They were probing the area.”
“Roadblocks? Checks?”
“None on the latest imagery. We’re scrambling to get more real-time data and coverage. You’ll probably be there before we get it, though.”
“Great.” Mara reached down and began pulling on her boots.
“Be careful, Mara. Don’t take any unnecessary risks.”
You should have told me that before I joined the company, she thought.
Jimmy Choi had taken the first watch himself. His usual smile slipped when Mara told him that their subject was in trouble — but just a bit.
“We pull his fanny from fire, what you say?” The Korean slapped his hands together. “Four kilometers nothing.”
“It’s more like eight on the roads.”
“Four, eight — good round numbers. Very lucky.”
Jimmy trotted over to the tented lean-to his men had erected to sleep under. Three minutes later, he had them ready to go. He and Meanie, his fellow Korean, sat together in the Hanma. Moe, the Russian, rode shotgun in the truck with Mara behind the wheel; Jeb, the American-Eritrean, was in the back.
Moe grunted when Mara handed him the paper map. She didn’t speak Russian, and if he spoke English he had yet to share a word of it. But he looked vaguely Asian, certainly more so than the fair-skinned Jeb.
And Mara, for that matter. She pulled her soft cap down and pulled up her collar, obscuring but not hiding her European features.
Moe rode with a Chinese rifle locked and loaded upright in his hand. His own FN SCAR, configured for close- quarter combat with a stubby barrel, sat on his lap. He had ammo all around him, and two pistols on the floor. Mara worried about taking the bumps too hard.
The Hanma had the lead. Jimmy took them down the streambed pretty fast, then spun onto the hardtop, pressing the command car for all it was worth. Mara did the best she could do trying to keep up, but it was definitely a losing battle. The Hanma’s engine was nearly the same size as the truck’s but had a lot less weight to pull.
“Tell him to slow the hell down,” Mara told Moe finally as Jimmy disappeared around a curve. “We have to get there together. And in one piece.”
Moe didn’t answer. In fact, he made no sign that he had heard.
“Give me the radio,” Mara said, holding out her hand. “Radio.”
Moe grunted, but apparently not in assent, because he didn’t move. Mara slammed on the brakes.
“Radio, damn it.”
Moe looked at her, then slowly unhooked his headset and handed it over.
“Choi, where the hell are you?” said Mara, holding the mike up.
“Where you, boss lady?”
“I’m way the hell behind you. Wait for me until I catch up.”
“Ho-ho. We’re in a hurry, right?”
“We have to get there in one piece.”
Jimmy started laughing. Mara put the truck back into gear. She found him waiting two curves ahead.
He didn’t adjust his speed all that much. As they came down a hill, they passed out of the jungle and suddenly had a good view of the valley where MacArthur had made his call.
“Wait,” Mara said over the radio. She slammed the brakes hard enough to jar Moe, then jumped out of the cab, running to the side of the road with her binoculars.
Lucas had described the surrounding area, saying that there was a farm very close to MacArthur’s hiding spot. Mara saw a farm that she thought might be it; smoke was rising from the barn. Roughly two dozen Chinese soldiers were in the field watching as it burned.
“Shit,” muttered Mara.
She pulled out her sat phone and called Lucas back. “Peter, can you connect me with the scientist?”
“How close are you?”
“Maybe two miles.”
“I’m reluctant to call him right now, Mara. It looks like the Chinese have an ELINT plane in the area. They may be looking for his signal.”
“I’m looking at the farm you said was near where he was. The Chinese have surrounded a barn. It’s on fire. If he’s there, I want to know.”
“Shit. Shit.”
Mara heard Lucas putting through the connection, then switching her into the line. A thin, tired voice came on.
“Yes?”
“It’s Peter, Josh. Are you in the barn?”
“Barn? What — no. No, I’m not.”
“Good. Are you safe where you are?”
“No.” It was an emphatic no.
“I want you to find a good hiding place, a very good hiding place, and stay there,” said Mara. “I’ll worry about everything else.”
“Who are you?” Josh asked.
“Josh, I want you to find a hiding place near where you are,” said Peter. “Don’t say anything else. Sign off now.”
His line cut out.
“Stand by for the location,” Lucas told her. “It’s two kilometers to the west of that farm.”
Lucas said something else, but his words were drowned out by the heavy drone of approaching helicopters.
“Ho-ho, better get back in the truck,” shouted Jimmy Choi from the Hanma. “Those are Z-10’s — Chinese versions of the Apache. If they even suspect we’re not on their side, they make us wish we were.”
20
Sheer adrenaline propelled him, but even adrenaline had its limits. Finally Josh had to stop, the bike nearly dropping out from under him as his strength failed. M? jumped off, landing on her bare feet, legs bent and body ready, as if she were a wrestler getting ready for an opponent.
“We’ll have to hide,” he said.
Josh got off the bike and wheeled it into the jungle beyond the road. M? followed as he pushed through the thick bushes. He rammed the bike forward so carelessly that he nearly pushed it into a tree.
He was starting to lose his grip, starting to give in.
I’m in survival mode, he told himself. Stay alert. But the words were more a theory than a command, and far from a plan. What was the plan? To survive long enough for Peter to grab him and get him the hell out of there. Which was hardly a plan at all.
What if they just gave themselves up to the Chinese? Weren’t the Chinese America’s allies? Or friends, at least. Business partners. America bought Chinese goods, all sorts of goods. China bought American bonds.
The soldiers he’d seen in the field weren’t anyone’s friends.
Josh rolled the bike under a nearby bush, hiding it. The Chinese would never see it from the road, and they’d
