“I’ll be all right,” Armstrong said, his words barely making it from his lips. “You get the photos?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t send them on the phone.”
“Why?”
“Compromised.”
“I don’t get it.”
Su came to them with a first aid kit, and pulled out a bandage and tape. As she pulled up his coat to access the wound, Jake lay onto the floor next to Armstrong.
“What do I do with the photos?” Jake asked him.
“Shemya… Alaska.”
“What about it?”
“Bring it there.”
“A Agency officer there?”
“No.” He writhed in pain.
Jake looked at Su, who was trying to cover the wound, but was losing the battle. Her hands were full of blood; the compress bandage had turned from white to completely red. And Jake realized she must be in pain herself, with her left wrist broken.
“Who then?” Jake asked.
“Colonel Powers. Only him.” Armstrong’s eyes started to close.
Jake shook him. “No. Stay awake. How’d you find us?”
“G… P…S… Inside backpack handle.”
“Shit! Just hang in there, man.” The horror of this was just starting to hit Jake. He had worked with Armstrong’s brother in the Ukraine, and that officer had died. Sure Jake had had no part in that, but maybe he could have seen it coming. And now another Armstrong, who was only trying to save his ass, was now dying.
Su pulled on Jake’s arm. “I can’t stop it.”
Armstrong’s eyes were now closed; his breathing had stopped. Jake checked for a carotid pulse.
Nothing.
Jake shook his head. “Damn it!” He slammed his hand against the deck.
Su put her hand on Jake’s back. “You good friends?”
He shook his head. “No, we just met a few days ago.” He hesitated and then said, “It’s a long story.”
Jake took in deep breaths, trying his best to maintain control. He had to think about their current situation. Who was flying this beast? And where were they heading?
He pulled the headset from Armstrong’s head and put it on. Then, through the microphone, he asked, “Hey, you speak English up there?” He could only see the back of the pilot’s head, which was covered by a helmet.
The pilot turned around. It was a black man in his 50s. “What the fuck you think, Bitch? What’s up back there?”
“Armstrong took a bullet in the back,” Jake said.
“He all right?” the pilot asked.
“He’s dead.”
“Dat ain’t all right.” The pilot turned back to flying.
Jake moved forward. He saw they were flying low, the trees to the side even with them. Then he saw why. They were following the river downstream.
“I’m Jake Adams.”
“I’d shake your hand and all that shit but I’m a little busy right now,” the pilot said. “Armstrong told me about you on the flight up. We coulda picked ya up last night in the mountains but we had no way of contacting you. Had to go back for fuel.”
“Phones weren’t working,” Jake said.
The pilot nodded agreement.
“You work for the Agency?” Jake asked.
“I work for whoever pays my ass. Been in these parts for more than thirty years. After Nam I just couldn’t go back. Damn pussy is just too damn good.” He peered around behind him toward Su. “She can’t hear this. You get any of that yet? She fine.”
Jake changed the subject. “Where we heading?”
“Changchun for fuel. Then Shenyang. You can catch a flight from there to Beijing.”
“What about Armstrong?”
“We had a contingency for all this shit. You let me take care of him. I fly. You get the hell outta China. You better bring her with you?”
“Why?”
The pilot hesitated and then finally said, “They been roundin’ up her relatives. She can’t go back.”
Jake looked to the rear at Su, who was now curled up in a blanket trying to get warm.
What in the hell was going on? This should have been a simple job. Get in, take a few photos, get out. But nothing was ever as easy as that. Now he had to tell Su that she would have to leave China with him. Would she go?
He watched the landscape fly by below as the sun rose higher on the horizon. He had left his stuff in Beijing at the hotel, but he had no real desire to go back for it. It was only clothes. He could get those anywhere.
Glancing back at Armstrong on the deck of the chopper, he wondered how he would ever be able to justify his death to himself or anyone else. And why Alaska of all places? Did it matter? He had already been paid quite nicely, and the job was not over.
He never left anything undone.
29
“Where the hell is she going?” Special Agent Fisher asked aloud to himself as he turned the car onto I-205 North just south of Portland.
It was getting dark, at that period where the eyes had not changed from day to night, and the rain had picked up some. To make matters worse, it was Friday evening and rush hour traffic would become a bigger problem as they approached Portland.
Cliff had his eyes closed in the back seat, and Agent Harris had climbed over to the front passenger seat about ten miles back to help navigate.
“I’m guessing the airport,” Harris said. “The two oh five bypasses most of the city and ends up right at Portland International.”
“Great. If we don’t stick close, she’ll end up on a plane to damn near anywhere without us catching her. I say we just pull her ass over. We got her on murder and espionage. What more do we need?”
“You know better than that,” Harris said to him. “We need to know who she’s working for; otherwise we’ll never get it out of her.”
Agent Fisher pulled around a couple of cars to get closer to the white Trooper ahead.
“What are you doing? Not so close.”
“We lose her and we’re fucked.”
Harris thought for a minute and then pulled out a map of Portland. She could barely read it, only seeing what she needed from the headlights of cars behind them.
“Okay,” Harris said. “We call ahead. Have a reception waiting for her at the airport.”
“What if she doesn’t go to the airport?” This surprised the both of them, coming from Cliff in the back.
“Shut the fuck up,” Harris said.
“He’s got a point,” Fisher said under his breath.
She checked the map again. “All right, smart ass. Where do you think she’s going?” She turned directly at Cliff; a look that burned right through him.
“Seattle.”
“Seattle?” she asked. “Why the fuck Seattle?”
Cliff shrugged. “That’s where I’d go. Li is Chinese, right? If she’s working for them, then she’d need a flight there to deliver the DVD she got from me.”
“And she can’t do that from Portland?” Fisher asked.
“There are no direct flights from Portland to China,” Cliff assured them. “You have to fly to Seattle, San Fran, or L.A. So, she’d want to pick up a direct flight.”
“Why do you assume that?” Harris asked.
Cliff shook his head. “She could have caught a flight to Portland in Eugene, and then another to Seattle. That’s if she had wanted a bunch of connections.”
Fisher laughed as he pulled out and passed another car.
“All right,” Harris said. “But why does she have to deliver the DVD? Why not just send the data over the Internet to China?”
Cliff leaned forward in his seat against the seat belt. “Now here’s where I’m sure about her. She doesn’t trust technology. She thinks the government is tracking every transfer of data.”
Harris glanced sideways at Fisher and then back at Cliff. “Which government?”
“Doesn’t matter. All governments.”
“Shit!”
“What?” Fisher said.