other things to think about than an admiral’s pettiness.
“You and your people did a good job as well,” Dog told Woods. He was sincere — though the emphasis fell more heavily on the Navy personnel working for Woods rather than the admiral himself.
“I’m sorry about the people you lost.”
“So am I,” said Dog. Beside Chris and Torbin Dolk, one other member of Breanna’s EB-52 was officially listed as killed in action — Lieutenant Freddy Collins. His body had been discovered by the Navy patrol that was backing Danny up when they recovered Dolk. Captain Kevin “Curly” Fentress was officially MIA, but he was almost certainly dead as well. A thorough search of the area, both by the UMB and the Navy, had failed to turn up any trace of the young Flighthawk pilot.
Woods cleared his throat. For a second — perhaps less than that — Dog thought the cocksure-of-himself admiral was actually going to apologize for kicking him out of the Philippines.
Then he realized the fleet would sink before that happened.
“Piranha and your robot planes obviously did well,” said Woods, the edge back in his voice. “You must be feeling pretty good.”
“Actually, the only thing I feel at the moment is tired,” said Dog, killing the transmission.
He looked up. The copilot was just emerging from the cockpit. “Colonel, you have another call pending. Dr. Rubeo.”
All of his favorite people were tormenting him today, thought Dog. All he needed next was a call from his ex-wife.
“Doc, talk to me,” said Dog, clicking into the circuit.
“The disc that was recovered from the downed Megafortress contains an unidentified contact at long range that appears to be a U/MF,” said the scientist.
“What?” said Dog. “Is it the search team?”
“Hardly,” said Rubeo. “This occurred just prior to the shoot-down. We had no assets in the vicinity. The contact was a small, extremely robust aircraft, nothing on the order of the first- or second-generation UAVs available to the Chinese, or Russians for that matter. Nor was it large enough to be a MiG-29, which is another theory you’ll hear. I’m quite sure, Colonel. I have one of the radar specialists and a member of the U/MF development team here to talk you through the data, I wanted to make sure you knew about this as soon as possible.”
“Go ahead and plug them into the circuit,” said Dog grimly.
[b]Jennifer managed to wait until the cabin door of the small aircraft cranked open. Then she launched herself at the steps catching Dog about midway down.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey yourself,” she said, hugging him tightly. She’d been waiting here for nearly six hours. Zen and Jennifer had arrived on the islands on a commercial flight out of Japan, which Iowa and the rest of her crew returned directly to Dreamland, their deployment over.
“I was worried about you,” Dog told Jennifer.
“Me?” She took a step down to the Tarmac. “Why?”
“Because I was worried,” said Dog.
“Oh, please. Why would you worry?”
Seeing he was going to explain, Jennifer did the only sensible thing — she leaned close and kissed him.
“People are watching,” he said when they parted.
“You think we can do better?”
Without waiting for an answer, Jennifer kissed him again. When their lips parted, Jennifer leaned her head back slightly, then smiled.
“Third time’s a charm,” she said, kissing him again. It did do the trick; she felt him finally relax.
“What’s the word on Breanna?” he asked when they finally started walking away from the plane.
“She’s getting better,” said Jennifer. “She’s at Bright Memorial.”
“I’m going to go over there right now,” said Dog.
“I thought you would. I have a car waiting for you in front of the hangar.”
“You coming?”
“I’m supposed to have a phone conference with the people on the Piranha team in about fifteen minutes,” said Jennifer. “They’ve been asked to make a presentation to the White House first thing in the morning, so they’re scrambling. Ray talked to you?”
Dog nodded.
“It’s possible that the radar image is an echo of the Megafortress’s own Flighthawks,” she told him. “If the gear was malfunctioning because of the fire, it’s possible. We’ll have to carefully analyze the tape.”
“Dr. Rubeo doesn’t think that’s likely,” said Dog.
Jennifer nodded. She agreed with Ray.
“Where’s Zen?” Dog asked.
“I think he’s at the hospital. I haven’t seen him since we landed in Honolulu.”
Dog gave her one of his uh-grunts, the sort he used when he was processing several things at once. “We’ll hook up later,” he said.
“At the hotel,” she said. “We’ll have room service dinner and then R&R.”
“Sounds good.” He turned and kissed her again. “I love you,” he whispered.
“Hold that though,” she said, barely managing to twist herself away.
An hour later, Colonel Bastian waited at the visitor’s desk of Bright Memorial Hospital Honolulu as a volunteer fumbled through a stack of old-fashioned visitor cards, looking for Breanna’s room number. “I’ll find it, I’ll find it,” insisted the woman, talking more to herself than him.
Dog glanced down the hallway. His uniform would probably get him up to her room without a problem — except he wasn’t sure where exactly it was. Not only was the private hospital immense, it had been cobbled together under several different administrations. Each wing seemed to be a maze unto itself. He didn’t need a pass; he needed directions.
That or a GPS device.
“Here, oh, yes, here she is,” said the woman, pulling the card from her file. “Breanna Stockard. What sort of name is that?”
A name that her stubborn mother insisted on, thought Dog. He answered that it was Irish.
“Hmmm. She has a visitor,” added the volunteer after giving him directions and a color-coded map.
Probably Zen, thought Dog. But it was Danny Freah he found standing at Breanna’s bedside.
“Hey, you,” he told Breanna.
“Hi, Daddy,” She started to push up.
“It’s okay, baby,” he told her, putting his hand on her shoulder gently. He leaned down and kissed her forehead. She pulled her arms around him; he could feel her tears on his cheek.
His tears too, maybe.
“I’m damn glad you made it,” he told her.
“Me too.” She looked toward Danny.
“And you!” Dog turned and gave his captain a hug. “Thanks. Thanks.”
Danny, looking embarrassed, shrugged when Dog let him go.
“Where’s Jeff?” asked Breanna.
“I thought Zen was here already,” said Dog.
“I haven’t seen him since I woke up,” said Breanna.
“Probably ducked out for dinner or lunch or something. I’m sure he’ll be back,” said Dog. He felt a flush of anger at his son-in-law for not sitting at Breanna’s side, where he belonged.
“He flew the B-5,” said Danny, obviously sticking up for Zen. “That’s how we found you. They loaded a mini- KH package in the belly, rigged up a way for him to fly it from Iowa, and he found you. Thank God.”
“So where is he?” she asked, her voice hoarse.
Dog looked at Danny, who shrugged.
“TV was on when I came in,” said Danny. “You were just kind of drifting awake.”
Breanna’s face was puffy. Her eyes seemed to have trouble focusing, and Dog could tell that her head was
