“The C-17 has a fifty-foot tail,” Joe countered.
Kurt had no answer to that, but in the end, it was his job to find the plane before anyone else did. And he thought they were looking right at it.
“Look,” he said. “Someone shot Ridley. It wasn’t the Chinese. It wasn’t us. And it wasn’t the Russians. It had to be someone else who knew where the plane was and didn’t want Ridley spilling the tea. My money’s on the pilot who had to land the damn thing. But whoever took Ridley out, they’re obviously running hot and scared at this point. They could be making a deal with the Chinese or the Russians at any moment. We have to go now. If there’s any chance that the EAGL is hiding there under the snow, we have to reach it before anyone else does.”
Both Joe and the captain seemed to be sobered by that point. Joe said no more, but the captain scratched his head and offered one more bit of bad news. “If you’re right about that, you have another problem. A bigger one. That plane is a full mile over the border. It’s in Russia, after all.”
Kurt knew that. It didn’t matter. “All the more reason for us to go now.”
Joe agreed. “It’s forty miles by road and then another ten across the lake. Do you want to take the helicopter or the Big Orange Rig and drive out onto the ice?”
Kurt grinned. “Both options sound good to me.”
Chapter 40
Paul had spent a solid hour quizzing his wife before agreeing to let her join the expedition. Her official diagnosis had been a stinger, a type of injury football players get from a particularly violent collision. The tons of snow that piled on top of the van had pushed it down on her spine, compressing the nerves, creating swelling and numbness, which went away as the swelling receded.
The doctors said she was fine. Gamay insisted she was fine. But, until she offered a biting comment in response to his fifteenth question, Paul hadn’t been entirely sure. Even so he filled her backpack with lightweight items before allowing her to pull it on.
Bundled up, and hauling backpacks full of supplies, she and Paul went down the ramp to the dockside, arriving beside the Big Orange Rig.
A taller figure with silver hair partially tucked under a black wool hat stood there. “Are we ready?”
“Yep,” Paul said. “Let’s mount up.”
As Paul stowed the backpacks and helped Gamay into the back seat, the gray-haired man jumped into the passenger seat. A shorter man with dark hair climbed into the driver’s seat. He started the engine, put the vehicle in gear, and drove the rig cautiously along thecrowded dockside. He pulled to a stop at the entrance to the harbor. Three roads intersected at the entrance, one to the left, one to the right, and one that would lead them into town.
“Which way?” the driver asked.
Paul looked up, considering the options. He waved his hand like a sultan. “Off that way somewhere,” he suggested. “Just drive until something interesting happens.”
Aboard the Chinese icebreaker, Gushan had been watching the Americans load up their ostentatious land yacht. He’d seen two figures who looked like Austin and Zavala climb in and then the unmistakable pair of Paul and Gamay Trout. He with the lanky basketball player’s build and she with the wine-red hair spilling from her stylish hat.
But the Chinese camera technology was as good as NUMA’s. And as Gushan zoomed in on the figures walking dockside he knew something was wrong. Despite the gray hair sticking out from under the cap, he could tell that the leader of the group wasn’t Austin at all.
Austin moved with a type of calm confidence, his actions were slow and easy, as if there was not a care in the world that could hurry him along. The man playing his part was a little stiff, a little too earnest in his steps.
As for the man who was supposed to be Joe Zavala, he moved like an athlete, with a bounce in his step much like the man he was imitating, but his look was all wrong. A closer shot of his face showed him to be grim and serious.
In Gushan’s time working with NUMA, he couldn’t recall a moment when Zavala wasn’t cracking a joke, or smiling at life ingeneral. The worse things got, the more he seemed to laugh at the circumstances.
Gushan sat back. “So, we’re meant to believe this is an expedition to the downed aircraft. Very well.”
He plucked a radio from beside the computer. “Haifeng,” he called. “Send one of the cars to follow the NUMA expedition vehicle. Tell them not to get too close unless the Americans get out and start digging in the snow.”
Gushan had co-opted Haifeng and several others after the incident at the tavern. With five members of his squad in the hospital after the car chase, he needed all the help he could get.
“Sending one car,” Haifeng replied.
He turned to the drone operator on his right. “Show me the American ship again.”
A side-angle view from the icebreaker’s mast camera was enough to take in the entire NUMA vessel. Their position across the harbor meant they could see only the undamaged side, but drones and a few surreptitiously placed cameras made sure every angle was covered.
The damaged side remained abuzz with activity. Workers on scaffolding could be seen inspecting the damage, planning the repair process. Yellow tarps stretched across the gaping holes. The blue glare of arc-welding equipment and acetylene torches was already flashing here and there. A flatbed truck idled on the dockside. New sections of hull plating were off-loaded and the dismantled wreckage was piled into a jumble on the back in return.
The side facing the water was quiet. Just another ship slumbering at the dock.
“Give me infrared,” Gushan demanded.
