Match Play (15 page)

“Who or what is a plasma separator?”

Luke's grin was swift and predatory. “It's a technique developed by the French that uses superconducting magnets and plasma physics to enrich uranium. The North Koreans are desperate to obtain enough U-235 to fuel their weapons-development program.”

“Can they get it from this plasma separator?”

“They can,
if
they manage to beg, buy or steal the technology. Even then it would take decades to bring the separator to full production capacity. We tested the process a few years ago, incidentally, but didn't find it either efficient or cost-effective. Dr. Wu knows that. Or thinks he does. Ms. Brodie might convince him otherwise, particularly when both the U.S. and the U.K. flatly deny the existence of both a storage site and a separator.”

“Which do not, in fact, exist,” Dayna finished with an answering grin. “Making Ms. Brodie and company look
extremely
foolish when they troop through acres of gorse and heather looking for both. Neat. Very neat.”

“We think so,” he said smugly.

“You work fast, Harper.” She couldn't believe he'd pulled everything together so with such speed and precision. “Think we can carry this off?”

“We'll sure give it a helluva try, Puddles.”

“Puddles?” Jilly echoed, amusement lighting her blue eyes.

“I'll explain later,” Dayna lied with a quick glance at her watch. “Luke and I need to get down to the restaurant. We don't want to keep our guests waiting.”

Nodding, Jilly waited until the door closed behind them. Then she treated Hawk to a look of wide-eyed innocence.

“Looks like it's just the two of us for dinner.”

 

Dayna and Luke beat the Wus to the dining room by a scant couple of minutes.

The Koreans' watchdogs were already seated at another table some distance away. Kim Li's trainer flicked a glance in Dayna's direction as the hostess seated her. His expression gave no hint of his thoughts, but he had to be aware of sumo-mama's disappearance by now. Did he suspect Dayna and Luke of engineering that? Did Kim Li?

The girl's pale, strained face when the hostess led her to the table a few moments later suggested she did. Dr. Wu looked almost as tense as his daughter. Perspiration beading on his cheeks and forehead, he shook hands with Luke before taking his seat.

“I have read of you in the newspapers,” he said in heavily accented English. “You are a pilot, yes? With the American air force?”

“I am.”

“I, too, wore uniform of my country. Many years ago. Now only humble scientist.”

“You're too modest, sir. I've read the paper on fusion you presented to the Twenty-Eighth International Congress of Nuclear Scientists. That was anything but humble.”

Good grief! Luke
had
been busy. Did he dig up that presentation this afternoon, between arranging for the fabrication of fake skin for his aircraft and setting up Ms. Brodie's gang for a fall?

A silent, sneaking admiration added to the combustible mix of emotions Luke Harper had already stirred in Dayna's heart. The smart, handsome college senior she'd fallen for all those years ago didn't compare to the smart, handsome, self-assured officer he'd become.

“Why you read my paper?” Dr. Wu asked after a quick look over his shoulder.

The brief, almost furtive glance didn't fool Dayna. The Wus had to be wired. Their watchdogs wouldn't let them out of earshot unless they could monitor their conversations.

Shrugging, Luke played to the hidden mike. “Let's just say I have an interest in the subject.”

Removing his glasses, the scientist polished them with great care. When he put them on again, his face had lost every trace of color. Kim Li wasn't in much better shape. She had her napkin bunched in a white-knuckled fist.

“Perhaps…” Dr. Wu cleared his throat. “Perhaps we talk more on this when Kim Li and I come to base tomorrow.”

“That can be arranged.”

Luke didn't so much as twitch a facial muscle, but Dayna could sense the same intense elation in him that almost made her squirm in her seat.

The Koreans had taken the bait.

Sweating in earnest now, the scientist mopped his forehead with his napkin. “How we go to base?”

Dayna used her menu to hide her mouth from any astute lip-reader. She had to play the game.

“My associates, Mike Callahan and Gillian Ridgeway, will separate you from your watchdogs during the hubbub immediately prior to the trophy presentation. Do you remember Gillian? You met her yesterday.”

“The woman who speaks Korean?”

“That's the one. She and Mike will take you to the aircraft that will transport you to the States. Luke and I will bring your daughter.”

Kim Li wadded her napkin into a tight ball. “Can my father and I not go together?”

Not if they wanted to give Dr. Wu time to observe the altered Stealth bomber without raising suspicions.

“It's best if we take two vehicles. We've arranged tight security for both.”

Father and daughter shared a glance. Then he gave an almost imperceptible nod.

The crumpled napkin slid off Kim Li's lap. She bent to retrieve it before the waiter could come to her assistance. Using the tablecloth skirting as a cover, she dropped a folded slip of paper into Dayna's lap.

Casually, so casually, Dayna unfolded her own napkin and draped it over her lap.

“T
he Wus want a helicopter hovering a half mile from a specific point along the DMZ at twenty-three hundred tomorrow, Korean time?” Lightning's glance shot to the bank of clocks on the far wall of the Control Center. “That'll be 3:00 p.m. there in St. Andrews.”

“Roger that.” The Control Center's sensitive speakers amplified the quiver of excitement in Rogue's voice. “Just about the time the tournament is expected to wrap up. The note cites the exact coordinates.”

As she rattled off the latitude and longitude, OMEGA's on-duty controller punched them into his computer. Instantly, the digitized map of the Korean peninsula projected onto the wall-size screen enlarged.

The Demilitarized Zone went from showing as a thin scar across the middle of the Korean peninsula to a fat strip marked with observation posts on both sides every hundred yards or so. Interspersed among the guard posts were several narrow, snaking lines that bisected the DMZ.

“Hang on, Rogue.”

Squinting, Lightning tried to decipher the unidentified lines. Since all traffic between North and South was strictly controlled at the main checkpoints, they couldn't represent roads or rail tracks.

“Zoom in on that line on the left,” he instructed the controller.

The satellite imagery sharpened to display incredible detail. So precise that Lightning could see a goat grazing dangerously close to the barbed wire that enclosed the heavily mined DMZ.

“Well, damn,” the controller muttered, zeroing in on a shadowy blur. “That looks like the opening to a tunnel.”

“It is,” Lightning confirmed with sudden recall. “An infiltration tunnel, dug by the North Koreans a half century ago.”

“Come again?” Rogue asked via the speakers.

“Years ago North Korea dug a series of tunnels under the DMZ in preparation for an invasion. The invasion never happened, and an engineer who defected in the late seventies revealed the tunnels' existence. The South Koreans uncovered four. Each was more than two kilometers long and wide enough to allow passage of an estimated thirty-thousand troops per hour. The defector claimed more than twenty had been dug. If so, they're still well hidden.”

Now, apparently, another defector intended to use one of those hidden passages as an escape route.

“Does the note say who the helicopter is supposed to pick up?”

“Negative,” Rogue replied. “Only that she'll flash three short bursts of light and one long as a signal for them to come in.”

“She? The note specifies a ‘she'?

“It does. We—Hawk and Luke and Jilly and I—think it must be Wu's wife.”

“We haven't received confirmation from our contacts in Korea that Madam Wu is alive,” Lightning cautioned.

“True. We're going with our collective gut here, backed up by the masseuse's stuttering assertion.”

“And your gut says Dr. Wu has arranged his wife's escape and is using us to make it happen.”

“Exactly. We're guessing the doc and his daughter will hedge their bets and demand proof she's safe before they climb aboard a plane at this end.”

Lightning shoved back his suit jacket and thrust his hands in his pockets. He'd attended a meeting at the White House only a few hours ago. Relations between the U.S. and North Korea had gone well past strained and were edging toward hairy over Pyongyang's determination to build a nuclear arsenal. The President was determined to put a spike in North Korea's program by aiding Dr. Wu and his daughter to defect. Now, apparently, they'd added a third person to the equation.

“We can relay a radio transmission if and when the chopper crew picks her up,” Lightning assured his field agent. “But I have to say, everything about this op gets more squirrelly by the hour.”

“No kidding! Can I confirm with the Wus the chopper will be at the designated rendezvous point?”

Squirrelly or not, Nick didn't hesitate. The U.S.—hell, the world—had too much at stake.

“You can.”

 

Across the Atlantic, Dayna ended the transmission and faced her three coconspirators. Empty cups and Pellegrino bottles littered the coffee table. Hawk, Jilly and Luke's expressions reflected the same combination of doubt and cautious optimism she suspected hers held.

“So we stick to the game plan?” Luke queried. “Hawk and Jilly take the doc, you and I escort Kim Li?”

“Unless you think you should be the one to show Dr. Wu around the base.”

“Colonel Anderson has that covered. I do need to head back to Leuchars tonight, though. I want to hear how Alan Parks' visit to the pub went and make sure everything is a go for tomorrow.”

Tomorrow was taking on more twists than a boa with rickets, Dayna thought. After looking at their scheme from every angle, however, she was still convinced they should go through with it. If Dr. Wu's real intent was to spy for his country, he'd absorb and—hopefully—feed his cohorts completely false information. If he
did
plan to go over to the West, he could still feed the North Koreans false data right up to the moment he boarded the plane to the States.

It sounded, smelled and tasted like a win all around for Dayna and her team. She'd feel a lot more confident if they didn't have to contend with so many damned “
if
s.”

“I'll go with you,” Hawk said. They'd hashed and rehashed the game plan so many times every detail was burned into their brains. They all needed a break. More to the point, he needed to put some distance between himself and Gillian. Three solid hours in her company had brought him too damned close to forgetting all the reasons he was wrong for her.

“My car is in the parking lot behind the hotel.” Luke shepherded the women to the door. “I'll see the ladies to their room and meet you downstairs.”

“We can probably make it up one floor on our own,” Dayna commented at the elevator.

“I'm sure you can.” Unperturbed, he hit the button. “We need to settle another issue before I hit the road.”

“Another issue?” She wracked her mind while the elevator winged up one short flight. “What string did we leave dangling?”

“This one's personal.”

The offhand comment was enough to trigger a swift mental leap from fifty-year-old invasion tunnels and plasma separators. That, and the hand Luke hooked around her arm to detain her when they entered her suite.

“You mind, Jilly?”

“Not at all.”

Waggling her fingers, Gillian steered a straight course for the bedroom. Dayna's heart was thumping before the door closed. She had a good idea now what issue he wanted to settle. Luke confirmed her guess with a gentle stroke of his thumb along the inside of her arm.

“We may not have time tomorrow, so I thought we'd better reopen negotiations tonight.”

“We don't have much time tonight, either, with Hawk waiting for you downstairs.”

“It won't be a complicated negotiation. I lost you once, Pud. I don't want to lose you again.”

The simplicity of it took her breath away. And left no room for anything but the truth.

“I don't want to lose you, either.”

“That's all I needed to hear.”

Tugging her into his arms, he covered her mouth with his. Dayna returned the kiss, holding nothing back. She had no idea where they'd go from here. For the moment, this was enough. More than enough, she thought when Luke raised his head and smiled down at her.

“My active-duty service commitment is up in four months. If I take terminal leave, I'll be back in the States in three.”

“Terminal leave?” Startled, she blinked up at him. “Are you talking about quitting the air force?”

“We tried long-distance love once. It didn't work. I'm not taking any chances this time around.”

“But…”

“No buts. We can't make a life together on separate continents. End of negotiations.”

His mouth descended on hers again, more fiercely this time, before he left with a parting admonition. “Lock the door behind me.”

She did as instructed, feeling more than a little shell-shocked. And she thought Wu Kim Li had dropped a bomb in her lap!

Luke and her, making a life together.

On one continent.

After he separated from the air force.

All these years Dayna had resented the fact that Luke had put his military career ahead of her. So why did his abrupt decision to hang up his uniform produce this ridiculous spurt of guilt?

He could serve his country in other ways, she argued fiercely. A whole alphabet soup of governmental agencies in Washington would snap up someone with his smarts and experience. The Pentagon could put him to work, not to mention the FAA, the CAB and the NTSB.

And not just to fly a desk. Luke could still strap on an airplane if he wanted to. Okay, maybe not a sleek bomber designed to penetrate unseen to the heart of any conflict. But flying was flying.

Yeah, right. Like taking a rowboat out on a small, placid pond was the same as crashing through a rocky gorge on a swollen river.

Well, hell! Why did love have to be so complicated? Lips pursed, Dayna stalked into the bedroom. Jilly paused in the act of slathering cream on her face and blinked.

“What's wrong?”

“Luke just told me he loves me.”

Not in those exact words, but close enough.

Jilly blinked again. “And that pisses you off because…?”

“Because I love him, too, dammit.”

 

The next morning, Luke rapped on the door to Dayna's suite just as she geared up for the final round of the Women's International Pro-Am Charity Tournament.

He'd swung by his flat first to shower and shave. His dark hair still glistened and he'd splashed on a woodsy aftershave that smelled nothing like gardenias. In khaki slacks, a sky-blue V-necked sweater and his leather jacket, he looked good enough to eat.

Dayna almost did just that. She'd had all night to mull over their renegotiations. Glee had vanquished guilt. Her heart flaming with a fiery mix of love and lust, she hooked her arms around his neck and dragged him down for a kiss that left her gasping and him groaning.

“What time do you tee off?”

“Too soon for what either of you have in mind,” Jilly drawled from behind them.

“Later,” he promised, rubbing Dayna's nose in an Eskimo kiss.

“Later,” she breathed, knowing that could mean three long months
if
the Wus went through with their triple deception and
if
Dayna boarded the plane to the States with them and
if
Luke followed through with his plans and
if
…

Oh, hell! She'd had enough
if
s to last a lifetime. What she needed now was action!

“Ready to implement the final phase of Operation Wu?”

Grinning, Luke slung her gear bag over her shoulder. “Let's go get 'em.”

 

When Dayna and her partner, Allison Kendall, joined Joan Ryson-Smith and Kim Li on the first tee, the Korean barely glanced their way.

Nervous and skittish as a racehorse at the starting gate, the teen turned her back on the others and sliced her driver through the air in repeated practice swings. An eager fan edged too close once again and—once again—earned a sharp rebuke. The green-coated official who had the effrontery to suggest she move off the tee box to practice her swing received an icy glare. When her drive went into gorse to the right of the fairway, Kim Li let loose with a spate of angry Korean and stalked off without waiting for the others.

“And this is just the first hole,” Allison murmured.

“Should be a fun round,” Dayna agreed.

Contrary to expectations, she and Allison soon discovered Kim Li's nervous energy presaged an absolutely brilliant game. After the first bungled drive, the girl hit magnificent shot after shot and sank unbelievable putts. Almost, Dayna thought as they rounded the turn and started the back nine, as though Kim Li had decided to make her final appearance on the circuit as a North Korean golfer one to remember.

The game would certainly stick in Dayna's memory. Every nerve in her body snapping, she managed to hold her own on the links while keeping tabs on the gallery. She connected silently with Luke before every drive. She also recognized several of the undercover British operatives salted through the crowd, or thought she did.

A signal from Hawk confirming the chopper the Wus had requested was in place almost made her whiff her approach shot on number twelve.

Okay. All right. One Wu about to be accounted for. Maybe. Now, for the other two.

Watching from the corner of her eye, Dayna saw Hawk and Jilly edge closer to Dr. Wu.

They moved in on seventeen, then got lost with the doc amid the whooping, surging crowd when Kim Li sank a birdie putt on eighteen to win the round.