Finally, Cliff broke the quiet. “I didn’t mean for this to happen. It just did.”
“Do you know what happens if the Chinese get this technology?” Fisher asked.
“I didn’t think about that.”
“Think about it now. It would negate our laser superiority. If they sold the technology to Russia or any other country, we might as well scrap our systems.”
“And that’s a bad thing,” Cliff said. “Maybe I should have posted it on the Internet. Then every country would have to get rid of their nukes. Maybe I’ll still do it.”
“What do you mean?” Fisher glanced back through the rearview mirror.
“Nothing.”
“You have copies?”
Cliff was silent.
“You have copies,” Fisher repeated.
“Hey, Li never said it was an exclusive deal. I thought I’d make a little extra selling to the highest bidder.”
“You set up an Internet auction? You’re fuckin’ incredible. When does this happen?”
“You’re a smart guy. Figure it out.”
When would be the moment of greatest worth? Fisher struggled with that as he passed a semi trailer that nearly knocked the Crown Victoria off the road. Once he got in front of the truck it came to him. “Right after a successful test,” Fisher said. Shit. The test of the new software in Alaska was tomorrow. They needed to stop the test. Or at least delay it.
32
Jake drove on into the night, while Chang Su slept in the passenger seat. They were just a few miles out of Dandong, a port city of some two million, across the Yalu River from Sinuiju, North Korea. Jake had chosen the city for a couple of reasons. First, nobody would expect them to go there. There was, after all, no large international airport. It was a port city of little concern to most. Also, Jake was hoping they’d be able to catch a regional flight that wouldn’t attract much attention. On the down side, he knew, tourists had not started flocking there yet-at least not in numbers like those heading to Beijing, Shanghai, Xi’an, Guilin, and Yangtze River cruises. He would stick out.
Su started to wake as the lights from the city started to pass by their windows.
“Where are we?” she asked.
“Just outside of Dandong. I could use your help.”
“Sure.” She sat up in her seat. “What you need?”
“We need to find the airport.”
“There,” she said, pointing to a sign. “What time is it?”
Jake took the turn toward the airport. “Why?”
“If it’s after ten, the airport will be closed.”
He pulled the car to the side of the road and stopped, the engine sputtering and almost shutting down. He ran his fingers through his hair and realized that it had been a long few days. He needed a place to sleep. A place to take a shower. And he needed a place that would not take his passport, or even care about his personal information. Better yet, he thought, he could use one of his additional passports. Since he moved to Austria a few years back, he had gotten a passport under that country. Nobody questioned an Austrian passport in Europe. But here, it would be a novelty that would be easily remembered. It would have to do, though. He was too tired to get original.
He put the car in gear and drove a few blocks to the Bravo Airport Hotel, a large European-style place. In an isolated part of the parking lot, the two of them found more appropriate clothes from their backpacks and checked in as a couple.
When they got to their room on the fourth floor, with a view of the airport, Jake realized there was only one bed, and it was not even a queen size.
“I guess I’ve got the floor,” Jake said to her.
Her eyes seemed dazed, as if she hadn’t even considered the sleeping arrangements.
“You mind if I shower first?” he asked.
“That’s fine.”
Jake got into the small bathroom and stripped from his clothes. He had been on the run for so long, he could only imagine how good the shower would feel.
Naked and standing under the hot water, he ran the soap over his body, the steam rising up in the small room. It was the first time since Beijing that he had gotten a spontaneous erection.
Seconds later, the shower curtain moved aside and Su stepped into the tub, completely naked. She didn’t say a word, but her brows rose when she saw him like that.
She got wet and he rubbed the soap over her body, bringing her nipples to match his rigidity. When she first touched him, he thought he would explode. But he forced himself to wait. He had observed her for the last few days, imagining what she would look like under all those clothes. And now. His imagination had not done her justice. She was so perfect. Her skin was as smooth as jade, yet as warm as a hearth.
She shifted her head up to him and he wiped her wet hair to the side of her face, clearing drops of water from her dark eyes.
As their lips touched for the first time, he felt a spark within him that he had not felt in quite some time. They lingered like that, the water running down their heads.
He reached around behind her and lifted her to him.
Sliding down onto him, she gasped.
Together, as one, he helped her rise and fall onto him, until, as if they had synchronized the final act, she writhed with pleasure and he burst into her.
Much later, they lay in bed together, her head against his bare chest, the darkness broken only by a strip of light from the airport.
Jake had had time to think, trying his best to understand what had just happened. He knew that sometimes it was better not to find reasons for some things. Just accept them as they were. He hadn’t had the normal hints that they were heading in this direction. Perhaps that was because they had both been focused on the job at hand and the long journey and the death of her friend in Harbin. Although he had been intrigued by her from the first moment they met, he also knew that working closely with someone in his world often clouded his judgment to the real task at hand.
“What you think?” she asked him, barely above a whisper.
“I’m glad you decided to join me.”
She turned her head to look him in the eye. “I meant about tomorrow,” she said. “I don’t expect anything else. I needed.” She hesitated, her breathing slowed and her eyes shifting away from his. “I need to feel something good so I’m human again.”
He held her tighter. “I understand. You lost a good friend in Harbin.”
“You lost Armstrong,” she said, as if they were equal.
“True. But we barely knew each other. I feel responsible for his death, though. If I had called him, kept him informed, maybe he wouldn’t have had to come looking for us.”
She put her hand on his mouth. “No. It was his job. You were doing him a favor. And, they would have caught us if he did not come.”
He held her hand. “I know. But first his brother dies in the Ukraine and now…”
“Not your fault.” Her voice was more serious now.
“Did you know Armstrong?”
She shook her head. “I knew about him, but I worked through a man in Shanghai.”
Jake already knew this. At least as far as he was told by Armstrong’s man, Anderson.
“Now what?” she asked him.
“Are we talkin’ about us or tomorrow?”
She laughed for the first time, and it was appealing. “Tomorrow.”
“Well, we have to get out of China. I have a friend in Korea. If we can get there, he can help us.”
Her smile turned to a gravity he had not seen in her.
“It’ll be all right,” he assured her.
“Not all right. I have to leave my country for good.”
“You left for college.”
“Yes, but I came back. They might kill my family.”
Jake shook his head. “No. We’ll plant a story. They’ll think you’re dead.”