive thriller will keep you guessing till the not-so-bitter end.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marvin J. Wolf
• Release date: Jan 25, 2023
• ISBN: 9798215409527

Marvin J. Wolf

Marvin J. Wolf served as an Army combat photographer, reporter, and press chief in Vietnam and was one of only sixty men to receive a battlefield promotion to lieutenant. He is the author, coauthor, or ghostwriter of seventeen previous books. He lives in Asheville, North Carolina, with his adult daughter and their two spoiled dogs.

Book preview

Chapter One

Ft. Fremont, California

Special Agent Rudy Chelmin took the last bite of his slightly stale plain donut, washed it down with a swallow of lukewarm black coffee, and prepared to face his day.

He had two open investigations: A humvee that had been stolen from the base motor pool and found damaged a day later abandoned on the shoulder of Highway One, and the rape of a female lieutenant by an unknown perp. He knew it would be easier to solve the stolen vehicle case, and he had learned that the rapist had left no DNA, so without a good description and some identifiable feature of the rapist’s anatomy—a scar, a tattoo, a distinctive mole, or something else—he stood a poor chance of ever finding the rapist.

There was also the chance, though very small, that there was no rapist and the sex had been consensual but followed by a savage beating. A dim possibility, Chelmin felt, but one that had to be investigated nevertheless.

Then Emily Forsythe, Chelmin’s chubby, fifty-something secretary, stuck her head through the door. Chief Spaulding is on line one, she said.

Chief Spaulding of the Barstow PD?

Is there another Chief Spaulding?

Chelmin sighed and picked up the phone.

How’s it going, Art? he said.

All quiet, until Spring Break, Spaulding replied.

How can I help you today?

Something came up. I need to reach Will, Spaulding said.

He didn’t come home on leave?

For five days. He said something about transition training before he left for Korea. He might still be at Fort Stewart, or he might be en route to Korea.

I can try to find him, Chelmin said. But if he’s in transit…

I’d like you to give him a message if you catch up with him.

What’s up?

Prinze Communications is being sold. That’s Barstow’s newspaper, the TV station, the radio station, and the TV and radio stations in Victorville and Mohave. The buyers, an investment group out of Boston, won’t go through with the sale while there’s the possibility of a libel lawsuit hanging over Prinze. For all that garbage that they printed and broadcast about Will last year.

Have they made him an offer?

A pretty good one, I think. If I knew where to send the papers….

I’ll get right on this, Art. And give my love to Beth.

She asked me yesterday if you were married yet?

Very happily, I’m glad to say. Why?

Last time you were here you were single, and she has a lady friend, a young widow…

Ancient history! Listen, Art, I’ll send a message to his unit in Korea. They’ll get it in a few hours

Appreciate it, Rudy. Stay in touch. Do you ever get out this way?

Not likely. But it could happen. Never know in this line of work.

Chapter Two

Yongsan Compound, Seoul,

Criminal Investigation Division

Special Agent-In-Charge Asher Shapiro was bored. And anxious. Bored because her four agents worked almost exclusively on cases involving petty theft, pathetically transparent embezzlement, the odd burglary, and the occasional assault or rape. Cases that were cleared in hours or days, with few exceptions. Since her arrival almost two months earlier, she had never been in the field. She had spent most of her time counseling her agents, doing paperwork, and briefing the provost marshal.

She was anxious because she hadn’t heard from Will, who was due to arrive almost two weeks ago but had not yet reported to his unit. Theirs had been a short, hyper-intense courtship, days and nights spent almost constantly in each other’s company while pursuing a gang of phantoms—Army deserters supposedly a decade dead but instead alive and attacking CID agents and military policemen. She had come to depend on Will and he on her, and when she invited herself into his bed for the first time, she realized that he was the lover she had longed for since her teens.

Shapiro was tiny, barely five feet tall, with a slim, almost perfectly proportioned body, clear olive skin, lustrous dark hair, and large, dark eyes. She was twenty-six, a graduate, at age 20, of American University with a BS in Justice and Law. Ash grew up in Liao Cheng and Guangzhou China, College Park, Maryland, and Alexandria, Virginia. She spoke English, Mandarin, Cantonese, Modern Hebrew, and a little Yiddish. On her way to Seoul, she had stopped at the Defense Language Institute’s Foreign Language School in Monterey, California for a thirty-day crash course in Hangul, the language of Korea. She could hold her own in casual conversation, and she could read street signs, subway maps, and shop signs, but she was far from fluent.

For the eighth time in an hour, she checked her phone for messages. And there was one from, of all people, the CID Special Agent in Charge at Fort Fremont, California:

Ash: Will took Apache transition flight training en route to Korea. Re-assigned to 4th Attack/Recon Bn at Humphreys and arrived today. His C.O. sent a message to Mo Goldzweig—-he thinks Will is an undercover spook! Will should call you as soon as he has a few minutes—-now in-processing.

Hugs,

Rudy

Ash put the phone down and dug out an Eighth Army phone directory, then dialed the Command Chief Warrant Officer of the Fourth Attack/Recon Battalion.

Chief Melvin speaking, said the voice in her ear.

Chief, this is Special-Agent-in-Charge Asher Shapiro, Yongsan CID.

How can I help you, Agent Shapiro?

"My fiancé, CWO-2 Spaulding, is or will soon report to your outfit—

Sorry to interrupt, but he just left the Old Man’s office. He’s going to Bravo Company, and they will have him for most of the day, in-processing, and then a check ride. If you give me your number, I’ll make sure that he calls you as soon as he’s free.

Appreciate it, Chief, she said, and recited her office and then her cell number.

Chapter Three

Bravo Company, 4th Attack/Recon Battalion

"Spaulding, did you enjoy your transition to the Longbow?" said Chief Warrant Officer Four Benjamin Peters, the battalion’s senior instructor pilot.

‘Kind of, Will said. It’s bigger than the Kiowa, way heavier and faster—and the weapons system is complicated—but at the same time, it’s so automated that it’s almost too easy to use. I was just getting the hang of it when the class ended."

That sums it up nicely. Before we suit up and go for a check ride, I’m going to read you into the military situation here in South Korea.

As you probably know, in the last five years, likely with the help of Iran and Russia, North Korea has developed a suite of nuclear and conventional missiles, both tactical and strategic. Their air force is mostly obsolete MIG-17s and MIG-23s—we have no idea what their maintenance profile looks like—and a few more advanced MIG-29 aircraft. For that reason, whenever we are on a training exercise, our birds carry Sidewinder air-to-air missiles.

Will raised his hand and Peters nodded to him.

Chief, have the North Koreans attacked our helicopters?

"Not yet. But they’ve buzzed helicopter formations carrying US or South Korean troops, and flown so close to our Blackhawks that they had to take evasive action.

This usually takes place during large, multi-service training exercises, Peters continued. The KPA also has some Soviet-made transport helicopters. Standing orders are to avoid all engagement with NK aircraft.

Then unless we go to war, I probably won’t see any enemy aircraft?

Not their helicopters. Spaulding, you need to know that the North Koreans are forever trying to get us to chase after them. Engage them, fire at them. And that is what we are to avoid at almost any cost. The only exception is if they fire at us, or if they are more than five miles inside South Korean airspace. But, should that be the case, before firing we are to make every effort to get them to land or leave ROK airspace. Rules of engagement. Got it?

Yes, sir, Will said.

One of their favorite stunts is to dive from high altitude down through a formation of helicopters. Sometimes they manage to bring enough turbulence to flip a bird or two.

Have you experienced that?

Not yet. But I’ve seen one bird lose a rotor blade and another turned turtle for a few seconds.

Would that be enough to slip a Sidewinder up his tailpipe?

Peters laughed. Unless you’re at least twenty miles from the DMZ, I wouldn’t. They’d claim we invaded North Korean airspace.

Do you think the North Koreans want war?

Only on their terms. They have close to a million troops entrenched along the DMZ, which runs 151 miles from coast to coast. They have enough emplaced conventional artillery to kill a million civilians in Seoul in a few minutes. And there are tunnels under the DMZ.

Hold on, Chief. Tunnels under the Demilitarized Zone? From North Korea into South Korea?

We’ve found five, going back to the Seventies. There might be as many as a dozen more that we haven’t found.

How big?

Miles long and some wide enough for two big trucks to pass each other.

So big enough for tanks?

Sure. And we’d be up trying to kill those tanks for a couple of hours before the ROKs and our guys could get our tanks up there to engage them.

How much if what you just told me is classified, chief?

Only the part about turning a bird upside down with a MIG screaming down from 35,000 feet at Mach two.

Got it.

Okay, let’s suit up and go for a ride, Peters said.

Chapter Four

Yongsan Compound

Wearing a below-the-knee skirt in peach under a fuzzy white sweater, her raven hair pulled into a ponytail that fell to her waist, Ash waited at The Yongsan bus station until a big, olive-green bus pulled in and Spaulding, wearing a flight suit and carrying a large brown envelope, jumped down the stairs and ran to Ash, who fell into his arms.

I was worried, she murmured.

Sorry. Our flight from Robins AFB was delayed by weather, and by the time I got to Osan, the shuttle bus to Humphreys had stopped for the night.

No matter, you’re here, and that’s all I care about.

Gently, Will lowered her feet to the ground.

You’re even more beautiful than I remembered, he said.

Cut it out, Ash said, smiling. So, what’s with the lawyers?

Long story short: One of the reasons I enlisted eighteen months ago was because I arrested the brother of Barstow’s media mogul—head of the Prinze family—with a dying girl in the trunk of his car. Hit-and-run homicide, with a twist: He was gonna bury her body. Should have been an open-and-shut case, but things got crazy. The Mercedes he was driving disappeared from the impound lot. The tow driver moved out of the state. The girl at Wal-Mart who sold the perp a pick and a shovel left town and couldn’t be located. Then the family newspaper, their TV station, and their radio station began running stories about how I was a crooked cop. That I sold the Mercedes to a chop shop in San Bernardino. That I stole cash from drug busts, took bribes, assaulted prisoners and suspects—anything and everything they could put out to poison the jury pool against the arresting officer.

You sued them for libel? Ash said.

Will shook his head. "Couldn’t afford to. Talked to three lawyers but none would take the case on contingency. They each wanted a $200,000 retainer. The Prinzes were very clever about how they wrote things, always attributing my supposed crimes to unnamed sources.

"But now they’re selling the stations and the paper for half a billion dollars. The buyers worry that I might still sue for libel and they won’t go through with the sale until the Prinzes settle with me.

How much?

$500,000, Will said.

Ashe laughed. You’ll take it, right?

Will shrugged. They put me through a lot of crap. I lost several close friends. I want to talk to a lawyer before I make up my mind.

It’s just around the corner, she said.

§

The Judge Advocate’s offices were in a three-story, khaki-colored stucco building. An MP at the entrance stopped the couple and seized Ash’s arm.

No yobos allowed, he said, using slang for a Korean girlfriend.

Ash swept her leg across the MP’s shins and he toppled sideways to the concrete.

She lifted her sweater to reveal a CID Badge and a holstered 9mm clipped to her wide belt. Then she pulled her credentials from her purse. Special Agent-In-Charge, Yongsan CID, she said.

I didn’t know, the MP whined.

I’ve been in this building a dozen times this month, Ash said. You should remember me. More important, you should know better than to grab a woman—any woman.

Upstairs, a senior noncom checked Will’s ID and led the couple to an open door.

Chief Warrant Officer Spaulding and his, uh, friend, sir, he said to a balding and burly major behind a large steel desk.

The major smiled. Special Agent Shapiro, he said. How can I help you?

It’s my fiancé’s issue, she said.

In half a dozen sentences, Will described why the Prinze family was offering him $500,000.

May I see the offer? said the major, and Will slid the envelope across the desk.

In silence, the lawyer skimmed the six-page document twice, then went back and re-read a few paragraphs.

Libel is outside my field of expertise, he said. I don’t have any kind of handle on what a settlement might go for. And I don’t know of an American personal injury attorney here in Korea. But I can share two things: Whatever the settlement is, the award is fully taxable.

What rate will I pay? Will said

It’s taxed as ordinary income, so, adding $500,000 to your annual income as a CWO-2, probably 37 percent, unless you have a lot of deductions.

What’s the second thing? Ash said.

It’s never a good idea to take the first offer. You can usually get more if you make a counteroffer. Remember, these people are trying to close a $500,0000,000 deal. One percent of that is $5 million.

Will said, So if I ask for five million, they might come back with three?

The major smiled. You’re a quick study. Now let’s say you get three million. You could save a lot in taxes by having them put that money in an interest-bearing escrow account and take it over several years. If you’re going to be filing as a married couple, add your salaries and see how much you can squeeze into the lowest tax bracket that applies. Or you could find a good CPA, and see if he can find some tax loophole, such as investing some of the proceeds in a retirement account.

Ash said, Do you know any CPAs here in Korea?

Not personally. But there are quite a few American companies here, and some are bound to have a CPA on staff.

Ash and Will were halfway down the stairs from the second floor when they heard the first bomb go off.

Chapter Five

Bus Station, Yongsan Compound

Running flat out, Will could barely keep pace with Ash. She ran toward the sound of the explosion and the smoke rising into the sky.

At the bus station, they found two buses ablaze. An Army shuttle bus, obviously the bomb target, was by then a blazing shell. Alongside it, a yellow school bus was burning from the rear, where its fuel tank sat over the engine.

Will saw children pounding at the windows, which were stuck because the bus frame had bent from the blast. The front door was similarly jammed. Ash pulled out her phone and called the fire department as Will ran to a parked car with a woman behind the wheel.

Open your trunk, he said, his voice ringing with authority.

He ran around to the back, pulled the trunk wide, and came away with a tire iron that doubled as part of the jack. He raced back to the bus, jammed the thin end into the side of the accordion-style front door, and pulled with all his might.

The door opened a few inches. Will dropped the iron and with both hands pulled the folding door open.

A child tumbled out, followed by several more.

Ignoring the heat and smoke, Will climbed inside, and noted that the driver was a Korean woman in her middle years and that she was slumped over the wheel. He worked his way up the aisle and found a child on the floor, wedged into the bottom of the seat. He pulled her out, then turned to see two boys, both unconscious in their seats.

The flames came nearer and nearer. He felt his hair melt as he picked up all three children and made his way to the front of the bus. Ash took the kids from him, laying them on the grass several yards from the bus. Then she returned to the bus and dragged the driver, who was still breathing, out of the bus and to the grass.

Will had meanwhile moved to the middle of the bus and found two more children, one conscious and coughing and one unconscious. He put one under each arm and ran for the front door, leaped from the bus, and took three long strides before the bus’s gas tank exploded.

Laying both children on the grass, he began administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to the unconscious boy.

After what seemed an eternity, the boy coughed twice, opened his eyes, and began to cry.

Moments later the first fire trucks and ambulances arrived, and paramedics began working over the children. None were badly burned, but Will was almost certain that he’d seen two bodies burning in the last row.

He sat down on the curb and tried to catch his breath.

Another explosion rocked the compound, this one from the direction of the commissary.

Seconds later, two of Ash’s men came trotting up, followed by a dozen MPs armed with M4 carbines.

Where are Johnson and Lopez? Ash asked.

They diverted to the commissary, said Agent LeMoyne, a slim, dark man of perhaps forty. Within minutes, the provost marshal, a bulky lieutenant colonel named Reynolds, arrived in his M1161 Growler light strike vehicle with an MP captain and an MP sergeant.

The captain and his sergeant began interviewing the bystanders, one by one, taking their names, rank, and unit.

Will was still breathing hard from his exertions when Ash approached, followed by a medic. Will, you need to go with this medic, she said.

I’m okay, he said.

"You’re not okay. Your hair is burned, your face is scorched, and I’ll bet you inhaled a lot of toxic smoke. Put your heroic self away and go with Specialist Morgan. She’ll take you to the hospital, and I’ll join you as soon as I’m free."

My heroic self?

Will! We know you have brass balls, but I don’t have time for his. Go with Morgan.

Will nodded. You’re right. See you later, he said, then followed Morgan to an ambulance, where she gave him an oxygen mask to wear, helped him lie down on a gurney, then drove away.

They were almost to the hospital when the third bomb exploded in a parking lot outside the Provost Marshal’s office.

Chapter Six

Bravo Company Orderly Room

"I understand that you saved at least a dozen children," said Major Jay Coleman, a trim man with the silver wings and surmounted star of a Senior Aviator on his flight suit.

I guess so, Will said. I didn’t stop to count them.

Well done, Mister. That was a gutsy move.

Thank you, sir. I’m sure you would have done the same.

I think I might have got the door open. But I have three children of my own, and I’m not sure that I would have run into a burning bus.

Yes, sir.

If you haven’t guessed, I’m Jay Coleman, your company commander, he said. Welcome to Bravo. And the flight surgeon will want to examine you before you go up again.

I think I’m okay, sir.

You look like shit. Half your hair is burned off and you have the worst sunburn I’ve ever seen.

Yes, sir. The hair will grow back, and they gave me some ointment for my face and hands.

If the flight surgeon clears you to fly, I’ll be very surprised.

Will shrugged.

Nowadays everyone carries a cell phone, Spaulding. You’ll be on the Armed Forces Korea Network news tonight. The Korean networks will pick that up, I suspect. I was able to get them to withhold your name.

Thank you, sir.

Not my idea. Your girlfriend—I mean fiancée—asked me to do that.

Ash—Special Agent Shapiro—is very special.

That she is, Spaulding. When do you tie the knot?

We were thinking that should be when we return Stateside, so our families can have the pleasure of participating in a wedding ceremony.

That’s two years from now. Very considerate of both of you, Coleman said.

We’re both only children. And both adopted, although my father is my biological uncle. And we both owe our parents a great deal, even more than most kids do.

I’m very glad to have a man—a pilot—like you in my company. I know that you need to rest, but unfortunately, the battalion commander asked me to bring you to his office.

§

CWO Spaulding reports to the battalion commander, Will said, saluting.

Have a seat, Spaulding, said LTC Faas. Coleman, stick around, have a seat.

Will cautiously lowered himself into a cushioned chair in front of Faas’ desk.

I just got off the phone with General Davis at Rucker, Faas said. Jay, what I say next does not leave this room.

Yes, sir.

"How is it that a submarine operated by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard managed to make its way submerged into Mobile Bay, where it surfaced and was then disabled by rocket fire from a US Army helicopter, then boarded by the Coast Guard, who recovered millions in stolen cash—and I don’t know anything about this? Why wasn’t this in the papers and on network TV?

Will shook his head. Homeland Security decided that it was need-to-know, compartmentalized intelligence. They wanted to negotiate with the Iranians without publicity. The Coast Guard released a story to the effect that it was a US sub as part of a training exercise.!

Faas shook his head. Why didn’t you just sink it, Spaulding?

"I didn’t want to kill the crew and magnify the encounter into more than it was—not so much an international incident, as an international criminal conspiracy. The Coast Guard towed the sub to a dry dock, where its Iranian markings were camouflaged while the diving planes, rudder, and screw were repaired. Meanwhile,