Chapter 32
Inside the tavern, Gushan wondered what Kurt had in mind. Guardrails would be a good thing. Rules of engagement had kept the world safe for eighty years. “What are you suggesting?”
“It’s simple,” Kurt said. “Tell your people to stand down. That plane is American property. It belongs to us. Let it go.”
“The law of the sea and the rules of salvage would say otherwise,” Gushan insisted, hiding behind the thinnest of veils.
“Those principles apply to abandoned vessels,” Kurt said. “Not hijacked ones.”
Gushan found himself irritated. He wasn’t interested in being lectured. “Then perhaps a different law applies,” he said coldly. “To the victor goes the spoils. One way or another the plane has been lost. We intend to find it. If you and your people find it before us…so be it.”
“You’re risking a war,” Kurt said. “One you’re not in any position to fight. This isn’t the East China Sea. You’re in our lake now. Help is a long way from here.”
Gushan nodded at the table in the distance. “We have allies,” he said.
Kurt was unflinching. “If you were working with the Russians, you’d be sitting with them. Stand down before this turns into a bloodbath.”
Gushan found his emotions fighting one another.
Austin was correct about who had the advantage of help nearby, and he was correct about the Russians; in fact Gushan had been wondering what they were doing there from the moment he’d overheard their distinctive voices. But none of that changed the facts.
“You act as if I’m the one giving orders here,” he said. “I go where they send me. I do what they tell me. If I reject those orders, I’ll be gone and another operative will take my place.”
The truth was Gushan had envied Kurt’s freedom back when they’d worked together. He seemed to have the authority to rewrite his orders whenever needed as long as it served the purpose of catching the terrorists. To change his own commands, Gushan had to go through layers of bureaucracy.
“Find a way to convince them,” Kurt insisted. “Otherwise, this is going to end badly.”
The drinks arrived. They remained untouched. This was not the time to share a toast.
Gushan looked over at Kurt once more. “Your government should have blown the plane up when they had the chance. It would have been better for everyone.”
“They tried,” Kurt said. “Now it’s our turn. I’ll say it once more. Stand down.”
Gushan stared back at him, but there was no point in saying anything else. Austin’s face suggested he knew this, but had needed to speak his mind anyway. Without another word, Kurt put a few bills down on the bar, tucked them under his glass of whiskey, and walked away without touching it.
Gushan remained where he was, his face a study of grim, repressed anger.
Try as he might, he could think of no way to get Admiral Li or the high command to back off.
Not even the sudden interest of their Russian allies would accomplish that.
The laser system the Americans had built was so effective—so world-changing in its potential—that the rules of engagement had been thrown out the window.
As he looked at the untouched drinks, Gushan felt the walls closing in.
Despite his own restraint in the attack on the NUMA ship, despite the Americans holding their own fire and not sinking the icebreaker in response, they were all still inching closer to disaster.
In some ways it felt unstoppable, as if some invisible hand was pushing them into a pit of chaos from which no one would escape.
Blood would soon begin to flow. The only questions were whose blood, how much, and what price the inevitable act of vengeance would extract.
—
In the room above the tavern, Ahab stood frozen in the dark.
He could barely believe what he was watching.
His Chinese contacts had insisted they’d crippled the NUMA ship.
At the very least it was dead in the water, disabled and adrift.
It would go down soon enough, they said.
And yet here was Austin, appearing as if out of ether, seemingly no worse for the wear.
For Ahab this was more than an annoyance.
It was a significant problem. He’d designed this trap for two parties, not three, intending to give equal but differing information to the Chinese and Russian delegations.
It would be enough to start a bidding war.
One that the Chinese would inevitably win.
And then, once the Chinese were given the location of the downed aircraft, he would secretly confer with the Russians, giving them the information they needed to ambush the Chinese.
When all was said and done, he would have used the Chinese to avenge himself against Austin and NUMA, and then used the Russians to get his vengeance on Gushan and the Chinese. But somehow Austin was still alive and still in the game.
Even worse, now he was in the bar discussing something with Gushan.
This was an even bigger problem. Both men were smart, intuitive, and resourceful.
Their history of working together suggested they would understand one another, even trust each other to a certain degree.
There was little chance their nations would allow them to collaborate, but if they shared information, even in an argument, the outlines of Ahab’s long con might appear.
One or both of them might realize they were being played.
As Ahab’s mind whirled, Ridley reappeared. He was still wearing the bulky coat. He’d just come back up the stairs after smoking his cigarette. The smell lingered on him. “I’m not going to play these games anymore.”
Ahab turned.
“I’m not going to wait,” Ridley snapped, his fight-or-flight reflex switching from fear to anger. “I brought the EAGL to you and you were supposed to cut the deal. All these games are going to end.”
“And how would you end them?” Ahab said.
“Make a deal,” Ridley demanded. “Choose one of them.”
Ridley nodded at the computer screen with its surveillance camera images.
Ahab turned to the screen. “You choose. Russians or Chinese. Who do you want?”
Ridley looked at the screen once more, his eyes darting back and forth as if perusing a menu.
In this instant of distraction, Ahab grabbed a snub-nosed pistol that he kept at the ready.
He fired two shots at Ridley. The bullets were small caliber, they were fully jacketed, they went right through him.
Ridley stumbled back in disbelief, grasping at his stomach. He crashed through some of the boxes and tumbled to the ground. He pulled his own weapon and fired at Ahab, missing to the right and blasting the video screen.
The room went dark. Ahab seemed to vanish into that darkness.
Expecting another bullet, Ridley scrambled toward the back exit, where he tumbled down the steps.
Getting to his feet at the bottom of the stairwell he pushed through the inner door, knocking over a waitress who was carrying a tray filled with glasses back to the bar.
They crashed to the ground. The waitress screamed.
With a half dozen people looking at him, Ridley took off in the other direction, bursting through the outer door into the frigid night.