Sam swallowed. “Not a chance in hell.”
Chapter Forty-Six
Sam found Svetlana working on the laptop Elise had loaned her in the meeting room on the first deck. It’s hard drive had been wiped beforehand, and it had no connection to the satellite internet. At the end of the room, Genevieve reviewed maintenance logs for the Sea King and caught up on some other paperwork, which was more of a pretense for what she was really doing, which was guarding Svetlana. No one had told her that Genevieve was Russian. Right now, they wanted to play all their cards as close to their chest as possible.
To Svetlana, Sam said, “Any luck finding who was involved?”
She took a sip of her coffee and said, “Some, but not enough.”
“What do you know?”
“The man who came to visit the Vostok while I was locked in my surveillance room was an American. What’s more, the very same man visited the Vostok nearly three months ago, just before she was assigned to the Arctic Circle. One of the men who took him for a tour of the Vostok was my commander who’s now dead, but the other one I can find, and right now I have no way to find out if he was another American or one of ours.”
Sam said, “If you give me a copy of the image of the man’s face, I can have Elise find out for you. If he’s one of ours, she’ll have it on the navy’s human resources database. And if he’s one of yours, she will probably have it on the navy’s foreign intelligence databases.”
Svetlana eyed him, as though conflicted by how much to trust him. “Sure. I’ve got a copy on this USB stick. You can give it to Elise if you still don’t want to trust me with wireless connectivity.”
Thanks, Sam said, taking it. “I think that’s best, for everyone.” Then, turning to Genevieve, he said, “Do you mind running this up to Elise and asking her to urgently locate the identity of the man on the right.”
“Sure,” Genevieve’s eyes darted between Sam and Svetlana and back again. “Are you sure you’re all right down here?”
“Fine,” Sam replied amused by her concern.
Genevieve had already mentioned that just because the Russian spy wasn’t armed, didn’t make her any less dangerous.
Returning his gaze toward Svetlana, he said, “Elise is a genius. It won’t take her long to find out whose face that belongs to.”
“Elise is in intelligence gathering?”
Sam evaded the question. “Sort of.”
“CIA, FBI, or Military?”
Sam laughed. “It’s none of your business, but if it lets you concentrate on the task at hand, I’ll let you in on a secret.”
Svetlana smiled, as though she was willing to wait patiently for whatever it was Sam was going to reveal to her.
Sam said, “Elise works with me. She’s a computer geek and one of the best hackers in the world. She’s not for sale. She only works for me because it entertains her, and if I don’t find her enough interesting challenges, she disappears.”
Svetlana smiled, amused by the thought. Then, returning to her problem, said, “What about the American?”
Sam grinned. “I don’t suppose he was just coming on board as a guest?”
“No way in hell. You forget the Vostok was our prized information gathering vessel. There’s no way someone would have allowed an American to come on board.”
“What do you think he was doing there, three months ago?”
“I think he was offering to sell the Omega Deep to the commander.”
“But the Omega Deep hadn’t even launched yet.”
“Think about it, Mr. Reilly. You’re a smart guy. Where are the crew of a submarine from the whole world over, a few weeks before they’re deployed to a potentially 3-6-month tour of duty?”
“They’re on leave.”
“Exactly.” Svetlana smiled, revealing perfectly even white teeth.
Tom walked into the room.
Sam said, “Hey Tom, do you have the crew list for the Omega Deep on you?”
“Yeah, I think the Secretary emailed it to my phone. Why?”
Svetlana answered. “Because we need you to use it to see if someone who boarded the Vostok three months ago was on it, who I believe might have been in the process of trying to sell the Omega Deep to my commander.” She froze the image and zoomed into the face. Turning the laptop toward Tom, she said, “This man.”
Tom glanced at the screen and frowned. “I don’t have to check the list.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Because I already know who that is.”
Sam said, “Who?”
“His name is James Halifax, and he’s my father’s XO.”
Chapter Forty-Seven
Sam contacted the secretary of defense and updated her with the news of who most likely betrayed them.
When he was finished, Sam asked, “Any news from the survivors?”
“It was LSD.”
“What?” Sam asked, confused.
“You said to check their urine for traces of illicit drugs. We did. There were high levels of LSD.”
“In all of them?” Sam asked.
“Every single one of them. Someone wanted them to give a strange account of their disaster, that would confuse our search.”
“It would appear so.”
Sam asked, “How much longer until we have the Chinese and Russian navies on our tail?”
“They’re running about 24 hours behind you. The Russian aircraft carrier crossed the Bearing Strait a few hours ago and the Chinese aircraft carrier will reach Hawaii in about 4 hours.”
“All right, so while we keep heading south, we’ll keep that advantage, but I don’t have a clue what we’re going to do while we search for the Omega Deep, if it even is in the Pacific Ocean. Like you said, no matter which way you look, it’s almost impossible to think that the survivors have all traveled from the South Pacific Ocean in small life rafts.”
“About that.”
“What?”
The secretary said, “It appears some of the survivors might be telling the truth.”
“How so?”
“They said they ran aground in the South Pacific Ocean, so we had the life rafts tested — to see where the microbes and sea life originated.”
“And?”
“As expected, there were many types of marine algae, protists, plankton, and bacteria.”
Sam almost shouted, “What did you find!”
“Bacillus pacificus.”
“That’s only found in the tropical, warm waters of the Pacific Ocean.”
“Yes.”
“And our only lead takes us farther south. There’s no way we’re heading the right direction.”
“I know. It’s not necessarily helpful, but at least you know you’re in the right ocean. We’re sending the USS Gerald R. Ford back to escort you. Good luck.”
Sam put the satellite phone down.
Svetlana asked, “What now?”
“The life rafts were contaminated with the bacteria Bacillus pacificus, which is only found in the tropical waters of the Pacific Ocean.”
“Does that definitely rule out the South Pacific?”
Sam said, “It does unless you can find some warm water there.”
“How warm?”
“At least 85 degrees Fahrenheit.”
“What will you do?” she asked.
“I’m not sure.” Sam shook his head with incredulity. “To make matters worse, we now have aircraft carriers from Russia, China, and America all racing to converge on our location.”
She leveled her gray eyes at him. “You know if you play this wrong, you’re going to set us up for World War III, don’t you?”