His eyes adjusted to the night, Jake made out the silhouette of the tiny island’s sparse shoreline. He had set the submarine drifting as close to the shoals as he dared, and the beach seemed touchable.
He called Renard.
The Frenchman sounded fatigued, and, for the first time in Jake’s reckoning, old.
“Mon ami,” Renard said.
“You don’t sound happy to hear from me,” Jake said.
“Surprised. Cautious. I question why you are using your phone instead of the radio.”
“It’s encrypted, right?”
“Of course, but that is not my concern. It’s your ability to use it. Where are you?”
“Japanese waters. Yonaguni Island. Right where I should be per plan. But I’m surfaced.”
“Obviously, but dear God, man,” Renard said. “Why?”
“I needed to talk to Linda.”
“Call me a romantic, but I long for the days of wooden ships when men had no choice but to avoid such frivolous distractions.”
“My wife needs me.”
“Is there a crisis?”
Jake found Renard’s question unsurprising but disliked the mistrustful strain in the Frenchman’s voice.
“No,” he said. “She just needs me.”
“My wife needs me too. I understand that. But we picked strong women who accepted us for who we are.”
“It’s not your ass out here at risk,” Jake said.
“Where’s your courage, man? Where’s your confidence? You’re the best there’s ever been.”
“I just got my ass kicked, I barely survived an ambush, and I’d be dead right now along with the rest of the gang if it weren’t for Henri.”
“I’ve read your report. You made the right decision using the hydrazine line.”
“Henri saved us. I’m supposed to be your genius protégé, but your mechanic saved us. I screwed up, and I can’t figure out how. Something’s wrong in this scenario.”
“That was my fault. I unwittingly set you up for an ambush, but I also left you a defense as a mitigation. Give yourself credit for being smart enough to use it, even if Henri had to cajole you.”
Jake remembered a pattern of hesitating in his past commitments to Renard. The Frenchman had always promised excitement, adventure, and purpose, and he had always delivered. But this operation torqued his guts.
Without warning, the answer hit Jake like a stomach punch. He was overkill in this one. Renard didn’t need him.
The Frenchman had spent years advising the Taiwanese and had enjoyed the luxury of time and foresight to do what he did best — arm a nation per his plan. Jake digested the enormity of Renard’s preparation. He had driven Taiwan to build the Hai Ming, to lay defensive hydrophones, and to equip its vessels for tactical nuclear combat.
“Pierre,” Jake said. “You have this operation planned out like you never have before, at least not since I’ve known you.”
“Perhaps. Yes, I’ve invested a good deal of time into this. It promises to be my most important accomplishment.”
“Right. Your accomplishment. Not mine. This is your show, and you don’t get me for free this time.”
“I always pay you well, and I will for this operation. I know you trust me to make it worth your effort.”
“That’s not what I meant. For you and me, money hardly matters. I mean this time I have a home. I have something to lose. There’s someone back there who loves me.”
Jake noted a silence unlike any he’d shared with Renard. The Frenchman seemed struggling for words.
“Pierre? You still there?”
“Damn it, man,” Renard said. “I love you.”
“What?”
He heard Renard pause and sigh.
“I snapped as I said it, but I meant it,” Renard said. “You are a son to me.”
“You’ve run out of threats and prizes,” Jake said. “Are you resorting to my softer emotions to manipulate me?”
“No, I think not.”
“Then what the hell, Pierre? If you love me, why wait until now to tell me?”
“Because I’m proving it by letting you go.”
Jake glanced at the beacon to assure himself the shoreline’s proximity remained real.
“Really?” he asked. “You have a change of heart all of a sudden? On the doorstep of a battle?”
“I admit it to myself only now,” Renard said. “I planned this operation to succeed without you. It wasn’t until events unfolded and this became a reality that I felt compelled to garner your involvement. But in retrospect, I see it clearly. I’m only using you as an insurance policy.”
Tension washed from Jake’s body.
“Yeah,” he said. “I get it now. That’s what was bothering me. Maybe I wanted you to need me, but you really don’t.”
“And I’m sure this tastes bitter to you as it does now to me,” Renard said. “I had no right, and I can hear it in your voice that your heart is not in this, nor should it be. I will let you go.”
“Are you sure you can get by without me?”
Renard laughed. It was a mix of fatigue and emotional release.
“No, I would never dare say that my situation is better without you, but I trust that I’ve turned the odds enough in my favor to succeed.”
“Can you get me off this thing?”
“I’m afraid there is insufficient time to send a boat to you,” Renard said. “I can arrange transportation from the island to Tokyo for your flight home, but you’ll have to make it to the island on your own.”
“You’re banking that I’m a strong swimmer.”
“You’re strong at everything, mon ami.”
“So, that’s it?”
“Give me a moment to speak to Henri first,” Renard said. “I will contact him on the ship’s radio.”
Jake lowered the phone and took in the island’s silhouette. It offered his exodus, but it threatened his longstanding bond of loyalty with Renard.
A voice from below startled him.
“Jake?”
“Henri?”
“I’m coming to the bridge,” Henri said.
As Henri’s soles thumped against metal ladder rungs, Jake looked to his phone. Renard had hung up.
Henri’s white hair emerged through the girder floor.
“I’m disappointed, but I understand,” Henri said. “Pierre told me everything.”
“I’m glad you understand.”
“Here,” Henri said. “For your phone or any other valuables you might have.”
The Frenchman extended a small waterproof sack.
“Thank you,” Jake said.
“Head below and exit from the sail door. You don’t want to risk jumping from here. I will secure the bridge.”
Through Henri’s attempt at graciousness, Jake sensed his standoffishness. Abandoning a comrade prior to combat created discomfort.
Jake descended the ladder and placed his shoe on the lip of the pressure hull. He turned and opened the door. It creaked open. He ducked through it, closed it behind him, and crept around the sail to its far side where he paused to fulfill his promise of calling his wife.
Unwilling to specify the terms of his return home for fear of overpromising, he told her that he loved her but could make no commitment to a return date. She wanted more information, but he held his ground.
He put his phone into its bag, noted the direction to beacon, and leapt into the water.
CHAPTER 13
John Brody glared at Defense Secretary Rickets with the intent to gore him.
“Spit it out,” he said. “You’ve been talking in circles for ten minutes. You already talk like a politician.”
“Okay,” Rickets said. “You’re to withdraw all naval forces from the waters and airspaces of the Korean Peninsula, beginning immediately with a complete withdrawal in forty-eight hours. South Korea will defend itself.”